Money, money, money
Intriguing exchanges at Holyrood on the subject of money.
Firstly, between the first minister and Iain Gray on capital expenditure, with Annabel Goldie pitching in too. Secondly, on the subject of HBOS with Tavish Scott.
The latter first. Alex Salmond was notably coy in response to a request from Tavish Scott that the first minister should declare that the proposed take-over by Lloyds TSB was no longer necessary.
Mr Scott, the LibDem leader, said in terms that the recapitalisation engineered by the UK Government obviated the need for the take-over - and that, consequently, it would be preferable for Scotland to retain HBOS, with its Edinburgh HQ and branch structure.
My feeling is that would be Mr Salmond's preference too - if things were equal. But things are chaotic - and Mr Salmond must deal with the situation he finds, not the situation he might prefer.
Specifically, he is in detailed negotiations with Lloyds TSB about preserving jobs and decision-making influence in Edinburgh, on the presumption that the deal goes through
He needs leverage with Lloyds TSB. You don't gain leverage by informing a financial institution that you think their proposal for a merger is mince.
Right thing
However, Mr Salmond offered indications as to his thinking. He said he would have preferred the recapitalisation to have occurred some time back, thus forestalling other subsequent developments.
He noted further that the merger partly depends upon the suspension of competition rules - and that such a measure has yet to be tabled and voted upon in the Commons.
He noted still further that the merger rests upon a vote by shareholders in the two banks, given that the boards have given their support.
Which leaves us where? The deal may have logic beyond the capitalisation issue. In other words, it may still be the right thing to do.
If, however, it is not, it may yet be stopped.
So what might happen, given those alternative scenarios. Firstly, the Commons may not endorse the suspension of competition rules - although that would require the UK Government to reverse its declared position, which seems unlikely at this point.
Secondly, the shareholders may say no. Thirdly, another bid may come in. Fourthly, the deal may go through as billed.
Public debt
In essence, Mr Salmond's answers were designed to cover all those eventualities - while dealing upfront with the Lloyds TSB offer which, as he noted, remains the only prospect firmly on the table.
Turning now to the capital investment point, I thought Iain Gray made a notably good fist at putting his points. Restraining himself, he sought to project an image of consensuality - while, in fact, challenging a key aspect of the Scottish Government's economic strategy, the deployment of the Scottish Futures Trust in search of a new model for investing in schools, hospitals and the like.
Mr Gray said: suspend the SFT and go back to PFI/PPP for now in order to kick-start the economy with public projects.
Mr Salmond argued, in response, that a period of economic turmoil was the very point at which it was vital to secure value for money.
PPP/PFI, he asserted, didn't meet that criterion: plus it was about to be put on balance sheet under new rules, thus counting as public debt and removing a key element of its attraction in the past.
It was a powerful, substantive exchange with both leaders making cogent points. The winner? We'll only know that with the passage of time. If the trust comes up with the goods, then Mr Salmond will be justified. If not . . .
I'm 
~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~26~RS~)
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Nobody can really argue whether an independent Scotland would be better or worse off in the current banking crisis, because we simply don’t know.
However the one thing we do know with absolute certainty is that being united with England has NOT protected us
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Must get my sound card fixed, so I can follow Parliamentary proceedings myself!
However, it sounds like we had an intelligent debate, and that's a good thing.
Just at the moment, I'd rather see a little more certainty that the financiers weren't going to try to recoup more of their losses from us through PPP, before accepting Gray's point.
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Since we are talking Money!
Net Debt £545bn £20,591 per household. (August '08, ONS)
Northern Rock £87bn £3,287 per household (June '08, ONS)
Bradford & Bingley £40bn £1,511 per household (Media reports)
Public Sector Pension Liabilities £1,000bn £37,781 per household (January '08, Watson Wyatt)
Future Private Finance Initiative payments £110bn £4,156 per household (March, '08, Institute of Fiscal Studies)
TOTAL £67,327 per household
On top of this the latest bale out of £500bn
by my calculation comes out at £18,887 per household.
Getting awfully close to £100,000 per household.
It does get worse as national debt is now £632.7bn August 08.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/oct/09/taxandspending.economy
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We can't go back to PFI/PPP. The whole idea was ridiculous from the start - how on earth can they be value for money when the private partners need to make a profit for their shareholders, something they are legally obliged to do? It made no sense from the very start. This is why hospitals have been torn down and rebuilt on other sites - allowing the private company to then sell off remaining land at a profit or make other developments - when it would have been much cheaper to simply refurbish the original building.
It's astounding to see that Iain Gray has not learned from the mistakes of New Labour's decade of dishonesty and shady balance sheet activity. Just as well Alex Salmond has.
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Can it be added that the PPI that the sorry Aberdeen Council had signed in February for work on their schools, is with an Icelandic Bank and we know what is happening there! And there seem quite a number of LA's with investments in the north too. Perhaps Iain Gray would have been better to hold fire on this until the fall-out from Iceland (and others as yet unknown?) was clearer.
As far as HBOS is concerned, I agree Brian that at present, it is the only offer on the table and that is where the Scottish Government has to work. While doing so, of course, to make it all to clear that there is a long way to go before the deal is cleared, whatever your preferred option may be. The way things are going, there seem to be changes every hour, let alone daily.
Mind you, Westminster were incredibly slow to act. It seemed strange that things were so bad, and yet Westminster was no recalled.
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If PFI/PPP is the answer I guess we need to be careful who stumps up the cash - they might not be around tomorrow! (GBP120m scheme `funded by Iceland`>)
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#1 Caledonian54
"However the one thing we do know with absolute certainty is that being united with England has NOT protected us"
How do you work that out. If assuming Scotland was independent at the time the crisis struck, unless the financial system consisted of nothing but friendly societies then there would be big trouble indeed. There seems to be an assumption that Scotland can have an Edinburgh based banking system (I support this by the way) that doesn't do any banking. To avoid the current situation, the Edinburgh banks would have had to have spent the past 15 years sitting on their hands and backing only "widows and orphans" type ventures. There shareholders would have abandoned them and they would have been taken over or nationalised. Remember that two of the most aggressive institutions during this period were RBS and BOS.
Funnily enough, up until a few weeks ago Lloyds TSB was derided for its caution, based on its bad lending experiences in the 1980s and 90s. Whose laughing now?
So now what? These apparantly Scottish banks who hold a disproportionately large amount debt (RBS less so) are having to be bailed out by public funds, of which only a relatively small amount will come from Scotland. I would say that England has saved your proverbial bacon here. Independent, you would be in the same boat as Iceland.
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Well PFI is totally scunnered now.
Aberdeen Council's plans for £120 million school scheme funded by PFI have been put in seriously doubt by the banking crisis.
Also all the banks have raised the risk on all PFI projects. It costs a lot more now in the financial markets to raise money under PFI.
PFI IS DEAD, LONG LIVE SFT.
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#2 oldnat
Re your posting about changes to the parser on the previous thread, I haven't quite finished testing, and it's not yet 100% correct, but you can see the main changes on http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2008/04/new_ways_into_blogs.html#comment81
Good news, by and large, as should eliminate the "what happened to my posting" comments, but there'll still be plentry of "why are the mods picking on me" comments re complaints.
Good luck with your sound card, but double check your cabling & speaker set-up first. If they're dodgy you may be better getting a headset to chat to your family over the pond.
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"However, Mr Salmond offered indications as to his thinking. He said he would have preferred the recapitalisation to have occurred some time back, thus forestalling other subsequent developments"
Why then did he not say this some time back?
It's easy to be wise in hindsight.
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10. Come on, give credit where credit is due.
The hindsight of these nationalists is perfect!
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Brian,
I'm glad to see that the wholesale financial incompetence of certain local authorities in Scotland is now beginning to be exposed.
I refer, of course, to the startling revelation that any number of these authorities have invested fairly sums of money with the Icelandic banks that have now proved to be mostly insolvent.
Both you and I are long enough in the tooth to remember the BCCI crisis and the Western Isles Council!!
No lessons seem to have been learned!!
I hope that persons responsible in these councils are identified and shown the door!
The BCCI experience should have been a salutory lesson for generations of local council officials to come, and the further news that the already discredited Aberdeen Council has arranged Icelandic bank finance to complete a PFI project just reveals the utter poverty of their systems and controls and that of Labour-controlled authorities when this was arranged.
Whatever I may have written, I remain aghast at this development.
Brian, you have a whole series of posts to do on this subject!!
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#10 Think he did actually a while ago, but everyone was so busy saying how clever, everyine else was, to notice!
He certainly said often enough, that there strange reluctance to address the problems and they were being very slow.
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3. Cynicalhighlander, you are up to your usual nationalist exaggerations again.
There is an easy-to-understand BBC report that says that, even with all the nationalisation/bail-out debts included, total government debt will be close to 50% of GDP.
Well within the EU's 60% limit.
That seems starkly at odds to the 400% of GDP you have just claimed in your post.
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Given that the markets are still falling, maybe Gordon should have made it a round trillion.
