Freedom for Scotland, Good for Londoners
Today the SNP led Scottish government is putting forward plans for a referendum, Alex Salmond is proposing four options; the status quo, the limited change offered by the Calman Commission, maximum devolution and full independence.
Labour opposes any referendum. Somewhat incoherently so do the Tories and the LibDems. Both parties claim to be in favour of localism and returning power to the people wherever possible. The Tory arguments for repatriating powers back from Brussels to Westminster apply to giving the Scottish the right to self-government in Edinburgh. So why do they oppose measures that move towards those goals in Scotland? Isn’t it just petty partisan calculation?
Guido thinks Scottish Toryism is a busted flush. Every nation in Western Europe has a strong, centre-right, patriotic party capable of forming a government – except Scotland – which has a weak centre-right party seen as too English. Justifiably so. Cameron says he will not allow Scotland to go independent on his watch, reminding us that his party is the Conservative and Unionist Party. Well that isn’t very localist and it isn’t “trusting the people” to deny them a referendum. The rhetoric doesn’t match the policies again.
Maximum devolution (where the Union government in Westminster maintains foreign policy and national defence) is compatible with the localist ideas and rhetoric advanced by Tories and LibDems. Brussels is where the fundamental legislative action takes place anyway. London effectively pays for the national defence of the United Kingdom already, that wouldn’t change if Scotland became fiscally independent, though the £19 billion Boris identifies as being exported from London would inevitably be reduced. If Scotland had to stand on its own fiscal feet it would soon discover that having a Sovietised economy is not sustainable. An independent Scotland would see the SNP turn from being a left-wing nationalist party into a normal centre-right, patriotic party as found in every Western European democracy.
The country has a choice between the international socialism of the Labour Party and the National Socialism of the SNP. Poor Scotland.
Give them their independence, on condition that they take back the Scottish Raj, starting with Gormless Brown and Alying Darling and solve the West Lothian question once and for all.
The West Lothian question seems to have dropped off everybody’s radar, too embarrassing to mention by M.P.’s and their great love of democracy. The STA, Scottish Tartan Authority (yes there is such an organisation) has announced it wants to run a competition for an official tartan for London, how appropriate given the make up of the present incumbents of Hoc. Any chance of independence for England from Scotland?.
We love the Scots
Hey, Jimmy! stitch this
we’ll take good care of all the oil revenue
A Nuncio’s Flaccid Mint
The polls consistently show that breaking away from the UK is something the Scots do not want and most of them are fed up to the back teeth with Holyrood.
I sense that a wee bit of Guido’s Catholicism is behind this post.
Yep, shows what a devious bastard Alec Salmond is. If he really wanted to win a referendum on Scottish independence then he wouldn’t hold it there: he’d hold it in England.
LMAO!!! Very true!
Spot on. The Scots will always vote for union with England and revile us all the way.
Meanwhile , I bet the English will vote by a substantial majority for an end to this abusive marriage.
If Salmond really meant what he says he would hold the referendum in England. It’d be a cakewalk.
Why would London-born Darling – a place in England – be taken back to Scotland exactly? He’s one of you, fool!
Sending Cameron back too will we?
What about all the blacks?
Bob you mong Darling is Scottish!
He is also famous for being one of the worst lawyers in Glasgow EVER!
He lost custody of children from women to men in Scots Law quite a few times. In Scots Law to do that is frankly ridiculous the woman could be a crack whore and the man a saint and he still would lose!
In fact he was so useless he gave up and became an MP much to the amusement of all who knew him and then horrow when he was made chancellor!
As a Scot I am gobsmacked at a well presented and balanced article,you wont get any such unbiased material up here where the media are hysterically anti independence whether left or right.
GF puts a very good point across on this. Historically I’ve opposed the idea of Scottish independence as I believe – and still do -the premis of one nation and one rule, but the years of neglect of Scotland and deliberate manipulation of the Scottish people has put the country into a position where a referendum is really the only course of action.
If nothing else it may lay to rest the selfish dream of the deeply unpleasant First Minister and expose his personal thirst for power over his minions.
What neglect?
They are allowed to continue their black economy. But England can not have coal.
They are defended from out of control development.
They have been protected somewhat from the out of control nanny state law making.
There have same number of people as the Yorkshire regions but are 22x larger in land area. So every piece of infrastructure, when charged per capita, is much more expensive.
Some of us wish the border was a little further south, so that we might get our unfair share.
No, GF’s argument is circular: he says the Scots are independent, then concludes they should be independent. This is the same ‘argument’ used by the SNP.
It is like saying the Northumbrians should be independent of the UK just because they are independent of the UK. No one apart from a few loonies think this is a reasonable point.
Oh and by the way, isn’t it about time the Norse invaders of Scotland handed back the borders area (south of Odinburg, now anglicised as Edinburgh) to Northumbria? It was stolen from the English in 1041 in an unjust, illegal war.
yeah, Northumbria is just the same as Scotland
you fucking ignorant twat
Anon, what a model of restraint, and sound reasoning, your ‘argument’ isn’t.
Pity you appear entirely ignorant of the Kingdom of Northumbria.
Freedom for the kingdom of the South Saxons i.e Sussex
lochdu – I heartily endorse your comment.
At least Guido isn’t glencampblly !
And me. , Good luck to Alex Salmond!
Can’t we just let them have it back now. These Scottish nationalists are begining to bore me. We’ll still be able to go there on holiday, and if they don’t let us in there’s always Wales.
Wales has an entry fee of £5. A bit like a zoo.
You could always sneak in on the A40. Back home on the M4, no problem: they don’t charge to let you out.
Try the A5 or A55. They’re free. Cracking scenery, too.
You’re obviously speaking from your London centric point of view. Anyone from the South Midlands (from Gloucester up) will go M5 – M50 and not pay a penny.
Really? But you make it back in a couple of days on the parking – lowest charges in Britain. And free for the disabled.
You couldn’t pay me enough to go to Wales
I went once, but it was closed.
Don’t laugh – it was once a hive of industry – now it’s almost empty – like England will become if we don’t get a PM to get a grip – and I don’t mean Gordo or Call me Dave.
You couldn’t pay me enough to go to Scotland, fucking savages thieving off the English.
That’s fine – we don’t want your ignorant, narrow-minded racist sort.
What did you do with the oil then?
.
.
I love the Scots….
they are like the Oirish…
They extol the virtues of their country….but they all come to England to make their mark in life…..
errr…like me…oh fuck !!
Al – Are you the multi-millionaire alex ferguson ? Do I get a prize ?
I’ve sent the SNP a donation because of Mr Ferguson’s love affair with labour. Admittedly it wont be as much as he gives labour however there are quite a few folk who would like to ‘repay’ Mr ferguson. You can get there by googling SNP.
I didn’t know that one has to pay at the door to go into Wales these days. Going in on A50 sounds a bit like when I was a lad, and we went into Wimbledon Speedway through a hole in the fence. Stolen fruit are always the sweetest – just ask our MPs.
You don’t have to pay, they’re talkin about the soft southern toll bridge.
Thanks for the update. When I was a lad there were only ferries south of Gloucester and we didn’t think of that as paying to go into Wales. More of a voyage to an unknown pagan world.
Is Wimbledon in Wales?
No but there is Wales in South Yorkshire, halfway between Sheffield & Worksop in Nottinghamshire. Just wonder how many people have gone to the wrong Wales?
why should scotland have independence and Wessex not?
Or Yorkshire.
We are all one country
why do we need a Scottish Daily Express?
Independence for the Kingdom of Northumbria!
Let Scotland have its referendum so it can become “politically grown up”.
Yes, I agree with Guido 100% on this topic – Scotland can only afford to have a crazy left wing bias, because it does not have to look after its own finances.
Please hold a referendum on Scottish independence in ENGLAND.
The English would surely vote for the Scots to sail off and REDUCE the Englsih tax burden at the same time.
Brillo pointed out the possibility that Dave could impose a referendum from Westminster, once in power, with a direct in or out question and out manoeuvre the slimy scotch toad to prevent him holding westminster to ransome on other issues – trebles all round, on Brillo!
The leftie run media in Scotland seems to be on a blogger witch-hunt. Two blogs forced to shut down in the past week due to the Sunday Papers…
http://tinyurl.com/yaluosa
Smears and sleaze – it’s in Labour’s D-N-A.
Not half Guido. Time to dump those dour spongers. And good riddance!
Although I could say the same about anyone north of Watford. Pikey whippet-eating scum, the lot of them.
Thanks. Fuck you, too.
A whippet isn’t just for Christmas …
If you carve carefully it will last to Boxing day!
Btw, Is ‘pikey’ French for gentlemanly?
Don’t you dare mention DNA
I always get a bit nervous too.
As guido is part pikey I’m sure that will get short shrift
will us english get a vote ?
