Tag: Speeches

Below is the text of the speech made by Alistair Carmichael at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland on 29th January 2014.

Thank you Charlie for that introduction, and for handing me the task of keeping our audience invigorated immediately after lunch.

I am delighted to be able to join you today to speak about what is, by any measure, a Scottish success story.

In Scottish higher education, we have a sector that enjoys an international reputation for excellence. A sector that punches above its weight on research.

And a sector that is currently teaching record numbers of students.

Earlier this month, figures published by the Higher Education Statistics Authority showed that in 2012/13 the number of qualifiers in Scotland was up.

The proportion of students obtaining a first or second class degree is higher in Scotland than elsewhere in the UK. And we have a higher proportion of women qualifying in science and technology.

The future

But it is to the future that we must look – a bright future if our current world rankings are anything to go by.

Five Scottish Universities rank in the latest top 200. The UK as a whole excels in academic excellence.

We are ranked second only to the United States. in terms of world-class research.

The UK’s share of the world’s top 1 per cent most cited publications is on an upward trend.

And in 2013 the UK was ranked third in the world for innovation in the Global Innovation Index.

UK-wide research

There are many reasons for this success – but one that is absolutely fundamental is the highly integrated research environment in which our universities and higher education institutions can operate.

This integration ensures a coherent and strategic approach to research activity in a common research area.

It allows funding, ideas and people to flow unhindered across the UK in pursuit of research excellence.

And that is of benefit to us all. A benefit that comes from being part of a United Kingdom.

And that is where I want to focus my comments today.

For too long there has been the simplistic assumption of devolved and reserved.

Devolved – for the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government alone. Reserved for the UK Parliament and UK Government.

But the reality is much more complex than that.

Whilst policy responsibility resides either north or south of the border, we all continue to work within a shared common framework.

And perhaps nowhere is this more clearly illustrated than higher education and research.

Last year I published a paper in our Scotland analysis series with the Minister for Universities and Science, that examined the contribution Scotland makes to our UK-wide research framework, and the benefits that Scotland gets as a result.

As part of the UK we are able to share the costs and risks of research, funding it from a large and diverse tax base to make research more affordable.

As we set out in that paper, in 2010 the UK Government allocated £1.9 billion for science and research capital for the period 2011-15.

And since then we’ve allocated an additional £1.5 billion funding for science and innovation capital.

Research councils

We’ve got a network of seven Research Councils operating across the UK providing a clear strategic overview of all research disciplines.

This network minimises duplication and overlap in institutions maximizing our ability to make new and innovative discoveries, and to go on to turn these discoveries into the next miracle cures of the future.

A shared set of policy guidelines, rules and regulatory arrangements provide a consistent grounding for research excellence and a shared framework on which research collaborations can be built.

And it’s not just at home that we invest.

Through our Embassies and consulates we have a Science and Innovation network in 29 different countries to help extend the reach of the UK’s research base.

Here in Scotland we’ve grasped the nettle to make the most of this UK-network.

In 2012-13, Scotland secured £257 million of research grant funding from the UK Research Councils.

This amounts to 13% of the funding available, all for a country which has 8.4% of the UK population.

Higher Education Research and Development figures for 2011 show that Scottish Higher Education Institute spent £953 million. This is the equivalent to approximately £180 per head of population in Scotland compared with £112 across the UK as a whole.

The point that I make is that we don’t get access to this despite being part of the UK, we get it because we are part of the UK.

So the questions we need to ask ourselves are:

How would an independent Scottish state maintain the level of research quality excellence currently enjoyed by Scottish Higher Education Institutions as part of the UK?

AND what evidence is there that independence would improve the performance of our institutions?

It’s not just me asking these questions….

We’ve seen academics specialising in subjects as diverse as bacteriology to space engineering, veterinary science to the food industry, highlighting the risks.

What the white paper says

Of course the Nationalists would have you believe that all would be well in the event of independence – in this and every other walk of life.

But merely asserting it is not enough. Evidence is required to back up their case.

And when getting involved in the world of academia, evidence is not a nice to have, it’s a prerequisite.

And yet, of course, it was evidence that the White Paper lacked.

We were promised a blueprint for independence, but we didn’t get it.

Instead we got a set of assertions and grand statements: ‘there will be major direct gains in an independent Scotland for Scotland’s universities.’

What we didn’t get was any explanation of how we might achieve these gains.

Instead all we got was a list of the things we have right now in our higher education institutions as part of the UK.

I don’t disagree with what the paper says about positive student surveys. As a graduate of a Scottish University with a sixteen year old son currently contemplating his own possible applications to them, I celebrate that.

I don’t disagree with student mobility initiatives such as Erasmus and Fulbright – I wholeheartedly support them.

Nor do I challenge the fact that this sector helps to drive the Scottish economy and the importance of maintaining a strong research base to ensure that it keeps on doing just that.

But the point is, all of these things are happening already; as part of a constitutional setup that delivers to the people of Scotland the best of both worlds.

All the Scottish Government did in their White Paper was to draw attention to everything that is already good about higher education in Scotland.

At the same time they failed to examine what we stand to lose by breaking up the UK-wide networks that we have.

According to the Scottish Government we’ll have a common research area between an independent Scotland and the continuing UK.

Sounds a lot like what we have right now doesn’t it?

Except of course for one vital distinction. National Governments fund national research.

There is no international precedent for sharing or replicating a system on the scale of the current UK funding streams across international borders.

Independence would mean creating a new separate Scottish state; and at the same time creating a new international border with England, Wales and Northern Ireland – the continuing UK.

You have to ask yourselves why would a state that we had just chosen to leave, want to carry on sharing institutions, funding, expertise in the same way that we do now because we are part of it?

Some of them have talked about the ‘international trend’ in research for collaboration between countries.

Let’s take a look at an example.

NordForsk is an organisation under the Nordic Council of Ministers that provides funding for Nordic research cooperation, as well as offering advice and input on Nordic research policy.

So far, so good.

But the bit the Scottish Government are less quick to highlight is that in 2011 the fund amounted to around £13 million – compared to the £307 million secured by Scottish institutions alone from UK-wide Research Councils in 2012-13.

We have excellent academic links with countries across the globe – of course we do.

No-one is suggesting that there would not be collaboration between scientists and researchers in a separate Scotland and their colleagues on the other side of an international border.

But the reality is simple.

Divergence in research frameworks could make the flow of funding, people and knowledge harder.

Domestic collaborations would become international collaborations and would carry larger risks.

