More than £600,000 was spent on the Scottish Government’s blueprint for independence, SNP ministers have revealed.
A total of 165,000 copies of the White Paper were requested by members of the public with 91,102 downloaded from the internet and 75,386 distributed in hard copy. This cost a total of £407,000.
A further £156,341 was spent on a publicity blitz associated with the White Paper, while £60,000 more went on events associated with the White Paper.
It is estimated the cost of running the referendum itself will come in at around £13 million.
Nicola Sturgeon has previously said the volume of the White Papers issued was testament to the appetite for information that existed around the referendum debate.
But Scottish Conservative deputy leader Jackson Carlaw said: “It’s been well documented that the SNP is one of the wealthiest parties in the UK.
“It’s therefore unacceptable that it should have used taxpayers’ money to fund its obsession with breaking up Britain, particularly on a White Paper which in its assumptions on oil prices proved to be a complete fantasy.
“People in Scotland did not expect to be the funders of partisan, fanciful Scottish Government propaganda.”
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