RISE NOW AND BE A NATION AGAIN !
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Brilliant article
The Anglosphere Media
BY BELLACALEDONIA on FEBRUARY 20, 2014 • ( 2 )
By Robin McAlpine
I haven’t always agreed with Martin Kettle’s Guardian columns over the years. They have mixed some good, pertinent analysis of what’s wrong with Britain with some unfortunate Blair-apologising. But of late I’ve felt that his commentary on what’s happening in Scotland just now has been quite good and more informed that many London-based commentators.
I write this because I really dislike overly-personalising political analysis; arguments should stand or fall on the basis of the content, not the person. So when I take his column today as a jumping-off point for a discussion of the skew-whiff nature of UK politics it is only as an example.
The basic argument in his column is that, in effect, the Scottish Government has abandoned reasoned, argument-based politics in favour of naked political posturing. He suggests that, faced with a barrage of detailed questions from George Osborne and some on-air comments from Barosso, the Nats have retreated into name-calling mode and have given up any pretence of statesmanship.
I am more than a little surprised. George Osborne flew to Scotland in the face of overwhelming SNP reasonableness. The SNP has taken a very modest approach to what it would seek in negotiations. George Osborne flew in to tell us that no, the UK will take the most aggressive and punitive approach possible to Scotland, seeking to impose on us all the liabilities of the UK but allowing us precisely none of the assets or rights. He made his speech to which only three pre-arranged questions from sympathetic sources were allowed. He refused any broadcast interview of any sort. As he ran to his car the STV political editor chased him asking him to comment on how the international money markets would view the collapse in the balance of trade in Sterling when it lost the value of oil exports. He refused to offer a word in answer and flew straight back to London.
That, apparently, constitutes a serious debate and serious engagement with the issues.
I watched a reasonable amount of BBC coverage from London. I can’t remember anyone explaining sufficiently well what happens if Scotland’s exports are removed from the UK books. One has to assume that this is because the answer is uncomfortable for ‘Great’ Britain.
Barosso is an unelected president of the European Commission which has no say in the acceptance of new member states. He is a right-wing politician who was allied to the same block of European right-wing political parties of which Spanish PM Rajoy’s Popular Party are and the UK Conservatives were a part. I didn’t hear this mentioned – you’d barely know Barosso was a politician. He said it may well be impossible for Scotland to become a member of the EU. This view is shared by not a single serious commentator I have ever heard. The idea that Bulgaria and Romania are fit for EU entry but not a country that has already been a member for 40 years lacks credibility. And yet the UK media has barely contested the claim.
Serious debate?
Vince Cable recently made the front pages of Scotland’s newspapers and appeared across the UK media claiming that if Scotland votes Yes RBS will have to move to London. This had previously been denied by the Chief Executive of RBS. He subsequently denied it again and made clear that Cable had made no contact with RBS to check veracity before making his claim. So he was monstered across the media for joke politics? Eh, no, it was barely mentioned. Alex Salmond has repeatedly had to answer on whether ceding some sovereignty to London in a Sterling union would mean Scotland was even a ‘proper country’. Of course, every time David Cameron appears on the same programme he is asked whether Britain’s much more substantial hand-over of sovereignty to the WTO, the IMF and the EU means that Britain isn’t really a proper country. Except that never happens. Only Scotland has to answer for what every nation does.
Or Barosso again. Was he asked by anyone the impact on the Spanish economy when it is no longer allowed access to Scotland’s rich fishing marine territories? Was he asked how happy the EU would be to lose a nation that is very much a net contributor to his salary? There are 40,000 Spaniards in Scotland and many more EU citizens living and working here. Barosso seems highly excited about a right-wing EU attack on a part of a member state which seeks only democratic self-determination. Was he asked about the refugee crisis as right to work is unilaterally removed by him and his friends? Not that I heard. Oh the rigours of the UK media.
No-one denies that Scotland has contributed more to the UK than it has received every year for the last 30 years. No-one denies that if Scotland took its proportion of debt it would be significantly less indebted than the rest of the UK. It hasn’t been seriously challenged that Scotland would have less pension liability than the UK (mainly because we die younger) – and yet that is seldom mentioned. Or take a look at the Financial Times investigations on the UK pensions industry. It is the most corrupt and inefficient in Europe in which investors have routinely been ripped off in the most egregious ways. This was all presided over by Gordon Brown who also raided pension schemes and froze the state pension. And yet he is put forward uncritically as an expert on pensions.
