RISE NOW AND BE A NATION AGAIN !
- Thread starter ~Stef~
- Start date
are you sure scotland will be in the EU?
I had also been wondering that. What does a political party do when its achieved its aims
.You have to remember that these people are all Politicians and in my experience as such they are dedicated to self-interest and self aggrandizment. Some have tried their hand at UK politics but didn't get very far so, if you want to be percieved as a big fish . . . shrink the pool. They are not going anywhere soon!
I have concerns about the Political landscape following a successful YES vote. Scotland has a population of around 5.5M, the voting population must be about 3M to 3.5M - that makes every vote precious and it won't take many voters to achieve some influence.
I feel there is a danger of fragmentation with small pressure groups forming parties to push their particular one-sided aims. The old Westminster parties won't feature and instead we could end-up with an unholy conglometation of small parties forming coalitions in order to form a majority government (until the wind changes again).
There could be some restrictive laws passed in order to appease the minority partners and keep them on-side.
Politics of compromise and appeasement with constant in-fighting & wrangling.
And remember, FREEDOM is a two-edged sword. For everyone wanting "Freedom To" there will be someone else wanting "Freedom From".
There will also be approaches from Global Business and Governments all wanting to get a foot on the ground. The majority may not want Trident, but you can bet the Americans will want a base here - and they may not be alone.
As a Chinaman once said . . "Be careful what you wish for".
I think we need a lot more information on how the Political Parties see the Political Landscape in Scotland after a YES vote. Until we get some manifestos we can't begin to make informed choices.
The question is - do we need that BEFORE we vote YES on not ???
Bob.
You want far too much certainty and the irony is that certainty is just an illusion.
Mr K
Registered user
I'm fairly sure the truth lies somewhere between the Utopia that the pro-independance campaigners would have us believe and the doom of the pro-union lot.
I'm fairly sure the truth lies somewhere between the Utopia that the pro-independance campaigners would have us believe and the doom of the pro-union lot.
Please don't confuse any sensible argument by cut n pasting inaccurate drivel from a foreign newspaper....only a page or so ago we were told that only people living in Scotland had any right to express an opinion, and now you use rubbish arguments from a provincial Australian newspaper to espouse your cause......and worse...quote Rabbie Burns as an argument for independence....fuxxake.
Toddy
Registered user
Scotland belongs in the EU
Scotland belongs in the EU, and independence won't change that
The no campaigners are floating scare stories about the EU denying the Scots full membership, but that will not happen
John Palmer
theguardian.com,
Friday 29 November 2013 13.42 GMT
Opponents of Scottish independence must be more nervous than they are admitting about the referendum result next year. Otherwise there would be no sense in provoking fears that – in some obscure manner – the European Union might frustrate the Scottish government's clearly stated intention to remain a full member of the EU.
As sometimes happens in political disputes of this kind, complicated provisions of the European treaties are being cited by the no campaign. But Scottish voters' eventual decision should be taken free of misleading propaganda designed to frighten yes voters.
In the event of a yes outcome, the Scottish government will take part in immediate negotiations with both London and Brussels about issues affecting Scotland's EU membership. But few have drawn attention to the fact that what we might call the "rump UK" government will also have to negotiate changes in the terms of its membership.
These will involve some relatively straightforward, technical EU treaty changes. But since no other EU member state will be directly affected, there is every reason to think that they could be approved rapidly and without ratifying referendums.
After all, they will have had the backing of both the London and Edinburgh governments and will not involve any new transfer of power to Brussels. What will have to be renegotiated?
• Obviously, the voting rights of Scotland in the EU Council of Ministers will affect the UK's future share of votes; the latter will have to be reduced because the population of the rump UK will be smaller.
• The number of MEPs to be elected from the two states will also have to be finalised. The number of Scottish members will have to be balanced by a cut in the number of rump UK members – except in the unlikely event of a further increase in the size of the European parliament.
• The payments of the two countries to the annual EU budget will also have to be settled.
• A balancing of rump UK and Scottish representation in other EU institutions – including the court of justice and the court of auditors – should be unproblematic. The Scottish government has never challenged the existing corpus of EU laws or legally defined common EU policies, with one possible exception. That is the commitment required of all EU members (with the exception of Britain and Denmark) to join the euro at some point. The Scottish government would be advised not to rest its case for permanent exemption from joining the euro on the dubious Swedish case.
