I’M delighted to see that from Monday Professor Alex Russell will be writing a series in The National on the incompetent and arguably corrupt mismanagement of our North Sea oil and gas by successive UK Governments (Major series on Westminster’s mismanagement of North Sea oil all next week in The National, October 20).

The facts and figures regarding the UK petroleum revenue tax structure have been in the public domain for some time, and although they make damning reading for oil economists, they make little sense to the ordinary person in the street. This was a fundamental failing of the previous Independence campaign in my opinion. Yes spokespeople, SNP in particular, lacked the basic knowledge of this key industry, and what little they did know, they had great difficulty putting across to the ordinary person in the street. The SNP practically gifted this key issue to Better Together by allowing the “neutral” and laughably “expert” opinions from Aberdeen billionaire Ian Wood to go unchallenged, Wood freely damned the North Sea oil industry to be in terminal decline during the decisive last week of the indy campaign, which Better Together immediately capitalized on with it’s mouthpiece BBC and the London media blanket. The economic outlook for an independent Scotland was dire and ordinary Scots were once again feart! (care for another knighthood Sir Ian?)