Scottish Liberal Democrat leader lends his support
Scottish Liberal Democrat Leader Willie Rennie MSP visited Rutherglen on Friday to support the referendum NO campaign.
He chatted to shoppers in Rutherglen Main Street while local Better Together supporters manned a street stall and made their case to passers by.
Later he visited residents in Blairbeth with the Better Together Rutherglen team.
In the evening, Mr Rennie spoke along with Rutherglen Liberal Democrat Councillor Robert Brown at a packed public meeting in Fernhill.
He spoke about the importance of the United Kingdom to Scotland and said that Alex Salmond was forcing people to choose between being Scottish and being British. He said he was a Fifer, Scottish, British and European and was proud of them all.
And he warned it was time to look properly at the likely costs of independence and warned that an independent study by the Institute of Fiscal Studies had shown very clearly that an independent Scotland would face a gap of about £6billion in funding – equal to the whole cost of education in Scotland or half the NHS budget.
Mr Rennie said: “South Lanarkshire council running costs for education services are £272million.
“A 17 per cent cut to school funding in the event of a Yes vote, as estimated by the Institute of Fiscal Studies, would cut £46 million from the South Lanarkshire education budget.
“This would need to be found in cuts to teacher numbers, school mergers and closures, increased class sizes and cuts to vital equipment like computers.
“We are all used to the SNP Scottish Government always blaming other people for the ills of the world. But the IFS has now told us all in advance the problems that an independent Scotland would have in balancing the books.
“Alex Salmond would not be able to say he hadn’t been warned. But by then it would be too late for Rutherglen schools.
“Local people will be paying the price for years to come”.
Rutherglen South Lib Dem councillor, Robert Brown said he was delighted with the success of the visit: “Willie Rennie spoke to an amazing number of people during his visit.
“I get the sense that people in Rutherglen and Cambuslang are now pausing and looking carefully at the value of the United Kingdom to Scotland and the real costs of independence.
“And they are absolutely right to do so because the future of the UK is of huge importance to Scotland – in terms of having a single, secure currency, of a single trading area for Scottish business, as well as a close partnership in all sorts of ways, large and small, with Wales, Northern Ireland and the regions of England, on things like the NHS, the energy market, or University research.
“Very few things about the SNP case stand close examination.
“They are offering all sorts of goodies without the faintest idea how these things will be paid for.
“The Yes campaign is all smoke and mirrors. The £6 billion gap in public funding identified by the IFS is not exactly small change.”