An independent Scottish state might wish to share arrangements and facilities but we do not share our Research Council funding – or have a common research framework, the very life-blood of research and innovation in the UK – with other states.

Why should we in Scotland expect to be treated differently?

Common research

The White Paper states that the Scottish Government would seek to continue the current arrangements for a common research area.

Much as they seem to seek a common currency area; common border area; common regulations for business.

I have said elsewhere that while the Scottish Government want people to believe they have a vision, in fact what they proffer is a mirage.

And like all mirages, the closer you get, the less real it becomes.

In research – as in so many other areas – there can be no guarantees.

If we vote in September to create a new separate state, we also vote to leave the United Kingdom.

Becoming a new state means setting up new institutions. And it means leaving the institutions we have in the UK, like the UK Research Councils.

The Scottish Government cannot assert that shared arrangements will be secured. This will all be subject to negotiations.

And as anyone knows who’s ever taken part in negotiations, to get a deal you have to give as well as take.

On top of this – we know they want to do a deal that sees them keep all the bits they like from being part of the UK, whilst giving up the bits they don’t, at break-neck speed. Something has to give.

But it would seem that the Nationalists want to rely on goodwill and generosity from the continuing UK.

They want agreement to share institutions from the UK family that we would have just walked out of.

A family to which we had decided to stop making our contributions.

But at the same time there’s no offer of goodwill the other way.

Take the situation of students from the continuing UK paying fees in an independent Scotland.

The White Paper states the Scottish Government remains committed to free tuition in Scotland.

At question 240 they recognise that students from any EU member state have, and I quote ‘the same rights of access to education as home students. This means EU applicants for entry are considered on the same academic basis as home students and pay the same. This will remain the case with independence.’

And yet the answer to the question will students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland still be charged is a simple ‘yes’.

Mike Russell has nothing to offer the higher education sector in his vision of independence.

Assertions

His White Paper is full of assertions and makes promises he cannot deliver.

That is precisely why he has chosen to distract attention with a synthetic spat around immigration with accusations of xenophobia.

It is the oldest trick in the book that when you have nothing of substance to say you seek to create heat as a substitute for light.

The UK Government has of course taken its own tough decisions on fees in England, and we know well that this is not easy.

But those decisions – like all decisions in government – must be taken in light of affordability, legality and non-discrimination.

Devolution has allowed the Scottish Government to make its own funding decisions within a member state. But as part of the EU an independent Scotland would have to abide by the law and not discriminate against another country.

Let’s just think about this for a second.

We’ve got a Scottish Government here claiming on the one hand that it could charge students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland…

…Whilst on the other hand admitting that if an independent Scotland were a member of the EU it would have to offer free tuition to students from every other EU member state.

What does it say about the good faith that the Scottish Government would go into negotiations with those representing the continuing UK we had just left?

I can see the script now: “We’d like to share the UK pound with you , and we’d still like to have access to the Bank of England – but as for your young people; they will have to pay fees whilst young people from France, Spain and Italy can get into our universities for free.

And can we have a common research area too, please?”

I don’t know about you, but I’m not convinced this is the greatest opening line for a set of negotiations of the sort the Scottish Government envisage with the continuing UK.

Not to mention the fact that it would be illegal under EU law.

First we saw a group of academics query the proposal saying it would run into ‘significant problems with EU law’.

Academics including Professor Hugh Pennington and Professor Peter Holmes.

We were told that there was legal advice. We’ve heard that before of course.

And just as with the legal advice the Scottish Government claimed to have on automatic EU membership, when people like the former Director of Universities Scotland, David Caldwell ask to see it, it goes strangely quiet.

The professor of European Union law at the University of Edinburgh has said that the Scottish Government would face an ‘extremely steep uphill battle’ to convince the EU that charging students from the continuing UK would be legal.

And Paul Beaumont, Professor of European Union and Private International Law at the University of Aberdeen has said there’s a ‘substantial hole’ in the Scottish Government’s plans for funding higher education in Scotland.

But it’s not just academics within Scotland who have voiced concerns.

The spokesman for the European Commissioner for education has confirmed that ‘unequal treatment based on nationality is regarded as discrimination and is prohibited by article 18 of the treaty on the functioning of the EU…’

The former European Commissioner for Education Jan Fiegel put it even more simply:

‘this would be illegal. This would be a breach of the Treaty.’

So now we have a Scottish Government planning to speed through its accession process for the EU

…securing all the favourable terms that the UK has built up over years and decades’ worth of negotiation

…whilst publicly stating that they immediately intend to breach the terms of EU membership which prohibit discrimination between states.

Again, if this weren’t so serious it would be laughable.

International stage

But this is how the Scottish Government would seek to represent Scotland on the international stage – and to think that Mike Russell has the temerity to accuse me of xenophobia.

A state that chooses to pick and choose from the rule book to suit its own ends.

That wants to rely on some kind of ‘social union’ and ‘great friendship’ to get good terms from those that it walks out on, but is unwilling to offer any goodwill in return.

I said at the beginning that higher education and research is an excellent example of how being a part of the UK delivers the best of both worlds.

A thriving network of universities that are delivering opportunities for all, regardless of social background, to improve life chances and enabling students to go on to contribute to the common good.

Graduates – doctors, teachers, scientists amongst them – all delivering benefits to society.

Whilst at the same time we are part of a UK-wide research network supported by a diverse and strong economy.

A network that provides the funding to allow our doctors and scientists go on to be the very best of their professions, exploring and making new discoveries that benefit us all.

The best way to ensure that our sector can continue to perform as it does is to reject independence and stay with a system of higher education that draws on the best of both worlds.

And if you cherish our system of higher education as I do

…if you are proud of the amount of highly rated research that is being undertaken here as I am

…and if like me, you believe in investing in our young people so that they can to make the most of what we have on offer…

You will make the positive choice for Scotland and for higher education, and vote to stay a part of our UK family.

Below is the text of the speech made by Alistair Carmichael, the Secretary of State for Scotland, in Brussels on 20th January 2014.

The most important political debate of my life-time – indeed of most Scots’ lifetime – is taking place now. In just 8 months Scots will have the opportunity to cast their vote on the future of our country in a referendum on Scottish independence.

We will take the most fundamental collective decision that a nation can ever be asked to take: Whether we stay part of the United Kingdom family or go it alone. That is Scotland’s choice.

There are many questions to ask and answers to give on the impact of such a permanent and irreversible step. It is by no means a new debate but it is one that still manages to throw up fresh issues and uncertainties.

