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Forums - Politics Discussion - Scotland to leave the UK?

 

Should Scotland leave the union? If yes or no please say why.

Yes 152 43.80%
 
No 143 41.21%
 
It does not matter 26 7.49%
 
I dont understand 26 7.49%
 
Total:347
the2real4mafol on 18 September 2014
trashleg said:
DanneSandin said:
Anyways, anyone wanna explain fast and simple why the Scots wanna be independent all of a (not so) sudden?


I'll tell you why.

The population of the UK is divided into constituencies (represented by seats in the House of Commons - a total of 626). Since Scotland has ~8% of the UK population, you can't expect us to ever have an effective vote in Westminster (UK) government. In the last general (UK-wide) election, there was one constituency in Scotland that had a majority vote for a member of parliament (MP) from the Conservative party.

The party with the most seats in Parliament forms the cabinet (basically the leading party provides the guys "at the top"). 

Last election, the Conservatives didn't have enough constituencies (seats) to form a simple majority government. Since the chances of them forming a coalition govt with the Labour party were sliiiiiiim, it was up to the centre-ist party (the Liberal Democrats) to choose, basically, which other party to form a coalition with. They had pledged to side with Labour but went with the Conservatives instead.

And so it came to pass that Westminster has a Conservative-Lib Dem coalition led by David Cameron, Conservative extraordinaire. Now, for the UK as a whole this might seem representative, or fair. But for the 5.3ish million people in Scotland, this did NOT represent our political intentions. 

So politically, having a local government that is more closely aligned with the policies and the representation that we actually desire, seems functionally more appropriate than being at the mercy of a government that has more important priorities, and a different political ideology.

Scottish people in general tend to lean more left than English people do. And they really likely and benefitted from the post war consensus social democracy Britain used to have until Thatcher got in 1979. 

Thatcher's policies tended to cause mass unemployment and deindustrialisation. This hit every part of the country even London quite badly but London has recovered since. But places like Scotland, Wales and the North haven't really. While stuff like the very unpopular poll tax made the Scots hate Tories (now they only have 1 tory MP) yet have to put up with the governments policies (a tory led coalition). As you said, the Scots have been badly represented by westminister but this has been going on since 1979 at least.

The current government isn't really that popular anywhere but especially hated in Scotland.

But anyway, this is probably why the independence movement grew despite Labour hoping devolution to be enough. Only the Scottish can run Scotland best, no one else. so it's about time 

Whether they seize the opportunity is another matter. Either way British politics will never be quite the same 



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the2real4mafol on 18 September 2014
Scisca said:
I hope they become independant. There are many reasons why and being able to watch all the shitstorm all around Europe - in Spain, Belgium, the Balkans waking up again most probably, maybe even Germany having to deal with separatists would also be fun and entertaining

Agreed. Europe could be split up more potentially. Belgium could be gone for good. 

Also, who wants to leave Germany? 



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Scisca on 18 September 2014
the2real4mafol said:
Scisca said:
I hope they become independant. There are many reasons why and being able to watch all the shitstorm all around Europe - in Spain, Belgium, the Balkans waking up again most probably, maybe even Germany having to deal with separatists would also be fun and entertaining

Agreed. Europe could be split up more potentially. Belgium could be gone for good. 

Also, who wants to leave Germany? 


Bavaria - the richest Land in Germany. They've always felt they were kinda different from the rest of the Germans and in theory there is some reason behind it, I believe they used to be more connected to Austria than Germany in the past (though I'm not 100% sure about this). Even the Pope Benedict XVI used the term "Country Grand Bavaria" before his pilgrimage to Germany (he's obviously from Bavaria). There are talks about leaving Germany over there and my friend from Muenchen isn't hiding that apart from some historical reasons (which are kinda shaky imho) the fact that they wouldn't be forced to pay massive sums to the poorer Lands anymore is a huge argument. Personally, I always get the impression that this is absolutely the most important reason and the rest is just fluff repeated so that they wouldn't look so bad

Can you imagine going fast forward and seeing Europe with UK totally broken up, Spain divided into two or even three countries, Germany losing its industrial backbone (no more BMW for Germany ) and 12.5 mil people, Belgium splitting up, one half joining France, the other Netherlands with Brussels becoming a free city and a real capital city of EU? Damn, would it be a funny new reality And just think about the shift of power in the EU with UK fading and Germany being pulled back quite a bit. France would be the undisputed winner with the only other remaining big EU countries being Germany, Italy, England (all 3 much weaker than now, as some Italians from the North would probably want to separate as well) and Poland - the rest being just a bunch of small countries. And all this starting with just one "Aye!"

