The Big Scottish Independence Debate

[Oddquine]

The Scottish Secretary's reasons to vote NO!  Persuasive, you think ?

 

Below is the list of twenty points cited by Mr Carmichael as reasons to vote no:

1. As part of the UK we keep the strongest currency option – the UK pound.
2. Financial services companies can be headquartered in Scotland and enjoy access to large UK market and one set of UK rules.
3. Safer banks with the whole of the UK standing behind them.
4. Greater financial protection for savers and pensioners (FSCS).
5. The UK’s £860m cyber security programme protects online shopping, banking and business.
6. More competition in the larger UK means cheaper mortgages and insurance.
7. More spending per person in Scotland.
8. We share the cost of expensive and vital communications networks like UK broadband and the UK postal service.
9. A true domestic UK single market has no barriers with added bureaucracy or costs to hamper Scottish business.
10. With 60m people in the UK we share risks and spread costs.
11. We have highly skilled and integrated armed forces with one of the largest defence budgets in the world.
12. The UK uses our international influence to make a positive difference through alliances and relationships.
13. UK makes a vital contribution to humanitarian operations around the world.
14. Fiscal-revenue stream is steady, not volatile.
15. In MI5, MI6 and GCHQ we have world class security and intelligence services protecting everyone in the UK.
16. The single UK labour market means workers can move freely across the UK.
17. 200+ UK institutions, like the BBC and the Met Office, serve all of the UK and don’t have to be replaced.
18. A strong research base supported by shared infrastructure.
19. Highly skilled defence sector protects and creates quality jobs in Scotland.
20. Devolution offers the best of both worlds.

I dunno how much Project Fear has scared the Don't Knows in the 2014 Referendum into the YES camp.........but it has fairly hoist the UK Government on its own petard. They have done such a good job of rubbishing Scotland that they have had to guarantee to foreign investors that they would pay ALL the UK borrowing if we vote for Independence.....and we would owe the UK our share.  ROFLMAO!  So logically.that would be one certainty ahead of independence....we will be using sterling.

Edited January 13, 2014 by Oddquine

[Alex MacLeod]

The Scottish Secretary's reasons to vote NO!  Persuasive, you think ?

 

Below is the list of twenty points cited by Mr Carmichael as reasons to vote no:

1. As part of the UK we keep the strongest currency option – the UK pound. No reason for that to change
2. Financial services companies can be headquartered in Scotland and enjoy access to large UK market and one set of UK rules. Dont see that changing either
3. Safer banks with the whole of the UK standing behind them. Really...........Scotland can legislate for safer banks and less greed among those who control them.
4. Greater financial protection for savers and pensioners (FSCS). Already legislation in place for that.
5. The UK’s £860m cyber security programme protects online shopping, banking and business. Cyber security is a world undertaking not a UK one
6. More competition in the larger UK means cheaper mortgages and insurance. That'll be why its all going up at present
7. More spending per person in Scotland. Yeh till they abolish the barnet formula
8. We share the cost of expensive and vital communications networks like UK broadband and the UK postal service. No reason for that not to continue...........except they've sold of the postal service
9. A true domestic UK single market has no barriers with added bureaucracy or costs to hamper Scottish business. Cr@p
10. With 60m people in the UK we share risks and spread costs. Yep. The Scottish revenues do help balance the UK books
11. We have highly skilled and integrated armed forces with one of the largest defence budgets in the world. We wont need it to the present extent.
12. The UK uses our international influence to make a positive difference through alliances and relationships. No reason why Scotland cannot be influential on its own. We aldready have a worldwide trade network
13. UK makes a vital contribution to humanitarian operations around the world. Scotland should look at addressing her own poverty first
14. Fiscal-revenue stream is steady, not volatile. And can remain so
15. In MI5, MI6 and GCHQ we have world class security and intelligence services protecting everyone in the UK. Controlled and subsidised by USA
16. The single UK labour market means workers can move freely across the UK. That wont change any more than the single European market will change
17. 200+ UK institutions, like the BBC and the Met Office, serve all of the UK and don’t have to be replaced. Dont see that changing.
18. A strong research base supported by shared infrastructure. Research into what?
19. Highly skilled defence sector protects and creates quality jobs in Scotland. Is that the ones affected by the closing of airbases and the reduction and disbanding of other military units?
20. Devolution offers the best of both worlds. Except control will still be with Westminster.

I dunno how much Project Fear has scared the Don't Knows in the 2014 Referendum into the YES camp.........but it has fairly hoist the UK Government on its own petard. They have done such a good job of rubbishing Scotland that they have had to guarantee to foreign investors that they would pay ALL the UK borrowing if we vote for Independence.....and we would owe the UK our share.  ROFLMAO!  So logically.that would be one certainty ahead of independence....we will be using sterling.

