Count down

In the run-up to the 2014 referendum many people have called for clear, unbiased presentation of the economic facts in order that they can make a reasoned judgment when finally called to vote on Scotland’s future. It is regrettable Fraser Grant (Letters, 3 October) presents a misleading representation of the conclusions to be drawn from the most recent Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland (GERS) ­report.

On the expenditure side, GERS 2010-11 concludes Scotland, with 8.4 per cent of the population, consumes 9.3 per cent of UK government spending, equivalent to more than £1,100 per head of population. Therefore, it is incontrovertibly true that Scotland receives substantially more than a pro rata distribution of UK spending.

Mr Grant counters this point, alleging Scotland more than pays for this, arguing we contribute some £2.7 billion more to the Exchequer in tax than we receive. This is nonsense!

Firstly, the claim that Scotland contributes 9.6 per cent of all UK tax revenue relies on hypothecating “a geographical share”, some 90 per cent, of all of the North Sea oil taxation revenues to Scotland’s account.

Although many Nationalists would claim that this is only “fair”, international precedent is quite clear (eg Canada, US, Australia) that the benefit of offshore oil and gas reserves accrue to the sovereign state and not to any of their constituent regions.

If one ignores this sleight of hand and uses the GERS figure based on Scotland receiving a pro rata share per head of population of oil taxation then Scotland contributes only some 8.3 per cent of UK revenues.

Secondly, as is obvious to anyone living in the UK for the past five years UK government spending exceeds tax revenue by a large margin. Therefore, 9.3 per cent of spending represents some £64bn, whereas 9.6 per cent of revenue represents some £53bn. There is no excess being retained by the Treasury, instead Scotland, even with a geographical share of North Sea oil revenues, spends some £11bn a year more than it raises in taxes.

Notwithstanding Mr Grant’s suspect arithmetic, what is more worrying is that he is parroting figures and (misleading) conclusions regularly stated by senior members of our current SNP administration. I am all for having a rigorous debate on Scotland’s future but repeating a set of misleading, economic, soundbite figures does not advance this.

Peter Muirhead

Kilmacolm

Renfrewshire