Tweet
For the latest news from Scotland see our ScotNews feed at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/
Electric Scotland News
We've fixed some long standing issues on the site this week..
.
Recipe database
This is where you can view recipes but also add your own and so contribute to the service. You can find this at http://www.electricscotland.com/recipe/
Help System
When you click on HELP in our main menu you should have got this service which provides answers and tips for using the service. This wasn't working but now is. You can see this at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/help/
Article Service
This was a service to let you add your own articles to the site but we somehow lost the database and the program wouldn't load either. We've now fixed it so it loads but we're digging through our backups to see if we can find a copy of the database. We'll let you know if we find it.
Postcard Service
I wasn't aware this program wasn't working but having now found out we've partially fixed the problem. By this I mean if you wish to send out a postcard immediately it will go out fine. However if you schedule it to go out the next day or another day then it won't work. We are looking to see how to fix this issue and hope to have it resolved shortly.
Our Community
I've been asked to create an online service for the Grand Priory of Canada. The idea is to create an online Priory so I see this as a way to create one. Essentially as Canada is such a huge country it's often hard to attend regular meetings. For example in Toronto we often have meetings at the Royal Canadian Military Institute. However, for some it can take an hour to get to it and a couple of hours to drive home after the event. Parking is also an issue. This means not many people attend these events and so the thinking is to create an online Priory. This being the case the Community will continue for a while at least while we try this out.
ElectricScotland.net
We have closed this site and transferred the content to either electricscotland.com or electriccanadian.com.
The reason for this is that we intend to install word press on the site and then embark on transferring our electricscotland.com web site content to it. The simple reason for this is that the web is now being accessed by mobile users so that now they represent over 50% of folk visiting web sites. Google has also announced that next year it will focus first on mobile and so mobile friendly web sites will get preferred treatment from them. All this means that we need to get mobile friendly which means we need to ditch our FrontPage web site to move to a newer mobile friendly platform.
We will be installing word press and then work with it to see how best we might get our content over to that platform. Once we become familiar with it we'll be able to make decisions on how to transfer our content. Of course if it means copying and pasting each page over then we'll likely see if any of you reading this newsletter would be willing to help by devoting an hour a day or part of your weekend as otherwise it could take a couple of years to move the content.
Scottish News from this weeks newspapers
Note that this is a selection and more can be read in our ScotNews feed on our index page where we list news from the past 1-2 weeks. I am partly doing this to build an archive of modern news from and about Scotland as all the newsletters are archived and also indexed on Google and other search engines. I might also add that in newspapers such as the Guardian, Scotsman, Courier, etc. you will find many comments which can be just as interesting as the news story itself and of course you can also add your own comments if you wish.
Nicola Sturgeon webcast
BBC Scotland's political editor Brian Taylor puts your questions to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon in a webcast during the SNP conference in Glasgow.
View this at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-37650643
The paradoxes of Scottish politics
The SNP and two different political unions
Read more at:
http://brexitcentral.com/eben-wilson...itical-unions/
Your favourite stories from around Scotland
From the BBC
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-37633070
Scottish Sliced Sausage
I happened to find a YouTube recipe for this which actually comes from Elda's recipe on our web site,
View this at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/food.../sssausage.htm
Salmond Spins Again
He clearly does have nothing but contempt for the intelligence of listening voters.
Read more at:
http://chokkablog.blogspot.ca/2016/1...-again_16.html
Royal National Mòd lives up to its name
The Prince of Wales was a surprise guest at the Royal National Mòd in Stornoway
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/cu...s-in-1-4262139
Sunset Song voted Scotland's favourite novel
The 1932 elegy to crofting sees off contemporary stars including Iain Banks, Irvine Welsh and JK Rowling to top BBC poll
Read more at:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/bo...novel-crofting
For more information see: http://www.electricscotland.com/history/other/lgg.htm
Establishment of UK-New Zealand trade policy dialogue
The UK is an important partner for New Zealand and we want to build on that in the years ahead.
Read more at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/e...olicy-dialogue
Tories open up biggest lead over Labour since 2010
The Conservatives have opened up their biggest lead over Labour since before the 2010 general election, according to a new opinion poll.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/politic...2010-1-4263177
20,000 people sign petition to improve train service
Scotrail anger as 20,000 people sign petition delivered to SNP Government to improve train service
Read more at:
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/po...e-sign-9081568
Electric Canada
Chronicles of Canada
I discovered this excellent collection and have been able to find all but 1 volume. I note that due to the tight binding that the first several pages of each volume have cut out the first or last letter or two of the word so is a touch challenging to read but as you progress the problem mostly goes away.