There should be 2 referenda:
1) Do the people of Scotland want independence?
2) Does everyone else in the UK want Scotland?
If the rest of the UK becomes fed up of their whinging and ‘please sir, I want more money’ attitude, then let them go their own way regardless of what they want.
Nope there needs to be another option – get rid of the parliament! – No politician would put that to the vote
True, but which parliament? Holyrood or Westminster?
I think the English should get the vote,you pay for our Mp’s who can influence your healthcare,education etc but can have no influence on Scots devolved healthcare,education etc.In fact why are Scots MP’s paid the same their English counterparts who would have part time jobs if they didn’t meddle in only English matters.If our English neighbours had a vote independence would be more likely,after all nobody asked the English about devolved government which led to the anomoly previously meantioned.
lochdhu; you know fine well that SNP MPs DO NOT vote on legislation that affects only england. Only Scot’s labour/tory/lib dum MPs do that…
Fucking delicious!
Don’t be silly. The English are officially a non-people in a non-country.
We’ve been taken over already.
Constitutionally if we are going to vote on the Union all members of it should have a vote.
The time has come for a UK government to invite us all to put up or shut up. At the present time the English are being used as the whipping boys of Scottish Nationalism.
You might if you ever bothered to use it.
I’ve often wondered what the response would be to a referendum on ejecting Northern Ireland from the Union.
Probably a pure, but disguised, horror from the Republic at the “Yes!” verdict.
It would be nice to have the Swiss system for situations like this…
Swiss democracy already being challenged by Catholic Church. The Pope has spoke.
“Will us English get a vote?
In a word, No.
Why change the habits of a lifetime?
I agree. In the 80’s the Scots resented rule from Westminster, now they resent lack of funding from Westminster. Let them go.
Not just good for London – good for the whole of England.
English taxes for England
English law for England
Home rule for England
English jobs for English people!
English parliament with English MP’s
Let them have their independence and then send all the useless Scots in Browns Westminister goverment back home. ( and they can take their F…… bankers with them )
Agreed, and then we can stop shovelling vast quantities of English taxpayers’ cash north of the border to subsidise them. The sooner we end this parasitic relationship the better. They clearly don’t want us and neither do we want their MPs, so that would also resolve the West Lothian question that DC and NuLiebour appear to be quite incapable of getting to grips with.
Och aye !! The Bank of England is still baling us out, the noo !
BOTH THE ENGLISH AND SCOTS NEED TO WAKE UP TO THE FACT.THAT THE USELESS BUNCH OF TOSSERS CALLED A GOVERNMENT.ARE PLAYING US OF AGAINST EACH OTHER.McJonah AND THE DWARF MILLIPEDE ARE TO BUSY ACTING LIKE WORLD STATESMAN.TO WORRY ABOUT OUR TWO COUNTRIES.
The over representation of Scots in the labour party hasn’t helped matters, even before you get to the absurd imballance of the Barnett formula. Cam’s struggling to sell me this one .
…not to mention their ridiculous over-representation in the media (and particularly Brown’s Broadcasting Corpn).
The Scots cleverly managed a reverse takeover of England a long time ago. Independence won’t undo this – there is no getting England back to what it was. An independent Scotland wouldn’t get Scotland back to what it was, either. It would simply result in an extreme example of localism within the EU where the citizens were under the illusion of living in their own country. If Scotland went independent, left the EU and produced a centre-right political party, that would be a different story.
except they wouldn’t be in the EU.
If the SNP wanted to be in the EU, which they do, I think the EU would automatically admit Scotland on independence. You don’t think the EU will take their grubby mitts off a piece of prime real estate, do you?
Salmond wants powers transferred from London to Edinburgh but only the few powers that London still has. The SNP will not attempt to recover powers from Brussels – and the SNP claims to be ‘nationalist’. A Scottish currency, Scottish central bank, Scottish control of farming and fisheries inter alia not going to happen nor to be campaigned for.
Codswallop – very few people in Scotland want a referendum on separating from the rest of the UK. Why hold a referendum on something people clearly don’t want?
If we’re going to do that we might as well have a referendum on all sorts of things, like whether it should be compulsory to eat soup with a chocolate spoon. Obvious people don’t want it? So what! It’s not “localist” to deny them the choice!
Not with you on this one, Guido…
So are ye one o’ them chocolate spoon users laddie?
Come clean – we noo war’ ye live!
Agreed with what you post above DB.
This debate so easily disintergrates into one between Nationalist fanatics ranting on about ‘Unionist quislings’ (directed against fellow Scots who happen to disagree with them – how pleasant!) and loons form South of the border spouting nasty and stupid anti Scottish garbage. (Oh and Labour party drones fearful of losing valuable seats!).
These two camps just feed each other and are sometimes political wind ups to suit both causes.
I agree that Scotland could use a ‘normal centre-right, patriotic party’ but I’m not convinced yet that the SNP is going to mutate into anything so reasonable.
The SNP were elected to government and have a mandate for a referendum. They had it in their manifesto. No mention of choccie spoons.
Except they don’t actually have a majority of votes and MSPs. They are a minority government.
LIKE McJONAH AND HIS RABBLE.IT USED TO BE CALLED A FIDDLE NOW IT IS CALLED DEMOCRACY.
When the Tories get in in England, SNP could gain votes.Goodie, a win win situation.
What one party do these majority of voters and MSPs belong to? Fuckwit unionists; can’t walk and talk at the same time. You deny the Scot’s people a referendum at your political peril pal…
Fucking delicious!
If nobody wants an independence referendum how do you explain an SNP controlled Scottish Parliament?Somebody must have voted for them.
If no one wants a referendum, then, I presume, no one wants independence? Well what are you worrying about? Let them have the referendum, you’ll win and the argument buried.
Or don’t you do democracy?
It’ll be like the Irish referendum. If Salmond loses he’ll just ask them the same question again the following year and every other year until he gets the ‘right’ answer. Once.
There’s a part of me that is all for a united single landmass in Great Britain in the same way that to most folk in Ireland it makes good sense to have a united Ireland. It just makes good organisational and cartographic sense. But the Scots have shown they don’t see it that way and decades of whining and whining and whining and Braveheart and whining are increasingly poisoning the Scottish voters so I say give ‘em their referendum. And hopefully give ‘em their independence and then hopefully the fuckers will collectively grow up instead of whining about some 800 or 500 or 300 year old fucking grievance all the fucking time.
Let Scotland go. Let them show that their desire for ‘independence’ is no more than a desire to spite England as they swap Westminster for Brussels.
Alex looks like he’s lost a few stone in that picture. Mind you – he needs to.
Harian was right ! we want the wall back only three meters higher and wider.
On the otherhand does not the taxpayer actually own Scotland now after all the good work the canny scots bankers have done ?? If we divide the area of Scotland by the debt of the scottish banks we could have a rental income like a Mayfair / Knightsbridge property !
Rental from Scots salmon lochs, and whisky stills, now that’s a splendid idea.
Could erect a southbound toll as well to help raise more from the birthplace of banksterland.
How many decades before FreddietheShittyShreddie has paid off his monumental scam?
jgm2 doesn’t do whining himself.
hilarious whining about the scots from a prize twat
you can’t put a price satire this funny
keep up the good work!
How about one on minarets then?
Freedom from Scottish imperialism!
Remove the Celtic Cabinet and the Barnett formula now!
Scotland isn’t a Nation.It’s a parasitical entity.Without the host it will collapse within a generation.
salmond must be fucking stoned.
the c’unt doesn’t have a pot to piss in for fucks sake. he is holding up two fingers and that can only mean one of the following things:
a)he has just smoked two very strong superskunk joints
b)the scottish banking sector is worth two quid
c)there are two taxpayers in scotland. both non doms.
salmon is full of shit. a bullshit artist just like gordon brown.
brown and salmon are a pair of fucking jokers and the sooner those two stupid c’unts have fucked off out of office the more honest offices of state will be.
salmon and his precious scotland are totally fucking potless FFS. the scottish economy is subsidised with English taxpayers’ and it would not last five minutes without the money the English generously supply to help the dependent scottish people pay for their food and clothes. The English also pay for the scottish peoples’ children to go to school and we pay for their children’s healthcare. without English funds the scottish would go hungry.
perhaps we are too generous to the ungrateful scottish wastrels, perhaps by subsidising their economy they will not be motivated to get off their fucking arses and pay their own way for a change.
perhaps we should cut the subsidies scotland receives from England and get the lazy scots to earn their own living instead of constantly sucking of the tit of the English taxpayer.
yes, scotland should stand on its own two feet and pay its own bills, what an excellent idea.
