7. To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the total cost to date of its “Building a New Scotland” series of papers. (S6O-02932)

The Scottish Government is publishing the publication costs of all the papers in the “Building a New Scotland” series. Parliament has been informed of costs for the first nine papers in the series. The cumulative cost has been £151,657.40, which means that the average cost of each of the first nine papers in the series was £16,850.21.That cumulative total represents a value of around 0.00025 per cent of the total Scottish Government budget for the financial year. We will continue to publish the cost information for future papers once they are published, as we have committed to do.

So far, the Scottish National Party Government has wasted about £151,000 on nine independence prospectus papers. What a complete waste of taxpayer money, when the propaganda papers fail to answer any key questions about currency, the fiscal framework or pensions. Even the First Minister previously described them as material

“that frankly sits on a website and nobody reads.”

Does the minister agree with the First Minister’s comments? Can he explain to Scottish taxpayers why that money would not be better spent on our schools, our health service or our police?

It is pretty clear that Mr Lumsden was looking for a figure that was rather higher than a value of around 0.00025 per cent of the total Scottish Government budget for this financial year. He was clearly not listening when I responded to Donald Cameron, so I remind Mr Lumsden that we won the last Scottish Parliament election and so have a mandate to take forward that activity. The Conservatives lost the last Scottish Parliament election, which is why the SNP is in government. The money is well spent.

Ireland has an income per head that is 24 per cent higher than that of the UK; in Denmark, income per head is 35 per cent higher than that of the UK; and in Norway it is 61 per cent higher than that of the UK. We have a boorach of a UK economy as a result of Brexit, and the Office for Budget Responsibility predicts that gross domestic product will be 4 per cent lower in the long run because of it. The only way that we can escape that mess is through independence, so we will continue to make the case for it.

C an the minister provide an update on how the United Kingdom’s gross domestic product per capita compares to that of the comparator countries that are used in the “Building a New Scotland” series of papers?

The Deputy Presiding Officer:

That was a bit wide of the question that is in the

Business Bulletin

, I am afraid, because we are looking for an update on the total cost of the actual papers, not the cost of the substance of the papers.

Having previously urged the Scottish Government to build a clear and credible independence strategy, former SNP minister Alex Neil now says that, in the view of many independence supporters, the SNP has

“abandoned any pretence of trying to get independence anytime soon”.

How does the Scottish Government justify the costs of the white papers and how does it hope to build consensus around its independence strategy—as set out in the white papers—when it cannot achieve consensus within its own party?

I have to say—not for the first time—that I disagree with Alex Neil. I believe that we are building a credible and compelling case for independence. I have already made the point about the advantages that countries that are similar to Scotland have as a consequence of their independence. I would have thought that the Labour Party might have agreed, because the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has said that destitution is on the increase in the UK, but is being mitigated by the Scottish Government, and the Resolution Foundation has pointed out that if the UK had the average income and levels of inequality of similar countries, typical households would be £8,300 better off, which rises to £10,200 when we are compared with countries that are similar to Scotland. I had thought that Alex Neil, the Labour Party and other members would be able to see the benefits of independence. That is the case that we will continue to make.