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The Big Scottish Independence Debate


Laurence

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OK, Charles........so you explain to us the certainty we will get from remaining in the Union, (over and above  the certainty of continuing austerity for the less well off, the continuing increasing rich/poor gap, the continuing growth in food banks, the continuing and increasing costs of maintaining a nuclear "deterrent", the continuing and increasing costs of maintaining the lifestyles of 1500 elected and unelected nincompoops, and the continuing burgeoning debt levels) which will be so compelling that they will be an obvious improvement on the uncertainty of being a rich country, with a population full of clever people like you and me, a surplus in overseas trade, increasing foreign investment, and without WMDs, with the choice as to whether a war is just or not.....and without the costs of maintaining the UK Government and higher echelon civil civil servants and the bankers in the manner to which they have become accustomed?

 

Or you could just answer the questions I asked you previously.......

 

.if Scotland votes NO....

 

With the Government and UKIP squaring up to the European Union, and a promised referendum, will the UK remain a member of the EU?

 

With Westminster politicians threatening to uproot the Barnett formula and cut Scottish funding by £4 billion, how secure are Scottish finances after a No vote?

 

Will the UK  still be one of the most unequal countries in the developed world?

 

Can Scotland trust Westminster to deliver any further devolution, given that depends on the votes of the UK Parliament? In fact, can it be trusted not to roll back devolution altogether, as has been mooted by some?

 

And, finally...... regarding the prospect of a currency union.or even just using sterling unilaterally..... If it is “not independence”, as many No campaigners claim, then surely many unionists will feel able to vote for it..and if not.why not?

 

 

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Stopped reading CB's posts some time ago, but my eye scanned his latest effort and caught the ubiquitous "haggis" mention.

 

What is it with this guy?  :blink:

At least if he was a non Scot, we could accuse him of being racist lol

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While Charles is pondering his response to the repeated questions in my post above, here's something for the rest of you to read. As usual, any bolding in the body of the article is mine.

 

For those who haven't used up this month's allowed articles or don't hit the paywall ....the link.....  http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/columnists/memo-to-danny-alexander-the-very-things-that-make-london-rich-make-us-poor.23633041

 

For those who won't pay the MSM for anything and have already used up their current quota..........

 

Memo to Danny Alexander: the very things that make London rich make us poor ...
Iain Macwhirter



Aggreko warns of risks." The Scottish front pages have been reduced to a proforma. They just fill in the dots. Alliance warns of risks, Standard Life warns of risks, RBS warns of risks ... Lloyds ... BP ... Shell ... Sainsbury's. There is a weary inevitability about the coverage of the referendum campaign. George Osborne says No, Ed Balls says No, Danny Alexander says No, Johann Lamont says nothing at all. A coalition of the City of London, the political classes and a UK-dominated media laying down the law. Wagging a finger. No means No!

I'm beginning to wonder whether this isn't becoming just a little counterproductive for Better Together. This relentless procession of finance companies, business bosses, Tory politicians all lecturing, scolding, tut-tutting and shaking their heads. You can't have the pound, we'll take our ball away. Your money won't be safe because we'll take the banks. We'll try to destabilise your cross-border pension funds - don't expect any co-operation from us. If you don't do as you are told, we'll take your passports away and have you kicked out of Europe. We'll put up the price of food in the shops, and your mobile phone charges, and your insurance rates.

Eventually people are going to ask themselves: who exactly is running this country? Who are these people to make these threats? Who elected all these financiers and captains of industry? Bob Dudley, the boss of BP who earned $8.7 million last year, heads a firm that isn't even British any more. Since when did we allow banks to make our political choices for us? The degree of direct political involvement by big business in this referendum campaign is unprecedented, and deeply disturbing. It is reminiscent of Latin America in the bad old days, of US dirty tricks and Yankee colonialism.

Normally, companies avoid taking political sides in Western democracies, because, well, they are supposed to be democratic countries. And it can damage business. As I noted last week, a lot of Scots - Yes and No voters - will be taking their money out of ­Standard Life and RBS and shifting to Barclays, whose chief executive recently said he would at least try to make any arrangement work. And Ryanair has become the airline of choice for thousands of Scots, after their canny boss said: yeah, sure, whatever.

