to wonder how Scotland's decision will affect england?

[LEMmingaround]

Just that really? If they do go their ownway how will it affect england?

Also will it open a can of worms with wales and northern Ireland?

Sorry, im only calling some of them moaning teenagers. I'm disgruntled as I had to live in Aberdeen for work and came across lots of anti English sentiment. Even though im half Scottish.

I'm English living in Scotland and haven't experienced much anti English sentiment.

At the moment Yes campaigners seem to be at pains to underline this is not about being anti English. And ironically most anti English comments have come from people who support the union 'they come up here with all their money pushing up house prices' and the whole 'white trash' comments around parts of Dumfries and Galloway.

It is in no way on a par with the discrimination suffered by other minority groups across Britain.

I think there will always be groups of people with prejudices - whether it's anti-english racism, general racism, "stop the polish taking our jobs", "muslims are all terrorists" or whichever nonsense you wish to insert. The problem is those folk seem to have an uncanny knack of either a) finding each other or b) converting those around them. I think that's why some people can like in Scotland for years and never experience anti English sentiment and others seem to experience a truckload of it.

That said, I've seen plenty of anti english crap being peddled by Yes campaigners over on the evil facebook. It seems to bring out the worst of both sides.

To those talking about assets and liabilities - do the hospitals, govt buildings, oil etc not count as assets? Is iScotland going to buy these from rUK?

Some of the stuff on Facebook is absolutely vile. Honestly at what people I thought I knew well write on there. What worries me is that once said, it will never be unsaid so whichever way the vote goes cracks in families and friendships will not ever be repaired.

The NHS is devolved, so hospitals would be fine.

I'm not sure about others. I have read something somewhere that a division is made on point of use- the comparison was an ambulance and a warship. The warship isn't used by the immediate population so it would have to be negotiated over. I'll try and find the actual article later if anyone's interested.

You mean the hospitals that aren't PFI

But yes, there are a lot of UK assets. In the white paper they state "Negotiations with the rest of the UK will cover a range of issues. These will include...Scotland’s share of the UK’s £1267 billion of net assets. This would include physical assets in Scotland, such as Jobcentre Plus, DWP and HMRC
offices, the Crown Estate and the defence estate. It will also include assets outside Scotland in which Scotland nevertheless has an interest as part of the UK, such as the overseas missions of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office"

That £1267 billion figure is from the "Whole of Government accounts". The latest ones can be found here but a few of the relevant things they include:
-land and buildings including things like council housing
-strategic goods held for national emergencies
-infrastructure assets like the strategic road network and Scottish Water Infrastructure
-Military equipment
-heritage assets like historic buildings, museums, statues etc
-current assets - currency reserves, gold reserves etc
-financial assets - including student loans
-financial liabilities
-provisions for oil and gas field decommissing

The oil fields themselves aren't, that I can see, included as a specific asset but are included in revenue i.e. they count the tax income from them.

They don't actually include the Scottish Parliament however the excluded entities are described as being "relatively small in scale" which I would take to mean that the Scottish Parliament does not have a particularly substantial balance sheet.

That should be decommissioning!

Indeed

It will also include assets outside Scotland in which Scotland nevertheless has an interest as part of the UK, such as the overseas missions of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office"

The UK government said that this was false in their analysis here (opens a PDF!)

An independent Scottish state would not be entitled by right to any UK diplomatic premises, equipment or staff. As set out in Scotland analysis: Devolution and the implications of Scottish independence, the legal position is clear: the bodies that support the UK now, for example the Bank of England, would continue to operate on behalf of the remainder of the UK on the same basis as before Scottish independence.12 If an independent Scottish state wanted to continue to receive services from UK institutions or utilise them to carry out functions in relation to Scotland, that would be a matter for negotiation and would have to be agreed with the continuing UK.

I'm sure Adam Tomkin's blog makes basically the same point re defence.

Plus there's computer software (intellectual assets?) too... the computers themselves might be okay, but how do we re-programme them?

I think with the premises it would depend on the ownership. If the government actually owns the building then the value of the building would be included in the whole of govt accounts as an asset and when it came to splitting the value of that would be part of the total amount being split. But there's a difference between comprising part of the total asset value to be divided and being entitled to actually own that specific asset IYSWIM? and the staff or organisations themselves aren't an "asset" (in the accounting sense!)

Again the issue with assets are that scotGov and UKgov fundamentally disagree on the type if breakup.

ScotGov says separation -> sensible division of assets liabilities

UKgov says successor/continuing -> no division of assets liabilities.