You won’t be surprised to hear that I’m very clear on my view: Scotland is better off within our United Kingdom, and the United Kingdom is better off with Scotland as part of it.

But this isn’t a decision that will only impact on our day-to-day lives within Scotland and the UK. It’s a decision that will affect our relationships with people and countries around the world.

Today I am going to set out why that would be and why I believe that it is in all of our interests that it should not happen.

I want to show how Scotland has flourished and achieved within the United Kingdom and because of the United Kingdom – not in spite of it. I also want to show how Scotland can continue to contribute to and benefit from our United Kingdom family. And why that contribution is important to all of us who live there and to our friends and partners here in Europe and across the globe.

Setting the scene

But first, let me recap on how we got here. The Scottish National Party’s outright win in the May 2011 election to the devolved Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh meant that Scotland had its first single-party majority devolved government since the Parliament was established in 1999.

The SNP entered that election campaign with a manifesto pledge to hold an independence referendum and succeeded in electing more than enough Members of the Scottish Parliament to set the legislative agenda.

What it did not have, however, was the legal power to hold that referendum. In the settlement which established the Scottish Parliament in 1999, the responsibility and power over all aspects of the constitution was retained by the UK Parliament at Westminster.

Whatever the legalities of the situation the politics was quite clear so the UK government took steps to ensure that rather than just talking about a referendum, there could actually be one.

For the Scottish Parliament to have acted alone would have been to act outside the law. And as every government knows: the rule of law is a fundamental first principle of government. You abandon it at your peril.

So Scotland’s two governments agreed a framework for a legal, fair and decisive referendum in Scotland. A framework that ensured the decision on Scotland’s future could be taken by people in Scotland. Reaching an agreement on the process was a big moment in 2012.

But now we are in an even more vital phase of this debate – discussing the substance, not just the process. What choice should Scots make?

I do not believe in Scotland remaining part of the UK because of dogma, ideology or nostalgia, but because of what the UK means in the here and now and what it can deliver in the future.

For too long successive Governments have allowed to go unspoken the contribution that Scotland makes to the UK – and we’ve been equally silent on the benefits that Scotland gets from being part of it.

We all put something in and we all get something out: the UK – like the European Union – is greater than the sum of its parts.

2013 was the year when the UK started putting the record straight.

EU in the context of the debate:

We embarked on an analysis programme examining the facts, reviewing the evidence and making the case for Scotland as part of the UK in a series of detailed papers.

Last Friday we published the ninth paper in this series – our first in 2014. This examined the benefits for Scotland of being part of the UK in the EU and on the international stage.

These issues are not esoteric. They matter for very practical reasons.

Ours is an age where people derive real benefit from increased cooperation and being part of a global society. Where the logical direction of travel is to break down barriers and work together rather than to erect them and create difference. Scots, like all Europeans, gain from our status as European citizens.

Membership creates employment, growth and prosperity across the UK thanks to the EU-wide single market. 1 in every 10 jobs in the UK is linked to the EU single market and nearly half of British trade, worth around £500 billion, is with other EU member states. 40% of cars and other vehicles built in the UK are sold in the EU. And 86% of British meat exports go to the EU

Being part of the EU also helps to open up new markets for UK businesses around the world. The EU has trade agreements with over 50 countries including emerging countries such as Turkey, South Korea, Mexico and South Africa.

And the EU is currently in negotiations for a free trade agreement with the US which is worth a potential £10 billion to the UK economy.

Economic benefits

These economic benefits cannot be underplayed. But all of us here today know that the EU offers our citizens more than an economic union.

EU cooperation is crucial for tackling cross-border security threats to the UK such as terrorism, drug smuggling and money laundering. The European Arrest Warrant is a crucial mechanism for combating cross-border crime.

Since 2009 it has been used in the UK to extradite over 4000 criminal suspects.

The EU also plays a crucial role in tackling climate change, increasing energy security and creating the low carbon economy we need for our future. A united ‘Team EU’ approach was critical in establishing the Kyoto Protocol and the Durban agreement.

And of course being part of the EU increases our individual opportunities: 2.2 million Britons live in other EU countries, working, studying or enjoying retirement.

More than half of all UK nationals have a European Health Insurance Card which allows us to receive free or reduced cost healthcare when visiting another member state, benefiting the 24 million of us who holiday in EU countries each year.

Of course, both the EU and the UK have been built over time and on the basis of shared interests and outlook.

The UK family sits within the European family and each has its own set of values and institutions that have put down roots. Most British citizens feel pride in the National Health Service that we built together. In the BBC whose reputation for broadcasting excellence is understood at home and overseas.

And in the sporting success we have enjoyed not least in the 2012 London Olympics where athletes from every part of the UK trained together, competed together and won together.

As European citizens we can all take pride in an unprecedented Common Market that creates jobs and has made untold millions of goods accessible to our citizens.

As a lawyer who is passionate about human rights I cherish a European justice system that protects civil liberties and has exalted human rights through the ECHR.

And a set of institutions that has brought democratic accountability across a continent in a way that would have been unimaginable just a few short decades ago.

Benefits of UK terms of membership

But as part the UK Scots benefit still further from being one of the largest member states in the EU. We are able to use our UK influence to deliver on subjects that are of direct interest and importance to people and businesses in Scotland.

We have secured ‘Hague Preferences’ allowing Scottish fishermen to benefit from higher quota shares. In the face of fierce opposition we secured protection for Scottish salmon from unfair trade from imported Norwegian salmon.

And in negotiations on the EU’s Third Energy Package we secured a special provision for energy companies based in Scotland to enable them to comply with European legislation without needing to sell off parts of their business.

We also benefitted from the flexibility that the European family has shown to our specific asks and needs. The United Kingdom was able to negotiate a permanent exemption from the euro.

We have also maintained our own common travel arrangements with an opt-out from Schengen. And then of course there’s the UK’s budget rebate. As one of the largest net contributors to the EU budget, the UK has negotiated a refund on a proportion of its contributions.

All three are at risk for Scotland if we leave the UK.

An independent Scottish state would have no share of the UK’s rebate from the EU, nor be likely to secure an abatement of its own.

The analysis we published last Friday shows that without its own budgetary correction even under the most optimistic scenarios Scotland’s net contribution would be at least 2.2 billion Euros higher during the current budgetary period than it would have been as part of the UK. That’s an extra 840 Euros per household in Scotland.

Scotland gets to share in these benefits with people across the UK because we are part of the United Kingdom. If we choose to become a new separate state, we choose to leave the United Kingdom.