I am going to add a volume each week so you have time to read them. Here is a description of the first volume...
Most readers of Stephen Leacock's works are familiar with his witty and humorous writings, but few may be aware that he was also a gifted teacher, political ideologue, economist and fiction writer. Though he wrote six books on Canadian history, none of them attained the status of a standard text on the subject and were regarded more as opinion pieces without much academic foundation. Yet, the Chronicles of Canada series by Stephen Leacock remains an interesting and entertaining read.
In this volume, Dawn of Canadian History: Aboriginal Canada, which is part of a thirty-two book series of short and simple essays, Leacock explores the little known origins of Canada's past. Leacock begins with his theories on the geological formation of the country and the beginnings of the earth's structures. The emergence of human beings and the original settlers of the North American Continent, the Native Americans as we know them today, is also well described, though in terms that may seem outdated to modern readers.
The “Canadian aborigines” and their culture is also described in terms of the different tribes and their relationship to the Eskimos in the extreme northern part of Canada. The advent of the white races like the Vikings or Norsemen is also one of the important events in Canada's history, as it changed the course of civilization in this country. Legends of Greenland and Iceland are well retold in the chapter entitled The Legend of the Norsemen. Another crucial event was the arrival of John Cabot of Bristol somewhere on the Labrador coast in the sixteenth century.
Politics in the sixteenth and seventeenth century Europe and the rivalry between nations like Spain, Portugal, England and France, seeking to explore new worlds and enrich their own countries is also well described. Leacock ends his book with the arrival of French explorer Jacques Cartier, known today as the Father of Canada. In historical terms, this would be set in the seventeenth century, when another great French explorer, Samuel de Champlain was making the first accurate map of the country.
For present day readers, Chronicles of Canada..., is a pleasant blend of facts with myths and legends. It is this quality which makes it much more entertaining than a pure historical account.
You can read this volume at: http://www.electriccanadian.com/hist...cles/index.htm
Electric Scotland
Life of Dr. John Leyden
Poet and Linguist by John Reith, M.A., B.D.
You can read about him at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...eyden_john.htm
Charters and Documents relating to the Burgh of Paisley (1163-1665)
And Extracts from the Records of the Town Council (1594-1620) with an excellent Introduction by W. M. Metcalfe, D.D., FSA Scot. (1902)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ow/paisley.htm
A Land of Romance
The Border, It's History and Legend by Jean Lang
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/history/borders/
The Life of Major-General Wauchope, C.B., C.M.G., LL.D
By Sir George Douglas, Bart. (1905)
You can read this book at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...alwauchope.pdf
Manual of the Law of Scotland
By John Hill Burton (Second Edition)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...awscotland.pdf
Memoir of Thomas Thomson
You can read about this Advocate in a book by Cosmo Innes (1854) at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...son_thomas.htm
Scottish History & Life
An excellent book with hundreds of illustrations but the scan quality is poor in that the text is quite faint. You can read this at:http://www.electricscotland.com/book...istorylife.htm where you will also get a copy of the Preface and the Contents page.
The Story
I am persisting on posting up stories about Scotland and Brexit and Independence as I just feel we need to look carefully at the facts. I read many articles each week on both sides of the argument and I am more than happy to post up contrary views but I won't post up information that is clearly inaccurate. I don't blindly accept arguments as I always do my own research to verify the facts and this means going to source documents and also reading opposing views.
The SNP have a fixation with being a member of the EU and so this article really demonstrates why this is not a healthy position for Scotland. I have tried to understand why they take this position and have concluded that the SNP have no policies in place to negotiate with the world if Scotland becomes an Independent nation and so would be reliant on the EU for trade negotiations. While that might not be a bad idea I can't help but think that the majority of countries in the EU have little in common with Scotland. It's like the SNP wants a minimum price for alcohol but the EU is resisting this process. Scotland has been unable to put a proper case for public/private investment and so the EU is withholding many millions from Scotland as a result. We actually pay more to the EU than we get back in grants so we're a net contributor to the EU. And our trade with the EU is less than our trade with the rUK and also the USA. And so why is the SNP so focussed on the EU? I have yet to find out for definite and hence this article.
