Then there are those who can most kindly be referred to as suffering from Stockholm Syndrome.

That’s the kindest you can manage? You sound nice…

I notice no-one has jumped in to defend the SNPs failure on benefits outlined above as a triumph for devolution, and an excuse for more?

How is the introduction of Universal Credit going? Such changes aren’t easy… and your point is clearly utterly irrelevant.

5,000 new SNP members since yesterday.

Patrick Harvie is giving Sturgeon a hard time about the Growth Commision at First Minister’s questions.  Labour and Conservatives are staying well away from even mentioning what happened yesterday for some reason.

Then there are those who can most kindly be referred to as suffering from Stockholm Syndrome.

That’s the kindest you can manage? You sound nice…

I’m in a good mood today.

There also seems to be a lot of deflection here based around the fact that pointing out something bad about the SNP should not reflect on the cause of independence itself.

Somehow the fact that the SNPs long thought out economic arguments are mince, and their actions (on education the NHS, local government, child benefit, WASPI women and benefits overall) defy their rhetoric, should not be included in a decision about independence which would involve either more or less radical people with “different” ideas.

This feels (from my point of view) exactly equivalent to the premise that brexit could be a success if only those “remoaners would shut up”, or if it was being handled “better” by TM and the tories, or “if only nigel, boris or putin or [insert numpty here] was in charge!”.

Its all mince. All the time.

Some ideas are so bad that theres no way they can be put right by a change of party, personality, or left/right leaning.

Nationalism sucks. As I said earlier, the SNP and Tories are two balls in the same nutsack.

Scotland  could be independent. but it would be poorer for it and that means less money for the NHS, schools and civil society. The list goes on, and includes pretty much everything that independence supporters seem to value when they are threatened by the tories.

So whats the cure?

Shut up about burning bridges and try to build a better society now.

Independence may come someday, or not, but what if we created a better society regardless?

the SNP and Tories are two balls in the same nutsack

that’s the best thing I’ve read on here in ages!

If there was an indy ref tomorrow I’d probably vote yes as things stand just now but these bitter old men moaning on about historical treaties or events and gumph just makes me want to have nothing to do with it.

Good summary by John Crace in todays Guardian

SNP gifts May a hissy-fit to take her out of the limelight at PMQs

The walkout might have been right up there in futility with the Lib Dem hissy-fit of 2008 – over an EU referendum, of all things – but the long-term fallout may be more damaging. The sight of several hundred entitled Tory backbenchers making it clear they don’t give a toss about anyone in Scotland is not going to play out well north of the border.

> delete <

kelvin

The SNP asked for more devolution, and despite going on at length about how the DWP benefits system is a disaster for the people of the UK (particularly the disabled), they have passed up on the ability to improve it for the people of Scotland.

Their rhetoric says that people are dying because of the DWP (which I believe) but they can’t deal with the powers for a few years extra and thats “Irrelevant”?

Your dictionary is broken between Iridescent and Irritable.

Please note that I also said that the SNP claimed a few years before that they could set up a whole nation in two years for a few hundred million quid. I think that point is very relevant.

And the 5000 extra SNP members are exactly that, @ binner post.

eat_the_pudding

…There also seems to be a lot of deflection here based around the fact that pointing out something bad about the SNP should not reflect on the cause of independence itself…

That is because we are not a political movement for perpetual SNP government, but a movement for independence ie self governance.

We will not necessarily be voting SNP after independence. The SNP is a tool towards that end.

bigjim

…bitter old men moaning on about historical treaties…

The “historical” treaty is the basis of the Union. It lays down the relationship between the 2 countries, and it is important to know what it says. It still applies so it is not some dusty forgotten piece of parchment.

The dissolution of the treaty joining Scotland to England is an avenue to independence and can be done without Westminter’s permission. (Similar to how a spouse can instigate a divorce without needing the consent of the other.)

The other is going on bended knee to the Tory govt and begging humbly for their permission to leave – after seeing how the Westminster govt has contemptuously treated the Scottish parliament since 2014, there’s not much chance of that.

I’m not sure what you’re saying.  I don’t think anyone has said that independence will result in immediate improvements for Scotland, everyone has said that things will get worse in the short term.

You yourself have said that things will get worse regardless of whether Scotland becomes independent or not.  In your opinion it will be even worse if Scotland  becomes independent but you haven’t explained how except to point out how bad the SNP are.

As many have said, the SNP post-independence will not be the same as the current SNP.  The post-independence Labour, Cons, and Lib-dems will also not be the same parties as today.  Pointing out the SNP’s record and the problems with the Growth Commission (and there are many) is not relevant to whether Scotland will be better off ten years after independence.