And in doing so we would need to become a member of the EU in our own right.

Law not politics

That is not a question of politics – that is a question of law. We set out the clear, legal position in the first of our analysis papers.

The EU is a treaty-based organisation and the UK – not Scotland – is the contracting party to the Treaties of the EU.

In the event of independence, the remainder of the UK – England, Wales and Northern Ireland – would be the same state as the existing UK, with the same international rights and obligations.

Its EU membership would continue on existing terms. The Scottish Government used to deny this of course.

They used to assert that an independent Scotland would automatically be a member of the EU. And they used to say they had legal advice to back them up.

But eventually – the truth was forced out of them (only after spending thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money I might add) There was no legal advice. There is no automatic entry.

The Scottish Government now grudgingly accept that negotiations would be required for EU membership. But I’m afraid they still fail to tell Scots the reality about that process.

Rather than applying in the same way that every other new member has under Article 49 of the Treaty of the European Union – seeking the unanimous support of the European Council; having membership approved through an Accession Treaty; and having the application ratified with the constitutional requirement of each existing member State – we are told by the Scottish Government in their White Paper that Scotland could become a new member of the EU by the ‘back door’.

The so-called “Article 48 route” is held up by the Scottish Government as the super highway to EU membership. The fast track not only into the EU but also exactly the same rights and responsibilities that we currently enjoy as part of the UK. But in reality this is a dead-end.

Article 48 has never been used to expand membership of the EU. There is no way round the law.

A new state must apply, it would be no different for an independent Scotland.

This is not to say a new Scottish state could not or would not become an EU Member State. But before the Scottish Government start excitedly quoting me on that, let me remind them that membership – and critically, the terms of membership – would have to be negotiated with 28 Member States.

This isn’t just our view. It’s the view of the President of the European Council and the President of the European Commission.

It’s a view expressed by some of those Member States that an independent Scotland would have to negotiate with including the Spanish Prime Minister.

And it’s the view of expert lawyers like Jean-Claude Piris, the former director general of the EU Council’s legal service who has said “it would not be legally correct to try to use article 48”. The Scottish Government ‘vision’ of independent Scotland in EU is a mirage

But it’s not just the question of process that’s at stake here. It’s the substance too.

And here we’ve seen yet more rocking from front-foot to back from the Nationalists when it comes to the heart of this debate.

Earlier in Alex Salmond’s leadership, Independence in Europe was the slogan for the Scottish National Party. And there was bullish rhetoric about a separate Scottish state, in Europe, punching above its weight.

On fishing for example – a subject of the greatest importance to my own constituents in Orkney and Shetland – the Nationalists used to assert that a better deal would come the way of a separate Scotland.

But now that the words require substance, the picture that Nationalists paint is not clear but blurred and patchy.

I have said elsewhere that while the Scottish Government want people to believe that they have a vision, in fact what they proffer is a mirage. Like all mirages, the closer you get, the less real it becomes.

Nowhere is this more true than on their position on EU membership. Their recent White Paper on independence demonstrates this perfectly.

There is a cursory mention of the implications of independence for Scotland’s fishing industry.

There is no mention of how an independent Scotland would avoid the recent cut to structural funds that has been shared throughout the UK. And despite their robotic assertions there is no explanation of how Scottish farmers could expect to do better under independence.

Uncertainty

In applying for separate membership, as a new state, there would of course be considerable uncertainty. This of course explains the curious mix of assertion and omission that stake out the SNP’s position.

But let’s just think this through.

Why would all 28 member states agree to reopen the terms of the Common Fisheries Policy to suit a new member with a small population and specific demands?

Why would they agree to revise the structural funds formula so that their money is redirected to Scotland to compensate for the loss that comes with leaving the UK?

And why would other member states that have had to phase in Common Agricultural Policy receipts over 10 years agree to an independent Scotland automatically receiving payments from day one?

Not just that – but according to the Scottish Government – reopening the CAP deal and agreeing to give Scottish farmers increased payments too.

That would mean newly joined countries like Croatia accepting to a deal that was never offered to them or their farmers.

And on the Scottish Government’s timetable this would require all 28 Member States to rip up the hard-fought EU budget ceilings agreed to 2020 and reduce their share of the budget in order to give Scotland more money.

Now that’s all before we even get to why those member states that have been required to join the euro and Schengen as a condition of membership – or that would like a rebate but have none – would now make special provision so that Scotland could have what they could not?

All of these things that the Nationalists say they would want for Scotland in the EU: The exemption from the euro and Schengen, the retention of the rebate – reform of the Common Fisheries Policy.

All of which as part of the UK, Scotland already has today, or is better placed to achieve them in the future.

Leaving the UK means leaving the EU, then trying to fight your way back in seeking the same terms from a weaker position. This runs against Scotland’s interests.

And we can’t afford to forget that the Scottish Government are seeking to rush all of this through in a flash. They have made clear that, in the event of a yes vote this September, they would declare independence in March 2016 – just eighteen months later.

But they have also said that they intend to settle the terms of EU membership – and gain unanimous agreement from all 28 member states – in that timeframe.

This would be a negotiation of record-breaking speed to obtain extraordinary terms.

Little wonder that experts like Professor Adam Tomkins – Chair of Public Law at Glasgow University and David Crawley – a former representative of the Scottish Government in Brussels – have said that such a timetable is simply not realistic.

Of course, in any negotiation, the more you give up, the more likely you are to reach a speedy conclusion. Equally the more emphasis you put on a deadline, the less leverage you have over the deal.

European leaders will be aware of this; Alex Salmond should be too.

The eighteen month timetable he proposes to place both on himself and the rest of the EU is a negotiating position of extraordinary weakness.

One man’s obsession to deliver independence not just to a specific timetable, but to a specific day of the week…would not just undermine Alex Salmond’s hand in negotiations, but Scotland’s future in Europe.

Instead of showing he has Scotland’s interests at heart, this obsession with a date rather than the deal reveals just how much of a vanity project this really is.

Of course the reality is that the terms of membership could not be known until such a time as they were agreed.

But the Scottish Government is morally bound to set out in detail what terms of membership they would seek and we are all entitled to assess just how likely this is to happen.

That clarity of terms is being denied by a party whose head is buried in the sand – and that hopes that other European leaders’ are likewise. The terms that they seek are by turns unclear and unrealistic.

The process they propose is flawed in legal terms and destined to fail in the cold hard light of political reality.

