INDEPENDENCE would diminish Scotland's role in helping poorer countries, meaning it would no longer be able to make a "transformational" contribution to international development, MPs said today.
A report from the Commons International Development Committee also noted how taking Scotland's contribution out of the UK's aid budget would reduce it by around £1 billion in 2016 - the year the SNP Government hopes Scotland would become independent.
It added that there would, over time, be a threat to hundreds of jobs at the Department for International Development's base in East Kilbride as an independent Scotland would have a comparatively smaller aid operation.
"DFID is a world leader in its field and, as a big player on the world stage, the UK also wields considerable influence in multilateral organisations," said Sir Malcolm Bruce, the committee chairman.
"As part of the UK, Scotland makes a tremendous contribution to all this. Scots have served as development ministers in the UK Government and three Scottish MPs, including myself, sit on the International Development Committee. If Scotland were to become an independent country, its development agency would be a much smaller player," he said.
Justine Greening, the International Development Secretary, said an independent Scotland would lose much of its power to transform the lives of those in extreme poverty.
A Scottish Government spokesman said: "To suggest countries of Scotland's size cannot have a transformational role in international development is simply wrong."
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 hereComments are closed on this article