The most important question that the no campaigners in Edinburgh or London cannot answer is: what provision exists in EU law to withhold citizens' rights from a people seeking continued EU membership and about whose country there is no question of any violation of fundamental European values? They cannot because there is none.
Unsurprisingly, the no camp has not dared justify depriving the Scottish people of these rights while the technical transitional arrangements are resolved. It will be in the interests of Brussels, London and Edinburgh to finalise these matters rapidly. The status quo could remain in place until a timetable is agreed for the new arrangements to come into force.
Not too much notice should be taken either of the muffled warning from the rightwing government in Madrid that it might veto Scotland's EU membership. The difference with Catalonia's claim to independence within the EU from Scotland's is that the Spanish constitution gives a veto to other Spanish regions over Catalan decisions – a potentially dangerous option for Spain itself. Meanwhile the Scottish people can vote knowing that no one has the power to deprive them of their EU citizens' rights if they decide to opt for independence.
Scotland belongs in the EU, and independence won't change that
The no campaigners are floating scare stories about the EU denying the Scots full membership, but that will not happen
John Palmer
theguardian.com,
Friday 29 November 2013 13.42 GMT
Opponents of Scottish independence must be more nervous than they are admitting about the referendum result next year. Otherwise there would be no sense in provoking fears that – in some obscure manner – the European Union might frustrate the Scottish government's clearly stated intention to remain a full member of the EU.
As sometimes happens in political disputes of this kind, complicated provisions of the European treaties are being cited by the no campaign. But Scottish voters' eventual decision should be taken free of misleading propaganda designed to frighten yes voters.
In the event of a yes outcome, the Scottish government will take part in immediate negotiations with both London and Brussels about issues affecting Scotland's EU membership. But few have drawn attention to the fact that what we might call the "rump UK" government will also have to negotiate changes in the terms of its membership.
These will involve some relatively straightforward, technical EU treaty changes. But since no other EU member state will be directly affected, there is every reason to think that they could be approved rapidly and without ratifying referendums.
After all, they will have had the backing of both the London and Edinburgh governments and will not involve any new transfer of power to Brussels. What will have to be renegotiated?
• Obviously, the voting rights of Scotland in the EU Council of Ministers will affect the UK's future share of votes; the latter will have to be reduced because the population of the rump UK will be smaller.
• The number of MEPs to be elected from the two states will also have to be finalised. The number of Scottish members will have to be balanced by a cut in the number of rump UK members – except in the unlikely event of a further increase in the size of the European parliament.
• The payments of the two countries to the annual EU budget will also have to be settled.
• A balancing of rump UK and Scottish representation in other EU institutions – including the court of justice and the court of auditors – should be unproblematic. The Scottish government has never challenged the existing corpus of EU laws or legally defined common EU policies, with one possible exception. That is the commitment required of all EU members (with the exception of Britain and Denmark) to join the euro at some point. The Scottish government would be advised not to rest its case for permanent exemption from joining the euro on the dubious Swedish case.
The most important question that the no campaigners in Edinburgh or London cannot answer is: what provision exists in EU law to withhold citizens' rights from a people seeking continued EU membership and about whose country there is no question of any violation of fundamental European values? They cannot because there is none.
Unsurprisingly, the no camp has not dared justify depriving the Scottish people of these rights while the technical transitional arrangements are resolved. It will be in the interests of Brussels, London and Edinburgh to finalise these matters rapidly. The status quo could remain in place until a timetable is agreed for the new arrangements to come into force.
Not too much notice should be taken either of the muffled warning from the rightwing government in Madrid that it might veto Scotland's EU membership. The difference with Catalonia's claim to independence within the EU from Scotland's is that the Spanish constitution gives a veto to other Spanish regions over Catalan decisions – a potentially dangerous option for Spain itself. Meanwhile the Scottish people can vote knowing that no one has the power to deprive them of their EU citizens' rights if they decide to opt for independence.
wully
Registered user
Why bother with Brussels? WTF to we want to be tied in to that bunch of useless, wasteful fuck wits?
We already comply with all the shite we need to do to trade with them and the UK voted only for 'the Common Market' not a United States of Europe.
If only Salmond and his cohorts would model a future Scotland on Norway he'd have my vote. But he won't.
We already comply with all the shite we need to do to trade with them and the UK voted only for 'the Common Market' not a United States of Europe.