Brilliant debate you’re all having. Brilliant. Really incisive.
Now let’s consider for a second how Britain would have responded if an EU Minister had arrive in Britain to say that you’re getting thrown out of the EU unless you sign up to the Euro entirely on the EU’s terms and that all your negotiated perks and benefits were being taken away unilaterally. Suppose this was done with a EU-prepared policy document. The suggestion is that Britain would calmly and sensibly engage point by point with the content of the policy document and refrain from any kind of nationalistic mouth-foaming. In reality, Britain’s politicians would be lining up to bleed from the eyes in rage and the media would be unhappy that ‘total hate’ was insufficient.
The same thing happens to us and Salmond says it is disrespectful. Even after months of being (in my view) far too reasonable in his negotiating stance. And he’s the provocateur in the face of George Osborne’s hand of friendship to the Scots?
Then again, the United Kingdom gets by pretty well by never asking itself difficult questions. This is a nation where economic wellbeing is measured in terms of retail sales and house prices and productivity, trade, innovation and industrial production are barely a part of national debate. Anything that Britain is bad at (it’s a long list) is off the agenda. There was a period in which the City State of London saw its economy grow by 35 per cent. Over the same period the economy of South Wales grew by three per cent. I find the use of the word ‘United’ interesting in this context. Of course, this is the subject of major debate in London as its metropolitan elite became conscious of just how much it has asset-stripped the rest of the peoples of this island.
Oh no, that’s right, it didn’t do that at all. We got Boris Johnstone in place of a debate about the reality of London’s management of Britain.
Salmond’s answers were all perfectly reasonable. The UK is almost certainly bluffing over Sterling and even if it went crazy and tried to force us out there are lots of good options for Scotland. Indeed, I’ve never disguised my belief that we shouldn’t even try to negotiate a currency union with for a currency that is managed on behalf of speculators and against the interests of manufacturing. The EU wants Scotland as a member very much – it is not even clear that Scotland CAN be thrown out. And any pensions industry in Scotland is almost certain to be less corrupt than the UK version.
I’m growing weary of ‘Scottish exceptionalism’. Why should Scotland have to answer to a different set of criteria to the rest of Britain? Once again, as in colonial India, what you do is normal, what we do is a ‘mutiny’. But above all, Britain is completely unwilling even to begin a conversation about what it has become – one of the worst developed countries in which to be a citizen. In case you didn’t know it, the following is the truth about Britain:
Britain is the country with the second lowest pay among advanced economies. Since 2010
British wages have fallen faster than all but three other EU countries – even though we work the
third longest hours. Britain has the third highest housing costs in Europe, the highest rail prices in Europe and is second worst for fuel poverty. Britain has the least happy children in the developed world, the worst infant mortality rates in Europe and some of the worst child poverty in the industrialised world. Britain’s elderly are the fourth poorest in the EU. Britain has the eighth biggest gap between men and women’s pay in Europe with childcare costs much higher than most European countries. Britain is the fourth most unequal developed society with a wealth gap twice as wide as any other EU country. Britain has the greatest regional inequality in Europe. Britain has the lowest level of trust in its politicians in Europe. Britain’s productivity is 16 per cent behind the average of advanced economies and has the worst record on industrial production.
This is only a sample. So when can we have a debate about this? When will London politicians be made to answer for the Britain they have created? It is Scotland that is trying – against the aligned powers of the London Elite and its client government – to draw a picture of a society that is different and better than what we have. Must we really have the agenda set by the empire we seek to escape? Must standards really be quite that double?
We know people think London is ‘grown up’ and other places are ‘childlike’. We know London thinks that anything it cares about is important and anything other places care about is unimportant. We know that London grants enormous status to other members of the international elite who agree with them and more-or-less ignores everyone else from here or abroad who doesn’t.