I see you feel a wee cross aboot us Scots, TAT. Have a wee dram and nay faas yerself, laddie.
these are the facts.
tat; normally agree (mostly) with your posts, but not on this one. We only have to be lucky once, but the unionists need to be lucky all the time. Bring on the Referendum…
Fucking delicious!
FD,
I take the pragmatic view that the nations that make up the United Kingdom should act as a block for favourable trading and diplomatic purposes.
should the people of scotland demand independence then so be it but currently the money side of things just does not add up.
what good is a parliament without full tax raising powers?
no fucking good to man nor beast for fucks sake innit.
you have been hoodwinked by westminster.
salmond is a useless c’unt, just like gordon just like dave just like nick.
political parties are the problem, they are a cancer within our democracy.
but in the final analysis currently scotland cannot afford to be independent. it has insufficient funds.
the fact is TaT doesn’t have a clue who he supports
Labour in scotland are an even bigger joke than they are in England as they relied on decades of blind support and tribalism and their gross incompetence and complacency stems from that
Scotland told NuLabour to fuck off in an Election with the SNP in power which is more than the Conservative Party managed thus far though despite little TwATs whining NuLabour is finally going to get booted out of Power in London and there will be no hung parliament with the polls all pointing to a Cameron win
those are the facts
Don’t I know you? Were you at the London School of Economics in 1979?
tat, you’ve proved once again why you are TOP BOY round here!
Keep up the great work!!
from one of your growing army of fans.
Don’t encourage it….
I was the first OFFICIAL Fan Club Member.
You must like me,stop double spacing.
TaT will never acknowledge anyone who engages in Dpuble Spacing
He considers them Wankers.
Said Tat, concerned about losing even more credibility.
Hahahahaha
The 60,000 net taxpayers in Scotland will be delighted in increase their contributions tat, have no doubt about that. Or would they simply head off to Berwick?
Thousands of Dutch people live just over the border in northern Belgium to take advantage of lower Belgian taxes, cheaper property etc. They just nip over the border to go to work, paying their taxes in their country of residence.
When Jockyland (Soviet EU republic of,) is finally chucked out of the UK / or votes for independence, I imagine that the few thousands of productive
Scots could settle in the north of England, Cumbria and Northumbria and bolster the economy there (and holding UK passports) while their pisspot little EU fiefdom relies on tourism handouts from Brussels and the largesse of Chinese and Indian tourists.
Substitute foreign loans for English and you will be spot on. The fact is that the whole of the UK is living on foreign loans and foreign money, thanks to those piss poor Scottish Chancellors of the Exchequer, Gobro and Aldar.
Disagree tat, Salmond’s been fighting for independence for years. About time Scots grew up and took on the responsibilty of their own country. Too many Scots running the show down South. Brillo thinks he’s a Londoner!! What a joke! Mrs. Thatcher could not have smashed the miners etc into submission without money from oil in Scottish waters. IMHO.
Dear Mr Fawkes,
I am a normal, white, English, well-adjusted, happily married heterosexual male. I was born into a loving (Christian) family with a loving Mother and Father, who cared for me as they knew best, and enjoyed a happy childhood.
However, somewhere along the way, – perhaps it comes from my genes – I developed an in-built uncontrollable sensitivity to Bull Shit, twaddle, and utter bollocks. I am given to understand that this leaves me totally unfit for the Socialist Paradise in which we live today.
Could you advise me which Noo_Lie_Bore remedial classes I should attend, and which as a matter of urgency.
Thank you,
(name supplied)
PS: I apologise if this query falls foul of your moderation devices on the grounds of being racist, sexist, religist, Englishist, or any other real or imagined slight against the New Order.
“I am a normal, white, English, well-adjusted, happily married heterosexual male. I was born into a loving (Christian) family with a loving Mother and Father, who cared for me as they knew best, and enjoyed a happy childhood.”
You and I are absolutely loathed by this NuLiebour government then.
Shame on you. You are Godless, and a heretic. There is only one true religion of peace.
Islam will take you back to the Stoneage even quicker than the Labour Party are planning.
Lets import every Muslim extremist we can. Make perfect sense. Close all Christian Religions as it may offend the ‘True Faith’.
Under the Ethnic Cleansing Act ( 1997 ) you people have no Rights to complain, moan or otherwise protest. We will continue to pursue our multicultural voter enhancement projects. Now shut up.
That wouldn’t be the Ethnic Cleaning Act that appeard on 2 May 1997 by any chance??
It may also have appeared on that date too.
Yes, Hugh Janus. That’s the day.
” A new day has dawned, has it not “…….T.B£iar, 2 May 1997
All Heterosexual white Englishmen are hated by New Labia. Question:why are they called New Labia? Because they are a bunch of cnuts!!!!
I am an English, white, heterosexual male and I am married to a beautiful, dusky lady from Jamaica. However, I really resent the way our current, Scottish lords and masters have effctively emasculated and shat upon the English, these past 12 and a half sorry years.
It is clear this Scottish Labour Government hates the English, wants to deny us our culture, our existence, our rights. There isn’t even a box for us on the Census form (I ticked Other and wrote English under nationality).
Send our Scottish PM, his Scottish Cabinet and Labour’s Scottish MPs packing back to Scotland!!!!!
++ Applause ++
Hear Hear
Make them take Miss sickly sweet soooper, fantaaaastic from gmtv with them.
Apply for asylum in Switzerland – They seem to have some good ideas
Mmmmm inarets?
Suggestion – go to Switzerland.
Scotland is Labour’s client state.
How dare you assume otherwise.
We of the Scots Raj keep them sucking off the withered tit in places like Glasgow to ensure Labour continues to dominate there.
And that is how it should be.
Have you read Boris Johnson’s pro-Scotland editorial? Also pro-London, too…
http://thatsnews.blogspot.com
Boris Johnson is a dhimmi and an idiot. I bet he’s joined Labour in slagging off the Swiss for voting to ban minarets.
Minarets for the Minorities
and the Minories.
Go to one of the onlnie betting websites and have a punt on that, why don’t you?
Boris is great, well educated too.
Yes it was a Scot Gordon Brown who saved the world fro financial meltdown.where is all your English gratitude.
Wibble wibble
Oops! UKIP’s new leader Lord pearson stands exposed as another greedy trougher milking the British taxpayer for all he can get.
He’s not much different from all those UKIP MEP’s milking the expenses system in Brussels is he?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/6686068/UKIP-leader-Lord-Pearson-claimed-100000-allowances-for-3.7m-London-home.html
A vote for UKIP is a vote for Labour.
Vote Tory or get five more years of Brown’s scorched earth policy.
Aye, that is sad but true. Vote UKIP in the EUSSR elections, but vote Tory in the General Election – it is the only way to get rid of NuLiebore!
Bollocks.
Thanks for your reasoned and well argued response.
Agreed Alan, what you say makes perfect sense
Thank you Mr Duncan. How’s the garden?
Not true actually.
Vote McRuin back in so the IMF will takeover the Treasury a week later and keelhaul the marxist mafia.
Best way to eradicate the vermin permanently and ensure snoteater is denied even a Big Issue pitch.
A vote for the Tories is a vote for Brussels.
The Tories want to keep Brussels in control.
A vote for Dave is a vote for Tony
“An independent Scotland would see the SNP turn from being a left-wing nationalist party into a normal centre-right, patriotic party as found in every Western European democracy.”
Pretty unlikely, given the political makeup of the SNP! Lefties are in the majority.
Good post other than that though.
Idiot!
They are a cross section from right to left
which is probably why Labour in Scotland keep coming up with the Tartan Tory label at the same time as the Tories acuse the SNP of being socialist
Trouble is Labour is so right wing now its difficult to tell Tory from Labour
It is easy to tell them apart. Liebore is run by that Scots fool Cameron while the Tories are headed by that Scots imbecile Brown. See?
It’s incredibly easy to tell them apart
Brown doesn’t like Blair whereas Cameron is the Heir to Blair
simples!
I’m all in favour of referendums, particularly the ones like they have in Switzerland:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/switzerland/6685719/Switzerland-risks-Muslim-backlash-after-minarets-vote.html
Yeah, make friends and influence people.
DelBoy = dhimmified Labour idiot
Personally I’d rather Scotland stayed in the Union as I believe that as a nation the UK is stronger than as independent states. However, if the Scots wish to go it alone, so be it.
There are many benefits to England. The removal of the Labour Party as a political force. The English no longer subsidizing the Scottish electricity network. The BOE would no longer have to support Scottish banks (North Sea Oil could be used to support them). Us English would no longer have to support Scottish HE, hospitals and OAP care that is currently free of charge in Scotland. We could remove all of the public sector jobs that cover the UK and instead locate them across the border in England, or even Wales. We could remove the submarine and air bases for relocation in England (along with associated jobs). The English would save a fortune and benefit from a mass increase in jobs. The Scots would bear all the costs but would have their independence. The Scots could then go cap in hand to the EU and become a lapdog to the EUSSR in exchange for a little bit of money (a bit like another celtic nation not too far away) and claim to be a successful independent country whilst living off the back of EU taxpayers.
