Snp Takes Scotland And What Is The First Thing Salmond Wants To Do?

[exiges]

I have wondered why there isn't a push for self determination in England.

http://www.voteenglish.org/

They gained some councillors this week.

[Guillotine]

I have wondered why there isn't a push for self determination in England.

It would be interesting if we had parliaments in each of the home nations (if I am allowed to use that phrase) and have Westminster become our Brussels. We could then withdraw from the EU and enter into a customs union with them (much like the Swiss).

Self determination for all. I would love it.

The democratic deficit is the cause of a lot of anxiety. But there are over-riding daily concerns that absorb the political spotlight ahead of the resolution of the West Lothian Question and broad democratic deficit.

Yet there have been polls recording widespread support for English Independence but the debate down here is immature. Even in Scotland which seems to have an intrinsic sense of itself, the independence debate has taken a few decades to mature.

Marry in haste, repent at leisure. We are headin for divorce and we should do so with optimism as the relationship has gone wrong.

[Number79]

The population of England was five times that of Scotland in 1707. Had Scotland paid the tax listed in Clause IX at the same rate as England they would have paid £400,000.

Instead they were required to pay only £48,000, roughly a ninth of the pro rata sum.

As for the oil and gas revenues, a substantial part of that has come from oil and gas English waters. Moreover, oil revenues have only been flowing for around thirty years and Scotland was being subsidised by England for the better part of three centuries before that. Nor is it true that oil and gas revenues have been consistently high because the oil and gas price was very low for a decade or more. In most years since 1980 Scotland would not have been contributing more to the UK Treasury than they took out even if ALL the oil and gas tax was allocated to them.

The terms of independance which I think are more than fair http://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/05/06/scottish-independence-yes-but-only-on-these-terms/

Edited May 7, 2011 by richyc

[cashinmattress]

Mods, can you please move this to current affairs.

[Number79]

Mods, can you please move this to current affairs.

Why?

Do you not think the subject is as important as clothing inflation or car sales or greece leaving the Euro?

I would say that this is more relevant than most of the crap in this section.

Edited May 7, 2011 by richyc

[cashinmattress]

Why?

Do you not think the subject is as important as clothing inflation or car sales or greece leaving the Euro?

Dik.

Well,

I'm not against a political debate, but I'm not sure the Guardians Severin Carrell's post election editorial regarding the majority win of the SNP has anything to do with what you spoke of, or house prices.

[sun n sea]

Horseshit - do you even ******ing read history? The "scottish" did not begg any english **** for anything. What happened is a bunch of rich ***** decided to accept a bribe to cover thier speculative losses and sold the country down the river to the devil.

The "People" had no part in it.

******** yerself as much as you want - the oil is Scottish - and pretty soon we'll be taking it back.

Enjoy your decent into Islamic hell without us..

A Ginger haired sectarian scumbag who hates anything Catholic, anything English....a ranting Saltire waving kunt who'd stab you in the face with a broken bottle of "Buckie" as soon as look at you....

You might be the nicest chap in the world but I'm afraid posts like this make English people wonder why the f*ck we're still bound together with a nation who hate us and the Irish?!!

After 13 years of Scottish Labour colonial rule I'd be happy to see Salmond win.... but part of the deal brokered by Cameron should be;

1) Compensation for English taxpayers visa vie HBOS and RBS

2) Resettlement in Scotland of all the third world scum your politicians invited into England without asking us... your Islamic guests go with you.

Give these two things and I'm sure most English people would jump at the chance of being rid of the nasty, chippy haters "beyond the wall"

[cashinmattress]

There is a house price angle.

I wouldn't have thought twice about buying a house in Scotland and living there (I've thought about it a few times - I love the Isle of Mull and the beaches around Findhorn) before, but if it were to become a separate country I would certainly have to think twice.

Not that I'd have any particular view on whether Scottish house prices/property taxes would decouple in a particular direction from English ones (although I can imagine it becoming, outside the cities, a super-rich resort of golf courses and castles for the Chinese, Russians, Japanese and Americans, etc.), but because I would be leaving the property market of my home turf. Like moving to Spain, I might not be able to afford to return as a homeowner, within my current housing budget.

Ok, this has become a discussion involving hypothetical market moves, based upon an editorial of a political outcome.

It's current, but it's still not news.

[Scunnered]

Mods, can you please move this to current affairs.

Or just delete it completely.

[South Lorne]

The oil argument is a bit tiresome, it's as if it's ok for the country to be unproductive, claiming benefits because they'd have oil to bail them out

..that's what Gordo the Clown did with the UK....and used cheap imported labour to do the work....

[R K]

Has Salmond said how he proposes to reclaim RBS, Bank of Scotland and those tens of billions in bad loans to Eire?

Whilst he's at it he'll be needing a new currency and a central bank of course.

Perhaps Gordon could run the central bank along with Fred Goodwin.

Can the English vote on this too pls?

[izzy]

+1

Time to tell the scotts and welsh that if they want to look after themselves then to bloody well do that. That their budget from now on is whatever they take in tax and if they have more going out than coming in then they better stfu and accept english taxpayers cash with a little more grace.

