An independant Scotland will have to reapply to EU

zagubov

zenmaster wrote: »

You disappoint me.

I was rather hoping that they would all become illegal immigrants overnight, and be rounded up and repatriated.
.

You sound very keen on rounding people up!:D
Got shares in a badge factory?:cool:

kabayiri

zagubov wrote: »

They've been voting with their hearts instead of their heads for long enough, and it seems to have given them half-emptied oilfileds, unworked coalmines, a steel industry transplanted to Northants, car industry closed down, demolished industrial estates, a short-lived population, high crime and disability rates, and a country that's apparently now too weakened to stand on its own feet by the unionists own accounts.

I very much think unionism'll have to up its game to sell more of the same to Scotland.:rotfl::rotfl:

And there's enough unemployed to roll their ancestors bodies in their graves to save them doing it themselves.:D

You could easily be describing the demise of the North East in your paragraph above, or Wales, or arguably other parts of the North.

I don't think government policy over recent decades has been anti-Scottish. I do think it has tended to centralise wealth, and a lot of the wealth in recent times comes from international finance. An unintentional deprivation perhaps.

I'd like to think there are more preferable answers than Scotland, NE, Wales, Cumbria and NW, all going independent though!

zagubov

kabayiri wrote: »

You could easily be describing the demise of the North East in your paragraph above, or Wales, or arguably other parts of the North.

I don't think government policy over recent decades has been anti-Scottish. I do think it has tended to centralise wealth, and a lot of the wealth in recent times comes from international finance. An unintentional deprivation perhaps.

I'd like to think there are more preferable answers than Scotland, NE, Wales, Cumbria and NW, all going independent though!

I'd love to hear those answers too. I just never do.
Westminster has created a bubble of affluence in a sea of deprivation and thinks that's all right. We need a parliament closer to where all the voters live.

In the case of Scotland that's already happening. TBH, somethings' got to happen. I'm not sure how much the rest of the UK can survive the neglect they get from Westminster with it's lazy unimaginative laissez-faire sink-or-swim attitude to spreading wealth.

Collectively the main parties slogan for the UK north of Watford might as well be: "see all those policies that have nearly killed you; well one more dose and then it'll be all right" :rotfl:
Aye right!:cool:

Graham_Devon

zagubov wrote: »

They've been voting with their hearts instead of their heads for long enough, and it seems to have given them half-emptied oilfileds, unworked coalmines, a steel industry transplanted to Northants, car industry closed down, demolished industrial estates, a short-lived population, high crime and disability rates, and a country that's apparently now too weakened to stand on its own feet by the unionists own accounts.

Is this one of your reasons for thinking Scotland would be better ouf of the UK?

Your oil fields will replenish? That we have someone emptied them on your behalf? This makes no sense, would you rather they just lay full?

Do you think coalmines will suddenly start producing again, and that England, Wales and NI's fault that the coal pits closed? You feel the steel industry will suddenly be sent back to Scotland....by leaving the UK? Car industries will be back? (not as if the rest of the UK has one...is it).

The rest of the UK has demolished industrial estates, and many parts also have a short lived population. Again, I don't think Scotland going it alone will extend the lives of the Scottish people.

Etc etc.

Do you really believe all this will be better if you left a union with the rest of us!?!? Scary stuff. Seems a time machine would be of more benefit for all those, than a vote for independance would be.

BobQ

zenmaster wrote: »

You disappoint me.

I was rather hoping that they would all become illegal immigrants overnight, and be rounded up and repatriated.

Of course, with the SNP in power, they could always claim asylum.

Well if that happens no doubt the Scottish Government would reciprocate.

BobQ

zagubov wrote: »

Oooooooookay. :cool:
Although I'm a bit suspicious that the EFTA members probably adopt at least most of that anyway via the EEA. So not quite sure we've reached the big unique selling point for the EU yet.

The EEA basically means you sign a teaty to adopt all the EU internal market rules (apart from fisheries and agriculture) but have no say in their development. This also means adopting many related EU laws and paying a contribution to the costs of taking part in the single market they join.

Your EFTA membership allows you to have free trade with a few nations like Norway and Leitchenstein. You still have to fund an EFTA bureaucacy also based in Brussels and Luxemburg which travels the world overseeing favourable trading agreements with other nations.

zagubov

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Is this one of your reasons for thinking Scotland would be better ouf of the UK?

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Your oil fields will replenish? That we have someone emptied them on your behalf? This makes no sense, would you rather they just lay full?

Do you think coalmines will suddenly start producing again, and that England, Wales and NI's fault that the coal pits closed? You feel the steel industry will suddenly be sent back to Scotland....by leaving the UK? Car industries will be back? (not as if the rest of the UK has one...is it).

The rest of the UK has demolished industrial estates, and many parts also have a short lived population. Again, I don't think Scotland going it alone will extend the lives of the Scottish people.

Etc etc.

Do you really believe all this will be better if you left a union with the rest of us!?!? Scary stuff. Seems a time machine would be of more benefit for all those, than a vote for independance would be.