I wish the Scots well whichever path they choose. Like I stated earlier, I would rather stay as one nation but as I can see no downside to England from a split then for me the Scots can do as they wish.
Agreed.
I think you will find that Scottish power gets exported to Engerland
England does not pay for healthcare, oaps free car parking , zero rates for small business, free prescriptions.
the fact that Scotland would have more income than if it were in the Union is another matter, but when Westmidden doles out the money to all the authorities, it is up to them how they spend it, the fact that the english welsh or irish councils see fit to spend their allowance on other things is up to them, the Scottish Government chose to do the things you mentioned, it means they cant spend on other things, like Olympic stadia, runways, flood defences etc etc
the sooner that Scotland gets its independence the better, then the maps can be re written with Scotland on top and poofland below
http://www.absolutelyandy.com/absolutely/videoclips/videos02/absolutely_mcglashan.wmv
http://www.berr.gov.uk/files/file52113.pdf
The Scots have their domestic transmission costs capped.
thanks for the pdf I wasnt aware of this , but youll agree that hydro is where it is at and there is a big power line going to be installed to take it doon south as this will be cheaper than oil , gas or nuclear generation
more maglashin
go to 22 mins on the vido
Strange ID, but good post.
Labour have a majority of English MPs.
The Celtic parts only have 117 MPs Labour had 356 last election and as 27 can clearly be identified as not Labour giving the 90 to Labour would result in 266 English Labour MPs from 529 English constituencies.
Please God give the Scots a vote on this. Practically every Scottish person I know hates the English and they are extremely vocal about this, continually bleating on about how they wish they were independant. Will give them the vote and let them put their money where their mouths are. I bet they won’t vote to be independant when they realise exactly how much money is sent their way etc and then perhaps they will shut up (but I doubt it).
Scotland is so very very differnet from England, in many ways for the better – Westminster is a long way for them – this is a complete cock up courtesy of NuLabour, once they had their own Parliament (which we paid millions for) they were never going to stop there.
Anyway, if they were indendant then maybe it would stop us looking like complete and utter amateurs on the world stage when issues like the libyan bomber come up – it was them, nae me, no them. By the way is he dead yet?
400 years of history means nothing much, does it?
Labour started Scotland down this route thinking it would sure up the Labour vote and was bitten on the arse when the SNP did so well. Labour have eradcated all history they can when it suits them, just look at the education system.
2000 years ago some fucker built a wall to keep them out.
We didn’t learn much then.
No, the obscene £414m spent on their silly building is of much greater irritation.
Actually 302 years of a VERY unpopular Union with England
the people were against it in 1707 and all the way to today
Lets get it done and consign the act of union in the waste paper basket of history!
Sorry, no..the Scots went cap in hand to England for the 1707 union. They were broke, flat broke and had just blown a fortune on their one and only, failed, colony at Darien in Central America. A bloody silly place to put a colony in the first place. The Scots have always been hopeless when it comes to public finance.
This is also why we need Scotland out of the union, to get rid of their incompetent political class if nothing else
I dont hate the English and I’m Scots………All most Scots want is fiscal atonomy……same Queen(united kingdom still there)…..no borderpost or passports…..we live on the same island,share the same language and common if sometimes fraught history.It’s not a fall out,just control of our own taxes and resources.
it is unfair that the Scots can dip in and out of what they want – taking all the best and leaving us with the dross is what they want – I don’t blame them so would I but they already have far more money spent and free prescriptions etc whilst the rest of is sickers sit here and take it.
Free prescriptions? I’m afraid not.
You, like a great number of other people on here are talking out of your arse.
Scottish banks. There are 3. RBS BoS and Clydesdale.
The 2 that had to be helped out are part English. Halifax is in Yorkshire is it not? BoS were ok until they hooked up with the whippet shaggers of Halifax.
RBS and NatWest are one and the same. A point conveniently missed by the uneducated, uninformed, propoganda guzzlers like you.
Idiot
HBoS was run from Edinburgh. The Halifax part was predominantly retail mortgages with only about a 3% default rate. The big errors were made on the corporate side by the BoS arm, often ‘investing’ in commercial property at soft in the head rates, or even a pyramid scam.
NatWest was bid for by BoS before the merger with Halifax. BoS lost out to Fred the Shred at RBS. Whereas BoS/Halifax was a merger, RBS was completely in control of its NatWest subsidiary. Most of the bad decisions were taken by Scots at Scottish head offices with the connivance of the Scottish Chancellor Gordoom McDebt.
THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN BECAUSE SCOTTISH VOTES.HAVE BEEN USED TO PROP UP EVERY USELESS SOCIALIST GOVENMENT.FROM WHICH BOTH OUR CONTRIES HAVE SUFFERED FROM.
Actually this IS what the SNP are proposing
Independence has nothing to do with the monarchy, its purely political
Under Independence, Scotland would still have the Queen, as it would still remain a Kingdom as it was before 1707
So would the Kingdom of Northumbria.
If Scotland attained independence then expats would be able to direct their taxes back to Scotland – not England – under double taxation rules. I think that would go quite some way to redress the money situation.
btw they would NOT let Broon & co partake as they are hated here as well.
Instead of slagging off the Scots the English should welcome and encourage Scottish independence if only to be rid of socialist (fiscally destructive) parliaments. Don’t understand why the tories want to KEEP labour MPs
Devolution was yet another Labour mistake. Scottish independence however would mean that we no longer have to cive Scotland 20 billion a year under the Barnet formula. Could it also mean that we could deport Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling as undesirable aliens?.
London is only successful because it is able to suck talent and resources from the rest of the UK, as well as from outside it. The loss of Scotland would weaken England far more than most realise. Of course, Scotland would be the main loser – it would become a small, poor state on the fringe of Europe, a Moldova of the west – but it would hurt all of us.
I agree but I still want the Scottish mafia to feckorf
What about independence just for the Outer Hebrides under Scottish mafia rule?
We already have a fecking Scottish government – taken a look at the cabinet lately, headed up by the Scot that likes Snot?
Scotland alone should not have an independence referendum vote the referendum should be the whole of the United Kingdom.
Yes, this may see Scotland leaving the union, it may also see Northern Ireland leaving and Wales too.
Would this be bad for England, no I do not think so, let the EU take them in, and we withdraw from the EU and rise up again. We would need to increase military spending as we would have hostile neighbours to the west and north and south of us, but that is a price worth paying.
As Wales , Northern Ireland and Scotland are not members of the EU technically in their own right, England should insist on their formal entry being outside the normal free movement zone. Therefore all Scots , Welsh and Irish will have to apply for Visa’s and leave to remain in England.
Introduce a fiscal incentive to rid England of sweatie’s and their offspring from infecting Englands green and pleasent land.
The end of the Labour party and Scottish MP’s occupying English constituencie
would be a dream come true.
Bring it on and reenact the laws of this land, if we see a Scotsman approaching York we can kill them. Lovely jubly.
would all those welsh, scots and irish buried in war graves also have to get a visa to stay ?
would non-pure english families have to apply?
would areas like Liverpool be next on the list ?
Liverpool should be fkg nuked mate, but yes we must de-louce the country from vermin starting with Irish, Welsh and Scots. I see another poor child has been killed by a crazy dog from one of the alleged drug dealing scumbags from Liverpool.
With Nu Labour in power mate, the war graves will be levelled flat with tarmac for Somali immigrants.
Any ENglish person who allowed his gene pool to become infected by Scottish blood would be required to go north with immediate effect.
I have absolutely no problem with an independent Scotland and welcome it but more to the point until that happens Westminster MPs representing Scottish Constituenccies should not be allowed a vote on purely English matters where their own Scottish Parliament has the sole say.For too long we have had the inbuilt Scottish Labour majority foisting through policies that solely affect England but not their own constituents. However that of course would put paid to Brown and his Scottish Raj and we can send them scuttling back North of the Border.
Apropos the Conservatives – the Conservatives should face reality and realise that are finished in Scotland- its’ all academic anyway following Lisbon we’re all just dependent regions of the greater franco-german state
Is that the 4th Reich?
YOU’RE LATE! Your pay will be docked 3 hours-worth, so about £15.
Sorry – £3.
Recent management of the real economy has been stupid, for sure.
“An independent Scotland would see the SNP turn from being a left-wing…party into a normal centre-right…party ”
Huh?
You don’t know much about Scotland if you think the SNP is, or ever could be, centre-right. This is a country where the public sector hogs 53% of the economy, and “free money for everybody, for everything”, is pretty much the local religion.
