Swinney accuses UK Government of ‘anti-Scottish’ move blocking Chinese factory

The First Minister has accused the Labour UK Government of an “anti-Scottish” move by blocking a Chinese firm from opening a wind turbine factory in Scotland.

Ming Yang had proposed building the facility in Ardersier, near Inverness, with the potential for creating up to 1,500 jobs.

But the plans were blocked by Westminster over national security fears about the Chinese firm.

In the first televised debate of the Scottish election on BBC Debate Night, SNP leader John Swinney said: “My concern is that Scotland’s renewable industry is being undermined by the actions of a Labour Government that’s just turned its back on £1.5 billion worth of investment.”

He said: “It is welcoming Chinese investment into Hinkley power station south of the border. If that’s not an anti-Scottish move by a Labour Government, I don’t know what is.”

Mr Swinney was referring to a partnership in 2016 involving China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN) and EDF at Hinkley power station in Somerset.

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar questioned the national security challenge involved.

He said: “Are you honestly saying that, as First Minister of Scotland, you would ignore a national security briefing that says there’s a national security challenge coming from investment from China?”

Mr Swinney said: “Why is investment allowed at Hinkley power station and not Scotland?”

SNP campaign manager and constitution secretary Angus Robertson told journalists after Sunday’s debate that he did not “believe for a nanosecond” such a project elsewhere in the UK would be rejected.

“I do not believe for a nanosecond that if this project were to be happening in the rest of the United Kingdom it would have been blocked in the same way,” he said.

“I think it would have gone ahead because of the long list of investment decisions, including in nuclear power, that the UK Government has been prepared to greenlight in the United Kingdom.”

Asked if he could back up his claims, Mr Robertson said it was his “opinion”.

He said: “I think the UK Government has been prepared to make a decision that is extremely damaging for the Scottish economy and for our position dealing with the opportunity, firstly, of renewables, but also our responsibility to deal with climate change.”

Scottish Secretary Douglas Alexander also told journalists that Mr Swinney had “lived down to expectations”, accusing him of trading in “the basest politics of prejudice”.

“National security is a serious issue in these serious times and there was a fundamental lack of seriousness in the way John Swinney addressed a question regarding the national security responsibilities of the UK Government,” he said.

Mr Alexander said that the First Minister had engaged in “hostility towards our friends and neighbours in the United Kingdom”.

The site was opened in the 1970s to build offshore platforms but closed in 2001 and has been vacant since.