Scotland should roll out the red carpet to rich people, scientists and engineers by keeping taxes low and lifting the ban on GM crops and fracking, Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson said.
The Scottish Government should pledge never to raise taxes higher than the rest of the United Kingdom to prevent Scotland's already low proportion of top-rate taxpayers fleeing south, she is expected to tell an audience in London.
She attacked Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale's "utterly naive and self-defeating" plan to levy a 50p top rate of tax on people with salaries of more than £150,000.
Scotland had just 14,000 top-rate taxpayers, about five per cent of the UK total and below its population share.
Ms Davidson wants to attract another 10,000 high earners to contribute hundreds of millions of pounds towards public services.
In advance extracts of a speech to the Adam Smith Institute at Westminster, Ms Davidson said: "We do that first by guaranteeing that tax rates in Scotland will be no higher than the rest of the United Kingdom, something I urge the Scottish Government to do immediately.
"This sends out the right message to everyone from across the UK that Scotland is not about punishing earned wealth.
"Secondly, I want to see us in Scotland rolling out the red carpet to our neighbours across the United Kingdom."
She added: "There is a problem, in that the SNP government keeps sending the wrong messages.
"Politics is all and the SNP's interest lies in continually trying to find a wedge to drive between us and the rest of the UK.
"Two weeks ago, the SNP made the entirely populist decision to ban GM crop development in Scotland.
"Will a well-paid scientist or bio-tech expert bring her family to Scotland now? I doubt it.
"Over the summer, the SNP - egged on by Labour - set out an equally populist ban on fracking technology. Will that encourage engineers to come and find opportunities in Scotland? I fear not.
"I know from speaking to business leaders at home that there are real worries that we are missing out of this great British revival."
She continued: "Scottish Labour's new leader Kezia Dugdale was barely in the job a week before stating her desire to raise taxes on middle to high earners.
"This, of course, will receive the warmest welcome from George Osborne as its most immediate impact will be to encourage Scotland's top-rate taxpayers to leave Scotland for south of the border.
"It is Labour at its most typical: borne of legitimate intentions, but utterly naive and self-defeating."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel