Scottish independence - The real issue

rockmonkeysc

If Scotland becomes independent then where will replace the Scottish BDS rounds?
They might have to have a round in England.

thekickingmule

The British Downhill Series or the British Driving Society?

Either way, in Scotland I imagine, being that even if they turn independant, it's the UK that's broken up, not Britain...

rockmonkeysc

If they don't have a couple rounds in Scotland then it will have to be renamed the Welsh Downhill Series.

schmako

I'm so farking sick of all these scottish retards thinking independence will mean anything! Alex Fishy and Nicola Even-More-Fishy are both total douchebags, I guess it shows how stupid everyone is if they listen to them.

But OT, it'd be a shame if they stopped the BDS here because of that garbage!

stubs

As you wont be able to use the £ what will the money be called. Will 100 Sturgeons make a Salmond

rockmonkeysc

You can't have our national downhill series when your the Peoples Democratic Socialist Republic of Scotland.

Northwind

RockmonkeySC wrote:

If they don't have a couple rounds in Scotland then it will have to be renamed the Welsh Downhill Series.

I lolled.

The Rookie

stubs wrote:

As you wont be able to use the £

Rethink time, they can use the £ if they want to...they'll just have no say at all in the running of the currency if they do.

CitizenLee

It'll be a poverty stricken sh*t hole when the oil eventually dries up.

This coming from someone who lives in the "oil capital" and works in the oil industry

Better to stay together but allow Scotland more control of itself, IMO of course.

Northwind

CitizenLee wrote:

It'll be a poverty stricken sh*t hole when the oil eventually dries up.

This coming from someone who lives in the "oil capital" and works in the oil industry

Economics says no- GDP and GNI without oil are more or less the same as the UK as a whole, spending just slightly higher... And that's not taking into account the lower deficit we'd have compared to the UK, or what could be done with the remaining oil revenues in the meantime, or for that matter the fact that all the current UK figures the comparisons are made with DO include oil. So it works out pretty reasonable.

stubs

The Rookie wrote:

stubs wrote:

As you wont be able to use the £

Rethink time, they can use the £ if they want to...they'll just have no say at all in the running of the currency if they do.

They can ask for a currency union but that would have to go through Parliament and the process has to start soon the vote is in autumn and if its a Yes that leaves less than 3 years to get things sorted. I dont know if a Tory govt would be that keen on spending the time and political capital to get such an unpopular act through both houses. At the same time whats left of the North Sea Oil and Gas needs to be divvied up and the liabilities of RBS and HBOS need to be untangled and thats going to take till about 2214. The lawyers will be the only winners there. Then there are companies that have offices in Scotland and England what do they do, do they become Scottish for the promised tax breaks or English for the security because the Scottish economy is going to be an unknown for quite a few years.

No one has mentioned whats going to happen to Westminster when the jocks have gone will constituency boundaries be redrawn to keep the same number of MPs. What will happen to Scottish born MPs with English constituencies do they have to resign because they are no longer English/Welsh.

Its all a lot more complicated than that political shyster Salmond makes out, he talks a good talk but with his madder ideas he could have Scotland looking like a worse version of Greece within 5 years.

markhewitt1978

stubs wrote:

No one has mentioned whats going to happen to Westminster when the jocks have gone will constituency boundaries be redrawn to keep the same number of MPs.

No; there would just be less MPs, there have been many calls to reduce their number anyway.

What will happen to Scottish born MPs with English constituencies do they have to resign because they are no longer English/Welsh.

Doubtful, there can't be many in that situation?

stubs

markhewitt1978 wrote:

What will happen to Scottish born MPs with English constituencies do they have to resign because they are no longer English/Welsh.

Doubtful, there can't be many in that situation?

Theres a few and with a coalition Govt and a General Election next year it could be an awkward question. Its looking like the Tories might just squeak in next year with a wafer thin majority and every seat will be vital.

markhewitt1978

Of course if Scotland votes yes in September this will cause problems since in May 2015 Scotland will not be independent and it's MPs will be up for reelection, but with the expectation they will not serve a full term.

The Rookie

stubs wrote:

The Rookie wrote:

stubs wrote:

As you wont be able to use the £

Rethink time, they can use the £ if they want to...they'll just have no say at all in the running of the currency if they do.

They can ask for a currency union

Rethink again, the rest of the UK could not stop them using the pound, in the same way the USA can't stop Zimbabwe using the US Dollar, that is not currency union, union would be where they had a degree of control or input to the control, I guess you could call it borrowing or theft of the currency depending on your viewpoint.

Northwind

The truth is currency union just makes sense for both parties. The RUK and Scotland will be essential trading partners, so a single currency is obviously a good thing. And currency union helps to ensure more parallel economic management- both nations retain more of a stake in the other. Also it reduces the disruption of separation.

And something that is rarely mentioned, post-independence the RUK's deficit as a percentage of GDP will rise significantly overnight. Depending on the outcome of negotiations, the national debt as a percentage of GDP will also rise- remains to be seen by how much, but it will rise. And without a currency union the Bank of England simultaneously loses the Scottish share of all of its asset reserves which are used to underwrite the currency. All of which is bad juju for the RUK, and which can be mitigated (for the first two) and avoided (for the third) with a currency union. So it's mutually very beneficial.

It's no surprise that those who say it can't happen are almost without exception anti-independence or part of the UK government. In deciding not to make a positive argument for the Union, Project Fear left themselves with nothing but negatives and scare stories, and we've seen that the facts aren't very important in the scare stories they choose...

Briggo

I love the Scottish Governments website on Scottish Independence, full of wishy washy promises and statements that mean either nothing or could mean anything, or they're making assumptions but putting them across as facts.

