Sensitive issues in the Scottish capital

Oct 15 2008 by Andrew Hebden, The Journal

ON Monday I visited Culloden in the Scottish Highlands, the battleground where the forces of the British government brought the Jacobite rising to a decisive and bloody end in 1746.

The sun was shining brightly and a stiff breeze swept across the exposed and boggy landscape where 1,500 mainly Highland Scots met their deaths at the hands of the Duke of Cumberland’s men in the last pitched battle on British soil.

Time will tell whether Monday, October 13, 2008, takes its place in the history books as some form of modern day Culloden. But it was a Black Monday for all those connected with the cause of Scottish independence.

Perhaps it’s no more than coincidence that all of the banks which have now been fully or partially nationalised – with the exception of proposed new HBOS owner Lloyds – were based either in northern England or Scotland.

One little noticed impact of the current crisis is that it has decimated regionally-based financial institutions. It will take years for them to get back on their feet and, for some of them at least, survival will mean being gobbled up by larger rivals.

These issues are inevitably sensitive in Edinburgh where financial services form such a fundamental part of the city’s economy. It also threatens to derail First Minister Alex Salmond’s juggernaut journey towards separation from the UK – his long-standing vision of an independent Scotland one day standing shoulder to shoulder with Iceland on a global stage looks particularly unfortunate.

The vision of these great Scottish banks having to go cap in hand to the Treasury has certainly strengthened the Unionist cause.

This is not a cause for celebration, however. Those of us who want to see an economy with a powerful presence in the regions of the UK can find little comfort in what has gone on.

While we all want to see London’s pre-eminence as a global financial centre restored, this must not be achieved at the expense of the rest of the UK.

It is more important than ever that those whose mistakes have precipitated this unhappy situation pay the price for their recklessness.

Whilst Northern Rock’s new management team have predictably decided that it is not worth pursuing legal action against former chief executive Adam Applegarth, we have at least seen the chief executives of the two large Scottish banks pay the price for their failure.

Now we await to see which of these disgraced individuals will have the decency to become the first to apologise for the damage they have caused – not just to their companies but to their regions and nation states.

Andrew Hebden is assistant editor (business) of The Journal

It was a Black Monday for all those connected with the cause of Scottish independence