SNP Government independence papers 'almost at the end of the process'

Ms Robison set out the Scottish budget for 2025/26 on Wednesday, focusing on tackling child poverty and reducing NHS waiting times.

However, she did not mention independence once in her budget statement, and the government’s budget breakdown has no funding set aside for independence spending, as was the case in 2024/25.

Speaking to journalists after her statement to parliament, Ms Robison said: “As I understand it they’re nearly concluding, they’re almost at the end of the process.

“It is in the final stages and I think that’s about the culmination of the papers that have already been set out.”

However she added the SNP government was elected on a mandate for independence, and therefore government ministers will “continue to talk about independence and the best constitutional arrangement being independence”.

Since 2022 the Scottish Government has been publishing its ‘Building a New Scotland’ series of independence papers, which set out its vision for what Scotland would look like after independence.

So far 13 papers have been published in this series, covering government portfolios such as the economy, migration, the EU, the marine sector, social security, culture and education.

No independence papers have been published since John Swinney became First Minister.

Mr Swinney also scrapped the position of independence minister when he took over government earlier this year.

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The last of these papers, focusing on justice in an independent Scotland and costing £11,867 to produce, was published just days before Humza Yousaf announced his resignation as First Minister.

As the SNP is now a minority government in Holyrood, Ms Robison will need to rely on other parties to get her budget passed.

It is widely expected this support will come from either the Scottish Greens or the Scottish Lib Dems.

Almost immediately after her budget statement, Ross Greer MSP, the Greens’ finance spokesman, said his party would not be supporting the budget in its current form.

The Scottish Lib Dems previously said that independence spending was a red line for them, and they could only support an SNP budget if “not a penny” of it is spent on independence planning.