The difference is that with independence Scotland will be able to decide it’s own future rather than being along for the ride with policies whose primary aim is to benefit the south of England.

I spoke to a unionist who said he voted no because he didn’t believe Scotland could be trusted to vote for a good government.  If you agree I think you should say so, so that at least we know where you are coming from.

Eat The Pudding has to be an alias!

8 years of forum membership and not a single thread started? Just trolling in the replies all the time 🤔

Eat The Pudding has to be an alias!

Pudding comes after your main course, such as Jambalaya?….

epicyclo, you realise that all decisions about how much money is given to NHS schools and councils are already made by the Scottish Parliament don’t you?

Nope it is not.  Scotland is given a fixed pot of money to spend ( ignoring the piddly amounts it is allowed to raise on its own behalf)  NHS is something like half the budget.  The scottish government simply cannot put significantly more money into the NHS – it has no way of raising it without huge cuts elsewhere.

Boarding bob

No this is actually my real name. .  .  not an alias at all?

PS trolling? really? Is the Scottish definition of trolling “not drinking the coolaid”?

If so then maybe.

Is the pot of money given to Scotland the same as England, per habitant ?

Less than London, more than the west country.

Its also much less than the tax raised in Scotland

cchris2lou

No, more. For good reasons and to the benefit of everyone living in Scotland google Barnett formula.

tjagain,

“less than the tax raised in scotland”

Wow …

Did you miss the SNP growth report acceptance of GERS and confirmation that an independent Scotland would have a 13Bn (ish) deficit wrt spending vs tax raised?

It was authored by the SNP (despite their best efforts not to release it) and hopefully will be enough to change your mind.

We can wait here while you have a read.

No this is actually my real name. .  .

That must have been fun at school.

Eat the Pudding you’re a bit out with your claims on the new welfare system. Yes DWP will be administering some benefits until 2020. The new powers according to your own link came into Scottish government hands in 2017 . That would be 3 years , meantime some benefits will be administered under the new system later this year.

gordimhor,

3 not 4 .. OK 🙂

My main pojnt is that they claim to want powers devolved for the benefit of Scotlands people because the current system is cruel.

Then they decide they can’t handle them and defer the chance to make any changes for at least 3 years (which is what “DWP administration” means).

There may be good practical reasons for that deferral, but they all look a bit weak in the face of previous claims from the same people that they could build the infrastructure for a whole country in 2 years for £400M.

Whatever way you look at it its not an ideal case to encourage further devolution of powers.

The point about the Growth Commission is that it was trying to show how an Independent Scotland would work economically. It is all very well saying that once Independence has been gained we Scots can vote in any government we like… but how will they change things? How would a Scottish government actually be able to achieve what people want it to achieve.

Politics is the art of the possible & too much of the Yes vote seems to think that ‘anything’ is possible post Independence. Political reality doesn’t just disappear because you’ve got Independence.

5000 new snp members in <24hrs

Maybe other parties should consider walking out of the HOC

It is all very well saying that once Independence has been gained we Scots can vote in any government we like… but how will they change things? How would a Scottish government actually be able to achieve what people want it to achieve.

Politics is the art of the possible & too much of the Yes vote seems to think that ‘anything’ is possible post Independence. Political reality doesn’t just disappear because you’ve got Independence.

For me, not being a Koolaid drinker, the economic argument is just that, a spurious battle of (half)wits that is pretty irrelevant either way.

I’m under no illusion that the glens are paved with gold, we would no doubt have a period of transition that may be financially difficult at first, but in the long term I believe we are intelligent enough to make our own decisions. I am not particularly anti-westminster, but every year that passes it feels further and further away, folks in the north of England feel detached too,  it’s not just us up here.

I’m in no way blind to the SNP either, indeed, I look forward to the post Yes vote political battle, a re-energised Labour, broken free from their rudderless National counterparts?, What will become of Darling Ruth and her Scots Tories? Lib Dems to become relevant gain? Greens continue their good work and grow?….

What you’re asking for is for the next thousand steps to make Scotland become a successful independent country be laid out.  The best anyone can do in any country in any process is lay out the next three steps and then go from there.  The important thing is that the majority of people agree on the direction.

The difference is that, as part of the UK, those three steps are going to take Scotland in a direction it doesn’t want to go (ie keep the foreigners out and damn everything else).

