I’M not sure the timing is great for grand claims about what an entirely untested and extremely high-risk plan could do for Scotland, in order to drive economic growth. Substitute UK for Scotland and does that not sound uncomfortably familiar?

We have just lived through days that demonstrated what happens when a band of ideological cranks get hold of an economy and a currency. The results have been so devastating that the whole operation has swung into reverse and the band leader is clinging to her job.

The moral of the story is powerful. Do not play fast and loose with other people’s businesses, jobs, pensions, savings, mortgages and life prospects in general. Yet at this very moment, another band of peculiarly Scottish ideologues unveils its own wafer-thin masterplan and invites laps of honour on the grounds it cannot possibly be worse than what’s just been visited upon us.

Well, actually, it could be – and anyway, that’s not really the point. While it took a fortnight for the Tories to retreat into the realms of relative sanity, there would be no such rapid turnaround for Scotland when every credible economist turned out to be right and the ideologues proved to be wrong.

That is the problem with economic arguments being concocted to serve a fixed political position. They don’t add up. No Scottish nationalist is motivated primarily by the economic case. It’s a fundamentalist belief and darn the consequences, which is a perfectly respectable position if honestly stated. It’s when they start to dress it up with an economic rationale that problems arise.

I suggest anyone tempted to think otherwise should seek out the summary of fiscal realities by Professor Ronald Macdonald, now circulating widely on social media. He is ranked among the top one per cent of the world’s economists with a specialism in currency, which makes him, in this context, the first person in Scotland who should be listened to and the last person on Earth the SNP wants to hear from.

In 150 seconds, he explains why “sterlingisation” – that is, the use of someone else’s currency with no control over it – would lead, within a short space of time, to “massive austerity policies”, devaluation of a Scottish currency if it ever arrives and much else besides, none of it good. That apolitical, exceptionally expert opinion demands attention, just as warnings against Liz Truss’s economic nonsense should have prevailed.

Indeed, if it is Scotland’s interest, rather than the SNP’s, that is at stake, why is a Scottish Government paper on such a critical subject not putting forward an analysis of risk as well as claimed reward? Instead of a propaganda exercise, why not have the intellectual confidence to foster a debate which might actually serve the useful purpose of public enlightenment?

Like previous papers supposed to accompany a referendum build-up, even if there is no referendum, yesterday’s effort is a re-hash of the same old assertions, notable for subjects it avoids rather than persuasive content. It remains perfectly possible to dislike the Tory Government and to believe Brexit was an idiotic piece of self-harm, without wanting to draw a border across a small island.

On that point alone, it's glib and easy to dismiss a border as “utter nonsense” but this scarcely accords with their own narrative. If there were different immigration policies, which is a central pledge, then border controls are inevitable. If Scotland is in the EU and England is not, then ditto.

Naturally, the assumption Scotland would walk into the EU runs through the paper without a shred of evidence to support it. In fact what they are offering is separation from our biggest trading partner and closest neighbour, pinned on crossing fingers that the EU would throw them a lifeline. Being outside one is careless; being outside both for an unspecified period is ridiculous.

It is Scotland’s misfortune that this level of debate persists when there is far more urgent business at hand – changing the Government rather than the constitution. Indeed, it seems somewhat absurd that so much attention is paid to the hypothetical when so many harsh realities are pressing in upon Scottish households.

Prime Minister Truss’s position is farcical but then so was her elevation. The impression that momentum was behind her served to bring on board Tory MPs who should have known better. In fact, most of them did know better but suspended disbelief in order to be on the winning side. It is impossible to imagine any of them actually believed in Liz Truss as a leader.

There should, of course, be a General Election rather than another internal Tory fix. The irresponsibility of those who elevated Ms Truss to a position for which she was so patently unfit should be punished without another chance to save their skins. In my dreams, monarchists and republicans could unite in encouraging King Charles to look closely at the rule book, as heads of state occasionally do.

In reality, we are lumbered with the Tories until a General Election is forced upon them and that intermission should be used to promote an alternative government driven by an entirely different set of values to the current one. Just as in the 1990s, Labour has to demonstrate competence and unity of purpose. It cannot rely on Tory failure alone, though it provides a good head start.

The craziness of what Ms Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng did has helped conceal the huge pressures which any government would have to navigate with great skill and care. Although matters were made much worse in the UK, the same challenges exist throughout Europe and are not going to improve any time soon, particularly if the Ukraine war continues. It is not a time for adding to the risks.

Scotland is not immune from these forces and while Ms Sturgeon and co may be gleeful about what the Tories handed them on a plate they will find, if it is ever put to the test, that their own diet of massive economic risk in pursuit of an ideological end is no more palatable.

Read more by Brian Wilson:

The double trouble that threatens to undo the SNP

As always with these people, the mistake was to get caught rather than the deed itself