Scotland can NOT keep the Pound & does Scotland - England = France?

[Isitmebut]

When any country splits, just like any messy ‘divorce’, temperatures are raised and both parties are obliged to look after their own interests; so it is expensive, takes a lot of legal time to resolve each claim, and usually at the end of it, neither side comes out as clear winners.

In Czechoslovakia, the last European-ish split, it took from 1990 to 1993 to finalize and 12,000 bills of legislation. So while the SNP insists that a Scottish split from the rest of the UK takes around 18-months – even assuming ‘old enemy’ temperatures do not reach boiling point to unwind over 300-years of history/integration, it MUST take twice as long to separate us even if Holyrood or Westminster have nothing else more ‘constructive’ to do.

So assuming there really were irreparable differences, the key to a successful divorce is the recovery, and the Pound is key to that on BOTH sides and practically the Pound cannot be shared between Scotland and the rest of the UK, and I’ll explain why.

Very generally speaking the SNP is similar to left of centre Labour, and Scotland currently receiving from Westminster around 10% higher spending per person than the rest of us, is USED TO HIGH PUBLIC SPENDING - and Westminster, through large economic peaks and troughs, is used to paying it – so a Scottish parliaments main headache is how to SPEND their annual income, not how to MAKE it.

So if similar to every UK Labour administration, full of high unsustainable public spending, high on ‘social justice’ wage increases, but short of business problem awareness - as the economy weakens, to continue PAYING for the high fixed cost of the State – a Labour, or any other left of centre government, will either run up National Debt and /or put up everyone’s taxes, which drags on the economy further.

As business/employment incentives are not in their vocabulary, businesses taxes although higher now fall, companies go bust - and those who achieved ‘social justice’ for a while, no longer have jobs.

A Scotland under the SNP MAY NOT knowingly follow this negative approach to a business cycle, where a Scottish hated Conservative government has to come back to Westminster every now and then and get the Private Sector/Businesses/Employment back on their feet to pay the Public Sector bills - but ALL GOVERNMENTS CAN OVERSPEND as tax receipts to cover spending often depend on (unforeseen) global ‘events’ i.e. a banking crisis, or a rise/fall in the price of oil.

It is worth noting that we had both a banking/business crisis and a huge volatility in the price of oil due to events beyond our shores (an independent Scotland will need to rely on) which during the administration of the last Labour government alone, the price for Brent Crude Oil traded under $20 a barrel to over $140 a barrel – and currently trading around $100 a barrel.

So how can a high spending Scotland faced with the prospect of running an annual deficit spending economy (for whatever reason and as the UK did from 2001/2 onwards) BORROW from the international capital markets to FINANCE the overspend, if Scotland can not issue UK government bonds, better known as Gilts?

So surely without a Scottish currency and government bond market (at a credit rating/cost of borrowing yet to be decided by credit agencies and every banks interest rates will be set higher than the governments) as night follows day, the ONLY real option to cover their spending is ever higher taxes to everyone - including businesses needed to get the economy/tax receipts – putting Scottish businesses into a slow decline, as the UK saw with that ‘social justice’ combination, during the high interest rate 1970’s, many of whom e.g. British Car Companies, were never to cover.

And domestic interest rates and currencies although open to MARKET forces, are economically intertwined, especially in periods of excessively HIGH or LOW currency rates - where if a currency is too weak a Central Bank of Scotland may need to RAISE Scottish interest rates to firm the Scottish currency up, or LOWER interest rates if too firm. Again using the Pound and the last administration as an example, I can remember the $ to £ as high as $2.10 and as low as $1.37, before settling in a range in the $1.60’s.

In Conclusion re Scotland the Pound; the rest of the UK, can NOT risk having an independent country open to the similar to France’s socialist high Public spending, left of centre ‘social justice’ pay rises whether businesses can afford them, high taxation on wealth until it leaves the country, non business friendly country economic model, still needing to run a deficit economy with flat economic growth, unemployment still over 10% and not the first clue how to fix it.