What are the current state of Scottish finances? Anyone got any record of Scottish GDP? What is the ratio of employed to unemployed? Could they fund their current system with Scottish tax receipts? How many years of production are left in North Sea oil and what kind of taxes are levied on that?

[ubuntu]

What will happen to all the Scots living in England, will they cease to be British? Will they become illegal immigrants and asked to return to Scotland? Hopefully that annoying unfunny Scottish Sikh 'comic' will be told to do one; or does independence mean they retain the right to live & work in England?

[izzy]

Horseshit - do you even ******ing read history? The "scottish" did not begg any english **** for anything. What happened is a bunch of rich ***** decided to accept a bribe to cover thier speculative losses and sold the country down the river to the devil.

The "People" had no part in it.

******** yerself as much as you want - the oil is Scottish - and pretty soon we'll be taking it back.

Enjoy your decent into Islamic hell without us..

To be fair, I think there was also a measure of extortion exerted on the Scotland at the same time. I seem to remember something about trade embargos at English controlled colonial ports denying Scottish merchants trade unless the Union deal was signed. However, to call late 17th century Scotland a country is a bit misleading as it was hardly a cohesive body then. There were the four burghs of Edinburgh, Perth, Dundee and Aberdeen, administrated towns and villages between them and then a huge unregulated, fragmented hinterland beyond. The Scottish admistration had no overall control over the clan lands and so Scotland wasn't really a country in the modern sense. The 17th century also saw several Scottish wars tear up Scotland, which along with repressive religious ideologies and widespread poverty made the land a very difficult place to live.

As for religious tensions, well Scotland has plenty of those. There's also a considerable 'cultural' difference and antipathy between the East and West coasts. However, all these things matter less than they ever did and so if the sums add up I don't see any reason why Scottish independance shouldn't be successful. My only concern is that I suspect average incomes are less in Scotland, unemployment levels are high and the population is used to generous public services. But I don't know the figures, so if Salmond thinks he can deliver the same services in an independent Scotland then good luck to him.

[cashinmattress]

What are the current state of Scottish finances? Anyone got any record of Scottish GDP? What is the ratio of employed to unemployed? Could they fund their current system with Scottish tax receipts? How many years of production are left in North Sea oil and what kind of taxes are levied on that?

Outside of the oil, political system, banks, fishing, agriculture and whisky... but per capita that is far better than what England or the rest of the Union can boast.

Employment is ok, but far too heavily biased towards social welfare. We could still run just the same with a lot less folk worrying about trivial matters (outside of health).

Most studies agree that the end of our oil boom will happened in 1999-ish, and the decade following 2020 will see most majors closing up shop.

As I work in the industry, I can say that there is very little chance of big reinvestment in any of the established fields. They just keeping putting plasters over things. At some point, there will be another major disaster because they are running the places with antiquated and fatigued equipment and the men who started these plants are for the most part in or entering retirement. Youngsters coming from the colleges don't have a clue on what they are looking at there, as far as controls, process and instrumentation. Most of the infrastructure there was built with a 15 year maximum life cycle, and we are now looking at three to four decades with some of the rigs.

North sea oil ran out quickly due to the geography, its shallow up there, and the easy oil wasn't very deep.

For example, the biggest field to date is the Forties, which is as below:

Check out the oil fields for yourself, I encourage everybody to get some insight into the very ugly predicament the whole of the UK is facing.

UK Monthly Oil Production

Thing is, whether Scotland separates or not, there IS an energy crisis that WILL get worse every day which will affect everybody, however you slice up the nation...

[ralphmalph]

I think the fact that Salmond wants to take control of borrowing and corporation tax is interesting.

Personally I wouldn't want Scotland setting its own corporation tax. Not because it is Scotland though.

Basically the strategy of setting very low taxes is a very effective way for smaller countries to game the bigger ones. They can effectively 'skim' a little from an awful lot of revenue and do very nicely out of it. This is after all what Ireland does and companies love it as they minimise their tax bills.

However, if companes want access to markets, they must pay a fair and level playing field amount of taxes or the whole system falls apart. I know Ireland hold dearly to the idea of gaming the system this way by linking it to 'national sovereignty' but here I am with the Germans and the French. If you want access to the free markets, if you want help in times of need then you need to play by certain rules.

Small countries become 'owned' by corporates far too easily and are prone to corruption at the highest levels if they are given the keys to the bank (Ireland, Iceland etc.) where politics, banking and property development all become intertwined (this also happened with the 'Scottish Mafia' and the Scottish based banks too of course). I'm not saying this does not happen in big coutries too mind - just that smaller ones are more susceptible.

The corporation tax issue with Salmond is pure politics. The last opinion polls in Scotland for independance were about 60% against. Salmond knows this and it is one reason he will not go for a referendum immediately, he would lose. So his strategy is the same as ever which is to convince the Scottish people that they would be better on their own (something I agree with) and to do this he will adopt a strategy of "Westminster is holding Scotland back from making the decisions that mean it can better it self).