Err.. Peter, if Scotland goes off on it’s own (please, God!), who is going to pay for the 53%? It sure ain’t gonna be paid by any ‘Barnett Formula’ any more, i.e. the English.
So, tell me, who’s pays for the bloated public sector in Scotland. RBS? Or Bank of Scotland?
England will pay a large , but it will be done through EU structural funds. The same thing happened with the Republic of Ireland. You still pay, have no influence on where the money goes and the recipients have no need to show any recognition for your contribution except to say it could have been bigger.
If the Barnett formula goes Scotland will receive the VAT paid in Scotland but collected in London as UK VAT and mistakenly counted as English.
Yep. That, and the utterly shit weather. And the constant undercurrent of anti-Englishness was what persuaded me to get the fuck out. That and I didn’t want my kids getting tied into the Scottish education system which is geared to sending ‘em to Scottish universities where they’d possibly meet some poisonous little ‘Braveheart’ and I’d end up with Scottish grandkids and stuck in fucking Scotland just to be near them.
Physically and culturally isolated. Violent. Self-destructive. Alcoholic. Woeful weather and a political class in a race to the bottom to promise an endless supply of free stuff from their magic oil money.
Did it really take me six years to pull the pin to get away from such idiocy.
Every time I read posts like yours I think independence is the only road to take.
I always worry when someone tells the world ,
“And the constant undercurrent of anti-Englishness was what persuaded me to get the fuck out. ”
I rather think it might say more about the person complaining than the reality of the situation.
No one likes an arrogant know all, no matter what their nationality.
No one likes the sneerer no matter what their nationality.
I’m sure Scotland will miss your children and grandchildren , but I doubt if she will miss you.
I don’t doubt that every time you read any post by any person it informs you that the best route for Scotland is independence. Just as for Gordon Brown the answer to any economic question is to borrow more money.
I wanted to like Scotland (otherwise I wouldn’t have gone there in the first place) but a few years of living there convinced me that those Scots who had left were definitely the smart ones and the ones who left were increasingly looking for somebody else to blame for their ancestors failure to get the hell out too.
yer just a cock, jgm2 me old son
a twatty little bigot with a chip on your shoulder
no doubt wherever you go you elicit the same response
it’s not because of the country you are in
it’s because you are a prize twat so everyone mocks you for being one
There’s only one group of people I hate more than racists and thats the fucking Scots.
Scotland is a millstone around England’s neck. Set it free – let them try and run a country on their OWN taxes, build their own infrastructure, support their own workshy, keep their noses out of things wot don’t concern them ie the governance of England.
We only wanted it for the grouse and now so few people shoot it hardly seems worth the bother.
If we let go then they’d have no one to blame but themselves.
Oi, sweaties, it’s all yours, and by George, you’re welcome to it.
send brown darling martin etc back to scotland…build a new wall like the israelis……
love all the sympathy fpr john fatscot……..
i thought he was the decendant of a boil and a pile of shite?
And independence for London too.
Salmond clearly wants to have his cake and eat it. He knows that a straight referendum ‘independence or not’ question put to the Scottish people would result in a ‘not’ vote, so he’s trying to find a half-way house. He also knows that Scotland would struggle if it had to financially support itself (oil notwithstanding), so the “multiple-choice” referendum is an attempt to ratchet up pressure on Westminster. Cameron is wise to stick with the Union for now, but addressing the West Lothian question in some way can’t be put off for ever.
In total agreement with the argument; what has troubled me for many years though, is why have a cake if you can’t eat it?
Salmond clearly does eat plenty of cake. And kebabs. And pies. Lots of pies.
How old are you jgm2?
Maybe Prescott will think twice before judging people solely on who their ancestors are
A person who is born into the english gentry can no more help it than Prescott born into his family
I think it is about time Prescott shut up and attempted to be a decent human being
The Voluntary ID sign up in Manchester is going well.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8385754.stm
“Since applications opened a fortnight ago, 1,386 people living in Greater Manchester have requested an application form, out of an eligible population of 1.7m.”
So only 0.08% of the Mancs have parted with cash for one of these wonderful cards.
Perhaps McBroon should be asked if he has signed up? Alternatively he should be asked if he has been checked out by Balls’ CRB system and charged to prove his innocence?
The BBC seems to be saying, as fact, that the ID system will not be compulsory.
Unless you want to leave your house at some point, they’re right
Why is there no English Parliament? Why is Gordon Brown the First Minister of England, in all but name? Consider this analogy:
———————————————————
Dear English Football Association
As a representative of the Scottish Football Association, I would like to inform you that we wish to change the way the English Football team is managed to bring it more in line with the way our Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, is running Britain.
This will involve the following:
1. The Manager of the Scottish team is allowed to be involved with the running of the English team. However, the manager of the English team should have no say whatsoever in the running of the Scottish team. This shall be known as the West Lothian Question.
2. A sizable proportion of any money the English Football Association raises from, say sponsorship or crowd takings, shall be given to the Scottish Football Association, regardless as to whether you need it or not. This does not apply the other way round. This is known as the Barnett Formula.
3. You are not to call yourself England any longer. You will now be known as the British Regions. We, on the other hand, are still to be known as Scotland, “a proud and noble nation”.
4. Medical treatment to your players will be limited to a few treatments because of cost. No such stringent limitation applies to Scotland.
5. If your playing surfaces are flooded, then do not expect much assistance. However, Scottish pitches will be adequately provided for in the event of flooding.
6. From this moment on, the English Football Association will cease to exist. However, the Scottish Football Association will be allowed to continue to work independently.
A failure to follow these rules will see you branded as arrogant, selfish and unfair.
I’m sure you will find this to your satisfaction. After all, you seem to be happy with this state of affairs with your political system, so why not your Football team?
Yours sincerely
Mr G Brown.
PS You English are so naïve, you are being abolished and don’t even realise it.
Ref: http://www.thecep.org.uk
Can anyone tell me why only Scotland gets a referendum on dissolving the Union?
I thought there werre other stakeholders involved here, or have we been so dominated & cowed by the Scottish Junta in Westminster that we meekly accept that opnly Scottish peoples views count?
To hell with them.
Can anyone tell me why only Scotland gets a referendum on dissolving the Union?
I’m wondering about this too. Why dont’ the English get a say?
I bet we’d vote yes too, byt a bigger margin than the sweaties too.
BTW, who’s to bet that if/when it happens, we’ll end up funding them anyway, even if it’s via our EU money find its way back to Edinburgh?
Too true !!
At least then they have to get in line along with likes of the Irish and the Greeks with their begging bowl at the dole queue of Europe rather than having it given straight to them no questions asked.
The trouble with the Scotch is that they’re too canny to vote for full independence.
The Scotch vermin in Westminster give them everything they want, higher pensions than in England, free higher edyukashun, higher spending per capita on roads, and so on and so forth, all funded by the English tax payer and buttressed by the English nation debt.
There are more alcoholics and crackheads in Scotchland than their are Tories, so clearly it is a parasite on the ‘Union’.
C’mon Scotch you know its right, go for independence
Yes. They get al that higher this and that and still those with any ambition leave thus further concentrating their gene pool to the point where they think nothing of endorsing a government that has practically b*nkrupt the entire UK. All the scottish politicians are in a race to promise as much free stuff as they can imagine and this will all be paid for, in perpetuity, by the bottomless oilwell they have ofshore.
And that is the entirity of Labour and SNP politics. Scotland has been depopulating for decades as everybody with any ambition at all leaves. It managed a brief stagger into an increasing population a few years ago when they offered free care for the elderly so naturally any Scot who needed such care skipped back ‘home’ to make sure they’d leave a little something for the kids. But otherwise it has been 30 years of so long losers.
An excellent idea has been floated to send Norman Tebbit to explain the benefit of the Union to them, thereby assuring the right result.
How long, oh Lord, before we can be free of these celtic scocialists.
Today I am investigating putting some of my hard earned cash beyond the reach of Brownism and its impending crash, so I am reviewing the potential of various currencies as a safe home for savings by comparison with what used be known as £ Sterling.
The currency I am drawn to at the moment, by comparison with the dodginess of the GBP, is the ZWD or Zimbabwean Dollar.
Any readers knowledge on the predicted strength of the Zimbabwean Dollar to the rocky GBP would be gratefully received.
Then of course there is the CHF or Swiss franc but I thought that might be a bit boring.
Last I heard the Zimbabwe dollar was rising against the pound.
An analogy worth considering:
Dear English Football Association
As a representative of the Scottish Football Association, I would like to inform you that we wish to change the way the English Football team is managed to bring it more in line with the way our Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, is running Britain.
This will involve the following:
1. The Manager of the Scottish team is allowed to be involved with the running of the English team. However, the manager of the English team should have no say whatsoever in the running of the Scottish team. This shall be known as the West Lothian Question.
