SCRAMBLE FOR PLAN B
■ General election to be ‘de facto vote on independence’ ■ First Minister set to use public cash as campaign funds
NICOLA Sturgeon was accused of a ‘dereliction of duty’ as she vowed to continue spending taxpayers’ money on her bid to break up Britain.
The First Minister yesterday defended the decision to spend public money on her failed Supreme Court bid for the right to hold a referendum without UK Government consent.
She also refused to withdraw a £20million referendum fund for next year despite the increasing squeeze on government budgets and said civil servants will continue to work on papers promoting the case for Scotland splitting from the UK.
Miss Sturgeon made the comments as she used a press conference within 90 minutes of the Supreme Court defeat to confirm she will attempt to turn the next general election into a ‘de facto referendum’ on independence.
Robert Kilgour, chairman of Scottish Business UK, said it was ‘time Scottish ministers tore up’ their ‘Plan B’ to use the next general election as a ballot on breaking up the UK.
He said: ‘To continue the same pointless Indyref campaign would be a dereliction of duty, particularly given the weakness of the prospectus already put forward by the SNP Government on everything from currency and trade to EU membership.
‘For business leaders those ideas have been a non-starter, promising only uncertainty to companies and lower incomes for households across Scotland. We urgently need ministers to stop taking us up legal blind alleys and get back to governing.’
Miss Sturgeon set out her response to the Supreme Court ruling at an event in an Edinburgh hotel shortly after the verdict was deliv
‘Complete waste of taxpayers’ money’
ered. She said she was ‘disappointed’ with the result but vowed to respect it, before claiming the court’s decision ‘makes the case for Indy’.
She claimed UK Government opposition to a referendum is ‘unsustainable’ but said she had found ‘another democratic, lawful and constitutional means by which the Scottish people can express their will’.
Miss Sturgeon said the next UK general election is the ‘most obvious’ to turn into a ‘de facto referendum’.
She said: ‘As with any proposition in any party manifesto in any election, it is up to the people how they respond. No party can dictate the basis on which people cast their votes.
‘But a party can be – indeed should be – crystal clear about the purpose for which it is seeking popular support.
‘In this case, for the SNP, it will be to establish – just as in a referendum – majority support in Scotland for independence, so that we can then achieve independence.’
The SNP’s national executive committee is to be asked to convene a conference in the new year to come up with precise plans, including a specific question and the wording of the SNP manifesto.
Miss Sturgeon said independence cannot happen unless more than 50 per cent of the Scottish population support it.
Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain, the Scottish Government’s top law officer, said at the outset of the case that she did not have the necessary degree of confidence that a referendum would be legal without UK Government consent.
It is estimated that the total cost to taxpayers may now run into hundreds of thousands of pounds. Miss Sturgeon yesterday said she could not say what the total cost will be but denied claims that she had wasted taxpayers’ money, saying: ‘I refute it absolutely.’
Asked whether she will remove the taxpayer-funded £20million referendum fund she has set aside for next year, Miss Sturgeon said: ‘While I am being realistic about the short-term, I still hope that we will have a UK Government that accepts democracy and we will have an agreed referendum, and we will take decisions around our Budget in the normal way.’
She also said the Scottish Government will continue to ‘prepare’ for an independence referendum by publishing more independence policy papers, and said it has been elected to do that.
On whether she would resign if she doesn’t win a majority in an election she bills as a ‘de facto referendum’, she said: ‘I will do the job as leader of the SNP as long as my party wants me to do that, and as First Minister of the country for as long as the country wants me to do that.’
Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton said: ‘This is an embarrassing defeat for the First Minister. Scores of legal experts warned that the law is clear and this case was a complete waste of Supreme Court time and taxpayers’ money, but the Scottish Government would not listen.
‘It has been a terrible use of funds at a time when every penny should be squeezed to help people through the cost of living crisis. Breaking up the UK simply isn’t a priority for people opening their bills with dread or struggling to get the treatment they need.
‘What Scotland needs now is new hope, not old divisions.’
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said: ‘We must now focus on the problems facing our country, from rising bills to the crisis in our NHS.’