Salmond pushed to guarantee currency Scotland would use

Scottish first minister Alex Salmond faced repeated demands during a key TV independence referendum debate last night to guarantee the currency an independent Scotland would use.

The currency issue has been one of the most important subjects during the campaign, which will end when millions of Scottish voters go to the polls in September.

During two hours of TV debate, Mr Salmond was repeatedly put on the ropes on the issue by Alistair Darling, former Labour chancellor of the exchequer and chairman of Better Together.

An eight-year-old, said Mr Darling, is able to identify “the flag, the capital and the currency” that is used by a country, but Mr Salmond is unable to offer guarantees.

The first minister rejected declarations by the Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats in London that they would rule out a currency union if Scotland said Yes.

Mr Salmond, having been pressed by a member of the 350-strong audience, said vetoing a currency union was “not a serious prospect” and was “a campaign tactic designed to scare people”.

However, Mr Darling said sterling “belongs to the United Kingdom, not to England, Scotland, Wales, or Northern Ireland”, adding that Mr Salmond had failed to answer legitimate questions.

An opinion poll published minutes before the debate began reported that 40 per cent of Scots who say they will definitely vote will vote Yes, 54 per cent will say No, while the rest say they are undecided.

Last night, the Better Together campaign was jubilant over Mr Darling’s performance, though Mr Salmond’s debate tactics provoked more than a degree of surprise.

Mr Darling, not noted for his debating skills and expected to lose the debate by a large margin, pressed the Scottish National Party leader throughout.

Opening his 12-minutes of questions, Mr Salmond demanded that the former Labour chancellor dissociate himself from a series of declarations made by Better Together figures.

During the course of the campaign, one Labour MP said jocosely that Scottish drivers would have to drive on the right side of the road, while one Tory minister warned of threats from outer space.

Mr Darling, surprised by Mr Salmond’s tactics, said he had “expected a grown-up debate” – a view that appeared to have been shared by many in the audience and by social media.

Late in the debate, both men faced a series of questions from members of the audience about the safety of pensions if Scotland decided to become independent. Mr Darling appeared to score points by saying that it surprised people who have paid national insurance all their lives that their money had not gone into a pension fund.

“The pensions that will be delivered will be paid by those people who are working at that time,” he said, adding that Edinburgh and London would have to reach a deal about past contribution rights.

Opening the debate, Mr Salmond said “few people, now very few people, dispute the fact that Scotland could be a successful independent country”.

Later, he caused Mr Darling problems when he repeatedly asked the Labour MP to say if he accepted – as British prime minister David Cameron had – that Scotland could be independent and successful.

Saying that Mr Darling clearly did not want to say that Scotland could be independently successful, Mr Salmond said he "felt like Jeremy Paxman questioning Michael Howard".

Replying, Mr Darling, rarely known for public flashes of humour, said: "You're more like Michael Howard [the former leader of the Conservative Party] rather than Jeremy Paxman."

Mr Salmond, referring to the success of the Commonwealth Games, said: “No fewer than 49 of the 71 competing countries and territories in the Commonwealth Games are either the same size or smaller than Scotland.

“In the European Union, no fewer than 12 of the 28 member countries are the same size or smaller than Scotland, and few if any of these countries possess the natural and human resources that Scotland is blessed with.”