The Brexit Thread

[thplinth]

So if so you can kiss any chance of indyref2 goodbye. If they are prepared to just ignore euroref1 then ignoring all calls for indyref2 will be a piece of pish. If so wings will have been proven right. We should have used our crucial votes at the pivotal moment to secure the power to call indyref2. We could then have waited a couple of years or more and it would have all died down. Now what will die down is our chances of achieving anything.

[Caledonian Craig]

Ignoring calls for an IndyRef 2 is a piece of pish anyway. Hence why there has been one real referendum on it for 300+ years.

[ThistleWhistle]

1 hour ago, wee-toon-red said:

Boris to table a motion on Monday calling for a General Election on December 21st. Must be expecting the EU to grant a Brexit delay until Jan 31st. You'd imagine the SNP will back an election but will Labour? Because it's a change to the Fixed Term Parliaments Act it needs a two-thirds majority to happen.

Heard on Radio 4 they could pass a one-line bill stating election on x date which would need a simple majority. If they were worried it could have amendments attached they didn't fancy another route is calling a vote of no-confidence in themselves!!

[wee-toon-red]

4 minutes ago, ThistleWhistle said:

Heard on Radio 4 they could pass a one-line bill stating election on x date which would need a simple majority. If they were worried it could have amendments attached they didn't fancy another route is calling a vote of no-confidence in themselves!!

The government voting itself out would be an appropriate next stage in this whole pantomime.

[PapofGlencoe]

On 10/24/2019 at 8:36 AM, TDYER63 said:

Can I ask what has changed your opinion from 5 years ago? The economic case wasnt much different then ? 
 

I would argue that when those one off investments are complete they will be replaced with new ‘ one of investments ‘ that probably are of no use to Scotland whatsoever. 

The economic case was completely different then. 

We were comparatively in surplus to the UK and it was before the oil crash...we've literally lost umpteen billions from the White paper forecast?

We would have been trading within the same trade bloc

There wouldn't be a hard border with England

Our currency would have remained the same within the same trade bloc

Free movement was not under threat

 

I've not changed my mind.  I'm still in favour but my confidence has been rocked somewhat.  Ultimately I want better services for people and that costs money.  I'm not that impressed currently with a number of things that have affected me recently (social care for the elderly) amongst other things.  A good game is talked when a lot of things on the ground are substandard and really quite disheartening.

 

[Orraloon]

15 minutes ago, PapofGlencoe said:

 

I've not changed my mind.  I'm still in favour but my confidence has been rocked somewhat.  Ultimately I want better services for people and that costs money.  I'm not that impressed currently with a number of things that have affected me recently (social care for the elderly) amongst other things.  A good game is talked when a lot of things on the ground are substandard and really quite disheartening.

 

Do you think these services are going to improve if we continue to be governed from Westminster?

[PapofGlencoe]

2 hours ago, Orraloon said:

Do you think these services are going to improve if we continue to be governed from Westminster?

Absolutely not but that's not the reality for a lot of services.  It's between Devolution and Independence.  Most of these services are governed by the Scottish Government.

The Westminster system gives us, currently, more money than is sustainable.

What actual difference would schools and social care get from independence if it was tomorrrow?  Apart from less money to spend on them I'm at a loss at the moment.

The SNP should be talking about the benefits of independence in terms of services and policies.  It's all fluff at the moment.  "Choose our own future" ... that doesn't actually equate to a policy.. 

edited to add:  The services are in a lot of cases awful.  Just because something is a scintilla better than down south is not something to be happy about.

Edited October 25, 2019 by PapofGlencoe

[ThistleWhistle]

59 minutes ago, PapofGlencoe said:

The economic case was completely different then. 

We were comparatively in surplus to the UK and it was before the oil crash...we've literally lost umpteen billions from the White paper forecast?

We would have been trading within the same trade bloc

There wouldn't be a hard border with England

Our currency would have remained the same within the same trade bloc

Free movement was not under threat

 

I've not changed my mind.  I'm still in favour but my confidence has been rocked somewhat.  Ultimately I want better services for people and that costs money.  I'm not that impressed currently with a number of things that have affected me recently (social care for the elderly) amongst other things.  A good game is talked when a lot of things on the ground are substandard and really quite disheartening.

 

 

38 minutes ago, PapofGlencoe said:

Absolutely not but that's not the reality for a lot of services.  It's between Devolution and Independence.  Most of these services are governed by the Scottish Government.

