Scotland

[blingo]

The Spanish have already said they will veto any application from Scotland to join the EU. So they won't be joining the EU if they vote yes anyway.

Yes, because an independent Scotland would give the Basques ideas, so the Spanish would want to squash the new state as thoroughly as they could to ensure everyone sees it is a bad idea to leave the mother country. I had not, until now, considered that part of the subject, so excellent point made, Mr B.

Spot on Rupert. The Catalans are watching this with baited breath and praying for a yes vote, even though their election will be illegal. The grass is always greener, until you take off the polarised lenses.    :008:

[Fernhurst]

Here's an opinion piece by Nobel Prize winning (Economics) Paul Krugman in the NY Times about Scotland's quixotic bid for "independence": http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/08/opinion/paul-krugman-scots-what-the-heck.html

Very reasoned piece.... But I need to ask why the yes voters are not influenced by reason??
Salmond has whipped his sheeplikes with powerful rhetoric over time and whoever wins next week will be left with a former opponent smouldering with discontent which may take generations to heal.

Dangerous, dangerous man who everybody should vote for wholeheartedly if he manages to gain his goal. Why????...... Because he must be held to account when the economic realities start to kick in. He must not be allowed to walk away.

Love Scotland...love the Scots, hate Salmond and what he's done to the Anglo-Scot relationship and now the long term damage caused to his own countrymen.

[Bill2]

It seems to me that the real debate has only begun over the past few days as the facts have started to come out. In the event of a "yes" vote, England would lose political clout but the consequences for Scotland would be much worse. I suspect they'd want to come back after the truth emerged but it couldn't be like that. But if they stay with us they'll never know and the idealistic rumblings would continue.

Regional identity within the greater whole is the best way in my view. It works in other countries - and the same goes for Europe but that's another topic!

If it does end up in "Devo-max", the issue of Scottish votes in Westminster over English/Welsh/N.I. affairs would have to be urgent addressed.

Sad person that I am I have already written to my MP on the West Lothian situation, so if there is a NO vote need to watch this and I would urge everyone to write to their MP and David Cameron that it must be a condition of devo max that any Scottish MPs do not take part in debates that does not effect Scotland.

[blingo]

Here's an opinion piece by Nobel Prize winning (Economics) Paul Krugman in the NY Times about Scotland's quixotic bid for "independence": http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/08/opinion/paul-krugman-scots-what-the-heck.html

Very reasoned piece.... But I need to ask why the yes voters are not influenced by reason??
Salmond has whipped his sheeplikes with powerful rhetoric over time and whoever wins next week will be left with a former opponent smouldering with discontent which may take generations to heal.

Dangerous, dangerous man who everybody should vote for wholeheartedly if he manages to gain his goal. Why????...... Because he must be held to account when the economic realities start to kick in. He must not be allowed to walk away.

Love Scotland...love the Scots, hate Salmond and what he's done to the Anglo-Scot relationship and now the long term damage caused to his own countrymen.

Problem is Mr F that Salmond won't be held accountable, he will wash his hands of politics if it all goes pear shaped and simply walk away making multiple excuses as to why this that or the other failed in his eyes, and that he tried his best. He will then probably move to Spain on a fat salary from the Spanish government to explain to the Catalans why independence is a bad idea lol.

[Holders]

Salmond is a very clever operator and will no doubt have many reasons to blame others over the coming years if he does not get his way. Should it happen, I very much suspect that the Scots would soon regret separation but would never get to know what it would entail unless it should happen so he'll be able to argue for years to come. 

Interesting that today North Korea came out in favour! With such friends, Mr. Salmond...

[Forever Fulham]

Another point of view from a respected U.S. jurist and author, Eric Posner:



Next week, Scottish voters will decide whether to declare independence from the United Kingdom. Scottish secession once seemed like a bizarre lost cause, but polls have tightened, setting off alarms in England and throughout the world. Critics outside Scotland think that Scottish independence is a crazy idea for the Scots and a bad example for the world, encouraging other separatist movements in less peaceful regions, with turmoil and financial ruin the sure result. But the commentators are wrong. Scotland should go free if that's what the Scots want.

The brief against independence is, at first sight, strong. The Scots already enjoy a great deal of autonomy within the United Kingdom. Although the U.K. parliament is the supreme source of law throughout Great Britain, the Scottish legislature makes many of the laws that govern Scotland, and Scottish courts enforce them. Unlike many secessionists, Scottish nationalists can't complain that they're being forced to learn someone else's language or that they have no control over how their children are educated. Scotland receives more money from the U.K. than its citizens pay out in taxes. And a Scottish divorce would be a messy, lengthy process that would distract political leaders for years.

The benefits of a large country are of diminishing significance in a world of free trade and relative peace.