All I can say is that we’re trying to work out how to reform our economy to make it productive and to create high-wage jobs in a strong, secure welfare state. London is giving money to wealthy people to inflate the housing market and make it look like the economy isn’t a basket-case. What on earth makes you think you’re the grown-ups?
The Anglosphere Media
BY BELLACALEDONIA on FEBRUARY 20, 2014 • ( 2 )
By Robin McAlpine
I haven’t always agreed with Martin Kettle’s Guardian columns over the years. They have mixed some good, pertinent analysis of what’s wrong with Britain with some unfortunate Blair-apologising. But of late I’ve felt that his commentary on what’s happening in Scotland just now has been quite good and more informed that many London-based commentators.
I write this because I really dislike overly-personalising political analysis; arguments should stand or fall on the basis of the content, not the person. So when I take his column today as a jumping-off point for a discussion of the skew-whiff nature of UK politics it is only as an example.
The basic argument in his column is that, in effect, the Scottish Government has abandoned reasoned, argument-based politics in favour of naked political posturing. He suggests that, faced with a barrage of detailed questions from George Osborne and some on-air comments from Barosso, the Nats have retreated into name-calling mode and have given up any pretence of statesmanship.
I am more than a little surprised. George Osborne flew to Scotland in the face of overwhelming SNP reasonableness. The SNP has taken a very modest approach to what it would seek in negotiations. George Osborne flew in to tell us that no, the UK will take the most aggressive and punitive approach possible to Scotland, seeking to impose on us all the liabilities of the UK but allowing us precisely none of the assets or rights. He made his speech to which only three pre-arranged questions from sympathetic sources were allowed. He refused any broadcast interview of any sort. As he ran to his car the STV political editor chased him asking him to comment on how the international money markets would view the collapse in the balance of trade in Sterling when it lost the value of oil exports. He refused to offer a word in answer and flew straight back to London.
That, apparently, constitutes a serious debate and serious engagement with the issues.
I watched a reasonable amount of BBC coverage from London. I can’t remember anyone explaining sufficiently well what happens if Scotland’s exports are removed from the UK books. One has to assume that this is because the answer is uncomfortable for ‘Great’ Britain.
Barosso is an unelected president of the European Commission which has no say in the acceptance of new member states. He is a right-wing politician who was allied to the same block of European right-wing political parties of which Spanish PM Rajoy’s Popular Party are and the UK Conservatives were a part. I didn’t hear this mentioned – you’d barely know Barosso was a politician. He said it may well be impossible for Scotland to become a member of the EU. This view is shared by not a single serious commentator I have ever heard. The idea that Bulgaria and Romania are fit for EU entry but not a country that has already been a member for 40 years lacks credibility. And yet the UK media has barely contested the claim.
Serious debate?
Vince Cable recently made the front pages of Scotland’s newspapers and appeared across the UK media claiming that if Scotland votes Yes RBS will have to move to London. This had previously been denied by the Chief Executive of RBS. He subsequently denied it again and made clear that Cable had made no contact with RBS to check veracity before making his claim. So he was monstered across the media for joke politics? Eh, no, it was barely mentioned. Alex Salmond has repeatedly had to answer on whether ceding some sovereignty to London in a Sterling union would mean Scotland was even a ‘proper country’. Of course, every time David Cameron appears on the same programme he is asked whether Britain’s much more substantial hand-over of sovereignty to the WTO, the IMF and the EU means that Britain isn’t really a proper country. Except that never happens. Only Scotland has to answer for what every nation does.
Or Barosso again. Was he asked by anyone the impact on the Spanish economy when it is no longer allowed access to Scotland’s rich fishing marine territories? Was he asked how happy the EU would be to lose a nation that is very much a net contributor to his salary? There are 40,000 Spaniards in Scotland and many more EU citizens living and working here. Barosso seems highly excited about a right-wing EU attack on a part of a member state which seeks only democratic self-determination. Was he asked about the refugee crisis as right to work is unilaterally removed by him and his friends? Not that I heard. Oh the rigours of the UK media.