I also know that some people reading this newsletter will not agree with my views but hopefully they won't mind my various postings on this front as I still add lots of history to the site each week which is not involved with recent history.
I also got an email request this week to be taken of our list which of course I have done. The person was quite frank with me as he gave the reason that he didn't like my Conservative bias and thought I should be supporting Scottish Independence. I confess I have a more liberal bias than a conservative one. I choose the newspapers I will look at for the news stories and currently I use the Scotsman, Dundee Courier, Guardian, BBC and the Chokka Blog as my main sources although I also look at the Highland Free Press, Reuters, and the Sunday Post. I do also look at BrexitCentral and ThinkScotland and the Scottish Review and will also check WingsOverScotland from time to time. I don't use other news sources that only let you read one story and then you need to take out a subscription to read other stories. I will check the Daily Record from time to time but as some of you may know there is little of substance in that newspaper.
Now I have to say that I was ambivalent about Scottish Independence but I was clear in my conviction that we shouldn't be a member of the EU. If I was back home in Scotland I likely would have chanced my arm by voting for Independence but I have also been clear in my distrust of the SNP. They are of course a superb political party and to make the gains they have made they speak with one voice and simply don't allow any descent in the ranks. They are also excellent at spin and by that I mean telling us that the EU is our largest export market which is correct but they failed to tell us that nearly 70% of our exports to the EU go to the rUK alone. That's just one of the reasons I don't trust them.
I also joined the SDA for a time when they were a think tank on how Scotland could be run as an Independent country as I liked their views. However as a political party they went down the tank. I also ran the web site for Ian Hudgeton who was the SNP's MEP and did that for some 5 years.
My view at this time is simple... I don't believe Scotland should be independent right now given the debt to GDP ratio which is greater than all other EU countries including Greece and the difficulty in being able to join the EU because of it. We also have no trade negotiation courses in our universities and so are simply not prepared to work on the global stage. Instead I feel we should embrace Brexit and use that to prepare Scotland for Independence some years down the road. I also am quite fed up with the SNP blaming Westminster for all their woes. They need to take responsibility themselves and not keep blaming others. I see no work being done with our fishing folk and on leaving the EU fishing and agriculture will become another devolved responsibility. I mean through EU mismanagement and lack of SNP support we lost 100,000 jobs and some 3 billion in annual income in the fishing industry alone.
Of course with me now living in Canada whatever Scotland decides is ok with me as I won't really be too affected by whatever route that Scotland takes. I am however concerned that we are not getting any decent information on Brexit and how to prepare for being outside. There are of course difficulties but also many opportunities but we seem unable to discuss anything positive and so we get very biased reporting. I liked Dyson's take on Brexit where he stated that the EU accounts for some 17% of world trade and he felt that there were great opportunities outside the EU. He also talked about the opportunities with the Commonwealth countries where we all speak English and have similar laws and they represent a third of the world's population of some 2.3 billion. This is also where future growth will come from.
I also believe that the EU will see sense on trade deals as look at how many cars come in from Germany with VW, Mercedez, BMW, etc. And I believe we import some 60 billion of goods from the EU more than we export to them. So if we don't do trade deals then the EU will suffer more than we will on that fact alone.
So the above is my reason why I do feel that I should profile Brexit from time to time in this newsletter. Of course if you don't agree with any of this, if you are reading this newsletter in our community, you can reply and provide your thoughts on the subject.
The story this week is ...
The single market that matters to Scotland is the UK
By Brian Monteith in the Scotsman
SCOTTISH exports to the British single market are more than four times as important as the EU, writes Brian Monteith
One of the irritating aspects of Scottish political debate is how it is often so very superficial, so empty of an evidence base. Political leaders talk regularly in meaningless clichés and platitudes as if they have never given any serious thought to what they are saying or looked for facts to back up their claims.
Nicola Sturgeon’s decision to make the trigger for a second independence referendum Scotland’s likely departure from inside the EU single market to having access from outside (like the rest of the world) is just the latest such example that deserves to be challenged. It is a false pretext for putting the country through a great deal of economic disruption, public cost and social pain that needs to be called out.
