The Confederation of British Industry muffed its lines on Scottish independence last week, attempting to register with the Electoral Commission to enable it to campaign against and then attempting to change its mind when faced with resignations from members who insist that they – and prefer that their trade association – should remain politically neutral.

There are some businesses – notably those that depend on UK defence contracts, such as Babcock, owners of the Rosyth dockyard – which would be significantly, and adversely, affected by a yes vote in Scotland.  But outside these, the widespread business opposition seems to be based mainly on vague expressions of unease which do not seem to have much specific content.

The Weir Group – a Scottish based global provider of equipment for mining and oil exploration, and one of the country’s most successful firms – commissioned a report on the business implications of Scottish independence.  The report provides a sensible and balanced if unsympathetic discussion.  And the natural conclusion is that there aren’t many business implications.  A company such as Weir operates globally and would continue to do so.  It exports from Scotland, and imports to it, and on the assumption that an independent Scotland because an EU member, which is a reasonable working assumption, it would continue to do so much as it does now.

Concern is expressed about borrowing costs.  But while a Scottish government would expect to pay more for its borrowing than the UK government, reflecting unfamiliarity and inequality, it is difficult to see why this premium should apply to Scottish based companies.  Look at multinational companies with headquarters in small countries, like Nestle, or Novo Nordisk, or Philips:  they borrow in multiple currencies, at rates which reflect their own financial strength, rather than that of the country from which they come.  And the same is true of borrowers in countries with mismanaged finances – like Zara, Fiat or Jefferson Smurfit.

The discussion becomes drawn into arcane territory.  Concern on limitations on the availability of group relief if there were separate corporation tax administrations between the two countries; worries about the implications of a – bizarre – EU directive which treats cross-border pension schemes differently from those that operate in a single member state.  You don’t buy or sell a house by reference to the light fittings, and the toothbrush holder, and you don’t make constitutional decisions that way either.  Thus central truth is something the wilting ‘No’ campaign has failed to grasp.

When Alliance Trust and Standard Life announce they are making contingency plans to shift the focus of their operations to England, it is hard to work out the basis of their fear.  Currency issues – global financial centres trade globally, and deal in whatever currencies their customers demand.  How else would Luxembourg have been, or Hong Kong and Dubai become financial centres?  And the people who claimed that London would lose its role as European financial centre if Britain stayed out of the euro could not have been more wrong.  An investment trust based in Scotland would continue to hold assets around the world and have its shares listed in London, and Standard Life would issue contracts in sterling to policyholders who wanted them in sterling, which would probably be most of them.

A Scottish government might correct its financial sector by introducing duty regulation, but there is no suggestion that it would, and it would have strong incentive not to do so.  The main source of duty regulation appears to be the EU, whose attractive investment fund managers directive has been (to no useful purpose) costly to Alliance Trust and whose solvency II directive is (to no useful purpose) costly to Standard Life.

No one is going to the Scottish ballot box in September with concerns about investment fund depositories, pension fund actuarial deficits, or group relief under corporation tax at the front – or even at the back – of their minds.  There are important implications for business in Scotland in the independence debate, but they are not these.  It is possible to describe an independent Scotland which would build a better business sector, less focussed on London as dominant commercial centre, made more vibrant by the energy and self confidence which greater devolution has already made evident in Edinburgh.  It is also possible to describe an independent Scotland cursed by a mixture of the entitlement based culture into which municipal socialism in the west of Scotland _____ with the crony capitalism and overweening ambition which nearly destroyed the country’s financial sector.  If Scots are to cast their votes on economic issues at all, this is the choice that should govern their decision.