If only Salmond and his cohorts would model a future Scotland on Norway he'd have my vote. But he won't.
Deleted account 210516001
Registered user
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That settles it then. The only hope of ditching the EU gravy train is to vote to remain part of the UK then vote no in the EU referendum. Its a no brainer. By tying Scotland's destiny to the EU fat Eck shows his true colours. Scotland can only go it alone if it hands over its sovereignty to Brussels. We will have to join the Euro at the going rate and at a stroke any savings you have in sterling will be converted to Euros.
Wee Eck....'We'll be in the EU' EU.....'errrr.....no you wont'
Wee Eck....'We'll keep sterling'....Sterling..... 'if you want, but you'll have to do as we say because you wont be making any monetary policy'
Wee Eck....'We'll be in NATO' ....NATO...... 'but we use nuclear bombs, you want to throw them out???'
Wee Eck.....'We'll have a thriving shipbuilding industry'...UK Govt...'Not building warships you wont, why should we send the work to a foreign country?'
White Paper on Independence.....Facts...nope, finances... nope. Uncosted wish list and aspirations...loads.
You make as much sense as the drunk in the pub the other night(Applecross Inn as it happens)....'I'm voting for independence because of Margaret Thatcher' Prat doesn't deserve a vote.
Get a grip. Get real. Braveheart was a film.
Independence will condemn Scotland evermore to left wing governance of one shape or another. And we've seen how well that works.
Wee Eck....'We'll keep sterling'....Sterling..... 'if you want, but you'll have to do as we say because you wont be making any monetary policy'
Wee Eck....'We'll be in NATO' ....NATO...... 'but we use nuclear bombs, you want to throw them out???'
Wee Eck.....'We'll have a thriving shipbuilding industry'...UK Govt...'Not building warships you wont, why should we send the work to a foreign country?'
White Paper on Independence.....Facts...nope, finances... nope. Uncosted wish list and aspirations...loads.
You make as much sense as the drunk in the pub the other night(Applecross Inn as it happens)....'I'm voting for independence because of Margaret Thatcher' Prat doesn't deserve a vote.
Get a grip. Get real. Braveheart was a film.
Independence will condemn Scotland evermore to left wing governance of one shape or another. And we've seen how well that works.
And please stop cut n pasting other peoples crap...its boring.
Toddy
Registered user
Euro, Pound Sterling or Scottish Pound?
Gordon MacIntyre-Kemp says...".
In the early exchanges on the referendum, the No Campaign made some noise by claiming that Scotland would be forced to adopt the euro and that the UK Government would refuse to let Scotland, as an independent country, use the pound (sterling) as its currency. It remains one of the major questions I am asked when giving talks on the economics of independence but, the plain fact is that neither the EU, the UK Government, or the Bank of England has the ability to affect those outcomes.
No Euro, even if we wanted to
In order to adopt the euro a country needs its currency to be committed to the Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) for two years. Scotland doesn’t have a currency to commit to the ERM, and as Scotland plans to keep the pound, we therefore cannot adopt the euro, even if we wanted to, and so certainly can’t be forced to either.
Alistair Darling has said we would have to reapply to the EU from outside, and that means being forced into the euro – however that is inaccurate and even David Cameron can’t help but say he was wrong.
Not really independent?
It has been argued that Scotland wouldn’t be independent if we kept the pound, however, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium etc have a shared currency and are independent of each other – the list is almost endless. Although Scotland wouldn’t be able to set independent interest rates, all the other more easily utilised fiscal tools would be available to the Scottish Government, and the joint interest rate would also help the English and other home nation economies.
The Scottish Government’s Fiscal Commission Working Group of leading economists, including former White House Chief Economic Adviser Professor Joe Stiglitz, has said that Scotland can agree to currency zone financial parameters the type of which any financially prudent developed nation should have following the lessons of the financial crisis but which do not mean a lack of flexibility to grow the Scottish economy.
Sterling is a fully convertible currency, this means that if any country in the world wants to use sterling it can. Examples of a fully convertible currency being used by other nations include Panama and El Salvador using the US dollar. Using the pound for a period, is a well proven route for countries leaving British rule (New Zealand/Ireland/Australia etc). However Scotland’s right to use sterling is stronger than other countries due to the fact that Scotland owns a population percentage share of the Bank of England (BOE), and so we will just be using a currency and services of a bank that we part-own with the other UK countries. So all that is being proposed is that Scotland will maintain the currency union that we joined hundreds of years ago and still works whilst leaving the political one that doesn’t.