Scotland is currently a member of two single markets, the United Kingdom and the European Union. The EU and the single market are one and the same thing. You cannot be inside the EU and outside the single market, but you can be outside the EU and have access to the single market. That is why David Cameron and George Osborne repeatedly said that if we voted to leave the EU we would leave the single market and is also why Michael Gove and Boris Johnson agreed with them. It was never disputed by either the remain or leave campaigns that this is what Brexit would mean.
Any suggestion that the electorate was duped is to either ignore the interviews, statements and reports of the campaign or to treat the voters as stupid. I tend to believe that the British electorate is rational in its voting behaviour and I think people knew what they were doing. They simply wanted control again of their laws, taxes, borders, fisheries and so many other facets of life.
Some countries, such as Norway, have been willing to pay a special price (including open migration) to gain privileged access to the single market. That’s unusual, for the rest of the world simply trades with the EU and accepts the tariffs of its customs union that average just over 1 per cent. [Editors Note: Other figures quote an average of 3.6%, with cars as 10% and wine at 32%] That is why you can buy Mazda sports cars from Japan or Jeep Wranglers from the US. It is why we buy wine from Australia or coffee from Bolivia.
We need to ask the question which single market matters most to Scotland? Just how important is the EU’s single market to Scotland and what difference could it make if the UK does not negotiate any special deal?
Scottish Government statistics show that in 2002 £28.7bn or 60 per cent of Scottish exports went to the rest of the UK, £10.9bn or 23 per cent went to the EU and £8.4bn or 17 per cent went to the rest of the world. The UK was two and a half times as important to Scotland as the EU for revenues, taxes and jobs.
By 2014 the figures had changed significantly, with £48.5bn or 64.4 per cent of Scottish exports going to the rest of the UK – a staggering increase of 69 per cent. Exports to the rest of the world grew an amazing 80 per cent to £15.2bn or 20.2 per cent of total exports, while exports to the EU’s single market rose by a lamentable 6 per cent to £11.6bn or 15.4 per cent. Now, the UK single market is more than four times as important as the EU and that trend is continuing, while the EU has fallen into third place.
Surely if access to the single market is so important it would have excelled compared to countries outside it operating under World Trade Organisation rules? But there’s the rub, WTO tariffs have fallen considerably and now average less than 2 per cent. The world has changed since the EU single market was conceived, only Sturgeon and many of her persuasion have not noticed.
Worse still, the figures are flattering to the EU. Our largest EU export market is, strangely, the Netherlands; many goods being shipped to the rest of the world first go to Rotterdam and are recorded as an export to the EU, not their final destination. It is generally held that this “Rotterdam effect” accounts for about 4 per cent of all UK exports but given the scale of exports from Scotland to the Netherlands it may well be higher.
In other words over that 12-year period the relative importance of the EU single market deteriorated badly while the importance of trade to the UK single market grew significantly – as did our trade with the rest of the world.
It is often said that the EU single market is important to Scotland’s finance industry but there is no EU single market in services. There is no banking union, no single stock market, just a patchwork of pension regulations and hugely differing cultural attitudes to investment and banking. This EU failure is reflected in the fact that while financial services represents 70 per cent of the EU economy only 22 per cent of it is internal trade.
On the contrary, the EU single market has posed a threat to our financial services industry through control of banking capital ratios, insurance solvency, a proposed transaction tax and wage caps. All of these things can affect financial services in Scotland as well as the City. Likewise, suggestions that the loss of EU passporting for capital markets will be significant is exaggerated, given we have more financial trade with the US without passports than EU trade with them.
If there is a single market that matters to Scotland then the UK is the real thing, it is how a single market is meant to work. There is freedom of movement of people and capital – with one language, one currency, one central bank and a sovereign national parliament that is ultimately responsible for the common public finances including all assets and debts. It also happens to have a common history and shared culture of over 300 years that to many, maybe still most people, matters.
That is the single market that our businesses and financial services depend on, where the vast majority of their customers are.
It is absurd to suggest the answer to the alleged distress of leaving one single market is to leave the other more important one of the two. But this is not about economic growth, jobs or prosperity – it is blind ideology willing to incur any amount of pain to achieve a minority goal.
END.
Note that you can read the comments about this story and add your own at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion...e-uk-1-4260051
And that's it for this week and hope you all enjoy your weekend.
