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http://scot-buzz.co.uk/suddenly-going-wrong-nicola-queen-scots/
Nicola PM of Scotland we don’t need Queen or King
Monarquies are social prasites
My guess is slightly tighter controls for EU immigrants (must be in employment, grace period if unemployed, no access to out of work benefits, plus criminal record check) in exchange for non-voting access to single market, and a commitment to align agricultural and fisheries policies, and non-EU trade agreements. UK to buy in to relevant common efforts, such as Horizon 2020 research.
Sturgeon to park indy2 even before listening exercise completes, and concentrate on soft diplomacy to EU states and EU institutions.
Holyrood to initially commit to keeping EU-legacy protections, but if Westminster starts to dilute, Holyrood likely to follow on grounds of red tape/sustainable growth/competitive Scotland.
Dear Crubag
Looks a good guess to me
“Park” is a clever word to use in this context, implying that the vehicle has not been scrapped, merely abandoned. It could be said now that the new raison d’être for the SNP is as the main opposition party to the Tories, but Nicola must know that for many, perhaps most, of the party’s members and supporters independence is still the be-all and end-all. Otherwise, I agree with your predictions for the outcome of Brexit. Indyref2 will continue to flicker on the periphery of Scottish politics like one of those annoying pop-ups in the corner of the screen.
I don’t think it will ever disappear – though Labour members might have thought that about Clause 4. Until BREXIT concludes, and the rEU decides whether it is now going to be tighter or looser as a result, there is no prospect of an indy2, we won’t know what we’re voting for.
(Germans want loose, why pay for everyone else? Italians and French like the idea of opening the German piggy-bank. No-one seems to like the unilateral German immigration policy)
The SNP owes a lot of its success to being a competent, constructive challenge to complacent, tone-deaf Labour hegemony. Like any political party it will slowly travel the same political arc (putting a corporate lobbyist in charge of your commission on the economy might be a sign of early onset though…).
In the meantime, I’d like to see the SNP use its current political capital to execute on the things that are currently in the control – better devolution of local government with closer connection to the people being one. Though here again the idea of giving money direct to head teachers seems more like a Tory solution. Empowered community councils would be my preference.
…I’d say ‘abandoned ‘ and’ scrapped ‘ have closely aligned meanings…..
I suspect, and I hope, that ” Great Britain ” is about to get a lesson on how insignificant it has become.
I recall the Chinese comment on ” a small off-shore island that nobody listens to “. That assessment is about to be driven home. Can’t wait.
Nicola is the best polititian in the uk ,also hearts in the right place, park inde 2 ,no way . Sooner we split the better,just need a bit of backbone.
May had said she will not “reveal” her hand prematurely in the discussions.
Presumably, these issues will be discussed among the Cabinet Brexiteers first and foremost? No leaks, no disagreements surfacing?
So what? We will all wake up and hear the announcement that we have brexitted and here are the details!
I think not. After all there are 27 plus 1 sides to the process after Article 50 has been invoked. The other EU states will be issuing press releases to their voters and citizens. I do nor think Mat can remain stumm .
Or perhaps, she means that we have no idea what we are doing and drift along.
The celebrated Westminster way of muddling through and changing the rules to fit one’s next inconsistency or unguarded statement will not work.
The Westminster regime is for the first time in 100 years “on the outside”. It has to knock to be asked in to Brexit negotiations and is not at the top table to veto or shift aspects from the inside. Quite a change, for once. No gunboats either or “cold steel” to hand.
Its only recourse to brexitting alone and getting one’s way is to leave at once and renounce all links since 1972!
Now that would be cataclysmic and a leap into outer darkness.
Still, I suppose Farage will come to the rescue!
We await the next utterings from the clueless Number 10. They have spurned the EU states, the EU Parliament, the EU Commission and the EU Council of Ministers. De facto exit means that, in reality, Number 10 cannot effectively engage with former “allies’ in the EU for favours.
Schadenfreude.
I think the Eurocrats quite liked the idea of punishing the UK for voting for independence.
But they were quickly put back in their box by the member states, and it is the Council of Ministers who will make the decisions.
With a net trade surplus and remittances to think about, they are likely to hit the deadline before WTO minimum rules kick in.
The rEU will be German-led, which is but unless they start fiscal transfer I don’t see both the euro and rEU surviving.
Not sure they are out to “punish” the UK. The UK, Westminster has put itself beyond the pale trying to appease the Tory party’s splits.
So, it is square one. The Council of Ministers is made up of the 27 states. They are starting to redefine the EU without the UK presence. Hence, Westminster is chapping at the door, looking in from the outside.
Whatever happens in the rEU will be determined by the remaining 27. Westminster will realise it has no automatic right of participation; it had, but opted for Brexit, or rather England/Wales opted for Brexit.
The Westminster set up is in a zero position at the outset; I don’t think Gordon Brown could even conjure up a Vow to assist!
If the present Brexit chaps in the Cabinet had ant ideas about next steps -or any steps, we would have heard by now. May keeps slapping them down, but she is a Jeanie-come-lately to Brexit or hopes to wriggle out of the mess they are in.
We await. Irrespective of what is on the table, there will be a flight of EU owned industry from dahn sath and non EU industry. Rolls Royce cars and Bentley to be repatriated to Germany by BMW and VW respectively!!
The whole issue is riddled with irony. The UK or largely English car industry is foreign owned and indeed most if the development work is done”abroad” by foreigners. If no passporting occurs, then the finance industry dahn sath goes into decline.
Still, they still will have the Queen dahn sath and the HoL and the pageantry and the Proms to lessen the shock.
I think the EU27 reaction is interesting – even without Article 50 we are effectively out. No re-runs, no second chances.
But the economic interests will trump any sentiment – effectively it will be a compromise with reduced freedom of movement going with reduced access to one another’s markets, and with rEU in the weaker position.