I can't speak for the Labour Party in Scotland, but I can tell you how it looks to many of their voters: an unpopular front with the discredited Liberal Democrats, the loathed UK Tories and the City of London. It's these daily hectorings about the irresponsibility of independence from the finance houses, Alliance, Standard Life, RBS, Lloyds - the very people who nearly destroyed the UK economy out of unrestrained greed - that sticks in my personal craw. Being lectured on public responsibility by banks is like being lectured on childcare by paedophiles.

A campaign that is based almost entirely on fear is a campaign that has lost the argument. Correction: it hasn't lost the argument on the Union because it hardly bothered to make it in the first place. A few platitudes about Team GB and Nelson Mandela from David Cameron in his Olympic speech does not amount to a reasoned case or claim of right. Then the dambusters took over. I defy anyone to compare the New Statesman lecture from Alex Salmond last week in London with what we heard from Danny Alexander in Edinburgh.

A lot of people dislike the First Minister, and perhaps with some justification. He can be a bit full of himself. He was fairly criticised for equivocating on whether he would cut the top rate of income tax in Scotland if it was still in place in England - though just imagine the threats that would have come from all those business interests if he had. But the point is that the referendum isn't about Alex Salmond or the SNP running Scotland - it is about the right of Scots to run Scotland and choose the government of their choice. Right now, Scotland is being run by the City of London and the UK political establishment.

This conflation of the personality of Alex Salmond with the case for Yes is the disingenuous means by which the left in London has sought to ally themselves with financial corporatism against Scotland. Ah - he's just like the rest of them, "shovelling even more wealth to the elite", tweets Owen Jones, the BBC Question Time's favourite tame lefty, clearly knowing and caring nothing about what has been happening in Scotland. Like ending means-tested prescriptions, scrapping tuition fees, promoting childcare, resisting the bedroom tax, and defending policies such as free personal care. You would think the left in London would be glad there was an alternative political space opening up in which it is possible to challenge the neoliberal consensus.

And come to think of it, which party actually did press for the abolition of university tuition fees? It was the SNP, and it was opposed by the Labour Party in Scotland, which regards these policies as part of "the something for nothing society". Salmond told the New Statesman audience last week that Scotland doesn't want to be a part of a country that is dominated by the anti-immigrant, anti-welfare, low-tax government of which Danny Alexander is a leading figure. He tried to spell out how Scotland could be a beacon of progressive policies that could counter the relentless drift to the right of the city state of London which now dominates the UK, and as even Vince Cable said, is sucking the wealth out of the rest of it.

One of the most chilling experiences I have had recently was at an NHS Scotland conference last week on welfare reform in Scotland. The impact of the UK Government's welfare reforms is devastating - especially on the many Scots with disabilities the bedroom tax is causing huge hardship, food banks are running on empty and, as our report shows today, poverty has returned to Scotland in a way I could never have imagined a decade ago.

George Osborne is planning to push through another £12 billion in cuts to people who are workless through no fault of their own. And there is nothing that the Scottish Parliament can do about it because it doesn't control welfare - or taxation, or the huge oil revenues that flow to the London exchequer to finance Boris Johnson's grandiose schemes. Politics of envy? Damn right.

And what was the Unionist response? Danny Alexander coming north wagging his finger, and warning: "the currency decision is final" - and anyone who doesn't get it will be sent to the back of the class and held after school. Well, here's a message to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury: the currency decision, Mr Alexander, will never be final, because it is not in the UK Government's gift to make it. The pound is common property of the UK, not London's toy balloon.

As for the threat on cross-border pension schemes - the EU is on the point of announcing that it wants to see a lot more of them. His pensions warning was just another nasty little scare, like mortgage rates, Europe, food prices. And don't think this scolding, contemptuous tone from the London financial establishment will somehow disappear if Scots obediently vote No. We've learned a lot in the past few weeks about power and how it is distributed. The campaign has revealed the true face of the Union. They may win the referendum, but they've lost Scotland.

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While Charles is pondering his response to the repeated questions in my post above, here's something for the rest of you to read. As usual, any bolding in the body of the article is mine.

 

For those who haven't used up this month's allowed articles or don't hit the paywall ....the link.....  http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/columnists/memo-to-danny-alexander-the-very-things-that-make-london-rich-make-us-poor.23633041

 

For those who won't pay the MSM for anything and have already used up their current quota..........

 

Memo to Danny Alexander: the very things that make London rich make us poor ...

