To think wealthy people will leave Scotland?

[Juniperberries25]

..if the YES side win a referendum? Surely a lot of successful businesses and people who are wealthy/ comfortable/ have paid into a pension will not want to risk all their assets becoming worthless? Or am I missing something? Higher taxes, unknown currency, economic uncertainty, hard border, national security concerns etc

It would cost BILLIONS to set up new Government bodies (eg DVLA, Passport office, MI5, MI6, Amy Navy, RAF to name a few) so surely taxes will be much, much higher than rest of the UK?

Just to clarify I am NOT a fan of Boris but surely he will be long gone by the time Scotland actually became independent after YES vote (probably at least 10 years, just look at the BREXIT timeline).

Please don't flame me, I am just wondering what people think as I genuinely don't get how the benefits outweigh the risks.

I think its harsh of you to describe the SNP publication as "whataboutery" bearing in mind you are trying to say its irrelevant, but perhaps you could repeat the cases you mentioned, along with more detail about these mysterious lobbies and discussions that you claim are taking place in Holyrood about reforming the constitution, which us mere members of the public are not privy to?

You do know that the EU applicant criteria is based on a lot more than economic factors? The EU makes it very accessible information.

@AchatAVendre I did not say that.
You raised about the Scottish legislative body and I was explaining why that is not an issue for joining the EU.
I understand the criteria for joining the EU. I have posted links on this thread.

Joining the EU and being an independent Scotland are two separate things.
In terms of becoming an independent Scotland what matters is whether it would be better for the economy.

That’ll be me then.

The point I was making was that many countries with renewable energy sources also have nuclear energy generation. So when the wind stops blowing and the sun stops shining, there is a back up.

Scotland does not have this. And it is opting to move away from fossil fuels.

I don’t think that’s an unrealistic point to make given that energy security is quite important.

You can deride and belittle me all you like. It speaks more of you than it does me.

The issue is that you don’t understand what you’re posting. If it really is a thesis it doesn’t say much about the quality of it. You claimed that there was an issue with the Scottish parliament being unicameral because it has “unfettered” powers then to back it up posted a uk Supreme Court case where Scottish parliament legislation was declared invalid as being outwith their powers. So rather obviously the case you actually posted demonstrated conclusively that the Scottish parliament doesn’t have unlimited power at all!

you haven’t got a handle on the basic concepts here. I am also not all that sure of your point anyway- as already explained no one is proposing that the Scottish parliament in its current form will join the EU. Rather the proposal to join the EU is on independence when the Scottish parliament will be abolished in its current form.

If you want to debate, that’s fine but you need to post something coherent.

@antelopevalley the relevance to the EU (very very simply explained) is that the Scottish parliament is a devolved parliament of the Uk parliament. This means it only has the powers the uk parliament gives it and no more (and these powers can be taken away at any time by the uk parliament). The boundaries of these powers (like all areas of law) requires interpretation by the courts. @AchatAVendre posted a case where the uk Supreme Court decided the Scottish parliament acted outside its powers and this the legislation it passed was void (as it is limited to the powers Westminster gives it).

when the uk was within the EU, certain areas were given by the uk parliament to the EU to legislate for. This meant that the UK parliament could not validly make law that contradicted EU law in these (very limited) areas (eg see Factortame, etc). So a similar situation (as courts could decide uk parliament acts were invalid if they contravened directly applicable EU law)

its not quite analogous as ultimately although EU law was supreme over uk law in those areas it was because we had signed a treaty so the uk parliament was still sovereign as it could decide to leave at any time.

it’s a complex area but basically in the current constitutional set up the uk parliament is supreme but can delegate powers to the Scottish parliament or other local bodies. Eu law was supreme in certain areas when we were a member but only because we agreed it was supreme and not as a general constitutional principle.

If we vote for independence I'm going to swathe myself in plaid and reclaim the Stone of Destiny. Reclaim Scotland from the hands of the SNP with guerilla style raids on holyrood and the Irn Bru factory, crying “Freedom!” as I do so

The above link was a bbc report on the cases posted by @AchatAVendre If you click through you will see they were declared invalid as they were not within the powers of the Scottish parliament.

@AchatAVendre in her post misunderstands that they were invalid due to lack of clarity and also in another post seems to think that such issues are due to the Scottish parliament having unfettered powers (it doesn’t). It’s sue to the legislation being have been determined by the court to be outside the remit of the Scottish parliament.

It’s usual for courts to interpret and clarify law (in fact that’s their primary purpose) and in the case of the Scottish parliament, courts can also determine its outside the competency of the parliament for various reasons.

Right. Will ye aye.

