To ask all Scottish MNrs to work together 2

[siiiiiiiiigh]

Sorry, filled the last thread with this, thought I'd better be part of Team Scottish MN and work together for those of us on the old thread...

Here's Armando's thoughts. I vote him in for everything.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/21/scottish-referendum-massive-voter-turnout-means-politics-changed-for-ever

Tab Maybe we should try to get voted in

OO Sorry, the post all went to hell.

'Devo & England' I don't get it, so please type slowly! I don't want England to be cut up into little bits, I want ONE parliament/assembly/elected bods to stand up for England, to get our share of the bulk funding and allow us to make decisions solely for England the same way the other 3 do. Why are people saying it's complicated? Why is it 'complicated' for England and fine for everyone else? Why is it so hard for people to see that just because WM is in England, it doesn't work FOR England, it works for the UK. Everyone gets involved in decisions that affect us, but we don't for anyone else?!

Grovel what do you find shitty about it?

Has it grovel how's that then?

Oh you mean The Dutch Debacle? Just read around it, the rest of us have :)

OO not at all, I felt bad because it did look that way & it wasn't my intention, just crappy highlighting!

England doesn't work as it is because it's too big ... In a more federal system I mean, not just it's too big, lol

As for the west lothian question...I'm in west lothian, I'll answer it - I don't see any logical reason why Scottish MPs are involved in matters that Westminster doesn't control in a Scotland.

They don't make a significant impact on votes in parliament anyway...just give them a day off every so often.

Chipping I find it complex because I don't know how the structure would be. England is the biggest of the 4 nations in the UK, and a diverse range of areas (so does Scotland, and doubtless Wales and Northern Ireland, but I don't know them so well) with different needs. I know my sister in the North of England feels they would benefit from more attention and funding.

But whatever is done has to be at least sellable to the people, which is why I think we need a wide-reaching constitutional convention, reaching all parts of society. But that would take time, no point rushing something through. And what works for Scotland might not work elsewhere. But making changes for Scotland and not elsewhere isn't going to be well-received.

I think that many people want the House of Lords reformed into an elected house. Maybe whatever replaces it could have some kind of regional representation element?

My feeling however is that to a large extent, except for local services, I think that the bigger questions of politics aren't really defined by geographical region but more by political ideas which can be shared by people across the UK. I think they should be able to work together to achieve things rather than subdivided up by geography. So I'm not sure.

It's not that I think geographical regions define politics...it's that different regions have different needs, different industries, different populations of different demographics and different geography (which can affect the other things) and I just don't feel that a central government does/can address those things effectively.

I will apologise for bringing it up again as it's mentioned all the time, but, the 'bedroom tax' (even if you agree with it as I know some people do) it was designed to combat a problem in one particular densely populated area, a problem that other areas don't have and in fact causes problems in those areas.

I'm not trying to convince you btw, just explaining my thinking on it.

People seem to keep suggesting a "neverendum" is somehow wrong or undemocratic. Of course its not, it only happens because a significant chink of the population wants it - that's democracy.

Fortunately, that absolutely isn't democracy. I'm amazed that this idea can seriously be put forward. Who decides at any given moment that a sufficiently large chunk of the population wants a referendum? How do they check that they're right about that? Should they have a referendum to decide whether to have a referendum? Suppose Salmond in his wisdom decided on 1st October that a sufficiently large chunk of the Scottish population wanted a referendum, should he seriously be permitted to waste another few billion pounds setting up another one? And suppose that ends up with a 60% No vote, can he then decide on 1st November that, goodness me, a large chunk of the population wants referendum no. 3?

And, of course, it wouldn't be restricted to independence. You would get people clamouring for referenda on capital punishment, immigration, banking control, hunting, corporal punishment in schools, abolishing gay rights, enforced church attendance, you name it. The country would be paralysed by virtue of the fact that we were constantly trotting off to the polls, and every time someone in power didn't like a result they could simply decide to rerun the referendum.

I have a range of thoughts on the House of Lords, which I am too tired to properly articulate. But I'd want at least some of it to be elected, and for it to represent community groups as well as political parties, and I'd want all regions represented. Just can't come up with the details just now as too tired.

The bedroom tax is ridiculous - there is a problem with housing supply, and there should be encouragement to move, but in many cases that just isn't an option. More should have been done on building up housing supply and helping people to move before we got to the current situation. The private member's bill recently was a good step to mitigating it (and hopefully it will make it into law) but the tax needs scrapped and a proper effort made at housing supply improvement.

Yes, England is too big compared to the rest of you to be 'one whole' if we go for the Federal system. There's no way to balance the power, I don't think, anyway.

But with the system we currently have - why can't we have our share of funding and make our own decisions? Like everyone else?!

Tab I've just had a look but I can't find what I was looking for (actual data!) but the vote on tuition fees for England passed only with the support of non-English MPs, for example.

