Effects of Brexit deal on Scotland

[Justpassingtime1]

Assuming it all goes ahead what are the likely impacts on Scotland?

As an aside, for many years the SNP were known as the tartan tories.

The SNP are the only party who can orchestrate a vote for independence in Scotland. It will be perfectly possible to vote for other parties in future and create a government of our choosing. That's the point where the SNP have to compete on policies.

I'll be voting SNP until independence and then I'll go back to voting for Labour.

My hope is for an independent Scotland with a strong labour government.

Snap. Mine too.

Politics isn't a faith based, emotionally driven thing for me - I can't see any clear upsides as yet for brexit either, but I don't see any upsides to continuing negotiations, prolonging uncertainty or voting for more uncertainty in short order.

Unless you want maximum economic chaos to win an argument. That's not responsible. The poorest always lose most in any downturn.

I think it's a real shame for our young people especially, that they've lost freedom of movement. Our kids have also lost access to the Erasmus scheme that made studying in the EU easy. For those with loads of money it won't make much difference but it's a lost opportunity for those without.

Lots of things will be affected, take the music industry for example, which brings in significantly more money than fishing.

There will be a huge cost and red tape barrier now for EU bands touring here or Scottish bands wanting to tour Europe. Until yesterday they could just organise the gigs and go. Now, they will not only need a visa for each country they go to, for each member of the band and crew, but also a "carnet" document for taking each piece of equipment across each border, which costs money and time and a knowledge of what's required for each country.

Visa and carnet costs could run into the thousands for a single tour.

Big name bands will just absorb the costs but it'll kill off touring for thousands of bands getting themselves established - the potential big name bands of the future.

It also has a negative impact on job opportunities, with some employers relocating or not choosing Scotland in the first place, or having to scale back and also fewer opportunities to work in the EU.

What are the opportunities? People are talking of making the most of it - how, exactly? I can't see it.

To be honest if we had a strong labour government in Westminster I wouldn't want independence.

But I cant look at this present tory Government with anything other than total revulsion. I still cant believe the working class in England who gave them a majority. It just amazes me. Like Wales voting for Brexit. What happened to people?!?

@kurtrussellsbeard I think the problem is nobody really knows which is why this whole thing is so divisive. Who knows? As a remainer I oscillate between deep despair to manic optimism that everything will be ok. Erasmus was scrapped because it was costing the U.K. government more than what we were getting out of it because so many EU students want to study in the U.K. because we have great universities here. There was a financial element to that. And if I am not mistaken it has been replaced by an alternative scheme so U.K. students won’t miss out and they can also study outside the EU with the new scheme too. But please somebody correct me if I am wrong. I also see things like the vaccine approvals in the EU being caught in a slow regulatory system. Again my Dutch husband says the Dutch are tearing their hair out at being so late to start the vaccination programme. So o genuinely don’t know. I will now knuckle down though and try and make it work - by buying British where I can and not moaning and putting the country down. Let’s see

I think I'd be more inclined to try to be more positive if leaving the EU wasn't always being proclaimed a victory for sovereignty.

I never want to hear the word sovereignty again. It comes joint equal to coronavirus.

I'd prefer the narrative to not be so bloody triumphalist. I mean, sure, leave a trade agreement. But the rhetoric from our side - from day one - was nationalistic, aggressive, devoid of truths or subtleties.

A grown up assessment of the pros and cons never happened; it was all Farage and his vile racist posters and empty talk of victory. It wasn't a fucking war, but we did our best to make it one. There was no need and we've embarrassed ourselves on the world stage because of it.

Agree with all of this. It's such a sad state of affairs. It always felt like a weird xenophobic thing. I still can't get over the leave campaign were proven to be liars but nothing seemed to be done about it! I struggle to see silver lin s but hope there are some.

@ssd, tell that to the SBP (Scottish Brexit Party).

@ssd I completely agree. When corbyn became leader my appetite for independence dwindled hugely. It's a class thing not a nationalist thing. Many of my friends and colleagues felt exactly the same.

Re Labour, the first time I felt an ounce of respect for Richard Leonard was a couple of days ago when he said the truth in Parliament during the debate- that it wasn't a choice between no deal or the deal that's just been passed that's worse than the TM deal that the PM resigned from the shadow cabinet over.
Better still, the Tory's created a simple, 3 world slogan for the gullible #NodealNicola. Blaming the SNP for the clusterfck of Brexit when they weren't allowed any representation or input on negotiations - pretty far out even for the Tories but people on mumsnet were repeating it so it worked on some!
Of course, the Tories/ English Labour MPs passed the deal so here we are.
There's no benefit from it. The Tories know this and RD said it'll wreck the Scottish economy. It's been estimated the deal will reduce Scotland 's GDP by 6.1 per cent by 2030 compared to EU Membership.