Some of that will quite rightly be a crime although i suppose it depends what you mean by “raids”. Perhaps just see if Asda does online deliveries to your area.

@Villagewaspbyke Thanks. Of course it would be a new parliament. I was forgetting that as its current power are very limited.

What are the SNP proposals for a new post independent parliament?

Well, @WouldBeGood, I think you’ve just ensured every Scottish resident on the thread will vote yes now- i mean who’d miss that spectacle? 🍿

🤣 Just as well I’m an imposter!

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

A bit off topic here but I think whether you are pro -independence or pro-union, and despite things getting pretty heated on the thread, everyone should take a moment to appreciate how much more in-depth and intelligent the discussions on this thread have been compared to discussion prior to Brexit. There is clearly still a lot of case-making to do for both sides but there’s already been more thought put into how things will work in practice than there has been to this day on Brexit! Personally, I suspect Scotland is going to be just fine one way or another.

I always find it amusing on these threads when people state that Scotland couldn't go it alone, and how they are propped up by the UK government. Always makes me wonder why Westminster government are so desperate to keep them.
Still remember the Love bombing from 2014 by Politicians and celebrities when they thought there might actually be a Yes vote.
In early 90s, the Czech Republic and Slovakia became 2 countries and was called the " Velvet" divorce. Not even sure anyone noticed for years.🤣

Are you hearing a whooping in your head there @WouldBeGood?

Yes, but you also glossed over the fact that I acknowledged this was currently a limitation in Scotland, one that would prevent use from moving completely away from fossil fuels until battery storage technology can bridge the gap between supply and demand.

We won't know exactly what the government's plans are on this until autumn this year when they publish their next energy strategy that focuses on that transition but, it won't be a case of "we're just gonna stop using gas fired power stations without any sort of backup/replacement".

We can't go back and magic up nuclear power plants and it would take longer to build new plants now than it will for battery tech to become widely available on industrial and personal levels, so the fact other countries have built and can use nuclear energy is irrelevant.

You can already buy power cells for your house. The Generac pwrcell for example, provides 18kWh of storage captivity (around 2 days of electricity use for an average household). With wind availability at around 95% across Scotland the chances of running into 2 days of no wind are very slim, and as said before we already produce 96% of our gross needs from renewables so the capacity isn't a problem and within a decade the storage won't be either.

And that's not even touching on tidal power, which while still it's infancy is progressing (see Japan's current Kairyu Deep Sea Turbine trials for example).

Scotland more than virtually any other European country is positioned to be entirely energy self sufficient now and in the future, and if we didn't have to share our energy resource with the rest of the UK would be a net-exporter right now rather than being lumbered with some of the highest energy bills in Europe.

Finally, even if everything with renewables fails miserably the oil and gas reserves aren't going to magically disappear. An independent Scotland could vote in a pro oil and gas party in future if the population so decided.

Well said. If we are so heavily subsidised by England why are they so desperate to keep us, and won't let us go. If we were truly subsidised by England they would be desperate to give us indendance.

Scotland more than virtually any other European country is positioned to be entirely energy self sufficient now and in the future, and if we didn't have to share our energy resource with the rest of the UK would be a net-exporter right now rather than being lumbered with some of the highest energy bills in Europe.

Yes- and Scotland produces 30% more energy than it needs- mosty from renewables. This excess is sent to English consumers.

Where are you getting these figures from? We’re currently self sufficient in energy and have a surplus of 30% ? I don’t think so. Please can you link to the relevant doc stating this?
Also the idea that everyone will have thousands to spare to shell out on battery packs for the home is wildly over optimistic.

We also PAY the windfarm companies to turn OFF their windfarms if it's too blowy!!!!!!!!!!

HERE IS a LINK scotlandagainstspin.org/2021/10/electricity-customers-paid-windfarms-1bn-to-switch-off-turbines-stv/

But surely the other uk countries paid an equal share in setting up the power farms so they equally own the power produced.

Power generation companies are not state owned in the Uk.. Nor is electricity generated owned by the state..

Read the article. No need for the apostrophes .

They're not paid to stop if it's "too blowy", they're paid to feather the turbines and stop generating if the grid is at full capacity and there's no demand. One if the reasons this happens is to keep nuclear and fossil fuel generation ticking over at safe/responsive output levels.

They're not paid to stop if it's "too blowy", they're paid to feather the turbines and stop generating if the grid is at full capacity and there's no demand. One if the reasons this happens is to keep nuclear and fossil fuel generation ticking over at safe/responsive output levels.

And - that's good is it - we're paying the Chinese and Danes etc to produce nothing - even if we did away with the other fuels we'd still need them to feather the turbines, and we'd still pay them to do it.

Scottish independence would be a total economic disaster