SNP wins outright majority in Scottish Parliament

Wow! The Scottish Parliament uses a PR-derivative which normally should prevent any major party forming an outright majority in the Parliament.

Last election I got excited because the SNP looked like (and ultimately did) defeat Labour to become the ruling party of a minority government. However Scotland has 4 major parties - the 3 major UK ones plus the SNP, the other 3 are all "unionist" parties and would veto any attempts to pass an independence referendum.

With the new Conservative-Lib-Dem Coalition government in the UK, Labour had regained a bit of popularity (or more particular the Lib-Dems lost popularity too, the Conservatives already being hated in Scotland) - and opinion polls just 1 month ago were very clear ... the SNP would be removed after one term with Labour being restored back to power as normal.

The election campaign however has been one of the most bizarre and pathetic ever. The SNP campaigning strongly on its record in its first term, positive campaigning - with SLAB (the Scottish Labour Party) campaigning strongly negative - against the Conservative and Lib-Dem Westminster government, while ignoring the SNP and Alex Salmond. For Americans, imagine a State campaign where the Republican favourites spend the whole campaign for state parliament or governor insulting Obama and totally ignoring all State politics and the States popular governor who was seeking re-election.

A few weeks ago the polls started to move, with the SNP narrowing the gap, pulling ahead and then massively ahead. Now the results are in and its amazing, a total wipeout. Despite a mixed quasi-PR they have an outright majority in the Parliament. With the votes still coming in to the 129-member chamber, the SNP have just won their sixty-fifth seat.

The SNP have not particularly been campaigning on their key point of a referendum on independence, but now the impossible has occured and they have the votes to allow it. So in 2-3 years time there will almost certainly be a Scottish Independence Referendum. Irony being the SNP will probably lose that vote, they've been gaining popularity as a mature political party not a one-issue party.

[Tumbleweed]

Nobody cares?

I'm hoping the Scots vote for independence, though I know it's not very likely (then again, the longer the Tories stay in power, the more the Scots will dislike the Union). It will force Labour in the rest of the UK to moderate its policies. And it's only a matter of time before Scotland goes the way of Greece given its fiscal recklessness.

I really do think this is a bad thing. As much as I understand your desire to separate from the welfare guzzling Scots, I don't think turning a semi-imaginary border into an actual border is a good idea. States voting to shrink themselves for -- well, what exactly? -- seems like a bad long-term move.

How in the modern era is a national border an "actual border" anyway? What will change on the border that's a problem for you?

I went to Scotland for the first time earlier this year, got a train to Edinburgh. At no stage was there any way to no when we left England and entered Scotland - I kept checking on Google Maps on my iPhone out of idle curiousity but there was nothing there to say so. That wouldn't change.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

How in the modern era is a national border an "actual border" anyway? What will change on the border that's a problem for you?

I went to Scotland for the first time earlier this year, got a train to Edinburgh. At no stage was there any way to no when we left England and entered Scotland - I kept checking on Google Maps on my iPhone out of idle curiousity but there was nothing there to say so. That wouldn't change.

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Why not? Aren't you assuming to easily that Scotland would be a part of the EU once it leaves the UK? You'd need a lot of new agreements between the remaining UK and Scotland to keep things as they are. Not to mention the fact that the EU would also have to agree. Might be that Scottish goods would have to be taxed higher or be subject to border controls.

Why wouldn't Scotland be a part of the EU*?

* Assume we're talking about the actual EU here, not the petty, vindictive fantasy one only interested in 'punishing' countries that step out of line that you carry round in your head.

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

Why wouldn't Scotland be a part of the EU*?

* Assume we're talking about the actual EU here, not the petty, vindictive fantasy one only interested in 'punishing' countries that step out of line that you carry round in your head.

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Because the UK is the member, and that may be smaller if Scotland gets out of the Union, but it continues existing. That makes Scotland the new legal entity you have to deal with. That country would start out as a non-member of the EU and that is a different situation than it is in now. To keep things more or less as they are today, you'd have to have a whole host of treaties. Unless you do that, Scotland is 'just another country', and a situation would exist not unlike at the border of Poland and Belarus.

Reasonable you'd assume the EU/UK/Scotland to want Scotland to remain inside the EU, but there is nothing automatic about it.

P.S. I think Greeks, Irish nor Portugese would think the punishing EU is anything but imaginary. But that's an entirely different issue.

