Thursday 24 May 2012

TEN REASONS TO SAY YES TO INDEPENDENCE

I make no excuses for shamelessly copying this from Dark Lochnagar. It's a great post and heart warmingly cheering now that the UK has slipped even further into recession with the loonie Osborne at the financial helm.


Life doesn't have to be like this. Things really don't have to be this awful... We have the opportunity to opt from independence, and it could be like this:
1 Scotland would officially be one of the world's richest countries - ranked 6th in the OECD compared to the UK's 16th place. We have 24billion barrels of oil remaining in the North Sea, according to industry body Oil and Gas UK. That's £1.5trillion in today's prices - half as much in value as has been taken out.


2 We also have around 25 per cent of Europe's potential offshore wind and tidal energy - and a tenth of Europe's wave power. An extra 45 per cent of renewable energy was generated in Scotland last year, according to the UK Department of Energy. It's more than we need and can be exported for cash.

3 Other countries want to invest here. The recent Ernst & Young UK Attractiveness Survey highlighted Scotland's leading position in the UK for job creation from international investment. With independence, we can make the country even more attractive to these employers.
4 Independence will allow us to keep services such as the NHS and the welfare state. In England they are being privatised and cut. Benefits are being taken from the needy and the Scottish Parliament can't stop that under present powers.

5 Scotland has five of the top 200 universities in the world. We also punch well above our weight in the number of research papers they produce. It means our historic reputation as a well educated nation is flourishing. We give our universities one of the best packages of support in Europe, with no fees for students from Scotland. With independence we can do even more.

6 We'll have more money in our pockets. If we got back what we sent south in tax, official figures show every Scot would have £510 more a year. The only tax the Scottish Government controls just now is council tax, and it's frozen under the SNP. Imagine if we controlled fuel duty, national insurance, VAT and income tax.

7 Our government would be more streamlined. Scotland, like Denmark, New Zealand, Norway and Finland, is a goldilocks country - not too big and not too small. The UK wastes money on bloated institutions bogged down by bureaucracy - look at HMRC, the tax authority. It's gone from one calamity to another. The rich get away with evasion while the rest are overcharged.

8 Mobiles would work and we'd all get high-speed broadband. Telecommunications are controlled in London. Westminster auctions licences to phone companies but only demands 90 per cent coverage of the UK. This means "notspots" in much of Scotland. Broadband is patchy too, and it doesn't help that Scotland's capital budget has been cut by a third by the Tories.
9 Our culture would get a boost. We'd have control over broadcasting and more high-quality programmes could be made here. Our news would no longer look hand-knitted compared with well funded UK offerings. We could export high-quality drama and our young bands would have a platform on the radio.

10 Imagine the goodwill. Scotland is held in high regard around the world - by those who know us. But being buried in brand Britain means sometimes we don't get to shine as we should. Independence would generate global interest. We would be the new kid on the block - young, modern, and happening.

28 comments:

  1. I could not get your links to work Tris, and was wondering if it is an error at my end or with the link itself?

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  2. Thanks for pointing that out Dean. I've just tried them out and the paragraph starting "life doesn't have to be like this..." seems to link to DL's blog.

    Of course, once there, you will see only exactly what you see here, being as (apart from adding some nice pics of Scotland) I lifted the whole lot, lock, stock and barrel from him!!!

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  3. NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO TEN TIMES NO TO SNP MISRULE....AND TO THE SNP CAMPAIGN.


    Yes to the ever continuing United Kingdom of free peoples under our beloved queen.

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  4. A Scotland within the UK has the future

    an snp Scotland has only the past

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  5. While I entirely agree with your sentiments Niko, I never realised you were a good royalist :)

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  6. Brilliant reasons! And all irrefutable.

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  7. Brilliant reasons! And all irrefutable.

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  8. Do I hear one REASON for your NO NO NO NO NO, Niko?...One refutation of what we set out above? No.

    Nope... Just some outdated drivel about free peoples in Britian... The trouble is we are going backward with Britain and if the coalition gets its way we'll be as free as the Chileans were under Pinochet.

