Scottish "nationalists" win parliamentary majority for "independence" referendum

You sure it's not the other way around? Phil K check this out:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/News/Releases/2010/06/23103654

Since Westminster has only had deficits in the last years, how can you say you're not more or less griping on Scotland? I find Scotland's case interesting even as the amateur economist I am and from across the continent, and I watch the situation there closely.

 

Yes I have, even on the independence subject on a few occasions. I generally am familiar with your media. But time and technology seems to be on your side. 2014 is still some way ahead. I think there's a good chance you won't miss this shot.

Oh yeah I have. We surely do have our won hordes of brainwashed people. Especially in the rural areas, when it comes to the old people scaremongering gets extreme.

Well then show me some of the hottest?

 

Edited post and ended up with two versions. Removed the unedited one.

 

From your lips to God's ears! Lol!

Newsnet Scotland link on my sig might do in the meantime.......it has most lies and responses to them.. I've had a couple of glasses of red tonight (was daft enough to buy red wine for a recipe and couldn't resist not wasting what was left! ) If I remember......or if you remind me.... I'll dig through my bookmarks when I am a shade more sober.

 

The lines ... You're the only person with a non-UK accent I have ever heard say they don't feel safe with British authorities. Did you give them reason to believe you might be a criminal? Even if you were your normal good natured self, I can't see for a moment how they would threaten you in any way. Romanian Crime a matter for concern for London Police. For a Romanian to say they don't feel safe with the authorities here is quite ironic" are together because Romania is well known for its corruption (You've mentioned it yourself.) in a Europe with widespread corruption and this corruption in no way leaves Romanian police untouched. It seems to affect the Roma most of all; another reason they emigrate, probably.

Far more crime is being committed by proportionally far fewer Romanians than Poles. How do you explain that? You can say, "but they're Roma!" but it makes no difference to us, they'll still gain unfettered access as Romanians with the wholehearted backing of the European Commission. [Romanians don't even have the right to free movement until next year unlike the Polish).The victims of these crimes know that Romania is a much poorer or less developed country than the UK but this does not make them feel better and they already know that most criminals are scum whether they're Romanians, Brits or Martians! I don't want anyone to have to put up with British criminals, so why should we be expected to put up with foreign criminals?

That's not in dispute, but it's not much of a comfort to the victims.

No country is destined to stay bad forever. In the meantime we're sick of being unable to deport criminals who commit crimes. We have enough criminals of our own to deal with. No doubt Romania will improve the standard of living for its people, but I don't see it improving nearly fast enough to suit victims of Romanian criminals.

The UK isn't 'doing great' at all and just one of the reasons is our inability to act in the country's best interests. I'm all for "co-operation" and "working together" but seriously, this breed of togetherness severely hinders the well being of the people already here.

They didn't **** up their neighbours in Europe. The politicians of those countries did that all by themselves. The Tories and Cameron played a large part, along with the rest of the political establishment here, in ******* up this country. The Queen was merely a bystander.

Nevertheless, the people of this country voted the Tories into power more than they ever did their opponents. Still, the good news is that the Tories are losing their grip on their own supporters. It might mean that we have to suffer another few years of the Labour party's methods of ******* up the country before things will change for the better.

 

http://www.thefarrellreport.net/report_1__introduction.html

This make a mockery of any Democracy in this German run dictatorship!

Be frightened, be very frightened of those that run these nation states!

And no .... its certainly not going to get any better, those, your degenerates have had too much power for too long!


Regards
Highlander

 

I wonder how many of the Europeans posting in favour of Scottish independence from the UK are also in favour of the UK getting independence from the EU.

 

A deeply divided kingdom: Scots each get £1,600 more state cash a year spent on them than the English

Free Scottish services cost English families £420 a year
Scots income tax would rise 11p to pay it themselves

The gulf in state spending between Scotland and England has hit a record £1,600 per head.

Government spending in Scotland averaged £10,212 per person last year – £1,624 per head more than in England.

The staggering figures, buried in Treasury documents, reveal the gap increased by more than 15 per cent in only a year.

Ministers were under renewed pressure to review Scotland's controversial funding formula last night – amid warnings the issue is fuelling growing resentment in England.

But Treasury officials admitted that the yawning gap would continue to widen over the next four years.

