to believe the remaining UK should not make special exceptions for Scottish economic refugees?

[longfingernails]

In the event of Scottish independence, the Scottish economy will be in the toilet. In this event, Britain should not be allowed to become a magnet for Scottish economic migrants.

I wouldn't blame Cameron if the Scots choose independence; the Tory party don't exactly have a strong foothold in those parts. However, I will certainly excoriate him if he gives an inch in any negotiations in the event of independence - especially if he allows large scale unskilled immigration from Scotland into Britain.

An independent Scotland would have almost zero negotiating power and Britain should exploit that to maximise our own advantage.

Tsk, tsk Santana you forgot to quote this bit:

Scottish wealth levels are comparable to that of the U.K. ('AAA'), Germany ('AAA'), Ireland ('BBB+'), and New Zealand ('AA-').

Even excluding North Sea output and calculating per capita GDP only by looking at onshore income, Scotland would qualify for our highest economic assessment.

Higher GDP per capita, in our view, gives a country a broader potential tax and funding base to draw from, which supports creditworthiness.

Ah, guilty!

S&P still rate the UK as AAA they didn't downgrade the rating when other agencies did. So potentially (not guaranteed and with a lot of factors still to be determined) the same credit rating NOT better. I haven't seen a speculative rating from other major ratings agencies such as Fitch or Moody's.

From your link- "Scotland would qualify for our highest economic assessment"

Scottish wealth levels are comparable to that of the U.K. ('AAA'), Germany ('AAA'), Ireland ('BBB+'), and New Zealand ('AA-')

Um, forgive me for stating the obvious, but could that not be said to be because Scotland is currently part of the UK?

This says nothing about how it will be affected by Scotland becoming independent!

From the FT:

Scotland would struggle to match the UK’s AAA credit rating with Standard & Poor’s if it failed to negotiate a currency union with London or the eurozone, the credit rating agency warned on Thursday.
In a report setting out its initial thinking before undertaking a formal ratings exercise, S&P highlighted many potential strengths of an independent Scottish economy, but noted that the UK’s near-top-notch rating depended on its power to issue a global reserve currency.

Followed closely by 'Nevertheless, Scotland's economic performance would be subject to several potential adjustment risks during its early years as an independent state.'

Weatherall

melonade and who decides what the 'important' issues are?

I would have thought basis common sense! And I don't think many people would argue that they include currency, EU membership and potential economic difficulties!

How many door have you knocked on? How many public meetings have you attended where people have asked questions?

None. I am a simple taxpayer. Paying tax which will fund the referendum. I have however as part of my job answered some of these questions.

In my experience of this campaign people are more worried about WM's austerity policies, public services, employment, their children's future than currency and EU membership. These are important but are quite 'distant' to some people

Since when were you appointed a spokesperson for the Scottish people? Are they aware of this? Most "people" I speak to, such as my neighbours, are concerned about paying more tax, damage to the economy, possible loss of their jobs and being patronised by a left leaning political class, out of touch with reality.

Why do so many "Yes" campaigners like to portray Scotland as deprived and poor (when it suits them) but as some kind of improbable paradise when it suits them otherwise? It doesn't make sense.

Lots of people look towards Norway to see how this could be successful

Really? Is this not racist? Why Norway? What about all the other countries which have a similar population and left leaning politics but which are not conveniently blond haired, Aryan and reserved? And do they really? Have you ever been to Norway? Sorry to Norwegians, but its miserable most of the time. Most Norwegians seem to spend a lot of time driving to Sweden to find affordable goods to buy!

Oh shit, I forgot we are not getting rid of the sodding Queen. Massive opportunity lost there.

Well the White Paper seems to assume that Scotland will get to decide how the Crown estates income is spent (I think technically it belongs to the sovereign) so they will need to keep the Queen sweet.

It's daft that anyone would want the Queen if they vote Yes. As daft as expecting currency union.