No-one denies that Scotland has contributed more to the UK than it has received every year for the last 30 years. No-one denies that if Scotland took its proportion of debt it would be significantly less indebted than the rest of the UK. It hasn’t been seriously challenged that Scotland would have less pension liability than the UK (mainly because we die younger) – and yet that is seldom mentioned. Or take a look at the Financial Times investigations on the UK pensions industry. It is the most corrupt and inefficient in Europe in which investors have routinely been ripped off in the most egregious ways. This was all presided over by Gordon Brown who also raided pension schemes and froze the state pension. And yet he is put forward uncritically as an expert on pensions.
Brilliant debate you’re all having. Brilliant. Really incisive.
Now let’s consider for a second how Britain would have responded if an EU Minister had arrive in Britain to say that you’re getting thrown out of the EU unless you sign up to the Euro entirely on the EU’s terms and that all your negotiated perks and benefits were being taken away unilaterally. Suppose this was done with a EU-prepared policy document. The suggestion is that Britain would calmly and sensibly engage point by point with the content of the policy document and refrain from any kind of nationalistic mouth-foaming. In reality, Britain’s politicians would be lining up to bleed from the eyes in rage and the media would be unhappy that ‘total hate’ was insufficient.
The same thing happens to us and Salmond says it is disrespectful. Even after months of being (in my view) far too reasonable in his negotiating stance. And he’s the provocateur in the face of George Osborne’s hand of friendship to the Scots?
Then again, the United Kingdom gets by pretty well by never asking itself difficult questions. This is a nation where economic wellbeing is measured in terms of retail sales and house prices and productivity, trade, innovation and industrial production are barely a part of national debate. Anything that Britain is bad at (it’s a long list) is off the agenda. There was a period in which the City State of London saw its economy grow by 35 per cent. Over the same period the economy of South Wales grew by three per cent. I find the use of the word ‘United’ interesting in this context. Of course, this is the subject of major debate in London as its metropolitan elite became conscious of just how much it has asset-stripped the rest of the peoples of this island.
Oh no, that’s right, it didn’t do that at all. We got Boris Johnstone in place of a debate about the reality of London’s management of Britain.
Salmond’s answers were all perfectly reasonable. The UK is almost certainly bluffing over Sterling and even if it went crazy and tried to force us out there are lots of good options for Scotland. Indeed, I’ve never disguised my belief that we shouldn’t even try to negotiate a currency union with for a currency that is managed on behalf of speculators and against the interests of manufacturing. The EU wants Scotland as a member very much – it is not even clear that Scotland CAN be thrown out. And any pensions industry in Scotland is almost certain to be less corrupt than the UK version.
I’m growing weary of ‘Scottish exceptionalism’. Why should Scotland have to answer to a different set of criteria to the rest of Britain? Once again, as in colonial India, what you do is normal, what we do is a ‘mutiny’. But above all, Britain is completely unwilling even to begin a conversation about what it has become – one of the worst developed countries in which to be a citizen. In case you didn’t know it, the following is the truth about Britain:
Britain is the country with the second lowest pay among advanced economies. Since 2010
British wages have fallen faster than all but three other EU countries – even though we work the
third longest hours. Britain has the third highest housing costs in Europe, the highest rail prices in Europe and is second worst for fuel poverty. Britain has the least happy children in the developed world, the worst infant mortality rates in Europe and some of the worst child poverty in the industrialised world. Britain’s elderly are the fourth poorest in the EU. Britain has the eighth biggest gap between men and women’s pay in Europe with childcare costs much higher than most European countries. Britain is the fourth most unequal developed society with a wealth gap twice as wide as any other EU country. Britain has the greatest regional inequality in Europe. Britain has the lowest level of trust in its politicians in Europe. Britain’s productivity is 16 per cent behind the average of advanced economies and has the worst record on industrial production.
This is only a sample. So when can we have a debate about this? When will London politicians be made to answer for the Britain they have created? It is Scotland that is trying – against the aligned powers of the London Elite and its client government – to draw a picture of a society that is different and better than what we have. Must we really have the agenda set by the empire we seek to escape? Must standards really be quite that double?
We know people think London is ‘grown up’ and other places are ‘childlike’. We know London thinks that anything it cares about is important and anything other places care about is unimportant. We know that London grants enormous status to other members of the international elite who agree with them and more-or-less ignores everyone else from here or abroad who doesn’t.
