Patrick Harvie: case for a currency union between an independent Scotland and rUK 'even less convincing' than in 2014

Patrick Harvie - Image credit: Colin Hattersley Photography

A currency union between an independent Scotland and the rest of the UK is an even worse idea now than it was in 2014, Patrick Harvie has told the Scottish Green Party conference.

The SNP last month announced plans for a new growth commission to examine different currency options for an independent Scotland, as part of a renewed drive for independence in the wake of the UK Brexit vote.

But, speaking in Perth, the Green co-convener argued that a new Yes campaign will need to create new arguments to react to the new conditions created by the UK vote to leave the EU.

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Harvie said that a currency union between an independent Scotland inside the EU and a UK outside the EU would be even less appealing to voters now than it did in the run up the 2014 referendum.

He said: “We need to convince people of the values that the Green Yes campaign took two years ago, and we will continue to strengthen the case for independence because it is not just a case of rehearsing and repeating everything that was in that big book of answers from the SNP’s White Paper.

“Let’s just take the currency union for starters. With the UK set on its self-destructive course for leaving the European Union, where does that leave the idea of a currency union between an independent Scotland inside the EU and a UK outside the EU? I think that is going to prove even more unconvincing than it did in 2014.

“But as well as that there is also the need to build the case for Scotland to overcome its remaining over reliance on the fossil fuel industry, on oil and gas, because we cannot afford and we will not permit a new Scottish economy and a new Scottish currency, to be a petrol economy, or a petrol currency.”

The Scottish Greens campaigned for the creation of a new currency in the run up to the 2014 referendum.