Danny Alexander concedes Scotland could continue using the BBC and national lottery even if it votes for independence

The UK government would negotiate sharing the BBC and national lottery with an independent Scotland if there was a yes vote in September's referendum, Danny Alexander, chief secretary to the Treasury, has conceded.

He told the Guardian that he was very doubtful about Alex Salmond's plans for an independent Scotland to continue using the BBC and the lottery but said "all these things can be discussed in negotiations".

He added: "I'm very sceptical about such proposals but clearly if Scotland votes yes and there are negotiations, these are things that they can put forward. I'm sure that [the Scottish government] would put them forward."

The government has shelved an official paper in its Scotland Analysis series for the referendum that was due to explore the status of the BBC and the lottery and was being prepared before the culture secretary, Maria Miller, resigned over the expenses row in April.

The fate of BBC shows including EastEnders, Strictly Come Dancing, and Doctor Who, has become the focus of intense debate in the referendum campaign, with figures in the no camp insisting the BBC would cease broadcasting in Scotland after independence.

Last week Gordon Brown, the former prime minister, said Scottish families faced losing these shows or paying far higher costs for watching them after independence. A future Scottish Broadcasting corporation would be charged for screening them and would lose access to £4bn worth of BBC programming.

Despite 14 detailed papers in the Scotland Analysis series, covering topics such as currency, banking, defence, border controls and Europe, there has been no detailed official analysis by the UK government on the BBC or the lottery.

Publishing a final summary paper on Thursday, Alexander said work by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport on the BBC and lottery had "fed into" the other papers.

A DCMS spokesman insisted there were no guarantees that an independent Scotland would be able to share the BBC or lottery. But Pete Wishart, the Scottish National party's culture spokesman at Westminster, said Alexander's admissions were "very significant‚" and "really encouraging".

The UK government has been openly hostile to other deals with Scotland: it has vetoed a currency union, resisted Salmond's case for fast entry to the EU, and rejected his plans for a deal on immigration.

Wishart said he believed the DCMS had come under intense pressure from BBC figures in London, MPs on the Commons culture committee, and the lottery operator, Camelot, to allow operations in Scotland after a yes vote.

"I know that the temptation of the UK government on all these issues is to say 'Scotland can't get it', and that's what they want to do," Wishart said. "But they're under severe pressures from stakeholders in both these ventures who believe that what we propose is a sensible way to work if Scotland becomes independent."

The Scottish government's white paper on independence, Scotland's Future, has recommended the BBC set up a joint venture with a new Scottish Broadcasting Corporation, which would take over BBC Scotland's operations and buildings. The SBC would be funded with £300m of licence fees raised in Scotland. Scottish ministers and independence campaigners point to the BBC's deal with the Republic of Ireland to screen and license its programmes in Ireland.

Salmond also wants to share the National Lottery, but Wishart confirmed that would need legislative changes. The lottery is legally restricted to just the UK and players in the UK and cannot operate across borders.

The Euromillions game is run in the UK solely by Camelot and is not run by a single cross-border operator.

Alexander said that raised real doubts about whether the lottery could be shared with Scotland.

"I'm very sceptical about the idea. There are an awful lot of UK institutions. [They] are UK institutions and Scotland is voting to leave the UK. To take the National Lottery as an example, that is set up by UK legislation, that's a UK institution. It's a national lottery not an international lottery."