But why use the pound rather than launch our own currency?
I was one of the first economists to suggest this, and absolutely agree with the Scottish Government policy. Like most people my heart says launch a Scottish currency, but my head says keep the pound – here is why:
The other home nations will, after independence become our largest export market. It makes sense not to put a currency barrier in way of trade. The No campaign is trying to get us to vote against a form of independence (they call it separation) which isn’t on the ballot paper. My independence, the Yes campaigns independence, and the SNP’s independence, is one that maintains the appropriate levels of economic interconnectivity, interdependence and social, cultural and yes – currency ties. Crucially, however, we will be making those decisions to share services as a sovereign country because we believe it to be in our interests. We’ll be making the choice, not London, and we can change our choices when we want.
Why a shared currency?
A Scottish pound would likely be a very strong currency – with oil, gas and renewables, a smallish population, a strong balance of payments, a far better financial position versus rest of UK and an almost guaranteed AAA credit rating. This would mean that the Scottish pound would buy a lot of rUK pounds, a lot of Euros and Dollars etc.
This would mean that for a short time imports would be cheap, the finance industry would grow and holidays would be cheap. Unfortunately this would mean that England, the other home nations and most of the rest of the world couldn’t afford our food, whisky, oil technologies, energy or even services, so we would risk a significant downside to our exporting industries with our own currency.
Why not just devalue?
It has been tried, and Switzerland in particular with all of its financial muscle has been unable to stop the rise in its currency. Uruguay the ‘Switzerland of South America’ has been devaluing to keep its currency a pace with its largest trading partner, Argentina, but Argentinas over reliance on quantitive easing (printing new money) to buy dollars, is in danger of weakening the currency and creating inflation in a low growth economy (stagflation). My point: large scale currency manipulation exercises no longer work, they are a thing of the past, globalisation of markets has diminished any governments power to manipulate currency values.
Many people think that quantitive easing is a great way to increase the money supply, but it amounts to less than 3% of new money created in the UK (so has a limited effect) and strangely, still has an oversized inflationary pressure attached to the practice. Controlling fiscal policy is very different to economic policy – devaluing the currency and setting interest rates are blunt tools, but more targeted economic levers such as reducing landfill taxes, corporation tax, air passenger duty etc, can be targeted in support of specific economic policies and that is why not launching our own currency has no relevance to being truly independent or not.
As a plan B, launching our own currency and devaluing is a credible option, but plan A (keeping the pound) as set out by the Scottish Government is far better.
Our friends and neighbours
The rest of the UK has a massive balance of payments deficit problem, we buy in too much, and export too little – this is a hangover from decades of keeping the pound strong for the finance industry, the all eggs in one basket strategy.
A few months ago I did some work that compared the deficits as a percentage of GDP in 2011 (last reliable figures available). Using an average of Eurostat, IMF and CIA projections it was found that out of 170 sovereign states the UK debt level (the amount spent in the UK more than was raised in taxes) was poorly placed at 150th.
The really bad news is the UK is 188th out of 192 nations in terms of the strength of its current account balance. We have a critical balance of payments problem that is in danger of sinking the UK economy without a trace. That is a direct result of keeping the pound strong to help the finance industry (predominately based around the city of London) and this also led to deindustrialisation in Scotland and the UK regions. In 2007 and 2008 I met with Bank of England representatives including Monitory Policy Committee (MPC) members and urged them to curb the excess lending from the finance industry. I was told in no uncertain terms that, Scotland had never had it so good. The words eye, off, and the ball, come to mind.
Upsetting the balance
If you were to take oil, whisky and food exports out of the sterling zone, the balance of trade deficit could cause sterling to sink like a stone, and so would the English economy. Not only would that be bad for Scotland, but it would be bad for our friends in England and that is reason enough – we will still be from Britain (it is an island) after independence, and England will probably always remain our best friend, and trading partner. The rUK would also need to purchase between 30-40% of its energy from Scotland (oil and gas included) and if those trades were from sterling into another currency zone, then there would be no benefit from buying from Scotland, and not another EU country (especially after the EU super-grid has been completed).
Who owns sterling?
