Er, sorry to rain on your xenophobic parade, but have you ever heard of the Common Travel Area?
It is an agreement between the UK and "the Mick's" whereby citizens of each state can freely travel, live, work, retire, have health care and receive benefits in each other's country.

And I suspect we would have a similar agreement with an independent Scotland.

But that's the whole point! It's NOT a club, it was an Act of Union.

I suspect that you are about right with the 8%.

As to mortgages, that will be a commercial opportunity for some. A bank does not have to be of the same nationality as the area it serves, witness the Spanish bank Santander and the huge number of UK mortgages they have.

Er, aren't there supposed to be some minor issues like economic convergence, financial stability etc to be met before a country can join the Euro?

https://ec.europa.eu/info/business-e...e-mechanism_en

Can't see how that's going to work when ScotGov doesn't control the currency it enters with and can't even control it's own budget deficit. It's a relatively unprecedented situation in the history of the EU. Countries have hitherto joined with their won currency, not one that they're pirating from another state and central bank.

There's also the question of whether the EU actually wants to take on another net spender - as opposed to a net contributor. Right now I'm sure there would be a desire to do so as payback for Brexit. Whether that survived a cold analysis (not least by Germany) would be another question. And that's before we get to the Catalonian precedent that Scottish Independence might set......

Nowhere near as easy as wee Krankie is making out.

Boffin

Again we're back on the "economic" arguments - Scotland is so small teh EU would never notice it . And expanding the "union" is a basic tenet of the place - and, of course its one in the eye for London. The Spanish Govt themselves have said that they see a "free" Scotland that leaves o an n agreed basis as very different from a Catalonia

pr00ne,

Being an Ulsterman trust me me I am certainly not labouring under any misapprehension that Britishness equates to Englishness…God forfend.

However, I think that it’s a trifle presumptuous of you to assume that the Scots will want to retain HM The Queen as Head of State. Remembering that the last nation (sic) to secede from the UK, the Irish Free State (then the Republic of Ireland (RoI)) most certainly did not wish to retain any semblance of linkage to the monarchy.

Regarding the retention of use of the term ‘Pound’, indeed the Scots can call their currency the ‘Jock’ (made up of 100 ‘Sporrans’) if they wish, but if they want to go it alone then as you say there should be no linkage to the Bank of England. Remember, from 1938 until the RoI joined the Euro in 2002 their currency was the ‘Punt’ (Ir£) made up (if I recall correctly) of the ‘Scilling’ and the ‘Pingin’(?).

As for everyone in Scotland having the right to call themselves Scottish citizens that is a given. However, as you may recall from the Belfast Agreement (1998) the complex tenets of nationality are not just as clear cut as they first may seem. Everyone in Northern Ireland now has the right to be British, Irish, Northern Irish or any combination of the above! So what about the nationality rights of, what will be a very large number of Scottish Unionists? 32% of Unionists who did vote + the X% of Unionists who didn't vote in the recent Scottish Parliamentary elections!!

Indeed, given that the largest Pro-Union constituencies in Scotland are the border counties, will there be scope of redrawing the map of Scotland allowing these pro-Union counties to remain within the UK? Remember, that precedent has been set with the formation of Northern Ireland in 1921.

As regards the Civil Service I didn’t assume that they were English. However, they CS as now constituted serves ALL of the UK. If, and again God forfend, Scotland secedes from the Union, then, as per the RoI (and indeed Northern Ireland following the outworking of the Government of Ireland Act 1920 (and subsequent Acts)) then an independent Scotland will have to set up it’s own independent CS to serve their own wholly independent state.

As I said, an independent Scotland would be total anathema to me (and indeed many people), and as for a United Ireland…this is not the forum to go down that tortuous road. But the main thrust of my argument was that, contrary to what the SNP and their fellow travellers would have us believe, independence is not simply a matter of tearing down the Union Flag, putting up the Cross of St Andrew or the Lion Rampant, and replacing God Save The Queen with 'Scotland the Brave', 'Flower of Scotland' or even 'Stop Yer Ticklin’ Jock'. There are a huge amount of complex relationships to be sorted and mutually agreed, and these matters will not just be meekly acquiesced by HM Government despite what Ms Sturgeon thinks. We are certainly not going to solve the Scottish question** in this forum, but, one thing that you and I certainly can agree on is that Scotland has much more to lose by seceding from the Union than it has by remaining!