Iain Macwhirter

Aggreko warns of risks." The Scottish front pages have been reduced to a proforma. They just fill in the dots. Alliance warns of risks, Standard Life warns of risks, RBS warns of risks ... Lloyds ... BP ... Shell ... Sainsbury's. There is a weary inevitability about the coverage of the referendum campaign. George Osborne says No, Ed Balls says No, Danny Alexander says No, Johann Lamont says nothing at all. A coalition of the City of London, the political classes and a UK-dominated media laying down the law. Wagging a finger. No means No!

I'm beginning to wonder whether this isn't becoming just a little counterproductive for Better Together. This relentless procession of finance companies, business bosses, Tory politicians all lecturing, scolding, tut-tutting and shaking their heads. You can't have the pound, we'll take our ball away. Your money won't be safe because we'll take the banks. We'll try to destabilise your cross-border pension funds - don't expect any co-operation from us. If you don't do as you are told, we'll take your passports away and have you kicked out of Europe. We'll put up the price of food in the shops, and your mobile phone charges, and your insurance rates.

Eventually people are going to ask themselves: who exactly is running this country? Who are these people to make these threats? Who elected all these financiers and captains of industry? Bob Dudley, the boss of BP who earned $8.7 million last year, heads a firm that isn't even British any more. Since when did we allow banks to make our political choices for us? The degree of direct political involvement by big business in this referendum campaign is unprecedented, and deeply disturbing. It is reminiscent of Latin America in the bad old days, of US dirty tricks and Yankee colonialism.

Normally, companies avoid taking political sides in Western democracies, because, well, they are supposed to be democratic countries. And it can damage business. As I noted last week, a lot of Scots - Yes and No voters - will be taking their money out of ­Standard Life and RBS and shifting to Barclays, whose chief executive recently said he would at least try to make any arrangement work. And Ryanair has become the airline of choice for thousands of Scots, after their canny boss said: yeah, sure, whatever.

I can't speak for the Labour Party in Scotland, but I can tell you how it looks to many of their voters: an unpopular front with the discredited Liberal Democrats, the loathed UK Tories and the City of London. It's these daily hectorings about the irresponsibility of independence from the finance houses, Alliance, Standard Life, RBS, Lloyds - the very people who nearly destroyed the UK economy out of unrestrained greed - that sticks in my personal craw. Being lectured on public responsibility by banks is like being lectured on childcare by paedophiles.

A campaign that is based almost entirely on fear is a campaign that has lost the argument. Correction: it hasn't lost the argument on the Union because it hardly bothered to make it in the first place. A few platitudes about Team GB and Nelson Mandela from David Cameron in his Olympic speech does not amount to a reasoned case or claim of right. Then the dambusters took over. I defy anyone to compare the New Statesman lecture from Alex Salmond last week in London with what we heard from Danny Alexander in Edinburgh.

A lot of people dislike the First Minister, and perhaps with some justification. He can be a bit full of himself. He was fairly criticised for equivocating on whether he would cut the top rate of income tax in Scotland if it was still in place in England - though just imagine the threats that would have come from all those business interests if he had. But the point is that the referendum isn't about Alex Salmond or the SNP running Scotland - it is about the right of Scots to run Scotland and choose the government of their choice. Right now, Scotland is being run by the City of London and the UK political establishment.

This conflation of the personality of Alex Salmond with the case for Yes is the disingenuous means by which the left in London has sought to ally themselves with financial corporatism against Scotland. Ah - he's just like the rest of them, "shovelling even more wealth to the elite", tweets Owen Jones, the BBC Question Time's favourite tame lefty, clearly knowing and caring nothing about what has been happening in Scotland. Like ending means-tested prescriptions, scrapping tuition fees, promoting childcare, resisting the bedroom tax, and defending policies such as free personal care. You would think the left in London would be glad there was an alternative political space opening up in which it is possible to challenge the neoliberal consensus.

And come to think of it, which party actually did press for the abolition of university tuition fees? It was the SNP, and it was opposed by the Labour Party in Scotland, which regards these policies as part of "the something for nothing society". Salmond told the New Statesman audience last week that Scotland doesn't want to be a part of a country that is dominated by the anti-immigrant, anti-welfare, low-tax government of which Danny Alexander is a leading figure. He tried to spell out how Scotland could be a beacon of progressive policies that could counter the relentless drift to the right of the city state of London which now dominates the UK, and as even Vince Cable said, is sucking the wealth out of the rest of it.