Or why not a trillion trillion?
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Fairly civilised FMQs, showing the maturity of the party leaders. Until there is some stability in the banking world, entering into new PFI/PPP agreements is just plain foolish. I suspect, once we are through the current crisis, the financial world will be so different, that Governments can demand much better deals.
As far as the Union not protecting us, it was the City, red in tooth and claw, that helped create the crisis. Brown has been quite happy to let them continue with little constraint, as long as he got the taxes. Once we have stability again, he will have to answer for his actions. In short, with friends like these.......
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Cynicalhighlander, after reading about Salmond's revelation that he had been secretly (he never mentioned it at the time) wanting this recapitalisation to take place a while back and that he is still in favour of it now...
...do you disagree with Salmond and actually think this bail-out is a bad idea?
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We should not support the Government helping people or councils who invested their funds in foreign banks(Iceland etc).
My money was invested in Scottish/British banks and spread to stick to the recommendations. I didn't make as much money from my Investments but that is called LOW risk investment. If they'd been with RBS or HBoS they'd be OK now.
There is no way we should pay to save them, let the councils cut back on services or borrow and then answer to the electorate.
Pension funds for the public Sector will also have been badly hit and there will be a need for Government to support directly in England and via Barnett consequentials for the other countries.
Let's hear what Ian Gray says to this.
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Cynicalhighlander, if you answer the Muggle I'll be upset with you.
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Lest we forget;
Scots are a lot poorer today because of the Blessed Union Dividend.
It will get worse;
Taxes will increase. Public services will be cut. Jobs will be lost.
The result of 11 years of Labour's misrule;
Gordon Brown's Prudence has run off with a rich banker and is now living the high life at our expense.
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Brown will pay for his handling of the economy, which the IMF judges will mean Britain will go into recession proper and not just experience 'zero growth' like the majority of the rest of the developed economies.
Labour is an a position similar to the Republicans in the US - every time they return to the economy as a topic they damage themselves further. Every time the try to pin it on the other guy ('that one'), they look ridiculous and do themselves even more harm. They would be wise to just try and avoid it as much as possible (as hard as that undoubtedly is now)!
Iain Gray's question might as well have been phrased "SINCE GORDON BROWN HAS RUINED OUR ECONOMIC STABILITY WITH HIS 'REFORMING MEASURES' ... would it not be wise for the First Minister to ..."
Gray simply isn't up to the job, not that either Kerr or Jamieson would have done markedly better. Were I in the Labour Party Jamieson would have been my pick. She has the rare gift - in a Scottish Labour politician - of being able to appear strong without being dismissive or vindictive ... but Gordon's orders came and the votes (Union, MSPs, MPs, MEPs and Party Members) duly went to The Gray Man with all the personality of a 1960s high-rise.
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20. Scots are a lot poorer today because of the Blessed Union Dividend.
Another nationalist who often resorts to hysterical claims hoping desperately not to get challenged.
Well, unlucky.
Any chance you can elaborate on that statement, minuend?
I hope you are not going to resort to the discredited claim that the UK "stole all our oil" when even Salmond has to acknowledge that we are keeping all our oil tax revenues and then some.
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19. At 5:03pm on 09 Oct 2008, DisgustedDorothy
No need to get upset.
The CIA does have some uses, look to see who is at No.7 and then at No.186 in 2007.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2187rank.html
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Dear Diary,
What a day it has been.
There I was in the precincts of the pretendy wee parliament to see for myself what all the fuss is about, when it occurred to me, like a bolt from the blue - I'm always getting these bright ideas - that I might as well attend FMQs personally to find out, at least, whether anything much of what the FM says on these occasions can be heard in the public gallery.
After waving politely to a group of slightly uncouth fellows afterwards identified for me as the media circus, I found myself unaccountably being mistaken by the security staff for the leader of the Labour group. Consequently, I would like to make it clear that I am not he, he is not me, and we are not each other. Any similarity is coincidental and embarrassing to me personally, and no responsibility can be taken for any misapprehensions laboured under by the impressionable and easily misled. You must be Labour voters. That can be cured, you know.
Hush. Lights, camera, action. The show begins. That chap in the bright red tie doesn't look a bit like me. I have never worn such a garish tie in all my life. There must be a by-election on. There is? That'll be it, then, combined with the fact that he said he wasn't going to be partisan (a likely story). Without that unsightly red stain down his front, therefore, the leader of the Labour group, assuming complete sincerity on his part, might have feared that he would not be taken for a socialist. You remember those? As I recall, they wore garments of any old colour and of practically none, and yet no one could possibly have taken them for anything other than socialists. How times have changed.
Then the Labour man looked down and, rather disconcertingly, kept looking down while apparently reading laboriously from another clearly heavily prepared script that his team must have been working on all morning, or all week. Any one of those fellows in the media pack could have done that, it seemed to me. Better, probably.
Nonetheless, I have to hand it to Mr Gray. Credit where credit is due. He is an improvement on his predecessor, under whose leadership the Labour group looked and behaved like a rabble. On this occasion they seemed to be suitably restrained, and I had no difficulty in making out what the First Minister said.
To say that I was taken aback to hear the man in the red tie apparently suggest that the UK government had nationalized the banking sector is to understate the matter. Steady now. Don't get carried away. It's just a red tie, not a magic wand. It's only pretend. Try to keep things in perspective, do. As for the suggestion that the present global economic crisis has made the debt-creating funding mechanism of the previous Lab-LD Executive more relevant, it gave the First Minister an ideal opportunity to explain in measured terms precisely why the opposite is the case, and, as BT goes into that, I shall not bother.
Crisis. What crisis? In an economic crisis a deep and enduring malaise becomes part of the crisis. I refer to the malaise of inadequate powers, which is what most profoundly characterizes Holyrood and is regularly revealed and displayed for all to see and understand by our eloquent and plainly able First Minister, whose saltire lapel badge, unlike the Labour leader's bright red tie, actually stands for something for which its wearer stands up every time he appears before us as he leads our country forward to a better future.
PS. I wonder whether it would be fair to say that the curious notion that "England has saved your proverbial bacon here" properly comes under the category of "piffle" or "tosh".
I had thought that the Treasury belonged to the UK and was heavily dependent on not only borrowing but also income from Scotland and revenue from the energy resources of its territorial waters. I had not realized that these were all English resources, but then, unlike Anglophilia and all the other anglocentrics, I do not have an English perspective. How remiss of me and how fortunate we are that they are here to keep us right. Why, otherwise we might fall over and hurt ourselves, whereupon England would have to go to the trouble of saving our bacon all over again.
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Pattym
I agree Jamieson had possibilities but only if comes away from this New Labour bunch they don't have a single Scottish Policy. She should demand Fiscal Independence and Run Scotland with the SNP and arrgue about the referendum later.
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#23 What a wonderful link! Thank you!
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23. Cynicalhighlander,
Not too surprisingly, you decided to run away from this question.
Do you agree or disagree with Salmond on the bail-out?
Are you for or against the scheme?
Simple enough question!
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23 + 26. I know it goes against the grain of nationalists to check their sources...
...but have you seen who's at no.13 on this page of that very same site?
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This whole financial stushy is about panic, founded on gossip, founded on the truth that the Anglo-Saxon model has let their bankers peddle so called extremely safe AAA derivatives which were in fact more akin to The Emperor's clothes - a la Hans Andersen.
So we have the wee lad saying that the banks are actually nudists, all the hedge funds and other Square Mile bookies saying how terrible so let's manipulate the market so we can make lots of money out of naked bankers and stupid politicians who do not know where their backside is if they went searching for it with both hands.
Yet the hyperactive media, who are fuelling the story, are now wringing their hands in puritanical throws of pomposity while still running down successful and fully funded UK banks with hyperactive claims of their imminent demise.
So what is the story?
Brownovitch and his Square Mile pals have been found out telling big porkies over the 'safety' of sub prime and PFI / PPP deals. The taxpayers are going to have to bail the whole boiling out while being told we should trust politicians and the banks.
I can not be the only person who thinks the wrong people are paying the penalty for politician's gross stupidity and mendacity.
In my opinion every politician whose party has supported PFI / PPP should be surcharged by the Taxpayers until such time as the tax payers contribution to bailing these numpties out is repaid.
Where now Liebour's massive £30 million debt? Will their bankers be asking for immediate repayment given the financial situation? NO; but many small businesses will be going to the wall with far lower levels of debt than Liebour, the Conservatives or the Lib dems with far better cash flow.
If we want reform of the markets, the main UK parties need to smell the stench of imminent bankruptcy to sharpen up their thinking.
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24 Not Iain Grey
How very like Greeting-Earthlings you sound. You win the prizes for verbosity but it is no compensation for financial illiteracy
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23 Cynical Highlander
Nice post...just one thing though. If the UK in 186th place with -120 billion then presumably Scotland must be responsible for -12 billion putting it between India and New Zealand in about 175th place. Big deal!!
Were you expecting to be excused your share of the UK's long term and current account debt on independence? Dream on!