    As for the rant about the Queen, she would probably remain the queen of Scots as she did with the Australians, New Zealanders, Canadians, etc.

    Still you seem to want to stick to Tory rule, right wing policies and I can't understand why.

    Do you have no confidence in Johann Lamont...? If that's the problem, don't worry, she will soon be replaced. She was never destined to last any longer than any of her predecessors.

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  9. Oh and what future is it we have with the likes of the Eton boy in charge? The one I'm seeing at the moment is on a downward slope for everyone except your beloved queen and her family, the members of her majesty's house of peers, the greedy bastards that make up the Commons, and the bankers.

    God help you if that's the future you want. There no place in Cameron's Britain for the likes of you or me.

    Tell me Niko...what do you think of Mr Salmond's policy to find the money that bastard Osborne has cut from the Council Tax help that old and poor people get, and pay it to them, so that they are no evicted for non-payment, like they will be in England?

    Good idea... or bad?

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  10. Dean... You and Niko get closer every day. ... Scary!

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  11. So good you said it twice, Munguin.

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  12. tris


    The First Fat Man of Scotland would use any monies got to freeze the council tax again. and how does that help the worst off.

    Anyways your behind the times it is commonly acknowledged(by even high up members of the snp). Alex has chosen the rightward path and is moving ever more towards Thacherite territory.

    Your vote is as they say in the bag for Alex so now he needs others.......and what can you do eh?nowt! but fume and vote for the snp/Tory party and polices

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  13. Niko, do you not have any confidence that post independence an independent Scottish Labour party along the lines of the orginal Labour party could be formed to run the country or are you quite happy to support the Labour party cloned from the Tories? I do believe that if such a party was set up they would be strong favourites to win a Scottish election. Of course, that would mean a complete clear-out of the present day numpties.

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  14. Well, Niko, it doesn't help the very poorest, because, in Scotland (unlike England) the SNP has made sure that they don't pay council tax at all. But it does help the single mother working and having to pay for child care; it helps the young couple who don't have much money. Why even the Labour party admitted that it was so and had it in their manifesto, and now Cameron himself has copied the scheme as council tax in England became unpayable by low paid workers.

    So it doesn't help the very poorest because they don't need help with that particular item, but it helps the lowly paid who struggle to find £1500 out of their £12 a year.

    Local Income Tax would, of course deal with the problem, so that the well paid would pay more and the poorest would pay less... and those on under £10 would pay nothing. But we know what happened to that little scheme don't we.

    Labour it seems, would prefer that people on small salaries that wouldn't pay a penny in LIT are hit by a bill of £1000+ a year.

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  15. I'm not sure what policies you could describe as "right", but I wonder how they compare on a one for one basis with Labour's policy on the same thing.

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  16. John. It has never ceased to amaze me that Labour supporters don't see that, in an independent country there would be little need for an SNP type party, so after the deed is done, either the SNP dies, or it finds a new place in the centre ground of Scottish politics.

    However, there is no doubt that Scotland is a more left-leaning country than England (based on the massive voting power of the affluent south east of that country with over 50% of the UK population).

    In Scotland, never again would we be on the receiving end of a government we didn't vote for. 1 Tory out of 59.... and yet we have to put up with their ghastly policies, which they know will hurt us, but equally don't give a stuff about because we don't vote for them.

    Just imagine...never again a Tory government...what heaven, and as you suggest, without pressure from the likes of Peter Meddlesom and Tory Blurr, Labour in Scotland would actually BE Labour, and could propose LABOUR policies... not the current failure to complain about the spending of billions on WMDs fewer than 50 miles away from Glasgow.

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  17. Niko... the £12 and £10, are of course £12,000 and £10,000...

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  18. tris

    Scotland may lean left(me i think that is and always was a myth) but Alex is leaning right to gain votes any votes as many votes as desperate politico gets.

