Could Scotland afford full fiscal autonomy?

[Johnuk123]

The SNP are perhaps the most divisive party this country has ever seen. Wants to break up the union (which I'm not bothered about) but wants BoE to guarantee their currency so basically uses the rest of the UK taxpayers as a guarantor to their wild plans on public spending. Sturgeon and the SNP repeatedly said they would lock the Tories out of Downing St even if they were the largest party after the election. They are clearly against what the majority of people in England believe in. On top of all that Sturgeon is not even an MP.

They only have one real interest and that is leaving the rest of the UK which is fine by me.

I don't think most English people will be that bothered when they do, they certainly won't be the winner in any divorce.

 

[Bletchleyite]

As an English person I'm not overly bothered if they do or not, but if they do my firm view is that they get no special treatment e.g.currency or defence union. They are in my view to be treated the same as the Republic of Ireland.

 

[Johnuk123]

As an English person I'm not overly bothered if they do or not, but if they do my firm view is that they get no special treatment e.g.currency or defence union. They are in my view to be treated the same as the Republic of Ireland.

Talking of defence they want the Trident subs out of Scotland along with all nuclear weapons.

On the other hand they're quite content to have the NATO nuclear umbrella to protect them.

Rather two faced to say the least.

 

[reb0118]

ban the pesky Scottish from this side of the boarder...

Do you mean border as in frontier or boarder as in someone who stays at boarding house

Easy way to sort it out...rebuild Hadrians Wall...that will sort out the West Lothian Question!

Why stop at the Tyne we could always move the border down to the Tees. The four northern counties of Northumberland, Durham, Westmoreland, & Cumberland are always welcome back in their spiritual home. I believe there is a petition to move the border even further south to the Mersey & the Humber see here.

From The Grauniad:More than 12,000 people have signed a petition demanding the north of England break away from the “London-centric south” and join a new Scotland.

The petition says the northern English cities “feel far greater affinity with their Scottish counterparts such as Glasgow and Edinburgh than with the ideologies of the London-centric south” and demands secession from the UK.

Signatures to the Change.org petition were rising rapidly on Thursday before a visit to Manchester by George Osborne, the chancellor, and the only MP in the new Conservative cabinet with a northern English constituency.

Osborne, MP for Tatton in Cheshire, is expected to set out his plans to offer northern cities more powers if they accept elected mayors as part of his “northern powerhouse” vision. Earlier this week the prime minister appointed the Stockton South MP, James Wharton, to be minister for the “northern powerhouse”, which is a non-cabinet role.

The petition suggests the map of the UK be redrawn, extending Scotland’s southern borders along a line that runs between the mouth of the Humber and the Dee, which flows east from Wales via Chester and discharges to the sea between Wales and the Wirral peninsula in England.

“New Scotland” would see Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle and the rest of the north of England ruled from Edinburgh instead of London, with the Scottish National party holding the reins. The SNP won 56 out of the 59 Scottish seats in Westminster last week, leaving the Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats with just one each.

The petition was started last year during the Scottish referendum campaign but lay dormant following the no vote.

It has received a new lease of life in the last week since the Conservatives won a majority in the general election, more than doubling the number of signatures in the past few days. The performance of the SNP’s Nicola Sturgeon in the first leaders’ debate impressed many voters in England, who took to Google to ask if they could vote for her party despite living south of the border.

Started by a pun-lover called “Stu Dent”, who claims to be in Sheffield, the petition says: “The needs and challenges of the north cannot be understood by the endless parade of old Etonions [sic] lining the frontbenches of the House of Commons. The north of England should join the newly independent Scotland and regain control over its own destiny. We, the people of the north, demand that in the event that Scotland becomes independent the border between England and the New Scotland be drawn along a line that runs between the river Dee and the mouth of the Humber.”

The Manchester Evening News has received the idea with great enthusiasm, coming up with a list of of reasons for and against Manchester joining Scotland. While the paper is likes the idea of a Caledonian-Mancunian cuisine mashup – “deep fried Bury black pudding anyone?” – and thinks the Loch Ness monster could enjoy a change of scenery by swimming in Heaton Park. But it doesn’t fancy swapping a good old Madchester rave for a ceilidh: “Gay Gordons? No, ta. We’ve got the Bez dance.”

...... but wants BoE to guarantee their currency so basically uses the rest of the UK taxpayers as a guarantor to their wild plans on public spending....