Moreover, independence for Scotland will leave lots of victims in its wake. The many Scots who oppose independence will be forced to live in an independent Scottish state they reject, or move to England. They won't be able to start their own state and secede from Scotland. The English population will also lose the benefits of living in a larger country. Larger countries tend to be richer and safer. Smaller countries get pushed around. Although the Scottish population is a small fraction of the current U.K. population, the Scottish economy is not negligible, and Scottish territory represents a large fraction of the U.K..

We in the U.S. could also be hurt by Scottish secession. The United Kingdom has been a loyal and powerful ally of the United States in many international conflicts—against Communists, Islamic terrorists, and other foreign ogres. A disunited kingdom, embroiled for years in negotiations over the division of the country, would be a weak and distracted ally.

In the face of such arguments, some commentators blame the secessionist impulse on childish resentment at England, which is widely if falsely perceived as a bully, and emotional appeals to nationalist sentiment by scheming politicians.

But while it's true that Scottish nationalists often make mystical arguments (as nationalists always do), the case for independence is based on serious policy considerations. Some Scots believe that independence would give Scotland sole ownership of valuable oil deposits off its coast in the North Sea. Although those resources may well be almost depleted, it is possible that advances in oil-extraction technology would enable Scotland to create an oil-financed welfare state like Norway's.

More importantly, if Scotland were independent, Scots would control the whole array of policy instruments that Scotland now shares with the rest of the U.K.—above all, taxing and spending. The Scots would be able to govern themselves however they want—and that includes putting into place the more generous welfare state that the more right-leaning English public has denied them.

Against the real benefit of greater autonomy, the costs of leaving the U.K. seem abstract. In general, bigger countries are safer than small countries, but there is no serious threat to states of comparable size, or smaller, to a new Scottish state—including Switzerland, Norway, Denmark, and tiny Iceland. Unlike Ukraine and Georgia, Scotland has nothing to fear from its neighbors. And because Scotland will continue to enjoy free trade with Britain, Europe, and the rest of the world, it—like Switzerland, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland—will continue to prosper.

Both nationalists and their critics have obscured the stakes by presenting the question of Scottish independence as either/or when in fact it is a matter of degree. As noted, Scotland already enjoys a fair amount of autonomy within the United Kingdom. Recently, the British government offered Scotland more autonomy—more control over taxes and spending—if it remains in the United Kingdom. If Scotland declines this offer, it will almost certainly be allowed to join the European Union, and so remain a peer of the U.K. in that larger supra-national entity.  Scotland will probably be able to remain in a currency union with the U.K. despite English threats to expel it; if not, Scotland could join the euro or, as Paul Krugman advises, go it alone.

No one plans to build a fence around Scotland. Trade and investment will continue as before. Very likely free movement across the border between England and Scotland will continue as it does among most of the sovereign states of Western Europe. There is a sense—an irony not lost among the anti-secessionists in light of the nationalist rhetoric—that Scotland is not so much declaring independence as abandoning its status as vassal to the U.K. so that it can become a vassal to the EU.

This might really seem crazy. Why exchange one overlord for another? The population of the EU is 13 times that of England and Wales, and so the influence of the Scots on EU policy will be commensurately smaller. But the move actually makes sense. In lying to the left of England, Scottish political sentiment is closer to the continent's. European policies will be closer to Scots' preferences than the English policies that they currently reject. Scotland and France have enjoyed a centuries-long dalliance that England repeatedly thwarted; perhaps the advance of communication and transportation technology finally will allow the two countries to consummate their relationship.

If independence is in the self-interest of the Scots, critics can argue that independence is selfish rather than crazy. Many people worry that Scottish independence would inspire other secessionist movements to redouble their efforts, and in other parts of the world national divorces are less pretty than what we are seeing in the U.K. Secessionist groups have a nasty habit of complaining that they are deprived of self-determination and then, once they have their own state, expelling or repressing their own ethnic minorities. The logic of secession seems to portend an unraveling of the state system until the world consists of a billion sovereign households that are constantly at war with each other.

But it is most unlikely that Scottish independence will plant an idea into the heads of nationalists that is not already there. Scotland's secessionist movement fits into a larger trend of state fragmentation that goes back more than a half century. Since World War II, the number of states worldwide has increased from about 70 to almost 200. Much of this was due to the collapse of empires, but in the last 20 years numerous states have hatched simply because people no longer wanted to live with each other. Five countries rose from the ashes of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, and 15 from the Soviet Union; since then, additions include Eritrea, East Timor, Kosovo, and South Sudan. The Czech Republic and Slovakia split, as did Serbia and Montenegro. Secessionist movements have also made headway in Spain, Italy, and Belgium, and can be found in numerous other countries throughout the world.

The explanation for this trend is that the benefits of a large country—mainly, security and a large internal market—are of diminishing significance in a world of free trade and relative peace. Under these conditions, nationalist movements based on ethnic and linguistic difference, and cultural values, are likely to flourish. Countries split apart but they remain relatively secure (unless your name is Ukraine or Georgia), and able to trade with each other and others.

