29/08/2014 Scotland Decides

next hour. John, thank you.

Now, Scotland decides, our review of the week with James Cook.

This week on the look back at the past seven days of the referendum

campaign in Scotland. Alex Salmond and Alistair Darling meet in debate

for the final time, before the vote. Business leaders pile in too,

arguing about the pros and cons for companies big and small. We travel

to some of Scotland's most remote communities to hear the views of

islanders. Welcome to Scotland Decides, a review of the week. The

stately surroundings of Glasgow's museum felt more like a boxing arena

when Alex Salmond and Alistair Darling slugged it out in the second

and final televised debate. Yet again, the economy and weather and

`` whether and how an independent Scotland could use the pound,

dominated. Of course we could use the rulebook... We can use the

pound? The problem you are using somebody else's currency. You don't

have a Central Bank, so our financial services can't exist in

Scotland. The second thing ` hold on one moment. As we have heard, we

cannot be stopped from using the pound. What they can do is deny us

the financial access held at the Bank of England. The Bank of England

owes 27% of UK debt. We are offering to pay our fair share of this

agreement. Do you say we are not taking the debt? If the UK parties

take all of the financial assets of the United Kingdom, then we are

stuck with all the liabilities of the United Kingdom. It's perfectly

obvious. Plenty of sound and fury there, but what did it signify? Alex

Salmond was widely judged to have won, with a much better performance

than in the first clash, particularly on currency. Of course,

not everyone agreed. Alex Salmond has three other options. He said

they were all buses that come along at once. When you get on you know

where a bus is going, but the currency bus has been blacked out

and the driver is blindfolded. He wants a currency union. But if he

doesn't get one, he can't tell us what the currency will be. I can't

help, although I disagree with Alex Salmond, I can't help agreeing with

him that very clearly this is a campaign tactic by the "no" side to

scare people into thinking that we can't possibly vote for independence

when we know very clearly that there are several viable options. The

questions that Alex Salmond didn't answer three weeks ago, he didn't

answer yesterday. We still don't know what currency there will be in

an independent Scotland. He talked about three plan Bs. What is plan B?

Two are at least completely unworkable. I think people ` people

think it's patronising, if he thinks people are going to take that risk

into the dark about what the value of the money is. I think there are a

few major revelations. The most important was was that Alistair

Darling confirmed there was nothing to stop Scotland continuing to use

the pound after a "yes" vote. Contradicting what the "no" campaign

spokesperson had said that afternoon. That's something that

Alistair Darling is not going to be able to get away from and shows the

level of the substance and lack of substance that there is to the scare

stories. The debate was a talking point on social media all over

Scotland. This map of tweets, which included a location, shows hot spots

across the country and the debate tleneded in Spain. `` trended in

Spain. We'll look at some. James said:

Mark will wams saw it the other `` Williams saw it the other way:

That's the reaction. We'll look at some of the other stories.

The Labour MP Jim Murphy, who is on a soapbox tour of Scotland's

streets, was hit by several eggs as he struggled to shout over a hostile

Supporters of the Yes campaign were also accused of shouting

Mr Murphy said he was suspending his campaign while he took advice

The trade body Oil and Gas UK, which represents

the oil industry said it stood by its estimate that between 12 and 24

billion barrels of oil could still be extracted from the North Sea.

There were also predictions of a new oil boom west of Shetland.

But campaigners for the union continued to insist

there was not enough oil to prevent tax rises or spending cuts

Now, the National Health Service in Scotland is overseen from Edinburgh

Nonetheless it has become a hot topic in the independence

debate, with claims from the SNP that its budget could fall if

Everybody knows, everybody accepts that the rate of inflation in the

health service is always higher by definition than it is within the

economy as a whole. When John points to the worry, it is not as portrayed

by some, if you vote no, you would essentially be an accomplice to

finishing off the NHS in Scotland, utter rubbish, an insult of

intelligence. I think there intelligence. I think there is a

deeper issue behind this question of the NHS in England, it is an issue

of trust and democracy. You may recall the 2010 general election

when both parties now in government had in their manifestoes that they

would not conduct any more top`down reforms of the NHS and yet within 18

months they had enacted a reform which every independent commentator

agreed could lead to the rake up and emergence of daylight the privatised

NHS. Business took centre stage this week

with arguments about profits, The Prime Minister spoke

at a Confederation of British Industry dinner in Glasgow,

an event which had to be scaled back to avoid breaking the law

on campaign funding. He told the audience that the degree

of success Scottish businesses enjoy It happens because of the skill of

people in Scotland and because of the opportunities that come from

being part of something bigger. A large domestic market underpinned by

a common currency, common taxes, common rules and regulations with no

borders, no transaction costs, no restrictions on the flow of goods,

investment or people. But headlines written about

the event focused on a different warning, from the CBI president Sir

Mike Rake who didn't just voice his criticised Mr Cameron's policy

on Europe. We accept that holding a referendum

on EU membership is an issue for the government, that ambiguity is

increasingly causing real concern for businesses based on future

investment plans. Earlier in the week the divided

opinion of business was laid bare First,

around 130 business leaders signed a letter in the Scotsman voicing

concern about the impact of a "yes" vote; then some 200 business leaders

wrote a similar missive to the What you have in the stand is that

99% of business in Scotland. S M Es, they are entrepreneurial, they

invest their own hard cash into business in Scotland. I think the

uncertainty of remaining in the UK is that we could be pulled out of

the European Union without our consent and our markets and our

ability to trade would be damaged. Now, time for our weekly look

at the latest polling. And the poll of polls suggests

a slight move to the yes campaign, But the no campaign still leads on

56% when don't knows are excluded. That's according to an average

of half a dozen polls taken in August, calculated by the

What Scotland Thinks website. As we countdown to the referendum

we're canvassing opinions on the debate across Scotland, and our

special correspondent Allan Little The independence debate reaches into

every community, the level of engagement is unprecedented. The

annual Islay agricultural show brings the community together, minds

are being made up in places like this in lengthy, passionate

conversations between friends and neighbours. Definitely no. I ended

see chaos. What's the point of saying we want to be separate but

meantime all we get is a list of the things we don't want to lose? It

must be nice to be one or the other. I keep getting pulled back

and forward. I think it is great, it is the only chance in my lifetime to

be able to take this step and give it a go. It won't be easy but it

might be hard and cost money but it is well worth doing. In a place like

this you see something very important about the nature of this

debate. It is not just about national identity, it is about

power, where it should reside, how to make the centre accountable to

people who live on the periphery. There has been a national flag

waving at this has also been an extraordinary and energetic debate

that has energised people in every part of the country, in groups of

friends, families and about the nature of democracy itself and how

to make it better. The pace of that debate is now accelerating fast.

Both sides say they want change and the decision, change in or out of

the United Kingdom, is now just three weeks away. Don't forget you

can catch up with the latest analysis on our website. You will

find a lot of information there including information on the

specific topics to hopefully enable you to make your own decision. That

is it for now, I will be back at the same time next week. Goodbye.

One more story to bring you before we look at the weekend weather

forecast. As you know, this is Matthew's last day with us. He is

going to BBC