I understand that, but there any particular reason that Scotland wouldn't be allowed to join fairly quickly? I mean, looking to the south and the east it seems like the EU will take basically anyone, compared to that lot Scotland should be a shoo-in.

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

I understand that, but there any particular reason that Scotland wouldn't be allowed to join fairly quickly? I mean, looking to the south and the east it seems like the EU will take basically anyone, compared to that lot Scotland should be a shoo-in.

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Of course not, I would think that all parties involved would work towards a transfer that prevents Scotland from ever leaving de facto (as opposed to de jure). But Rand made it sound as if it would be some automatism, which it certainly isn't.

By the way; the EU has stopped taking in members as easily as it used to. Turkey is feeling the effects of the big bang in Eastern Europe in its membership 'negotiations'.

Come to think of it, it seems likely that if the Scots were to vote for independence a deal would be worked out in advance whereby Scotland could start as a member or at least continue the kind of easy travel between the two nations that Randblade talks about. It'd be a tremendous pain in the ass of you had to start carrying passports when traveling between the two.

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

Come to think of it, it seems likely that if the Scots were to vote for independence a deal would be worked out in advance whereby Scotland could start as a member or at least continue the kind of easy travel between the two nations that Randblade talks about. It'd be a tremendous pain in the ass of you had to start carrying passports when traveling between the two.

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A deal in advance of the vote seems highly unlikely; diplomacy doesn't work that way. A deal in the period after the vote but before secession I would consider well within the possible. As for your 'passport' remark, here you bring up something that will change for sure. With the UK not having ID-cards, Scots traveling to the UK and UK-citizens traveling to Scotland would have to start carrying passports since they would be foreigners who are obliged to carry a means of identification. Even if you keep Scotland in the EU without an 'out' period you can't fix that.

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Originally Posted by Hazir

A deal in advance of the vote seems highly unlikely; diplomacy doesn't work that way. A deal in the period after the vote but before secession I would consider well within the possible. As for your 'passport' remark, here you bring up something that will change for sure. With the UK not having ID-cards, Scots traveling to the UK and UK-citizens traveling to Scotland would have to start carrying passports since they would be foreigners who are obliged to carry a means of identification. Even if you keep Scotland in the EU without an 'out' period you can't fix that.

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As far as I'm aware there's no passport checks etc between the UK (Northern Ireland) and the Republic of Ireland. Despite the fact of the history of terrorism etc

Even were the EU not to exist, which clearly isn't the case, I don't think there'd be any hurry to install passport control between the two nations.

As for "highly unlikely" I'd go further than that. I'd say there is not a chance on Earth that a deal will be negotiated prior to the vote. After the vote though, it will most likely be negotiated then.

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Originally Posted by Hazir

A deal in advance of the vote seems highly unlikely; diplomacy doesn't work that way. A deal in the period after the vote but before secession I would consider well within the possible. As for your 'passport' remark, here you bring up something that will change for sure. With the UK not having ID-cards, Scots traveling to the UK and UK-citizens traveling to Scotland would have to start carrying passports since they would be foreigners who are obliged to carry a means of identification. Even if you keep Scotland in the EU without an 'out' period you can't fix that.

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I mean after the vote, but before actual independence.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

As far as I'm aware there's no passport checks etc between the UK (Northern Ireland) and the Republic of Ireland. Despite the fact of the history of terrorism etc

Even were the EU not to exist, which clearly isn't the case, I don't think there'd be any hurry to install passport control between the two nations.

As for "highly unlikely" I'd go further than that. I'd say there is not a chance on Earth that a deal will be negotiated prior to the vote. After the vote though, it will most likely be negotiated then.

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Border controls and obligations to carry ID are separate issues. There haven't been border controls between Belgium and The Netherlands for as long as I can remember, there always was the obligation to carry ID once in the other country.

You'd also get issues with social security, pensions, employee insurance. For example; a jobless Brit can move anywhere in the UK now to look for a job. If Scotland would become an independent EU member, an UK citizen would be limited to a 3 month search period to find a job. And the other way round of course. Somebody already on unemployment could move from one country to the other taking the benefit with him, but again, for a maximum of 3 months. These are not hypothetical problems, this is the kind of problems people encounter on a day to day basis in the EU when moving from one country to the other.