The Bank of England is a little bit of a misnomer it is the United Kingdom Central Bank and ipso facto the bank for the Government of the United Kingdom. Scotland as an integral part of the United Kingdom pays into the system and upon any succession would be entitled to a fair share of the assets, and yes deficits, of the United Kingdom. This includes the Bank of England, which was of course founded by a Scot.

It is unfortunate that attitudes like yours are increasingly turning right minded Scots into the hands of the nationalists, those that were once happy and secure in the Union.

What will fund our "wild spending plans"? Of course we know the answer, in the short to medium term at least, North Sea oil. AKA Scotland's oil. You get a lot more bang for your buck when you divide the tax revenues from the North Sea by five million as opposed to fifty, regardless of the current value.

They are in my view to be treated the same as the Republic of Ireland.

Did we the British not bale the Irish out recently? I mind Boy Osbourne stating something about it being the right thing to do for our economy.

In comparison to the peaceful campaign in Scotland Ireland went through a bitter war of Independence, a civil war, and a brutal terrorist campaign against us and yet for the most part trade relations have flourished. For many years the Irish currency was linked to Sterling and was almost accepted on par with it. The Irish to this day have a very privileged lifestyle within the UK compared to other foreign nationals - why should an independent Scotland expect any less?............

 

[Jonny]

Do you mean border as in frontier or boarder as in someone who stays at boarding house

I presume he means border

Why stop at the Tyne we could always move the border down to the Tees. The four northern counties of Northumberland, Durham, Westmoreland, & Cumberland are always welcome back in their spiritual home. I believe there is a petition to move the border even further south to the Mersey & the Humber see here.

The four counties are English. The term Geordie reportedly comes from loyalty to the English King George during the Jacobite Rebellion. County Durham is very much English and belongs in England. As a resident of County Durham, I only support setting Scotland adrift with its current borders.

 

[bussnapperwm]

I presume he means border.

Yes, I must turn off Autocorrect on my iPad, I did mean border

 

[radamfi]

Increased borrowing is the standard way of paying for public spending in English speaking countries, notably the USA and nowadays also the UK, leading to excessive debt. Scotland could choose the Nordic way of high taxation. The Scandinavian countries seem to do OK, actually better than OK. They have coupled high taxation with a high level of privatisation and free market economics. The UK in the 70s may have had high tax but didn't have privatisation.

 

[reb0118]

Yes, I must turn off Autocorrect on my iPad, I did mean border

No worries. To be fair if you are from the Scottish Borders and somebody asks where you are from most would reply:-

"Frae the boarders"

The four counties are English. The term Geordie reportedly comes from loyalty to the English King George during the Jacobite Rebellion. County Durham is very much English and belongs in England. As a resident of County Durham, I only support setting Scotland adrift with its current borders.

You are quite correct re. Geordie the rumour was that as the Jacobites approached Newcastle in 1715 the residents slammed the door in their faces and cried "For Geordie! For Geordie!". The county of Northumberland, as indeed Lancashire, was strongly pro Stuart at the time though.

NB. We should not fall into the trap that the Jacobite Risings were a Scottish vs. English campaign. There were supporters of both sides in both countries and in fact in the '15 there were a lot, and I mean a lot, of fence sitters. Many landed families kept the eldest son at home, to secure their patrimony, but placed younger sons in both camps.

By home town was very pro Hanoverian in the '45 and was taxed accordingly by the Jacobites as they passed through. Certain scallywags were reported marching over the Flints wearing women's clothing and carrying pots and pans that they had liberated from the guidwifes of Bo'ness. We also had a couple of heroes too - Colonel Gardiner of Carriden who commanded the government dragoons at Prestonpans. He was one of the few mounted officers who remained after the Highland Charge to try to offer assistance to the stricken infantry. For his trouble he was mortally hacked with a Lochaber Axe and died within sight of his own house at Bankhead. The other hero was the unnamed Collector of Customs at Bo'ness who managed to remove all the shipping on the River Forth to deny their use to the Jacobites.

In all honesty, with the exception of Berwick -upon - Tweed, I do not feel that their is much popular groundswell for the North of England joining Scotland despite the close cultural, linguistic, geographic, & historic links between there and the South of Scotland.

..... loyalty to the English King George during the Jacobite Rebellion.....

BTW George was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain &c.. England, like Scotland, had ceased to exist after 1707.(*).

This may seem a minor point but the constant referral to England instead of Great Britain or the United Kingdom, depending on circumstances, can be seen as disrespectful to the non English parts of our nation state.