And Scotland needs the flexibility of its own currency and government bond market to give the Scottish people independence from Westminster to carry out the NON Conservative core policies, which in 1979 when Labour passed the Conservatives an indebted country with businesses in terminal decline and the lowest income tax around 32%, a higher rate of 60 odd% upwards, with 90 odd% tax on income from investments. And last but not least, in 2010 when Labour passed the Conservative coalition an annual £157 bil a year overspend, manufacturing had fallen from 22% of our economy to 12%, with tax rises to the masses to come AFTER the 2010 general election, if they won it.

Maybe the left of centre SNP is different, but they will have to duplicate many of the UK’s fixed costs e.g. an army etc and UK history shows that overly high State Spending reliance is an unsustainable country/economic model - and if taxes do NOT rise substantially on all those receiving that spending - those getting a fat State today, passes the bill on to future generations which is NOT fair.

To leave the UK for the promise of spending ‘jam today’, or because of a Conservative Poll Tax decades ago when a left of centre Council Tax subsequently went up 110% plus over 13-years, or a recent ‘bedroom tax’ to try and free up social housing bedrooms for the 5 million Shelter said in 2009 needed one - is not only falling for someone’s propaganda, but extremely short sighted.

For an independent Scotland, where the two main political party’s SNP and Scottish Labour (or equivalent) keeps promising and bribing the electorate with ever increasing spending/welfare, with the economic ways to SUSTAINABLY pay for it all within a potentially volatile Scottish currency, interest rate and oil environment – it is a recipe for AT BEST a stagnant, high unemployment Scottish economy, similar to France, but they have enjoyed lower EU interest rates than the UK to fund their (over) spending, for the past 15-years or so.

“France: the new sick man of Europe”
www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/14/france-sick-man-europe-economy

P.S. _This was a view for rest of the UK’s citizens on why an independent Scotland CAN NOT be allowed to keep the Pound, why Scotland faced with a French economy we should not offer too many concessions to keep Scotland - and why WE should march on Westminster if our politician offers the UK’s silver to and independent Scotland on top of their(?) oil.

Greengrow - I think you're right - they will manage fine.

It's a bit like when you know you have to fly the nest and the last thing you need is the parents going all dependent on you and persuading you to stay in the nest.

I was surprised to hear He ry Kissenger on Newsnight last night more or less saying that separation was no big deal and the rUK would get over it

Re “Scotland will manage fine” and similar views; I frankly agree that Scotland would eventually ‘manage’, but that is relative to what Scotland and it’s citizens EXPECTS to get out of independence - and more important what stability and future prospects it leaves behind.

The poster ApacaLypse on the previous page brought up WWII, when we had the Blitz and told ourselves ‘we’ll manage’, ‘we’ll be fine’, and we were, but that didn’t mean it would be anytime soon and that more bomb’s weren’t going to drop on us in the meantime - and the problem for Scotland (as any country) is that there are too many foreigners out there UNEXPECTEDLY dropping financial bombs upon you - and the more DIVERSE an economy is, the better it can cope..

Let me both reiterate a few points I’ve made, and put some ‘numbers’ into the mix, for a Scotland that WILL rely on oil, WILL have it’s own currency, and WILL have it’s own interest rates. Now in my opening post, I gave you facts on market volatility just during the last Labour government, which had little to do with that administration, but wanted to show that it wasn’t Scotland’s ‘default’ blame on everything financial, the “effing” Tories.

Scotland’s(?) oil is priced in US$, from 1997 to 2010, the oil price traded as low as around US$18, and as high as around US$142, and recently even despite the Middle East civil wars/conflicts getting worse, the price has dropped over 10% and around US$98 – so there is no guarantees on how much revenue will come into Scotland ANNUALLY to pay for their current social spending and low income tax levels to ENSURE people’s incomes are at least at a ‘living’ rate._

An independent Scotland’s currency is also key as there will be a huge difference how much money comes into a Scottish Exchequer FROM OIL, even if by some miracle a Scottish currency was let volatile than the Pound Sterling. Lets for arguments sake say an oil miracle keeps the price at US$100 from now until Scottish oil runs out, just think of the huge difference of oil revenue to a Scottish Exchequer if like the Pound (to the US$) traded as low as US$ 1.37 to US$2.10.

