The Brexit Arms

[BrexitArmsLandLady]

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Article 50 has been triggered (finally!).
Now we move onwards to the future 🍻

All welcome, as ever...

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Someone posted 'no great shocks'. Lol, the currency collapsed immediately after the referendum. Further shocks are unlikely though, it will just be a slow decline by a thousand cuts.

I thought that many of the anomalies around who can vote in Scottish indy ref etc, are fudges to get around the fact that there is currently no black and white way to determine who is "Scottish". I know that someone born in Scotland, to Scottish parents, with Scottish grandparents is Scottish, likewise someone born in England with English ancestry is not Scottish. But there is so much movement between Scotland and the rest of the UK that most cases are not so black and white:
eg, I was born in England, live in Scotland, have a mortgage here, pay taxes here and gave birth to children here. I also have 2 Scottish grandparents - so why shouldn't I be allowed a vote on Independence?

The current solution is not perfectly fair (I do have sympathy for Scots temporarily living abroad who were disenfranchised), but any solution would be unfair to some people, and would likely be much more logistically complicated;
Say for example that only "Scottish" people can vote, and you define Scottish as being born in Scotland: You would have to create a new electoral role, double checking every applicants birth certificate. Massive faff.

My brother would be able to vote then

And we moved from scotland nearly 40 years ago

Sorry if it was born in Scotland only

squishy you are right that it was a fudge to avoid defining Scottish citizenship, but:
1 It suited the SNP narrative of "civic" nationalism as opposed to plain old BNP Nationalism.
2 The link I posted above and my cursory analysis suggests it did favour the Yes Vote and yet the Result was still 55% No to 45% Yes.

In contrast, since there are 3m EU Nationals in the UK and the Leave margin was 1.5mish, even after adjusting for Irish and children and voter turnout, if the EU ref franchise had been extended to them the Result could have been Remain.

Poles abroad can vote remotely in Polish elections back home (not sure about other EUs). They also voted in Indyref 1 last year to Remain (of course) - self-serving reasons. And yet a Scotsman living, however temporarily in England is not allowed to vote in Scottish matters. EUs votes count even though some of them intend to stay in UK for a limited time and then return home, but a Scotsman's vote about Scotland does not. Why should foreign workers be allowed to influence what happens in Scotland? Ridiculous.

But how do you define "Scotsman" RailwayCuttings? How do you separate "Foreign workers" from immigrants who may settle in Scotland for many years, have Scottish children, Scottish jobs, etc and be very much invested in the future of Scotland?

Wherever you draw the line, it is going to throw up some weird anomalies and be unfair to someone.

They also voted in Indyref 1 last year to Remain (of course) - self-serving reasons.

You are somewhat mixed up in that pronouncement. Indyref (1) was in 2014 and the options were Yes or No.

And UK citizens living abroad can vote in UK general elections and European Parliament elections if they have lived in the UK in the previous 15 years. They can't vote in local elections or elections to the devolved parliaments which require residency. Which were the rules that were applied to the Indyref.

But how do you define "Scotsman"?

Taking citizenship.

But you can't currently take Scottish citizenship. I don't have it, howabout doesn't have it, you don't have it, even Nicola Sturgeon doesn't have it!

Point is also that Scotland is currently not allowed to draw up its own rules about who is allowed citizenship under which conditions. Immigration is not a devolved matter. Scotland is much more inclusive than WM allows so the fact that Europeans who are settled in Scotland get to vote in the referendum tells you that Holyrood is not planning on deporting Europeans like WM seems to want to do.

Oh god, I've just realised there's a huge, huge pitfall if they hypothetically allow anyone with a Scottish parent a Scottish passport in a future independent Scotland....

That Michael Howard is a right shit stirrer, isn't he?

Oh god, I've just realised there's a huge, huge pitfall if they hypothetically allow anyone with a Scottish parent a Scottish passport in a future independent Scotland....

Tbf Scotland only seems to be far more inclusive because as even Eck will tell you we have a problem with emigration, not immigration. Scottish people traditionally view the whole World as their home - NS has it all backwards.

MH could barely keep a straight face yesterday. He was merely pointing out the sheer ridiculousness of the angst and hyperbole coming from those proclaiming Spain would be holding us to ransom. Given Gibraltar has special tax status and relies on Spanish workers it is pretty reasonable of the EU to suggest they can have an exclusive sidebar deal whatever is agreed with the UK.

For anyone angsting about the cost of redesigning the passport redesigning the passport, apparently we do it every 5 years or so anyway to keep up with changes in security technology. I like the multicoloured suggestion with all the geological designs on it.

I do worry how long it will be before they just suggest micro chipping us all.

I pointed that out on the other thread howabout - last time (2010) it was a £400 million deal to design and produce UK passports for 10 years. I would think the majority of the cost is in the secure printing.

I'm not angsting about the cost of the passport redesign, I know it would have been spent anyway. However, if they change the colour of my passport to some weird looking blue one, I will spend the next 40 years moaning on and on and on about it.

squishy my first passport was blue and I didn't leave the country till I was at Uni - I'm not even out my 40s.

One of the other threads is measuring Britishness on propensity to holiday in the UK. My Scottish cousin works in the travel industry and is moaning on FB about going off back to work in the Caribbean after a couple of weeks on holiday at home.

Same here squishy

I dont want a multi coloured one

Or a cath kidson one

Or emma bridgewater...although i liked the owl design she has

What is your preference Rufus given it will change anyway and the EU will probably laugh at us and get confused if we keep it like it is?

It just really fucking beggars belief that people would rather have a passport of their chosen colour that restricts you to one country, than one of another colour that allows you to live and work unrestricted across a continent.

Has anyone burnt theirs yet?
www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/you-can-burn-your-eu-11409040

As i said on the other thread how i liked the blue

Having said that i dont mind the colour of the EU one

I just preferred the hardback

I am really shallow

I'd like one like Croatia's got. Strangely they didn't have to leave the EU for it.