Tactics

Let no-one think that the Scottish Government has a vision for its membership of Europe. As in all areas it has tactics.

Not tactics to secure a good deal for Scotland. Just tactics to minimize the risks and uncertainties of independence in the eyes of Scots. Not just about the EU – Scotland’s place in the world is stronger as part of the UK

I’ve focused my remarks on Europe – but we all need to remember that this is not just a question of EU membership. The UK is at the heart of all the world’s most influential organisations.

We use our diplomatic global network to help others and to represent Scotland worldwide, promoting the interests of businesses based in Scotland and looking after Scots who get into difficulty overseas.

The Scottish Government claims that Scotland holds international priorities and values that are distinct from the rest of the UK – this is simply not true.

The UK has played a leading role in strengthening the rule of law, supporting democracy and protecting human rights around the world.

Scotland – as part of the UK – was one of the founding members of the United Nations. We have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council helping to take decisions on major foreign policy and defence issues.

Together, we can make a bigger impact on global poverty. Pooling our resources, we have grown our aid budget and become the second largest donor nation in the world today.

Put simply – as a United Kingdom, in Europe – we achieve more now, and will continue to do so in the future, if we stay together.

Below is the text of the speech made by Alistair Carmichael, the Scottish Secretary, at Stirling University on 13th January 2014.

It is a real pleasure to be with you all here in Stirling University today to talk about Scotland’s future.

On 18th September this year we will take the most fundamental collective decision that a nation can ever be asked to take. This is a once in a generation decision:

We have just over eight months to decide whether we stay in the United Kingdom family or go it alone. Eight months to choose between remaining part of this four-nation partnership that we have built together or to break away and to start from scratch. That is our choice.

That time will fly by – but I’m determined to the make the most of every minute. Why?

Quite simply because I believe in Scotland within the United Kingdom.

I believe in the contribution we’ve made over the last 300 years along with our friends and families across England, Wales and Northern Ireland: our common effort to create and share something bigger and that serves us all well.

I believe in the benefits we get from being part of this larger shared community.

I believe this because I can see the evidence around me – at home in Orkney, here in Stirling, in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Manchester, Newcastle, right throughout the United Kingdom.

Greater than the sum of its parts

We all put something in and we are all getting something out: the UK is greater than the sum of its parts.

Right now Scotland sees the benefit of this long shared history. Right now, we get the benefits from natural resources like North Sea oil – but we are able to manage the volatility in production and price as part of a much larger and diverse economy made up of 60 million individuals rather than just five.

Our economy comprises four and a half million companies rather than 320,000 – a market with no boundaries, no borders, no customs – but with a stable UK currency that is respected and envied across the world; a single financial system, and a single body of rules and regulations.

Because we share in these benefits, Scotland is best placed to succeed. We are the wealthiest area of the UK outside London and South East, and we have achieved that as part of the UK. And right now, all of this supports jobs here in Scotland.

Jobs in industries as diverse as oil and gas, defence, food and drink and the new and emerging creative industries of the future.

Let us not forget we get more back than we put in. Public spending in Scotland is currently 10% higher than the UK average.

Yes, there are national differences across the UK – we are not a monolithic culture, thank goodness. That’s true of our economy and our society.

One of things of which I am most proud in the UK is that we’re able to absorb, to protect and to cherish differences: differences of culture, religion, accent, origin and much, much more.

But let no-one underestimate what we share together and how that helps us succeed together.

Of course, our commitment to the UK family is not just about the facts and figures. It’s also about the values and ambitions we share.

The hands that built the United Kingdom have created things of enormous value. They strike a chord of pride within us and remind us all of what we can achieve together.

Institutions

Together, we built a National Health Service.

When William Beveridge identified the five “Giant Evils” facing post-war Britain – squalor, ignorance, want, idleness and disease – these evils blighted every nation of our United Kingdom.

And when the UK Parliament established the NHS, it did so to fight those evils within the entirety of our borders. We faced the same problems, we felt the same outrage and we together we found the same solution.

Today, people across the UK family take enormous pride in a National Health Service, providing comprehensive health services, free at the point of use for all UK citizens wherever they fall ill within our United Kingdom.

Together, we built the BBC – three letters that stand for excellence in broadcasting at home and around the world.

They invoke quality, depth and impartiality. It is the product of our shared wish for a national broadcaster that can educate, entertain and inform.

It is funded by a flat licence fee that guarantees access to programming that is both UK wide and nation and region specific. It serves local communities with a local presence in places like my own communities in Orkney and Shetland. It provides national reporting and entertainment across the nation. Around the world people look to the world service as a source of truth and impartiality.

It is unrivalled, unparalleled, and irreplaceable.

Together, we have built a formidable sporting culture too. In so many sports, the nations of our UK family have different traditions, different strengths and different teams.

But while we maintain a strong pride in our teams for football, rugby and so much more we also maintain an enormous pride in the sporting clout that we represent together.

Whether that’s the British Lions, or next month’s Winter Olympics, or of course, our astonishing achievements in the London 2012 Olympic Games.

At those Games, the UK won 29 gold medals. And over the Games, as the tally went higher, so did our collective sense of national pride.

Chris Hoy, Jessica Ennis, Andy Murray, Mo Farah, Katherine Granger. Those outstanding athletes weren’t cheered on by parts of the UK, but by all of us.

They were our representatives. They worked together, they competed together – many had trained together at facilities across the UK. Their success fed our pride.

The NHS, the BBC, our sporting events, teams and heroes. These are just a few of the things that bind together our family in pride and endeavour.

Shared values

Shared values, shared effort, shared achievements. Why should we now break these things up? As separate states must.

When we have achieved so much through our common values and labour, wouldn’t we go on to achieve so much more?

The challenges we face today may be different but they are every bit as demanding as those we faced in the past.

Together, we can afford the subsidies that will bring about a renewables revolution in this country. Cutting carbon emissions, tackling climate change, strengthening the green economy. Together, we can make a bigger impact on global poverty.

Pooling our resources, we have grown our aid budget and become the second largest donor nation in the world today. Together, we can rebalance our economy and become more prosperous.

Growing faster than any other G7 country, becoming the largest EU economy within perhaps just twenty years, providing the financial security that safeguards our banks and secures our currency.

The motivation to prevent climate change, to protect the most vulnerable and to build a strong prosperous and sustainable economy. These values are common across the United Kingdom.

And by staying together, we can build on those values to create a strong and secure future. Why should we now break these things up?

2013 – the year of evidence

I don’t believe in the UK family because of dogma, ideology or nostalgia but because of what the UK means to us in the here and now and what it can deliver for us all in the future.