Alastair
http://www.electricscotland.com/
Electric Scotland News
We've fixed some long standing issues on the site this week..
.
Recipe database
This is where you can view recipes but also add your own and so contribute to the service. You can find this at http://www.electricscotland.com/recipe/
Help System
When you click on HELP in our main menu you should have got this service which provides answers and tips for using the service. This wasn't working but now is. You can see this at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/help/
Article Service
This was a service to let you add your own articles to the site but we somehow lost the database and the program wouldn't load either. We've now fixed it so it loads but we're digging through our backups to see if we can find a copy of the database. We'll let you know if we find it.
Postcard Service
I wasn't aware this program wasn't working but having now found out we've partially fixed the problem. By this I mean if you wish to send out a postcard immediately it will go out fine. However if you schedule it to go out the next day or another day then it won't work. We are looking to see how to fix this issue and hope to have it resolved shortly.
Our Community
I've been asked to create an online service for the Grand Priory of Canada. The idea is to create an online Priory so I see this as a way to create one. Essentially as Canada is such a huge country it's often hard to attend regular meetings. For example in Toronto we often have meetings at the Royal Canadian Military Institute. However, for some it can take an hour to get to it and a couple of hours to drive home after the event. Parking is also an issue. This means not many people attend these events and so the thinking is to create an online Priory. This being the case the Community will continue for a while at least while we try this out.
ElectricScotland.net
We have closed this site and transferred the content to either electricscotland.com or electriccanadian.com.
The reason for this is that we intend to install word press on the site and then embark on transferring our electricscotland.com web site content to it. The simple reason for this is that the web is now being accessed by mobile users so that now they represent over 50% of folk visiting web sites. Google has also announced that next year it will focus first on mobile and so mobile friendly web sites will get preferred treatment from them. All this means that we need to get mobile friendly which means we need to ditch our FrontPage web site to move to a newer mobile friendly platform.
We will be installing word press and then work with it to see how best we might get our content over to that platform. Once we become familiar with it we'll be able to make decisions on how to transfer our content. Of course if it means copying and pasting each page over then we'll likely see if any of you reading this newsletter would be willing to help by devoting an hour a day or part of your weekend as otherwise it could take a couple of years to move the content.
Scottish News from this weeks newspapers
Note that this is a selection and more can be read in our ScotNews feed on our index page where we list news from the past 1-2 weeks. I am partly doing this to build an archive of modern news from and about Scotland as all the newsletters are archived and also indexed on Google and other search engines. I might also add that in newspapers such as the Guardian, Scotsman, Courier, etc. you will find many comments which can be just as interesting as the news story itself and of course you can also add your own comments if you wish.
Nicola Sturgeon webcast
BBC Scotland's political editor Brian Taylor puts your questions to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon in a webcast during the SNP conference in Glasgow.
View this at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-37650643
The paradoxes of Scottish politics
The SNP and two different political unions
Read more at:
http://brexitcentral.com/eben-wilson...itical-unions/
Your favourite stories from around Scotland
From the BBC
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-37633070
Scottish Sliced Sausage
I happened to find a YouTube recipe for this which actually comes from Elda's recipe on our web site,
View this at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/food.../sssausage.htm
Salmond Spins Again
He clearly does have nothing but contempt for the intelligence of listening voters.
Read more at:
http://chokkablog.blogspot.ca/2016/1...-again_16.html
Royal National Mòd lives up to its name
The Prince of Wales was a surprise guest at the Royal National Mòd in Stornoway
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/cu...s-in-1-4262139
Sunset Song voted Scotland's favourite novel
The 1932 elegy to crofting sees off contemporary stars including Iain Banks, Irvine Welsh and JK Rowling to top BBC poll
Read more at:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/bo...novel-crofting
For more information see: http://www.electricscotland.com/history/other/lgg.htm
Establishment of UK-New Zealand trade policy dialogue
The UK is an important partner for New Zealand and we want to build on that in the years ahead.
Read more at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/e...olicy-dialogue
Tories open up biggest lead over Labour since 2010
The Conservatives have opened up their biggest lead over Labour since before the 2010 general election, according to a new opinion poll.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/politic...2010-1-4263177
20,000 people sign petition to improve train service
Scotrail anger as 20,000 people sign petition delivered to SNP Government to improve train service
Read more at:
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/po...e-sign-9081568
Electric Canada
Chronicles of Canada
I discovered this excellent collection and have been able to find all but 1 volume. I note that due to the tight binding that the first several pages of each volume have cut out the first or last letter or two of the word so is a touch challenging to read but as you progress the problem mostly goes away.