The Westminster system gives us, currently, more money than is sustainable.

What actual difference would schools and social care get from independence if it was tomorrrow?  Apart from less money to spend on them I'm at a loss at the moment.

The SNP should be talking about the benefits of independence in terms of services and policies.  It's all fluff at the moment.  "Choose our own future" ... that doesn't actually equate to a policy.. 

edited to add:  The services are in a lot of cases awful.  Just because something is a scintilla better than down south is not something to be happy about.

The oil prices are a cycle so what the top price and bottom prices are should be academic.  The budget should be written on an average with money saved when it is higher and spent when it is lower so the price over the last few years is irrelevant really taken in isolation.    

We'd have the ability to vote for parties other than the SNP to spend our money the way we deemed fit.  One obvious area for discussion would be defense where currently a 9% allocation of UK spending would be about £3.5bn.  From Google looks like Denmark is around £2.6bn and ROI GBP1bn so there's a potential saving.  On the other hand if we got flush we could go full Norway and spend £6bn. 

I thought the white paper was a good document as a discussion piece but it would be interesting to know how many folk it positively influenced.  In hindsight it was easy for Better Together to just absolutely batter everything in it despite it being one party’s vision of what could happen which became less relevant the longer forward that was projected.  It got ridiculous when folk were genuinely asking what happens in 30 years when oil runs out (8+ general elections down the line) when in the 80’s could anyone have predicted the impact of the internet? 

 

Its slightly annoying that the equivalent in the Leave campaign was the side of a bus and pamphlets about migrants coupled with regular responses in debate that the day after the vote was a separate matter with some waffle about easy trade deals sprinkled in.  The consequence of this is people saying they'd now happily banjo MP's if they block the result of a vote a number of them don't even understand. 

 

In terms of Indyref 2 I’d be reticent in publishing anything that can basically be shot at and simply say it would be up to every party to provide an economic case if the vote was successful.  Then instead point to countries roughly our size like Ireland, Norway and Denmark and say the plan is to become like them. 

 

I’m a lot less bothered this time as seeing such a significant proportion of our population who, not only accept that we are a leach on the arse of England, but are happy  for the situation to continue is depressing.  It’s like blaming my wife in the passenger seat for my bad driving because she has control of her heaters and electric windows.  The debacle over Brexit should have folk foaming at the mouth that NI can stay in the customs union but we’re getting shafted, the Scottish Tories are allowing it to happen with no resistance at all like good house jocks and, in general we’ll just accept it like the pussies we are.  Our sole resistance may be to send 50 SNP mps to Westminster that will achieve the square root of fuck all and whose opinions for and on behalf of the people of Scotland are treated with abject disdain if they’re even listened to at all. 

 

Each to their own but I can barely be bothered supporting Scotland at anything as essentially we shat our pants last time.  How can there be pride in people representing a country that collectively believe it is unable to represent itself?   If we continue to believe that we are 'too wee, too poor, too stupid' frankly we deserve everything we get.   

[TDYER63]

11 minutes ago, ThistleWhistle said:

 

The oil prices are a cycle so what the top price and bottom prices are should be academic.  The budget should be written on an average with money saved when it is higher and spent when it is lower so the price over the last few years is irrelevant really taken in isolation.    

We'd have the ability to vote for parties other than the SNP to spend our money the way we deemed fit.  One obvious area for discussion would be defense where currently a 9% allocation of UK spending would be about £3.5bn.  From Google looks like Denmark is around £2.6bn and ROI GBP1bn so there's a potential saving.  On the other hand if we got flush we could go full Norway and spend £6bn. 

I thought the white paper was a good document as a discussion piece but it would be interesting to know how many folk it positively influenced.  In hindsight it was easy for Better Together to just absolutely batter everything in it despite it being one party’s vision of what could happen which became less relevant the longer forward that was projected.  It got ridiculous when folk were genuinely asking what happens in 30 years when oil runs out (8+ general elections down the line) when in the 80’s could anyone have predicted the impact of the internet? 

 

Its slightly annoying that the equivalent in the Leave campaign was the side of a bus and pamphlets about migrants coupled with regular responses in debate that the day after the vote was a separate matter with some waffle about easy trade deals sprinkled in.  The consequence of this is people saying they'd now happily banjo MP's if they block the result of a vote a number of them don't even understand. 

 

In terms of Indyref 2 I’d be reticent in publishing anything that can basically be shot at and simply say it would be up to every party to provide an economic case if the vote was successful.  Then instead point to countries roughly our size like Ireland, Norway and Denmark and say the plan is to become like them. 

