Independence is Good for Business: Infrastructure and investment
Infrastructure & Investment: Building for Business Needs
When it comes to investment in Scotland’s future, Westminster consistently shows where its priorities really lie - England.
Take Grangemouth. Scotland’s last oil refinery closed this spring, with over 400 jobs lost and an entire industrial ecosystem thrown into uncertainty. Yet, only weeks later, the Labour government stepped in to nationalise a steelworks in Yorkshire, guaranteeing wages and covering costs until a buyer is found. Scottish taxpayers will contribute over £100 million annually to that rescue, on top of similar subsidies for an English refinery, while Scotland is left without any refinery capacity at all.
UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves met with Grangemouth’s billionaire owner Jim Ratcliffe in the same month it closed down - but failed to even mention the Scottish site.
The MP for the area Brian Leishman tweeted: “To not even raise the issue is a disgraceful and shameful betrayal to working-class people from the second most influential politician in the land.”
A rerun of past betrayals
This is not a new story. In the 1970s, the Upper Clyde Shipbuilders were denied a modest £6 million loan to steady their books by the first UK government ever to be elected in England but not in Scotland. Workers, led by Jimmy Reid, staged the legendary UCS work-in to prove the point - it wasn’t the workers who had failed Scotland, it was Westminster.
Back then, the legendary MP and former Secretary of State for Scotland Willie Ross was “reported to be trembling with fury. The former army major told his fellow MPs that one of the saddest moments of his life had been going through Clydebank in his Highland Lights uniform the day after its bombing by the Germans. ‘The blow delivered by the government is even worse than that’.”
Half a century later, despite some measure of devolution, the same script plays out: industries that matter to Scotland are expendable: industries south of the Border are saved.
The great infrastructure bargain sale
Scotland is also suffering from the sell-off of major infrastructure by UK governments that Scotland didn’t elect. The UK threw away the birthright of all the citizens of the country in a bargain infrastructure sell off.
Gas, electricity, the national grid, rail infrastructure, harbours and ports, the Post Office, steel, aerospace and parts of the health service were privatised by UK governments without the democratic consent of the people of Scotland.
Westminster tried to privatise Scotland's water but such was the upsurge of feeling that they didn’t dare do so. Now water charges in England are going up while the water companies there have underinvested,
Scotland’s water is in a much better state, despite misleading claims by UK government ministers. The Independent Water Commission, led by Sir Jon Cunliffe, found 66% of Scotland’s water bodies to be of good ecological status, compared with 16.1% in England and 29.9% in Wales. The Scottish government is investing in Scottish Water, delivering billions in infrastructure upgrades.
The dogs’ breakfast of fragmented ownership and profit-seeking vulture capitalists that Westminster created in so many areas of natural monopoly is damaging Scotland’s wellbeing, prosperity and productivity.
With independence, the same principle that applies to water could be applied to energy generation, the grid, and transport. Essential assets run for the common good, not shareholder dividends.
A System That Holds Scotland Back
Scotland lacks the borrowing powers needed to plan and deliver long-term infrastructure. The Scottish Government can fund day-to-day services like health and education, but when it comes to big-ticket items, the sort of scale that would have been needed to save Grangemouth, undersea tunnels, ports, energy networks, it can’t borrow.
What Scotland gets in the UK’s capital block grant is not sufficient to build what Scotland needs. Even that grant is shrinking, down 2.5% in real terms since 2022 and projected to fall by nearly 9% by 2028. Westminster controls the purse strings, Scotland gets planning uncertainty and crumbs off London’s table.
What Independence Unlocks
Scotland has the talent and research base for growth sectors such as life sciences, offshore wind and green hydrogen. Independence would allow for targeted national programmes, backed by a national investment bank with real teeth, to grow industries for the long term instead of being constrained by UK Treasury rules.
An independent Scotland could nationalise the grid, plan upgrades strategically, and ensure housing and industry get the connections they need. Independent nations of Scotland’s size, like Ireland, Denmark or the Faroe Islands borrow, build, and repay. The Faroes have linked their islands with a network of subsea tunnels. Denmark is in the middle of a multi-billion euro infrastructure upgrade stretching to 2035.
Scotland has shown what is possible even within the narrow limits of devolution. Projects like the Stornoway deepwater terminal, the expansion of Scottish Water’s capacity in Perth, and the building of modern learning campuses prove that when decisions are made here, investment can be targeted and effective. But the scale is small because the powers are small. Westminster has shown us time and again, from UCS to Grangemouth, that Scotland comes second. Independence means Scotland comes first: building the infrastructure our businesses need, creating jobs, and investing in our future like every normal country does.
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