The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Let Scots evaluate a post-Brexit Britain
Sir - Even the most ardent of Nicola Sturgeon’s followers must be disappointed with her performance over the last few weeks.
The rest of us are just plain confused and those who thought her politically astute must be bewildered at the clumsiness and naivety of her obsession with EU membership while she relegates the governance of our nation to that of an mere afterthought.
By trying to pit the predictions of economic “experts” against the undisputed accuracy of the GERS data is surely stretching the gullibility factor of the Scottish people to the limit.
She’s in complete denial of the pitiless state we’d be in if the majority of Scots had believed what the SNP assured us independence would bring.
If Ms Sturgeon feels there is no safe economic haven in the British union, she may be well advised to examine the Greek experience with the EU.
Her political grandstanding fools no one living in the real world and treating Scots as though they’re cerebrally challenged is certain to produce a voter backlash at some point.
Scottish manufacturing is showing a devastating fall and we have seen a total collapse of oil revenue.
Audit Scotland is reported to have described 12,000 miles of shoddy road as significantly worse than in England. We have a crisis in GP numbers, a police force that appears to be in disarray, an unsustainable deficit and a reliance on the rest of the UK economically to sustain our infrastructure and services.
All this makes the obsessive pursuit of independence irrelevant to the wellbeing of our nation at this point and for the foreseeable future.
Brexit will happen, of that here can be no doubt, and once it has happened, Scots will have the chance to evaluate the situation in a post-Brexit UK as opposed to being in the European Union.
Only then will they be free to decide whether it is best to stay within our ancient union or submit to the sovereignty, economy, laws and defence of our nation to a Brussels-based bureaucracy.