 

I’m a lot less bothered this time as seeing such a significant proportion of our population who, not only accept that we are a leach on the arse of England, but are happy  for the situation to continue is depressing.  It’s like blaming my wife in the passenger seat for my bad driving because she has control of her heaters and electric windows.  The debacle over Brexit should have folk foaming at the mouth that NI can stay in the customs union but we’re getting shafted, the Scottish Tories are allowing it to happen with no resistance at all like good house jocks and, in general we’ll just accept it like the pussies we are.  Our sole resistance may be to send 50 SNP mps to Westminster that will achieve the square root of fuck all and whose opinions for and on behalf of the people of Scotland are treated with abject disdain if they’re even listened to at all. 

 

Each to their own but I can barely be bothered supporting Scotland at anything as essentially we shat our pants last time.  How can there be pride in people representing a country that collectively believe it is unable to represent itself?   If we continue to believe that we are 'too wee, too poor, too stupid' frankly we deserve everything we get.   

Excellent post and far better than anything I could have written in response to @PapofGlencoe 

The oil price is and was always going to fluctuate which makes projections difficult. A large leap of faith is required but I have complete confidence Scotland could be a successful independent country, 

[Orraloon]

1 hour ago, PapofGlencoe said:

Absolutely not but that's not the reality for a lot of services.  It's between Devolution and Independence.  Most of these services are governed by the Scottish Government.

The Westminster system gives us, currently, more money than is sustainable.

What actual difference would schools and social care get from independence if it was tomorrrow?  Apart from less money to spend on them I'm at a loss at the moment.

The SNP should be talking about the benefits of independence in terms of services and policies.  It's all fluff at the moment.  "Choose our own future" ... that doesn't actually equate to a policy.. 

edited to add:  The services are in a lot of cases awful.  Just because something is a scintilla better than down south is not something to be happy about.

I'm not saying that independence will improve these things. Independence is just the first step. It's what we do after we get independence which will determine whether these things improve or not. 

One thing I am certain of, in my own mind, is that these services will continue to get worse if we are under the control of a Tory or Labour led Westminster because there is no political will to improve the plight of the people who rely on these services. 

At least some of our current Scottish politicians are making the right noises about wanting to improve things. It will be up to the people of Scotland to decide whether we want to continue voting for those politicians or not. I want the people of Scotland to decide what level of services we get and how much we are prepared to pay for them. I don't want the people of England to decide that for us.

 

[Orraloon]

51 minutes ago, ThistleWhistle said:

 

The oil prices are a cycle so what the top price and bottom prices are should be academic.  The budget should be written on an average with money saved when it is higher and spent when it is lower so the price over the last few years is irrelevant really taken in isolation.    

We'd have the ability to vote for parties other than the SNP to spend our money the way we deemed fit.  One obvious area for discussion would be defense where currently a 9% allocation of UK spending would be about £3.5bn.  From Google looks like Denmark is around £2.6bn and ROI GBP1bn so there's a potential saving.  On the other hand if we got flush we could go full Norway and spend £6bn. 

I thought the white paper was a good document as a discussion piece but it would be interesting to know how many folk it positively influenced.  In hindsight it was easy for Better Together to just absolutely batter everything in it despite it being one party’s vision of what could happen which became less relevant the longer forward that was projected.  It got ridiculous when folk were genuinely asking what happens in 30 years when oil runs out (8+ general elections down the line) when in the 80’s could anyone have predicted the impact of the internet? 

 

Its slightly annoying that the equivalent in the Leave campaign was the side of a bus and pamphlets about migrants coupled with regular responses in debate that the day after the vote was a separate matter with some waffle about easy trade deals sprinkled in.  The consequence of this is people saying they'd now happily banjo MP's if they block the result of a vote a number of them don't even understand. 

 

In terms of Indyref 2 I’d be reticent in publishing anything that can basically be shot at and simply say it would be up to every party to provide an economic case if the vote was successful.  Then instead point to countries roughly our size like Ireland, Norway and Denmark and say the plan is to become like them. 