So if we keep the pound and the Bank of England (which under international law an independent Scotland owns roughly 9% of) we would leave the ability to set interest rates to keep inflation low with the BOE, it is generally considered a good thing to have similar levels of inflation and the same currency as your trading partners. But roughly 90% of the economic policy levers we would differentiate from the UK would move into Scotland’s control (we already have the rest via devolution).
Equally the UK Government and the Bank of England, in the event of independence, would naturally want what is best for the UK sterling zone and its citizens and would want (actually need) the backing for sterling that Scottish oil and other exports would provide. But, crucially in this new scenario, all of the effective fiscal and economic levers that we might want to vary, would be under the control of the independent Scottish Government.
Conclusion
Keeping the Bank of England, and the pound sterling, still gives us a choice to launch our own currency in the future should that be the right decision. Interestingly we don’t have the option to join the Euro (if we ever wanted to) until our own Scottish currency has been launched and has participated in the exchange rate mechanism for at least two years.
So, far from the scare story of being forced to join the Euro, we couldn’t join, even if we wanted to. Launching our own currency would be costly and difficult at the outset of independence, but it would also upset the trade balance with our friends in the rest of the UK by making cross border trades also a cross currency trade. If this damages the rUK economy then that isn’t in anyones best interest, independence can be a boost to all the nations of the UK economically and democratically.
The economists who work for the UK Government and in the treasury know all of this, and would move heaven and earth to ensure an independent Scotland kept the pound – everything else is just political manoeuvring in the hope of maintaining control of Scottish taxation at Westminster.
Gordon MacIntyre-Kemp says...".
In the early exchanges on the referendum, the No Campaign made some noise by claiming that Scotland would be forced to adopt the euro and that the UK Government would refuse to let Scotland, as an independent country, use the pound (sterling) as its currency. It remains one of the major questions I am asked when giving talks on the economics of independence but, the plain fact is that neither the EU, the UK Government, or the Bank of England has the ability to affect those outcomes.
No Euro, even if we wanted to
In order to adopt the euro a country needs its currency to be committed to the Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) for two years. Scotland doesn’t have a currency to commit to the ERM, and as Scotland plans to keep the pound, we therefore cannot adopt the euro, even if we wanted to, and so certainly can’t be forced to either.
Alistair Darling has said we would have to reapply to the EU from outside, and that means being forced into the euro – however that is inaccurate and even David Cameron can’t help but say he was wrong.
Not really independent?
It has been argued that Scotland wouldn’t be independent if we kept the pound, however, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium etc have a shared currency and are independent of each other – the list is almost endless. Although Scotland wouldn’t be able to set independent interest rates, all the other more easily utilised fiscal tools would be available to the Scottish Government, and the joint interest rate would also help the English and other home nation economies.
The Scottish Government’s Fiscal Commission Working Group of leading economists, including former White House Chief Economic Adviser Professor Joe Stiglitz, has said that Scotland can agree to currency zone financial parameters the type of which any financially prudent developed nation should have following the lessons of the financial crisis but which do not mean a lack of flexibility to grow the Scottish economy.
Sterling is a fully convertible currency, this means that if any country in the world wants to use sterling it can. Examples of a fully convertible currency being used by other nations include Panama and El Salvador using the US dollar. Using the pound for a period, is a well proven route for countries leaving British rule (New Zealand/Ireland/Australia etc). However Scotland’s right to use sterling is stronger than other countries due to the fact that Scotland owns a population percentage share of the Bank of England (BOE), and so we will just be using a currency and services of a bank that we part-own with the other UK countries. So all that is being proposed is that Scotland will maintain the currency union that we joined hundreds of years ago and still works whilst leaving the political one that doesn’t.
But why use the pound rather than launch our own currency?
I was one of the first economists to suggest this, and absolutely agree with the Scottish Government policy. Like most people my heart says launch a Scottish currency, but my head says keep the pound – here is why:
The other home nations will, after independence become our largest export market. It makes sense not to put a currency barrier in way of trade. The No campaign is trying to get us to vote against a form of independence (they call it separation) which isn’t on the ballot paper. My independence, the Yes campaigns independence, and the SNP’s independence, is one that maintains the appropriate levels of economic interconnectivity, interdependence and social, cultural and yes – currency ties. Crucially, however, we will be making those decisions to share services as a sovereign country because we believe it to be in our interests. We’ll be making the choice, not London, and we can change our choices when we want.