I am going to add a volume each week so you have time to read them. Here is a description of the first volume...
Most readers of Stephen Leacock's works are familiar with his witty and humorous writings, but few may be aware that he was also a gifted teacher, political ideologue, economist and fiction writer. Though he wrote six books on Canadian history, none of them attained the status of a standard text on the subject and were regarded more as opinion pieces without much academic foundation. Yet, the Chronicles of Canada series by Stephen Leacock remains an interesting and entertaining read.
In this volume, Dawn of Canadian History: Aboriginal Canada, which is part of a thirty-two book series of short and simple essays, Leacock explores the little known origins of Canada's past. Leacock begins with his theories on the geological formation of the country and the beginnings of the earth's structures. The emergence of human beings and the original settlers of the North American Continent, the Native Americans as we know them today, is also well described, though in terms that may seem outdated to modern readers.
The “Canadian aborigines” and their culture is also described in terms of the different tribes and their relationship to the Eskimos in the extreme northern part of Canada. The advent of the white races like the Vikings or Norsemen is also one of the important events in Canada's history, as it changed the course of civilization in this country. Legends of Greenland and Iceland are well retold in the chapter entitled The Legend of the Norsemen. Another crucial event was the arrival of John Cabot of Bristol somewhere on the Labrador coast in the sixteenth century.
Politics in the sixteenth and seventeenth century Europe and the rivalry between nations like Spain, Portugal, England and France, seeking to explore new worlds and enrich their own countries is also well described. Leacock ends his book with the arrival of French explorer Jacques Cartier, known today as the Father of Canada. In historical terms, this would be set in the seventeenth century, when another great French explorer, Samuel de Champlain was making the first accurate map of the country.
For present day readers, Chronicles of Canada..., is a pleasant blend of facts with myths and legends. It is this quality which makes it much more entertaining than a pure historical account.
You can read this volume at: http://www.electriccanadian.com/hist...cles/index.htm
Electric Scotland
Life of Dr. John Leyden
Poet and Linguist by John Reith, M.A., B.D.
You can read about him at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...eyden_john.htm
Charters and Documents relating to the Burgh of Paisley (1163-1665)
And Extracts from the Records of the Town Council (1594-1620) with an excellent Introduction by W. M. Metcalfe, D.D., FSA Scot. (1902)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ow/paisley.htm
A Land of Romance
The Border, It's History and Legend by Jean Lang
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/history/borders/
The Life of Major-General Wauchope, C.B., C.M.G., LL.D
By Sir George Douglas, Bart. (1905)
You can read this book at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...alwauchope.pdf
Manual of the Law of Scotland
By John Hill Burton (Second Edition)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...awscotland.pdf
Memoir of Thomas Thomson
You can read about this Advocate in a book by Cosmo Innes (1854) at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...son_thomas.htm
Scottish History & Life
An excellent book with hundreds of illustrations but the scan quality is poor in that the text is quite faint. You can read this at:http://www.electricscotland.com/book...istorylife.htm where you will also get a copy of the Preface and the Contents page.
The Story
I am persisting on posting up stories about Scotland and Brexit and Independence as I just feel we need to look carefully at the facts. I read many articles each week on both sides of the argument and I am more than happy to post up contrary views but I won't post up information that is clearly inaccurate. I don't blindly accept arguments as I always do my own research to verify the facts and this means going to source documents and also reading opposing views.
The SNP have a fixation with being a member of the EU and so this article really demonstrates why this is not a healthy position for Scotland. I have tried to understand why they take this position and have concluded that the SNP have no policies in place to negotiate with the world if Scotland becomes an Independent nation and so would be reliant on the EU for trade negotiations. While that might not be a bad idea I can't help but think that the majority of countries in the EU have little in common with Scotland. It's like the SNP wants a minimum price for alcohol but the EU is resisting this process. Scotland has been unable to put a proper case for public/private investment and so the EU is withholding many millions from Scotland as a result. We actually pay more to the EU than we get back in grants so we're a net contributor to the EU. And our trade with the EU is less than our trade with the rUK and also the USA. And so why is the SNP so focussed on the EU? I have yet to find out for definite and hence this article.