I very much doubt the damage would be reversed, at least any time soon. That’s unimportant though.

It’s like an reasonably fit person takes up smoking and their health declines. We’d all agree they should quit even if some damage is already done. They’re maybe not going to do athletics again but at least their deterioration might slow down.
And them saying that they should wait for their pals to quit, would be recognisable as a rubbish excuse.


I think ending the union could slow Scotland’s decline. It’s certainly worth trying. The shortened life span’s an epigenetic phenomenon and needs attention fast and it sure isn’t getting enough of it in the union (or, to be fair, the current version of it).

BobQ wrote: »

The EEA basically means you sign a teaty to adopt all the EU internal market rules (apart from fisheries and agriculture) but have no say in their development. This also means adopting many related EU laws and paying a contribution to the costs of taking part in the single market they join.

Your EFTA membership allows you to have free trade with a few nations like Norway and Leitchenstein. You still have to fund an EFTA bureaucacy also based in Brussels and Luxemburg which travels the world overseeing favourable trading agreements with other nations.

That's okay. It's a much slimmer (and Swiss-based ) operation than the Brussels EU one. Its workforce is tiny and I don't mean they're oompaloompas.

The costs would be about two-thirds of current ones. There would be free trade with the whole EU via the EEA. And as regards having no say in decision making let's not pretend there's much say as an EU member. There's none of this pressure to join the Schengen area or even the (actually fictional) "requirement to join the euro".

BobQ

zagubov wrote: »

That's okay. It's a much slimmer (and Swiss-based ) operation than the Brussels EU one. Its workforce is tiny and I don't mean they're oompaloompas.

The costs would be about two-thirds of current ones. There would be free trade with the whole EU via the EEA. And as regards having no say in decision making let's not pretend there's much say as an EU member. There's none of this pressure to join the Schengen area or even the (actually fictional) "requirement to join the euro".

EFTA is not just based in Geneva, it has offices in Brussels and Luxemburg and for three small countries a large bureaucracy not in EU terms but for its size. You may be right that it costs two thirds of those of the EU (I cannot disagree with these but this depends how they are attributed to Scotland). There are additional costs of EEA membership (again it depends how you calculate them) including enacting EU laws.

As UK is not in the Schengen area then nothing will change in our Common Travel Area.

I am not clear what Salmond's plan is for a currency is if Scotland does not join the EU and adopt the Euro.

zagubov

BobQ wrote: »

EFTA is not just based in Geneva, it has offices in Brussels and Luxemburg and for three small countries a large bureaucracy not in EU terms but for its size. You may be right that it costs two thirds of those of the EU (I cannot disagree with these but this depends how they are attributed to Scotland). There are additional costs of EEA membership (again it depends how you calculate them) including enacting EU laws.

As UK is not in the Schengen area then nothing will change in our Common Travel Area.

I am not clear what Salmond's plan is for a currency is if Scotland does not join the EU and adopt the Euro.

Quite right about the three offices. The number of employees is barely into treble digits IIRC. The EU has an absolute army by comparison.

The Swiss seem to have a very efficent system of government and bureaucracy. I always wonder who's their president, and apparently so do many of the Swiss. It's often an anoymous man or woman in a suit standing next to you on the tram. I read once that their government has a budget smaller than many US states or even cities.

Lke Eire, Scotland intends a Schengen opt-out.

A really important point everybody seems to be missing (well in the unionist press) is that the EU is inclusive and expansive, makes it up as it goes along, found ways of including East Germans and North Cypriots, and uses its flexibilty to sustain and expand membership and is 100% certain to not expel 5 million Scots their fish and oilfields for so much as a nanosecond.

Unless you read the unionist press which is sadly the entire press available in Scotland. And which entirely missed the voting landslide of the last election. Wow. :eek:

Can I get a job in the unionist press in Scotland? It seems all you have to do is print counterfactual tosh about how black is white and day is night. :rotfl:

pqrdef

zagubov wrote: »

Westminster has created a bubble of affluence in a sea of deprivation and thinks that's all right.

We've forgotten that the purpose of the economy is to support the population, not just to make some people rich.

But an independent Scotland will be just as forgetful. It'll have its own home-grown greasy poles, its own home-grown rampant social inequality, maybe even its own home-grown Tory party. You can't save it for your own political vision.

All the people who came together to win independence will then find that their visions of the independent future are totally incompatible and they can't all win. Look at Egypt. Look at Syria. How long do you give the anti-Assad coalition when Assad goes? How long do we give the SNP?

zagubov wrote: »

We need a parliament closer to where all the voters live.

No we don't. We look at Salmond and Sturgeon. We look at Stormont (but not for long, it hurts). We look at the shower we've just elected as police commissioners. We think about our councillors jumped up to a regional assembly. We look at our hopeless local and regional newspapers and regional TV studios and ask if they could hold a regional assembly to account. We recoil in horror and stick with Westminster. It's bad, but the alternative is truly dire.