Nicola Sturgeon has rejected claims that an independent Scotland would not be able to procure coronavirus vaccines as "nonsense".
Appearing on ITV's Good Morning Britain, the First Minister said coronavirus vaccines are not a “gift” from the UK Government to Scotland - but are rather procured on a joint four-nations basis with Westminster and the devolved nations.
Ms Sturgeon said: “The UK was still within the transition period when it procured the vaccine and that didn’t prevent it procuring the vaccine on a four-nations basis with England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, the way we procure the flu vaccine every year.
"That was done, nothing would have prevented that happening had we still been in the European Union.
Would you work with Alex Salmond? ' No'
— Good Morning Britain (@GMB) May 3, 2021
Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon says she is hoping to win a majority in the Scottish election and will 'convince' Scottish people to support Scottish independence. pic.twitter.com/Q3UZYUEA3w
“And of course the delivery of the vaccination programme in Scotland is down to the sterling efforts and fantastic work of NHS Scotland vaccinators and teams across the country and they have my deep and everlasting appreciation for the fantastic work that they are doing.”
GMB presenter Sean Fletcher said the delivery of the vaccination in Scotland was also down to the “procurement of the UK Government getting those vaccines”.
However, Ms Sturgeon told him to “hold on”, before stressing procurement was on a four-nations basis.
READ MORE: IN FULL: All the MSPs standing down at the Holyrood election
She added: “We do it voluntarily on a four-nations basis. It’s not a gift from the UK Government to Scotland. We choose to pool our efforts in that way. We do it with the flu vaccine every year.
“Scotland could if it chose procure the vaccine separately – health is devolved – but we chose to do it on a four-nations basis because it makes sense and if Scotland was independent it may well be that we still chose to do that.
“So these arguments that we couldn’t do these things if we were independent, frankly, are nonsense and don’t stand up to any scrutiny whatsoever.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Nicola Sturgeon said she will 'convince' Scottish people to support Scottish independence, and hopes to win a majority in the upcoming Holyrood election.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel