Question reference: S4W-14787
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow Anniesland, Scottish National Party
- Date lodged: 13 May 2013
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Current status: Answered by Keith Brown on 22 May 2013
Question
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-05467 by Bruce Crawford on 5 March 2012, whether it will provide an update of its estimate of Scotland's share of the cost of (a) operating and (b) replacing the Trident system.
Answer
The Scottish Government estimates that, based on 2011-12 UK defence spending figures and on UK Ministers’ statement that in-service costs for Trident are around 5 to 6% of the total defence budget, Scotland’s 8.4% population share of operating costs for the Trident nuclear weapons system is around £170 million per annum.
In addition to those operating costs, the Scottish Government estimates that Scotland’s population share of the replacement costs for the UK Government’s nuclear deterrent programme, outlined most recently in The United Kingdom’s Future Nuclear Deterrent: 2012 Update to Parliament, is between £1.26 and £1.68 billion at 2006-07 prices.