FREEDOM!!!! [3]

I take all polling with a shovel full of salt- the polling just prior to the last Scottish Election had the SNP more than 10 points behind- they won it with a landslide (a lot of those who voted SNP were the poor and disenfranchised, those least likely to turn up in a poll)

The poll I mentioned above was carried out by the Scotsman Newspaper- I give it some credence if only because the newspaper is Unionist.

The BBC Scotland news page also has a poll tracker where you can see the trends and use the drop down menus to change polling company and to see when they last took a poll.-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/events/scotland-decides/poll-tracker

Interesting. The nature of the question is such that it tends to lump many of the undecided's with the No's. If they'd had a counterbalance question that polled about the same in the other direction, something about Scotland being permanently legally and constitutionally bound to the UK for example, it would give you a way to measure that all-important middle ground.

The question is the same one that will be on the referendum when we go to vote. The NO side claimed the original wording was biased towards a YES response (it was 'Do you agree Scotland should be an independent country?' ), and the Electoral Commission had to approve the new one as being unbiased.

I really dont give the polls too much credence based on recent form at judging SNP support, and this is a much broader question, its not a vote for a party its a vote for constitutional change and they arent used to polling for that sort of thing.

Some news that emerged over the weekend.

In my bit of Scotland prospects are not great for work- all the industry that sustained this part of Scotland is all but gone entirely now.
But we could have had an oil boom, except for defence reasons we didn't-

'The Sunday Post revealed last year that declassified documents appeared to show the Ministry of Defence forced oil firms to withdraw applications to drill for oil in the Firth of Clyde, fearing exploration of the seabed would interfere with nuclear submarines travelling to and from Faslane.
Now Lord Heseltine, Defence Secretary at the time, has confirmed it.
Asked by The Sunday Post if it was the right decision he said: “I do remember that. The question is whether it was right for strategic or defence reasons.'

So if we get a YES and get rid of the bloody nukes it rather frees up a lot of potential oil-

'A potential second oil boom for Scotland has moved a step closer after SNP ministers ordered a wide-ranging review of reserves off the country’s west coast.
Despite its huge potential, just 20 exploration wells have been drilled to the west of the Scottish mainland, compared with more than 3,000 in the North Sea and west of Shetland.
Other areas which will now be examined include the Solway Firth, North Channel, the Sea of the Hebrides and, in the longer term, Rockall.
The news comes only days after it emerged one of the North Sea’s biggest untapped resources – Bently, east of Shetland – may produce oil for more than three decades.'

So much for the NO claims that there is hardly any oil left and it would only be a burden on poor little Scotland anyway!

The Wesminster Government have been caught out trying to tell Scottish cvil servants how to vote in a memo they sent round-

"It is important that, as civil servants, we understand why the Scottish independence referendum is different from elections such as a UK General Election or a European Election.
This is because the UK government has a clear position to maintain the Union and so it is legitimate and necessary for UK civil servants to support the government in this objective."


Thats Westminster's idea of democracy for you. Tell your employees which way they have to vote.   

The big debate at the heart of the independence debate in recent weeks has been currency.

The current position is that the SNP say a currency union after independence is in the best interests of both Scotland and the rest of the UK.

The Westminster parties however all say they will not agree to a currency union and the SNP therefore have no currency plan. And have been demanding plan B for some time.

Plan B (and in fact C,D and E) are however in the SNP White Paper. Plan B being to use sterling without a union, much as say Panama uses the dollar.

The No side say this would be a disaster for Scotland to attempt.
The SNP say that plan B would work fine but Plan A- currency union- would be better for everyone and that the NO side are bluffing anyway because a currency union would be in their interests too, and once a YES vote is achieved the position will inevitably change.

And so the two sides have remained.

Now a new report has come out from the Adam Smith Institute.