Scots, in the main, can also be Britons but never English - the converse also applies however I get the feeling that a lot of English feel that English and British are one and the same. They are not. If the UK government could see itself fit to rectify this through education and other cultural media e.g. the BBC then they may go some way to alleviate the undercurrent of resentment currently in Scotland (This may also apply in Wales? I will leave Northern Ireland to another time as identity there is fraught with all sorts of problems!)

* I doubt the actual cessation of Scotland and England was ever visualised by even the most ardent unionist and in any case by continuing the separation of the Scottish Legal, Religious, & Education systems the vestiges of a separate nation remained (this also, ipso facto, retained separate systems in England & Wales) so in theory if England & Scotland were no more after the Act of Union in practise they were very much so.

I suppose a lot of Scots look upon it like this. Separate at home (Scots) but united abroad (British) - this is undermined by the British Establishment seeing itself as English at home and abroad. We must square this circle if the union is to survive.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Scots, in the main, can also be Britons but never English - the converse also applies however I get the feeling that a lot of English feel that English and British are one and the same.

I don't know one English person who thinks that. Though I do know increasing numbers of English people who are getting bored of the moaning from north of the border and would be happy for Scotland to go on its merry way provided there is no cap in hand begging once they do.

Indeed, I would suspect were England, particularly the South thereof, included in the referendum, it would be a landslide "yes".

 

[cb a1]

I don't know one English person who thinks that.

I originally hail from Lancashire and indeed most of my family still live there.

I find that they use British and English / UK, GB and England as synonyms. Indeed, before I moved to Scotland I did the same. Now that I'm attuned to the difference, I hear it and read it frequently.

Things are getting better. I'm very pleased to see the use of St George's Cross instead of the Union flag when England are taking part in something rather than the UK (or Team GB, which incidentally I've always found rather disrespectful to NI).

The Independence Referendum has also had the benefit of getting many people to think about who and what they are and what they want to be. I personally identify myself as English first, British second. Conversely, I remember one chat with two friends in the run-up to the referendum, one born in Scotland, one born in England; they both identified themselves as British first, then Scottish and English second.

 

[reb0118]

Indeed, I would suspect were England, particularly the South thereof, included in the referendum, it would be a landslide "yes".

When the Union came about in 1707 it was accepted by both parliaments, both wholly unrepresentative of their respective peoples but it was a long time ago.

The modern way to do these things is now by referenda - so as both countries voted for the union why does the rest of the UK in fairness not also get a vote on its possible separation?

I think we all know the answer to that..............

 

[tbtc]

As a Scot living in England, I’ve mixed emotions here...

Could Scotland survive on its own? Certainly yes. There are plenty of smaller countries (than one with a population of around five million) which seem to function, even when you consider the need to serve some fairly isolated communities.

It’s easy to cherry-pick a handful of examples that suit your case, even if there are clear reasons why these “exceptions” appear to be punching above their weight (I’d suggest that Norway and Switzerland are the “Alloa & Ebbw Vale” outliers that you’d expect to get mentioned a lot in a discussion like this – to briefly make a parallel with the world of railways, where people clutch at a couple of examples to try to make a case for something)...

...but there are a lot more “unremarkable” cases that an independent Scotland may have as a benchmark – in the Portugal/ Ireland/ Slovakia/ Slovenia/ Denmark/ Finland league. Plenty of “smaller” European countries functioning in their own right, just like an independent Scotland could/ would. Things may be better together, but I think both parties could survive apart if they had to.

The questions for me are...

Would an independent Scotland have a similar standard of living to the one that it currently does/ as high a standard of living as the SNP want to promise for everyone? Hard to tell. A lot of the case for financial success rests on (a) the price of a finite resource that has reduced significantly in the past six months and (b) the continued location in Scotland of businesses that do most of their business elsewhere.

If those continue to pay handsomely into the coffers then the finances look pretty good – potentially even better in the shortish term if the SNP’s plan for Scotland to join the “race to the bottom” of smaller countries slashing business rates happens. But did having the likes of Amazon/ Google nominally based in Dublin (for tax purposes) save the Irish economy from a crash? The kind of firms attracted by a lower corporation tax in Scotland are the same kind of firms who’ll happily move their brass plaques to the next country that tries to undercut. Only really a short term policy to paper over longer term problems.

Obviously you’ve got to be careful how you pitch this because the SNP’s “low taxes for businesses” combined with their under-spend at Hollyrood does upset the image they want to project to their core vote that they are an anti-austerity left wing party.