All I can say is that we’re trying to work out how to reform our economy to make it productive and to create high-wage jobs in a strong, secure welfare state. London is giving money to wealthy people to inflate the housing market and make it look like the economy isn’t a basket-case. What on earth makes you think you’re the grown-ups?
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I always remember a story handed down from one of my caithness Cormack grandparents when Sutherland who started the Highland clearances asked some of the local lairds to strike up a cause to get recruits for the Highland regiments apparently one old local said since you've put sheep before us get your sheep fight the Rooshians (crimean war) well maybe the choice now is between the sheep and the union. I know my vote will still be no. Oh I'm tired come on guys get a life back to bikes not sheep.
Living in a democracy of sorts lets you vote anyway you wish, but a no vote will be the vote of regret in years to come.
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Grumpytwo my friend I'm not sure how old you are but I'm old lived a long time and long forgotten that most politicians words are cheap. But my whole uk family means more to me than all the promises of wee eckie, or anyone else for that matter he will be no different than all the other promise makers that have passed in front of my old eyes. So sorry I'm part of the UK always and forever. And we had a family get together just a day or two ago and my four young cousins (who are true wee scots) from Penicuik (Edinburgh) are firmly with their uncle John on that. No hard feelings we go our own way me, no. You to yours my bikey friend.
I am getting there age wise myself and I am originally from Edinburgh and at one point lived in Penicuik, moved to Aberdeenshire 26 years ago.
Alex Salmond is not Scotland nor is he Scottish independence, after the yes vote there will be a general election at which time we can choose whoever we fancy to lead Scotland and shape our future and our children's future.
A no vote let's Westminster rule us forever with a government not of our choosing, I don't want to live like that any longer. We have a chance to choose our own future and I trust in my fellow Scots to do the right thing and vote yes. Our nation was sold out from under us 300 years ago and I hope we are going to take it back again in 2014.
In the history of the world no country has ever voted no in an independence referendum and I pray that we are not the first and only ones. I would hate to open my eyes the day after a no vote and know my countrymen had sold us down the river again.
Believe me when I say that my yes vote is not an English thing, I have worked in rUK for the 20 years and have many friends who are English, and if yourself or anyone else from south of the border is ever up here my door is always open.
Alex Salmond is not Scotland nor is he Scottish independence, after the yes vote there will be a general election at which time we can choose whoever we fancy to lead Scotland and shape our future and our children's future.
A no vote let's Westminster rule us forever with a government not of our choosing, I don't want to live like that any longer. We have a chance to choose our own future and I trust in my fellow Scots to do the right thing and vote yes. Our nation was sold out from under us 300 years ago and I hope we are going to take it back again in 2014.
In the history of the world no country has ever voted no in an independence referendum and I pray that we are not the first and only ones. I would hate to open my eyes the day after a no vote and know my countrymen had sold us down the river again.
Believe me when I say that my yes vote is not an English thing, I have worked in rUK for the 20 years and have many friends who are English, and if yourself or anyone else from south of the border is ever up here my door is always open.
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None of these quotes imply a link with a No vote. If Cameron wanted rid of the Barnett formula in 2008 why do we still have it 6 years later? As far as I can see any replacement of the Barnett Formula relies on devolved government getting much more fiscal autonomy with tax raising responsibility. Why should the Scottish government fear having control of tax raising powers rather than just control of a block grant hand out.? Is it perhaps because the link between taxes and spending would be much more transparent. Its easy being popular spending money that comes from taxes raised by another government. They make all the tough decisions and take the flack for it while slippery Eck just dishes out the sweeties and claims all the credit.
All the information and answers are here,
http://wingsoverscotland.com
http://wingsoverscotland.com
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As far as I am aware the current Westminster government is the one I chose. It may not be the one you wanted but I doubt that a Scottish government chosen by the yes campaigners would be one that suited me. An independent Scotland would be just as unrepresentative of my opinion as a Westminster government is of yours. Why should anyone vote to live in a perpetual socialist enclave just to be able to say I live in an independent Scotland? Would you be willing to live under a right wing government for the rest of your life if that was the price you had to pay for independence?