I also know that some people reading this newsletter will not agree with my views but hopefully they won't mind my various postings on this front as I still add lots of history to the site each week which is not involved with recent history.
I also got an email request this week to be taken of our list which of course I have done. The person was quite frank with me as he gave the reason that he didn't like my Conservative bias and thought I should be supporting Scottish Independence. I confess I have a more liberal bias than a conservative one. I choose the newspapers I will look at for the news stories and currently I use the Scotsman, Dundee Courier, Guardian, BBC and the Chokka Blog as my main sources although I also look at the Highland Free Press, Reuters, and the Sunday Post. I do also look at BrexitCentral and ThinkScotland and the Scottish Review and will also check WingsOverScotland from time to time. I don't use other news sources that only let you read one story and then you need to take out a subscription to read other stories. I will check the Daily Record from time to time but as some of you may know there is little of substance in that newspaper.
Now I have to say that I was ambivalent about Scottish Independence but I was clear in my conviction that we shouldn't be a member of the EU. If I was back home in Scotland I likely would have chanced my arm by voting for Independence but I have also been clear in my distrust of the SNP. They are of course a superb political party and to make the gains they have made they speak with one voice and simply don't allow any descent in the ranks. They are also excellent at spin and by that I mean telling us that the EU is our largest export market which is correct but they failed to tell us that nearly 70% of our exports to the EU go to the rUK alone. That's just one of the reasons I don't trust them.
I also joined the SDA for a time when they were a think tank on how Scotland could be run as an Independent country as I liked their views. However as a political party they went down the tank. I also ran the web site for Ian Hudgeton who was the SNP's MEP and did that for some 5 years.
My view at this time is simple... I don't believe Scotland should be independent right now given the debt to GDP ratio which is greater than all other EU countries including Greece and the difficulty in being able to join the EU because of it. We also have no trade negotiation courses in our universities and so are simply not prepared to work on the global stage. Instead I feel we should embrace Brexit and use that to prepare Scotland for Independence some years down the road. I also am quite fed up with the SNP blaming Westminster for all their woes. They need to take responsibility themselves and not keep blaming others. I see no work being done with our fishing folk and on leaving the EU fishing and agriculture will become another devolved responsibility. I mean through EU mismanagement and lack of SNP support we lost 100,000 jobs and some 3 billion in annual income in the fishing industry alone.
Of course with me now living in Canada whatever Scotland decides is ok with me as I won't really be too affected by whatever route that Scotland takes. I am however concerned that we are not getting any decent information on Brexit and how to prepare for being outside. There are of course difficulties but also many opportunities but we seem unable to discuss anything positive and so we get very biased reporting. I liked Dyson's take on Brexit where he stated that the EU accounts for some 17% of world trade and he felt that there were great opportunities outside the EU. He also talked about the opportunities with the Commonwealth countries where we all speak English and have similar laws and they represent a third of the world's population of some 2.3 billion. This is also where future growth will come from.
I also believe that the EU will see sense on trade deals as look at how many cars come in from Germany with VW, Mercedez, BMW, etc. And I believe we import some 60 billion of goods from the EU more than we export to them. So if we don't do trade deals then the EU will suffer more than we will on that fact alone.
So the above is my reason why I do feel that I should profile Brexit from time to time in this newsletter. Of course if you don't agree with any of this, if you are reading this newsletter in our community, you can reply and provide your thoughts on the subject.
The story this week is ...
The single market that matters to Scotland is the UK
By Brian Monteith in the Scotsman
SCOTTISH exports to the British single market are more than four times as important as the EU, writes Brian Monteith
One of the irritating aspects of Scottish political debate is how it is often so very superficial, so empty of an evidence base. Political leaders talk regularly in meaningless clichés and platitudes as if they have never given any serious thought to what they are saying or looked for facts to back up their claims.
Nicola Sturgeon’s decision to make the trigger for a second independence referendum Scotland’s likely departure from inside the EU single market to having access from outside (like the rest of the world) is just the latest such example that deserves to be challenged. It is a false pretext for putting the country through a great deal of economic disruption, public cost and social pain that needs to be called out.