Why a shared currency?
A Scottish pound would likely be a very strong currency – with oil, gas and renewables, a smallish population, a strong balance of payments, a far better financial position versus rest of UK and an almost guaranteed AAA credit rating. This would mean that the Scottish pound would buy a lot of rUK pounds, a lot of Euros and Dollars etc.
This would mean that for a short time imports would be cheap, the finance industry would grow and holidays would be cheap. Unfortunately this would mean that England, the other home nations and most of the rest of the world couldn’t afford our food, whisky, oil technologies, energy or even services, so we would risk a significant downside to our exporting industries with our own currency.
Why not just devalue?
It has been tried, and Switzerland in particular with all of its financial muscle has been unable to stop the rise in its currency. Uruguay the ‘Switzerland of South America’ has been devaluing to keep its currency a pace with its largest trading partner, Argentina, but Argentinas over reliance on quantitive easing (printing new money) to buy dollars, is in danger of weakening the currency and creating inflation in a low growth economy (stagflation). My point: large scale currency manipulation exercises no longer work, they are a thing of the past, globalisation of markets has diminished any governments power to manipulate currency values.
Many people think that quantitive easing is a great way to increase the money supply, but it amounts to less than 3% of new money created in the UK (so has a limited effect) and strangely, still has an oversized inflationary pressure attached to the practice. Controlling fiscal policy is very different to economic policy – devaluing the currency and setting interest rates are blunt tools, but more targeted economic levers such as reducing landfill taxes, corporation tax, air passenger duty etc, can be targeted in support of specific economic policies and that is why not launching our own currency has no relevance to being truly independent or not.
As a plan B, launching our own currency and devaluing is a credible option, but plan A (keeping the pound) as set out by the Scottish Government is far better.
Our friends and neighbours
The rest of the UK has a massive balance of payments deficit problem, we buy in too much, and export too little – this is a hangover from decades of keeping the pound strong for the finance industry, the all eggs in one basket strategy.
A few months ago I did some work that compared the deficits as a percentage of GDP in 2011 (last reliable figures available). Using an average of Eurostat, IMF and CIA projections it was found that out of 170 sovereign states the UK debt level (the amount spent in the UK more than was raised in taxes) was poorly placed at 150th.
The really bad news is the UK is 188th out of 192 nations in terms of the strength of its current account balance. We have a critical balance of payments problem that is in danger of sinking the UK economy without a trace. That is a direct result of keeping the pound strong to help the finance industry (predominately based around the city of London) and this also led to deindustrialisation in Scotland and the UK regions. In 2007 and 2008 I met with Bank of England representatives including Monitory Policy Committee (MPC) members and urged them to curb the excess lending from the finance industry. I was told in no uncertain terms that, Scotland had never had it so good. The words eye, off, and the ball, come to mind.
Upsetting the balance
If you were to take oil, whisky and food exports out of the sterling zone, the balance of trade deficit could cause sterling to sink like a stone, and so would the English economy. Not only would that be bad for Scotland, but it would be bad for our friends in England and that is reason enough – we will still be from Britain (it is an island) after independence, and England will probably always remain our best friend, and trading partner. The rUK would also need to purchase between 30-40% of its energy from Scotland (oil and gas included) and if those trades were from sterling into another currency zone, then there would be no benefit from buying from Scotland, and not another EU country (especially after the EU super-grid has been completed).
Who owns sterling?
So if we keep the pound and the Bank of England (which under international law an independent Scotland owns roughly 9% of) we would leave the ability to set interest rates to keep inflation low with the BOE, it is generally considered a good thing to have similar levels of inflation and the same currency as your trading partners. But roughly 90% of the economic policy levers we would differentiate from the UK would move into Scotland’s control (we already have the rest via devolution).
Equally the UK Government and the Bank of England, in the event of independence, would naturally want what is best for the UK sterling zone and its citizens and would want (actually need) the backing for sterling that Scottish oil and other exports would provide. But, crucially in this new scenario, all of the effective fiscal and economic levers that we might want to vary, would be under the control of the independent Scottish Government.
Conclusion
Keeping the Bank of England, and the pound sterling, still gives us a choice to launch our own currency in the future should that be the right decision. Interestingly we don’t have the option to join the Euro (if we ever wanted to) until our own Scottish currency has been launched and has participated in the exchange rate mechanism for at least two years.
