{"id":225611,"date":"2025-10-26T01:03:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T01:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/225611\/"},"modified":"2025-10-26T01:03:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-26T01:03:08","slug":"scotland-could-thrive-with-its-own-currency-say-academics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/225611\/","title":{"rendered":"Scotland could thrive with its own currency, say academics"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n The Scottish Currency Group (SCG) held its third annual conference, which aims to explore currency and the economy in an independent Scotland, in Dunfermline<\/a> on Saturday.\n<\/p>\n

\n Contributors ranged from former MPs, academics, and experts in finance who all echoed the same point – if Scotland wants to achieve independence those in charge at the Scottish Government<\/a> need to be bolder with their ambitions and have more faith in establishing the country\u2019s own currency.\n<\/p>\n

\n National columnists and accounting expert Professor Richard Murphy summed up the event by saying that a Scottish currency<\/a> is about showing faith in the country and its ability to govern itself. Something he challenged the current SNP<\/a> leadership to show more of.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cMoney is about faith in the potential of Scotland. It’s about hope in the fact that potential might be released, but most of all, Scottish currency is love for Scotland,\u201d he said.\n<\/p>\n

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\n \u201cIt’s without saying, we believe in Scotland above all else, and that’s why we want our own currency, because that’s the only way we will deliver for the people of Scotland.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThey need it to deliver for themselves to make it their own for their own benefit, and for the benefit of those who can come after them.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Speakers at the two-day conference included former SNP MP Philippa Whitford and Scotonomics\u2019s William Thomson, and Common Weal Robin McAlpine and Craig Dalzell along with Alba\u2019s Kenny MacAskill<\/a>, and were asked to explain their \u201cvision for independence\u201d with a focus on economics.\n<\/p>\n

\n Professor Thibault Laurentjoye, who was commissioned by the Labour Welsh government to look at currency options if Wales were to become independent, has also been commissioned by the SCG to look at currency frameworks for an independent Scotland.\n<\/p>\n

\n Laurentjoye, a French academic who is an assistant professor in economics at Aalborg University Business School in Denmark, delivered his interim report at the conference and is expected to publish the final report next year.\n<\/p>\n

\n Dr Tim Rideout, convener of the SCG, said that the conference aimed to consider the \u201cwhy\u201d of independence is as important as the \u201chow\u201d, as speakers used their expertise to argue ideas and policy frameworks.\n<\/p>\n

\n Scottish Currency Group (Image: NQ)\n<\/p>\n

\n Whitford (above) spoke about how the Scottish Government has been \u201cswimming against the tide\u201d with the last 10 years of austerity drastically cutting public services, but she said the SNP have still managed to deliver critical policy changes, like the baby box and abolishing the two child payment cap. However, the former Central Ayrshire MP argued there needs to be more radical change proposed by the Scottish Government and that she would like to see the likes of an integrated care system, as she hammered home the point that poverty is one of the largest contributors to ill health.\n<\/p>\n

\n She addressed the fact that the Scottish Government is unable to make the \u201cradical\u201d changes needed to truly address an aging population and child poverty due to the constraints of having no control over its own budget and lack of borrowing powers.\n<\/p>\n

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\n Whitford also argued that recent initiatives from the UK Government<\/a>, like its newly formed investment vehicle GB Energy<\/a>, are not just a \u201cfarce\u201d but a \u201cthreat\u201d to Scotland\u2019s resources. McAlpine also addressed the conference about Scotland\u2019s resources, saying, \u201cwe need to get out as fast as we can\u201d from the Union, as he said the country is being \u201cregionalised\u201d.\n<\/p>\n

\n He argued that Scotland doesn\u2019t have any of its own \u201cbig players,\u201d citing the likes of ScottishPower, being a subsidiary of the Spanish energy firm Iberdrola, and how around 70% of Scottish whisky distilleries are owned by companies in other countries like America and Japan.\n<\/p>\n

\n McAlpine suggested nationalising energy to help retain the wealth in Scotland, along with other bold plans like implementing a limit of how many distilleries foreign companies can own, while establishing our own whisky distribution network.\n<\/p>\n

\n The establishment of a national statistics agency was also floated by McAlpine, along with other speakers, in which he said would help the independence movement move forward collectively as a country and stop acting like a \u201cregion\u201d.\n<\/p>\n

\n Independence was very much at the heart of the conference, and it aimed to show ordinary Scots how Scotland can survive on its own, by demonstrating just how easy it is to set up the country\u2019s currency and central bank.\n<\/p>\n

\n Examples of potential notes in an independent Scotland (Image: NQ)\n<\/p>\n

\n Ian Stewart, a banker for 40 years and a member of the SCG, reiterated the point that Scotland\u2019s right to self-determination needs to be broken down for ordinary people and explained in terms that matter to them the most.\n<\/p>\n

\n An example he gave to \u201cconvince the ordinary person\u201d is having a central bank of Scotland offering fixed-rate mortgages for 30 years, which he said councils used to offer similar deals prior to the Thatcher era.\n<\/p>\n

\n Murphy\u2019s comments summed up the summit and the overall mood on the first day best when he said: \u201cIn 2026 we have a Scottish Government in Holyrood<\/a>, we have a Welsh Government in Cardiff, and a Sinn F\u00e9in in Northern Ireland and we have three countries, excluding England, in the Union, with governments who believe independence, then we had to take independence seriously.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cScotland is going to be independent.\u201d He added: \u201cI think that the tipping point is coming very close.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe idea that England has something to offer to the people of Scotland, to the people of Wales, to the people of Northern Ireland, is becoming a joke.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cEngland hasn’t offered anything to the people of England, more people are telling me in England. So why the heck should anybody in Scotland believe it has?\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cAnd yet that’s the point. Scotland has something to believe in. England hasn’t.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cScotland could believe in its own currency, but the currency is that symbol of faith in the country, it is the symbol of faith in the value of the country, the symbol of the faith in the power to govern itself. And it’s the symbol of the faith of the Scottish people to manage the affairs of Scotland for themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Scottish Currency Group (SCG) held its third annual conference, which aims to explore currency and the economy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225612,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[84,1294,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-225611","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-economy","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225611","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225611"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225611\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225612"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225611"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225611"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225611"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}