At a lower, more practical level, its impacted Scotland's food industry already. For example companies selling shellfish to restaurants on the continent lost millions due to the introduction of red tape on leaving the EU (which affects their JIT supply model).
On a more positive note, Gibraltar is now effectively independent within the EU with remaining links to the British Crown. Also, the border between Gibraltar and Spain is open as is the border between NI and The Republic. The Tories have proved their argument of a need for a hard border between England and Scotland to be, well, utter pih.
Here's some nice data for you re Scotland's GDP versus other EU countries. Thanks for cheering me up as I was losing hope! Nice to see there are some informed, interested in the facts people on mumsnet. Happy New Year.

I am just happy that it is finally done. Time to move on, everyone.

Move on, are you kidding? We are only just beginning the perpetual state of being in negotiation with the EU about something, forever. And yes it's reopened the Scottish independence question, together with that of Irish reunification.

It will never be over.

@Outsidemum1, then why didn't the SNP vote for TM's deal? That would have saved a lot of heartache.
I'll tell you why, because it is not in their interest to support ANY deal. It just doesn't suit their narrative. Scotland could have been promised Heaven on earth, but it would have made NO difference whatsoever to the SNP's posturing.

Hear, hear ssd.

And yes, I don't understand how a racist liar was voted to become PM of the UK but it's the same as Trump- he said he could kill someone on camera and the stupid would still vote for him.
Of course, Brexit won't affect the insanely rich who orchestrated it. The fact that that the PM's father is applying fir dual citizenship so he can still spend holidays at one of his homes in France tell you all you need to know.
Of course, Farage's children have dual citizenship. It is the children that will suffer. For example, my nephew's taught English as a foreign language in Germany and France. He was looking to go back next Summer but now they don't want people from the UK as too much red tape.
Also, the Erasmus scheme ( new version) is not an exchange scheme. I believe it doesn't include having students come here so will cost HE £200m. This was a political decision as the Tories wanted us to be separate . The cost of Erasmus is pennies compared to, for example, HS2.

[quote Arkadia]@Outsidemum1, then why didn't the SNP vote for TM's deal? That would have saved a lot of heartache.
I'll tell you why, because it is not in their interest to support ANY deal. It just doesn't suit their narrative. Scotland could have been promised Heaven on earth, but it would have made NO difference whatsoever to the SNP's posturing.[/quote]
Are you serious? The SNP should have voted for TM's deal and if they had, everything would be rosy? It makes 0 differencehow the SNP vote. Zero.
But, very simply, the SNP don't want a hard Brexit for Scotland. The deal meant Scotland- outside single market. And competing against NI who are in it. Does that make sense?

May's deal was pish. That's why it wasn't voted for. Boris also thought it was pish. Then he negotiated pretty much the same deal and said it was great. It wasn't really they were just desperate and were running out of tome. Many people still knew it was pish though and didn't like being gaslighted and so didn't vote for it.

Time not tome

@kurtrussellsbeard

May's deal was pish. That's why it wasn't voted for. Boris also thought it was pish. Then he negotiated pretty much the same deal and said it was great. It wasn't really they were just desperate and were running out of tome. Many people still knew it was pish though and didn't like being gaslighted and so didn't vote for it.

Correct, no one in the Scottish Parliament voted for it apart from the Tories but let's blame Nicola..

The fishing deal is mainly for the east coast trawlers who are run by a couple of very powerful companies/families and employ workers on a very casual basis.
The shellfish trade is worth a huge amount of money and it is mainly on the west coast and consists of small boats who sell their catch to merchants who then take it to the continent in lorries. These were the vehicles trapped at Dover. Any additional costs, time or paperwork affects these small producers disproportionately.
There's also the seed potato trade, whisky, beef, lamb and salmon exports. All these are affected either directly by reverting to wto ( seed) or indirectly by additional paperwork and transport time.

@JustLikeStitch sadly the EU won’t want Scotland just to put two fingers up to Boris. I really don’t think they care about that. It will come down to hard economics.

Maybe the Scottish parliament should busy itself with the many things it has a remit on. But heavens forbid it actually does something useful instead of yapping endlessly, but that wouldn't fit the SNP's narrative as all our ills (including the self imposed ones) must be deposited on Boris's doorstep.

@Soooh agreed although I'd love for that to happen in a purely immature way 🙈

That being said I don't see why Europe wouldn't want Scotland on economic terms.

I'm not particularly up on the fishing arguments but I understand that Scotland being in the EU would mean that we would have a far bigger and better market for the fish that we do have to sell. Lots of Scottish fish goes to the EU. mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKCN1PP2AF
And Scotland being independent in the EU would mean we would actually be party to those discussions and would be able to negotiate for ourselves.