No financial security by staying in the UK due to Tory-made economic crisis - Swinney

Staying within the United Kingdom will not guarantee Scots financial security, the deputy first minister has said.

John Swinney said the “full blow economic and financial crisis” created by the Chancellor’s ‘mini-budget’ meant no unionist politician could suggest independence would erode financial security.

Labelling the abolition of the top rate of tax, later scrapped, and the other major tax cuts as “an act of fiscal recklessness” which “shredded” the fiscal credibility of the UK, the interim finance secretary warned of a “new age of austerity”.

This, he told delegates in Aberdeen, would “cripple public services and create misery for those on fixed incomes”.

Mr Swinney said the demands of the Scottish Tories to follow the UK’s tax cuts prior to the u-turn was “urging me to pour petrol on the flames”.

He labelled the party “a bunch of reckless hypocrites”.

The deputy first minister said: “By their actions in the mini-Budget the Tories threw away any claim they could have to be a party of fiscal responsibility.

"In contrast, this party has balanced the books in each and every one of our years in Government.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon alongside Deputy First Minister John Swinney after his speech at the SNP conference at The Event Complex Aberdeen (TECA) in Aberdeen , Scotland.

"We should make no apology for believing in – and delivering - fiscal responsibility and we should take no lessons on the subject from the Tories.”

He also said the economic chaos had weakened the case for the union in any future referendum.

Mr Swinney said: “If I think back to conversations I had with people who did not support us during the 2014 Referendum, many felt they had financial security within the United Kingdom. After the events of the last few weeks how can that any longer be the case?

"How can any politician look a pensioner, or a mortgage holder or a person living in poverty straight in the eye, after the wreckage of the last few weeks, and say there is financial security any longer in the United Kingdom.”

He added that devolution was “not enough” to mitigate the austerity forced on Scotland due to the decisions of the UK Government, stating the SNP would “do what’s right for Scotland’s people”.

Mr Swinney said the powers of devolution had been used “to the maximum they possibly could”, but “we cannot be at the mercy of Westminster decisions any longer”.

The interim finance secretary also said the Scottish Government would continue to oppose new nuclear power plants despite plans from the UK Government to expand nuclear across the country.

He said: We need no lectures from Liz Truss about security of energy supply. It is the UK that has failed to achieve energy security, with the National Grid warning of possible power cuts this winter.

"Let me make this clear, Scotland is not going to put up with a new round of nuclear power stations to make up for the failure of energy policy in the United Kingdom.”

Nicola Sturgeon will address delegates tomorrow afternoon to close the conference following three days of events in Aberdeen.

A paper on the economics of independence will also be published this week.

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It is available wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple Podcasts and Spotify.