The size of a state reflects an equilibrium between constantly shifting centrifugal and centripetal forces. People at once want the economic and security advantages of being part of a large country, and chafe at the loss of political control. How these forces play out in particular regions is too complex for outsiders to understand. Where national aspirations are heartfelt, you're not going to get far telling them that they can't start a new state because of the theoretical possibility that bad actors elsewhere in the world will imitate them. Let the Scots have their Scotland.

Eric Posner, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, is a co-author of The Executive Unbound: After the Madisonian Republic and Climate Change Justice.

[Holders]

There are a couple of assumptions in the above that don't ring true: 1. There is no guarantee that Scotland would be able to easily join the EU. 2. The border question. If Scotland separates from the UK and is outside the EU then we would need to establish border controls. If it joins it would be obliged to sign up to Schengen (which we opted out of but new members have to join); again, border controls.

[blingo]

Watch this. End of yes vote.
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=798709416847541&fref=nf

[ron]

Watch this. End of yes vote.
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=798709416847541&fref=nf

It's good to see sense spoken instead of Salmond's pie in the sky.

Scottish independence may seem a good idea to some after a few pints and the usual English bashing with a few verses of "Flower of Scotland", but  in the real world sticking to the Act of Union has got to be the best bet for all of us.....and who knows, perhaps our future together will be a more prosperous one outside that dreadful super bureaucracy just a Channel away ..........?

[Fernhurst]

Watch this. End of yes vote.
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=798709416847541&fref=nf

Thanks Blingo, all Jim states is very true and has been self evident for the entire campaign, however, Svengali Salmond has managed to purport a dream of utopia to the more gullible Scots electorate who hopefully within the last week have woken up to his pipe dream.

[Holders]

Beautifully spoken.

This bloke should be wheeled out all over Scotland this week.

[FFC1987]

A lot of things are assumed in that article as stated above. The oil for instance. What if it is depleted enough that it creates a shortfall. This is 60% of the Scots budget. It holds it together. The yes vote has failed on numerous occasions to address what happens in such a shortfall. Where the cuts take place is anyone's whim.

I'm literally sick to the teeth of the arrogance of the yes voters now. The heckling in debates, the false wisdom associated to Salmond and the utter recklessness that any argument for No is fear mongering or said by someone on the take it breath taking. Eve if its a No, this debate isn't over and will hold serious counter movements after. As someone else stated, do we get a referendum on whether we want them after all this?

[Holders]

If it goes "no", the "yesses" will continue whinging and no-one will ever know how bad it would have been for them.

Maybe it would be best for them to go and we can start saving money. Trouble is, they'll all be coming here for work.

[FFC1987]

If it goes "no", the "yesses" will continue whinging and no-one will ever know how bad it would have been for them.

Maybe it would be best for them to go and we can start saving money. Trouble is, they'll all be coming here for work.

Apart from the interim period, won't they have to get visa's etc?

[Nick Bateman]

I would hope they see independence is the best way forward for Scotland, instead of being the first place for Westminster to bring in an experimental scheme.  It may also lead to the break up of the flawed bureaucratic EU and a return to governance of the people by the people.

[Forever Fulham]

People vote their pocketbook.  Promise them two cars in every garage, and a chicken in every pot, and they'll vote your way.  It's the same everywhere, isn't it?

[FFC1987]

People vote their pocketbook.  Promise them two cars in every garage, and a chicken in every pot, and they'll vote your way.  It's the same everywhere, isn't it?

True. Just felt more frustrated than usual with the lying slur campaigns on this occasion.

[MasterHaynes]

Watch this. End of yes vote.
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=798709416847541&fref=nf

Thanks Blingo, all Jim states is very true and has been self evident for the entire campaign, however, Svengali Salmond has managed to purport a dream of utopia to the more gullible Scots electorate who hopefully within the last week have woken up to his pipe dream.

Salmond made sure he had plenty of Gullible voters by extending the votes to include 16 & 17 year olds, how Cameron agreed to this I don't know, clearly he never went through a utopian socialist phase like most 16 year olds except the young William Hague.

Prof Eric ignores a key point when assuming that currency union will take place, having had all the politicians say absolutely not and Salmond grinning back saying Oh yes you will, will be the building resentment of the English in this whole process who have had no say. Any political party that effectively underwrites Scotlands debts and allows them to raise money cheaply at our expense will soon see the backlash at the Polls. I'm sure young Nigel is waiting in the wings to gather in the anti Scots votes as well as the anti EU votes

[Fernhurst]

Oh how I wish the poll was tomorrow and we were spared Wee Eck's closing FREEDOM speech.

Let's get it on and begin the endless recriminations.

[Deanothefulhamfan]

Scotland is a beautiful country.... There are bad parts as there is with everywhere, but there is a lot more good.

If Scotland vote Yes it will be a complete disaster for them and the rest of the UK.I think the "don't know" will come out in force and vote no, and in the end it will be around 57 43 in terms of no, but it is a bit too close at the moment.