2. A sizable proportion of any money the English Football Association raises from, say sponsorship or crowd takings, shall be given to the Scottish Football Association, regardless as to whether you need it or not. This does not apply the other way round. This is known as the Barnett Formula.
3. You are not to call yourself England any longer. You will now be known as the British Regions. We, on the other hand, are still to be known as Scotland, “a proud and noble nation”.
4. Medical treatment to your players will be limited to a few treatments because of cost. No such stringent limitation applies to Scotland.
5. If your playing surfaces are flooded, then do not expect much assistance. However, Scottish pitches will be adequately provided for in the event of flooding.
6. From this moment on, the English Football Association will cease to exist. However, the Scottish Football Association will be allowed to continue to work independently.
A failure to follow these rules will see you branded as arrogant, selfish and unfair.
I’m sure you will find this to your satisfaction. After all, you seem to be happy with this state of affairs with your political system, so why not your Football team?
Yours sincerely
Mr G Brown.
PS You English are so naïve, you are being abolished and don’t even realise it.
Ref: http://www.thecep.org.uk
When Queenie kicks the bucket, then Britain will break-up.
An aging but generally liked monarch keeping the various nationalities and ethnicities together in a crumbling imperial state, Britain today looks a lot like Austria-Hungary in the final years leading up to 1914.
The analogy becomes even more poignant when you consider our rapidly dismissing role in the world, our total military dependence on our main ally, and our increasingly Balkanised population.
Just as a hundred years ago, large upheavals are coming, and not just to Britain.
Yes the Queen is very nice and pleasant (her husband is a bit of a windbag though) so most people are happy with the status quo. When the sad day comes and, to quote Christopher Hitchens, the slobbering, bat-eared, chinless, dauphin takes over I think we will start to see popular anti-monarchy movements in all places where it is still the official head of state.
Australia will be the first to go republican. That will have a domino effect stretching all the way back to the UK itself.
No, we’ll save them all the trouble by getting rid of the little twerp first.
What, and end up with a head of state like Bliar?
Much of the argument for independence has been shot by the disintegration of the Celtic Tiger Economy, and it’s propping up by the rest of the EU banking system
The safety of the rest of the Scots must be to recognise the bankruptcy of the Labour Party, who they vote for en bloc, which has failed to deliver any change for them during those generations. The solitary example held aloft should be Gorbals Mick
We may be stronger together, but separation might just divest the rest of the UK economy of RBS and HBOS/Lloyds
An Independent Scotland wouldnt have the idiotic FSA set up by Labour (Browns’s brainchild I think). It would have had a tighter fiscal control, like Canada or Norway
Both countries which have come out on top.
Scotland is more intune with Norway (same type of economy and population size)
Who owns the land your dingy little bedsit occupies?
I do.
You mean the same semidetached Daily Mail reading dimwitted fools who previously voted for Bliar and McBust?
A country were the men wear the skirts and the women wear the “troosers”
Just what the fuck is in it for us?
depends on your sexual preferences
Call it independence, do ye?
There’ll nere be independence whilst Campbells still side wi’ Royalists
Your ignorance of politics shines like a beacon matched only by your ignorance of economics.
You could have googled ‘Conservative MPs in Scotland’
But instead you chose to repeat your ignorance.
http://www.scottishconservatives.com/people/mp.aspx
Silly boy.
Scotland, land of the midge, moaners and meanies. Cut the fooking miserable place out of the UK and let them have their independence. Let them pay their taxes into their own coffer – but no more subsidies! Let them survive on their own revenue and we’ll soon see them squealing back to Westminster for hand-outs.
Oh, and cull all the Scots MPs that presently have their snouts in English afffairs.
I agree with all that. Only two provisos – the English & the Welsh also get a vote as to whether Scotland should be kicked out of the Union, and (hopefully!) after full independence is granted Britain implements border controls on the boundary between England & Scotland.
As a bonus, maybe seeing Scotland cast adrift might scare some sense into the Welsh…
Bronwyn does.
McTavish.
The Jocks will have a referendum on Independence-etc. At the mo, the other parties in the Jock Parly notably the Tories, lyinglabour, & the ‘WTF did we come 4th for party?’ are just playing ‘frustrate the Nats’. It’s the only power they can exert in the Parly, since the Tories & Libbies do not want a lyinglabour administration. The ‘reffie’ will come after a Conservative govt is elected and the option ‘devolution-max’ will be on it. The Tories will have conditions attached to ‘devo-max’:ie) less Scottish MP’s- all to be elected under PR; giving Scottish govt the SAME per-head to spend as in England; they could even change the Jock parly representation to PURE PR or increase the percentage of PR seats-who knows…
The bloody Arabs!
Racists bigots. I’ve only got one good word for the Scots, euthanasia.
The scientific answer is thermonuclear weapons. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_towns_and_cities_in_Scotland_by_population nuking the top 10 most populous cities would expunge about a third of the population. The rest can live off the land.
Guido can you something about the three arses that keep appearing above the comments box. The middle one looks as if she’s constipated.
Brown, Darling and Mendelson?
I think a lot of Scots are getting back behind staying in the union to spite the English now that there is a growing feeling south of the border that we would be better off out of this 300 year forced marriage.
There are no Liebour Members of Parliament representing England.
Dont forget that 10% of people living in Scotland were born in England – include me in that – moved to escape being the only one not wearing a burkha at the school gate..
assuming those people aren’t likely to vote for independence then that is a big skew on any likely vote.
You really are as dim-witted as your post implies, aren’t you Mom? Do you not understand that there are very many english born people living in Scotland who support the SNP – Mike Russell being one such?
I despise Westminister, not the english people…
Fucking delicious!
And what percentage of UK National debt will become Scottish debt?
Hopefully all of it.
Should be all of it, after all it’s a Jock who is responsible for it all.
The Scots wouldn’t dare vote for independence, it would be like biting the hand that feeds you. Without England, Scotland is just another welfare dependent council estate.
Scotland is to Britain what Quebec is to Canada.
yeah right tosser!
That old broken record
I havent laughed so much at the anti Scottish, racist crap being written up on this forum.
Think on this. at least Scotland has its own natural resources, what have England got?
Sweet fanny adams! which is why the mad one is going to build as many nuclear power stations as possible as England has sod all going for it as regards renewable energy sources
Guido,
Excellent piece. I completely agree.
It would also seem that the majority of your readers agree with Full Fiscal Autonomy or Independence for Scotland also.
In the face of such unanimity, let’s work together to make it happen.
Cameron is the man we need to convince of the basic common sense and fairness for all that comes with Independence or FFA.
Most of the stinking bastards in Scotland fall down dead at 47 (hooray!), after smoking 60 fags a day, scoffing 10 giant pies made from cow’s arse-holes and liquid pig fat each day, and drinking 2 gallons of meths (with a twist of lemon) each day, from the age of 10.
Fucking Nazi Hoons! We should build Hadrian’s Wall 150 feet high and mount automatic machine guns to shoot at the filth if the come anywhere near England. As to the Scotch pigs in England, we should tie them up and burn them like faggots (wood faggots, not Mandelson type arse faggots).
The Scotch are shit. They have always been shit and will always be shit.
Bliar: dirty evil lying thieving mass-murdering Scotch shit
Brown: loony dirty evil lying thieving mass-murdering Scotch shit
Darling: retarded dirty evil lying thieving mass-murdering Scotch shit
And so on ……… right the way through the rancid left Nazi kleptocracy that in Nu Liebore
“Och aye the noo” – shut your fucking face you Scotch Hoon.
Roll on separation I say.
What with 3 nuclear power stations, uranium enrichment at Dounray and a nuclear sub base at Faslane.
Just what the English want – another nuclear state aiming its missiles at it…..
nah, we’d just take them back and stick them in Newcastle. Wouldn’t surprise me if you ended up allying with Iran though.
don’t you get bored posting the same drivel under all those different names ?
all that time and effort and still you can’t hide your twatty repetitive posts or the fact that it’s you making most of them
does guido pay you to spam his threads ?
The Crown.
“An independent Scotland would see the SNP turn from being a left-wing nationalist party into a normal centre-right, patriotic party as found in every Western European democracy.”
Surely you jest, Guido. An independent Scotland would just end up the Venezuela of the North Atlantic.
Omce you English Imperialist Racist Bigots have paid back all the Oil and Gas money you have stolen from Scotland then and maybe then can we think about letting you English go mind you it wont be long before you are back with your begging bowls asking for more you English tramps.
Well said Braveheart. Remember Bannochburn or was it Culloden!
who paid for you Hoons for the previous 200 years?.