[dougiedanger]

From the Guardian, on the scandalous waste of Scotland's North Sea oil resources.

Dude, where's my North Sea oil money?

For a few years, the UK enjoyed a once-in-a-lifetime windfall – only, unlike the Norwegians, we've got almost nothing to show for it.

Last Wednesday, every single Norwegian became a millionaire – without having to lift a lillefinger. They owe the windfall to their coastline, and a huge dollop of good sense. Since 1990, Norway has been squirreling away its cash from North Sea oil and gas into a rainy-day fund. It's now big enough to see Noah through all 40 of those drizzly days and nights. Last week, the balance hit a million krone for everyone in Norway. Norwegians can't take a hammer to the piggy bank, amassed strictly to provide for future generations. And converted into pounds, the 5.11 trillion krone becomes a mere £100,000 for every man, woman and child. Still, the oljefondet (the government pension fund of Norway) owns over 1% of the world's stocks, a big chunk of Regent Street and some of the most prime property in Paris: a pretty decent whipround for just five million people.

Wish it could have been you with a hundred-grand bonus? Here's the really nauseating part: it should have been. Britain had its share of North Sea oil, described by one PM as "God's gift" to the economy. We pumped hundreds of billions out of the water off the coast of Scotland. Only unlike the Norwegians, we've got almost nothing to show for it. Our oil cash was magicked into tax cuts for the well-off, then micturated against the walls of a thousand pricey car dealerships and estate agents.

All this was kick-started by Margaret Thatcher, the woman who David Cameron claims saved the country. The party she led still touts itself as the bunch you can trust with the nation's money. But that isn't the evidence from the North Sea. That debacle shows the Conservatives as being as profligate as sailors on shore leave.

Britain got nothing from the North Sea until the mid-70s – then the pounds started gushing. At their mid-80s peak, oil and gas revenues were worth more than 3% of national income. According to the chief economist at PricewaterhouseCoopers, John Hawksworth, had all this money been set aside and invested in ultra-safe assets it would have been worth £450bn by 2008. He admits that is a very conservative estimate: Sukhdev Johal, professor of accounting at Queen Mary University of London, thinks the total might well have been £850bn by now. That doesn't take you up to Norwegian levels of prosperity – they've more oil and far fewer people to divvy it up among – but it's still around £13,000 for everyone in Britain.

Hawksworth titled his 2008 paper on the subject: "Dude, where's my oil money?" We don't have any new hospitals or roads to show for it: public sector net investment plunged from 2.5% of GDP at the start of the Thatcher era to just 0.4% of GDP by 2000. It is sometimes said that the money was ploughed into benefits for the miners and all the other workers Thatcherism chucked on the scrapheap, but that's not what the figures show. Public sector current spending hovered around 40% of GDP from Thatcher through to the start of the banking crisis.

So where did our billions go? Hawksworth writes: "The logical answer is that the oil money enabled non-oil taxes to be kept lower." In other words: tax cuts. When the North Sea was providing maximum income, Thatcher's chancellor, Nigel Lawson slashed income and other direct taxes, especially for the rich. The top rate of tax came down from 60p in the pound to just 40p by 1988. He also reduced the basic rate of income tax; but the poor wouldn't have seen much of those pounds in their pockets, as, thanks to the Tories, they were paying more VAT.

What did Thatcher's grateful children do with their tax cuts? "They used the higher disposable income to bid up house prices," suggests Hawskworth. For a few years, the UK enjoyed a once-in-a-lifetime windfall; and it was pocketed by the rich. The revolution begun by Thatcher and Reagan is often seen as being about competition and extending markets. But that's to focus on the process and overlook the motivation or the result. As the historian of neoliberalism Philip Mirowski argues, what the past 30 years have been about is using the powers of the state to divert more resources to the wealthy. You see that with privatisation: the handing over of our assets at knock-down prices to corporations and supposed "investors", who then skim off the profits. The transformation of the North Sea billions into tax cuts for the wealthy is the same process but at its most squalid.

Compare and contrast with the Norwegian experience. In 1974, Oslo laid down the principle that oil wealth should be used to develop a "qualitatively better society", defined by historian Helge Ryggvik as "greater equality". Ten oil commandments were set down to ensure the industry was put under democratic control – which it remains to this day, with the public owning nearly 70% of the oil company and the fields. It's a glimpse of what Britain could have had, had it been governed by something more imaginative and less rapacious than Thatcherism.