So, far from the scare story of being forced to join the Euro, we couldn’t join, even if we wanted to. Launching our own currency would be costly and difficult at the outset of independence, but it would also upset the trade balance with our friends in the rest of the UK by making cross border trades also a cross currency trade. If this damages the rUK economy then that isn’t in anyones best interest, independence can be a boost to all the nations of the UK economically and democratically.
The economists who work for the UK Government and in the treasury know all of this, and would move heaven and earth to ensure an independent Scotland kept the pound – everything else is just political manoeuvring in the hope of maintaining control of Scottish taxation at Westminster.
Yikes!!
morty
Registered user
what the f*ck my eyes hurt
Never mind your eyes hurting, there are far more important things at stake. I suggest you might want to read it and digest it. There's an opportunity here for one of the biggest political, social and economic reforms in any of our lifetimes.
Agreed......and we must mobilise everything we can to prevent the harm it will do to our country....
So far we have had the Canberra Times, The Guardian, The Independent....oh, and the CND manifesto.....rock on!! Marvellous!! What next...The Royston Crow, The Welwyn Times......keep your shite to yourself!!
So far we have had the Canberra Times, The Guardian, The Independent....oh, and the CND manifesto.....rock on!! Marvellous!! What next...The Royston Crow, The Welwyn Times......keep your shite to yourself!!
Fanum
Toubab
TODDY......
You have said more yourself in your signature (which by the way, is merely an ostentatious and meaningless list of bikes that presumably shows what you think of yourself......it says absolutely FUCK all about anything apart from what you've had before, and frankly nobody gives a shit
) than you have yourself on this issue...all you've done is mass cut'n'pasted loads of biased bollocks from whatever source you have that you find that supports the views that you have.......
I say that with tongue firmly in cheek, because apart from the evidence of your chosen cut and pasted material, you haven't expressed one single view
Have you ever had a single opinion of your own, born out from experience or your own knowledge?, or are you happy to go on looking like a total berk and letting cut and paste drivel singularly fail to speak for you?
So come on man, FFS, express yourself, without some bollocks stolen from elsewhere.....WHY do you think Trident being removed from Scotland will be good?
Your initial crappy cut and paste said that Billions had been invested in it....certainly true, but how much of that came of of Scottish pockets?
Most came out of teh pockets of others in the UK (by sheer weight of numbers and taxes paid) yet YOU, the Scots, have had nearly all of the benefits of the infrastructure improvements, economy boost and local spending because of it.........do you actually believe that having Trident based up there makes you into some sort of target?
FFS, you lazy sod, say something yourself, present an argument that stands up, rather than just quoting shit from mass media
You have said more yourself in your signature (which by the way, is merely an ostentatious and meaningless list of bikes that presumably shows what you think of yourself......it says absolutely FUCK all about anything apart from what you've had before, and frankly nobody gives a shit
) than you have yourself on this issue...all you've done is mass cut'n'pasted loads of biased bollocks from whatever source you have that you find that supports the views that you have.......I say that with tongue firmly in cheek, because apart from the evidence of your chosen cut and pasted material, you haven't expressed one single view
Have you ever had a single opinion of your own, born out from experience or your own knowledge?, or are you happy to go on looking like a total berk and letting cut and paste drivel singularly fail to speak for you?
So come on man, FFS, express yourself, without some bollocks stolen from elsewhere.....WHY do you think Trident being removed from Scotland will be good?
Your initial crappy cut and paste said that Billions had been invested in it....certainly true, but how much of that came of of Scottish pockets?
Most came out of teh pockets of others in the UK (by sheer weight of numbers and taxes paid) yet YOU, the Scots, have had nearly all of the benefits of the infrastructure improvements, economy boost and local spending because of it.........do you actually believe that having Trident based up there makes you into some sort of target?
FFS, you lazy sod, say something yourself, present an argument that stands up, rather than just quoting shit from mass media
Yo bro!!
Whether you like it or not, there's likely to be a left-wing administration of one kind or another in Scotland at least until there's a more equal distribution of wealth and a better Social Welfare infrastructure. I'd rather that better and more morally acceptable government policies aren't stymied by Middle England's tendency to vote in Tories. You seem to be unduly thirled to a conservative view that Independence is going to harm Scotland. Not everyone shares this view.
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