You can't help but notice that the bottom of the table is dominated by liberal free-trading democracies whilst the top is dominated by one party states and/or theocracies. Which side of the line does the independent Scotland want to line up on?
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24. Your leadership of the 'Lacking All Credibility Gang' is safe.
All beautifully summed up in this single sentence:
"....our eloquent and plainly able First Minister, whose saltire lapel badge, unlike the Labour leader's bright red tie, actually stands for something for which its wearer stands up every time he appears before us as he leads our country forward to a better future."
I've just come over all weepy.
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What a shame that the positive of todays FMQ's has been lost on most of you.
We had an actual political debate about an isue of Substance. It is what politics should be about.
Ian Gray is quite rightly asking what effect the SFT will actually have on the delivery of projects in Scotland, given there is no detail of how it is going to persuade investors to lend money at cheaper rates than the rest of the UK.
This type of sccrutiny will make better government. Ian Gray is not a great politican but he is at least trying. along with Tavish and Annabel we might get some proper scrutiny of the Government. We might get better government.
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If Edinburgh Royal Infirmary is anything to go by PFI/PPP is not something that should be encouraged. Like a holiday charter airline it delivers very little and rips off the customers. It's not about providing a public service and getting a reasonable return on money invested, it's about giving the minimum at least cost and making a vast and continuous profit at the expence of the taxpayer. If there isn't a cheaper and better way to build then schools and hospitals will become a thing of the past.
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Old nat
To carry on the disussion over the consitutional settlement my concern over the relationship with our neighbours would perhaps be easier in some ways but there are other factors to consider.
A tory ruled England would ensure a substantial backlash to an independant Scotland to wrap themselves in the St George flag and make them more popular. Such cross border planning would become more difficult in the short term.
Also the divorce settlement would be difficult to work out. We would need to take on our share of pension liabilities and debt, those negotiations would be difficult to say the least.
All of this would cost money, would require substantial reorgasnisation of government, inevitably a rise in the size of the public sector.
Politicans of all colours like bigger government, I think we need less but more effective government. All of this is missed in the current debate. probably because the answers are too difficult. I feel we would need two referendums, one to allow negotiations and one over the final settlement.
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12. At 4:38pm on 09 Oct 2008, freedjmac wrote:
Brian,
I hope that persons responsible in these councils are identified and shown the door!
In my case, South Lanarkshire Council, the Chief Executive should resign immediately.
Taxpayer's money invested in a FOREIGN bank?
Time for a politcal clearout methinks.
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Kaybraes
Whatever a schem is called is largely irrelevant. We need to borrow to pay for public construction schemes. Whatever way we do that has to be paid for.
The simple questionover SFT is who will lend money at a lower rate than they could get elsewhere in the UK.
A simple question.
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#7 Anglophobe - bear in mind that the games not over yet and there's still the possibility that the Iceland scenario could happen here, so England's saved nae body's bacon yet.
The point Caladonia was making is that, in the past, one of the myriad of arguments unionists has used is that Scotland need to part of the union to protect her from global economic turmoils. Obviously, that argument is now seen as utter nonsense (unless you'd like to claim that, somehow, Scotland hasn't been affected by the economic crisis affecting the rest of the world).
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38 FortranJo
You're right, nobody's out of the woods yet but you seem to be suggesting that Scotland, if independent, would somehow magically be immune from all this?
Iceland is now by the way...the bigger players are still standing. Which side of the line do think Scotland would be?
I put it all down in post 7, there's no point typing it all out again.
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I don't think Alex Salmond is in detailed "negotiations" with Lloyds, Brian. Alex is pleading for a shred of comfort that he can sell to his party and the nation as "another SNP triumph" and "proof" of Scotland's relevance, as secured by our glorious leader.
Any political shots will be called by Darling, who, of all the political figures involved, has come out of this, so far, looking like a man taking sensible decisions.
Alex Salmond, like his Icelandic counterpart, is a peripheral figure in all this, helpless against world events refereed by the Big Boys. That's not his fault, of course, just the way it is.
Some of the posts here, suggesting that we could somehow stand alone with an independent banking system, defy belief. Criticism of councils over the Icelandic deposits is also absurd. The Government required them to spread their money across a number of institutions, including apparently solid European banks. This is normal financial practice around the world.
Trying to link the above to PFI is cheap politicking at its most blatant and opportunist. You would almost think SNP supporters were glad we are in such a mess. Are you?
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Expat - you are as guilty as anyone else here in manipulating sources.
So please, less of the preachy tone.
Norway may be indebted but it can undoubtdly pay it off - whereas what chance does the UK have in paying off its debts considering the deficits Brown has us running now?! EU is actually going to start proceedings against the UK Government because of the size the British deficit,
http://www.eubusiness.com/news-eu/1209392222.9/
What does an additional potential 500 Billion do to that do you reckon?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/3159898/Financial-crisis-Bail-out-explained.html
That’s c19,200 for every British taxpayer, nevermind the original debt and deficit!
So less preachness please, any independent analyst would prefer to be in the place Norway is as opposed to Britain. Indeed, the IMF thinks the UK will likely be worse hit than any other major economy in developed world (with the possible exception or Ireland and Spain),
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/oct/08/recession.globaleconomy
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#33, 35 & 37 northhighlander
I quite agree with your #33 - a good debate on substantive issues is always worthwhile, instead of Yah, Booh stuff.
Your #37 is true, but the main argument for PPP/PFI wasthat the old rules kept such spending of the public spending register - it was an expensive dodge, which no longer works. It seems likely that a Government borrowing the money from a sovereign fund is likely to be a better deal (technically the LAs have to do the borrowing under the Scotland Act, but the SFT is a mechanism for getting round that).
Your #35 - the constitutional settlement.
"A tory ruled England" etc. I don't think this would be a problem. When I look at the UK/English blogs, English resentment seems to focus on two issues -
1. Their perception that Scotland is subsidised by England - whether true or not, doesn't matter. The grievance would be removed by fiscal autonomy for each nation.
2. Scots MPs voting on English domestic affairs - they are, of course, absolutely correct to be furious! Home Rule for England is the obvious solution.
"the divorce settlement" Unlike total independence, Confederalism would be more like a couple agreeing to lead separate lives in the same home. Yes there will be hard negotiation, but not everything needs to be settled immediately. I am an intrinsic gradualist because I consider that taking as much time as is needed would benefit everybody.
"bigger government" Within a Confederal structure, this isn't required (though I agree it has to be guarded against!). There is no reason why there can't be some form of "agency" agreement for the administration of some functions. A model might be the Strathclyde Pension Fund, where Glasgow administers the pensions for employees of the former Strathclyde Region, even though the disaggregated authorities are independent of Glasgow.
"two referendums, one to allow negotiations and one over the final settlement" I've always argued for this, but if Confederalism isn't even on the first referendum because of complicity between supporters of the fixed positions, then we've been manipulated by the political parties.
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31. At 6:39pm on 09 Oct 2008, Anglophone
"Were you expecting to be excused your share of the UK's long term and current account debt on independence? Dream on!"
At least you looked at the link which shows how Norway's income is far greater than it's expediture which is what I wanted to get across. Within in that site there is quite a lot to explore such as child poverty % per country we are on a par with Jordan! Explore at leisure it might open your eyes. In this part of GDP per person No6 Norway, No9 Ireland and No 29 good Old Blighty (UK)
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2004rank.html
Do you honestly believe that we live in a democracy where the ruling party can sign away our sovereignty to Europe and propose to lock up innocent people without charge for 42 days!
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#40 oh! Brig you old rogue you, accusing the SNP when infact it's your goodself that loves this mess since it gives you the chance to lectuer us all about the benefits of the union (as perceived by yourself I hasten to add).
#41 you noticed that as well Patty, I thought it was just me.
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For some reason I keep getting the message that Windows can't display the page .However I kind of gathered what it was about from comments.
Anyone see More 4 news tonight ?
Norway and the oil fund in the spotlight and doing very well thank you.
Interestingly, they follow the Coop and like ethical and environmentally friendly investments.
They reckon they have it sussed!
We could have emulated Norway, we did'nt.
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#39.
Anglophone.
"You're right, nobody's out of the woods yet but you seem to be suggesting that Scotland, if independent, would somehow magically be immune from all this?"
Perhaps, not all Western countries are loosing vast amounts of money like Britain and America are loosing. Could Scotland not have managed herself to avoid the crazy losses?
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#43
Replace "child poverty" with "population below poverty line"
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Old nat
I think there is much we agree on in this, I suspect if this type of reasoned argument was used to present the debat then we could be moving forward wirh some consensus.
However I think the confederate or federal option would require a significant change in one or other of the leading parties, I can't see that happening. The only hope for this would be the Lib Dems. Tavish would need a rush of testosterone to take such a bold step.
I would also like to see local government sorted at the same time. The current structure is unrepresentative the areas are far to large and we should have complete rstructure when we are at it.
I will always mistrust politicans, they always go for larger government even when they try to reduce government.