If Scotland had held on to the revenues from North Sea oil, the question today would not be how it would manage solo, but how London would fare without its bankrollers over Hadrian's Wall. Oljeeventyr is how Norwegians refer to their recent history: the oil fairy tale. It conveys the magic of how in just a few decades, they have been transformed from being the poor Nordic neighbour to being the richest. We have no equivalent term for our North Sea experience, but let me suggest one: a scandal.

[robbylad]

Scotland, the only country in the world to strike oil and become poorer!

[starchief]

No menetion of massive taxes in Norway and a culture of being ashamed to claim benefits?  There are many differences between Scotland and Norway other than Thatcher.

[dougiedanger]

No menetion of massive taxes in Norway and a culture of being ashamed to claim benefits?  There are many differences between Scotland and Norway other than Thatcher.

 

Indeed, the main one being, as the report states, that they have 1 million in the bank for every citizen, while we have the debt and misery that are the legacies of Westminster financial mismanagement.

[+DoofersDad]

Does anyone actually see the Yes option winning in September?  I know there's still a while yet and a lot can happen in that time, but does anyone (whether they're for it or not), actually see the independence vote winning?

 

I'm afraid from what I can see, the No folk have this one wrapped up.

 

I can't see popular opinion moving to be in favour of a yes vote but that is quite a different thing to who will actually win the vote.  In my view, the best chance of a "yes" win will be due to those happy with the status quo simply not bothering to vote.  Those who are enthused by the campaign will generally be those who are in favour of independence and will go out to vote in force.  A perfectly believable scenario is that we get a low poll delivering independence when only 20% of the population or so actually vote "yes".  I suppose it is a fair argument to say that it is reasonable to assume that those who don't bother to vote don't mind what the outcome is, but it would hardly be a ringing mandate for change. 

 

For such a radical constitutional change it would be far better if there was an actual majority of the electorate voting for the change rather than a simple majority of those bothering to vote.  Regardless of which side wins, I hope there is a good turn out and that the winning side actually gets the votes of at least half the electorate.  Sadly, I think there is about as much chance of that as there is of ICT winnning the league this year.

[Sneckboy]

I know what you're alluding to, DoofersDad. A low turnout would be to the YES campaign's advantage due to the dynamic you stated, suggesting complacency/apathy from the status-quo brigade.

It must be remembered that the Conservatives 'won' the last General Election with only 23% of the electorate voting for them. But obviously there are far more options to vote for there as opposed to just YES or No in the referendum.

 

Your example of Independence from only 20% is perhaps a little on the low side as that would assume a very poor turnout of just 40%. I can see this getting around 70% come September.

I can't see either camp getting an overall majority so even in defeat the YES camp can claim a 'moral victory' due to there being less than half the electorate actually voting  

to remain in the Union.

 

A realistic example could be. Turnout 70%. Yes 40% of votes cast. No 60% of votes cast.

That translates into

Voted YES = 42% of electorate.

Voted No = 28% of electorate. 

Didn't vote = 30% of electorate.

 

A 'hollow win' for the NO's, giving Salmond grounds for a re-match!

 

[Oddquine]

 

Does anyone actually see the Yes option winning in September?  I know there's still a while yet and a lot can happen in that time, but does anyone (whether they're for it or not), actually see the independence vote winning?

 

I'm afraid from what I can see, the No folk have this one wrapped up.

 

I can't see popular opinion moving to be in favour of a yes vote but that is quite a different thing to who will actually win the vote.  In my view, the best chance of a "yes" win will be due to those happy with the status quo simply not bothering to vote.  Those who are enthused by the campaign will generally be those who are in favour of independence and will go out to vote in force.  A perfectly believable scenario is that we get a low poll delivering independence when only 20% of the population or so actually vote "yes".  I suppose it is a fair argument to say that it is reasonable to assume that those who don't bother to vote don't mind what the outcome is, but it would hardly be a ringing mandate for change. 

 

For such a radical constitutional change it would be far better if there was an actual majority of the electorate voting for the change rather than a simple majority of those bothering to vote.  Regardless of which side wins, I hope there is a good turn out and that the winning side actually gets the votes of at least half the electorate.  Sadly, I think there is about as much chance of that as there is of ICT winnning the league this year.

 

Can't disagree with that tbh....but that's the way the system works...and we in Scotland didn't make the system.........Westminster did!  However, the majority of the electorate thing is pretty much the same threshold thing we had in the 40% referendum in 1979....when the dead, and everybody who had left the country between compilation of voters' rolls,were included in the totals to make the threshold. The legacy of that one-off change to the norm still rankles in Scotland, as it smacks of loading the dice against the view which the Government opposes. 