For too long we have allowed to go unspoken the contribution that Scotland makes to the UK – and we have been equally silent on the benefits that we get from being part of it.

2013 was the year when the UK Government started putting the record straight.

We embarked on an analysis programme examining the facts, reviewing the evidence and making the case for Scotland as part of the United Kingdom in a series of detailed papers.

Soon we will publish our first paper of the new year. It will examine the benefits for Scotland of being part of the UK in the EU and on the international stage.

The UK is at the heart of all of the world’s most influential organisations. As part of the UK we are one of the founding members of the United Nations and have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council – helping to take decisions on major foreign policy and defence issues.

As part of the UK we can use our influence to help others – whether to give our home-grown businesses access to new export markets through our highly-developed embassy network; or providing support and assistance to other countries in times of crisis.

Our paper will set out the facts about Scotland’s contribution and the benefits we get from being part of this world-leading partnership. We’re talking about a complex, detailed piece of analytical work.

That’s because what we have in the UK is a product of years, of decades worth of cooperation and negotiation – both within the UK and with our neighbours.

Academics, businesses and legal experts here in Scotland have read – and contributed to – the papers we’ve published to date.

Facts and evidence

They support the facts and the evidence we have presented.

You’ll find no grandiose flights of fancy here – only the very facts of our United Kingdom:

– our banks are safer

– we have greater financial protection for savers and pensioners

– greater levels of competition delivering cheaper mortgages and insurance for families and businesses

– we invest in research, infrastructure and industry to remain at the forefront of new technological developments

– we have a single labour market which allows people to move freely within the UK for jobs

– we use our international influence to make a positive difference

The list can – and does – go on.

Together these facts to make a positive case for Scotland in the United Kingdom. And throughout the remainder of this year we’re going to keep making that case.

But you don’t just have to accept the facts we’ve published, just take a look at some of the other contributions we’ve had so recently in this debate:

We have heard the supermarkets talk about the benefit of being part of a single large economy where food and drink costs us, the consumers, the same regardless of the costs of production and distribution.

We’ve heard the CBI – the organisation that speaks on behalf of business – say that the nations of the UK are stronger together and that Scotland’s business and economic interests will be best served by remaining part of the UK family

We’ve seen the body that represents accountants in Scotland continue to ask questions about the Scottish Government’s proposals for pensions – questions that remain after the White Paper’s publication

And we’ve heard legal experts describe independence as ‘a road to nowhere’

It’s no surprise that the Scottish Government argue against all the evidence and the facts that we’ve presented – but their eagerness to shout down the experts from the worlds of business, academia and the law is worrying and regrettable. Other side of the argument – not being honest

I don’t argue with the right of those on the other side of this debate to feel the way they do about the future of our country.

But I do feel very strongly that those who want to break up our United Kingdom have a duty to listen to the experts and to make an evidence-based case of their own.

It is not good enough to adopt the politics of ‘he who shouts loudest’. It’s not good enough to say, when challenged, “just because I say so”.

For most of 2013 the Scottish Government told us in response to almost every question put to them: ‘wait for the White paper’; ‘the answer will be in the White paper’. But what we got in November was heavy on rhetoric and light on answers. It was a wish list without a price list.

Promises

On the one hand we got a set of promises that the Scottish Government can’t deliver.

No matter what they say, it is not for the Scottish Government to dictate what deal a separate Scotland could negotiate with the rest of the UK.

As Scots we all have to ask ourselves if we choose to leave the UK, why would those we’ve walked out on want to continue to share the things we have at the moment precisely because we part of the UK?

If we stop contributing to the UK, why would we keep getting the benefits from being part of it?

And that’s before we even start to think about the negotiations that would be required with all 28 EU member states, bilateral relations with countries around the world and international organisations.

Yet on the other hand we saw the Scottish Government promising things post-independence that they could be delivering today.

The Scottish Government chose to put the spotlight on childcare in their White Paper – something that it is within their power to do right now.

Last week they finally acknowledged the folly of this approach and came forward with proposals to start the catch-up with childcare provision in the rest of the United Kingdom. In so doing they made the case for what we have – not for what they want.

The Nationalists like to assert that they have a vision for an independent Scotland and that their White Paper is its articulation.It is not. This is not a vision; it is a mirage.

Like all mirages, the closer you get the less real it becomes.There is no coherence whatsoever in this nationalist document – or any other – about the kind of country Scotland would be if we were to leave the UK family.

This is not surprising. The Scottish Government has long been skittish and evasive about the model for an independent Scotland.

They proffer whatever fits for any given audience at any given time. Then switch it for something else when the moment suits.

Back in 2007 we were told that Scotland would be the free market Celtic Lion. Roaring to the sound of banking deregulation, and echoing across the arc of prosperity to Iceland and Ireland.

By 2011 the tune had changed. Now we would be a Scandinavian-style social democracy. With social services and public spending priorities that looked east, not west.

The White Paper couldn’t decide which way to jump.

A promise to cut some taxes, and freeze others, clumsily grafted on to expensive commitments on nationalisation, public spending and a lower retirement age. All based on a single, solitary page of numbers and the wilful omission of data from 2008 – the inconvenient year of the financial crash.

In every sense, it simply does not add up. Even in the best of times, no-one can have a low-tax economy paying for Scandinavian levels of social provision. If they could, Scandinavia – and others – would have done it.

Lack of vision

To say that they will do so with the backdrop of an ageing population and reduced oil and gas revenues, only adds insult to injury. There is no vision, just 670 pages of words.

All things to all people, big on rhetoric, low on facts, it offers no true picture of what kind of country Scotland would really become.

What currency would we use? What terms of EU membership could we hope to achieve? How much would independence cost and just how would it be paid for?

It is for the Scottish Government to present a full, true and costed vision of what independence would mean. If they refuse to do that, what are people being asked to vote for?

Positive case

In 2014 my job – and the job of all those who believe in the United Kingdom – is to make the strong positive case for the UK and to make it loudly and proudly.

We can do that confidently, because our case is supported by the experts. The substance of the argument is on our side and it has gone without meaningful challenge by our opponents.

Now our job is to make sure that every voter is aware of these facts before they enter the polling station.

Because ultimately this isn’t a debate that will rest on the production of papers by Governments, however learned and substantial they may be.

This is a debate that must take place in the pub and in the bank – at the school gates and on the factory floor – our universities and in our supermarkets. This must be a debate in which we are all involved.