So he will push for more powers to be devolved to Holyrood and every time Westminsters says no he will be on TV with "Westminster does not care about Scotland, they are holding us back." Corporation tax will be the first issue and if refused then it will be unemployment in Scotland is caused by Westminster.

[interestrateripoff]

What are the current state of Scottish finances? Anyone got any record of Scottish GDP? What is the ratio of employed to unemployed? Could they fund their current system with Scottish tax receipts? How many years of production are left in North Sea oil and what kind of taxes are levied on that?

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Economy/GDP/Findings

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Economy/TrendLongerGDP

Although they don't appear to offer an actual figures.

[Number79]

What are the current state of Scottish finances? Anyone got any record of Scottish GDP? What is the ratio of employed to unemployed? Could they fund their current system with Scottish tax receipts? How many years of production are left in North Sea oil and what kind of taxes are levied on that?

The population is just over 5.3million with 250000 unemployed. There is an employment rate of just over 74%.

Of that 74% around 10% are english/welsh. The banks also employ about 5% of the populace.

It is difficult finding figures but wiki has these boom time figures which would shed some light

Total Population: 5,494,801 (2007 est)

Working Age Population: 2,475,386 (2007 est.)

GDP (£billion): 86.3 (2006) 137 (2009)

Manufacturing GVA (£million): 28, 900 (2007)

Number of VAT registered companies: 185,925 (2007 est.)

Number of Large Companies (250+ employees) in Scotland: 2,240 (2007)

Number of new homes built pa.: 24,581 (2006)

Employment Rate (% of adults of working age): 78.7 (2007)

Median Gross Weekly Earnings of full-time workers on adult rates (£): 592.70

Claimant Unemployment Rate (%): 2.1 (2007)

People of working age claiming key Social Security benefits (%): 11.7 (Feb. 2007)

[exiges]

Median Gross Weekly Earnings of full-time workers on adult rates (£): 592.70

Yup, lots (disproportionately) of public sector staff there. 1 in 3 jobs at the last count. Wonder what the median would be without

Edited May 7, 2011 by exiges

[Number79]

Yup, lots (disproportionately) of public sector staff there. 1 in 3 jobs at the last count. Wonder what the median would be without

not very pretty at all imo. I dont understand why the scotts are so bold in denying that English taxpayers keep them afloat, are none of these figures ever released in scotland?

English population around 51 million, scotts less than 6 million. It seems that the majority of scotts still know who butters their bread for them.

[mattyfc]

If Labour was in power Salmond could threaten them with independence. With the Tories what leverage does he have? It would be massively beneficial for the Tories to hive off Scotland as an independently run part of the UK. Can't see full legal independence as it would be too complicated.

Let them set their own taxes, laws etc negotiate sharing of costs for military, administration, etc. As good as independence but without leaving the UK. Kick all the Scottish MP's out of Westminster and let them do their own thing.

Without the Scottish seats the Tories would have a majority of 21 currently, when the voting boundaries are updated this would no doubt increase. Labour in England would be doomed, perpetual Tory government would be near inevitable.

Ironic that Blair the arch populist may have unwittingly sown the seeds of destruction of the English Labour party.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/06/scottish-election-victory-snp-devolution

[Alba]

not very pretty at all imo. I dont understand why the scotts are so bold in denying that English taxpayers keep them afloat, are none of these figures ever released in scotland?

English population around 51 million, scotts less than 6 million. It seems that the majority of scotts still know who butters their bread for them.

Who are these 'scotts' you are referring to?

You obviously did not benefit from a good Scottish education!

[White Craw]

To be fair, I think there was also a measure of extortion exerted on the Scotland at the same time. I seem to remember something about trade embargos at English controlled colonial ports denying Scottish merchants trade unless the Union deal was signed. However, to call late 17th century Scotland a country is a bit misleading as it was hardly a cohesive body then. There were the four burghs of Edinburgh, Perth, Dundee and Aberdeen, administrated towns and villages between them and then a huge unregulated, fragmented hinterland beyond. The Scottish admistration had no overall control over the clan lands and so Scotland wasn't really a country in the modern sense.

I can't agree with this picture of 17th c. Scotland, it had been a unitary state for some time with a nationwide framework of local power and administration, for instance the Scottish Parliament with the "Three Estates", namely the bishops, nobles, and lairds with burgesses, (later nobles, lairds and burgesses). The last internal force denying the Scottish Kings nationwide power ended with the suppression, by King James IV, of the Lordship of the Isles in 1493.

The 17th century also saw several Scottish wars tear up Scotland, which along with repressive religious ideologies and widespread poverty made the land a very difficult place to live.

The covenanting wars were so closely linked with conflict and disturbance throughout Britain and Ireland (The "English" Civil War!) that the second half of the seventeenth century is better described as the War of the Three Kingdoms.

Edited May 7, 2011 by White Craw

[exiges]

Who are these 'scotts' you are referring to?

You obviously did not benefit from a good Scottish education!

They teach pedantry to A level there.

[White Craw]

They teach pedantry to A level there.

Surely you meant to Higher Grade?