New currency would have a devastating effect on Edinburgh’s financial centre

We are told after the “once-ina-generation” vote on Scottish independence that a second attempt should happen within two years and that Scotland should set up its own currency should the vote go in the nationalists’ favour.

With an unsustainable fiscal balance of £16 billion that idea is unsustainable because Scotland does not have the cash to back a new currency in the international markets.

A new currency – the groat, Scottish dollar or bawbee – would immediately devalue against the pound, making everything we import much more expensive and any asset – from pensions to property – worth much less.

Its effect on Edinburgh’s vital financial centre, which manages billions of assets in pounds sterling, would be catastrophic.

Professor Ronald Macdonald, professor of macroeconomics and international finance at Glasgow University, has said that following the introduction of the new currency “any debt repayments, such as those on mortgages and credit cards, that remain denominated in sterling would rise sharply... pensions would also be worthless”. The SNP executive has shown little financial acumen in balancing the books all the years it has been in office.

Without the largesse of the Barnett formula giving every man, woman and child £1,600 a year extra over England in public expenditure, and the super-austerity measures required to set up a new currency, Scotland post-independence would go belly up.

WILLIAM LONESKIE Justice Park, Oxton, Lauder

Nicola Sturgeon seems oblivious to the reality that ramping up “pressure” for Indyref2 might play well with her faithful followers but is being less well received by the rest of Scotland.

Having lost her preferred position on a Scottish currency at conference, Ms Sturgeon has resorted to the tried and tested “go for it anyway” tactic so beloved of her predecessor.

The SNP have basically nothing to lose in this situation. Brexit has not provided the obvious fillip to its cause and time and the SNP track record in office is not helpful either.

The Snp/green alliance has an acid test to face from the electorate in 2021 at the next Holyrood elections. If its case was as watertight as it suggests, waiting until then ought to be a mere “blip”.

The fact that it seems so desperate to have another tilt at independence before the next Holyrood vote suggests weakness, rather than strength.

For Indyref2 to have any hope of success, it has to have massive popular support – 51 per cent will never do.

Therein lies the SNP’S core problem.

(DR) GERALD EDWARDS

Broom Road, Glasgow Keith Brown [depute leader of the Scottish National Party] may think a new currency to be a “winning economic plan” for Scotland, but many of us dread such a move. Still, it is heartening to see the SNP’S Dalkeith branch providing overall guidance.

I just hope they are up to the task of thwarting the currency speculators in the City of London who will surely pounce on this opportunity.

Why do I fear that Derek Mackay versus the City can only have one outcome?

KEN CURRIE Liberton Drive, Edinburgh