I’m sorry if I’m not explaining this very well, but just think when going away on holiday that if like us is on a spending budget/allowance, you look (and get pissed off) if the US$, Euro, or the North Korean Donger (whatever) has moved a bit from the last time you checked, and that means less glasses of wine.

Finally an independent Scotland’s interest rates, that I have no idea of what an independent Scotland’s international credit rating will be, we can look at a variety of other country’s 10-year government borrowing rates and get an idea - bearing in mind a country’s government is usually the most credit worthy and so banks, and then us, borrow at much higher interest rates.

UK currently needs to offer investors 2.52%.

Australia offers 3.60%

New Zealand offers 4.23%

EU Greece (in the Euro protected by the European Central bank) offers 5.51%

Brazil (an emerging, diverse economy) offers 4.03%.

Now I am not even going to try and interpolate WHAT EXACT INTEREST RATE the independent government of Scotland would need to pay investors to borrow; either to run a budget deficit economy by policy, or government revenues shortfalls, due a Scottish currency volatility, oil price volatility, or any other unexpected bombshell events from foreign sasanachs beyond our shores.

But even if an independent government of Scotland had to borrow between 4 and 5%, that is substantially higher than the UK, and borrowing rates (and admittedly savings rates) to banks, companies and individuals, higher still.

The SNP, or any future party, could offer the masses as much spending as they liked, but as many countries’s found after the financial crash, when Greece had trouble borrowing at 15% and had to call in the International Monetary Fund to bail them out/slash spending/jack up income tax – so sustaining that economy, sustaining that spending, is the hard part.

And that is why the REST OF THE UK can not allow Scotland to use the Pound, our interest rates, or the Bank of England as bailer out of ‘last resort. As they say, ‘nothing personal, it’s business’.

And that is how our 'divorce' will be, and looking at Salmond still blaming Westminster for all sorts, we'd expect nothing less confrontational.

How very ‘statesman like’ that when businesses voice almost obvious fears from the basic political, regulation, currency, interest rate, tax, and spend risks of an independent Scotland, reprisals to businesses are threatened.

Clearly ‘statesman’ in North Korean, Russia and the Ruskie rebels in the Ukraine, saw a similar ‘style’, before the rest of us.

“Big business warned of 'day of reckoning' if Scots vote Yes”

“Jim Sillars, Alex Salmond's former mentor, says the nationalists will have their revenge by nationalising BP, breaking up the banks and boycotting John Lewis”

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scottish-independence/11091801/Big-business-warned-of-day-of-reckoning-if-Scots-vote-Yes.html

There is nothing like encouraging future businesses that can locate anywhere, needed for a diverse Scottish economy to invest in, hire within, and trust a permanent left of centre Scottish government, from next Thursday on. And this is nothing like that encouragement, in fact, clueless.

Scotland, and potentially thanks to them the rest of the UK, faces huge economic uncertainties as they are heading for the 'known unknowns' of a currency, interest rate and oil price unknowns - while we are still recovering from the 'known knowns' of the LAST financial shock that with a £157 billion annual overspend had to be addressed whoever was in government.

Trying to show the consequences of an independent Scotland is not "scaremongering" and they know it, hence the hairy legged nationalist threats to anyone who dares try to quantify those known unknowns.

An independent Scotland under Salmond WITH all this previously ignored 'stuff' hitting the fan, should no longer be able to blame Westminster for the living standards of the Scottish people that previously received around 10% more government spending per head than the rest of us - so it has to come via the 'divorce' negotiations - when Westminster needs to focus on a UK economic recovery. Marvellous.

I see Richard Branson's come out in favour of Better Together. No surprise there seeing as it's his company getting all those juicy NHS contracts in England .

But apparently Scotland will get it's triple AAA credit rating on independence .