One of the most chilling experiences I have had recently was at an NHS Scotland conference last week on welfare reform in Scotland. The impact of the UK Government's welfare reforms is devastating - especially on the many Scots with disabilities the bedroom tax is causing huge hardship, food banks are running on empty and, as our report shows today, poverty has returned to Scotland in a way I could never have imagined a decade ago.

George Osborne is planning to push through another £12 billion in cuts to people who are workless through no fault of their own. And there is nothing that the Scottish Parliament can do about it because it doesn't control welfare - or taxation, or the huge oil revenues that flow to the London exchequer to finance Boris Johnson's grandiose schemes. Politics of envy? Damn right.

And what was the Unionist response? Danny Alexander coming north wagging his finger, and warning: "the currency decision is final" - and anyone who doesn't get it will be sent to the back of the class and held after school. Well, here's a message to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury: the currency decision, Mr Alexander, will never be final, because it is not in the UK Government's gift to make it. The pound is common property of the UK, not London's toy balloon.

As for the threat on cross-border pension schemes - the EU is on the point of announcing that it wants to see a lot more of them. His pensions warning was just another nasty little scare, like mortgage rates, Europe, food prices. And don't think this scolding, contemptuous tone from the London financial establishment will somehow disappear if Scots obediently vote No. We've learned a lot in the past few weeks about power and how it is distributed. The campaign has revealed the true face of the Union. They may win the referendum, but they've lost Scotland.

Oddquine - has the fact that this is principally a football website not alerted you to the fact that there was actually a game on today. So while life at the best of times is far too short to read your increasingly verbose perorations about the whole world havng it in for the Yessenpee Campaign, combining one of your pontifications with the kind of outcome produced at the TCS today is actually far, far more than flesh and blood can conceivably stand :crazy:  :amazed:

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Charles,

 

  George Armstrong Custer went into battle in Montana at the battle of the little Bighorn very imprudently. He was outnumbered VERY heavily, was on their territory, was more vainglorious than brave and his bluster meant that when he realised how bad a situation he had begun then it was too late and, for him, there was no way out. Having made his name in the American Civil war, especially his propensity for showboating as much as anything else, he felt he was unstoppable and unbeatable and for him this made it very difficult to retreat.

 

Have you ever had eerie, depressing feelings when you visited Culloden? If so, that was the eerie feeling I got years ago when I visited the battleground. Stark open country, low clouds and bleak as far as the eye could see to yonder mountains. Which gives Montana the nickname of "The big sky country".

 

So I hope that the devolutionists think deeply about all the aspects of separation very carefully and determine their fall back positions before they move. If they do, I think getting out from under and away from Westminster could be a very good thing for Scotland. 

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Well, it's a free country, Charles, and it's Oddquine's thread as far back as I can remember and it hasn't been terminated yet by the  site's beaks .....so...... why should she not continue if she wants to at any time?

 

You have contributed heavily to it's continuance so--are you now the boss, or what?

Were you at the game yourself?

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Charles,

 

 

Have you ever had eerie, depressing feelings when you visited Culloden?

Frequently... especially when I come across some of these hairy eejits who wrap themselves up in swathes of tartan, wave saltires and generally have delusions that they are latter day victims of English oppression. They are the sort of nationalist equivalent of these Celtic fans who spend their lives hanging about Parkhead.

The Battle of Culloden must be one of the most misunderstood episodes in British history which time and again finds itself hijacked by ultra-Nationalist cranks who are probably an embarrassment to the SNP if they haven't already been chucked out, and rightly so. It's people like this who bring me closest to any feeling of sympathy with tge SNP :lol:

For instance when you look at photos of the recent protest about housebuilding near the battle site, here are the ever present saltire-waving hairies in caricature gear acting out their delusions of grievance against the English. I was also at a charity run at Culloden last October, and again here was a squad of ultra-Nat nutters doing the run in the teeshirts of some kind of off the wall, chip on both shoulders organisation.

Two of the things that worry me most about Scotland are the manner in which it has allowed its history to be subverted for political purposes and the embarrassing way in which it has connived at the caricature of itself which is all too often presented on a global scale.