First a bit about the Institute from wiki-

'The Adam Smith Institute was the primary intellectual force behind privatisation in the Thatcher era, and, with the Centre for Policy Studies and Institute of Economic Affairs, helped drive Thatcherite policy on privatisation, taxation, education, and health. Several of the Institute's policies have been adopted by the Major and Blair governments, and the ASI has also advised governments overseas.
The Institute currently advocates the free market by publishing books and policy proposals, advising foreign governments, calculating the British Tax Freedom Day, hosting speaker events for young people, and publishing a popular blog.'

So not what you would call traditional supporters of SNP style social democratic politics.

Here is what they concluded on using sterling without a currency union-

'using the pound without the use of a central bank - would be "a significant improvement on Scotland's current arrangements".
"Under sterlingization, Scotland would lack the ability to print money and establish a central bank to act as a lender of last resort.
Evidence from dollarized Latin American countries suggests that far from being problematic, this constraint reduces moral hazard within the financial system and forces banks to be prudent, significantly improving the overall quality of the country's financial institutions.
Panama, for example, has the seventh soundest banks in the world."
Further, it argued a system of "adaptive sterlingization would allow competitive, private banks to issue their own promissory notes backed by reserves of GBP.'

The BBC's economic editor summed it up as-

'Previously the Institute of Fiscal Studies said that 'sterlingization' should be bottom of the list of currency options because not having a lender of last resort would make the financial system vulnerable.
Now the Adam Smith Institute have flipped that on its head by saying that not having a lender of last resort would actually create a more careful banking culture.'

As well as this report Prof Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel prize-winning economist who advises the Scottish government told US media company Bloomberg pro-union politicians ruling out a currency union was "obviously a bargaining position" which would change after a "Yes" vote.
Prof Stiglitz, who teaches at Columbia University in New York, said: "Once they get independence, if that happens, then I think there will be a very different position and countries can work with many different monetary arrangements."
He also said current Scottish government policies like free university education proved Scotland is moving in a more socially democratic direction to the rest of the UK.
Prof Stiglitz said: "Those policies are working. And that's a very different view from, say, the Cameron Conservative policies in England where they are raising tuition (fees) for universities. So the two parts of the United Kingdom are moving in very different directions."


So it seems yet more of Project Fear withers to nothing in the cold light of common sense and in the eyes of those who dont have a stake in the outcome.

boy oh boy was the Salmond/Darling debate embarrasing. Salmond was shouty and smug and Darling was spluttering and shaking, what a bunch of knobheads. You can tell that Salmond loves all the adoration from the peanut gallery, and Darling hated every second. He is just not a good public speaker I dont know why he was put in that ridiculous position, dont they have someone with balls? If it had been Salmond v Boris it could have been very entertaining, like a blood sport without the Bunny.

The polling afterwards showed 71% thought Salmond was the clear winner and Darling got 29%

But thats two debates and both times I have thought the moderation was poor. Although the format does not help engender good debate- despite it taking ages to negotiate the format between the two sides.

It has been fun reading all the pro-union press today who have had to publish the poll results, and give this round to Salmond as their man was so poor, but it has been excused as everything from "he was the clear winner, but it wont matter in he end' to "the audience was rigged with proSNP supporters' (shame on you Telegraph for that last one, given they know full well the stringent rules for political audiences in live tv debates on the BBC)

The weird thing is the actual debate, the actual words they said was the exact same as the first debate, almost word for word, but the difference was in attitude. For some strange reason Salmond had the upper hand as soon as he left the podium, that was showmanship and it left Darling looking like a prat. Very odd indeed.

Darling looked like he expected to lose form the beginning.
And not having answers to key things that would happen in the event of a NO vote was a particular low point for the NO side. He should have been better prepared than that.

Another problem was even after being given 3 alternative currency options he insisted on repeating again and again in the debate the now defunct, 'he has no plan B line.'
The NO side must have guessed Salmond would be prepared with the other options this time, the SNP have been preping this in their campaign since the last debate. That they sent Darling out there with no other line but 'no plan B' was poor indeed. It just made Darling sound like he had not been paying attention, and could think of nothing else to say but to trot out the propaganda line and repeat it.

yeah but the 3 alternative plan Bs suck. So he doesnt really have a plan B, he said so. He wants plan A, and insisted on plan A throughout the debate. he wants currency union with the pound and thats it. He does not have a plan B.