As an independent Scotland can pick it’s own direction which, in my opinion, should be moving closer to the Scandinavian model.  Not towards whatever the UK is turning into.

tjagain

Nope it is not. Scotland is given a fixed pot of money to spend ( ignoring the piddly amounts it is allowed to raise on its own behalf) NHS is something like half the budget. The scottish government simply cannot put significantly more money into the NHS – it has no way of raising it without huge cuts elsewhere.

It is given proportionately the same as England spends on the NHS as part of that.

It has chosen to give the NHS a smaller % increase.

I know you don’t like it,

But its true.

This might help http://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe

PS and if it was independent it would have 13Bn less to spend (approximately the cost of the NHS). You never did say which bits of society you would cut off to cover the deficit if it becomes a reality?

13Bn is an even bigger chunk of the total spend than I recalled!

(edit for wrong graph)

Maybe other parties should consider walking out of the HOC

Perhaps they should all walk out – of Westminster, Holyrood, councils. Go on a nice holiday somewhere like Pluto.

Then the rest of us could get on with our lives for a while without politicians arsing everything up. I’m pretty sure that, just now, the good that they do in fixing broken things is far outweighed by them breaking things that work fine.

eat the pudding – because of cuts something has to go.  Fortunately the SNP have reduced wastage in the Scots NHS by removing all the private / false market nonsense so the scots NHS does more with less. Scots NHS admin costs are 40% of the English NHS.  Note the increase in social services spending – that takes pressure of the NHS.

When yo have a fixed and reducing pot of money something has to give.

eat_the_pudding, the economic arguments you are putting up are irrelevant. It’s basically how many angels can dance on a pinhead stuff.

Not because the arguments you put forward are incorrect, but simply because you do not know the future, so it is speculation not fact. A future in which circumstances can change overnight.

These are circumstances, some good, some adverse, that have been dealt with by every country that has become independent, yet none want to come back.

Are you implying the Scots out of the hundred plus countries that have become independent of the UK are uniquely incapable of managing their own economy after independence?

Edit: 5,000 plus new members for the SNP in less than 24 hours. Sounds like Scotland is really pissed off now.

Personal experience.  Edinburgh has an issue with bed blocking.  A number of units have been set up to deal with this – sort of “halfway houses”.  These units are funded partly or wholly from social services funding despite being inpatient beds run by ( partly or wholly) NHS staff.  this spending is coming out of the increased social service budget not the NHS budget.   Hence the disparity in the figures  Money has been transferred from NHS to social services – as can be seen from your graphs

Isn’t the GERS deficit estimate based on the current situation and not what it could look like under independence, where for example we wouldn’t be wasting billions on the likes of Trident…

We also have the ONS study.

the English deficit looks a wee bit worse than Scotland’s…

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/governmentpublicsectorandtaxes/publicsectorfinance/articles/countryandregionalpublicsectorfinances/2015to2016#net-fiscal-balance

Indeed it is Bob – the GERS figures have a lot of criticism attached to them but for political reasons the SNP this time have decide to take them as fact to remove one of the attack lines used agaisnt them last time.

IMO the scots population are mainly in 3 groups each about a third of the population

Idealogical independence supporters who want independence no matter the cost.

Ideological unionists who want the union no matter the cost

Pragmatists who want what would give them and their fellow countryfolk the best lives – this is the group I am in.  MY judgement is that an independent Scotland in the EU would provide the best lives for me and my fellow countryfolk.  My position was somewhat soft last time round.  Its now hardened a lot as a result of the foul xenophobia from Westminster.  I want to be no part of Brexit Briton.  Its a place I abhor

Added to the mix are those who want out of the  UK union and out of the ~EU – a fair amount of the independence side and then there are the unionists who see the EU as more important than the UK – these two groups had a lot of movement in their voting intentions on independence – anecdotally I know of people who last time campaigned for no but who now would vote yes – because they see the descent in xenophobia from England and Brexit as more important than the UK union so despite last time actually campaigning for the union they now would vote YES because of the change in circumstances.

Its a place I abhor

The whole thing?  I live here, you know.

However BoardinBob, if Scotland leaves – that deficit will only get worse. Whilst London taxpayers will be able to better prop up the North of England.

But, will they?

This is one of my personal reasons for wanting Scotland to remain in the union… without them the North/South divide is likely to increase. We need your political weight to add to our own (outside the SE of E) to stand any chance of getting a United Kingdom that works for all regions. If Scotland becomes independent, especially if it gets early EEA sign up, the outer regions of England, and Wales, will suffer more than those North of a new border. I haven’t mention NI, because if Scotland goes… I see no chance of them staying with us.

Kelvin – one of the reasons I voted yes with a heavy heart last time.   I felt like I was abandoning my friends in the north of England