Originally Posted by
HAS59
Okay this has drifted a wee bit but ...
That was a rather selective answer to a puzzling question ... and you'll need more than a few coastwatchers.
A quick peek at what the UK Govt currently have to operate comes up with a few more (uncosted) agencies you may well need to maintain the standard we all currently have.
Cabinet Office 22 agencies and public bodies
Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy 41 agencies and public bodies
Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport 45 agencies and public bodies
Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs 33 agencies and public bodies
Department for Transport 24 agencies and public bodies
Department for Work & Pensions 15 agencies and public bodies
Foreign & Commonwealth Office 10 agencies and public bodies
Home Office 29 agencies and public bodies
Ministry of Defence 27 agencies and public bodies
There actually hundreds more organisations which are currently national (which includes all of the UK) which an Indi Scotland may well need.
Which would take years and would cost more than the 'voters' would be happy with.
I am genuinely puzzled as to what it is you feel the need to be independent from and what it is you think you will be gaining.
Independence from oppression I can understand - is it independence out of a fit of pique?
I have lived on the border and on both sides of it - half my family are Scots the other are not.
I see no point whatsoever in turning back the clock and tearing down the union for the dubious joy of saying 'Get it right up yi' and watching another re-run of Braveheart'.
I know what you have to lose on day one after 'freedom' - I do not know what you think you will gain.
I think you'll find, with one obvious exception, that the Scottish Government and Executive in Edinburgh operates most of these functions in one form or another already. Bear in mind, as a country one tenth the size of England our requirements would be proportionately less. The one obvious exception is the MoD. And that, I guess, is the subject of the posts on here now. For the sake of completeness, taxation and social security are also reserved matters so Work and Pensions would need to be addressed.
Anyway, some homework for you. Write down the values of the Norwegian Sovereign Oil Fund and the UK's Sovereign Oil Fund. Show your working, but don't spend too much time on the UK's, as (big clue), it's zero, despite call me Dave Cameron's promise that one would be set up if Scotland voted to remain part of the UK in 2014. Successive UK governments, starting with Thatcher's in 1979, have pissed trillions of pounds revenue from the north sea up the wall, and that's a crime.