It may be the government you as an individual chose but with one conservative mp in Scotland it is hardly representative of the rest of us living in Scotland so your argument is rather mute.
A no vote will condemn us to a life under a right wing government with austerity thrown in.
The referendum vote is for Scottish independence not a general election, the time to vote for a Scottish government will come after the yes vote. Regardless of what you think about the SNP or Alex Salmond a yes vote is the right vote.
Toddy
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It might but the UK has frequently returned a government that is of the same political persuasion as Scotland. It just chucks them out from time to time while we get our finances back in order then lets them back in. Scotland alone could not withstand the sort of catastrophic financial crash that follows a socialist government so even if the Scottish electorate came to their senses and realised that there is no such thing as a free lunch forever no right wing government would be able to repair the damage without the sort of austerity that you currently see in Greece and Iceland.
That is a very piss poor argument and one I suspect you don't fully accept yourself. You should read how Iceland's economy is booming now and growing faster than any EU country, kind of knocks your arguement on the head, doesn't it?
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/17/iceland-economy-idUSL5N0LI2OH20140217
Google Iceland Economy for more facts.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/17/iceland-economy-idUSL5N0LI2OH20140217
Google Iceland Economy for more facts.
Mr GrumpyTwo, as far as I can see we are not being offered true independence. Which SMP's are promoting true independence, i.e. not within the EU. The UK is under the thumb of the EU, do you really think that Scotland out of the UK and in the EU would fare better? Do you honestly believe that the Germans and French who wield most of the power would suddenly become fans of a newly independent Scotland? I think not, they would be more concerned about ensuring that if we were accepted as members of the EU that we were tied in to the Euro, had no rebate, had no power of veto, had no say on immigration etc. etc.
As for the subject of a single Scottish Conservative MP, that is a matter for the electoral system. To reiterate what has been said before, in the 2010 GE the Conservatives in Scotland polled ~413,000; the Lib-Dems ~465,000 and the SNP ~491,000. Labour were just over 1,000,000. The subsequent election of the SNP in Scotland was a reaction against the abysmal performance of the Westminster Labour administrations which were too fresh in the minds of the electorate to be ignored. People who had previously been utterly committed socialists cast their votes elsewhere. The SNP came to power on a wave of anti Labour feeling. If there was another election for Scottish Government today the results would be very different. I think that the SNP would get a hammering and Scotland would probably get another socialist government who in all probability would set about repeating the mistakes of Wilson, Callaghan, Blair and Brown. As Bennysdad has said it would take at least another two periods of disastrous Scottish socialist governments before the electorate accepted that it wasn't only Westminster socialists that brought fiscal ruin to Scotland. Only then would we have a chance at a sensible Scottish administration that accepted the facts that the success of a country has to be built on the success of it's commerce and that you can (should) only spend what you have gathered in taxes. The problem is, what state would Scotland be in by then?
As for the subject of a single Scottish Conservative MP, that is a matter for the electoral system. To reiterate what has been said before, in the 2010 GE the Conservatives in Scotland polled ~413,000; the Lib-Dems ~465,000 and the SNP ~491,000. Labour were just over 1,000,000. The subsequent election of the SNP in Scotland was a reaction against the abysmal performance of the Westminster Labour administrations which were too fresh in the minds of the electorate to be ignored. People who had previously been utterly committed socialists cast their votes elsewhere. The SNP came to power on a wave of anti Labour feeling. If there was another election for Scottish Government today the results would be very different. I think that the SNP would get a hammering and Scotland would probably get another socialist government who in all probability would set about repeating the mistakes of Wilson, Callaghan, Blair and Brown. As Bennysdad has said it would take at least another two periods of disastrous Scottish socialist governments before the electorate accepted that it wasn't only Westminster socialists that brought fiscal ruin to Scotland. Only then would we have a chance at a sensible Scottish administration that accepted the facts that the success of a country has to be built on the success of it's commerce and that you can (should) only spend what you have gathered in taxes. The problem is, what state would Scotland be in by then?
So Iceland is doing well with a centre right government, but there is every indication Scotland would have a left of centre government with all the usual socialist money squandering that goes with it.
