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Humza Yousaf vows to rid independent Scotland of nuclear weapons

First Minister wants to enshrine a nuclear-free Scotland in a post-independence constitution.

Mark Macaskill19 , Telegraph, June 2023

The removal of nuclear weapons from Scottish soil will be enshrined in a post-independence constitution, Humza Yousaf, the first minister, has said.

The plan is contained in the SNP’s latest blueprint to help the country meet future challenges in the event that the union is dismantled.

The nuclear pledge revives a call made almost a decade ago by Mr Yousaf’s predecessor, Nicola Sturgeon, who questioned why Scottish taxpayers were funding “one of the largest concentrations of nuclear weapons in Europe on our doorsteps”…………………..

“What we will not see under these proposals, are nuclear weapons on the Clyde. This proposed constitution would ban nuclear weapons from an Independent Scotland.”

The drafting of a new constitution is outlined in a new strategy paper, Building a New Scotland………………………………………

In 2014, Ms Sturgeon, who at the time was deputy first minister, said that embedding a legal obligation to work for nuclear disarmament in a Scottish constitution would place a duty on Holyrood to strive for the removal of submarine-based Trident nuclear weapons.

In 2021, the Ministry of Defence reversed a 10-year-old disarmament plan by announcing the “ceiling” on the UK’s nuclear weapons stockpile would increase from 225 to 260 because of “technological and doctrinal threats”.

The same year, Nukewatch, which monitors the transport of nuclear weapons, claimed that the UK government had quietly boosted the number of Trident nuclear warheads stored on the Clyde in the previous five years. It estimated that 37 new warheads were delivered from England to Scotland between 2015 and 2020. Nine were added in 2019 and 13 in 2020.  https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/06/19/humza-yousaf-vows-to-rid-scotland-of-nuclear-weapons/

June 21, 2023 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, UK