**This could have all the makings of what Sellar and Yeatman said in '1066 and All That'...'Every time the English tried to solve the Irish Question, the Irish changed the question!!'

Which bank does Scotland own? All those current mortgages are with UK banks /building societies with Sterling set at an interest rate in Sterling. Which new commercial bank is going to provide mortgages with no accounts and no savings?

As a mere Sassenach it seems to me that at the moment Scotland runs (most) of its own affairs on its own while being subsidized by the UK (as do Wales & NI). Seems like a winner to me & I fail to understand why they want to go it entirely alone without the subsidies and the other things like frigate construction contracts which are placed north of the border as a sop to the nationalists.

Many years ago I earned in Dutch Guilders, I was offered a cheap mortgage from
Germany. My financial advisor advised, 'if you do this you are actually a currency trader
open to exchange rate variations for the life of the loan'.
Cue rapid exit.

One might speculate they could be invited to use Lossie as a F.O.B...

Good post OJ, and at the risk of slight thread drift; one correction. Ireland being officially bi-lingual Punt was the gaelic/Irish name and Pound the English for the currency. Ireland's currency went decimal in 1971. The currency was pegged 1-to-1 with Sterling until 1979 when it free floated, with the country later being in the first tranche of those entering the Euro.

JAS

No. We're back on political arguments. The Euro either has entry criteria, or it doesn't. The basic stability of the currency depends on it and the boxheads (and Cloggies for that matter) might be slightly less than enthusiastic about that effect.

Not at all sure the Spanish have actually said what you suggest.

the requirements to join the Euro and the EU are different the Budget deficit is to join the Euro not the EU to join the EU you just have to give a commitment to join the Euro at some time in the future. Sweden,Poland,Hungary amongst others have not and show no sign of doing so.

Those countries all have their own currency, which an independent Scotland will not.....

Er,meant to be wildly ironic,think I pulled it off......................................................... .....!

I was living in Aberdeen for the last indyref, where I heard all forms of fanciful plans. I'm looking forward to watching the next one with a bowl of popcorn.

the Cloggies and the Boxheads are actually very happy happy with the Euro. As exporting nations they benefited greatly from a shared currency as their previous own currency was much stronger.

but to come back on the argument: the only way to see if there is a backing for independence is to have a referendum. So let them have it. Wether it is smart or not is not the question. The same applied to the Brexit ref. The future will tell..

As was I and I'm still here. Most of the Wifes family are rabid SNP supporters who'd happily hang Boris if they got the chance as everything bad in Scotland is his and Westmonsters fault.
They either won't listen to sensible arguments about tax and spending or claim it's all 'operation fear' to put people off.

I was also told by a work colleague last time that I shouldn't be allowed to vote in an Independence Referendum as I'm English, even though i've lived in Scotland for almost 20 years (I think he'd fall foul of Hamza's new Discrimination law these days), all the polish people on TV with Salmond saying they were voting yes were fine but the English shouldn't get a vote.

I'm still waiting on Nicola to announce when all the freebee's she promised in the last few months are coming - and who's going to pay for them... Free bus transport for under 21's, free computers for school kids who can't afford them and free bikes, free dental care and of course the 4 day working week. All of the promises were un-costed in their manifesto but they did promise not raise taxes, but they did that in 2016 then raised taxes. Of course when she can't provide it all it'll not be her fault, we'll blame Westmonster and it's another reason to hold a Referendum.

Or I may just be a cynic

From the original post...

How'd that work out for you? :)

It's worth reading the 2013 blueprint that the SNP produced for the Independence referendum:

SCOTLAND’S FUTURE. Your guide to an independent Scotland

The full read starts from page 232 but apparently the UK would be quite happy to hand Scotland the following hardware:

• 2 Frigates
• 4 Mine countermeasures vessels
• 2 offshore patrol vessels
• 6 patrol boats
  
  
• 1 deployable Brigade HQ
• 2 light armoured reconnaissance units
• 2 light artillery units
• 6 AAC HELICOPTERS
• 1 Typhoon squadron
• 6 C130 Hercules
• 1 RAF helicopter squadron

I don't think so, somehow.

Artificially low is one thing. Stable is another. Might also be a bit of an issue if you import energy priced in dollars (or even roubles for that matter).

At some point the Northern European taxpayers - and financial institutions - will tire of supporting the rest of the EU. Which is why yet another net spender (like Scotland) may not be as welcome as they'd like to think when there are a diminishing number of net contributors..