England should be ruled by the English with upstanding and pure English visionaries such as David Blunkett, John Prescott, Margaret Beckett, Jackie Smith, Keith Vaz, Jasmine Ahlibi Brown, and Lennox Lewis and Zola Bud maybe Baroness Scotland could be the new Prime Minister just to show Scotland that we are a serious nation and not a third world dump for Sudanese immigrants, that in the green and pleasant fields of the Moss Side Estate and the Valleys of Toxteth and Brixton are the true English values of shooting stabbing mugging living off the welfare state – the Scotch think they can do that but no one is as lazy and uselss as we English cmon Engerland Engerland INNIT
Given that the party of independence struggles to get a third of the vote and even that has declined since the Lockerbie bomber fiasco, Salmond must be off his chump if he thinks he can win a vote on independence. I guess he feels it might be his last chance before the SNP lose their grip on Holyrood. Then again he will almost certainly try again if he gets the chance while Westminster is run by the Tories.
The Tories aren’t even in power yet and already their principles are a sham. Reminds me of Cameroon’s cycle. And they wonder why we’re sceptical of politicians?
Good, get rid of them.
If they had become independent in ‘99 instead of just devolving they’d have lasted a grand total of 8 years before the collapse of RBS bankrupted them. Do they really think that a population of 6 million, only a few hundred thousand of whom actually pay taxes could have weathered that storm? Let them see what it’s like to try and maintain a 21st century standard of living with their economy (and without the 57 million people in England propping them up and bailing them out). Similarly, solve the West Lothian question, tell all the mad Righteous Stasi who are constantly bleating about fags, booze and other lifestyle issues (and are invariably Scottish) to stay there, and remove a major chunk of Labour’s core vote forever so they will never see power again.
Sorry – is there any downside at all to letting Scotland go?
The National Westminster ” had a recent history of poor financial performance”. Its poor performance led it to be taken over by RBS. In such a scenario it could easily ahve needed rescuing.
When it comes to Scotland, I’m with Garth Marenghi.
Sad to see a perfectly sensible piece by Guido Fawkes become an excuse for the ‘Sock a Jock’ brigade to air their dismal prejudices. God! it is not even original or inventive abuse.
Was there no room left in der Daily Mail for you then??
Seriously, some of you people need psychiatric help, even more than Brown.
Ever been had?
oooooh get her
when did england ever stand on its own feet without stealing the resources of other countries whether natural or human, try lets see if you have the balls
“When did England ever stand on it’s own two feet?”
Caledonian irony, perhaps?
“An independent Scotland would see the SNP turn from being a left-wing nationalist party into a normal centre-right, patriotic party as found in every Western European democracy.”
No it wouldn’t, at least not for a long time. The SNP would just follow the same logic as Brown; they’d just get themselves into ever increasing debt until they went bust, then they’d all be forced out of power and someone else would have to clean up their mess. So, what you say would happen, but it would only occur after scotland went bankrupt.
Brown/Labour have been actively destroying our economy and driving us bankrupt for 12 years, and the uk electorate have only just realised; the electorate are sadly very stupid/slow, and politicians like those in the SNP are equally stupid.
fuck off you English batards
Cricket batards is that?
Are you a friend of Gromit’s?
its the old alliance – if you’ve been shagging french sheep in exile for too long you pick up the lingo
No more of this anti-decmocratic bullsh*t.
Scottish MP’s not only get a vote on English/Wales/N Irish affairs, but they have even forged some of the most disgracefull Nanny laws all of us South and West of the Border are forced to endure. NO such laws exist in Scotland.
I am amazed that CMD wants to hold the Union together with current disasterous policies in place, if this situation continues it will prove the guy is nothing more than a wet sponge.
Either Scotland is ruled by the complete abortion that is Westminister, or we seperate. I don’t care which, that’s for the Scots, but this rediculous situation can not be allowed to continue.
Correction there DL George. Scottish MPs – that being SNP – do NOT vote on English affairs, which is the correct thing to do.
MPs from Tory, Labour and Lib Dem do however. These are not Scots at all but Union flag waving Brits. Parties run out of London. How come the leaders of these parties haven’t sorted that out? They are in charge after all. Very easy to do.
Didn’t know that about the SNP. Thanks Bob. It makes sense, the MP’s I’m thinking about here are all Zanu/Scot, can’t remember other parties (even con/lib) being involved.
Cheers.
Wow, I just wrote a note of thanks and it disapeared into the ether.
Here we go again…
Thanks for the correction Bob, didn’t know that.
I’ve never understood why the Scots just don’t have a vote and make up their minds once and for all?
They whine about London ’stealing THEIR oil’ so if they think that why didn’t they go independent decades ago?
The only thing I want that if the jocks clear off we have a law in England that says you have to be born in England to be an MP or PM, just like the yanks have, otherwise we will still get all the human garbage from Scotland joining Liebour and taking over Westminster again.
So you’ll be keeping Darling then you mongo since he’s born in England?
I’d have Darling over Brown any day (not in a bloke on bloke way you understand).
I’d LOVE to have a bit of Darling, we all would at the BBC.
Hahahahaha!
made a proper cun’t out of yourself there didn’t you Ex BBC rent boy with a sore arse/D L George/Obama is a Twat
All the sockpuppeting in the world will still never hide the fact that you are a complete twat and m0ng
Spot on Guido with your analysis for David Cameron could pull the rug complete;ly out from under Labour’s support in Scotland if he has the courage to devolve full fiscal autonomy to Scotland (Devo max) but with Scotland remaining still within the UK for that is what the vast majority of Scots would vote for. For Labour are offering nothing more to the Scots but their Calman proposals which is a dogs breakfast that will inflict enormous damage to the Scots economy if applied. Scots are naturally conservative – indeed you may recall its not that long ago since Scotland returned a majority of Tory MP’s to Westminster. They would return to the fold if the economy of Scotland was improved. Labour fear this more than anything for it is only the benefits dependency that they created that gives them votes in their municipal socialist republics in Scotland.
They say ignorance is bliss and that may be the case for many of your correspondents who appear to think Brown and his new Scots Labour MP’s are typical of Scotland. However Labour’s support in Scotland is mostly confined to the poorest former industrial areas where benefit dependency is off the scale and people vote Labour out of tribal loyalty and because Labour feed their benefit dependency habit. For example Glasgow which has only 12% of Scotland’s population receives 22% (yes 22%!) of government spending in Scotland. You won’t find much of a vote for Labour in the oil rich North of Scotland for example. Its no exaggeration to say that Labour don’t want the constituencies they represent to become economically successful for that would destroy their core vote. The people of Scotland are fed up of being portrayed as charlatans and wasters because of the actions of Labour politicians and the people they represent and want to stand on their own two feet unaided but still within the UK. That is where the SNP come in for they have the vision to make the changes required but need complete fiscal autonomy in order to do it otherwise Labour will still call the shots economically in Scotland because they have gerrymandered the system of voting for Holyrood to benefit Labour. All of this could change for the better if David Cameron has the vision to make the offer of full fiscal autonomy and changes to the voting system for the Scots Parliament in his manifesto for the next general election. The majority of Scots are naturally conservative but turned away temporarily from the Tories to the SNP because the Tories don’t yet appear to have the vision to give the Scots the tools to sort their own problems out.
The Duke of Roxburgh owns a sizable chunk.
When I was a young man my wife and I visited Hadrian’s wall near Housesteads.I am English/Irish and she was Welsh/Jewish/English.She was caught short and had a shit near the wall,I can’t remember on which side and I didn’t care at the time.Doesn’t this demonstrate the absurdity of xenpohobia?
Landowners
Other Landowners (including some based offshore)
I was walking along Hadrians Wall one day when I saw this lovely young thing having a shit on the English side of the wall.
I though to myself I bet she is an English/Irish/Welsh/Jewish/English bird., they always do that.
Get to fuck you racist scotch twat
Myth 1: Scots get more public cash than anyone else
Fact:
Scotland, with its many remote areas and pockets of deprivation, certainly has hefty public spending by any standards. But the highest? It is not even close.
That honour, by a considerable margin, goes to Northern Ireland. Official public expenditure there is measured at £10,271 per head at the last full count. The social and economic legacy of 30 years of civil strife means that the province needs more support than any other part of the UK.
Next up in Britain’s regional league table of state spending is London. The government, in all its guises, dished out £9748 for every man, woman and child there, not least because of its armies of civil servants and creaking, expensive and essential transport infrastructure.
Next we come to Scotland, which edges ahead of the north-east of England to take third place in the spending stakes. Scots account for an average of £9631 in state expenditure all kinds, vastly more than non-metropolitan counties of the south-east and east of England. There, state spending averages out at just £7544 and £7256 respectively per head, less than anywhere else.
