PLAYFAIR’S unfinished monument to the fallen Scottish soldiers and sailors who fought Napoleon has been given the nickname of Scotland’s Disgrace. This monument – which was to be modelled as an enlightenment Parthenon high on Calton Hill, dominating Edinburgh’s skyline as a self-styled Athens of the North – lies as an unfinished timeless folly of the unfulfilled grandiose plan. Style over substance in enlightenment Edinburgh.
Earlier this week the Scottish Government published its own modern Scotland’s Disgrace; the annual ritual public humiliation of Scotland’s public finances – the Government Expenditure & Revenue Scotland, or GERS estimates. Each year this document has been published, since the devolution settlement of 1997, matters gradually get worse.
Not in one single year has the Scottish budget been in surplus, but the numbers just published for 2024-25 are not only a national disgrace they amplify the utter delusion of those currently wandering around Holyrood.
This official publication looks at the state of Scotland’s public finances and frankly it makes abysmal reading at every level. Last year Scotland spent £26.2bn more than it received in tax (over £30bn before oil). With the exception of the lockdown year 2020-21 this is by a margin the worst ever.
Taxes in Scotland are substantially higher than the rest of the UK, spending is also substantially higher – but despite this the Scottish Government is racking up excess spending over tax receipts of over £10,200 for each and every one of Scotland’s two and a half million households.
But it is worse than that. It is worse for several reasons; some are matters of economic fact and others being matters of perception.
Let’s deal first with economic facts, or at least facts using the Scottish Government’s own figures.
Fact 1. Public spending in Scotland last year was £117.6bn. As a matter of fact that is a staggering £44,882 per household. £44,882 is not a typo.
Fact 2. Spending increased by 5.5 per cent – over 1.5x the rate of inflation
Fact 3. Public spending was £82.8bn in 2019-20. It is £117.6bn today. That is an increase of 42 per cent in just 6 years. If spending had risen in line with inflation it would have been £103bn this year, thus public spending has increased by £15bn more than inflation over that period. Any talk of austerity is absurd. The only austerity Scotland has had has been in the private sector – which is shrinking.
Fact 4. The Scottish state now accounts for a staggering 55.4 per cent of GDP before oil and 52 per cent including oil revenues. In other words the private sector is far less than half the economy. The state’s share continues to grow. As a reference, when devolution was introduced, the Scottish State accounted for 43 per cent of the economy. Scotland’s state share today can be said to be akin to the levels of Soviet Poland’s.
Fact 5. These numbers are by a margin the worst in all Europe and, without a sugar daddy, are utterly unsustainable. The chart below puts Scotland in the context of other European nations. Denmark, Ireland and as result of force majeure Cyprus and Greece, run surpluses. Scotland’s deficit is around 2x the UK average which in itself is firmly bottom quartile in a European context. If Scotland was independent such a position would mean national insolvency. Capital markets would not lend to such a basket case, period. Scotland only gets away with it as it piggy backs the UK balance sheet.
What exactly does the average family get for this £44,882? One might imagine a gold plated education, healthcare, clean graffiti-free streets and a utopia that might be the near envy of the world? Do you, the reader, think your family is getting that for your £44,882?
Good healthcare? Eh no, Scotland’s life expectancy continues to lag and at just 76.8 years for a male is around 5 years less than what the average Swiss, Swedish or Italian male can expect. Hospital waiting times have increased materially and GP access is clearly inferior to just a few years ago. The mental health statistics are tragic with, as just one example, 19 per cent of children aged 10-12 being categorised as displaying high or very high difficulties and emotional problems.
Good education? Well on every international measure Scotland’s once proud educational record has been trashed. According to the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) Scotland’s record is declining in English, maths and science. Is that a surprise as excellence is substituted for mood and relativism? 13.5 per cent of males are classified as NEET (Not in Education, Employment or Training) up a staggering 1.7 per cent from 2024 and extraordinarily 25.7 per cent of working age Scots are either unemployed or ‘economically inactive.’ What a tragic waste at a both personal and societal level.
