Scottish Secretary Alistair Carmichael said nationalists shouldn\u2019t try to stop businesses publicly opposing independence ahead of the Sept. 18 referendum on whether to stay in the U.K.<\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters in London yesterday, Carmichael cited comments by Gavin Hewitt, the former chief executive officer of the Scotch Whisky Association, who told the Herald newspaper June 13 he had received \u00e2\u0080\u009cintimidating calls\u00e2\u0080\u009d from senior members of the pro-independence Scottish National Party.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf that\u2019s true, and we hear these stories ourselves, that doesn\u2019t help the debate,\u201d said Carmichael, the minister responsible for Scotland in the U.K. government. \u201cThis debate has got to include an awful lot more than just politicians. People need to hear the voice of business in particular, because business voices are voices that are trusted.\u201d<\/p>\n
Carmichael also referred to the online response to Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling\u2019s 1 million-pound ($1.7 million) donation to the anti-independence campaign for which he said she was \u201cquite frankly, monstered.\u201d<\/p>\n
Two business leaders have commented on independence in the past month. Ivan Menezes, CEO of drinks-maker Diageo Plc (DGE), said on May 30 that it was \u201cextremely important\u201d Scotland remains in the European Union. The same day, Ian Cheshire, CEO of retail group Kingfisher Plc, said a vote for independence would lead the company to \u201cpause\u201d investment as a result of uncertainties about Scotland\u2019s currency and EU membership.<\/p>\n
The SNP didn\u2019t respond to a request for comment.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Scottish Secretary Alistair Carmichael said nationalists shouldn\u2019t try to stop businesses publicly opposing independence ahead of the Sept. 18 referendum on whether to stay in the U.K. Speaking to reporters in London yesterday, Carmichael cited comments by Gavin Hewitt, the former chief executive officer of the Scotch Whisky Association, who told the Herald newspaper June 13 he had received \u00e2\u0080\u009cintimidating calls\u00e2\u0080\u009d from senior members of the pro-independence Scottish National Party. \u201cIf that\u2019s true, and we hear these stories ourselves, that doesn\u2019t help the debate,\u201d said Carmichael, the minister responsible for Scotland in the U.K. government. \u201cThis debate has got to include an awful lot more than just politicians. People need to hear the voice of business in particular, because business voices are voices that are trusted.\u201d Carmichael also referred to the online response to Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling\u2019s 1 million-pound ($1.7 million) donation to the anti-independence campaign for which he said she was \u201cquite frankly, monstered.\u201d Two business leaders have commented on independence in the past month. Ivan Menezes, CEO of drinks-maker Diageo Plc (DGE), said on May 30 that it was \u201cextremely important\u201d Scotland remains in the European Union. The same day, Ian Cheshire, CEO of retail group Kingfisher Plc, said a vote for independence would lead the company to \u201cpause\u201d investment as a result of uncertainties about Scotland\u2019s currency and EU membership. The SNP didn\u2019t respond to a request for comment.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[8,11],"class_list":["post-147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-business","tag-request","entry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agec-rdc.com\/en_us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}