Edited by Charles Bannerman
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Then, Charles, if you are a republican.the best chance of getting rid of the monarchy is in an Independent Scotland!     Go on, vote YES......you know it makes sense!  :smile:

 

Was pointed at a blog today (an eclectic FB friends list often turns up some interesting stuff and saves much googling) .

http://tarffadvertiser.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/the-alexander-brothers-and-currency.html

 

A quote from there.....

According to the most recent OBR figures the UK debt to GDP ratio is 75%, this is projected to rise to 95% for England and Wales (with NI) if Scotland exits the Union and stays in a Sterling currency union. The comparative figure for Scotland's debt to GDP ratio after a 'Yes vote' is between 45 and 50% depending whether Scotland is in or out of a Sterling currency union.

 

Easily seen why Westminster is fighting Independence with all the scare stories they can spin..

 

From that blog a link got me to http://moneyweek.com/endofbritain/

 

My next half written pontification was going to be about pensions, the increasing of entitlement ages and what that means to Scots, given the difference between the life expectancies in England versus that in Scotland, NI and Wales, with reference to http://www.pensionspolicyinstitute.org.uk/uploaded/documents/2014/20140219 PPI Single Tier Series Paper 5 SPA.pdf .

 

However, the UK financial problems appear to be much bigger than how to pay in the future for the unfunded state and public pension obligations, and is more than a shade scary.

 

To quote from the Money Week article....In recorded economic history, every single country with debts as big as ours – every single one – has suffered a devastating economic collapse. There are NO exceptions.

 

and

 

Shockingly, our debt load is now on a scale comparable with one of the most frightening economic disasters of the 20th century…

We're talking about the Weimar Republic.

 

Now that is a real Project Fear possibility the Unionists are not using to scare the crap out of us...because it is one we can avoid with independence.

 

 

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For some reason I picture CB writing these posts in a Union flag onsie while sipping tea from a Charles and Diana mug,

Gordie... I am a republican :thumbup: I find this presumption of Royalism a bit bizarre.

 

 

My apologies CB just in jest anyway 

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For some reason I picture CB writing these posts in a Union flag onsie while sipping tea from a Charles and Diana mug,

Gordie... I am a republican :thumbup: I find this presumption of Royalism a bit bizarre.

 

 

My apologies CB just in jest anyway 

 

Yes, I know Gordie... no offence taken. :smile:  You couldn't afford to take offence on this thread anyway :lol:

I find Oddquine's suggestion that an separate Scotland would get rid of the monarchy a bit strange. One of Salmond's several commitments is to keep the monarchy.

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Now that is a real Project Fear possibility the Unionists are not using to scare the crap out of us...because it is one we can avoid with independence.

Sure, by following the French model advocated by Gordon Brown.  The one that's led to even heavier debt levels in that country than than previously.  The same policy that led to the voting out of the Spanish government when theirs failed too.

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For some reason I picture CB writing these posts in a Union flag onsie while sipping tea from a Charles and Diana mug,

Gordie... I am a republican :thumbup: I find this presumption of Royalism a bit bizarre.

 

 

My apologies CB just in jest anyway 

 

Yes, I know Gordie... no offence taken. :smile:  You couldn't afford to take offence on this thread anyway :lol:

I find Oddquine's suggestion that an separate Scotland would get rid of the monarchy a bit strange. One of Salmond's several commitments is to keep the monarchy.

 

This is where your arguments always fall Charles. You forever harp on as if the independent Scotland will vote an SNP government in 2016. That may well not be the case.

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For some reason I picture CB writing these posts in a Union flag onsie while sipping tea from a Charles and Diana mug,

Gordie... I am a republican :thumbup: I find this presumption of Royalism a bit bizarre.

 

Just the union Jack onesie then?

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This is where your arguments always fall Charles. You forever harp on as if the independent Scotland will vote an SNP government in 2016. That may well not be the case.

 

So equally we can also completely ignore the following, and a lot more about the so called "shape of an independent Scotland", from the 670 page publicly funded SNP Manifesto published last November?