Scots receive a range of services free of charge, including prescriptions, long-term care for the elderly and university tuition – all of which attract hefty charges in England.

Subsidising these services costs every family south of the border £420 a year.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...s-1-600-year-spent-English.html#ixzz2QiyF83f4

A plot to shatter the Union and the REAL reason English taxpayers pay for Granny McTavish to live the high life

One man will be grinning from ear to ear over the news that three students from England are to sue the Scottish government for discrimination.

The trio, led by Jennifer Watts, from Manchester, will argue that it is unfair to charge students from England tuition fees of up to £9,000 a year when Scottish students get their university education for free.

The man who is grinning is Scotland's First Minister, Alex Salmond. True, if his government loses the case it could throw the Scottish education system into disarray, with thousands of English students applying for places north of the border.

But what is that compared with the huge propaganda victory that will come from highlighting what a good deal Scottish students enjoy?

Alex Salmond's strategy is to whip up the English into such a frenzy of anger that they start demanding independence from Scotland. He is succeeding.

The same poll which revealed just 29 per cent of Scots are in favour of independence found that a much higher proportion — 41 per cent — of English voters are in favour of the Scots going their own way.

And tuition fees are not the only battleground on which Salmond is trying to alienate the Auld Enemy.

He has furnished the Scots with free personal care at home for the over-65s, free prescriptions, free hospital parking, and free school meals for five to seven-year-olds. Essentially, any public service which English taxpayers resent having to pay for, Alex Salmond will ensure becomes free for Scots.

The message for English voters is: Granny McTavish is living it up at your expense.

The great irony is that under EU law, Scottish universities are not allowed to discriminate against members of other EU states. Were Miss Watts a Belgian, a Pole or a Greek, she would be entitled to free education at a Scottish university. But English? Forget it.

The Scottish government insists that this does not constitute discrimination because the EU rules apply only to members of other EU states; they do not demand that citizens of the same member state be treated equally.

As for Scottish students studying in England — they do have to pay fees, but the state loans available to them are much more generous than those available to English students.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/a...payers-pay-Granny-McTavish.html#ixzz2QizN8rBD

 

Poland is not set to rival the UK in 20-20 25 years.

In fact, the predictions are that within the next few decades Britain is to overtake Germany as Europe's largest economy and most populous state (due mainly in part to all those cashpoint muggers and illegal squatters from Romania).

 

How do I explain that? Well it means then that our criminals are better, more energetic, more prolific at their thing than the Polish or yours . That might apply to the good people of our countries as well. But the numbers of criminals must be equal between countries, proportional to the population of their country. Same was with Cuba in 1983 when entire prisons were exported to USA.

Why do people always see the empty half of the glass? Why aren't they happy with the good part of the things as they are now? You think this is bad and it can't get any worse? Well it can get a thousand times worse. IF they add Turkey to the EUropean Union you will start to miss the days when only Polish, Romanians and Bulgarians were the trouble.

Turkey is half the size of Europe. Never been European and never shared our values. Even though they try to be democratic at the back of their mind they still believe that women are inferior and stuff like that etc etc.

Fortunately many powerful people in the EU quietly oppose that. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't pray that it stays out for another thousand years. The EU doesn't have any Muslim countries. And still look how much tensions arises because of Arabs. France a prime example. If Turkey becomes EU these days will seem like happy days to you Brits compared to then.

 

Yeah.

It was revealed in 2011 that England gives Scotland £35 billion a year which the Scottish government uses to lavish Jocks with all sorts of goodies and freebies which are denied to the English.

That will stop in the unlikely event that the Scots vote for independence, of course.

The Scots, as well as the Welsh and Norns, also receive more per capita in public spending than the English do.

 

You can post all you like about how "really wealthy" Scotland which "pays its own way" is more than capable of cutting the apron strings with England.

But I can tell you right now that the economic woes which have hit Britain mainly started in Edinburgh rather than the City of London. The two big banks which crashed and needed a bailout - HBOS and RBS - are both Scottish banks based in Edinburgh, not the City of London (Northern Rock also had nothing to do with the City).

And here's the thing - RBS's balance sheet was 13 times Scotland's GDP. So these two banks were able to be bailed out only by the millions of generous English taxpayers. But what would have happened had Scotland been independent when HBOS and RBS crashed? Scotland would have been in deep faeces. There's no way, as an independent nation, that it would have been able to bail its two big banks out, and it would have made the situation in Iceland seem insignificant.

