State pension 'at serious risk' after Scottish independence

State pensions and benefits are at “serious risk” from Scottish independence unless the UK Government continues helping administer them, a report backed by SNP ministers has warned. 

 Nicola Sturgeon, the Deputy First Minister, reacted by insisting that a separate Scotland could share only the parts the British welfare state it wanted, despite expert warnings that it would be “extremely difficult” to pick and choose. 

But opposition parties said the report’s conclusions, which followed months of attacks on the Coalition’s welfare reforms, was a watershed in the referendum debate as even Nationalists were starting to realise separation made “no sense”. 

The study, by the Scottish Government expert working group on welfare, said creating a new system immediately after independence would be so complex that there would be a “significant” chance claimants would not receive their money.

This would also affect millions of pensioners and welfare claimants in England, the report claimed, because their payments are processed at Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) offices in Scotland. 

The group argued that Scottish ministers should get their UK peers to agree to “transitional” arrangements whereby the DWP would help continue running the welfare state north of the Border for two or three years after independence.