THE annual cost of renewing and maintaining Trident could instead fund the training of almost 3,000 public-sector workers, new analysis published today has found.

The Scottish National Party, which is opposed to the nuclear missiles based at the Clyde naval base on the west coast of Scotland, says £180 million per year is being “wasted” on Trident.

This sum of money could be used to train almost 750 nurses, 370 police officers, 1,500 teachers, and 235 doctors with the tools of their trades in Scotland, the party says.

SNP MSP Bill Kidd, who is co-president of the parliamentarians for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament group in Scotland, said: “The millions of pounds in taxpayer money that is being wasted by Westminster could go towards making sure our public services come first; building hospitals, training public-sector workers, improving schools and lifting people out of Tory-inflicted poverty.”

In 2015 Scottish Labour’s conference voted in favour of advocating the scrapping of Trident. The party included this position in its platform for the 2016 Holyrood elections.

But in the following year’s general election, Scottish Labour’s manifesto stated that the Scottish Parliament has no jurisdiction over defence and that UK Labour Party policy was still in favour of nuclear renewal.

Since then, however, the party has elected lifelong CND member Richard Leonard as its leader. At a hustings event in September 2017, he said: “I do not think Trident should be renewed, but there must be protections in place for the workforce.”