Brexit is doing us down

PETER A Russell (Letters, November 15) asks from where an independent Scotland would recoup the £10 billion subsidy we receive from the UK. Despite a benign taxation regime compared to Norway, the UK Government is expecting more than £12bn from Scotland’s North Sea revenues this year while UK inflation has removed £1.7bn from the Scottish Government’s very finite budget.

Brexit, which Scotland rejected, has reduced UK GPD by twice as much as Covid and is a major reason for UK recession and the decade of austerity that lies ahead. Now we learn that, as predicted, the Uk/australia trade deal is bad for Scotland’s farming, food and drink industries (“Johnson-era minister admits Australia trade deal ‘is not very good’ for UK”, The Herald, November 15).The UK economy is over-reliant on a disreputable City of London financial sector which has been overtaken by Paris, with many jobs moving to Dublin post Brexit, and while Scotland is hoping for a ferry link to Bruges, Ireland with fewer exports, has 44 direct sailings to Europe every week.

Unlike England, energy-rich Scotland is a net exporter of oil, gas and electricity with a balance of trade surplus, which will earn foreign currency including from our food and drink industries, making a nonsense of Professor Ronald Macdonald’s claims on a Scottish currency (“Leading economist warns independence would see ‘day one currency crisis’”, The Herald, November 14). On independence, Scotland would also be entitled to a share of the UK Bank of England’s reserves, particularly if we are expected to pay interest on the UK National Debt. Last year, Prof Macdonald claimed that Scotland would need £300bn of currency reserves which is more than France or Germany and is just ludicrous.

As well as remaining in the EU, in 2014 Scotland was promised 13 frigates but only three are being built, so news of five Type 26 frigates for the Clyde confirms another UK broken promise (“PM awards contract to build five more warships on the Clyde”, heraldscotland, November 15). Fraser Grant,

Edinburgh.