This week Honey keeps you up-to-date with leaked memos and staggers at the prospect of 2 million barrels of oil a day. Relations between Bute House and No. 10 take a nose-dive, and where else could you find Rangers and the Catholic Church in the same sentence...
12th March Quotes of the week
“Independence is forever, oil is not”
Better Together campaign
“Scotland is projected to see an average £48 billion oil boom in the next six years … There is little doubt that Scotland in moving into a second oil boom and it will remain an enormous economic resource for many decades to come.”
Maureen Watt, SNP MSP for Aberdeen South and North Kincardine
"Even the SNP's own spurious numbers reveal the problems we would face - we have slipped from sixth to eighth on John Swinney's fantasy world rich list in just a year. The SNP is being utterly reckless with Scotland's future by asking us to gamble on oil and won't even be honest with us about the choice we face.”
Ken Macintosh, Scottish Labour's finance spokesman
“The difference between what the SNP say in public and what they know in private is astonishing. It is yet another example of the SNP trying to con the people of Scotland by promising them the earth but knowing they do not have the money to deliver.”
Ruth Davidson MSP, Scottish Conservative leader
“We have reduced our forecasts for GDP growth in 2013 and 2014 to 0.9% and 1.7%, respectively. We now forecast 2015 for the first time and expect growth to be higher in that year, at 1.9%, as recovery finally, and hopefully, takes hold.”
Economist Brian Ashcroft, Fraser of Allander Institute on yet another forecast downgrade
"February’s Purchasing Managers Index rose to an eight-month high signalling continuing improvement in output and business activity… The increase in new orders both in the domestic economy and for exports is particularly welcome. These results provide further evidence that the Scottish economy is avoiding a “triple dip” and has started 2013 in growth mode.”
Donald MacRae, Chief Economist Bank of Scotland
“His [Salmond’s] own civil servants are telling him of the dangers of basing his plans on a volatile and diminishing commodity like North Sea oil but he is in denial. They are telling him of an even deeper public spending crisis coming after the referendum…Yet when I raise these issues the SNP deny there is a deeper crisis coming. That’s not what his own officials are telling him.”
Johann Lamont MSP, Scottish Labour Leader
“Asking prices in some areas are still too high and do not match the level at which buyers are willing to trade. Properties continue to be slow to sell, apart from those that are best-in-class in the most desirable locations, or where sellers are accepting offers due to pressing personal circumstances like death, debt or divorce.”
Estate agent Savills, warning that asking prices still have to fall 10%
“450,000 new homes are required to help meet household formation and population growth in Scotland over the next 20 years, but at current build rates this would result in a shortfall of 150,000. This would significantly exacerbate Scotland’s housing crisis and highlights the scale of the challenge facing our sector.”
Philip Hogg, Chief Executive Homes for Scotland