I still think when the costs are worked out they will be high and that would need to be set against the advantages.
I would also like to see the advantages worked on and debated a little more. Too much of the debate is about things that won't hppen any more or blaming England for our woes.
We need a positive view point on what we can achieve for ourselves. There is a lack of vision, at present the debate is framed in negatives.
The debate is there to be won but not with the current nationalist standard of debate, or the unionist retorts. However perhaps things will change we must remain optomistic!
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#44 InMyKip: I've never really argued for any specific benefit of the Union. Just that I saw nothing better. But this crisis has changed that a wee bit. True, the Union didn't protect us from the storm, but I believe it will help us to ride it out, eventually.
Anyway, I'm off. And none the wiser, I fear.
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#42 oldnat
Not much point in me posting on this thread while you're keeping the few lucid unionists scratching their heads and the others continue the yah boo stuff, so I've done quite a bit more research on the parser changes and posted a summary in #84 on the New ways into blogs thread. In essence, just the three changes discovered earlier.
Enough for today, I think - TTFN.
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John:
"True, the Union didn't protect us from the storm, but I believe it will help us to ride it out, eventually."
Do we really have a choice? At this moment of time Scotland is apart of the United Kingdom and will have to ride it out alongside England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
By the way the Union did not protect us from the storm, they were the storm, Westminister should have better regulated the financial markets and perhaps we would not be in the troubles that we are.
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#51 Thomas_Porter
"By the way the Union did not protect us from the storm, they were the storm, Westminister should have better regulated the financial markets and perhaps we would not be in the troubles that we are."
While there's a substantial amount of truth in that statement, It would be fairer (and so harder to refute) to split the troubles into separate areas of blame.
1. The UK could in no way stop the US credit crunch for which blame must rest with Bush Junior and the US authorities for incompetent regulation, although signs had been there for a year which HM Treasury were not competent to read, interpret and mitigate.
2. Brown and HM Treasury deserve considerable blame for allowing the UK banks to go virtually unregulated for a decade.
3. Thatcher's Tory Government deserve blame for allowing virtually unregulated demutualisation of the Building Societies, although only one major instance (Abbey) actually happened on her watch.
4. Most of the demutualisation happened on Brown's watch at HM Treasury, when no attempt was made to improve the regulation regime inherited from the Tories or even to discourage demutualisation.
5. The house pricing crisis and the bank troubles which have followed were a logical and foreseeable result of the pursuit of profit which resulted from the demutualisation, yet nothing regulatory was done by HM Treasury, even as Northern Rock was going bankrupt.
On the taunts about Iceland, there's no need to be drawn - independence within the EU and the Euro would make Scotland's situation much more like Ireland. Ireland isn't out of the woods yet, but the necessary nature of their act has been copied within days by much larger EU economies.
Anyway, good blooging - an early night for me.
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Rank Order - Debt - external
"1World $ 51,780,000,000,000 2004 est.
2United States $ 12,250,000,000,000 30 June 2007
3United Kingdom $ 10,450,000,000,000 30 June 2007
"
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2079rank.html
World pop. 6bn
US pop. 350mil
UK pop 60mil
Can this be true that we are carrying a fifth of the world's debt? Dumfounded!
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People
As I have pointed out before there are some posters here who are not worth engaging with; they are offensive and partisan too the extreme.
Please do not engage; eventually they will tire and disappear: the debate will return to a more civilized level.
Whilst still exploring every facet it will be conducted with respect for opposing views.
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#39 Anglophobe - Where, exactly, am I suggesting Scotland would somehow be immune? Was it when I was picking YOU up on is your assertion that Scotland would be in dire straits without England's aid?
No one can say what would definately be the case and what wouldn't be. Unless you have some sort of inter-dimensional viewing device that allows you to see alternative realities, you have no way of knowing how an independent Scotland would be fairing in the current climes.
The whole point being made, though, is that, as part of the UK, Scotland isn't fairing well. Whether she would fair better as an independent nation may be debatable but what is not debatable is that the current situation has utterly destroyed a major Unionist argument.
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Whilst not disagreeing that an independent Scotland might have been able to weather the current crisis - and no one knows for certain, be honest - the one thing that is for sure is that there are not the current funds available to go independent withint the near future.
Oil revenue is not going to be magically switched over to Scotland, so where is the money coming from?
We have councils with money in danger. Regardless of the fact that whoever told them to do invest in foreign banks should be hung, the money is not safe at present.
Both sides of the independence debate would do well to quieten down until things settle a bit, then we can have a more informed debate.
Two things annoying me at the moment:
Gordon Brown playing the legal card against Iceland.
Alex Salmond making out that he is key to the current Lloyds/HBOS negotiations. Yes, he is trying to do something to help but the bottom line is he wants to look good politically out of this, as does Gordon Brown with regards to the Iceland situation.
For once can we have some sensible discussions? This situation is getting a little bit unsettling, and wild comments from either side of the fence do not contribute anything to it.
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48. At 9:18pm on 09 Oct 2008, northhighlander wrote:
The debate is there to be won but not with the current nationalist standard of debate, or the unionist retorts. However perhaps things will change we must remain optomistic!
-----------
From a "sitting on the fence" position, that is the most sensible comment I've read on this blog for a long time.
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I find it absolutely mind boggling that there are those on this blog who imagine that being a part of the state that is recognised to be worst placed to ride out the economic storm and is the most indebted state in the world offers us a good place to be.
When the dust settles the British public finances, ruined for a generation and the tripling of the national debt during Brown's reign will be clearly recognised as the inevitable results of the con trick that was Brown's economic "stability".
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#51 Thomas_Porter
"(...) the Union did not protect us from the storm, they were the storm, Westminster should have better regulated the financial markets and perhaps we would not have been in the troubles we are in."
In examining the above statement of yours from an anglocentric point of view, it would be difficult to agree with it. Too many cultural assumptions of one kind and another militate against that. However, one can understand how a Scottish perspective can be free of these and may genuinely see things differently.
Of course, to be Scottish is not automatically to see things from a Scottish perspective, as to live in UK Scotland all one's life is to be subjected to a constant cultural bombardment from south of the Border so that, whereas a resident of England is hardly likely to have any very clear conception of what a Scottish perspective on anything might conceivably be, a resident of Scotland perceives with ease what the English way of looking at anything is likely to be and understands it, not least because the constant bombardment or, to change the metaphor, more or less permanent immersion in it, may well cause him or her to adopt it without necessarily realizing that that is what is happening.
The present cultural and political renaissance within Scotland, however, together with greater cultural and media access to the outside world, is wearing away at this state of affairs. More and more Scottish identity is re-asserting itself and challenging the cultural conditioning and stealthy unionist indoctrination to which residents of Scotland are subjected all their lives, in school, through the anglocentric media and in the universities. There is arising, as we know, what is perceived to be a perversely awkward, unconventional and challenging questioning of the established order of things from a point of view that seems so alien to our southern neighbours that they inevitably react against it and endeavour to suppress it, even in our universities, where one would have thought that any unconventional and challenging questioning of the established order of things should be at home. Not where the survival of an old established nation-state is concerned, however.
To adopt a pro-independence position is to adopt a perspective from which the world looks so different from that of a unionist from either side of the Border that in adopting it one has already turned oneself into a kind of foreigner. How one sees things is foreign to those who have not adopted this point of view. The alien doctrine and the quasi-alien who espouses it is a threat to the unionist's own anglocentric world view, to his or her view of that view and to his or her own conception of his or her own national identity and homeland. So one comes to see eye to eye less and less with those on the other side of the constitutional divide, and dialogue between the two sides becomes more and more like a dialogue of the deaf. One might almost be speaking a different language.
This foreign set of assumptions, therefore, aligns one more with other foreigners up to a point and in some important ways, notwithstanding the acknowledgment of the existence of what is referred to as the social union of the British Isles. This brings me back to the quotation from your post.
Within the British Union we in Scotland are part of the Anglo-American community referred to habitually by the French in a way which is not intended to be complimentary. When they saw this economic storm coming, a common assumption was that it would stop at their frontier, because it was and is commonly perceived by them to constitute what they are referring to not just as the credit crunch but as nothing less than the failure of the Anglo-American form of capitalism, by which they mean a deregulated free-for-all built upon easy and unsound credit rather than genuine wealth creation based upon real value and government regulation as well as other forms of regulation to a degree and in ways which the Anglo-Americans found fault with in the French but which they are now adopting and to a greater extent by force of extreme circumstance.
To say that "Westminster should have better regulated the financial markets and perhaps we would not have been in the troubles we are in" is to look at the matter from outside the world of Anglo-American assumptions from which there has been no chance of escape in the UK in recent times . . . unless one looked outside the box and listened to a view from another perspective than the anglocentric one.