Really, what does he do, supply them with airplanes for the flying doctor, telephones, or fizzy cola drinks? lol

Re Scotland as Triple AAA rating, I doubt very much that a country old or otherwise would receive the top rating, especially as investment banks are calculating that Scotland would LOSE about 5% of GDP very quickly - which put into context, the UK as a whole LOST just over 7% of GDP in 2008/9 - and it took to a few months ago, for the UK with a far more diversified economy just to get that lost 2008 output back.

Still there are three main agencies, Standard & Poors, Moodys and Fitch and I believe the UK as a whole lost its AAA from one, maybe two, that puts us in good company with the U.S. and twice downgraded France.

I hope for Scotland's sake that they would be rated as one of the few still with straight AAA's, but I would bet the farm they they won't.

Where are you seeing that Scotland would get a AAA????

here

And it's Standard and Poor predicting triple A although on another thread they think that report was from February so things may have changed.

Citibank and Moody's have both said Scotland will likely get an A rating, couple of grades before current UK rating of Aa1.

TheBogQueen ... re the NHS and Virgin, thank you for answering my ignorance. If the following quotes are correct on the link you provided, we should be thanking HIM, rather than putting his motives, or contracts, to any doubt.

"Free at the point of need;"
"Better than what went before;"
"A great experience for everyone; and"
"Better value for the public and the NHS."

Kewcumber ….. a single A would make far more sense, looking at other country ratings, rather than AAA, but may I correct you re “a couple of grades” before AA1 in one agency, or the equivalent AA+ in another.

Moody’s assign 1, 2 and 3 to each ‘AAA’, ‘AA’, ‘A’ , ‘BBB’, ‘BB’ etc – with 1 the higher quality.
www.moodys.com/Pages/amr002002.aspx

If the UK is one notch below AAA with Moodys at AA1, then it must be Standard and Poors we are still AAA, so we have what is known as a split rating, near the highest, which means we pay LESS interest to investors buying our government bonds than those below,

So the difference between the UK and Scotland is around FOUR ratings or more higher, depending if Scotland is finally rated A!, A2, or A3.

FYI just below an A3 is considered NON investment grade for many fund managers/pension funds that buy government or any other bonds – so the largest investors in the world cannot buy any bonds at A3 or the next lower BBB’s – reducing the pool of potential investors/demand, which raises the interest rate a government needs to pay, potentially much higher than the UK’s AA1/AAA split rating.

Clearly if Scotland is rated below the A3 level at a later date, borrowing will be expensive for the government, and ultimately the taxpayer.

If any consolation to Scotland, the rest of the UK's current rating after an independent Scotland will immediately be put on what is known as 'credit watch' by all agencies, with the view to a downgrade or two.

Thanks for clarifying... I simpified as I don't think most people have a corporate treasury qualification or an economics degree. There is no point trying to be definitive about what the difference would be been new UK and Scotland, as no-one actually knows what either rating would be alone.

(And yes it is S&P who have rated UK at AAA)

Sigh

Virgin healthcare willbe picking off straightforward/routine cases and more expensive complex cases will be kicked onto the NHS thus putting the NHS under more pressure with less money.

Kewcumber ..... due to the work of the credit ratings agencies, we don't NEED an economics degree, I only got an old CSE in maths (bless), the ratings look difficult but like everything, s'ok once you know how.

Let me put this in perspective, Moodys rates Italy and Spain in the mid BBBs, and Portugal below in the BB's - is Scotland a larger economy than Italy, I don't know but the agencies will have to, once they come in to sort out the debt, assets and spending of Scotland.

Countries aren't rated by size for example USA has a lower rating than Finland, so whether Scotland is a bigger economy than Italy and Spain is irrelevant.

S&P downgraded USA to AA so despite someone at S&P claiming Scotland would be AAA rated (compared to all the other agencies who say A more likely) I would personally be amazed if Scotland gets a rating higher than AA and A more likely. Fitch (at a select committee hearing in 2012 so before the various PR machines got into action) confirmed that they had never given a AAA rating to a newly independent sovereign state yet.

I'm impressed that you find the credit ratings so easy to understand, one of the big complaints of govt treasuries around the world is the unfathomable process by which they are arrived at and the lack of transparency.

