If you voted no in the independence referendum...

[HirplesWithHaggis]

...is Brexit changing your mind?

I've seen a number of people on social media (including MN) saying that they voted No in 2014 but would say Yes, or are starting to come round to the idea, in a second indyref because of Brexit. Sometimes it's because of the loss of freedom of movement, sometimes it's because Scotland's Remain vote has been completely ignored (see also Irish border issue), sometimes just the way our MPs are treated in Westminster.

Often it's reluctant, which I can fully understand. Have you changed your mind, are you swithering? Might you be persuaded?

For probably unnecessary disclosure, I voted Yes, and will do again. I am not a member of any political party/group. I'm just curious.

I agree with what @PCohle said many months ago:

I voted no. Initially I was tempted to change my vote as I was so keen to remain part of the EU and thought that independence would facilitate that. However looking at how Brexit has gone I have no faith whatsoever politicians would make a better job of disentangling Scotland from the UK.

But also think @@yellowallpaper makes a really good point:

*Surely common sense says wait for the dust to settle, wait for an eu trade deal, and other trade deals to emerge. Then evaluate whether the U.K. as a whole and Scotland in particular needs a new referendum on independence, and possible reentry into the EU.

This mad scramble for independence is simply a ploy for Scotland to remain in the EU after Brexit*

Surely common sense says wait for the dust to settle, wait for an eu trade deal, and other trade deals to emerge

But it isn't just about trade, it's about being in charge of your own destiny for yours and your family's sake. Or trusting Johnson/Mogg/Patel to steer the UK through the biggest change since WWII. And I do mean trusting because you don't have the power to sway their decisions and you never will.

it would massively complicate things with a border across Scotland being inevitable

Not sure why this should be a problem...we don't have the historical baggage of NI/Rep of Ireland, which is the main reason for concern there. Logistically, it means some additional overheads for business but, as Johnson is promising a Free Trade Agreement, these would be minimal.

Surely in the interim the Scottish Parliament should be making steps to truly rule Scotland with sensible taxation...

We are not allowed to

... and a slow shift of full power and independent rule to the Scottish Parliament?

Quite the opposite is happening. Holyrood passed legislation to protect devolved powers - they had the legal right to do this. Westminster then passed legislation to remove that legal right.
Holyrood mounted a legal challenge to Westminster's move, which Westminster defended all the way to the Supreme Court. Holyrood lost. So Westminster can now legally reverse any devolved power 'without challenge' because they changed the law to limit Holyrood's powers.

(Pic source - IndyPosterBoy - all free to use)

The longer we wait, the harder Westminster will make it, including passing whatever laws they see fit. Waiting would be folly

I have no faith whatsoever politicians would make a better job of disentangling Scotland from the UK

Brexit and independence are not the same thing. Westminster has taken more than 3 years, 2 general elections, 2 party leaders and multiple scalps to decide what it wanted and still nobody knows what they are getting!

Part of the reason for the Brexit mess is the differing political agendas of the factions involved together with the fact that Brexit is the 1st time that anyone has left the EU. In comparison, Scotland will be the 52nd (52nd!!) country to take the established route to independence and regain power from the UK. There will be negotiations around asset ownership etc but there are no flavours of independence - there is only one outcome. You are either independent or you are not

I am reluctantly coming to the conclusion that another Indyref in the next few years is probably inevitable, although I am not looking forward to it; as a Unionist my experience if the first one was pretty awful. Like most people right across the U.K. I’m horrified with the way the Brexit negotiations have played out, which I think just goes to show how difficult disentangling a Union with long history is and that its absolute madness to undergo such major constitutional change on a simple majority. And that’s without the additional complications that Scotland would have leaving the U.K. such as disentangling the shared institutions, infrastructure, free travel, currency, pensions and on and on (which incidentally the other territories that have gained independence didn’t have). I hope that in any future referendum we at least learn the Brexit lessons and require a supermajority to put the result beyond doubt and avoid some of the resulting divisions, otherwise we’re facing generations of nastiness.

