If Scotland Goes

Taxes galore for Scotch makers

By Scheherazade Daneshkhu

Scotland’s £5bn whisky industry is a “sitting target” for higher taxes in an independent Scotland, researchers have warned, because the spirit cannot be made outside the country.

Val Smith, chairman of International Wine and Spirits Research, told the Financial Times that Scotch was vulnerable to revenue raising measures by an independent Scotland to fund its social programme.

“The easiest thing to tax would be to hit Scotch producers who can’t move their production base. They are a sitting target,” he said.

Whisky must be produced at a distillery and matured in oak casks in Scotland for at least three years to be able to call itself a Scotch.

There have already been calls for producers ...