Mervyn King will weigh in on Scottish independence – but not yet

Alex Salmond is in London to give a speech explaining what he would do with fiscal autonomy.  My colleague Faisal Islam just asked Mervyn King for a comment on how much he looked forward to being lender of last resort to an independent Scotland and the Governor of the Bank of England couldn’t have been more tight-lipped. “I don’t want to say anything about that at the moment,” was the less than grabby response. But he did promise that the Bank of England WOULD chip in on this debate at some point and it will be quite a moment when they do.

David Cameron is off to Scotland tomorrow for some face time with Alex Salmond. The First Minister’s office asked for the meeting and eventually got it but there is a mis-match between the way the two sides are billing the event. David Cameron’s team is talking of a “courtesy visit” but Alex Salmond’s team is saying this is the forum where they expect the deal over the referendum to be struck.

No. 10 insists the detailed talks on lending Scotland powers to have a referendum and agreeing the format etc is a matter for Michael Moore, the Scottish Secretary, who met Alex Salmond on Monday.

As for the pro-union cross-party campaign itself, we seem to be no nearer the outline of one and the Tories are clearly hoping, David Cameron’s speech in Scotland tomorrow aside, that Scottish Labour will do the heavy lifting – deploying Alistair Darling and others in the months to come. Gordon Brown, I hear, will weigh in on the economics of the independence/union row but not for a while yet.

One Labour big beast wandering the corridors of the Lords last night said that there was one surefire way to save the union and it involved parachuting Rangers and Celtic into the English league. Maybe Alex Salmond would pocket that prize as proof of the ever-lasting “social union” he talks about to take the fear out of independence.

Gary Gibbon tweets at @GaryGibbonBlog