 

Personally, I think voting should be compulsory in referenda.  I think it should be compulsory in General elections as well, but without PR in General elections, all that would do is give either Tweedledum, Tweedledumber or Tweedledumbest even more of a conviction they can do what they like and never mind their manifesto promises and what we would like.

 

I often think, and have said on some forums, that  it is really the Civil Service and advisors who run the country. The elected members produce their brainfarts....advisors come up with how to do them and it's the Civil Service which works out how to implement them.  The elected members and party or PM selected ministers are just figureheads. The politicians say "That looks good! that should increase our vote at the next election among our supporters" and nobody actually looks past the money saved to the misery caused. Nobody will ever convince me that Osborne and Alexander in Treasury.....or Darling and Brown before them sat down with  an envelope on the back of which they worked out the costings of financial brainfarts and the effects of them on us.

 

That being the case...why do we need professional politicians and political parties at all? Why do we need elections?  Why do we need the undemocratic Lords? Why not just stick pins in the voters roll every five years and, as we do with jury selection, pick however many voters, representing every constituency, and park them in Westminster for a fixed one-off term of five years.  They can get together, come up with ideas, which are not fixated first and foremost on what "the party" likes and will aid their continued employment at the next election, but by consensus as to the good of both the population and the country.....and pass them across to the people employed to make it work.......as the highly paid professional politicians do now?

 

Because I'm an old bugger, I remember the days of town councils and county councils...and frankly I thought they worked pretty well on the whole.......maybe because the members were there because they were interested in the community in which they lived and were not fighting each other to push party political dogma  or earn a rather large "part-time" salary.  It has always seemed to me that once you bring politics and money into the equation of a previously unpaid public service...you then get less public service and more self-service.

 

Am I cynical about modern Government? You betcha! 

Edited January 17, 2014 by Oddquine

[Charles Bannerman]

A low turnout would be to the YES campaign's advantage due to the dynamic you stated, suggesting complacency/apathy from the status-quo brigade.

It must be remembered that the Conservatives 'won' the last General Election with only 23% of the electorate voting for them. But obviously there are far more options to vote for there as opposed to just YES or No in the referendum.

 

 

 

A realistic example could be. Turnout 70%. Yes 40% of votes cast. No 60% of votes cast.

That translates into

Voted YES = 42% of electorate.

Voted No = 28% of electorate. 

Didn't vote = 30% of electorate.

 

A 'hollow win' for the NO's, giving Salmond grounds for a re-match!

And at the 2011 Scottish election the SNP got their overall parliamentary majority with 45.4% of the vote on a 50% turnout. That means that, by your own argument, 22.7% of the Scottish electorate - less than the Tories' 23% - gave them a "mandate" to impose on us these three years of the tedious crap which has been this Neverendum. As a result, 22.7% of the Scottish electorate who thought they would give the SNP a second chance to mismanage the Curriculum for Excellence, let Libyan terrorists out of jail and demoralise the health service find that they have also landed us with this massive distraction from life's far more serious issues.

I also suspect that there was more to waiting until 2014 than some kind of pathetic attempt to get everyone painting their faces blue on the 700th anniversary of Bannockburn (a mixed metaphor I know) plus the Ryder Cup and the Commonwealth Games and yet another bloody Homecoming with its caricature invasion of Yanks straight off the set of Brigadoon.

Because by 2014 I am sure the SNP are hoping that the silent majority, who really can't be arsed with this whole pantomime and are happy to get on with their lives as they are, will by then have got so fed up with it all that they won't bother voting.

And I could see Salmond having the hard neck to want to keep having votes until he gets the result he wants because most people have lost the will to live and the only ones left who can be bothered are his own chums and a wee cabal of Cybernats.

Edited January 17, 2014 by Charles Bannerman

[Yngwie]

 

A realistic example could be. Turnout 70%. Yes 40% of votes cast. No 60% of votes cast.

That translates into

Voted YES = 42% of electorate.

Voted No = 28% of electorate. 

Didn't vote = 30% of electorate.

 

 

Nobody spot the mistake?

[+DoofersDad]

 

 

A realistic example could be. Turnout 70%. Yes 40% of votes cast. No 60% of votes cast.

That translates into

Voted YES = 42% of electorate.

Voted No = 28% of electorate. 

Didn't vote = 30% of electorate.

 

 

Nobody spot the mistake?

 

Yep.  Another rigged ballot!

[+Wanderer]

Did I hear correct that Scotland would go to the back of the queue for EC membership and that entry would be contingent on acceptance of the Euro and open Schengen borders?

 

Apologies if this has been discussed already.