So you can tell unionists until you are blue in the face that the British Union has failed Scotland rather than "saved your proverbial bacon", but it will make no sense to them, for reasons which I have attempted to elucidate above. What seems to a non-unionist to be a clearing up of debris after a catastrophe against which we might have protected ourselves better if we had been outside the Union is not a view that a unionist is likely even to begin to be able to entertain, just as the Anglo-American world is permanently out of synchronization and out of sympathy with the Gallic one. As one French TV news correspondent reported on an evening news report from Washington while the first bail-out proposals went before the US House of Representatives, American politicians were saying that "we are the United States of America . . . if we accept this degree of state intervention we shall be the United States of France." The correspondent added, as if his audience needed to have this explained, that "this was not intended as a compliment."
Scotland, together with many other countries, is currently beginning to suffer grievously from a massive collapse of Anglo-American capitalism. The fact that we have been landed in this catastrophe to the extent to which we have been landed in it by the United Kingdom and by the Labour Party not least is clearly not stopping unionist apologists from attempting to use the mess they have made to show that Scotland could not survive without the British Union. What we are now being told by wave after wave of unionist commentator of one sort and another is that what we need to save us from the ill that has been visited upon us is not relief from the unionist regime that has done so much to produce it but more of the same medicine. The more harm it causes us the more we need it to save us from harm, we are told. That is not how they express the matter, of course, but that is how I receive the message, because I am not one of them, because I do not share their perspective or their assumptions or their prejudices or their blindness to the world outside the anglocentric little box in which we are encased but from which it is not impossible to escape.
I congratulate Brownedov (#52) on his response to your post.
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It's hard to say how an independent Scotland would have fared with the banking crisis. Nobody knows. But what has that got to do with the independence debate. I doubt any single person would have changed their view on independence because of the banking crisis. For the Unionists to claim that it has killed the argument for independence stone dead is a rolling around the floor laugh.
Can someone help me with when independence has been won? I know there is a possibility of the referendum, However, in the last election, 2007, the SNP got more votes and more seats than any other party. Not a majority but who says it has to be a majority? The SNP won. Where does that leave us in an international legal context. And, has any country become independent with a similar scenario?
Freedom
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#57 Neil
Actually there are several arguments (or at least several positions within the same debate), and the debate has travelled significantly over the last 20 years.
Think back to the 20th century.
Then the main debate was between the unitary UK state and devolution. If there is a single poster who wants to go back to the unitary state I can't identify them, and it's not the position of any political party (except UKIP, I think).
After 2007 the debate became whether the Scottish Parliament should have more powers, or should the status quo prevail. The decision of the 3 Unionist parties (I'm using that term to mean those who don't want a serious renegotiation of the constitutional settlement - potentially the Lib-Dems might not fit within that category, but need to demonstrate their Federal credentials more strongly to do so) to set up the Calman Commission appears to have moved the Unionist side of the debate on to which additional powers the Scottish Parliament should have.
Those of us who wish to have a re-negotiation of the current UK Union (and many of us use the SNP as the vehicle to achieve what we want to see happen) cover a wide spectrum of views.
However, I think there are several focus points along that spectrum -
Federalism (the official, though seldom expressed, position of the Lib-Dems, and much favoured by Expat!)
Confederalism (not any parties point of view, but argued for by mavericks such as Brownedov and me)
Independence (within Europe - the SNP position)
The Iceland/Norway model (Independent Scottish EFTA membership - advocated by some Nationalists)
Brigadoon (la-la land).
My concern about the debate is the number of people who spend their time being negative about the polarised position they ascribe to parties they dislike. (Personally, I dislike all parties, but some can be more useful than others!) instead of arguing for the particular constitutional settlement they wish to see.
Goodnight all.
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As I seem to be a little more at my leisure on this trip, what with the slower pace of life in Fife and the distraction of a collapsing economy to keep me from my purpose, I have lapsed. Instead of getting on with what I came to do, which was to solve the electoral mystery of the glen called Rothes, which I had actually gone off at a tangent to a place called Moray to investigate first of all, I have been footering, as you say.
Finding that the Moray Rothes, after which the Fife one was apparently named because of an ancient transmigration of aristocratic souls from north to south, was another kettle of whisky altogether, I made for east Fife really to have what you call a wee break and to cover my embarrassment, which I have now revealed to you for no good reason that I can think of.
Anyway, finding myself at a bit of a loose end in St Andrews and suspecting that there must be more to the gowf than meets the eye, I have deigned to follow the Internet link kindly provided for me by Brownedov, who seems relatively sensible for an Earthling. Would that have something to do with living in Switzerland? I suspect that it might. The altitude perhaps. I must take a look once I have done with the by-election.
Having read the tall tale to which I was directed, the clouds of befuddlement and incomprehension have parted, and I have seen the light. The raptures of enthusiasm that I had noticed about this place and had taken to be a sign of incipient insanity are now fully accounted for, and I can now move on to the next mystery. Thank you, Brownedov. You are a pal.
Before retiring, I must just pay courteous obeissance to the topic of this thread. Otherwise I shall feel as if I am trespassing. The FMQ session, which I have looked at on plasma screen, was not exactly riveting, but I realize that serious matters were discussed seriously and with appropriate respect for dissenting opinion. This is not unimpressive, although the lack of powers of the legislature should, I suggest, be a matter of concern when the world is tumbling about your ears.
I would tell you how this historically momentous drama all turns out, by the way, but I don't want to spoil the plot for you. I like a good plot and so cannot but recommend The Coming of Gowf by PG Wodehouse. Do follow Brownedov's link to it in the previous thread if you have not already done so, especially if the argy-bargy in this one has made you a little tense. I never let dissenting opinions upset me, of course. I may not always be right, but I am always certain . . . that certainty is merely a means of papering over the cracks. Which is fine, just as long as you don't fall through the paper. Toodloothenoo.
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#7 Anglophone
I don't often agree with the unionists but I suspect that if Scotland was independent when this financial crises broke then we would probably be in the same boat as Iceland.
However, we would have far better resources to be able to ride out this storm than Iceland does. But, even if we didn't, I would rather be independent and in a financial mess than attached to a union and hiding under the English skirts.
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# 60 hadrianswall
Refering to our independence, I wouldn't like the idea that Scotland managed to get its independence through the back door by not having a majority of the Scottish voters voting for independence. Any other way would seem like we had conned the electorate of Scotland. I have said before that we should only get our independence if a majority of those who voted, voted for independence. It should not be on the number of seats won in the parliment but by the number of people who voted for it. Those who don't vote don't count.
Also I would find it hard to have an independent Scotland without Berwick north of the Tweed.
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FTSE is in meltdown this morning, HBOS shares down 28%.It's coming home...
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I find it truly amazing that even n these very difficult economic times there are those who seek to place all the blame upon the Union. Those who live in (and may never have left) Scotland, may be unaware that many of those who work in the City (of London) are Scottish - and I should know. Many of those who form the present government at Westminster are Scottish. Many of the senior people in the regulatory authorities are Scottish. The two biggest banks now facing serious trouble are - wait of it - Scottish. To pretend that all these economic woes were forced onto Scotland whose people are innocent of all folly, or that an independent Scotland would not have suffered as badly, is absurd, and does nothing to further sensible debate on this subject or that of Scottish independence.
Scotland entered the Union with England and Wales because of hard economic times. It may or may not yet prove to be the case that she is better off in the Union for the same reason today. The jury is still out on that and will be until this world-wide crisis is properly resolved. Whatever the eventual answer, however, one thing is for sure: an independent Scotland would have been in the same position as Iceland is now, not because of her size alone, but because of the condition of her big banks. Scots are not imbued with some mystical power to avoid this turbulence anymore than anybody else, and the activity of a good many Scots who have been involved in the actions leading up to, and contributing to, the present economic situation are the proof of that. Or are the usual tunnel-visioned independence boggers really saying that these people would have acted completely diffrently had they been operating in an independent Scotland rather than in the Union? Given that Mr Salmond, a trained economist, did not predict any of this prior to the proverbial hitting the fan that seems highly unlikely, to put it mildly. It may be an incovenient truth for some of the more rabid (and ill-informed)nationalist posters, but not every misfortune to hit Scots can be blamed on the Union, and not all of them can be avoided through independence. Indeed some may even be made worse. Those who feel that is a price worth paying in order to be rid of the Union (and one or two posts actually do say that), may have some trouble convincing the more sensible Scottish electorate.
This post is not an argument for or against Scottish independence - it is a post calling for a reality check based upon known facts and not nationalist emotion.
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Re post 61, Old Nat, you and some others on this Forum make a lot of sense. I think your reasoned arguments and tone are excatly right at this time of major international financial problems. I also agree a confederacy would be a good way forward, but as you say as no major political party appears to support it am not sure how realistic it is -
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#61 oldnat
"argued for by mavericks such as Brownedov and me"
Careful oldnat - don't get us branded as tartan McCains or, worse still, Palins.
#63 gedguy2
Given the SNP commitment to remain within the EU and the stated desire of the LibDems and both large unionist parties for the UK to remain within it, I really don't see the Iceland analogy is appropriate. The Irish situation would surely be much closer.