Kewcumber …… taking your points one by one, you are 100% correct, as far as countries and credit ratings are concerned, size does NOT matter, as similar to Scotland, Botswana’s main industries are natural resources i.e. diamonds and copper , they have a population of 2 million and are rated ‘A’ .

Moody’s have said that Scotland is likely to receive a ‘A’ “with a downward bias”, in other words on the ‘credit watch’ I mention further above, from Day One.

Next Standard & Poors have NOT officially claimed that Scotland will be ‘AAA’, the SNP indirectly did so by giving them THEIR biased figures, not the independent assessment I’ll mention later – so anyone peddling a Scotland ‘AAA’ rating is being as disingenuous as those claim Scotland ‘is one of the richest in the world’, assuming they have no share of the UK debts/liabilities.

S&P have said that Scotland will have an ‘investment grade’ rating, but as mentioned in an earlier post, that could be BELOW ‘A’.

“S&P warns of bank rating 'uncertainties' in independent Scotland”
uk.reuters.com/article/2014/04/24/uk-scotlandindependence-sp-idUKBREA3N01P20140424

"The willingness and ability of the Scottish government to support its banking sector appears challenging," S&P said, highlighting that the Scottish banking system's assets are currently a high 1,254 percent of Scotland's GDP.

“This compares with 880 percent for Iceland in 2007, just before its banking system collapsed, the ratings agency said. It currently classifies Iceland as "support uncertain," factoring no extraordinary government help into domestic bank ratings.”

Finally re credit ratings agencies and “their unfathomable process”, that is over critically generalising somewhat, as in the past they did sometimes assume that what they were being told/shown by those requesting credit rating were competent in the figures/asset claims they provided

A perfect example (away from Scottish nationalist claims lol) is the credit ratings assumptions that U.S. Mortgage Asset Backed Bonds in the late 1990’s to the pre crash 2000’s, had a similar quality individual mortgage suitability check of all those in the bond issue’s ‘basket’ of mortgages, as those from the 1930’s onwards - when this way of providing mortgages to the poorest was started.

Scotland like every other new country requesting a rating will have to have its country books looked into thoroughly for assets, liabilities AND it’s country economic/social/fiscal policies before a rating is OFFICIALLY assigned.

Credit Ratings Agencies have to look ahead to assess a country’s OUTLOOK, that has been part of the investors/treasurers criticism you mention, as ratings agencies sometimes wait too long to warn investors BEFORE an actual downgrade

Hence the ‘credit watch’ service they provide, that basically mentions if the current rating is ‘stable’, or ‘negative’ for a potential downgrade, and of course ‘positive’ for a potential upgrade’.

If Scotland has £1 for every time one of the nationalists said "we are one of the richest country's in the world", they'd be someways to paying off their share of the UK’s Pension Liabilities to come out of their oil revenues, on top of their share of the current £1,.400,000,000,000 trillion National Debt.

www.nationaldebtclock.co.uk/

www.if.org.uk/archives/2031/ons-reveals-full-uk-pension-liabilities
The total government pension liabilities are £5 trillion. These break down as follows:
• Government employee pensions: £1.2 trillion (unfunded: £0.9 trillion; funded: £0.3 trillion)
• State pensions: £3.8 trillion (all unfunded)

So that is a TOTAL National Debt, State Pension liability and Public Sector (unfunded) Pension liability of £6,100,000,000,000, (£6.1 trillion) from which Scotland the country have a liability/share BEFORE spending an annual penny on services.

I wonder if other 'richest countries in the world' like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia or Norway has those type of debts?

Why would working class Scottish voters tempted by the ‘social justice’ and the promise of ‘a rich country’ spending arguments, actually vote for an independent Scotland?

Taking how Credit Rating Agencies assign their ratings, on basically a country’s ability to service and repay its debts, as mentioned above, they have to look at the economic model as a whole – including taxation and a country’s ability to provide sustainable growth.