It also looks like they wouldn't have been so successful if the UK hadn't bailed out their banks (money which is still owed to us) If Scotland had been independent could the Scottish government have been able to afford to bail out RBS and BoS?
This whole independence or should I say secession debate is saddening to me. I hope for all your sakes the final result is a massive majority in either camp. To Packer and Bennysdad I love your posts and reasoning. I hope you get the result you want.
It also looks like they wouldn't have been so successful if the UK hadn't bailed out their banks (money which is still owed to us) If Scotland had been independent could the Scottish government have been able to afford to bail out RBS and BoS?
This whole independence or should I say secession debate is saddening to me. I hope for all your sakes the final result is a massive majority in either camp. To Packer and Bennysdad I love your posts and reasoning. I hope you get the result you want.
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Even a dead cat will bounce if you drop it from high enough. Of course Iceland's growth is high compared with other countries because it started from such a low point. Also they have a government that is not afraid to slash public spending. Civil servants had between 5 and 15% pay cuts from the outset. The mortgage rate is currently 7.25% and they have refused to pay back creditors from outside Iceland. The Dutch and British have just launched a £5.3 billion claim against Iceland.
And you think a boost from a trade union is a GOOD thing.......its fully worse than I thought!!!
Fortunately the true.....red.....colours are coming out in time for the voters to realize that a vote for independence is a one way street to a permanent socialist scottish state....and we've seen how well they work?? NOT!!!
After all, as we are, the public sector is only 23% of Scottish employment. Once we've set up all the offices of state......defence, home, education, transport, rail, roads, aviation, marine, broadcasting, education, employment, revenue, immigration, diplomacy, welfare, pensions, benefits(?), vehicles/driver licensing/examination/testing, taxation, health, policing, monetary/fiscal management, food safety, and all the myriad others that we currently share with the UK, and will as an independent state have to support on our own, we as a nation of a mere 5 million should be able to get it up to near 50% shouldn't we? We'll be able to afford that with our (dwindling) oil revenue....and wind power....won't we?? We see every day yet more businesses declaring their intent to re-locate in the event....or even the threat...of independence. All lost jobs and income. Who is going to pay for these organizations? Lots of flag waving required here?
Scottish independence is a vote in the face of every known economic tenet.....the economies of scale any-one? It is economic illiteracy, and economic suicide. It will destroy this great nation. We will be at the mercy of professional cutnpasters without an original thought in their heads. All because they didn't like Maggie!!! Silly soundbites will rule!!
Zealots keep telling us that we mustn't be scared that independence necessarily means wee eck....but that's exactly what it does mean.....he'll be in charge. Him and all the other failed local government officers that gravitate to Hollyrood after that's all there is left for them to occupy themselves.
Fortunately the true.....red.....colours are coming out in time for the voters to realize that a vote for independence is a one way street to a permanent socialist scottish state....and we've seen how well they work?? NOT!!!
After all, as we are, the public sector is only 23% of Scottish employment. Once we've set up all the offices of state......defence, home, education, transport, rail, roads, aviation, marine, broadcasting, education, employment, revenue, immigration, diplomacy, welfare, pensions, benefits(?), vehicles/driver licensing/examination/testing, taxation, health, policing, monetary/fiscal management, food safety, and all the myriad others that we currently share with the UK, and will as an independent state have to support on our own, we as a nation of a mere 5 million should be able to get it up to near 50% shouldn't we? We'll be able to afford that with our (dwindling) oil revenue....and wind power....won't we?? We see every day yet more businesses declaring their intent to re-locate in the event....or even the threat...of independence. All lost jobs and income. Who is going to pay for these organizations? Lots of flag waving required here?
Scottish independence is a vote in the face of every known economic tenet.....the economies of scale any-one? It is economic illiteracy, and economic suicide. It will destroy this great nation. We will be at the mercy of professional cutnpasters without an original thought in their heads. All because they didn't like Maggie!!! Silly soundbites will rule!!
Zealots keep telling us that we mustn't be scared that independence necessarily means wee eck....but that's exactly what it does mean.....he'll be in charge. Him and all the other failed local government officers that gravitate to Hollyrood after that's all there is left for them to occupy themselves.
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