Scottish Independence

Well I'm north of the border and I don't understand it either. However, I expect that our shouty SNP friend will be along shortly!

Brussels actually don’t ‘dictate’ very much.

I can't understand this Scottish 'thing' about independence either. They are dependent on oil and that's going out of fashion, not to mention the volatile price. And haven't they considered the difficulties of border controls between Scotland and England?

Shouty SNP here Jane 10 Westminster is responsible for over 80% of our laws and financial decisions ...well spending our money anyway.The EU is only responsible for 5% .With Westminster we are a largely ignored "partner" in the union ,witness any day in the H of C for examples.In the EU we would remain one of 27/28 EQUAL partners with a say on everything just like any other Independent country,you must understand that the UK had as much a say in every EU law as everyone else .

..Bagatelle WE aren't dependant on oil,Westminster takes the lions share of the revenue from oil from OUR coastal waters and even had 6000 square miles reasigned to England before devolution.The coast of ENGLAND now stretches to St Andrews.Westminster continues to sell licenses for the oil in Scottish waters ,there was yet another new find of upwards of 50 MILLION barrels being worked on just this week.You wont hear that from the BBC! Scotland has the ability to be a wealthy country IF we dont subsidise the rUK as we have been doing for not just decades but centuries.The figures are available from WM archives though they stopped publishing them in 1922.Perhaps you'd like to ask any other nation why they want THEIR independence ,we aren't the only ones who have broken away ,when Malta decided to go down this route all the same nonsense was thrown at them..too wee ,too poor , too stupid.Malta is doing very well and it doesn't have fraction of the assets we have .Now we find ourselves being dragged out of the EU ,we NEED immigrants ,and we are happy to have them .Well most of us are, not sure about the OO or the tory contingent .Ask Jane about them .I wont be replying to this after all the ratio on here is even higher than WM unionists and WM SNP ,so the bullies will appear always to win ...the biggest boys in the playground usually do .Of course Bagatelle we know the oil is safer on the UK 's broad shoulders ,thats what Cameron said....so it must be true ,our scandinavian friends who discovered it at the same time dont agree with him either.I wont be replying to this so enjoy yourselves running us down as you all do it so well .Maybe I should campaign for independence for England? Oh wait a minute they would be much worse off without us...THATS why they hold on so desperately!Now I'm out and off the site for good.

It wasn't 'us' that held on to Scotland so desperately paddyann, it was Scotland by voting against independence that held on to us.

PS and in the following general election the SNP lost an embarrassing number of seats.

Up here we're thoroughly sick of SNP and their grievance politics. Everything is Westminster's fault! As if.

I don't know, Opal but if you find out, do let me know!

I've been out for lunch today with a group of old friends. None of us wants an independent Scotland, possibly because we in the NE of Scotland are treated very badly by the Scottish Government.

It's all about the Central Belt, and the Scots Govt doesn't give a fig about the workers in the NE who produce the much-vaunted oil that some people like to talk of. We're up here are just the cash cow producing the money and we get little in return from Holyrood.

Smileless, in the general election following the Scottish independence referendum, the number of SNP MPs increased from 6 to 56.

SueDonim, surely you must be aware that the money you "cash cows" in the NE are producing goes directly to Westminster and not to the Scottish Government!
But regarding Scottish independence, the group of voters most against it are the over 65s. And nobody lives forever!

Lucylastic, I'm speaking of the money that Holyrood has now. They lavish it on the Central Belt, it's not distributed fairly across Scotland and we in the NE are suffering from that. Maybe that's why Mr Salmond lost his seat in the last GE.

Well said Paddyann,????

Young people grow up lucylastic and see blind nationalism for what it is.

Whole I'm thinking about it (and I try not to as its so aggravating) I don't know where the money actually goes. I'm quite sure that NE suffers but here in the central belt we're no better off. The schools are famously in bother with unfilled posts and crumbling buildings underpinning falling education standards. Health and social care are notably failing etc etc etc.
It's worth noting that SNP lost so many seats that they lost their majority in the most recent Scottish election. That says something about what Scotland really thinks about SNP.