I was just toying with the idea of dividing up the value of government buildings, rather than letting them stay with whichever country they happen to be in.

So Independent Scotland owns 8% of the Palace of Westminster

And independent rUK owns 92% of Holyrood.

H'mmmmmm

I don't think that's quite true ItsAllGoingToBeFine. Whilst the UK argues that it's successor/continuing (which I agree with) I don't think they've said there would be no division of the assets and liabilities. There would still be a negotiation - the below is from the uk govt.

"The division of liabilities and assets is a significant part of any negotiations to create a new state, and would also have to be settled by negotiation. Although there are some general principles of international law that could impact upon this matter there is no clear consensus in international practice as to the precise allocation of national debt in circumstances of state separation or dissolution. However, there would be an expectation that an independent Scottish state would take on an equitable share of the UK’s national debt. How an ‘equitable share’ would be calculated is open to question and would have to be negotiated. The continuing UK would approach negotiations in good faith and, in the interests of its citizens, would need to seek to ensure that a fair settlement applied to assets and liabilities (such as national debt). For particular fixed assets, such as government buildings, the territory in which they are situated would be a significant factor to be taken into consideration in the discussions."

Could get interesting PigletJohn. Can we have BigBen then, it's kind of iconic. Would look quite cool reassembled in the middle of Princes Street Gardens!

My understanding of continuing/successor is that pretty much everything remains the same for the continuing state, and the successor starts our as a brand new country.

So the only real division of assets would be that Scotland keeps what is geographically Scottish and that other assets/liabilities are pretty irrelevant as it starts out brand new

But of course that doesn't mean that iScotland cant be a different scenario altogether where everything is up for negotiation.

I don't think anyone has a problem with a fair split of assets and liabilities. There is a view in some sectors of the No camp, however, that Scotland is entitled to none of the UKs assets, but that if it took none of the assets it should somehow still be responsible for a share of the liabilities.

" if it took none of the assets it should somehow still be responsible for a share of the liabilities."

I haven't seen that opinion.

I haven't heard anyone say that. The only time I've heard something remotely similar is when people are talking about the currency, and YES campaigners say that if we don't get currency union we wouldn't be getting a split of the assets so wouldn't take the liabilities. This ignores the fact that the actual currency isn't classed an asset - the reserves of it are just like reserves of dollars or gold, but the mechanisms which control the currency, the BoE, the monetary and fiscal policy...they're not assets.

I don't think I've heard any No campaigners saying Scotland wouldn't get the govt buildings based her, or ownership of the roads, rails, Scottish Water etc

But its not just the assets in Scotland
If Scotland is to take 10% of UK debt, it should also receive 10% of UK assets which it has helped to create. I also agree the currency union or no debt thing is a bit spurious, however, if states seperate (as opposed to Scotland being brand new state) it is usual for the states to split everything where at all possible eg treaties etc.

(Very biased) article here, but it does set out asset division quite well.

www.businessforscotland.co.uk/independence-will-generate-a-109000000000-asset-windfall-for-scotland/

I know it's not just the assets based in Scotland - but realistically, when it comes to a division you'd likely try to split it so that whilst it was fair on a % basis, Scotland got the assets in Scotland, surely? That was what I was getting at.

If a married couple are divorcing and both have equal sized pensions then when it came to dividing them you wouldn't decide to each have half of the others, you'd keep the one in your name.

Given that the UK government has no mandate from the rest of the UK to dissolve the union then I think Scotland would have to be seen as a successor state. Calling both new states would probably be a violation of the rights of those in rUK as they haven't voted for any changes.

know it's not just the assets based in Scotland - but realistically, when it comes to a division you'd likely try to split it so that whilst it was fair on a % basis, Scotland got the assets in Scotland, surely? That was what I was getting at.

I completely agree, I don't know if 10% of UK assets are in Scotland though - and of course there are things in Scotland we don't want, like the nukes.

Given that the UK government has no mandate from the rest of the UK to dissolve the union then I think Scotland would have to be seen as a successor state

That seems sensible to me too. However, I'm not sure that it will technically be that exact situation as there has been some talk of division of rUK assets?

It does sort of ignore the flip side though - the liability division. Scotland can't really just say "we'll not take anything then, we don't want the liabilities or the assets" because it simply wouldn't work. Are we going to rent all of our infrastructure from rUK? Really? How's that going to work.

Describing it as "an asset windfall" immediately makes the article rubbish, frankly!