 

I’m a lot less bothered this time as seeing such a significant proportion of our population who, not only accept that we are a leach on the arse of England, but are happy  for the situation to continue is depressing.  It’s like blaming my wife in the passenger seat for my bad driving because she has control of her heaters and electric windows.  The debacle over Brexit should have folk foaming at the mouth that NI can stay in the customs union but we’re getting shafted, the Scottish Tories are allowing it to happen with no resistance at all like good house jocks and, in general we’ll just accept it like the pussies we are.  Our sole resistance may be to send 50 SNP mps to Westminster that will achieve the square root of fuck all and whose opinions for and on behalf of the people of Scotland are treated with abject disdain if they’re even listened to at all. 

 

Each to their own but I can barely be bothered supporting Scotland at anything as essentially we shat our pants last time.  How can there be pride in people representing a country that collectively believe it is unable to represent itself?   If we continue to believe that we are 'too wee, too poor, too stupid' frankly we deserve everything we get.   

Well said Sir. 

Next time round I'm thinking about getting a bus with something like "Let's save £240 billion on Trident and spend it on the NHS instead" on the side of it. Do you want a seat on my bus?

 

[Mark frae Crieff]

a couple of toe tappers.

 

[PapofGlencoe]

chaps if we can afford it and it means we have enough money to improve people's lives I'm all for it.  i'm sure there are many people like that.

we're not convincing anybody of that by simply saying "it'll be upto us"...  us is incredibly subjective, money isn't.  A white paper is needed with the basic building blocks and economic case.

We currently hold parliament elections to govern huge swathes of our lives already.  More democracy than almost any other part of the UK.  We currently receive billions more than our entitlement according to our own sides figures which is spent according to the wishes of a government elected by us.  I'm questioning why we would voluntarily reduce the amount of money to help our most vulnerable people for what is essentially..."feeelinggzzz" about a random number of people who happen to live in our side of the border.

by the way, this idea we would save up the oil etc is complete fallacy.  We spend it already and then some.  All it does is make our deficit go from nearly sustainable to deeply concerning.  To save you'd have to take money out of the country...again making services poorer.

 

[Ally Bongo]

23 minutes ago, PapofGlencoe said:

We currently hold parliament elections to govern huge swathes of our lives already.  More democracy than almost any other part of the UK.  We currently receive billions more than our entitlement according to our own sides figures which is spent according to the wishes of a government elected by us. 

 

 

Jesus

[Orraloon]

5 minutes ago, PapofGlencoe said:

chaps if we can afford it and it means we have enough money to improve people's lives I'm all for it.  i'm sure there are many people like that.

we're not convincing anybody of that by simply saying "it'll be upto us"...  us is incredibly subjective, money isn't.  A white paper is needed with the basic building blocks and economic case.

We currently hold parliament elections to govern huge swathes of our lives already.  More democracy than almost any other part of the UK.  We currently receive billions more than our entitlement according to our own sides figures which is spent according to the wishes of a government elected by us.  I'm questioning why we would voluntarily reduce the amount of money to help our most vulnerable people for what is essentially..."feeelinggzzz" about a random number of people who happen to live in our side of the border.

by the way, this idea we would save up the oil etc is complete fallacy.  We spend it already and then some.  All it does is make our deficit go from nearly sustainable to deeply concerning.  To save you'd have to take money out of the country...again making services poorer.

 

Economic forecasts are hardly worth the paper they are written on. Nobody can predict the future.

Even measuring past economic activity isn't easy. GDP growth figures are issued every 3 months. They are a measure of what they think has happened in the past 3 months. You would think that would be fairly easy to work out. It isn't, and it's just an educated guess. Almost every time these figures need to be revised later, after some more calculations have been done. And even then they are still just estimates.

Trying to predict future economic activity is much, much more difficult and it is always just a wild estimate. Ask 5 different economists what they think will happen in the next year and you will get at least 10 different answers. 

What most economists would agree on is that the economies of Scotland and rUK are pretty much aligned and as close to each other as makes little difference. There are some obvious differences but in the overall scheme of things are almost irrelevant. That's the starting point. What we do from there is up to us.

There are plenty counties around the globe which survive perfectly well, with much smaller GDP and GDP per capita than Scotland. There is plenty money there. Let the people of Scotland decide how to spend it.

 

 

[Caledonian Craig]

The blueprint here for us is Ireland. How is it that Ireland (once part of the UK) is now independent and doing perfectly well? Also other countries with similar populations and GDP to Scotland such as Norway and Denmark are coping perfectly well as independent nations. If they can we can is my mindset. To suggest we can't is pretty insulting considering we are one of the biggest producers in Europe of renewable energy along with other caveats. As an exporting country we stand at 37th in the world above many other perfectly functionable independent countries such as New Zealand and Portugal etc.

