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Straight answers to honest questions about Scottish independence

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The nation's books

Wouldn't independence saddle Scotland with huge debts and set-up costs?

The short answer

There are two numbers in this question, and both deserve straight treatment.

The first - Scotland's "share" of the UK national debt - is not a bill waiting on the doormat. The UK Treasury put it in writing in January 2014: the debt is issued in the UK's name, the UK will honour all of it in all circumstances, and anything an independent Scotland contributed would be settled by negotiation. The second - the cost of setting up a state - is real, one-off, and on the most defensible independent estimate comes to less than half of what GERS says Scotland pays every single year in interest on debt it had no say in running up.

Neither number is a reason a country can't exist. Both are things the negotiation exists to settle.

Whose debt is it?

In January 2014, with the referendum approaching and the markets getting nervous, the Treasury published a technical note to steady them. Its core statement: "the continuing UK Government would in all circumstances honour the contractual terms of the debt issued by the UK Government." An independent Scotland would be expected to take on "a fair and proportionate share" - but the note is explicit that the share and the terms would be "subject to negotiation" (HM Treasury).

That note wasn't a concession to the independence campaign; it was reassurance to the people the UK borrows from. But its legal logic is worth understanding: every gilt is a contract between a lender and the UK government. Scotland isn't a party to those contracts and can't be made one. A departing Scotland couldn't be handed a share of the debt - it could only agree to one, as part of a wider settlement covering everything else on the table.

What would a fair share look like?

A population share of today's roughly £2.9 trillion of UK public debt (House of Commons Library) would come to something like £240 billion. That's one honest benchmark, and in 2014 the Scottish Government's own position was that Scotland would take on a fair share.

But debt doesn't travel alone. Three centuries of shared taxes bought shared assets - the Bank of England and its reserves, the diplomatic estate, the military equipment, the institutions - and a fair settlement divides both sides of the balance sheet. The precedents show how widely such settlements can land:

This page won't predict where between those markers a Scottish settlement would land - that depends on the whole negotiation, in which both governments hold cards (assets, debt, the Faslane timetable, currency cooperation, trade). The point is narrower: "Scotland's share of the debt" is an output of that negotiation, not an input to it. Anyone quoting you a precise figure today is guessing.

What Scotland pays now

While we're on interest bills: the status quo isn't the debt-free option.

GERS assigns Scotland a population share of the UK's debt interest - £8.5 billion in 2024-25 alone (Scottish Government - GERS FAQ). That charge appears in Scotland's accounts every year, for debt accumulated by successive UK governments making UK-wide choices. Whatever share of debt an independent Scotland agreed to service, it would at least be servicing a known quantity, agreed by its own government - with every pound of new borrowing thereafter its own decision too.

What does it cost to set up a state?

The short version: the Treasury's famous £2.7 billion figure was repudiated within days by Professor Patrick Dunleavy, the academic whose research it misused; the honest range for core institutions runs from hundreds of millions to around £2 billion, one-off and spread over the transition (LSE). That's less than a quarter of the £8.5 billion interest charge that lands in Scotland's accounts every year under the current arrangements.

And it's no longer theoretical: since 2018 Scotland has built a national benefits agency from scratch. Social Security Scotland now pays around £6 billion a year to 1.2 million people (Scottish Government progress report). The full story - the estimates, the precedents, and how it's all paid for - has its own page.

So what's the real question?

Not whether Scotland can afford the debts and the set-up - the numbers, honestly stated, are a negotiated share of a balance sheet with two sides, and a one-off cost a fraction of what Scotland already pays annually towards debt it doesn't control.

The real question is the usual one: who should be at the table? Every figure on this page - the debt share, the asset share, the terms, the timetable - gets settled in a negotiation between two governments. Scotland currently has no seat at that table, no veto over the borrowing done in its name, and an £8.5 billion annual charge for the arrangement. Independence doesn't make the numbers vanish. It makes Scotland a party to them.

Related: What would it cost to set up Scotland's new institutions? · Doesn't Scotland run a huge deficit? · What currency would an independent Scotland use?

Take it with you

Facts for sharing - each button copies the line, with its source and a link back to this page.

  • The Treasury put it in writing in January 2014: the UK honours 100% of UK debt 'in all circumstances'. An independent Scotland's share would be negotiated, not imposed (HM Treasury)
  • GERS charges Scotland £8.5 billion a year as its share of interest on debt Scotland had no say in running up (GERS 2024-25)
  • In 1925 the UK waived Ireland's entire prospective share of UK debt - a sum approaching 80% of Irish national income - as part of the wider settlement (London Agreement)
  • Since 2018 Scotland has built a national benefits agency from scratch: Social Security Scotland now pays around £6 billion a year to 1.2 million people (Scottish Government)

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