How do they expect people to decide on something so important based on "we'll improve childcare and make the tax system fairer"

What the farkin hell does that mean Salmond, how will you improve it and how will you make it fairer?

Kowalski675

CitizenLee wrote:

It'll be a poverty stricken sh*t hole when the oil eventually dries up.

This coming from someone who lives in the "oil capital" and works in the oil industry

Better to stay together but allow Scotland more control of itself, IMO of course.

To be fair, if they're going their own way then they shouldn't get the oil anyway - it belongs to the UK, which they won't be part of anymore...

Northwind

Does it bollocks, project fear had a crack at that one too but the international law on marine resources is very simple. To coin a phrase, "It's Scotland's Oil". The UK should just think itself lucky it's been able to nick the profits for 40 years eh. If Scotland had seen its fair share of that, maybe we'd be less keen to break away now

poah

I for one would welcome the change - I don't agree with how the country is being run by a government that wasn't voted in by the people of Scotland. I also don't mind paying a bit more tax to make sure the country is better off than it currently is.

The big thing that the better together campaign says is that we can't afford to go it alone so we must be a drag on the current UK government. if we go it alone then they should have extra cash. why do they want us to stay, what does Scotland provide the UK government that is so great.

I hope we get independence and get trident to fuck out of the Clyde and get the Westminster toffs out of our issues.



http://aye2014.wordpress.com/2013/12/20 ... /#more-231

spongtastic

I agree with getting rid of Trident, it's not an independant deterrant, we're paying billions to retain an outmoded military concept.

In a perfect world I'd prefer Scotland to stay part of the Union (save money changing everything over) have a singular financial settlement for all areas of the UK, and then remove Scots MPs from Westminster and let everybody manage their own affairs. There's four large financial drains on public spending that per head cost more than everywhere else combined, you just make yourself unfeasably unpopular if you actually point them out.

bompington

POAH wrote:

I for one would welcome the change - I don't agree with how the country is being run by a government that wasn't voted in by the people of Scotland

Nobody in my street voted (or at least admits to voting) for the SNP, so presumably we could secede from Scotland.

As for the use of the word "toffs" it's one of those keywords (like "pharmstrong") that indicates clearly that intelligent debate has been left behind.

markhewitt1978

Briggo wrote:

How do they expect people to decide on something so important based on "we'll improve childcare and make the tax system fairer"

What the farkin hell does that mean Salmond, how will you improve it and how will you make it fairer?

But there are two issues which are being completely intermixed and confused.

One the one hand you have what Scotland as a nation could do if it were independent, regardless of who was in power at the time.

On the other you have the SNP manifesto as to what *they* would do if they were the government of Scotland.

They are two entirely seperate things, it's not beyond the realms that if Scotland is independent they could vote in another Lab/Lib coalition government and not the SNP.

poah

bompington wrote:

POAH wrote:

I for one would welcome the change - I don't agree with how the country is being run by a government that wasn't voted in by the people of Scotland

Nobody in my street voted (or at least admits to voting) for the SNP, so presumably we could secede from Scotland.

As for the use of the word "toffs" it's one of those keywords (like "pharmstrong") that indicates clearly that intelligent debate has been left behind.

not really - toff is a class thing and a good description of the current leaders of the UK that clearly have no clue as to how the majority of the UK live.

your street is not representative of the country as a whole

Thewaylander

oooo polits,

i'm pro scotland to go.. then i don't have listen listen to them whinge so much, and if they go tits up its there own fault and they can't randomly blame the English..

markhewitt1978

Thewaylander wrote:

oooo polits,

i'm pro scotland to go.. then i don't have listen listen to them whinge so much, and if they go tits up its there own fault and they can't randomly blame the English..

Given that everything is always the previous governments fault, I expect this to continue in Scotland for at least 100 years.

bompington

POAH wrote:

bompington wrote:

POAH wrote:

I for one would welcome the change - I don't agree with how the country is being run by a government that wasn't voted in by the people of Scotland

Nobody in my street voted (or at least admits to voting) for the SNP, so presumably we could secede from Scotland.

As for the use of the word "toffs" it's one of those keywords (like "pharmstrong") that indicates clearly that intelligent debate has been left behind.

not really - toff is a class thing and a good description of the current leaders of the UK that clearly have no clue as to how the majority of the UK live.

your street is not representative of the country as a whole

Fair enough, if it was representative of the whole country at the 2011 election then about 23% of the street would have voted SNP ;-)
But then maybe that's because we're all toffs, and

toff is a class thing

and

intelligent debate has been left behind

would seem to me to be entirely consistent statements, as class issues are generally approached via emotion and prejudice (on all sides), not rational thinking.

poah

bompington wrote:

Fair enough, if it was representative of the whole country at the 2011 election then about 23% of the street would have voted SNP ;-)
But then maybe that's because we're all toffs, would seem to me to be entirely consistent statements, as class issues are generally approached via emotion and prejudice (on all sides), not rational thinking.

different classes of people have different views and different apathy's. The government as a whole is made up of people that don't represent most types of people. I suppose the major problem is the type of person that is attracted to politics

Northwind

bompington wrote:

Fair enough, if it was representative of the whole country at the 2011 election then about 23% of the street would have voted SNP ;-).

Ah now you know that's misleading, Scotland votes for Westminster parties in the UK elections, the SNP can't compete on a national scale so many supporters vote tactically instead. But they got an overall majority in the Scottish Parliament- a system that the designers admit was specifically chosen to prevent the SNP getting an overall majority

cooldad

Scotland is a country? I thought it was a character in a Mel Gibson movie.

rockmonkeysc

Scotland cant be independent, it's one of the nicest counties in England.