Perhaps this should not be too surprising, considering that Scotland contains one-third of the British land mass, with its mixture of isolated islands and rural communities. It also has some of the most deprived communities in the UK, in cities such as Glasgow. The Barnett formula – which is used to work how much the Scottish Government should receive – is often cited as proof of disproportionate Scottish spending. Yet over time it is actually supposed to reduce spending in Scotland.
So where are today’s numbers coming from? We can forget devolution and all of the complications over the way in which the Scottish Government is funded. These figures are a measurement of how total government spending, devolved or not, is distributed in the nations and regions.
They are based on something which economists call, affectionately, Pesa – the Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses.
Most of the money which is spent in Britain is what the government regards “identifiable”. That means accountants know exactly what part of the country in which it was spent.
There are other funds that are a bit trickier, with “non-identifiable” spending – money that is hard to pin down to one part of the country or another. The numbers crunched here are how much “identifiable” cash was spent, added to an estimate, carefully calculated by consultants Oxford Economics, for how “non-identifiable” money is distributed.
Total “identifiable” spending in Scotland came to £41.7bn in including the £22.7bn spent by the devolved Scottish Government, according to Pesa. That compares with £344.7bn for England.
Myth 2: English taxes pay for Scotland’s high spending
Fact:
Scotland’s big spending bills might sound high. But, at the last count, they were almost exactly the same as the government revenues raised in the nation.
Adding up how much tax Scots and Scottish businesses generate is far from easy.
But Oxford Economics, the consultants, did so earlier this year, based on Treasury figures. They found the tax haul from Scotland was £49bn, compared with total spending of £49.2bn. Scotland, in that year at least, was in the red – but not by very much and certainly within any margin of error.
Where does all this money come from? The big figure includes the UK’s entire North Sea revenues of £9.7bn . That could be controversial: there is dispute about how much oil and gas is from Scottish waters. The exact size of Scotland’s oil bonanza has always been open to question, a key battleground in the statistical war between Nationalists and Unionists.
How North Sea revenue might be divided is also questioned. There are extensive gas fields off the coast of north-east England. A split might mean 75% or even 95% of the total coming to Scotland. It should be borne in mind that the £9.7bn figure came at a time when Brent crude was trading at as much as $50 per barrel.
Other revenues are also interesting. Aside from income tax, national insurance and VAT, Scots make a heftier than average contribution to the Exchequer on several core revenue sources.
Corporation tax runs slightly above the national per-capita average, at £3.51bn in total: not least, say economists, because of the healthy financial sector. That figure is far higher than most UK regions but little more than half as much as in London.
Heavy smokers push tobacco duty collections up to well above £1bn a year, out of a UK total of £8bn.
Scots do represent a far smaller proportion of some other revenues. Collection of stamp duty on home purchases adds up to a lot less than in London and the English shires, where house prices are far higher. London accounts for nearly 28% of total UK stamp duties.
So where is Scotland in a league table of contributors to the national UK coffers? Only Londoners contribute more, per capita. Revenues from the capital add up to £10,947 per head, nearly £1200 more than spending in the city. Scots pip residents of the south-east counties to come second, with total taxes, including North Sea oil, of £9593 per head. The north-east of England, for the record, contributes least, at barely £6000 per head, just a few pounds less than Northern Ireland. Both regions, along with the north-west of England and Wales, are considerable net beneficiaries of income transferred from the richer parts of the United Kingdom to the poorer.
Myth 3: Scots take more from the welfare state than anyone else
Fact:
Scotland does have some pretty horrific areas of deprivation, by any measure. But the nation’s overall bill for welfare and pension spending lags well behind Britain’s most needy areas.
The UK’s biggest outgoings on “social protection”, says Pesa, are in the north-east of England and Northern Ireland, the two areas which – perhaps not coincidentally – contributed least in tax and other revenues.
The overall “social protection” spending item includes everything from unemployment and disability benefits to pensions, including those for former government employees.
In north-east England the payments average at £3284 , the last year for which there are official statistics. That was only slightly higher than the £3256 per head in Northern Ireland. Next in the welfare league table is Wales, where payments came to £3136.
Only then does Scotland feature, with an average dole and pensions bill of £3086, slightly ahead of the per-capita figure of £3066 in the north-west of England. Of the 10 areas of the UK with the lowest life expectancy, seven are in Scotland. Shorter lives mean less money spent on pensions.
London, despite severe pockets of poverty, was mid-table at £2876, with south-east England’s home countries, by many measures the richest part of western Europe, the smallest recipient – at an average of just £2382 per head.
Overall, Scottish welfare bills were higher than the average for the whole of England, which was £2736.
So Scots received £15.7bn in social welfare and pension payments in 2005-06, up from £15.2bn the previous year. The bills topped £2.5bn for incapacity, injury and disability benefits; hit £3.6bn for child benefit, income support and family tax credits; and neared £1.4bn for housing benefits.
State pensions in Scotland amounted to £4.7bn, against £46.4bn in England.
Myth 4: Scots enjoy far better public services than the English
Fact:
devolution dividend of better hospitals, schools and myriad freebies in Scotland have dominated some right-wing Fleet Street papers in the past year or two. So are our services marching ahead of England’s? Most experts baulk at answering that one, muttering under their breath about “swings and roundabouts”. It is certainly hard to find clear-cut evidence that English voters are right to feel resentful about the land of milk and honey north of the border.
The issue came to a head last month when an MP representing a seat in the north-west of England asked Gordon Brown why his constituents should pay for Scots to get free prescriptions.
Graham Brady’s constituency in Sale, Greater Manchester, is in a region that benefits from far more net “subsidy” than Scotland. Net gain for the north-west of England, at £1732 per head, is 45 times higher than the modest £38 each Scot, according to Oxford Economics, gains from the rest of the UK.
There was another problem with Mr Brady’s question. Scots don’t actually get free prescriptions, at least not yet (the Welsh, however, do). The Scottish Government has said it believes medicines should be free.
But it is far from clear that First Minister Alex Salmond and his ministers will achieve their aim. After all, they don’t have a majority in Holyrood.
But Mr Brady’s sentiment was real, and the widely-held belief that Scots get free prescriptions is not the only myth about our public services bonanza.
Only this week, English-based newspapers or politicians have also claimed that children in Scotland get free healthy school meals and enjoy shorter waiting times for hospital appointments. Neither is true.
Scotland’s critics have also highlighted one or two of the real big ticket successes of devolution, including much-vaunted (but still patchy) free personal care for the elderly, smaller class sizes and free bus travel for pensioners.
True, some NHS drugs are prescribed more quickly in Scotland than south of the border, but only because our regulation process is more streamlined. It works both ways, with pregnant women often receiving two free scans in England, a far better service than in Scotland.
Oddly, some of the multi-billion-pound investments in England, especially the south-east, seem to be forgotten. Crossrail, the scheme to improve commuter services to and across London, will cost an estimated £15bn. That would be enough to keep the entire Scottish transport budget going for seven-and-a-half years.
Myth 5: Scottish ministers and the public sector hand big ticket’ projects to Scotland
Fact:
Edinburgh famously got Holyrood, one of the most notorious public building projects in recent decades. Critics north and south of the border watched as its costs mounted, ending at £414m, although that is less than previously estimated. But has Scotland really capitalised on the Westminster big-wigs who hail from the north?
The Scottish Parliament is at least up and running and doing the job it was built for. The same cannot be said of the Millennium Dome. By the time it closed, unloved, it had consumed £603m of lottery cash, £200m of it in rescue grants and top-ups.
London, too, has by far the most to gain from 2012 Olympics. The official budget for the Olympics, including lottery spending that would otherwise have gone to Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and the English regions, is running at £9.3bn. Few expect the final bill to come in on budget. Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell has admitted the government had still to do a “line-by-line analysis” of planned expenditure. The event could end up costing four times its original estimate, some analysts claim.
Lottery funds, of course, are not included in the distribution of government money. Neither is the way the BBC spends its licence fee. The corporation earlier this autumn opened a £180m HQ in Scotland.
However, it recently said it would triple spending north of the border to bring programme-making in line with Scottish contributions to the licence fee.
About time it was said too! London doesnt know how lucky it is!!! But put money aside, the solution is not some racial banning from high office or banning Scots voting on English issues or even independence. What needs to happen is we should only have UK Ministries represented at the Cabinet table otherwise, quite rightly, Scots will ask why England only Ministries are that UK cabinet given they do not represent the UK. Health, education, justice, the list goes on. Instead, bring in an English Secretary of State to whom all these offices would report. We had it that way in Scotland until Devolution. The whole of Scotland’s interests were represented at Cabinet level by one person. And it worked. It was truly joined up government. And it saved a fortune in costs.
Full independence for Scotland, fine, but none of this fiscal autonomy nonsense please. If the Scots wants to go they should go, bags, baggage and bagpipes, remembering to close the border firmly behind them. Passports and visas to be required and no dual nationality option.