But there are many here, and in Scotland, that do NOT understand that there is no god given right to private sector jobs. There is no theological debate, ‘what come first, the chicken (company), or the egg (job)’ dilemma – as without jobs, there are no chances of a pay rise or economic growth at any time, never mind when just emerging from the worst recession in 100-years.

Recessions, or what we had that could be classed as a Depression, are called so for a reason, and there is not one in history I remember that jobs and pay rates increased, rather than decreased.

Looking ahead, the only Scottish jobs that could be termed as (relatively) safe from EXTERNAL factors, are those Scottish domestic businesses that have a Scottish Head Office, a balance sheet in the Scottish currency, have all or most of their earnings in the Scottish currency, pay all their employees in the Scottish currency and don’t have to worry too much about penal Scottish interest rates.

For foreign companies located in Scotland, we don’t have to go too far to find a company that HAS external pressures putting the viability of that company at risk, with Scottish ‘social justice’ issues similar to those followed in France whether companies can afford it or not - whose policies Mr Miliband promises a 2010 returned Labour government would have followed.
Oct 2013 ; “Grangemouth refinery 'to stay shut'”
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-24546521

Companies therefore are not ‘scaremongering’ in threatening to leave, as apart from huge uncertainty/risk in the Scottish Currency and Interest rates, they could see a Scotland (if delivering what it is promising voters) _anti business policies including the restrictive labour regulation/red tape as seen in the likes of France and Italy – where businesses are frightened to hire employees they are not allowed to fire if business turns down – with the following consequences STILL causing negative employment/growth problems for years to come.

Jan 2014; “French unemployment at record high”
www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25922231

Oct 2013; “French Parliament passes law punishing plant closures”
www.cnbc.com/id/101079582

Sept 2013; “Francois Hollande admits French Taxes are too much”
www.cnbc.com/id/101046068

Aug 2014; ”Shock as Italy stumbles into third recession”

www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11016018/Shock-as-Italy-stumbles-into-third-recession.html

If Scotland that will wearing whatever happens their fare share of UK pension/deficit/ national debt liabilities yet STILL wants;

• UK central bank control over their Uk Pound currency and Pound denominated interest rates,

• Socialist principals on high government spending, even if budget DEFICIT spending, with anti business policies one parliament, then (as Salmon is currently offering) lower Corporate Tax and other pro business policies to CREATE jobs lost during the next parliament as here,

Then Salmond is ideologically acknowledging the current two party UK ‘country model’, needing Conservative style business tax cuts to create/maintain jobs, that Scotland apparently NEEDS to adopt, then Scotland should vote ‘NO’ and REMAIN in the UK - and stop screwing around with the business/private sector they currently enjoy to help balance their economy - with the potential threats of French and Italian ‘country models’ with higher unemployment and taxes, and lower growth. IMO.

You know when a debate starts (and ends) from a ‘single purpose’ and therefore not open the rational thought , when even the intellectuals join up in purpose with the hairy legged mob, in order to stifle well thought out, nay factual, reasons why that ‘single purpose’ is not such a economically viable idea.

When socialist turns on socialist and calls them “traitors”, when for years they have shared the same “scaremongering” NHS and hard done by per capita spending (from the Tories) in Westminster) that maintained the Barnett Formula Scots enjoy, there is something fundamentally wrong with the accuser’s argument, if they WILL NOT ALLOW FUTURE SCOTTISH REVENUES to be questioned.

So the attempts in the streets to bully the ‘NO’ meetings and all those within that camp, turn even more sinister when SNP politicians try to influence the BBC coverage, academics from Scottish universities, as well as the businesses always needing to plan ahead for years – who’s directors have to know the basic currency, interest rate, fiscal, labour and other factors needed to budget/invest/hire, both now and the years ahead.

And similar to the Grangemouth Refinery dispute, you can try and bully for YOUR terms and conditions as ‘the right social thing to do’, but now as in the 1970’s - with all those British manufacturing brands I grew up with long gone - if you threaten companies already financially threatened with closure, the companies doors will close.

So who, or what, is going to finance this ‘fairer society’ soundbite the Nationalists have had so much success within the working classes, currently receiving more per capita spending than the rest of us?