[daviebee]

3 hours ago, PapofGlencoe said:

Absolutely not but that's not the reality for a lot of services.  It's between Devolution and Independence.  Most of these services are governed by the Scottish Government.

The Westminster system gives us, currently, more money than is sustainable.

What actual difference would schools and social care get from independence if it was tomorrrow?  Apart from less money to spend on them I'm at a loss at the moment.

The SNP should be talking about the benefits of independence in terms of services and policies.  It's all fluff at the moment.  "Choose our own future" ... that doesn't actually equate to a policy.. 

edited to add:  The services are in a lot of cases awful.  Just because something is a scintilla better than down south is not something to be happy about.

Eh???  Am I reading that right - we get too much pocket money?

[PapofGlencoe]

18 minutes ago, daviebee said:

Eh???  Am I reading that right - we get too much pocket money?

we don't get too much.  we got more than would be sustainable as an independent country with our level of current revenue.  have done for the last few years and showing little sign of changing.

We were comparatively a contributor for many years whilst disgracefully being called too poor.  Not so now.  

[Redz]

13 minutes ago, PapofGlencoe said:

we don't get too much.  we got more than would be sustainable as an independent country with our level of current revenue.  have done for the last few years and showing little sign of changing.

We were comparatively a contributor for many years whilst disgracefully being called too poor.  Not so now.  

Source of this?

[PapofGlencoe]

47 minutes ago, Redz said:

Source of this?

https://fraserofallander.org/scottish-economy/gers/government-expenditure-and-revenue-scotland-2018-19/

for those decrying...how much could we support as an independent country?  I'm not seeing any evidence from anyone suggesting we could spend more.  which is all i'm asking for.

there will genuinely be people saying we should launch a new currency off the back of a 10% deficit.  this is playing politics with people's lives.

Edited October 25, 2019 by PapofGlencoe

[ThistleWhistle]

2 hours ago, Orraloon said:

Well said Sir. 

Next time round I'm thinking about getting a bus with something like "Let's save £240 billion on Trident and spend it on the NHS instead" on the side of it. Do you want a seat on my bus?

 

Last time I would have been up for driving the fucking thing but this time I can barely be arsed to jump aboard.  

[TDYER63]

7 minutes ago, ThistleWhistle said:

Last time I would have been up for driving the fucking thing but this time I can barely be arsed to jump aboard.  

When that engine starts revving you will feel different 😊 

[ThistleWhistle]

40 minutes ago, PapofGlencoe said:

https://fraserofallander.org/scottish-economy/gers/government-expenditure-and-revenue-scotland-2018-19/

for those decrying...how much could we support as an independent country?  I'm not seeing any evidence from anyone suggesting we could spend more.  which is all i'm asking for.

there will genuinely be people saying we should launch a new currency off the back of a 10% deficit.  this is playing politics with people's lives.

The last Gers forecast was pretty much called out as bullshit wasn't it?  

https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2019/08/21/the-gers-data-is-ludicrous-scotland-does-not-generate-60-of-the-uks-net-fiscal-deficit/

I mean essentially Scotland is now responsible for almost 60% of the UK deficit with 8% of the population.  

[Dave78]

17 hours ago, ThistleWhistle said:

I’m a lot less bothered this time as seeing such a significant proportion of our population who, not only accept that we are a leach on the arse of England, but are happy  for the situation to continue is depressing.  It’s like blaming my wife in the passenger seat for my bad driving because she has control of her heaters and electric windows.

Has anyone ever told you you have a way with words?  

 

Pap is a dyed in the wool nashnalist.

He'll vote Yes in any coming referendum. In fact i'd take 9/4 and put the wife and kids on it.

But he's perfectly articulating the calculation that 10 to 15 percent of Scottish voters will make come indyref2 (i.e. the ones that will decide the outcome)....short-sighted plebs that he/they are! 

The reality is a 'hard' Brexit gives Scots indy a moral shot in the arm, but makes the economics harder. I think Sturgeon knows this, and is why she instructed her MPs to vote for the only brexit that keeps the rUK in the single meerkat during the 'indicative votes' months ago.

 

 

 

[Caledonian Craig]

https://metro.co.uk/2019/10/15/brexit-fan-gets-october-31-exit-date-tattooed-stomach-10923256/?fbclid=IwAR0XMjXJvlcC3p_zkvYMmX287VxTCFeIiVDqByqViKzippBuHZsIRJwiMa0

Oh dear.