My column in The National today:
'What I can say with certainty is that GERS is no more useful now than it was when I first began to look at it' // @RichardJMurphyhttps://t.co/jhmElz8Ucy
— The National (@ScotNational) August 5, 2021
The annual fiasco is coming - and I am not expecting the data to be any better than it has been in recent years - when I described it as CRTAP - a completely rubbish approximation to the truth.
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Can you explain Richard why there is a revenue charge in the GERS figures for depreciation against capital projects. A very large charge!
Government accounting does include depreciation
But as this is a non-balance sheet model (single entry accounting is so much easier to fiddle) a depreciation charge makes no sense at all
Why would anyone expect GERS to be less or more useful compared to when you first started looking at it?
The methodology is the same. The margins for error are unchanged. The extents to which it passes the tests of the UKSA (it still does) is the same.
If GERS was a useful tool leading up to referendum 2014, then its usefulness is unchanged to this day. There is no reason for anyone to expect otherwise.
Casey
Richard is pointing this out because it may have escaped your attention that a lot of people won’t be so critical of GERS as they need to be. And they need to be.
If it forms the basis of a settlement with the Scottish government at independence then that could have huge ramifications. It will be a settlement based on dodgy data. Not a good start.
Anyhow, I thought that you were the compere of a rather meagre US pop music show in the 1980’s? Maybe you’re bit of out of your depth here?
GERS has never been a useful tool to anyone but the Tories and even then only for political rather than economic purposes. It presents an untrue and distorted picture of Scotland’s economy. How can it do otherwise when only about 4% of the data represent actual facts that can be proven by audit trail? And, as Richard points out, the absence of a balance sheet allows data to be made up or distorted. The greatest puzzle for me is the Scottish Gov endorse it annually when it damages their cause and facilitates a false understanding of the Scottish economy in the Scottish electorate.