Does Salmond really want independence? "Let's have a Head of State and currency in common with rUK! Let's let the Bank of England set our interest rates!".

La-la land. If Scots want independence I can live with that. But do it properly.

I can live with it but I'd be sad, I should add.

I don't think Salmond does want independence - or not now. I think he wants Devo Max, but that option was taken away. The version of independence being promoted is very much Devo max under another name in my view - to give a few examples, same head of state, same currency, open borders, same BBC programming, same financial regulator, same lender of last resort......

I think he knows that a lot of people voted SNP because they were their preferred option for a Holyrood government, not because they wanted independence. The SNP is a long way along the line from a single issue party - I know a lot of people who voted SNP but are not independence supporters.

Currently we (England, Scotland, Wales) share an island like a highly individualistic family under one roof. Under the proposed arrangements we would become neighbours. If England chooses to frack but the Scots don't how will our common Queen (common as in shared, not vulgar) be expected to react to a row about potential cross-border ramifications?

People talk about WM being played by the SNP for Yes/ No and not Devo Max, I think it's the other way about. The SNP never thought they'd get the yes/ no question and were (are!) hugely unprepared for the realities of a yes vote.

I mentioned Norway because they have their own currency and aren't in the EU. ie responding to your comments about currency union and EU membership

For you to insinuate some kind of racial motivation is such a below the belt accusation. I think you should retract that and apologise.

This is the sort of thing that drives me mad with the Yes campaign.

What, as opposed to Better Togethers posters of guaranteed new powers and a safer pension

At least your link is presenting facts, albeit not all of them.

Personally I think in the long run iScotland would be devastatingly bad for the people of Scotland but it's for them to decide.

The whole crux of the economic argument for Salmond is 'we've got lots of oil so we'll be alright!'

But oil revenues fluctuate. North sea oil is getting harder to extract. New technologies such as shale gas/oil & fracking are bring down prices globally.

To hitch the success of your entire country to the oil seems a HUGE risk to me.

There are proportionally more pensioners in Scotland than in rUK and currently more is spent per pensioner in Scotland too. As the population grows older iScotland would really struggle to fund pensions. Especially since Scotland is traditionally more socialist in it's outlook than rUK.

SNP know this and don't have an answer for this so have defaulted to their stock answer of blaming the 'No' camp for negative campaigning.

It seems to me that every question they can't answer, they just blame negative campaigning and that everything will be cushdy.

The whole crux of the economic argument for Salmond is 'we've got lots of oil so we'll be alright!'

This is incorrect. Even without the oil Scotland is still a perfectly viable independent country. (See eg Standard and Poor's report linked to above)

There are proportionally more pensioners in Scotland than in rUK and currently more is spent per pensioner in Scotland too. As the population grows older iScotland would really struggle to fund pensions.

There are several considerations here.

Scotland already pays for pensions through the money it creates and gives to Westminster - its not like on independence Scotland won't have Amy money because WM isn't giving it to them anymore.

There are many areas where iScotland could make savings (trident, bureaucracy etc). Some of this could be spent on pensions.

Scots (shamefully) currently have a significantly lower life expectancy than in rUK.

Are we all going to start eating healthily and exercising more after independence? Of course higher life expectancy will probably lead to higher pension ages so there's one commitment gone.

Sure Scotland of course pays money towards pensions but from what I've read, more is spent on pensions than they give. (Correct me if I am wrong). And as the population grows older, Scotland need to find even MORE money. This is already a timebomb for many western countries but will be even bigger risk for a small country who will not have the economy of scales that a larger one would.

There is no relationship between size of country and amount of pension (%age average earnings)

www.oecd-ilibrary.org/finance-and-investment/pensions-at-a-glance-2013_pension_glance-2013-en

Scotland already pays for pensions through the money it creates and gives to Westminster - its not like on independence Scotland won't have Amy money because WM isn't giving it to them anymore.

No, but Scotland will have more pensioners and a lower amount of tax payers to fund pensions and other benefits.