The New Fat Scotland 'Thanks for all the Fish' Thread.

Shakethedisease

.string. wrote: »

I didn't follow the meaning of that map - Does it show that most of the signatures come from Scotland - is it an SNP ruse?

It's backfired. Lots of Scots independence supporters are signing it after the first petition came to light due to this hashtag.

Hilarious Scots Twitter users troll bitter Brexiteers as #throwscotlandout hashtag is hijacked

HILARIOUS Scottish Twitter users gave some light relief this morning, after a hashtag based on the comments of bitter English Brexiteers started trending.
The flurry was started after Twitter user “DM Reporter” who collates some of the more ridiculous things said in right-wing tabloid the Daily Mail, highlighted a number of comments on a story about Nicola Sturgeon’s demands for a Brexit strategy.

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/hilarious-scots-twitter-users-troll-9126719

Because of course the surest way to upset a Scottish independence supporter is to actually demand Scotland gets independence. That'll show em eh. :cool:

TrickyTree83

Shakethedisease wrote: »

It's 2.2 billion in total not per year. And you've proven Whytepaper's bias yourself. Because this has all only been in force for ONE year so far. Until then the Scottish Govt had no borrowing powers at all and had to balance the books or underspend. Yet he's twittering on and on about the SNP bumping up huge a deficit. Making it sound like all this has been the case since at least 2012.

Like I said, the blog isn't very good. Misleading at best. Still, some people are only too happy to be lead up the garden path I suppose.

I never said the £2.2bn was per year. Go and read it again, I never said it was £2.2bn per year. Why don't you guys read this stuff, you just gloss over it and then tell me I'm wrong.

No, you're twisting it.

The reference to the £2.2bn and the £500m, which I assume you acknowledge are in force and do exist now, is in relation to the SNP supported meme that the Scottish government does not have the power to borrow.

It does.

Secondly, he later goes on to explain that the deficit is the difference between what Scotland spends, and what Scotland generates in revenue.

It's not rocket science.

The money is given to Scotland, and Scotland spends it.

Lets say that Westminster gives Scotland £100. And out of that £100 Scotland spends £60. Scotland generates £63 in revenue. That would be presented in GERS as a £37 surplus.

If we take the same scenario but this time say that Scotland spends the entire £100, that would show up on the GERS balance sheet as a -£37 deficit.

Therefore, to maintain the current level of services, living standards and social programmes Scotland would be operating with a £15bn deficit if it were to be independent.

If the Scottish government had chosen not to spend more than they generate in revenue regardless of what they were allowed to spend, then we'd be saying an independent Scotland would have no deficit. Wouldn't we?

This is playgroup accounting stuff, Tomy: My First Balance Sheet stuff.

The meme:



Therefore the SNP/indy meme claiming the Scottish government cannot borrow money is wrong. Because clearly they can. It's in legislation. It's in law. There's no wriggling out of that one.

They claim it's a false deficit because they didn't borrow it. Maybe so, but they did spend it on Scottish people and Scottish things.

The claim that selling the assets would mean that the deficit would disappear. No one appears to have told the meme creator you can only sell assets once, not every year.

The apparent contributions to English projects are all false with one exception, HS2. But then that's covered by Barnett consequentials, so Scotland is actually a net beneficiary from this.

TrickyTree83

.string. wrote: »

I didn't follow the meaning of that map - Does it show that most of the signatures come from Scotland - is it an SNP ruse?

Yes. Essentially.

Shakethedisease

TrickyTree83 wrote: »

I never said the £2.2bn was per year.

No, you're twisting it.

The reference to the £2.2bn and the £500m, which I assume you acknowledge are in force and do exist now, is in relation to the SNP supported meme that the Scottish government does not have the power to borrow.

It does.

Secondly, he later goes on to explain that the deficit is the difference between what Scotland spends, and what Scotland generates in revenue.

It's not rocket science.

The money is given to Scotland, and Scotland spends it.

Lets say that Westminster gives Scotland £100. And out of that £100 Scotland spends £60. Scotland generates £63 in revenue. That would be presented in GERS as a £37 surplus.

If we take the same scenario but this time say that Scotland spends the entire £100, that would show up on the GERS balance sheet as a -£37 deficit.

Therefore, to maintain the current level of services, living standards and social programmes Scotland would be operating with a £15bn deficit if it were to be independent.