It helps the SNP to let people in England *think* they are “1970s tax-and-spend Socialists” (since the SNP are intelligent enough to know that provoking outrage in England will push Cameron into a UKIP friendly “English votes for English laws” direction that may end up causing Scottish independence by the back door – they couldn’t persuade the people of Scotland to vote for it, so they’ll try to agitate the people of England to want a split instead), but the reality isn’t so.

Apart from Trident (the SNP having the NIMBY policy of wanting the protection of NATO’s nuclear weapons, just not in their back yard :roll, they really aren’t that far from Blairism. I mentioned the underspend (above), since fiscal discipline (and some rhetoric about austerity being bad) is more important than actually alleviating austerity (since you can blame Big Bad London for it, conveniently ignoring the fact that you have powers over income tax to tackle the excesses of austerity).

Interestingly, the IMF described the SNP’s policies as being *more* austere than those of Labour/ LibDems (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-cuts-than-labour-says-watchdog-10199584.html) – though the populist rhetoric of the SNP means that many of their supporters aren’t too worried by facts like these. Easy to shout from the rooftops about austerity being A Bad Thing (and blame London for every cut)... let’s hope nobody actually reads the details of the SNP’s alternative!

(it’s a bit like the way that Cameron/ Osbourne keep telling us there’s a Long Term Economic Plan and hope that nobody notices that they inherited an economy growing at 1%pa in May 2010 and turned it into an economy growing at 0.3%pa by May 2015 – focus on the message and ignore the facts)

Would the scary Socialists that the English media rage about do things like let Brian Souter’s donations influence their transport policies into more “business friendly” ones? The fact that they are "in bed with" Rupert Murdoch should show you that they are centrist pussycats rather than fierce left wing beasts. Please don't fall for the myth that the SNP are "far left" - they've won the votes that they have by being pretty centrist (even if they like to pretend to be further left). Some SNP voters feed on the kind of outrage that a thread like this generates, trying to divide people, when there's really not the big differences that they like to shout about.

The Tory government in London would be well advised to tread very carefully regarding Scotland.
English Nationalism doesn't cut it north of the border even among their own handful of supporters.
Talk about austerity cuts just pushes us to the very edge.
Control of welfare benefits should be handed over to Edinburgh as soon as.
Along with a very large cheque.
Maybe then Scottish anger just might ease off.
Get it done Dave.

It’s hard to tell from this (and other posts) whether you’re just badly trolling or you’re a UKIP supporter trying to discredit the SNP cause by appearing to be as divisive as possible...

Obviously both sides of the argument (the Scottish Nationalists and the “little Englanders”) have an interest in playing to the extreme positions, in the way that extremists on one side of any argument need extremists on the other side to be opposed to.

I don’t think that you’re helping your “cause” though (unless you think that playing the pantomime villain will upset English people enough to make them say things that’ll upset Scots more which’ll fuel more division?)

 

[reb0118]

As a Scot living in England, I’ve mixed emotions here...

Could Scotland survive on its own? Certainly yes. There are plenty of smaller countries (than one with a population of around five million) which seem to function, even when you consider the need to serve some fairly isolated communities.............


.................Obviously both sides of the argument (the Scottish Nationalists and the “little Englanders”) have an interest in playing to the extreme positions, in the way that extremists on one side of any argument need extremists on the other side to be opposed to.

A very good post.

 

[St Rollox]

If there's one group of people i find cringe worthy then it's Scots living in England trying to justify their country of birth being shafted for the last few decades by successive British governments.

 

[NSEFAN]

If there's one group of people i find cringe worthy then it's Scots living in England trying to justify their country of birth being shafted for the last few decades by successive British governments.

I will ask again, how has it been shafted? Are you asserting that Scotland is paying more to the treasury than it's getting back?

 

[Dave1987]

A very good post.

Completely agree! Some excellent points in there.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

If there's one group of people i find cringe worthy then it's Scots living in England trying to justify their country of birth being shafted for the last few decades by successive British governments.

I work with quite a few Scots to whom I have shown your posts on this thread and they said they found them not representative of what majority of Scots believe. Be that ones who still live in Scotland or those who now live in England.

 

[HilversumNS]

If there's one group of people i find cringe worthy then it's Scots living in England trying to justify their country of birth being shafted for the last few decades by successive British governments.

How about addressing the points that others make, rather than simply stirring up more brown stuff with ludicrous statements?

BTW @ TBTC, great post!!