[Sneckboy]

 

 

A realistic example could be. Turnout 70%. Yes 40% of votes cast. No 60% of votes cast.

That translates into

Voted YES = 42% of electorate.

Voted No = 28% of electorate. 

Didn't vote = 30% of electorate.

 

 

Nobody spot the mistake?

 

Please, Yngwie, show me the error of my ways!

I don't follow,does my arithmetic not add-up?

 

100 folk in the electorate, say for simplicity. 70 turn out to vote = 70% turn-out. Therefore, 30% didn't vote.

 

And...of the 70 folk that voted, 3/5ths (60%) voted NO and 2/5ths (40%) voted YES.

60% of 70 people voting No = 42 people.

40% of 70 people voting YES = 28 people.

[The Mantis]

 

 

 

A realistic example could be. Turnout 70%. Yes 40% of votes cast. No 60% of votes cast.

That translates into

Voted YES = 42% of electorate.

Voted No = 28% of electorate. 

Didn't vote = 30% of electorate.

 

 

Nobody spot the mistake?

 

Please, Yngwie, show me the error of my ways!

I don't follow,does my arithmetic not add-up?

 

100 folk in the electorate, say for simplicity. 70 turn out to vote = 70% turn-out. Therefore, 30% didn't vote.

 

And...of the 70 folk that voted, 3/5ths (60%) voted NO and 2/5ths (40%) voted YES.

60% of 70 people voting No = 42 people.

40% of 70 people voting YES = 28 people.

 

Yngwie's too busy working   Find it yourself   

[The Mantis]

Did I hear correct that Scotland would go to the back of the queue for EC membership and that entry would be contingent on acceptance of the Euro and open Schengen borders?

 

Apologies if this has been discussed already.

http://www.yesscotland.net/news/experts-undermine-eu-scares

[The Mantis]

I was searching for a book about the merger and guess what, our very own 'Mr Angry' has been busy   

 

[The Mantis]

 

 

 

I also suspect that there was more to waiting until 2014 than some kind of pathetic attempt to get everyone painting their faces blue on the 700th anniversary of Bannockburn (a mixed metaphor I know) plus the Ryder Cup and the Commonwealth Games and yet another bloody Homecoming with its caricature invasion of Yanks straight off the set of Brigadoon.

 

You must be gutted that the British Government are going to be celebrating the centenary of the START of WW1 as well 

[Yngwie]

 

 

 

A realistic example could be. Turnout 70%. Yes 40% of votes cast. No 60% of votes cast.

That translates into

Voted YES = 42% of electorate.

Voted No = 28% of electorate. 

Didn't vote = 30% of electorate.

 

 

Nobody spot the mistake?

 

Please, Yngwie, show me the error of my ways!

 

You quite simply switched the Yes and No results when showing the % of electorate.

[Sneckboy]

Jeeeez...so I did!!

And to think I spent ages looking at the calculation! The error was staring me in the face! You're so cruel not telling me it was a typo and not my calculation!!!!  

[Yngwie]

[PaderbornCaley]

Some great and interesting arguments on both sides here. There‘s something i‘m wondering though if anyone can help me out.

What is the Yes plan for Military Personnel? Not speculation, but an actual plan? Will every single serving Scottish soldier get the opportunity to join a new Scottish Army? What happens to regiments such as Scots Guards (formed in 1640). Will current Scottish serving personnel get the opportunity to remain within the British Army if they wished to? It seems vague and a lot of Military jobs could be at risk.... or could they?

[Charles Bannerman]

 

What is the Yes plan for Military Personnel? 

 

It seems vague and a lot of Military jobs could be at risk.... or could they?

3 Scots - which is currently an infantry battalion - would become Hughie, Willie and Jimmy standing on an oil rig waving claymores 

Edited January 20, 2014 by Charles Bannerman

[dougiedanger]

Some great and interesting arguments on both sides here. There‘s something i‘m wondering though if anyone can help me out.

What is the Yes plan for Military Personnel? Not speculation, but an actual plan? Will every single serving Scottish soldier get the opportunity to join a new Scottish Army? What happens to regiments such as Scots Guards (formed in 1640). Will current Scottish serving personnel get the opportunity to remain within the British Army if they wished to? It seems vague and a lot of Military jobs could be at risk.... or could they?

 

Hopefully, independence will mean we no longer send our young to be cannon fodder for the UK's unnecessary wars.

[The Mantis]

Derek Bateman, with a heavy heart, reveals the not-very-surprising but nevertheless shocking news

 

The not-very-surprising but nevertheless shocking news

 

Derek Bateman asks why none of the MSM (mainstream Scottish media) have mentioned the not-very-surprising but nevertheless shocking news