I’d like to take this opportunity, in my first Orkney News column of 2024, to wish all readers a healthy and prosperous New Year.

Taking the subject of health, I know that it isn’t maybe being widely reported in Scotland, but south of the border six days of strikes by junior doctors across England came to an end at 7am on Tuesday morning, having begun on 3rd January. These damaging days of industrial action came about because the UK Government prioritised tax cuts for the wealthy over paying NHS staff fairly.

The strikes have caused disruption on a massive scale, and are in stark contrast to the situation in Scotland, where we have taken different choices and avoided a single day of NHS strikes. The Scottish Government budget gives the NHS a real-terms increase,  investing over half a billion in our frontline boards – taking total investment to £13.2 billion in the year ahead.

And if we look at prosperity, then moving away from a situation where we in the Scottish Government continue to mitigate as best we can the impacts of damaging UK Tory policies becomes more attractive by the day.

I know that many folk in Orkney look at the relative prosperity of their Nordic neighbours such as Norway and Denmark – and also at the infrastructure advances that have been made in the Faroes under Danish rule. In a speech on Monday, Humza Yousaf drew on a report that compared Scotland to some of these countries to show how we could prosper under independence compared to our situation being led by the Tories in an increasingly insular and broken Britain.

A new report by the Resolution Foundation has found that if the UK closed its income and inequality gaps to the same level as similar economies –  Australia, Canada, France, Germany and the Netherlands – Scottish households could be £8,300 better off.

However, using the same analysis for countries that are similar to Scotland – such as Denmark, Ireland and Finland – the difference for the typical Scottish household would be even greater would be £10,200 better off.

That could be the prize of independence.

No one is saying we would match the performance of these independent countries overnight, but being in control of our future would see us start catching up so our levels of prosperity become more normal, more like those of comparable nations. It is the growing inequalities within  the UK that make us the outlier as things stand.

And with a General Election likely towards the end of 2024, both Labour and the Conservatives agree that the UK should be out of the EU and the huge European single market – and they both want to cut vital inward migration.

These two examples demonstrate that for the two main UK parties, Westminster political interests will always override the economic interests of Scotland.

I can assure you all, looking ahead to this election year, that the SNP Scottish Government will always put Scotland, its economy, and its people first.

This is a regular column by SNP MSP Emma Roddick. All Highlands and Islands Regional MSPs have been offered the same space in The Orkney News to share their personal views.