Swinney: Trident opposition ‘not going to change’

The Scottish Government’s finance secretary John Swinney has told the BBC that the SNP’s opposition to Trident nuclear weapons is “not going to change”.

His remarks firmly reject suggestions that Trident’s removal from Scotland could be used as a bargaining chip in negotiating a currency union between an independent Scotland and the rest of the UK.

It follows increased speculation about the negotiations that would follow a vote for independence in Scotland’s referendum this September.

Swinney told the BBC’s Brian Taylor that his party’s commitment to remove nuclear weapons from Scottish soil and waters was “a position that I, and my colleagues, have held fundamentally through all of our political lives”.

The Trident nuclear weapons programme, based on the Clyde, has featured heavily in the SNP’s campaign for independence, with the party’s support for disarmament winning the Yes campaign the support of the Scottish CND.

In 2012, the CND published Trident: Nowhere to Go, a pamphlet which argues Scottish independence could lead to unilateral disarmament in the UK.

Later that year, the Scottish CND formally announced its support for a Yes vote in the referendum. Its chair, Arthur West, told journalists: “People will consider a whole range of subjects when deciding how to vote in 2014. We recognise that we have members who will not be supporting independence for other reasons. On the issue of nuclear disarmament, our advice is to vote Yes.”

But the policy was questioned after a report in The Guardian quoted an unnamed UK minister, who said the continued berthing of Trident nuclear submarines in Scotland could provide the basis for a currency deal.

Today, Swinney said there was “no truth” to speculation that this deal could happen.