 

  • Thirty hours of childcare per week in term time for all three and four-year-olds, as well as vulnerable two-year-olds.
  • Trident nuclear weapons, currently based on the Clyde, removed within the first parliament.
  •  
  • Housing benefit reforms, described by critics as the "bedroom tax", to be abolished, and a halt to the rollout of Universal Credit.
  • It would be in Scotland's interest to keep the pound, while the Bank of England would continue as "lender of last resort".
  • BBC Scotland replaced at the start of 2017 with a new Scottish broadcasting service, continuing a formal relationship with the rest of the BBC.
  • Basic rate tax allowances and tax credits to rise at least in line with inflation.
  • A safe, "triple-locked" pension system.
  • Minimum wage to "rise alongside the cost of living".
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This is where your arguments always fall Charles. You forever harp on as if the independent Scotland will vote an SNP government in 2016. That may well not be the case.

 

So equally we can also completely ignore the following, and a lot more about the so called "shape of an independent Scotland", from the 670 page publicly funded SNP Manifesto published last November?

 

  • Thirty hours of childcare per week in term time for all three and four-year-olds, as well as vulnerable two-year-olds.
  • Trident nuclear weapons, currently based on the Clyde, removed within the first parliament.
  •  
  • Housing benefit reforms, described by critics as the "bedroom tax", to be abolished, and a halt to the rollout of Universal Credit.
  • It would be in Scotland's interest to keep the pound, while the Bank of England would continue as "lender of last resort".
  • BBC Scotland replaced at the start of 2017 with a new Scottish broadcasting service, continuing a formal relationship with the rest of the BBC.
  • Basic rate tax allowances and tax credits to rise at least in line with inflation.
  • A safe, "triple-locked" pension system.
  • Minimum wage to "rise alongside the cost of living".

 

Nope....it is exactly what every UK party does before every election..........puts forward what they'd do if they got into power.  It's called a manifesto and the SNP made no secret of the fact that part of the 670 pages included what they would hope to do if they became the first iScotland Government and depending on the results of the negotiations. Nicola Sturgeon said as much on a GMS interview post the publication.

 

It was in there mostly as an example of what could possible if we had the control of our own economy, compared to what we know will happen in the Union if we vote NO. Before the end of negotiations we won't know stuff like......will we have our share of the debt or no debt....... will we have our share of assets or none of them.......but it was written on the assumption that Westminster wouldn't tear up the Edinburgh Agreement (given the current Westminster rhetoric, that assumption was most certainly wishful thinking).

 

Could give you links to the other parties ideas on what an independent Scotland could be like if they were in power. Personally, I don't expect to have many , if any, majority Governments in iScotland, which pleases me, because consensus politics is a lot less wasteful than adversarial politics.

 

Still waiting for a cogent response to post #576, btw.

Edited by Oddquine
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Now that is a real Project Fear possibility the Unionists are not using to scare the crap out of us...because it is one we can avoid with independence.

Sure, by following the French model advocated by Gordon Brown.  The one that's led to even heavier debt levels in that country than than previously.  The same policy that led to the voting out of the Spanish government when theirs failed too.

 

Why on God's good earth would we take any notice of anything Gordon Brown says.....ever?  

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one of the most frightening economic disasters of the 20th century…

 

 

Speaking of which, we certainly dodged a bullet by not being independent in 2008 when our banks needed bailing out, eh?  The inability of an independent Scotland to support its financial sector is one of the reasons pretty much all of those institutions will be moving to England, taking their jobs, GDP and tax revenues with them.

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one of the most frightening economic disasters of the 20th century…

 

 

Speaking of which, we certainly dodged a bullet by not being independent in 2008 when our banks needed bailing out, eh?  The inability of an independent Scotland to support its financial sector is one of the reasons pretty much all of those institutions will be moving to England, taking their jobs, GDP and tax revenues with them.

 

Nope......we didn't.

 

Firstly....... we'd not have been 10 minutes independent in 2008 when the banks went doolally, so would have, I trust, have, well before then, set up sensible banking regulations and better oversight,  which would have stopped our banks playing fast and loose with the economy to earn ginormous profits and equally ginormous bonuses for the gamblers.

 

And secondly.......we would only have been liable for the losses incurred by the Banks operations within Scotland.  I am getting tired of saying this on forums.....operations by branches of banks operating furth of Scotland are the responsibility of the countries who gave them licence to operate.  That was why the USA supported the RBS and Barclays operations in the USA....and the UK didn't have to.  And that is why the UK supported BOS and RBOS in the UK........because 90% of their activity was over the border in England. Even if we had been independent at that stage, we would only have had to find at most 10% of what the UK spent.