P.S. I just checked for Ireland, they don't require a passport but 'satisfactory photo ID' which seems to include the driver's license. The embassy in Dublin advises people to take their passport with them anyway, as that is always satisfactory photo ID.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

At no stage was there any way to no when we left England and entered Scotland

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Exactly, because you're part of the same country. When you become part of a different country, you can tell the difference and those gaps will only multiply over time if you are two separate nations.

Does anyone really benefit from more jurisdictions being added to the same geographic area? Seems like a hassle for commerce and governance.

While we'd all love the Scotts try and actually manage their own financial affairs [before failing], the relationship between Scotland and England seems relatively solid beyond the feeling some of you seem to have that you shouldn't be in one country.

If you drive through continental Europe from France to Germany or Spain you know how you can tell that you've changed country?

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

If you drive through continental Europe from France to Germany or Spain you know how you can tell that you've changed country?

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Colour of the roadsurface very often, lamp posts, lettering on signs, and sometimes a sign telling you you are leaving one country followed by another sign telling you you are entering the other.

Sometimes you can still see where the old border checkpoints were, but most of them have been demolished.

And if you stop you may notice different prices, different laws and a different language.

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Originally Posted by Dreadnaught

And if you stop you may notice different prices, different laws and a different language.

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How do you notice different laws? Prices close to borders tend to differ a lot less now that we've got the euro; it's really not much of a problem for people to hop over the border to do their shopping.

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Originally Posted by Dreadnaught

And if you stop you may notice different prices, different laws and a different language.

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Och aye Jimmy, all 3 of those already exist.

So what if the Scots decide to join the EMU ?

What of it?

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

What of it?

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You may have to exchange currency at the border. Or have to calculate what a scottish price is in your currency.

Anyway, what is most interesting in this whole breaking up of European states (of which a lot has been going on over the last 2 decades) that very often the same people who couldn't suffer to live under 'foreign' rule at the same time had very little objections to be part of the EU, with that level of government having such a bad press.

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Originally Posted by Hazir

You may have to exchange currency at the border. Or have to calculate what a scottish price is in your currency.

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You mean like they already do at the UK/Irish Republic border?

Why should the UK/Scotland border be any different?

Your argument seems to be that Scotland is really different enough to be its own country, yet it's not really different enough to really notice a difference.

Either you're a separate country or you're not. But this idea seems like a bit of a bourgeois independence push meant to fix a problem that doesn't really exist except in the heads of people who think about it a lot. And a contiguous piece of land that allows itself to be split up for very unclear reasons seems like a state weakening and folding in on itself.

Has anything really changed in the past few years to make it seem like Scotland desperately wants to split? They've had the theoretical opportunity for years now, but it took this long for this particular party to get elected. Seems more like a fluke than a real independence push.

This isn't a region we're talking about, Scotland already is a seperate country. The UK is a union of countries, Scotland is one of those countries. The criminal justice system of Scotland was never merged with that of England and Wales, etc, etc

Sources for Scotland being a country:
UK Statistics: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/geography/uk_countries.asp
10 Downing Street Website: http://webarchive.nationalarchives.g...gov.uk/Page823
ISO standard: http://www.iso.org/iso/newsletter_i-9.pdf

Yes, and they've had a separate parliament for all of 12 years. I realize Scotland is a separate "country", but the UK itself is considered a nation. You're talking about making Scotland into a separate nation and the reasoning for this de-facto dissolution of the United Kingdom is very fuzzy.

Scotland is not a seperate country just because its got its own Parliament, Greater London has its own Assembly but nobody considers that a country. Scotland was a country within a country, a nation within a nation even when it had no Parliament.

The UK is a Country or a Nation, Scotland is a Country or a Nation. I know the two words are not interchangeable but both Scotland and the UK are both, Scotland is simply one within the UK. I can not think of another country in the world where that is so, especially odd given our total lack of a federal structure.

Unlike Lincoln, the current UK government like all modern UK governments (and unlike Spain etc I believe) has a very clear view on Scottish independence: The Scots have a right to self-determination. If Scotland votes to become independent (something it can't simply just do), the UK government will not stop it. If the Scottish Parliament votes to hold the referendum (which the SNP now has the votes to force it through) the UK Government won't block it despite such a referendum not being within the powers of the Parliament. So the question legally is quite simple, what will the Scots vote to do? If the Scots vote to become independent, they will.

Scotland was not conquered by force, the Act of Union was voted through democratically. It can be dissolved just the same too.