If I’m honest though, as unhappy as I might be, I can’t see myself voting in favour of independence. It is just too extreme a step for me, especially given the large number of powers Scotland has anyway to run its own health, education, police; pretty much everything really. If I’m honest, I don’t really care if we’re in the EU or not. Not as much as I care about being British. The border issue with independence is a complete nonstarter for me. I don’t recognise the pretty incendiary picture currently being painted by Nicola Sturgeon: I don’t feel abused or trapped, my life is generally pretty good within the U.K., although it would be nice if the Scottish government paid more attention to the things actually under its remit (like the falling education standards, a particular worry). If anything, the repeated insistence of the SNP that they speak for me, and that ‘Scotland’ wants independence, is making me feel completely unrepresented. But I understand how democracy works so have to accept it.

At the very least, I hope that Brexit is sorted out first, as otherwise we’re voting completely blind. Didn’t Nicola Sturgeon herself say that she wanted to see how the dust settled with Brexit first? We should at least see what kind of EU/U.K. deal is struck so as not to leap completely into the unknown.

Hi there,
Scotland's population is the most educated in Europe with 47 per cent going into further education. This is 5 per cent higher than UK.
SNP refused to cut police numbers unlike England and Wales, hence we have 40 yr low of violent crime whereas England and Wales unfortunately experiencing highest ever levels of violent crime.
NHS Scotland outperforms England and Wales especially regarding A and E waiting times.
The SNP are doing much better than Tories in England and Labour in Wales.
Hope you can join us on the 'other side' and vote for Scotland to be a normal, independent country. It would be fantastic if we can achieve our potential and keep the money raised in Scotland, in Scotland. It might push those in England and Wales to fight for something better than the Tories.

And the reason Brexit's such a cluster*uck is that the Tories can't agree what they want.
When the PM's own brother resigns from parliament as he can't stand by and watch the no deal go through as he knows how bad the recession's going to be from it, you know it's time to part company.

I would say SNP gov have had many years to make Scotland 'fantastic' and as far as I can see the quality of life is deteriorating.
If we have this highly educated pop why is NS desperate to encourage immigration, including using a points system. Where are our educated DCs to find work if competing with the pick of foreign immigrants?
Ok we have the Edinburgh festival, and research links with foreign unis but how are we actually going to make income ? We need industry , businesses and jobs. A dwindling oil industry and the nuclear deterrent being moved to England after independence leaves little else.
I voted yes last time but am a definite no to Indy now.

Scotland is in the top 5 for youth employment in Europe alongside Austria, the Netherlands, Czechia and Germany; 7.6% youth unemployment compared to the UK average of 11.5%.6 Meanwhile, Scotland is categorised by the European Commission as ‘Regional Innovation Leader’ as it ranks 41st out of 220 regions in terms of innovation in Europe. If we're able to part ways with Westminster/ go back into EU this should continue.
Scotland has a very highly skilled workforce ( much higher than rest of UK). Due to number if tech jobs available, we still need immigrants to fill roles so don't worry about there not being enough skilled roles to go around.

There's no reason why we can't be a successful country like the Scandis. As David Cameron said on the Andrew Marr show- we don't have savings of a million pound per person from income from oil as its shared amongst 60k people not 5k people ( population of Scotland and Norway around 5k). Instead we are part of UK which is currently just under 2 trillion pounds in debt. Yes, it will run out in the future which makes it more imperative that Scotland is able to set up an oil fund asap.

I mean we now have the United Nations conducting an investigation and report due to disgustingly high poverty levels in the UK (114m), the lowest state pension in the developed world, that's with the age on which you'll receive it on track to be 75! France - they're striking due to possible early 50s!
It doesn't need to be like this and like I said above, if Scotland gains independence and doesn't need to pay billions towards projects such as HS2/ London crossrail/ sewage system/ Trident etc and can spend this on improving the quality of life here, I hope that voters in England will push for change there too.