He does have a plan B but he got an independent think tank to look at all the options- the first 3 are all perfectly viable and have succeeded fine in other places following independence. Most of them not as wealthy as we are to start with. But Plan A according to this think tank was the best option for both Scotland the rest of the UK.
It was therefore the option the SNP said they would negotiate on on behalf of the people in the event of a YES vote. And the SNP put this in the White Paper, along with all the other currency issues- and it was published months ago.

Cameron signed the Declaration of Edinburgh which stated that the RUK would negotiate in good faith on all the terms set out by the people of Scotland in the event of a yes vote.
That includes negotiation over currency as the Bankof England is not a part of governemtn but independent and therefore an asset of the UK, not of England.
The current position of the NO side is a tactic. No matter what happens the day after independence Scotland will still be using the pound, the only difference will be whether it is inside or outside of a union with the Bank of England.

Plan B is to use sterling as its a freely tradeable currency.
If RUK does say NO then every RUK party is going to be standing on a platform, next election of decreasing the value of the pound in your pocket- oil revenues supports the balance of payments and you wont be getting those any more- national debt of the RUK will have an effective increase, as if Scotland is denied all rights to RUK assets then we have no legal obligation to take our share of the debts either (the Bank of England assured the markets recently all debt was liable to and backed by RUK), and every business which trades goods with Scotland (most of them) will have to play a transition charge on every sale and likewise Sots companies to english ones. So making doing business instantly more expense.

It doesn't make a blind bit of sense. Which is why the YES insist when there is a yes and it comes to the actual negotiations, the line will not be the same from Westminster (especially not when one of the cards YES holds is the fate of RUK's nuclear weapons and how long we are prepared to keep them whilst RUK finds somewhere to put them). Its a scare tactic.
This was revealed anyway by a much publicised comment from a senior cabinet minister involved in the NO side who told a reporter that in the event of a yes vote of course there would be a currency union.

If you get plan A the Bank of England will run the show, whats the point? You would be in the position of a country like Panama. Why make yourself weaker when being part of the UK currency makes you stronger.  We will be foreign countries with the Bank of England controlling the interest rates. its barking mad and very risky.

Many countries share a central bank.

((I don't have sound for some reason, think this is what I was looking for.))

Pettytyrant101 wrote:Many countries share a central bank.

yeah Banana Republics.

That depends on your view of the euro- which will rpbbaly be a success in the long wrong.

Then there is the swiss franc, shared by Switzerland and Lichenstein, or of course sterling itself used by-

United Kingdom
British Indian Ocean Territory
Falkland Islands
Gibraltar
Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha
South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands
Guernsey
Isle of Man
Jersey

The population of Jersey is 90,000, most of these islands have tiny populations, merely more than small sized towns, they are tax havens, and in no way can be compared to Scotland.

I gotta agree with Figgs here.  I don't think that jumping straight into a currency union with the country you're trying to become independent of makes a whole lot of sense.  Maybe pegging your currency to theirs while you get everything set up, but I thought Scotland's models were Denmark and Norway moreso than Liechtenstein, which is dependent on Switzerland for all sorts of things.

Its an interim step Eldo, mainly to stop the business sector getting panicky, an in particular the financial markets. The long term plan is either our own currency or if it shapes up the euro eventually.
I personally prefer using sterling the same way Ireland did, they kept the pound, called it a different name and it was pegged to sterling without a currency union.

Ireland did this just fine and they have a population of 4.5 million. Scotland's population is 5.2 so I think they are perfectly comparable.


Russel Brands thought on independence-

Business leaders tell Scots to vote no in independence referendum

Signatories claim 'uncertainty surrounds a number of vital issues'

More than 120 business leaders have urged Scotland to vote no in next month's referendum, saying the economic case for independence has not been sufficiently made.