We cannot leave this to someone else and hope they get it right for us. We must not let anyone tell us what we can and cannot think or say.

In this debate, everyone’s voice matters. We all get one vote.

The future of our country really is in our hands and we must take it, grasp it and decide for ourselves.

So my hope for 2014 is this: in September I hope that all of us who can vote, do vote.

And I am confident that people right across Scotland will make the positive choice and vote no. The positive choice to stay part of the United Kingdom family. The positive for a bright Scottish future as part of the United Kingdom.

Below is the text of the speech made by Alistair Carmichael on 13th November 2013.

It is a pleasure to be here in Inverness today – as an MP of 12 and half years I’m used to making speeches, but this is my first key-note speech as Secretary of State. In terms of where and when to make it I gave only one wish for my speech it was not going to be in the central belt!

It is an enormous pleasure for me to be here in the city of Inverness, capital of the Highlands. This is a city that has seen enormous growth and change over the decades and is now home to many businesses in a wide-range of fields, but which is still identifiably a Highland community in its feel.

This seat is home to my friend and colleague Danny Alexander, I have been privileged to work closely with Danny over the years and we have both been Ministers in this coalition Government and he has become an enormously influential politician.

When Danny tells people in Government to listen they do – and Danny takes every opportunity in his job to speak up for the Highlands.

Now in Cabinet a boy from Colonsay sits across the table from a boy from Islay who represents Orkney and Shetland – two island men both represented at the heart of this Government.

Proud

I am very proud to take up the role as Secretary of State for Scotland particularly at the current time. Right from the start I got to see how quickly the labels get put on you on this job.

Their labels as a ‘bruiser’ or any of the rest of it are all a predictable part of how the press covers politics: plenty of reminders of what I look like dressed as a Viking warrior for the Up Helly Aa (and I can let you into a little secret – it’s not an outfit I wear every day) to being described as a ‘supposed Scot’: all in the space of four weeks!

The latter description was, I suspect, designed to provoke. It certainly did tell us something about this debate – that I’m not alone in experiencing.

Not content with trying to divide the UK, the supporters of independence also seek to divide our fellow Scots – depending on their voting intentions in the referendum.

I tell you this – once you start mixing up politics and patriotism you can quickly get into dangerous territory.

I am proud to be a Scot and come from a family that as far back as we can trace, have always lived in Scotland. My father is a native Gaelic speaker and as a child and a young adult I competed at local and national Mods.

I was educated in the Scottish state sector and studied Scots Law at the University of Aberdeen and qualified as a solicitor in Scots law. I have held a commission as a Procurator Fiscal Depute – one of the great ancient offices of the Scottish legal system.

Since 2001 I have represented a Scottish constituency in the House of Commons. I look forward to Hogmanay as much as Christmas Day. I drink malt whisky and I’m partial to the occasional tunnocks teacake.

What else do I have to do for these people to regard me as a “true” Scot as opposed to being a “supposed” one?

Scottishness

No one has a right to question my Scottishness or anyone else’s come to that.

Polls would suggest that most people in Scotland want to remain part of the United Kingdom. Many others do not.

A few weeks ago, in yet another effort to have a debate about the debate rather than having the debate itself, Alex Salmond called on David Cameron to debate independence. He wanted, he said, to see the Prime Minister “argue against Scotland”. Not, you note, “against Scottish independence” but “against Scotland”. In the nationalist mindset it seems to be the same thing.

Let me be clear: You are not a better Scot if you support independence. Nor are you better if you don’t.

Being a part of the UK doesn’t undermine our Scottishness – our identity as Scots is not and never has been at threat.

This is not a debate about patriotism – It is a debate about whether or not we should continue to work together across the United Kingdom, or whether we should go it alone.

A lot of airtime gets devoted to what independence would mean for Scotland – and rightly so – there are plenty of questions, I’ll return to just some of those later.

But before we make a choice about our future, we need to understand what it is we have right now as part of the United Kingdom.

The nationalists like to take us right back to 1707 and even further to Bannockburn. Don’t get me wrong – history is important: but our recent history is just as important as the more distant. That recent history has been one of collaboration, of partnership, of working together.

Best of both worlds

I’m not going to turn this speech into ‘the greatest hits of the UK’ – but I will say this: we have achieved a great deal working together. And I don’t think those of us who believe in a strong Scotland within a strong United Kingdom spend enough time talking about that.

So next time someone asks ‘what has the UK ever done for me?’ I want you to remember this….

Together our economy is stronger and more secure.

We have a domestic market of 60 million individuals rather than just 5, 4.5 million companies rather than 320,000 – with no boundaries, no borders, no customs, but with a common currency, single financial system, and a single body of rules and regulations.

I am in no doubt: businesses right across Scotland have no wish to change this system.

I put it like this: we have a stronger place in the world with a great and wide network of embassies and diplomatic offices across the globe – supporting our businesses overseas and looking after Scots abroad.

As part of the UK we are a major player on the international stage: with significant influence in the EU, UN, G8 and other international institutions. We can and do make a real difference to people in other parts of the world in times of trouble, as our work in the Philippines is showing right now.

Benefits of the UK

At home the benefits of our United Kingdom can be seen not just in the make-up of families like mine and many others right across the UK, but also by the more than 700,000 Scots who live and work in other parts of the UK and the 30,000 people who travel between Scotland and the rest of the UK each day to work. All of us benefit from a common passport, tax and national insurance system, meaning that people as well as goods and services can move freely.

Where it makes sense to have decisions taken in Scotland by the Scottish Parliament responsibility has been devolved to Holyrood. It is a constructive and positive approach. Devolution within a United Kingdom really does give us the best of both worlds.

Week two of the job and the crisis at Grangemouth petro-chemical plant landed on my desk. That illustrated well what the best of both worlds gives us: working together John Swinney and I could bring together the resources of government to secure the future of the plant more effectively than we could working separately.

That is why at the start of this year we embarked upon a detailed programme of work to examine Scotland’s position in the UK today and to make clear the choices that would face all of us if the UK family were to break up.

These papers have been detailed and evidence based and together set out a detailed case that shows every part of the UK makes a valuable contribution and that together we are greater than the sum of our parts.

When we go to the polls next year we’ll be asked the question: ‘Should Scotland be an independent country?’. We’ll be asked to put our cross in a box saying yes, or a box saying no.

That simple act – will be replicated right across Scotland from the highlands and islands, to the borders; in our great cities and our rural communities.