#64 gedguy2
I don't think anyone's seriously arguing against that view, although some here seem not to accept that as being enough - often the same ones who think a UK government supported by less than a quarter of the electorate represents the ultimate flowering of democracy.
Berwick people should certainly have the option of choosing for themselves, as should other border areas if a reasonable part of their population (5%, perhaps) demand a referendum.
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Brian,
Given the overnight movements in the equity markets and the fact that the HBOS share price has led the free-fall in London this morning, can we expect Tavish Scott to resign immediately
He most certainly should - his first flagship initiative as the FibDem leader is already in tatters!
Mr Rumbles and Mr. Finnie should dust down their acceptance speeches!
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#62 Greetings_Earthlings
Thanks for the pat on the back. You could be right that the altitude encourages visitors and the Swiss to take a more measured view of affairs. OTOH, it must be admitted that when foreign politicians come here to debate issues on "neutral" territory it often ends in tears - as did the League of Nations.
Are pimploid politicos as fiercely immune to fresh ideas as most of our earthling ones seem to be?
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#67 jordanbasset
"Great oaks from little acorns ...."
My descendants will be able to gaze on the plaque outside the Scottish Parliament "In memory of brownedov and oldnat - founders of the Confederacy"
:-)
However, my guess is that any constitutional settlement will have to be one that no single party supports, so that no single party can claim victory. It makes sense, therefore to put the arguments for other options into the public domain, so that they are at least available if needed. Nothing is lost by doing so.
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Iceland has a population of only 300,000, and should be compared to Luxembourg or Liechtenstein rather than Scotland.
Realistic benchmarks for Scotland would be Ireland or Norway. Ireland has a much bigger property bubble than Scotland and no significant natural resources. Norway has its oil fund, a large budget surplus, and a notable absence from the headlines...
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For all Unionists -
Doesn't the treatment of Iceland by the Bristish Governmenmt make you feel proud to be British!
A McG
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Re financial crisis:
We need to understand what has caused this crisis fully, I acept that. Then we can move forward and alter the system to learn the lessons.
But lets be clear about who is to blame. It is every single one of us. The whole nation has been living beyond our means for the last 20 years.
Yes Brown could have done better, but to proclaim others seen it all coming or would have handled the situation better is pointless. Would £100bn into HBOS been good for Scotland? No-one can say they saw it all coming, I don't remember any party campaigning on a debt reduction platform.
So lets get a little more realistic on this debate, we will never know if we would have been better or worse as an independant nation, in many ways it is irrelevant. Ireland may or may not do better than us in the future, we will need to wait and see.
What is important is we look forward and decide how to get out of the mess. If someone can convince me that another constitutional reform would assist this then good, but lets keeo the debate away from the "four legs good two legs bad" level.
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Re 68
I know I lament about the standard of political debate in Scotland, but we are hopefully a long way form the macain / palin ground.
If we sink that low I will look at emigration as a serious option.
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#66 MalcolmW2
I don't deny you make some valid points about foresight, but your "Scotland entered the Union with England and Wales because of hard economic times." ignores the fact that it was the pockets of our lords & masters pinching and those same pockets that were refilled by entering the union.
In these days of supposed democracy, isn't it the people who should have the say?
Also, you entirely ignore the fact that virtually nobody on these threads is arguing that Scotland should be outwith the EU - a much larger economy with many faults but some hopes of reform.
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Re post 71, Old Nat, you do give me hope.
Re post 74, North Highlander, what you say re the current situation is true, only a concerted joint effort, without name calling will get us out of a situation that has developed over many years.
People quite rightly should continue to put forward their view of the constituional way forward, but this can be done without demonising another view point
I for one make a pledge to try and keep it at this level in any future posts.
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The current financial upheavel makes me believe I would be better stuffing my money into the fruit machines on the Strip in Las Vegas rather than investing in the stock market or banks for that matter. My return would probably be as good and at least if it all ran out the fruit machine wouldn't be interested in lending me any more.
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This myth that Scotland is somehow better protected by the union is now been shown to be exactly that - A myth.
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Lots of nationalist gibberish, ignorance and stupidity already today!
41. Kindly read the entire article in your eubusiness link, especially the last two paragraphs.
Then feel free to examine the current deficits of the eurozone countries.
You may also like to refer to the date of your linked report.....
52. Brownedov continues to show off his perfect hindsight. Rest assured that I am in as much awe of this astounding and fantabulous super-ability as the nats are.
53. Cynicalhighlander, do you think, perhaps, that the website is wrong?
You are actually trying to claim that the UK has a #5trillion debt and not the ~#600bn that everyone else seems to think we have?
By the way, you have still refused to answer whether you agree with Salmond, your beloved leader, on the recapitalisation.
Using all the experience and knowledge of economics that you and Wikipedia can muster, are you in favour or not?
58. Sneckagain, so Brown has tripled national debt, has he?
In 1997, it was 33% of GDP, today it is 43% of GDP. How is that "tripling"?
My God, is there a single nat out there who has any clue what he's talking about?
This is why no-one, with sufficient brain cells to rub together, takes anything uttered by a nationalist seriously.
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kaybraes #34,
My 2 kids go to a PFI school in North Lan, I have to say the facilities are first class and the kids, parents and teachers are very positive about it. 2 years ago they were being taught in a crumbling Victorian school where a quarter of the kids were taught in wooden huts.
Meantime, 17 months after the SNP victory, the country is STILL waiting for the first brick to be laid on an SFT job. Remember the "brick for brick" promise in the manifesto?
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I much enjoy Oldnat's regular forays but cannot I understand his fixation with federalism or confederalism (what's the difference). There can be no sensible federation put together in which one component (England) is ten times the size of the other bits (Scotland, Wales and N Ireland)put together unless you want Scotland on par with Yorkshire and Devon. Federalism is merely the last stand of unionism. And England would retain the whip hand - so what's the point.
We could argue about the details of federalism for several decades - which,of course, the unionists would like us to do.
Independence is much simpler, much more logical and certainly much more effective if we wish to drive ahead and improve our country.
Paradoxically a federation would be easier worked out by independent component parts - the Nordic Council springs to mind
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Jake-the-saltire - you make an interesting point.
How many other people have, like me, received an offer in the post offering them an unconditonal loan of up £100,000 or the like recently?
It makes me really wonder if any of the bankers are actually learning.
How many times must they Pi55 on the toilet seat before they figure out they have to lift it up?
It's this type of lending that has caused this.
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I agree with Old nat, the eventual settlement will need to be something different from what we have so no-one can claim to have won.
The other reason would be that what is on offer from the main parties does not really address the problems we face.
Also I don't believe that the majority of the public support independance as offered by the SNP, when a referendum campaign was started in earnest then I feel support would dwindle as there are so many unaswered questions.
Equally I don't believe the public want a beefed up holyrood either. It would just be a sticking plaster and not a lasting solution.
A Island wide solution that addressed many of the issues that I perceive as disadvantages of independance has definite merit.
We would then retain much of what I like about the UK, and perhaps get rid of some of what we don't like.
The idea needs to catch on in England though. I have daily contact with England and constitutional reform is not really on the radar.
We need something that restores a link to democracy for the ordinary person. If we don't the whole principal of democracy is being undermined and may not recover.
If you look in America it appears that business buys the elections, we are already on that path.
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From today's Telegraph. It suggestas that gordon brown's actions are the ones that are responsible for our Councils monies being lost in Iceland
"Are we supposed to be impressed? Gordon Brown gets nasty with Iceland, a nation with half the population of Wiltshire. He seizes the assets of an Icelandic bank, effectively closing it down. He uses anti-terrorist legislation against a friendly country.
Icelanders can't understand it. They had tried to co-operate, to find a way through, but were treated by the FSA as enemies. Now their bank has folded, and many depositors will never see their money again."
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#63 jedguy2,
I agree with you (apart from your last sentence). Our biggest economic strengths would have turned into our achillies heel.
The Irish plan of guaranteeing the deposits of all was praised by Mr Salmond. However, had an independent Scotland done the same, it would have left the country with liabilities many times in excess of our GDP and technically bankrupt. This is the situation which Iceland finds itself in now, their response has been to only guarantee the deposits of Icelandic nationals. This is why the UK Government are quite rightly playing hardball with Iceland, and they deserve credit for doing so.
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#60 hadrianswall,
To answer your second paragraph....
...in 2007 the SNP secured the votes of 1 in 6 of the Scottish electorate. I dont think you'll find many takers for this being a mandate for independence.
The SNP secured a mandate to govern effectively for 4 years. Nothing more, nothing less.
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#61 Oldnat,
I, personally, am undecided between three of your constitutional options, namely the Norway model, the SNP model, and the confederal model.
I would be grateful if you could provide me with more information on your confederal model, as I do not know sufficiently much about it to make an informed decision. I know you posted recently something about how it differs from the federal model, but I can't seem to find it.