You might have to come live here for a year or two to understand Scotland and it's position within the UK. My DH is English and quite political minded and he would fully admit he did not understand Scotland until he moved here. He looked upon it like a region of England, like the Midlands. It's not.
He did not understand how we got annoyed about being treated like a 2nd class region instead of a proud country. Not until he lived here . He will now point out nuances like our sportspersons being British when they won something and Scottish when they lost. Institutional racism if you like, though I will admit that is happening less often in the media.
He also did not understand fully that we see ourselves as country and will now tell his English friends that. We're not Yorkshire, nor the Midlands, nor the South East. We have our own regions, the Highlands and Islands, the North East, the Borders, D&G and Central. And also like England favours the South and Home Counties, our country favours Central Belt due to the same kind of reasons - the mass of people who live there compared to the others areas.
We are a country and some want independence from another country. Pretty much like some in England want independence from Europe

The Scottish Parliment voting system was set up to represent a fairer result than first-past-the-post. There are 73 constituency seats. The additional list system (56 seats) means the total number of 129 MSPs is supposed to reflect the proportion of votes cast. It's actually quite difficult for any party to gain an overall majority.

The first two Scottish parliaments were controlled by Labour, but they needed coalitions with the Lib Dems to achieve power.

The current breakdown is SNP 62, Conservatives 32, Labour 23, Greens 6 and Lib Dems 5.

There is one independent and one non-affiliated MSP.

The SNP achieved what had been thought as impossible (under the dual system) with an overall majority from 2011 to 2016.

The SNP now are in coalition with the Greens, but they still have almost double the number of seats of their nearest rivals, the Conservatives, whose success in knocking Labour into 3rd place - previously thought most unlikely in Scotland - is believed partially to be due to their popular and charismatic leader, Ruth Davidson.

One of the biggest successes of the SNP/Green coalition has been to make Scotland a leader in renewable energy.

Nothing is perfect and the longer any party is in power, the cracks show. That happens at Westminster too.

What many people forget about Scottish independence is that we wouldn't necessarily be governed by the SNP. Just as possible to be run by any combination of the above, once the bigger parties accepted the split from London.

I'd hope we'd keep the proportional thing as a better reflection of the wishes of the electorate. 16 and 17 year old Scots should also keep the vote. They can marry and have children and run businesses at 16, so they need a say in their future.

Sorry for not answering your original reasonable question, Opal. I'd probably need to borrow your hard hat by the looks of things.

Paddyann - so sorry to hear you are leaving Gransnet for good. I DO NOT agree with your politics at all but see no reason why you can't express them on here as we all live in a free country. Since joining this site I have read some good advice being given by you on many subjects and I think you will be missed.

Thank you, Craftergran, your first sentence is spot on. Coincidentally, I had a conversation yesterday with a young man who has come to live in Scotland from the NE of England. He said that he didn’t understand the Scottish independence question until now. He made the point that while Manchester is referred to as “up North “ Scotland has no chance of explaining Scottish Nationlism. So A bit of
insider knowledge is required.
There are, of course, political divisions within Scotland which are well explained by Caledonail.
It is interesting though to hear from Suedomin that the NE of Scotland thinks that money is lavished on the central belt. Another North/South divide? I give up.

No EU member is "ruled" by Brussels - another Brexit myth - they are equal partners. Only a tiny % of our laws originate from the EU - 96% are of our own making.

Tell that to Greece and and probably Italy, Never mind being run by it, I think they feel shafted by the EU!! Closer union, federal state?! No thank you!!

The majority in Scotland voted against Brexit. Yet we are Brexiting.

A country, not a city, nor a county or a region.

That's equivalent to the Netherlands voting to stay and the Belgians saying we don't care what you want, you're leaving.

Imagine being a Geordie stuck between a rock and a hard place ? We are not Scottish and we are forgotten by ( or a thorn in the side of) Westminster .

I do hope you reconsider your decision to leave GN paddyann we need to hear different views or else what’s the point ?

The Netherlands and Belgium are not part of a union like the countries inside the UK. Neither is tied to the other even remotely, they even have their own RF!! So not the same as Scotland, England, Wales and NI.

Parsley3 and Jane10, it's not that the NE thinks it's badly treated by Holyrood, it's a fact. This area gets the lowest council funding grant in all Scotland and has been hit with the third largest target for cutbacks from an already low base.

In general terms, our health and education services have gone from being pretty good to going downhill on a steep and slippery slope.