Each of us will be asked the same question. And when we answer – we will all do so on the basis of what is best for us as individuals, for our families and for our communities, now and in the future.

And the benefits of being part of the United Kingdom can be seen in our future as much as our past:

There are the challenges we already know about: by pooling our resources we are better placed to meet some of the demographic challenges that we will face in the future: funding pensions through contributions from the working populations of Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland is more sustainable than simply trying to fund our ageing population in Scotland alone: you don’t need to be an expert economist to work that one out.

Then of course there are things that we can’t predict:

Fifteen years ago the idea of broadband roll out across the UK, including our remotest areas would have sounded like a pipe-dream.

And yet here we are, with UK wide funding helping to join us up and bring us all closer together. Twenty per cent of the UK broadband budget is being spent here in Scotland – that’s more than our fair share – and we can do this because we pool our resources across the UK.

We need to ask ourselves: what will the next broadband be? And will it be more sustainable to fund it by clubbing together as the UK or doing our own thing in a separate Scotland?

It is this past, present and future United Kingdom that we need to think about when we go into the polls next year.

White Paper

But right now attention is turning to the Scottish Government’s White Paper which will be published in just less than two weeks. And rightly so.

This is after all a long awaited document.

Whilst we have published our analysis – on the legal implications of independence, on financial services, on the economy, on the challenges of an oil fund, or on the currency – what we’ve so often heard in response is ‘wait for the White Paper’.

The First Minister tells us that this Paper will resonate down through the ages and Nicola Sturgeon has said it will answer all the questions – boy does it need to.

But before we get to the detail let’s start with ‘The ‘why?’. Why do the nationalists want independence?

Since signing the agreement with the Prime Minister over a year ago to ensure that we would have a referendum, the answer to ‘why’ seems to have become less clear, rather than more.

In the few areas where the Scottish Government have sought to offer any answers, they – ironically – seem obsessed with UK wide solutions. According to them:

We will leave the UK…but have a shared currency and keep the Bank of England working as lender of last resort;

We’ll leave the UK…. But continue to share a UK welfare system;

We’ll leave the UK….. but still get UK warships built in Scottish yards;

We’ll leave the UK…but still share a single set of financial regulations….

The logic of the Scottish Government’s position has left many scratching their heads in puzzlement. But in truth it is just part of a pattern we see from the Scottish Government: They are doing this to offer false reassurance. Independence would prove very different in practice and they know it. Right now all they are proving is that they are prepared to say anything and promise everything to try to win votes.

But let’s be generous and leave that most fundamental question of ‘why become independent’ to one side for a moment.

The Scottish Government have another duty in the White Paper: to explain how independence would work and what it would mean. This is an important decision for us all. The details matters. We cannot be offered a prospectus of ‘it will be alright on the night.’

Now we know that for many issues all the White Paper can do is provide a wish-list of what the Scottish Government might like to secure in negotiations:

An independent Scotland would need to sit down at the negotiating table with the rest of the UK – who would then be a separate state from us.

Sit down with the member states of the EU and the Allies of NATO to thrash out an enormous amount of very important detail.

In each case an independent Scottish state would be pursuing its interests, just as the other states would pursue their interests.

So the Scottish Government should take the opportunity in the White Paper to tell it straight about the fact that many important issues will need to be negotiated and they need to be upfront that there can be no guarantees in advance.

Fundamental questions

But that does not excuse the First Minister and his team for dodging some fundamental independence questions that they can answer.

The White Paper must be frank on a few fundamentals of independence if they are serious about bridging the credibility gap that exists with their plans.

Today I am posing three very straight-forward questions that need to be answered if people in Scotland are going to get any closer to knowing how independence will work and what it might mean for them.

Let’s start with the pound in our pocket. Or, to be precise, the UK pound sterling in our pocket.

This is fundamental.

The First Minister is fond of saying that the pound is as much Scotland’s as it is the rest of the UK’s. It is now, but if Scotland decided to leave the UK, we would also be leaving the UK currency.

Public international law is clear: the UK would continue. The UK’s currency would continue and the laws and institutions that control it like the Bank of England would continue…for the continuing UK

But if Scotland became an independent country, we would need to put in place our own currency arrangements; new currency arrangements.

Currency union

The First Minister says he wants a currency union with the rest of the UK.

The UK Government – and plenty of others – have pointed to the challenges of currency unions between different states. You only need to look at the Euro area to see that everything can appear fine in year one, and how quickly circumstances can change.

And there are plenty of examples of currency unions that have failed. When Czechoslovakia broke up the Czechs and Slovaks tried it. It lasted 33 days.

The bottom line is that a currency union may not be in the interests of Scotland or the continuing UK and it is highly unlikely to be agreed – not because of any malevolence, but because it wouldn’t work. It would be very foolish for anyone to vote for an independent Scotland on the basis that they will get to keep the pound. It’s high time that the Scottish Government stopped claiming that a currency union is a given and instead answer this first question: will the White Paper set out a credible Plan B on currency?

Pensions are another fundamental building block of any state. The UK and other developed countries are facing rising pension costs because of ageing populations. Independent forecasts by the ONS confirm that the demographic challenge Scotland faces is greater than the rest of the UK. We will have more elderly and retired individuals receiving pensions compared to those of working age who are paying taxes.

So my second question is will the White Paper set out how much more pensions will cost each of us in the future if we leave the UK and leave behind 90 per cent of the people that are currently paying into the larger UK pension pot?

Price tag

Finally, the overall price tag of independence is something we never hear anything about. John Swinney’s private paper to his Cabinet colleagues said a new tax system alone would cost more than £600m each year. Setting up a new Scottish state from scratch will not be cheap. The White Paper must tell us how much it will cost us to set up.

But in truth it’s not just the one off set up costs we need to think about.

In public we see the Scottish Government promising more and more ‘goodies’ for an independent Scotland. But people aren’t daft: we know that every goodie has to be paid for.

So I want to know how much we are expected to pay to go it alone as an independent state. Rather than making empty promises, the White Paper has to tell us how an independent Scotland would fill the black hole.

OK – I’ll admit – that’s more than three questions – trust me I could ask plenty more.

But what I’d really like to hear are the questions you want to see answered when you open up the White Paper.

Because this must not be a document that Governments alone pour over – as much as Alex Salmond might like it, this isn’t a debate between the UK and Scottish Governments.

Indeed despite the approach of those SNP members who question the right of ‘supposed Scots’ like me to speak out, this is a debate that each and every one of us has a right to be involved in: we each have a voice in this debate.

I hope to hear yours.