If I were to rank your options in order of personal preference I think they'd be-
1= Norway model
1= SNP model
1= Confederal model
4 Federal model
5 Devolution +
6 Brigadoon
7 Unitary UK
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I'd just like to add that (at least up to post #78, the last one moderated at this moment) the level and tone of debate has been at a noticeably higher level than at some points in the past. Every cloud has a silver lining I suppose, and I congratulate you all.
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All very slow on here today....
However, I wonder if it's possible for the nationalists to go the rest of the day without resorting to nonsensical lies, exaggerations and fabrications?
How about it, nats?
Can you join the fray and just use facts instead of your usual silliness?
How about earning extra points by not using that pointless classic along the lines of, "This would never happen if we were independent!"?
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73. Yet more of the same from Alisdair_McGray.
The nation of Iceland is close to bankruptcy (an excellent idea by Salmond to use this as an example of successful small nationhood!), #3bn of public and private UK funds are invested in their banks, all three major banks have had to be saved by nationalisation, very few overseas deposits have been released from the other failed banks and no assurances have been given about release of the remaining funds.
So, Oh Glorious Nationalist Sage of Economics, what would you have done to ensure the security of our money?
I eagerly await your wisdom.
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#75 northhighlander
Thankyou for that. I agree, but sometimes it's hard not to get carried away with partisanship. I'll be off shortly to write I will try harder a few hundred times.
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Correction, there are #15bn in UK assets in the various nationalised and failed banks of Iceland....
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82. Outstanding.
In just one wonderful post sneckedagain shows;
a) his complete ignorance of both federalism and confederalism,
b) makes more promises and guarantees about an independent utopia, yet again without any evidence to back himself up and
c) suggests Scotland leaves one union to join a Scandinavian one instead.
Like I say, outstanding.
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Bingowings makes an excellent comment on the PFI / SFT issue.
My kids go to a crumbling secondary school that by every measure should be replaced. It is a disgusting environment to teach children.
My Kids education is suffering, good teachers leave because of the environment, new staff are doubly hard to attract to work in a dump.
We have had a lot of exchange with Mr Salmond who says he supports us and it is not his fault, it is the Council. the councill say no they have inadequate funding for all the building replacement required.
Politics are being played with our children. I would welcome a PFI school. anything would be better. Currnetly we have no chance of getting a new school. By the time SFT is started my kids will be left school.
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Oh Dear Reluctant-Expat a week or so ago you were offering up some constructive views and my opininons on you improved.
Pity you are back to the boring Antagonistic wally you were before.
Come on you can do better.
For the record I am against all of these bail outs, were throwing money away. Till the banks are forced to lend at lower rates to eachother the markets are screwed. The banks will take the handouts and use it to buy up bargain basement companies, this to me is commercial piracy.
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While waiting for Greetings_Earthlings to persuade his pimploid overlords to rescue us all with some intergalactic credits, I happened upon the following article from New Scientist (other scientific periodicals are available bias fans!): Our psychology helps politicians bend the truth. So when they lie we've only ourselves to blame!
To pick up a couple of earlier points...
#59 Anaxetogrind: something of the pimploid about your post, but regarding the union failing us/saving our bacon: it seems a bit like somebody giving you a lift in their car, negligently crashing it and then expecting you to be thankful that they provided you with a seat-belt.
#64 gedguy2 and #68 Brownedov:
What should be the eligibility criteria for voting in a future referendum on Scottish independence? Born in Scotland? Currently resident in Scotland? Brought up in Scotland? Educated in Scotland? Scottish parents/grandparents? Seems to me like a can of worms unless it's restricted to residence, but I'd be interested to hear other thoughts.
Regarding Berwick, if you put the border at the river you'll be excluding the fine people of Tweedmouth, East Ord, Spittal and Scremerston. I can just imagine the envious glances across the bridges (in which direction, dear reader, I'll leave to you to judge!). That said, Tornio and Haparanda (aka EuroCity) manage to rub along pretty well either side of the Finnish/Swedish border. They even have a one hour time difference to deal with (any gowf fans might like to know that on the local course you can literally hit a ball into next week if you time it right!).
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46 Thomas Porter
Silly me, I forgot. An independent Scotland would have surely avoided any financial turmoil because it is peopled and led exclusively by socially altruistic savants who would have simultaneously delivered prosperity and social justice.
When you start believing your own publicity, the end's not far away!
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#80 Reluctant-Expat
"Brownedov continues to show off his perfect hindsight."
Your irony is not lost on me, although I have always been an opponent of demutualisation (the earliest of the relevant pieces in the jigsaw I mention in my #52, moving all my UK funds into the Nationwide BS when others seemed to be following that route, and I'm not alone in thinking it wrong. Andreas Whittam Smith's: Building societies should never have gone public in the Indy is a good summary. You'll easily find similar articles dating back for at least a decade if you care to look.
However, if you want proof that this is not a brand-new, convenient view, you need look further than the UK ruling party's own MP for Edmonton (well Lab/Co-op, actually) - Andrew Love, in the House of Commons Hansard Debates for 23 March 2007, well before the housing and Northern Rock bubbles burst.
The relevant passage is: "Members have mentioned the changes brought about by the Building Societies Act 1986 and the movement towards deregulation. In the early 1980s we got rid of exchange controls, and in the mid-1980s we had the big bang in the City of London, and it was almost inevitable that that would feed through and have an impact on the building societies and the housing association movement. The result was the 1986 Act, which introduced the opportunity to demutualise. We have had many arguments subsequently about whether demutualisation gave the members of that generation a short-term benefit but at the cost in the longer term of the society and future generations of its members. I do not wish to rehearse those arguments with the hon. Member for Bournemouth, West, but I think that we both agree that many people lost out because of the blandishments offered in respect of what was a short-term benefit. The current members of demutualised societies are living with the consequences of that."
No, I cannot provide published examples of my own wisdom, but I can there are published the views of others who most certainly did have foresight.
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#96 i think you will find he/she/it is being ignored ..... i dont see nationalist posters on here mentioning 'arch unionist' with every post. Quite clearly he/she/it/tv/etc is just out to antagonise the nationalist posters. I think its the kind of rubbish the one redtop rag had when labour were kicked out of government the last time in the uk ..... the headline on the front page was ' will the last person in great britain please turn out the lights' ..... lo and behold six months later Labour were friends.. Exprat you are doing yourself no favours with your 'arch nat' rants because its obvious you are a buffoon. ok a buffoon with a major grudge !
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43 Cynical Highlander
As ever you are spewing forth statistics without any understanding of their derivation. The child poverty stats are always misleading as they relate to children in families with an income lower than x-percent of the national average. It doesn't mean that British children are "as poor as children in Jordan". The peversity of this stat is that using this measure it becomes almost impossible to eradicate child poverty...as incomes rise, any disproportionality will place more children into apparant poverty. If you believe that British children are living in poverty then I suggest that you apply for a passport and travel a bit.
Your last paragraph suggests that you're meandering away from the approved script. In your efforts to portay the UK as a police state you talk of "surrendering sovereignity", presumably to the EU. Errrr sorry guys but isn't the EU Scotland's presumed sugar daddy once independence comes?
So you'll be escaping apparant tyranny by errr...willingly handing over additional powers to a supra-national authority that isn't even democratically accountable. So are you in favour of the EU or not? Get back on the script or Alec's enforcers will come and take away your dongle;-)
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#82 sneckedagain
"federalism or confederalism (what's the difference)"
As oldnat has pointed out, there's no hard, universally agreed definition, but the federal model is usually a top-down devolution, as in Germany, whereas the confederal one is a bottom-up delegation of powers by sovereign states, as in Switzerland. Full fiscal autonomy would come close to being a starting point for the latter.
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#63 gedguy2: "I would rather be independent and in a financial mess than attached to a union and hiding under the English skirts."
What a frightening post!
#64: "Those who don't vote don't count."
Even the ridiculed National Conversation makes it clear "Independence would require the explicit support of the people of Scotland."
Not a simple majority of votes cast - the explicit support of the people. I'm afraid that means a majority of the electorate. And in any regulated organisation an abstention is regarded as a vote for the status quo where a change to standing orders is contemplated. Usually a two-thirds majority is required.
A number of posters are trying hard to be constructive and reasonable. But I'm sorry, gedguy2, your posts confirm the existence of a lunatic fringe within Nationalism.
(Other parties have them too, of course).
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#84 northhighlander
"If you look in America it appears that business buys the elections, we are already on that path."
We seem to be already there. If you look at the two big unionist parties, it seems to be a contest of who appears cuddliest to the electorate while retaining the blessing of big business and nice Mr Murdoch's media. Even the LibDems seem to have forgotten their federal agenda, although they do at least retain their commitment to electoral reform.
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#24 Absolutely enjoyable post. *;o)
I suspect we have an alien who has shapeshifted into human form?
Keep 'em coming dude.
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#88 Richard_the_Rogue
The Switzerland's Direct Democracy is a pretty good start to understanding how the Swiss confederal model works.
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#73,
Plain wrong.
The UK government is merely standing up for UK interests.
Out of interest, what would you prefer an independent Scotland to do in the same position? Stand by and let them clean of with Scotlands money?
