Dear Scottish Fetchies

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GI Feb 2014 10:39am, 7 Feb 2014 131 posts	0 GI We've never done what we're told anyway!
oi you Feb 2014 12:03pm, 7 Feb 2014 217 posts	0 oi you Angus, I think you may have misheard. The shout was Fiefdom.
McGoohan Feb 2014 12:06pm, 7 Feb 2014 10,664 posts	0 McGoohan I don't want Scotland to go. It's only people voting Labour in Scotland that means England n Wales don't always get a Conservative government.
fitzer Feb 2014 12:14pm, 7 Feb 2014 3,110 posts	0 fitzer Maybe McGoo, but is it fair that when no one in Scotland votes for the tories, they still get a tory government?
Old Croc Feb 2014 12:14pm, 7 Feb 2014 24,262 posts	0 Old Croc there would be hell on if Cameron had come out and said he wanted Scotland out of the UK!
daviec Feb 2014 12:18pm, 7 Feb 2014 3,685 posts	0 daviec McGoohan. That's actually a fallacy. There's only been two governments since 1945 that the Scottish vote has made any difference to. Remove the Scottish vote and the government almost exclusively remains as it would have done. wingsoverscotland.com
Old Croc Feb 2014 12:24pm, 7 Feb 2014 24,264 posts	0 Old Croc don't forget that after the vote the SNP will fade either way - they will have either done their one aim and set up a separate Free Unconnected Caledonian Kingdom with President Alex at the helm (until the first election) or will have failed in their goal. If they succeed they will be a.n. other political party running a new country and be exposed as just the same as the rest, if they fail they are a party that has lost their main reason for existence.
daviec Feb 2014 12:34pm, 7 Feb 2014 3,686 posts	0 daviec I don't think it'll be either way OC. The result will be close, and that's reason enough for them to fight on after a No. They are the most left positioned party of the main parties in Scotland and will be able to continue in charge of a devolved parliament (if we get to keep it after being such upstarts). In the event of Yes, I think the membership may end up split between new parties.
RedBen Feb 2014 12:48pm, 7 Feb 2014 989 posts	0 RedBen Don't forget Old Croc, that the Tory party in Scotland still, I think, goes by the full name of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party! Or have they dropped the Unionist bit now? Carney had it the closest last week by pointing out that a nation without its own currency, central bank or interest rate setting authority and with, at the very least, a titular monarch who remains "sovereign" over the whole of the former UK is not really independent at all. This is the fallacy of what Fat Eck is proposing: tub thumping for independence when what he actually wants is nothing of the sort. When he's called on this, the paucity of the Yes campaign's thinking is laid bare. What's really depressing is that he's streets ahead of everyone else here as a political operator.
Wirral Dave Feb 2014 1:04pm, 7 Feb 2014 108 posts	0 Wirral Dave I don't think the result of the referendum is going to make any difference at all. In the highly unlikely situation Yes wins, the independent Scottish government (which will be voted into power in 2016 and has nothing whatsoever to do with the current SNP administration, which was elected on an unrelated mandate) will then try to find ways of keeping some parts of the union together, so we might end up with the same DVLA, substantially the same military (albeit with Scottish and RUK governments determining when to deploy it), a common communications and postal area (to avoid excessive charges for talking between England and Scotland) and other similar areas which aren't really social policy based. So we'll end up with Scotland as an independent country, but with a shared 'Unified Kingdom' arrangement keeping London's monarch and some political agreements. In the likely situation that Scotland votes No, then the SNP will use the 2015 Westminster election to manipulate a system where it gets increased devolution powers in return for deals with the two main parties. The 2015 election will be interesting if there is a requirement for a coalition government and the Lib Dems aren't the third largest party (as it highly plausible). I suspect the SNP will make a deal, prior to the election, which will allow Scotland to have tax-raising powers, set it's own welfare agenda and potentially, decide it's own immigration policies (for instance, through awarding work visas which allow the right to work in Scotland but not England, and vica versa). Such devo-max is what the SNP were really pushing for in the first place and what they wanted in the referendum (which was removed by Cameron and only the option which wouldn't win kept). So, we're get the results in 2014 of the referendum, but come the 2016 Scottish Elections the only real difference is whether Scotland is an independent country with certain areas dependent on the UK, or part of the UK with maximum devolved powers. Either way, it's not really going to make a difference to the political environment of Scotland.