THE most important thing about GERS is that it includes all spending with any kind of bearing on Scotland but only includes taxation which can be shown to arise directly inside Scotland. There is inconsistency and inherent bias towards a Scottish deficit.

The second most important thing is that, with a single exception, all the spending figures have been collected inside the UK machine already, and for purposes other than the generation of accurate statistics for Scotland. There are more than two dozen of such sources, and each is put together with the others to produce a Scottish total.

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To give a practical example, the two aircraft carriers built at Rosyth count for Scottish spending while construction is completed. But they will also count for Scottish spending during the next 50 years while they (probably) have US bases in the South China Sea.

No other country in the world would tolerate it. I wish Scotland would just announce an end to this practice and take whatever Unionist flak is coming its way.

That certainly would be better than lending any further credence to an annual ritual that has only ever been meant to discredit the idea of Scottish independence.