That would be entertaining and no matter what happened - civil, but most probably all hell would break lose in the Balkans, as the Russians would no doubt aid the Serbians and fuel them to start doing what Russia is doing in Ukraine right now. And it wouldn't be pretty, knowing their temper.



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Moren on 19 September 2014

Well, it seems UK will still be one...



ikki5 on 19 September 2014

Darn, I was hoping for a show for the next few weeks to months.



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Moren on 19 September 2014
ikki5 said:
Darn, I was hoping for a show for the next few weeks to months.

Yeah, me too. That would have been soooooo interesting.



benao87 on 19 September 2014

It appears so, unless the ~880k voters of Aberdeenshire, Edinburgh, and Fife decide to put some suspense into it.



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irstupid on 19 September 2014
Metrium said:
Zekkyou said:
Metrium said:
If I lived in a country that still acts like if this was the 17th century where it's ok to be ruled by queens, dukes and princes, I would certainly want to leave.

It's funny you say that, because your VGC page says you live in Canada. One of her official titles is in-fact the "Queen of Canada", since Canada still exist under the monarchy in a form. She's the granny on your $20 notes.

Anyway, we aren't rules by her or the royal family. The queen is mostly just a figure head who has a very small amount of theoretical power. For the most part she just engages in formalities like swearing in the new prime ministers etc.

There isn't much reason to get rid of them, so we don't. As well as being great for tourism and a part of our national identity, they happen to be the largest land owners on the planet Without getting into details, we make almost £160m in profit every year simply by keeping them around. Dat sweet sweet Crown Estate revenue deal.

Believe me, I know and I hate it. I hate that her face is on our money, I hate that everytime she or one of her relatives visits we spend millions to welcome them. I also hate that the our conservative gouvernment wants her to be even more present, like a few years back I think they introduced a big protrait of her in our parliament and they changed the name of our canadian air force to the ''Canadian Royal Air Force''. And worst of all, I hate that our tax money goes to a political person named the governor general of canada that is officialy the representative of the queen who gets payed only to look good, visit other countries in the name of the queen and to perform some crappy political tradition. You know when a gouvernment at the start of a year or w/v officialy unvail their plan and budget? Well never look at what Canada does cause you will die laughing at us, it's call ''The speech from the Throne'' and it's read by the representative of the queen thru a ceremony that is a complete joke with ppl weiring wigs and dressed like if it was was 17century.

God I hate this so much! This is partly why I wish Québec would have become a country when it had the chance!

You must be a French Canadian.

 

But funny that the vote probably just comes down to money.  Pretty sure they would have left already if they could keep the pound, but isn't England saying if you leave you can't use the pound?  And no one wants to use the Euro.  Good job on a few countries for fucking up that currency.  



baloofarsan on 19 September 2014
Scisca said:
the2real4mafol said:
Scisca said:
I hope they become independant. There are many reasons why and being able to watch all the shitstorm all around Europe - in Spain, Belgium, the Balkans waking up again most probably, maybe even Germany having to deal with separatists would also be fun and entertaining

Agreed. Europe could be split up more potentially. Belgium could be gone for good. 

That would be entertaining and no matter what happened - civil, but most probably all hell would break lose in the Balkans, as the Russians would no doubt aid the Serbians and fuel them to start doing what Russia is doing in Ukraine right now. And it wouldn't be pretty, knowing their temper.

This is how it could look like:

 

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_active_separatist_movements_in_Europe



The Fury on 19 September 2014

Confirmed still part of the UK. 55% to 45% or there abouts.

I just hope now, Salmond can be respectful to majority of his nations choices and run the country as best he can. All we need now is the Scottish to join us to get rid of CaMORON, next May. We want him out.



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