Scotland is currently a member of two single markets, the United Kingdom and the European Union. The EU and the single market are one and the same thing. You cannot be inside the EU and outside the single market, but you can be outside the EU and have access to the single market. That is why David Cameron and George Osborne repeatedly said that if we voted to leave the EU we would leave the single market and is also why Michael Gove and Boris Johnson agreed with them. It was never disputed by either the remain or leave campaigns that this is what Brexit would mean.
Any suggestion that the electorate was duped is to either ignore the interviews, statements and reports of the campaign or to treat the voters as stupid. I tend to believe that the British electorate is rational in its voting behaviour and I think people knew what they were doing. They simply wanted control again of their laws, taxes, borders, fisheries and so many other facets of life.
Some countries, such as Norway, have been willing to pay a special price (including open migration) to gain privileged access to the single market. That’s unusual, for the rest of the world simply trades with the EU and accepts the tariffs of its customs union that average just over 1 per cent. [Editors Note: Other figures quote an average of 3.6%, with cars as 10% and wine at 32%] That is why you can buy Mazda sports cars from Japan or Jeep Wranglers from the US. It is why we buy wine from Australia or coffee from Bolivia.
We need to ask the question which single market matters most to Scotland? Just how important is the EU’s single market to Scotland and what difference could it make if the UK does not negotiate any special deal?
Scottish Government statistics show that in 2002 £28.7bn or 60 per cent of Scottish exports went to the rest of the UK, £10.9bn or 23 per cent went to the EU and £8.4bn or 17 per cent went to the rest of the world. The UK was two and a half times as important to Scotland as the EU for revenues, taxes and jobs.
By 2014 the figures had changed significantly, with £48.5bn or 64.4 per cent of Scottish exports going to the rest of the UK – a staggering increase of 69 per cent. Exports to the rest of the world grew an amazing 80 per cent to £15.2bn or 20.2 per cent of total exports, while exports to the EU’s single market rose by a lamentable 6 per cent to £11.6bn or 15.4 per cent. Now, the UK single market is more than four times as important as the EU and that trend is continuing, while the EU has fallen into third place.
Surely if access to the single market is so important it would have excelled compared to countries outside it operating under World Trade Organisation rules? But there’s the rub, WTO tariffs have fallen considerably and now average less than 2 per cent. The world has changed since the EU single market was conceived, only Sturgeon and many of her persuasion have not noticed.
Worse still, the figures are flattering to the EU. Our largest EU export market is, strangely, the Netherlands; many goods being shipped to the rest of the world first go to Rotterdam and are recorded as an export to the EU, not their final destination. It is generally held that this “Rotterdam effect” accounts for about 4 per cent of all UK exports but given the scale of exports from Scotland to the Netherlands it may well be higher.
In other words over that 12-year period the relative importance of the EU single market deteriorated badly while the importance of trade to the UK single market grew significantly – as did our trade with the rest of the world.
It is often said that the EU single market is important to Scotland’s finance industry but there is no EU single market in services. There is no banking union, no single stock market, just a patchwork of pension regulations and hugely differing cultural attitudes to investment and banking. This EU failure is reflected in the fact that while financial services represents 70 per cent of the EU economy only 22 per cent of it is internal trade.
On the contrary, the EU single market has posed a threat to our financial services industry through control of banking capital ratios, insurance solvency, a proposed transaction tax and wage caps. All of these things can affect financial services in Scotland as well as the City. Likewise, suggestions that the loss of EU passporting for capital markets will be significant is exaggerated, given we have more financial trade with the US without passports than EU trade with them.
If there is a single market that matters to Scotland then the UK is the real thing, it is how a single market is meant to work. There is freedom of movement of people and capital – with one language, one currency, one central bank and a sovereign national parliament that is ultimately responsible for the common public finances including all assets and debts. It also happens to have a common history and shared culture of over 300 years that to many, maybe still most people, matters.
That is the single market that our businesses and financial services depend on, where the vast majority of their customers are.
It is absurd to suggest the answer to the alleged distress of leaving one single market is to leave the other more important one of the two. But this is not about economic growth, jobs or prosperity – it is blind ideology willing to incur any amount of pain to achieve a minority goal.
END.
Note that you can read the comments about this story and add your own at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion...e-uk-1-4260051
And that's it for this week and hope you all enjoy your weekend.
Alastair
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