Government silent on role in Scottish independence blog row

Think tank claims government asked authors to remove blog from university website

The UK government has failed to deny an accusation that it asked two authors to remove a blog post on Scottish independence published by the London School of Economics because it did not reflect Westminster’s view on the issue.

In a blog post published by LSE on 30 March, authors Geoffrey Chapman, an economist at the UK Department for International Trade, and Richard Mackenzie-Gray Scott, a research fellow at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law, argued that although there would be “immediate economic costs” if Scotland broke away from the UK “the long-term view suggests there are benefits”.