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#103 Brigardier John
I guess you were part of the Labour Government that denied Scotland devolution in the 70's causing the complete downfall of the left as you seem to agree with their view at the time.
Congratulations!
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#97 forfar-loon
"What should be the eligibility criteria for voting in a future referendum on Scottish independence?"
I'm not sure I see a problem using the existing electoral rolls, but as expats outwith the UK have voting rights and those elsewhere in the UK do not I should recuse myself from that argument. There's certainly a case for including or excluding both groups but less so for one or the other. UK tax domicile would be an essential, I think, if birth is to be taken into account.
"Regarding Berwick..."
As Berwick was formerly part of Scotland, it deserves to be treated as a special case but could only do so with the permission of the UK parliament. I'm not sure that would be forthcoming in the current climate. In the Swiss system, any commune can vote to re-attach itself, but that's a long way off.
"one hour time difference"
Spain and Portugal cope with that pretty well, although I would agree that they have relatively few cross-border commuters except in the far North.
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99. There has rarely been a proposal or a scheme that has enjoyed universal support.
He may have been against demutualisation but was it for the reasons that have led us down the path currently travelled? Don't forget that said demutualisation led to a boom in investment throughout the economy (and no, this UK boom is not the cause of the current global crisis before someone says it).
On a separate note, I think it's time that some of the more excitable contributors take a step back and take in some perspective.
The UK has enjoyed 16 years of sold continuous growth, averaging 2-3% a year, that has seen the economy become one of the strongest in Europe, far outstripping the eurozone countries (a group the SNP strangely deem preferable to the UK). GDP per capita in the UK was ranking up alongside the USA, at the top of the G8 group, at the start of the year.
This impending recession (and remember that we have yet to see a first quarter of negative growth in the UK, unlike much of Europe) is forecast to last only 6-12 months, and see a 1-2% decrease in GDP, before growth returns.
The worst global recessions of recent years, in 1973-74, 1982-83 and 1991-92 never lasted more than 15 months.
16 years of growth at 2-3% per annum.
1 year of recession at 1-2%.
Not as bad as many people are wailing about.
(Hopefully.)
As for the EU and its huffiness at UK borrowing. If they wouldn't do anything about all the eurozone countries breaking the 3% and 60% limits, then they can barely touch a country not using the euro, can they.
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100. Ouch.
Another brutal savaging by a baby goldfish.
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Browne dov
Re 99
Somethings are best left unchallenged. Politcial debate requires both parties to at least acknowledge the legitamcy of other opinion.
You are wasting your time arguing this one, life is short.
Re 104
I agree with you we are fast heading down that road. We are not there yet but it won't be long. I can see us with regular 20 percent turn out at elections.
So something has to change, hopefully the current crisis will lead to positive change.
There is an opportunity for someone of courage to offer an alternative way forward.
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108. Aah, so it was the 1979 Scottish devolution referendum that led to the downfall of the left throughout the entire UKin the late 80s.
Here's me thinking Maggie had something to do with it.
Jeez, BrianSH, have you ever left Scotland to see anything of the rest of the world, or even just the UK?
Maybe you should start to read one of those awful London-based papers that everyone seems to read instead of the Record/Scotsman/Herald nowadays.
Just sayin'.
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#108 Brian SH: Part of the Government? A Labour Government? Me?
But I was against devolution then, not so much the principle as the quality of the people pushing for it. I'm still against it today, simply because I don't see it as a better option.
I don't quite understand your point about the Left. But if my vote damaged extremists, I'm happy. But I didn't see politics in those terms.
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#103 brigadierjohn
You would have a fair point if it weren't for the fact that you are against reforming an electoral system that gave the current UK government 100% of the power with the votes of less than a quarter of the electorate and with more than 60% of the voters voting against them.
As such, pending a back-bench rebellion, the PM could create enough peers to allow the current parliament to sit indefinitely, not to mention any other changes he wishes to the "peculiar institution" that is the British Constitution.
Personally, I regard voting as a duty and would support its becoming compulsory as in some commonwealth countries with COs being allowed to perform community service instead.
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Expat - you clearly inhabit a strange unreality. Care to expand on any of the points you made? Yes, indeed, the deficit article I posted was from earlier on this year ... of course Britain's financial situation can only have improved from there!
'Stupidity and ignorance'
Another unionist who thinks that plain insults can substitute for an argument ... from one who posts here quite so often you should be able to expect far better.
I notice as well, you don't wish to question that Norway can afford to pay off its debts, but the UK will be hamstrung for decades.
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101. At 1:01pm on 10 Oct 2008, Anglophone
Room!
I think the word relatively might be fitting.
I support Independence (c4 decades) there are a lot of the policies of the SNP I disagree with but until the act of union is reversed I will continue. I voted NO to joining the EU for various reasons including the selling up our once sustainable fishing stock in the North sea.
If that makes me an arch nat, your words, so be it.
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#110 Reluctant-Expat
Follow the link and read all of his speech for his views on deregulation. I don't share all his views but my #99 demonstrates that some did have the foresight you often deny.
I'm not sure the rest of your post is an argument either way. In any event, it's probably more suited to the new thread.
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Appears to be some who like to kick the wee guy (Iceland) when he's down.
I'd rather give him a hand up.
A McG
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#112 northhighlander
Yes, and his #111 proves you right. I do know I shouldn't rise to the bait. I'll go any write I will try harder another few hundred times to see if it helps.
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111 aw ... come on .. a broon troot mair like.
:o)}
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116. Enough with the Norway comparisons as it has always been, and will always be, totally irrelevant.
Norway has saved every cent of its oil revenues, instead financing its high public spending wholly from non-oil taxation.
Scotland, even with high taxation, still runs a massive #10bn annual deficit if oil revenues are not used. That is 30% of Holyrood's budget.
Even with full oil revenues, Holyrood still required an additional #3bn from the Treasury in the last accounts. (The nats may deny this but the SNP doesn't.)
Also, when talking about his oil fund, Salmond is yet to clarify what he would do to fill that #10bn gap.
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#115 Brownedov: Your point is inconveniently true, although I was talking about a referendum rather than an election. In normal elections we tend to accept poor turnout as a fact of life. My point was that in a life-changing moment - altering the status of an entire nation - something more substantial than a simple majority is required. If only to avoid serious, possibly violent, recriminations.
Whatever the outcome, we have to avoid the feeling that it was a fix, or some sort of back-door sleight of hand. Therefore a true and substantial majority of the electorate should be required.
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#123 brigadier,
Sorry brig, but I disagree. In a simple yes/no referendum, the option with the highest number of votes wins. If you can't be bothered to vote, then you can't exactly moan about the outcome.
Anything else is a fix!
To suggest that a vote not cast should automatically be a 'no' vote makes a complete mockery of democracy. To set limits at something other than 50% (of votes cast) does likewise. Any attempt of that ilk would be the quickest way to arouse violent recriminations that I can think of.
D'ye think I came up the Clyde on a bike?
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#103 Brigadierjohn
I am sorry that you feel that way that all voters must vote either way in the vote for independence. Last time I looked we were in a democratic country (or as close as we can get) and if some people don't want to vote then why should their vote count for any side. No vote, no say!
However, I like the idea that people should use their democratic right to vote because I am a believer in democracy however it is not for me to insist on that.
As for 'standing orders'; we don't have that in a democracy; that's army speak and as we all know, the army is not democratic. Thank God.
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#123 brigadierjohn
"My point was that in a life-changing moment - altering the status of an entire nation - something more substantial than a simple majority is required"
Point taken, although the UK government could constitutionally (if theoretically) pull the plug on Holyrood tomorrow or do something equally life-changing.
I would prefer a two-stage process where first confirmation is given to negotiate a new constitutional arrangement (simple majority) followed by a confirmation at the end of the process (higher hurdle).
So long as voting is not consiered a duty, I think two thirds of the electorate would be much too high (much higher than the National Governments of the '30s) but would be open to suggestion as to what would be reasonable.
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Expat - nonsense figures based on out of date analysis and you know it (or at least you should, if you would actually care to look at studies over the last 5 years or so).
There is no 'gap' - Scotland is in surplus even without oil, or at least it was until Brown led us over the edge into the financial abyss now!
You can spread whatever unionist lies you like but it doesn't change the underlying truth that Scotland contributes more per head than any other 'region' of the UK (South-East aside).
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A lot of silly posters seem to think Iceland, with a population about half of Glasgow's, is comparable to Scotland. In fact its nearest equivalent would be Luxembourg. Iceland's problem has noything to do with its size or its independence. It's to do with bad banking practice. Iceland would be okay if the idiocy in the US hadn't finally imploded the West's economy,built as it has been on invented money and the ultimate perversity of selling debt as an asset.
When the dust settles the real culprits will be easily seen - and one G Brown who rode high on an economic con trick will be among those first fingered.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
More4 news has an excellent piece on Norway and its investments, look on Channel4 website.
This is the second time i have posted this .
It is not offensive ,it is not abusive and it is informative.
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