The bailing out of the two Scottish banks was only capable thanks to Scotland being part of the UK.

 

Scottish independence

It’ll cost you

Scottish independence would come at a high price

Apr 14th 2012
The Economist



IN 1698 the nobles and landowners of the Kingdom of Scotland tried to elevate their country to a world trading nation by colonising the isthmus of Panama. The Darien scheme failed and nearly bankrupted the country. Within a decade Scotland had signed an Act of Union with England to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Scots found it tough in the 18th century to be a small nation in a globalising world. But nationalists are an optimistic bunch, and they would dearly like to have another go.

In two years' time the people of Scotland will be asked whether they want to become an independent sovereign state. It is not often that a 300-year-old union (the most successful union in world history) is broken, so the vote will have ramifications far beyond a land of 5m people. Scottish independence could lead to a break-up of the United Kingdom. The Catalans, among other disaffected European groups, see Scottish independence as a harbinger of their own bid for nationhood. Other diverse nation-states watch, and worry.

Some of the arguments for and against Scottish independence are aimed at the heart. Alex Salmond's pro-independence Scottish National Party (SNP) says Scotland has its own “society and nation” that could thrive with autonomy. It has also played on local resentment at being bossed around by posh Westminster politicians—so successfully that no politician with an English accent, let alone a plummy one, is likely to play a large part in the pro-union campaign. As for the unionists, they argue that Britain would be diminished on the world stage if Scotland were to go its own way. Petty resentments and centuries-ago battles notwithstanding, the nations have rubbed along pretty well over the years and have a glorious common history, they say. Why dissolve the marriage now?

Every nation has its price

The political and cultural issues around independence are hotly debated. Yet fittingly, in the birthplace of Adam Smith economic arguments seem to weigh heaviest. Opinion polls suggest that they will determine whether or not Scots go for independence. One poll found that just 21% of Scots would favour independence if it would leave them £500 ($795) a year worse off, and only 24% would vote to stay in the union even if they would be less well off sticking with Britain. Almost everyone else would vote for independence if it brought in roughly enough money to buy a new iPad, and against it if not.

Opinions on the economics of independence are starkly divided. Nationalists argue that, mostly thanks to North Sea oil and gas, Scotland subsidises the union and would be better off alone. The more sneering sort of unionist argues the opposite, that Scotland is a parasitic subsidy junkie.



Both are wrong, in the short term at least. Assuming it keeps the oil and gas extracted from under Scottish waters, an independent Scotland would currently gain roughly as much in taxes as it would lose in subsidies.

The future, however, looks much dicier. This is a stormy economic world, and an independent Scotland would be a small, vulnerable barque. It would depend on oil for some 18% of its GDP, making it subject to shifts in global commodity prices. Though high oil and gas prices have pushed up tax revenues, if they drop production as well as receipts would plummet. The richest reserves have already been exploited, leaving inaccessible oil that becomes uneconomic when prices fall. North Sea production has been falling by about 6% a year for the past decade. Eventually the oil will run out entirely.

A small country is more vulnerable to other shocks. In 2008 the British government had to bail out Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and HBOS, Scotland's two biggest banks. At its peak, RBS's balance sheet was 13 times Scottish GDP. Edinburgh has faltered as a financial centre since, and would be hard to revive (not often pointed out is the fact, as a share of its GDP, Scotland has a larger financial services sector than England). There is a limit to how large a financial sector an independent Scotland—a new, small economy—could support. Mr Salmond has already rebuffed suggestions that he should take a share of RBS's £187 billion of toxic assets.

The sexy Swedish model

By virtue of its size, an independent Scotland's borrowing costs would almost certainly be higher: its bond market would be small and illiquid. But Scotland's biggest problem could be its currency. The SNP's enthusiasm for the euro has faded: it wants Scotland to stick with the pound for the moment. That would mean entering a monetary union without fiscal union, a set-up that has proved disastrous in Europe. Though Mr Salmond claims Scotland would enjoy automatic EU membership, European Commission lawyers are doubtful. A candidate Scotland would have to negotiate entry terms—and commit to join the euro one day.