OO I don't know what the answer is either :/ but what I do know is, it feels vastly unfair that we don't get to choose what happens here, not because of our politicians, but because of yours - if that makes sense? Scotland were voting for independence, which is ironic really, given they have more independence from UK administration than England does.

I also think the bedroom tax is ridiculous, but, it was an example of a policy designed to combat the fact that there's a lack of housing stock and an inequality between renters of social and private housing. My answer would also be increase the housing stock.

But it is a huge issue in some areas , other areas have a much bigger housing stock to start with...they don't need a policy to deal with a problem they're not having.

I mean, I think most areas could do with a bit more social housing, but it's only causing this big housing issue in some places.

There are other examples , but that's a really current one.

Chipping yes, there are some votes that Scottish MPs did make a difference to, but it's not a huge amount and I don't think they had any business voting on tuition fees.

There's the data.

Although it's only 21 out of thousands, I can't say I'm happy about a lot of those 21 votes anyway.

Tab I know what you are saying about bedroom tax. It was a stupid ill thought out tax anyway, but that aside, why can't one central body just say there's an issue with x in y area and therefore z will happen. It doesn't have to be the same everywhere, just fair.

Anyway, I'm going to have to go to bed, my brain is overloaded - I'll be back tomorrow and probably rewrite half of tonight's posts!

Night

"why can't one central body just say there's an issue with x in y area and therefore z will happen. It doesn't have to be the same everywhere, just fair."

They could, it's just not my preferred option, lol.

I'd like better representation so that areas could decide for themselves what they need instead.

Just read that an SNP MP said that Scotland can declare independence if pro independence MPs win a majority of the Scottish seats at Westminster.

HAHAHA HAHAHA!

Where do these people get such ideas from?

Westminster is the sovereign parliament for the whole UK. It is the only body with the power to decree Scottish independence. But - and this the key bit - it acts in concert. In other words, all MPs would get to vote on the question.

toad I believe the polite word is posturing :)

Going back to the discussion, I am still unclear on the role of a local authority in all of this although I wouldn't be sad if they were swept away and we started afresh clean away the corruption

DH also can't understand how England only has Westminster and Scotland Wales and NI each have a separate layer. A poster above, and I agree, said this was just another layer. Of bureaucracy, waste of money and inefficiency. I have yet to find government, local or national anything but a monumental waste of money full of people thinking of their own interests. Rant over......

As I understand it, on devolution, the same work was done, by the same number of people, mostly in the same places. What changed was that the people doing it were responsible to the Scottish / NI / Welsh administrations rather than the Scottish/ NI / Welsh Offices. So no extra layer.

IMHO, if Westminster restricts English matters to English MPs, there is no need for an English parliament. It would be better if central government devolved certain matters back to local government.

For the person who said something about the Danny Alexander article and cutting 500k public sector jobs - reread the article and check the date. It's from 2010. I've seen it shared on FB so it is obviously doing the rounds.

Anyways, I think the continuing agitation for independence will do massive harm to the Scottish economy. Just look at the example of Quebec. Companies will hold back on investment until they're sure of a more stable climate.

As an aside, has anyone seen Naomi Wolf's FB page? She seems obsessed with the idea of demanding a recount. It's very strange.

People seem to keep suggesting a "neverendum" is somehow wrong or undemocratic. Of course its not, it only happens because a significant chink of the population wants it - that's democracy

What was undemocratic was Salmond's speech within 2 days of the result rubbishing it , suggesting people, especially older voters, were mistaken.

The SNP will now have to decide what it puts in its manifesto. Does it give a commitment that there will be no further referendum if it secures a majority in the next Holyrood election?

There were 60% and over No votes in areas where the Holyrood mps are SNP and where the Westminster mps are SNP so clearly a vote for the SNP in parliamentary elections does not mean support for independence.

This hasn't just become a shitty thread (with admirable beginnings). It's become a fucking mental thread.

Anyway, unpleasantness aside, it's great to see so many smart, socially conscious women still up for political discussion and working together

I'm kind of glad I had an early night last night!

Was it my imaginary country when I couldn't get to sleep that did it?

If so, it's fine, I have no political power.

I voted SNP in the last election but voted no in the referendum, I suspect it is people like me who have made Alex Salmond so grumpy, he must feel that we just need nudged a wee bit further but I think he may be wrong. I was happy with the gradualist approach to devolution/ independence as I felt it would stop at a level that made the most number of people happy with the result whilst doing the least amount of damage to the country.

I am very annoyed with the 45 not accepting the result, they seem to be now regarding no voters as the enemy rather than Westminster, I don't think another referendum in a few years would be good at all, I keep thinking about the judgement of Solomon ( I went to a good old Presbyterian Sunday school).

I am also ironically reminded of Mrs T as Thatcherism was the last major political ideology that was prepared to smash up national institutions and cause financial pain in the short to medium term in order to remake the country because they "knew best". Only the mess they made still hasn't been cleared up. I don't think AS would like being compared to MrsT but I can see some parallels these days.

Evolution not Revolution.