Salmond and Sturgeon Want the English Fish for More Fat Subsidies

Leanne1812

dktreesea wrote: »

Seriously? There's nothing "little brother" about Scotland. I live in Scotland (born in England). If ever there was a case of the tail wagging the dog in the UK it would have to be the power of Scotland over England. The Scots kow- towing to anyone? Not in your wildest dreams.


As to Westminster, their attitude to English issues is so poor it's outrageous. How could people in Yorkshire feel anything but disgust at Cameron saying they are going to increase funding for flood defences from a paltry £100 million to £280 million, for the whole of Yorkshire, a county with a similar population to Scotland, when the budget for flood defences up here for one river alone, the Water of Leith in Edinburgh, is £85 million and counting?


Look at what happens with social housing. England selling all theirs off as quickly as possible. Scotland keeping their houses and building plenty more. Why stop there? How about further education? Better to live in Scotland than England if you want to go to Uni.


When exactly does Scotland do what Westminster tells it?


Even private companies get in on the act. For a few months last year Lidl was giving people anything form £5 of a £20 spend up to £5 of a £35 spend each week. Lidl, mind you. One of the cheapest supermarkets. Was this available in England? No.


I'd like an independent Scotland. But I can understand those who voted no. Every time a half sensible question was asked, like what happens at the border (mostly those who live in Scotland but travel south to England each day to work) and will we have to go through passport control, people were told to "trust the vision". And surely the initial currency (presuming the later intention would have been to join the Euro) should have been the Scottish pound, not the English one? Not to mention the stupid militants on the "yes" vote side saying anyone who voted no was a traitor. That decided a fair few Scots to vote no, I would have thought. "Being told" by anyone, about anything, is definitely not a way of life up here.

I'm not saying we do kow tow but the vibe from this thread alone and the media in general is that we should be. Those pesky scots, after all we give them, everything we do for them and there they are whinging. Do we expect other areas of the U.K. to do the same or do we all just get on with everyday life and come here for some 'light' entertainment. Why are scots expected to sit down, shut up and be happy that we get more per head in the union? We get more for perfectly valid reasons. Should we be subservient because of this? Well no, i don't believe we should. Isn't politics a never ending cycle of reform to try and improve areas & life/society in general?

I don't believe we are the tail wagging the dog.

Is it Scotland's fault that funding is so low for flood defences?

I agree re housing & education, some of our policies are to be admired.

As far as Lidl offers go, maybe they know they have to offer the canny Scot a deal to entice them. Their marketing people obviously decide what is good for business.

Seeing not all areas are devolved- we'd be independent then- we are answerable and accountable to Westminster and they do make decisions over which our representatives have no real influence at all. The recent bombing campaign being one.

I can understand those who voted no too. I've no gripe with them. We all voted with the best intentions. I've said repeatedly it was a matter of trust. Who did you trust more. We all had a choice and made it based on what we felt was best for Scotland & her inhabitants.

Leanne1812

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Yes.


..........

Can you elaborate please?

Leanne1812

kabayiri wrote: »

I don't know. I don't understand this point , for example
"Additionally, it adds weight to calls to invest now to turn the North East into a world centre for renewables energy, preparing for the time when oil does become depleted."

What does that mean precisely?

One expensive component of wind turbines are the blades. Are we suggesting they are made in Scotland?

LM WindPower are the biggest suppliers of components and services to the wind turbine industry. Look at this from their website as to where their blades are manufactured

"Our global manufacturing footprint includes wind turbine blade factories in China, USA, India, Canada, Denmark, Spain, Poland and Brazil. "

No mention of Scotland there. They are headquartered in Denmark, with fund management from London.

Is the future of a prosperous Scotland another big industry to replace oil&gas, or a thousand diversified but successful smaller businesses?

Which strategy enables a country the size of Scotland to ride out fluctuations in demand?

I know there is lots of talk on investing in renewables here. I believe the subsidies have been stopped though. As you know fracking is very controversial. I'm not sure at the moment how that will pan out but my feeling is one of distrust that it is 'safe' I keep meaning to look into it more and I will.

As far as the manufacturing goes it's the same old story isn't it. If it's cheaper to source elsewhere then invariably that's what will happen. I'd like to see Scotland invest in manufacturing but I suppose it needs to be cost effective.

I know I'm not answering your questions very well here but I was just looking for some feedback on the article and seeing if other people could understand a different viewpoint and give it some thought.

Moby

Generali wrote: »

Regardless of the actual dollar figure, when the price of your main export drops by 2/3rds in a year or so it is likely that the finances of the country would be in trouble.

As I say, do what cost are you prepared to pay for independence. Given the massive loss of revenue that must have happened as a result of the falling oil price it is inevitable that potential Scottish government revenues must be lower than hoped for at the time of the referendum. Back then I don't recall anyone claiming that there was a massive surplus.

Even if you don't accept Whitehall figures, the simplest back of envelope calculation shows that the fiscal numbers must have got much worse.

Independence for Scotland is an emotional thing. Economic 'facts' are hard to be certain about in any event. Put 40 economists in a room and you'll have 40 opinions. Independence for Ireland succeeded in far more difficult circumstances.

islandannie

Leanne1812 wrote: »

Can you elaborate please?

No need to as far as I can see.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Moby wrote: »

Independence for Ireland succeeded in far more difficult circumstances.

Except of course it took them over 30 years to recover economically back to where they were before independence.

What about indy is worth three decades of ordinary people being poorer?

elantan

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Except of course it took them over 30 years to recover economically back to where they were before independence.

