Humza Yousaf claims independence will make households £10,200 better off - but it won't happen any time soon

First Minister starts New Year with familiar claims about benefits of independence, but no route map

First Minister Humza Yousaf says Labour doesn't need Scottish votes to win the election, but Scotland needs SNP MPs to ensure it is not ignored. Picture: Lisa Ferguson. The speech will be the first in a series of events outlining the Scottish Government’s ambition for a more productive economy to achieve higher living standards in an independent Scotland. This first speech will focus on independence and industrial policy.

New Year is a time for tradition – for many Scots that means steak pie on New Year’s Day; for some hardy souls it's the Loony Dook; and for politicians it's scene-setting keynote speeches and interviews.

No-one knows what a new year will bring, but at least they can start it with something familiar. And sometimes the familiar means political leaders repeating well-worn arguments and trundling out favourite themes they have expounded many times before.

First Minister Humza Yousaf, for instance, is claiming Scots households could all be £10,200 better off under independence. The figure might vary, but the idea of a boost in individual prosperity from independence has often been promoted in the past, yet did not prove convincing enough to secure a majority in the 2014 referendum.

The £10,200 claim is based on comparing Scotland with independent countries of roughly similar size, like Ireland, Denmark and Norway. And lest it is dismissed out of hand, Mr Yousaf was quick to put it in context: "I'm not selling independence as being an overnight change, that somehow there will be rivers of milk and honey. There will be challenges. It will be a transitional process."

Support for independence has remained steady despite the slump in the SNP's poll ratings, so it is understandable that, with a likely general election in mind, the First Minister should opt to focus on the issue – and it is, after all, the fundamental purpose of the SNP.

Mr Yousaf insisted, as he has before, that if voters want independence they have to vote for it and warned that Labour would use every Scottish vote it won as an argument for the Union. He has promised that independence will be line one on the first page of the SNP’s general election manifesto.

But the reality is that independence is not going to be achieved any time soon. The UK government has made clear it will not agree to transfer the powers to hold another referendum; the Supreme Court has ruled the Scottish Parliament cannot hold one without UK agreement; and the Scottish Government has not been able to come up with any other viable route to independence.

The first major poll of 2024 shows the SNP losing 24 seats, falling to just 19 MPs, while Labour leaps from two to 27. In a bid to prevent a major loss of SNP support, Mr Yousaf claimed the independence cause would move "backwards" if the party were to lose seats at the election, though he stopped short of repeating Edinburgh East SNP MP Tommy Sheppard’s warning that "if the SNP loses the election in Scotland, the debate on independence stops".

The First Minister has claimed the Tories are “done” and it is "very clear” that Keir Starmer will be the next prime minister. He even went as far as to claim that Labour "does not need Scotland" to win the election. But he urged: "Scotland needs SNP MPs to make sure that we are not ignored and that Scotland's voice is heard."

That sounds like a tacit admission that voting SNP will not actually bring independence any closer and a return to the lesser, but very familiar, claim that the SNP is the only party that can be relied on to stand up for Scotland.