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Over the past two weeks I have been reading and reading loads of papers on Scottish Independence.
Some of these papers were very technical but none the less I did my best to understand their points of view and have done my best to double check some of their sources.
My understanding to date is that there are two key points that would make a real difference and that is to do with membership of the EU and our currency.
Right now the UK is London biased and thus the regions of the rUK are not being well served. The UK on the whole is performing worse that many other European countries. It has a poor industrial sector and that means our exports are much poorer than many other countries.
To try and understand the issues I would recommend reading the paper which discusses our currency and industrial performance at http://www.cuthbert1.pwp.blueyonder....y%20310513.doc
The other factor is to do with the EU. From everything I've read being a member of the EU is definitely not in Scotland's best interest. By being a member would mean we'd have to give up some of our independence and thus swap control from Westminster to Brussels and so instead of representing 10% of the population with Westminster we'd only be representing 1% of the population in Brussels. We would have less say on the world stage in the EU than if we instead joined EFTA and the EEA.
Read the paper at http://www.electricscotland.com/inde...ndinEurope.pdf
To me this all means that with the SNP deciding to go for membership of the EU and to go with Sterling as our currency then in my mind we'd be better of saying NO in the referendum as it's pretty obvious to me that they simply don't understand the issues and are thus not fit to lead an independent Scotland.
To me the SNP has done a good job domestically in Scotland but to be a successful country we need to engage in International affairs and that is a major weakness for them.
You could gamble that if Scotland voted YES then the SNP will quickly be voted out of power and that our domestic political system would change to reflect the need for the country to go down a different path than the one the SNP has laid out for us.
You could also argue that if we don't vote YES then it is likely to be a whole generation before we get the opportunity again.
Frankly the decision to vote either YES or NO is fraught with problems and it is by no means a simple decision.
I also think that comparatively few Scots are going to go to the trouble of trying to understand these issues.
Alastair
Some of these papers were very technical but none the less I did my best to understand their points of view and have done my best to double check some of their sources.
My understanding to date is that there are two key points that would make a real difference and that is to do with membership of the EU and our currency.
Right now the UK is London biased and thus the regions of the rUK are not being well served. The UK on the whole is performing worse that many other European countries. It has a poor industrial sector and that means our exports are much poorer than many other countries.
To try and understand the issues I would recommend reading the paper which discusses our currency and industrial performance at http://www.cuthbert1.pwp.blueyonder....y%20310513.doc
The other factor is to do with the EU. From everything I've read being a member of the EU is definitely not in Scotland's best interest. By being a member would mean we'd have to give up some of our independence and thus swap control from Westminster to Brussels and so instead of representing 10% of the population with Westminster we'd only be representing 1% of the population in Brussels. We would have less say on the world stage in the EU than if we instead joined EFTA and the EEA.
Read the paper at http://www.electricscotland.com/inde...ndinEurope.pdf
To me this all means that with the SNP deciding to go for membership of the EU and to go with Sterling as our currency then in my mind we'd be better of saying NO in the referendum as it's pretty obvious to me that they simply don't understand the issues and are thus not fit to lead an independent Scotland.
To me the SNP has done a good job domestically in Scotland but to be a successful country we need to engage in International affairs and that is a major weakness for them.
You could gamble that if Scotland voted YES then the SNP will quickly be voted out of power and that our domestic political system would change to reflect the need for the country to go down a different path than the one the SNP has laid out for us.
You could also argue that if we don't vote YES then it is likely to be a whole generation before we get the opportunity again.
Frankly the decision to vote either YES or NO is fraught with problems and it is by no means a simple decision.
I also think that comparatively few Scots are going to go to the trouble of trying to understand these issues.
Alastair
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