Callaghan's government gerrymandered the sea to take Scotland's oil wealth

I don't normally post up whole articles from the press, but the issue of Scotland's oil is very important to me, and the Herald don't seem to archive their old stories:      

Alex Salmond yesterday claimed there is now "proof positive of Westminster deceit" over Scotland's oil wealth.

The First Minister was speaking after documents released under the 30-year rule showed the thinking behind the decision of Jim Callaghan's Labour Cabinet to create a specific region called the UK Continental Shelf so that oil revenues would not accrue to Scotland.

Trade Secretary Edmund Dell wrote a briefing for the Cabinet on March 30, 1977, stating: "There was no agreed way of allocating the North Sea area to the indigenous regions, and the attempt to do so would inevitably distort the regional accounts.

"The great majority of the profit would accrue to Scotland, and would represent almost a doubling of the Scottish GDP, which in 1974 had been about £6.5bn."

Speaking after documents were made available by the National Archives of Scotland, Mr Salmond said: "These papers are proof positive of the statistical manipulation perpetrated by successive UK governments - Labour and Tory - to hide the extent of Scotland's oil wealth from the Scottish people for nakedly political reasons.

"As recent official figures show, an independent Scotland would move up the EU league table from 10th to 3rd in wealth per head, with our North Sea oil and gas resources included in Scotland's accounts. This is the reality that the London-based parties have been desperate to suppress for decades, but the truth is now out."

The First Minister said that with oil prices at a record high, and huge reserves remaining, we must "make sure that Scottish control and opportunity replace the Westminster chicanery of yesteryear".

He pointed to Norway's Oil Fund established a decade ago and now worth £177bn, securing the benefits of their oil wealth "virtually for ever".

Mr Salmond added: "If we are to enjoy the same benefits from our oil as Norway, then we must make our own future as an independent nation, and learn the lessons of Westminster's deceit."

He pointed out that Energy Minister Malcolm Wickes had admitted in October that Norway had done a better job of husbanding its oil revenues than Britain. "If you could replay history, the idea as in Norway of building up a national fund is actually quite an attractive one," Mr Wickes had been quoted as saying.

A briefing paper by the Scottish Government's chief economic adviser shows that fuelled by oil revenues the UK lies seventh in a table of 27 European nations for Gross Domestic Product per capita. If Scotland was allocated a share of either 75% or 90% of oil and gas revenues it would lie third on that list, behind Luxembourg and Ireland.

For previous deceit uncovered thanks to the 30 year rule, including how Scotland would be in "chronic surplus to a quite embarrassing degree" according to Whitehall economists see here and here.

 

Comments

[Jeff]

Interesting stuff and thanks for including the entire article. I can't say the Tory/Labour duplicity is particularly surprising.

So with so much oil remaining, it's clear that Scotland would be able to make a good fist of independence if we chose that path.

That's assuming Aberdeen doesn't break away from us and claim all the oil to itself of course....

[joe90]

Mr Salmond added: "If we are to enjoy the same benefits from our oil as Norway, then we must make our own future as an independent nation, and learn the lessons of Westminster's deceit."
- Yes, but Norway only has the highest standard of living in the world (well, at the moment, the second highest) -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index>Human Development Index
see bottom of page 'Past top countries'
Wikipedia

Surely Scotland's oil wealth is being put to good use at the moment by the British Government who follows its American orders (aka British Foreign Policy) and wastes Scotland's oil wealth on buying billions of pounds worth of arms from British Merchants of Death, in order to murder and maim millions of people in West asia (for a pack of New Labour lies)?

Surely Scottish oil wealth will be put to good use by the British Government when it uses it to upgrade Britian's nuclear deterent?

Surely Scottish oil wealth was put to good use recently when the British Government intervened in the capitalist free-market (to prevent the free-market from working properly) by bailing out a private bank, Northern Rock, and other financial institutions?

Otherwise an independent Scotland, with its own government, will only use Scotland's oil wealth to improve the lives of Scottish taxpayers and ordinary Scottish voters, just as is done in Norway, whose oil wealth is used to improve the quality of life for everyone and not just the lucky few private shareholders and billionaire owners of arms and finance industries.

[joe90]

Of course,
we have tens of billions of pounds to 'invest' in a failed private bank, Northern Rock, but no money to 'subsidise' important public services such as Post Offices in rural Scotland.

Destroying public services is the job of the British government and subsidising faied private buisnesses in the capitalist free-market is the job of the British Government, I keep forgetting!

Ah, the stench of British democracy and New Labour-Conservative corruption and corporate cronyism!

Here is The Herald -
http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/news/display.var.1948551.0.18_post_offices_to_close_11_downgraded.php>18 post offices to close, 11 downgraded
08 Jan 2008
- with some decent readers' comments on the matter.

all the best!