Law and Order? Has that improved? Few would think so I would wager.
And perhaps the greatest bellwether of all for a society at ease with itself, drug-related deaths continues to shock – at around 1200 people dying of drug abuse per annum, broadly 3x the rate of a generation ago and by far and away the worst rate per head of any EU nation. The response is feed the addicts, send them to a consumption room, and then keep them out of sight and topped up rather than set on a pathway to recovery.
You might say ‘well this does not impact me. It’s a minority issue.’ Possibly true, but it’s a metaphor for all that is wrong with our society.
It is a metaphor of the management of decline and refusal to face the truth of impending national suffocation as private and community prosperity is replaced by bland, state conformity. Just as happened in Soviet Russia, it crushes the spirit of the people, breaking families, leading to mental health and other societal problems. Healthy societies do not exhibit the symptoms of the crisis we are facing. It is the nationalisation of responsibility that is crushing Scotland. It reflects the weird idea the state knows best.
Let’s deal with perception.
One might have thought such a performance might result in both some contrition from our political class and introspection. Perhaps a grand plan of how such a fine nation as ours can have fallen on almost every measure so catastrophically far? Not a bit. The SNP on its website helpfully put up an explainer (see here.)
To say it is economic with the truth would be an understatement. It seeks to distort fact with spin. It conflates higher spending on health and education as if that was achieved by the magic of SNP governance rather than outright subsidy over what Scotland raises.
It, in bold writing, claims Brexit continues to damage the economy where, as a matter of fact, it has made not a jot of difference (either positive or negative). Then, with a sense of delicious irony, again in bold, argues that the powers to grow Scotland’s economy are kept in Westminster’s hand claiming GERS proves ‘the need for Scottish Independence’.
Either these people are economically illiterate or are utterly deluded. Make no mistake with financial figures like this Scotland makes Greece look like a success story. If they wish independence it can only be achieved from a position of economic strength, not abject state sponsored failure.
I have no idea what a modern-day higher teaches in economics in Scotland but there is not a cat’s chance in hell of a country running a deficit (by far the worst in Europe), with a sadly crushed private sector (which is now so small it is usefully under half the economy and shrinking) and a public sector far more generously endowed with UK cash than the rest of the country (for far worse outcomes), could possibly be independent without delivering a major financial crisis. What the SNP has done is create a failing dependent state and that dependence, like a drug addict, is feeding its decline.
And the perception from the Scottish Conservatives? Well on their X feed
They brag about the £2,578 per head ‘Union Dividend.‘ Well that might be factually correct but it rather misses the point. It assumes all this spending is wise, effective and required. It’s not. At £44,882 it’s monumentally wasteful and not only that, counter-productive for the Scottish economy which has barely grown in real terms in a decade. Why? Because the private sector is shrinking and is being slowly crushed by the weight of massive regulation and tax by a smug managerial class providing a very poor service.
It need not be thus. Scotland has great potential. It has been a global leader in the past and can be again but frankly until those in power either show any understanding of the magnitude of their failure and the false narrative our identikit legacy parties peddle we will continue to decline economically, morally and culturally.
Scotland was a powerhouse and, as Eastern Europe shows, from a far worse situation post -communism recovery is possible but that recovery is only possible by providing the right architecture.
Some of that architecture can be built quite quickly like addressing massive spending inefficiencies using the proceeds to start to reverse the tax and regulatory problems that are driving enterprise away.
Others are generational and they are built on building family and community responsibility, returning to educational excellence while valuing and also encouraging non-academic paths. Frankly trusting the people, rather than crushing them.
Our political elite either choose to ignore this GERS survey and hope it will go away or if they mention it to distort its meaning severely. The first step of recovery is to understand when you are ill. It might be helpful if those in Holyrood might have the humility to recognise even that. It would be a modest start.
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Photo of ‘Edinburgh’s disgrace’ from Adobe Stock by dan_eggleton