 

And thirdly, on forums, at the time of, and after, the banking crisis, I continually advocated dealing with it on the Swedish 1990s model....which would have meant not gaily writing cheques before compelling the banks to write down losses and hit the bank's shareholders, who had reaped the rewards of irresponsible banking practices for some years, before they trashed the taxpayer....thus holding the banks, and their shareholders, to some extent, responsible for their actions.

 

Do you read any part of the MSM articles other than the headlines, starchief?  If you did, you would know that pretty much all of those institutions will be moving to England, taking their jobs, GDP and tax revenues with them. is nothing more than Unionist spin (lies).  All of them are preparing to move all or parts of their businesses if necessary.....which is sensible business practice......but none of them has said unequivocally, that they intend to move lock, stock and barrel out of Scotland on Independence as soon as, or shortly after we vote YES. Businesses do pragmatic and will wait and see what policies will come into play....as many have said they will, including a couple of the airlines and a couple of the banks. 

 

If you have read S&P's report on the credit rating of an iScotland, they actually  appear to think that less reliance on financial institutions in the economy  will improve Scotland's credit rating.  Contrary to Westminster scare mongering...the "reliance" on oil is less of a problem for iScotland than the "reliance" on financial services.

 

Does make one kinda wonder, given the reliance in the UK on London and financial services to underpin the economy, how their credit rating would do without nearly 10% of their economy, without the Scottish Trade exports to set against the UK Trade deficit and without oil.

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This is where your arguments always fall Charles. You forever harp on as if the independent Scotland will vote an SNP government in 2016. That may well not be the case.

 

So equally we can also completely ignore the following, and a lot more about the so called "shape of an independent Scotland", from the 670 page publicly funded SNP Manifesto published last November?

 

  • Thirty hours of childcare per week in term time for all three and four-year-olds, as well as vulnerable two-year-olds.
  • Trident nuclear weapons, currently based on the Clyde, removed within the first parliament.
  •  
  • Housing benefit reforms, described by critics as the "bedroom tax", to be abolished, and a halt to the rollout of Universal Credit.
  • It would be in Scotland's interest to keep the pound, while the Bank of England would continue as "lender of last resort".
  • BBC Scotland replaced at the start of 2017 with a new Scottish broadcasting service, continuing a formal relationship with the rest of the BBC.
  • Basic rate tax allowances and tax credits to rise at least in line with inflation.
  • A safe, "triple-locked" pension system.
  • Minimum wage to "rise alongside the cost of living".

 

Nope....it is exactly what every UK party does before every election..........puts forward what they'd do if they got into power.  It's called a manifesto and the SNP made no secret of the fact that part of the 670 pages included what they would hope to do if they became the first iScotland Government and depending on the results of the negotiations. Nicola Sturgeon said as much on a GMS interview post the publication.

 

It was in there mostly as an example of what could possible if we had the control of our own economy, compared to what we know will happen in the Union if we vote NO. Before the end of negotiations we won't know stuff like......will we have our share of the debt or no debt....... will we have our share of assets or none of them.......but it was written on the assumption that Westminster wouldn't tear up the Edinburgh Agreement (given the current Westminster rhetoric, that assumption was most certainly wishful thinking).

 

Could give you links to the other parties ideas on what an independent Scotland could be like if they were in power. Personally, I don't expect to have many , if any, majority Governments in iScotland, which pleases me, because consensus politics is a lot less wasteful than adversarial politics.

 

Still waiting for a cogent response to post #576, btw.

 

 

Is it an election?

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Oddquine, you posted this link http://moneyweek.com/endofbritain/ in an earlier post.  I have read it and on the face of it there would seem to be some logic in the worrying conclusions it draws that economic meltdown is just round the corner due the level of the UK debt.  If that is the case then to argue that an independent Scotland would be less at risk if Scotland's per capita debt is less makes sense.

 

What doesn't make sense to me is that if the Westminster parliament and the London centric banking institutions' irresponsible borrowing policies are leading to imminent economic meltdown, why does the Yes campaign remain totally focussed on currency union?   Given that the doomsday scenario the article predicts would cause a catastrophic devaluing of Sterling, I would have thought a main reason for independence would be to disentangle the Scottish economy from the fatally flawed pound ASAP.

 

 

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