In an open letter published in the Scotsman newspaper, they write: "As job creators, we have looked carefully at the arguments made by both sides of the debate. Our conclusion is that the business case for independence has not been made."

Signatories include HSBC chairman Douglas Flint and Co-operative Bank CEO Niall Booker, as well as dozens of Scottish CEOs from business ranging from fish and whisky to technology and finance.

The letter says: "Uncertainty surrounds a number of vital issues including currency, regulation, tax, pensions, EU membership and support for our exports around the world; and uncertainty is bad for business.

"Today Scotland's economy is growing. We are attracting record investment and the employment rate is high. We should be proud that Scotland is a great place to build businesses and create jobs – success that has been achieved as an integral part of the United Kingdom.

"The United Kingdom gives business the strong platform we must have to invest in jobs and industry. By all continuing to work together, we can keep Scotland flourishing."

Others signatories include Andrew Mackenzie, chief executive of the mining company, BHP Billiton; Ian Curle, the chief executive of Edrington, which owns the whisky brands the Macallan and the Famous Grouse; Sir John Grant of BG Group; and Simon Thomson, chief executive of Cairn Energy.
The letter was organised by Keith Cochrane of engineering firm Weir Group, which said that no political organisations had been involved.

The call by business leaders comes after first minister Alex Salmond said the yes campaign had "its tails up". But both sides have sent letters to voters making contradictory claims about the impact independence could have on Scotland's economy. The no campaign has claimed that independence would make food more expensive in supermarkets and add £1,300 to the average mortgage in Scotland.

Flint has previously spoken out against independence, warning that it would be "a giant step into economic uncertainty," and that introducing its own currency would be "an enormous challenge".

The guardian

I saw that this morning- as is usual with pro-union stories, its half the story- here is the other half-


'Business for Scotland said in a statement: "Business for Scotland has 2,500 members who run businesses in Scotland, employ people across the country in a range of industries, and all believe that Scottish independence is in the best interests of Scotland and Scottish business.

"It's a position reached after looking at the facts and figures and realising that, from a simple balance sheet point of view as well as other considerations, our best interests lie in becoming an independent country."

Former Royal Bank of Scotland chairman Sir George Mathewson, has said that Scotland's vital financial services sector - for example - would flourish if Scotland votes "Yes".

"There is nothing to suggest that being part of a smaller country hinders a financial services industry. Switzerland, for example, has - in Geneva and Zurich - not one, but two of the world's Top 10 financial centres. Singapore, with five million people, is ranked 4th," he has said.

"Investment is an increasingly global business, where success depends much more on people than on borders."

Economist and former head of Scottish Enterprise Sir Donald MacKay has argued that an independent Scotland would be in better fiscal shape than the UK is at present.

"An independent Scotland should use that financial advantage to invest in re-engineering our economy towards industrial, manufacturing and tradeable services development," he has said.

Willie Walsh, the chief executive of IAG, owner of British Airways, also says that independence could be good for Scotland.'- BBC

thats the problem. experts from both sides are convinced their story is right. So who is right. Those in business who say no or those in business who say yes. Its all confusing.

And this is the dilemma we face come the vote- for every issue there are two contradictory sets of evidence and prominent people promoting that evidence.

But I think a friend of mine who has gone over the course from a No voter to a YES summed it up well when he said, "It fell into place for me when I realised all the politics don't matter a jot. Its not a political question, its a constitutional question. The question is actually very simple- do you want Scotland to run its own affairs or do you want Scottish affairs to remain largely run by Westminster?
The politics will come into it only once we vote. But its irrelevant before we vote.

thats niave. Its political whether people want it or not. Its inseperable. saying its constitutional is just a nice clean comfortable way of distancing oneself from the nitty gritty. Its a political act to say to the rest of the UK we are severing ties and going it alone. Its a political act for Salmond to try to hustle for the best deals. He wildly underestimated the sheer bloody minded fury he will unleash from England if he wins. But he wont win, its not going to happen, so this is all academic.