    As Gaels/Celts we used to worship pagan gods whereby we would strangle people and throw them into bogs in the moonlight.

    you cant get more Tory like than that its in our dna but i unlike you dont kid meself about how kind and nice our people are....they aint inside is a raging Tory beast

    and we need the Labour party to keep it caged....Grr!


    the £12 and £10, are of course £12,000 and £10,000...

    see how rich the snp are now who can tell the diff between £12 and £12,000 ffs

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  19. Niko, As a Gael I would of course condemn that utterly - with a few exceptions. No comment then on a Labour party along the original lines? I've always thought that's what you wanted rather than be in conjunction with, and in cohorts with, the Tories

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  20. There is no such thing as a Labour party anymore as Blair turned them into blood red tories involved in torture and rendition with a love of WMDs. The guy who they sent back to Gadafi to be tortured is now in government there and hopefully he will ask for Straw to be extradited to be tried under abuse of human rights.

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  21. Well Niko. I'm still waiting for examples of the right wing policies that the SNP are enacting.

    Of course, the SNP does try to govern for Scotland; all of Scotland, not just Glasgow; not just the North East; not just the poor; not just the rich; not just the middle classes, but all of Scotland.

    Just like I'm waiting for reasons why we are better off under the English Tories... and yes, with the exception of Mr Muddle that is what they are.

    Don't kid yourself that killing people is a right wing prerogative. Stalin was pretty neat at killing people and Enver Hoxha was even better than Pinochet, friend of Jack Straw and Margaret Thatcher (never could tell these two apart).

    :)

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  22. You begin to wonder about Niko's left wing credentials, don't you, John.

    He seems to want to continue to live in a country that goes to war at the drop of a Neocon American president's hat; that maintains WMDs and that thinks that people who are deaf, dumb and blind, and can't get out of their wheelchair without help, should be made to look for work.

    It's not my cup of tea, but...

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  23. Hey CH... how are you? Not seen you for ages.

    Yes, the Lord Voldermorte Meddlesome and Blair turned the Labour party into exactly what Niko is accusing the SNP of.

    "Never mind about the Welsh and the Scots; never mind about the north of England... they are so stupid they will vote for us no matter what we do, but let's concentrate on winning the votes of the people in Chumping Norton on the Marsh, and the pretty little villages of Wiltshire. If we are more right wing than the Tories, they will flock to us. " (followed by mad laughter... )

    Wouldn't it be funny to see Stuttery Straw (Blinky I think Denis Skinner calls him) sent to Libya ... but of course they will find a way to avoid that, even if it costs the taxpayer millions in aid to the oil rich country.

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  24. I, unlike anyone here I reckon (excep. Cynical) actually have family in Highlands/Gaels/live in - real Gael Scotland...

    that said, I reject I am like Niko (@TRIS, last I checked, I continued to suppport devolution and fiscal autonomy) ... but I do accept the issue of lowland identity. Gaelic in Stathclyde is historically inaccurate. And a product of SNP bastardisation (not in the offensive use of the word, merely academical Tris mum!) of history lessons.

    Why don't we teach the history of the Scotland of the 4 kingdoms? Or of Alexander II or Saint David?

    HMMMM!

    Doesn't suit the SNP and their goal of homogenisation us into a single ethno-cultural population.

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  25. You are talking from between the cheeks that your 'god' made an arse of in his first creation Dean. You prefer dictatorship by a monarchical state from democracy so it can play it's game of imperial past into the future. The UK was built on corruption by corrupt people to suit the rulers wishes which is continued by the sham elections every so often. The whole country is infested by cronyism which is why the anti-independence camp is so feart that their cushy revolving door cash cow is liable to dry up.

    Vote YES in 2014 is the only way to get democracy.

    The UK is no better than Syria only we export our abuses to foreign lands and blame it on others so we can hold our heads up high and strut about the World stage as 'big boys', utterly pathetic.

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  26. Did we teach that under the last administration Dean... or did the SNP come in and sweep away all history, a bit like Stalin...?

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  27. I think, too, CH, that we have made a splendid job of sucking up to the USA, which means that our torture, WMDs, etc,etc, are disregarded, because we are useful to them.

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