Oil; I’ve previously mentioned the volatility of the oil price – currently coming down as world growth slows and the market is awash with the stuff – but to put Scottish oil in perspective with paying an independent Scotland’s bills – last year, the oil brought in £5 billion into the UK Exchequer, which if Scotland have nabbed the lot, it is only around 3% of the Scottish economy.

Very important to understand, as so many tax paying companies in Scotland say they will ‘break for the border’ if Scotland votes for independence.

The EU; whenever Scotland is allowed to join, the people will just swap the Bank of England and Conservative Party for the European Central Banks and the Germans, constantly on at high spending/deficit country’s like France and Italy to adhere to EU rules on running high spending/deficit economies (via the Stability & Growth Pact explained in the link below) - which slows economic growth and jobs and will ONLY change when those country’s bring in REFORMS the UK brought in during the 1980’s and 1990’s.
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3139460.stm

The EU and the 18 country’s Eurozone using the single currency and interest rate, has been shown to be a ‘fair economic weather’ project and socialist country’s cannot hide within - who without electorally unpopular reforms, will struggle for years to come, if allowed to.

Scotland finally lost it’s independence for financial reasons, having gambling half it’s wealth on sending ships to Panama to fund it’s future, that failed. It’s quite ironic Scotland now wants to leave the UK to either gamble it can pay it’s own bills and/or‘ sail’ to the EU and be governed by Germany’s fiscal/social prudence, rather than the Conservatives and the fastest growing economy in Europe.

So what you are saying is, for and English person in England the best result would be for Scotland to gain independance?

There is a lot of talk of tax payers moving south of the border if there is a 'Yes' vote, but I do wonder if there will also be a shift of some going the other way. I'd like to know how Scotland will manage the divide between areas of majority higher rate tax payers and places like Glasgow which is one of the poorest cities in Europe. If there is a way to solve that one without Aberdeen emptying and turning into a ghost town, then independence/home rule or whatever local decision making will make it happen would get my vote.

Isitmebut

Goodness mee - you are obsessed!! :D

Let the Scots have their independence if that's what they want - I say.

There's a saying - 'When children leave home parents have to stand on their own feet.'

Nope, have not said that throughout this thread, we are all screwed if Scotland pursues an independence dream.

But the less economically diversified Scotland with dreams of spending money like a socially drunken sailor in a whore house, will get screwed more on their own, or when dictated to by the European Central Bank and Germans – as France and Italy is getting lectured now, belligerently still doing it their way, but knowing they have to face a hostile electorate to reform, OR continue to stagnate under national debt, high taxes and high unemployment (see links further above).

I agree that Scotland can't (logically) use the pound after it becomes independent.

I have a stupid question too - (am in england). Once the currency situation stabilises, won't England be better off than it is now as Scotland costs more than it earns currently?

Sorry that's very simplistic, but I also agree that perhaps this should have been a vote for all of us , if it has such a big affect on us all. And also, agree with whoever said that it seems ludicrous to have such an important decision made when so many facts are unkown.

just something else to throw in the pot

BeattieBow …. The problem is that we are all so constitutionally, militarily and economically entwined, it will take years to sort out.

Using the army as an example, as they found in the 2010 Defence Review, where the UK had an annual £34 bil ish budget, but also had an £38 bil additional overspend, you cannot ‘salami slice’ the problem, one bit for Scotland, several bits for the rest of the UK.

Back to my original ‘divorce’ analogy, a six piece dinner service split 5 to 1, means replacements if possible to make up a six, and the partner with one setting (if not a Norman-no-mates) has to replace at least one setting, probably more.

So much to be sorted/replaced, expensive to both sides, during an acrimonious bun fight, will take years.

The markets, investors, companies etc that need certainty cannot settle down while this is going on and we have a Scotland debtor on our border that some so called experts give a year or so before getting in trouble, and the UK potentially leaving the EU via a referendum in 2017 – all great news for the Irish government in Dublin with a 12% Corporate Tax (less than half of most other countries in the world) and automatic EU license to do business. IMO.