What about indy is worth three decades of ordinary people being poorer?

I understand it's different for everyone, but I do remember talking to a poster on here during indy ref who now lives in England but comes from Ireland and he talked about indy for Ireland, he was saying yep it was hard ( or so his dad told him ...which I dare say makes a difference)but that they would vote indy again in a heart beat. He did talk about how hard it was for many though, including cutting chunks of grass and earth to heat their homes etc

He didn't particularly think Scotland should go independent mind you ... which I did find a tad bizzare

Tromking

Moby wrote: »

Independence for Scotland is an emotional thing. Economic 'facts' are hard to be certain about in any event. Put 40 economists in a room and you'll have 40 opinions. Independence for Ireland succeeded in far more difficult circumstances.

There were plenty of Scots in the indyref who were willing to base their decision on which group of economists they believed. What was key and in the end did for the YES campaign was the amount who voted to remain within the UK because they believed the economic case for an independent Scotland was not made. In my view until Nationalists square that perticular circle, they are nowhere.

Generali

Moby wrote: »

Independence for Scotland is an emotional thing. Economic 'facts' are hard to be certain about in any event. Put 40 economists in a room and you'll have 40 opinions. Independence for Ireland succeeded in far more difficult circumstances.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Except of course it took them over 30 years to recover economically back to where they were before independence.

What about indy is worth three decades of ordinary people being poorer?

And of course the Irish faced some pretty brutal repression so there is a pretty easy argument to make along the lines that I'd rather be poor on my feet than rich on my knees.

In the C21st there is no repression of Scottish people for being Scottish, as much as anything the referendum showed that. Scots can have Burns Night, wear a kilt or a Saltire, get an extra public holiday at New Year, laugh at The Proclaimers and sing along with Billy Connolly (other way around?). I just don't see what the gain is to the man on the Edinburgh Omnibus. Why lose so much to gain so little? It's either blind hate or stupidity. There is no other explanation I can see.

dktreesea

Leanne1812 wrote: »

I'm not saying we do kow tow but the vibe from this thread alone and the media in general is that we should be. Those pesky scots, after all we give them, everything we do for them and there they are whinging. Do we expect other areas of the U.K. to do the same or do we all just get on with everyday life and come here for some 'light' entertainment. Why are scots expected to sit down, shut up and be happy that we get more per head in the union? We get more for perfectly valid reasons. Should we be subservient because of this? Well no, i don't believe we should. Isn't politics a never ending cycle of reform to try and improve areas & life/society in general?

I don't believe we are the tail wagging the dog.

Is it Scotland's fault that funding is so low for flood defences?

I agree re housing & education, some of our policies are to be admired.

As far as Lidl offers go, maybe they know they have to offer the canny Scot a deal to entice them. Their marketing people obviously decide what is good for business.

Seeing not all areas are devolved- we'd be independent then- we are answerable and accountable to Westminster and they do make decisions over which our representatives have no real influence at all. The recent bombing campaign being one.

I can understand those who voted no too. I've no gripe with them. We all voted with the best intentions. I've said repeatedly it was a matter of trust. Who did you trust more. We all had a choice and made it based on what we felt was best for Scotland & her inhabitants.

Probably many of those who voted no trusted the Scottish Executive more than Westminster to take care of their best interests, otherwise why would Scotland be awash with new settlers from down south year in year out? But the actions of the Vote Yes militants, and in particular their individual acts of violence, possibly made people think about the kind of discrimination non Scots might experience once Scotland was independent, or even Scots who didn't toe the SNP party line, and pushed them off the fence into the No camp.


And it's hard to place trust in a party whose response to hard questions was "trust the vision". I don't see small countries like NZ or Belgium borrowing some other country's currency. Why would the Scots need to? A few other things may have got in the way, for example, at the point of independence, Scotland would have ceased to be a member of the EU.


As to flood defences, the Tories have shown themselves quite willing to take us more and more into debt. They're quite capable of borrowing £3 to £4 billion to get the flood defences down south into order. They've shown no such qualms with big projects like Crossrail, and presumably the coming high speed train project will be equally well funded on borrowings. They would rather spend on the next generation of nuclear powered submarines than take care of the environment.


I don't believe Cameron's commitment to proper flood defences for a moment. Even he can't surely be stupid enough to believe £280 million spent in Yorkshire will do the trick, let alone the £40million sticking plaster he is now proposing. I believe instead that they have decided to sacrifice a few thousand houses, plus the city centres if necessary, to the high possibility of flooding every few years.


The SNP, in contrast, are unlikely to allow the situation in Dumfries to continue on, in spite of the opposition to any flood defences be built in the Whitesands area from the people who live there. They will probably do it properly, building a suitable dam in the catchment area like what they are doing with the Water of Leith. If the Water of Leith is any indication, money is no object up here when it comes to flood defences. Over engineered comes to mind even.


I'd rather see money spent on flood defences rather than high speed rail or Trident. Flood barriers like the one at the mouth of the Foss, to hold back the Ouse from backing up the Foss should be a last resort, not a first resort.


Here's a bet - the shoring up of defences on the Tweed and the defence of Dumfries versus proper flood defences built on the Ouse and the Aire. Which will come first? Scotland for sure.


Or how about the dualling of the A1 from Newcastle to Edinburgh (even in Salmond's day he said he would start on the Scottish side of the border as soon as the English would start on their side) vs the dualling of the A9 all the way up to Inverness? Scotland to come first again. No contest.


It's pathetic that a country of 50million+ people should have to settle for less than a country of 5million+ people. Just pathetic.