Why is care for the elderly and school education starved of funds and why is population falling if we are living in this nirvana.

I think it’s very misleading that we could be like Scandinavian countries.
I think our whole outlook is very different; I really do not think that as a nation we are ok to put up with things that are inconvenient for us but better for the majority of people. I read the book ‘a year of living danishly’ by Helen Russell and the author states that the personal allowance is tiny when compared to us (around £4,600) income tax is set at something like 37% for everyone until a level of £50,000 then rises to 51.7%.
I think services would great if that was implemented but would joe bloggs be happy with that? Going by the fact that even though SNP government have tax raising powers, I think not.

So pensioners on the new state pension of £8,500 pa (the lowest in the world according to pp) would get taxed - that would go down well.

Yes I've got that book- personally I'd be ok with paying higher tax if able to keep it all in Scotland. I'm at the age where my main focus is my son having a good country / good opportunities.
SNP plan to bring Scottish pensions in line with other European countries like France (mid £20k).
I definitely don't think we live in a Nirvana, far from it!! Our school is collecting food to feed children in the local area yet taxes spent on an abundance of projects like Trident. Something very wrong with that- when I was in school we sent care packages to Africa. Unfortunately, under Westminster, the corruption levels are similar to those in Africa. Just so sad. For example, Boris' elite are making millions short selling on the back of no deal Brexit.

Yes I can see why you agree with that system of tax too; as everyone would benefit, irrespective of income and we’d all feel like we had contributed to it-no them and us-but my argument is that most folk won’t. Most folk don’t like others spending their money on things that they may not have a say in or that may not directly benefit them. For that to work the country needs a different collective mindset and I would argue we are quite divided at the moment.

Is the UN ok with us not having trident though? I’ve read conflicting opinions from them. To be honest I think it’s a moot point in some ways as I read that India managed to produce nuclear weapons from their nuclear power stations?!
But then again I don’t hold UN up as the holy grail to answer the worlds’ problems; they are behind Agenda 21, making policies and working towards the world eating a vegan diet.

What worries me is you say that we have corruption on par with Africa (I have no direct knowledge of corruption in Africa only anecdotally; my Nigerian friend at university said she would never go back there because of the corruption and from my friend whose husband works and lives in a secure compound in an African country where you travel separately to your luggage when you get off the plane).
Naively perhaps I would like to think that we don’t have high corruption levels in this country comparative to many parts of the world.
I would argue that parts of Europe have levels of corruption (horse meat/honey scandals) that I do find worrying and don’t appear to be tackled.
Regarding food security, which is an expanding field for organised crime gangs; last week a Romanian veterinary surgeon was up in front of the uk professional disciplinary committee for giving a bribe to her veterinary college so that she could pass the food security part of her degree; she was not the only student to have done so. Irrespective whether one feels that she was to blame or not, a higher institution in the EU was involved in this taking bribes to pass important exams(some would argue more important than small animal surgery). I hope their would be uproar in the uk if this happened here, and that the institution should be removed from being able to provide veterinary education valid in the uk.

Well, Transparency International rated the UK as 80/100 (100 being the best) for low levels of corruption with a world wide position of 11/180. Putting us very close in the rankings to Norway and Sweden.

The majority of African countries were way down the list, I think the best was Botswana 61/100, most are in 20-40 range. Those are the 2018 rankings but I don't think we've plummeted so far in 2019 that we on a par with African nations. The difference is our corruption tends to make news headlines, in really corrupt countries it doesn't make the news.

Corruption Index 2018

I voted No and Brexit has completed changed my mind on the matter of Scottish independence - I'm very pro-EU. Would most likely vote Yes if there's another referendum.

@Elfnsafe1y surely you're not ignoring the rural exodus. We need immigration because our population is so educated. Rural populations are being decimated and there are no young folk left to care for the old in those areas.