Smoke and mirrors

The EEC Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) provided £4 billion to the UK.

Scotland’s share was approximately £850 million.

In addition EEC Rural Development and Social Funds provided around £160 million.

Total £1.10 Billion annually.

The entire budget was transferred to Westminster at the time the UK left the EEC and there it sits today.

Square the foregoing with today’s Westminster announcement of £177miliion levelling up” finance. Projects sharing £177m in Scotland are:

£27m for a new ferry between Shetland and the Fair Isle.

£20m to help turn Arbuthnot House in Aberdeenshire into a museum and library as well as modernising Macduff Aquarium.

Refurbishment of the Palace Theatre in Kilmarnock, costing £20m.

Re-routing of the A78 dual-carriageway to improve Greenock – £20m.

Regeneration of Riverside Park in Fife (£19.4m) and the Forthside area of Stirling (£19m).

£14m multi-storey car park redevelopment in Dundee.

More than £9m for regeneration work in Cumbernauld.

Nearly £11.3m to free up land at a former coal-fired power station.

Almost £18m to help Dumfries and Galloway turn redundant spaces and buildings into new cultural and leisure opportunities.

The Tory government in Scotland trumpets that direct financing of projects from Westminster is wonderful but Scotland is being short changed by around £823 million.