Subtly, the nationalist argument has shifted. Some years ago the SNP envisaged Scotland joining an “arc of prosperity” of small, thriving countries such as Iceland and Ireland. After the banking and euro-zone crises, advocates for independence have pointed instead to the Nordic countries. The SNP implies that Scotland can combine a Scandinavian-style nurturing state—with free university tuition, free elderly care, free universal child care and more generous pensions—with a thriving business sector. An independent Scotland would hope to lure businesses through low corporation taxes, hucksterism and a dose of industrial policy—something the SNP says cannot be safely left to a government in far-off London.



Small countries can indeed pull in foreign investment: just look at Ireland. But Scotland would struggle to attract enough to pay for such a generous state. The country would not be the only one bidding for footloose global capital: one competitor would be Britain, which is cutting corporation taxes swiftly.

If Scots really want independence for political or cultural reasons, they should go for it. National pride is impossible to price. But if they vote for independence they should do so in the knowledge that their country could end up as one of Europe's vulnerable, marginal economies. In the 18th century, Edinburgh's fine architecture and its Enlightenment role earned it the nickname “Athens of the North”. It would be a shame if that name became apt again for less positive reasons.

http://www.economist.com/node/21552564

The economic realities of Scottish independence: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201213/ldselect/ldeconaf/152/15204.htm

 

By far the greatest economic asset of Scotland, is not its oil, it is the people. The UK has not come anywhere close to mobilising the economic potential of Scots and neither has the SNP government in Holyrood. It could be done, not by an independent Scottish kingdom but by an independent Scottish republic, a solution the SNP has set its face against.

How could a republic be so much more successful than a kingdom? I'll tell you. It's no secret but the royalists who run the kingdom don't want to know so once you know don't think telling them will change their minds. You need to kick them out with their Queen.

The Scottish economy

By Peter Dow. First published - 12th June 2011 in the For Freedom Forums

The Scottish economy is being wrecked, or held back certainly, by the lack of academic freedom at Scottish universities which means that established professors can stifle academic debate by excluding outspoken students and junior academics who are challenging the established professor for leadership.

Scottish wealth creation depends on allowing new people with innovative ideas in science, technology, engineering and medicine to flourish on campus. Instead managerial control is being used to intimidate into silence anyone who is thinking of challenging the established professors, deans and principals for academic leadership.

The lack of academic freedom in Scottish universities arises from the lack of civil freedom in Scotland and in particular the people have no practical rights to publish or to speak out about incompetence or mismanagement of any rich person or powerful institution who can afford the best lawyers to take legal action for defamation ("libel" in Scotland) in order to silence their critics.

Anyone breaching a court gagging order can be jailed indefinitely for contempt of court for the "crime" of speaking out with a view to be allowed once again to attend university, to continue with their studies, to establish their academic credentials, to publish brilliant new ideas for wealth generation or even simply to explain how new ideas published globally can be developed to create new businesses and well-paying jobs in Scotland.

A rule of terror imposes silence upon those who could make the economy grow but have only jail in Scotland on offer if they dare to try. No wonder then that there is a brain drain of talent out of Scotland to elsewhere where civil and academic freedoms apply - such as the USA.

The law in Scotland, such as it is, is irrelevant. Whatever European conventions of human rights are said to grant the right of freedom of expression there is no-one who can be relied upon for threatened students or junior academics to turn to.

Thus the weakness of the Scottish economy is directly attributable to the oppressive actions of the legal system which operates under the union crown. There is no Scottish president of a Scottish republic to call a halt to legal actions which smash freedom of expression in Scotland.

Academic and economic opportunities are denied in Scotland. As a person so denied opportunity, I have turned to republican revolutionary politics as the only way forward for the Scottish economy. Most other academics so abused would leave the country in disgust to offer their talents where they are appreciated.

Therefore it can be seen that the SNP's false "independence" notion which plans to keep the Queen as head of state will do nothing to solve the critical problem of the interference by the Queen's courts with civil and academic freedoms.

The Queen never has and never will tell her courts to stop crushing civil and academic freedom.

Only a president of a republic with the authority to send the army against the courts to insist on freedoms in Scotland will ever suffice.

So yes in theory Scottish independence could allow the Scottish economy to do much better - but it would need to be real republican independence with personal freedoms guaranteed.

A Queen's "independent" Scottish kingdom which continues to suppress champions of the economy would change nothing.