If the Scottish government had chosen not to spend more than they generate in revenue regardless of what they were allowed to spend, then we'd be saying an independent Scotland would have no deficit. Wouldn't we?

This is playgroup accounting stuff, Tomy: My First Balance Sheet stuff.

The meme:



Therefore the SNP/indy meme claiming the Scottish government cannot borrow money is wrong. Because clearly they can. It's in legislation. It's in law. There's no wriggling out of that one.

They claim it's a false deficit because they didn't borrow it. Maybe so, but they did spend it on Scottish people and Scottish things.

The claim that selling the assets would mean that the deficit would disappear. No one appears to have told the meme creator you can only sell assets once, not every year.

The apparent contributions to English projects are all false with one exception, HS2. But then that's covered by Barnett consequentials, so Scotland is actually a net beneficiary from this.

The SNP and the Scottish Govt have no significant control over Scotland's macro economic policies. You're quite right, Scotland is 'given' what it gets. But again, it's not the Scottish Govt running up any deficit which is what your pal was trying to 'prove'.

I'm not going round the GERS tree again. It seems to be a particular favourite of unionist bloggers. Is all they have left most likely.

TrickyTree83

sss555s wrote: »

I've read your posts but just see you quoting fiction, and your own biased views.

You giving your opinion about Scotland is like me giving my opinion about London. I can watch the news, I can read the internet, I have been many times but I don't live it day in day out.

I thought better of you Shakey than to thank this poster for the diatribe above.

You've not read that post properly either since your opening retort was "it's not £2.2bn per year!". I never said it was. Read it again.

Shakethedisease

TrickyTree83 wrote: »

Yes. Essentially.

No it's a bit of Twitter fun.

TrickyTree83

Shakethedisease wrote: »

The SNP and the Scottish Govt have no significant control over Scotland's macro economic policies. You're quite right, Scotland is 'given' what it gets. But again, it's not the Scottish Govt running up any deficit which is what your pal was trying to 'prove'.

I'm not going round the GERS tree again. It seems to be a particular favourite of unionist bloggers. Is all they have left most likely.

Based on the evidence would you say that the meme, which was retweeted by SNP MP's, is wrong or is it correct? If you don't want to answer a blanket statement like this, there's some questions broken down for you below:

Does Scotland have borrowing powers? Yes/No

Does Scotland have the ability to sell it's assets, ad infinitum, to cover the yearly deficit? Yes/No

Does Scotland contribute to English projects as the meme claims? Yes/No

Does Scotland benefit from Barnett consequentials on the HS2 project? Yes/No

I suspect I'll only get lies in return, but it'll be interesting for everyone to see the responses.

Shakethedisease

TrickyTree83 wrote: »

I thought better of you Shakey than to thank this poster for the diatribe above.

You've not read that post properly either since your opening retort was "it's not £2.2bn per year!". I never said it was. Read it again.

We've been through the wars together on Scottish threads sss555s and I in previous years.

You made it sound like it was.

You will however note that as part of the Scotland Act 2012 he is indeed correct that new powers were given to enable Scottish ministers to borrow up to £2.2bn for capital purposes AND £500m for revenue capped at £200m for a particular year.

bolding and capital letters in AND mine.

Happy to accept that that isn't what you meant though.

TrickyTree83

Shakethedisease wrote: »

We've been through the wars together on Scottish threads sss555s and I in previous years.

You made it sound like it was.

bolding and capital letters in AND mine.

Happy to accept that that isn't what you meant though.

Grammatically if I was stating the £2.2bn was per year I would/should have written:

borrow up to £2.2bn for capital purposes per year and £500m for revenue capped at £200m for a particular year.

But that's not the case so I didn't.

And you may have "been through the wars" together on other threads, it doesn't change the reality that he/she doesn't read things and just plays the man not the ball.

kabayiri

sss555s wrote: »

I'd feel much better with us selling services to each other, it would make things far clearer.

Scotland would get paid for the water it supplies, renewable energy (which Westminster has de-incentivised) and Faslane, to name a few.

Yes, absolutely.

It works both ways.

The current political set up does not work, because Scotland; Wales; NI; they all have a body fighting for their cause; and yet England has nothing.

This creates the suspicion that Westminster is really a proxy for England.

I'd rather smaller regions each competing for a share of the spending pot by putting forward better plans for encouraging growth and prosperity.