I don’t worry so much about not having a specific plan, it’s a revolution and there is a spectrum of views on what should come next.
It will be the same when/if Scotland disolves the British union.
I agree with your last sentence.
What is unpredictable is the reaction the brexist of brexiteers when/if there is a split in the Cabinet, May is kicked out due to a cabal and the rebels withdraw from the EU with no time plan, ie UD of Brexit.
They might be tempted; the msm is “biggin” up the economy currently experiencing a Brexit upswing. But we have not left the EU yet!!
There is another possibility and that is two tier deepening. This is more likely to be the German, Dutch, Scandi approach whereby the UK is allowed to remain with access to the free market but out of political union, while that union takes a dual path now open to it – Effectively there may soon be two Euro currencies, high and low, that are more suited to like for like economies. Therefore limited fiscal transfers could then occur between say the northern central bank/ reserve and the southern one without the perception of undermining sovereignty as in the greek case. Essential two federal reserves linked for such things as asymetric shocks, emergency fiscal transfer, but not for daily avoidance of fiscal conditions, such as massive public overspend – then the rich Northern countries and poorer but more prudent countries like Slovakia and Slovenia (who have the hump with paying for Greece despite Greeks being better off than them and enjoying all the perks) could distance themselves – the Chinese and SE asians are thinking on this line as countries like Vietnam, the Philipines really don’t want to be dominated in a trading or currency block with the Chinese. And of course it is perfectly possible, and has been mooted in some Irish/ English quarters (and even Danish, Dutch and Norwegian quarters with the Krona NOK and DOK pegged/ mirroring the pound rather than the euro) of a quasi federal system including the UK. This would essential solve the Scottish independence question as it would adopt differing federal conditions and may even focus on civic links such as city regions like Skane and Copenhagen – Aberdeen and Stavanger – London and Amsterdam – Manchester and Dublin. This tiered approach would be the most sensible (and indeed radical) option. Imagine that cooperation for once.
Essentially you would have a tiered system that cuntires could move between depending on their circumstances. 2 currency options linked and pegged but one higher and the other lower thus countries that need to devalue can while countries that need to maintain a high value currency can. Many of the former commi countries adopted this approach in their initial transition phase. Perfectly fesable.
that’s countries…not ‘cuntires’ even if the second is by far the superior word to say.
“Its only recourse to brexitting alone and getting one’s way is to leave at once and renounce all links since 1972!”
here’s a look at the advantages and disadvantages of a hard or soft brexit – Guess which will happen, given Boris Johnson is now supporting “Change Britain”, the latest pressure group to pressure himself?
https://eurofree3.wordpress.com/2016/08/23/post-brexit-hard-or-soft-landing/
Can’t see May honouring brexit in full if being honest. She will work around something to ensure the wealthy still get to line their pockets,
I would suggest Ms sturgeon now gets on with her job. Scotland isn’t a member of the eu, we have no real say over membership. You can’t be fully independent in a union anyway! Matters not what the union is.
She never wanted indy ref 2 anyway. She never expected that eu result!
For someone that didn’t expect that EU result, she impressed globally, as being the ONLY politician in the UK, that looked like she had a plan, got to work all that week.
Meanwhile, BoJo and Gove stood in front of the cameras, with faces like smacked arses.
Those two are the ones that didn’t expect that result.
May et al have not got a clue, but they have the press and state broadcaster on their side to misinform the public and steady the ship. If that fails trot out Carney, he’ll steady nerves.
What is evident is that their is a split in the cabinet, naturally, there are remainders and brexiters.
One sure thing, their man in Scotland mundell is a million miles away from even the merest input, he was not at Chequers last week. This reveals the contempt the tories have for Scotland and that mundell has no pride, fight or gumption.
Would you give mundell the task of going to the chipper for a poke of chips, with the expectation he would return with a poke of chips?
Basically May is in an impossible position, the more they discuss, negotiate and fall out with everyone including the Scottish government, it will become apparent to the public, brexit has no benefits!
Once brexit, further austerity, targeting of the poor and inability of labour to function as a credible party that could form a uk government – sink into Scottish minds, there is only one conclusion.
Freedom!
Earlier this week the First Minster said that she would work with like-minded U.K Ministers to try to get the U.K as a whole into the least worst position, and that means staying in the single market.
Since then, the Secretary of State for Exiting Europe has stated that it was “highly improbable” that the U.K would remain in that market after exiting the E.U. And yesterday, Jeremy Corbyn, or at least his spokesperson, refused to guarantee the Labour leader’s backing, for staying in the free market place.
Do these statements, coupled with the exclusion of the Secretary of State for Scotland, from last weeks cabinet meeting discussing the U.K exit, give an indication of Westminster’s view that Scotland, and its opinions, are of no importance?
And if the First Minister’s initiative is unsuccessful, does our exclusion from the single market in itself constitute a valid reason for us turning to the option of a second independence referendum, or would there have to be other factors in play?
Good question. It looks as though the goalposts have been stealthily moved. The objective of “remaining in the EU” has been downgraded to “maintaining/gaining access to the single market”. So losing that access is now the “material change” thought necessary to trigger Indyref2. This in turn implies that should May and her team succeed in their bid to remain in the SM, Indyref2 is decisively “off the table”.
However the waters have been further muddied today with a report by Simon Johnson in The Telegraph which suggests that in the event of a hard Brexit, Scotland would have to choose between free trade with either the UK or the EU, but not both. There are indeed “other factors” in this stushie!
I would choose trade with the EU every time. Our trade figures with rUK are distorted, and not fully known. E.g., a large quantity of our trade of whisky is simply passing through England for export, so it’s counted as a UK export. Our ports have been run down for that reason. We have a food and drink industry worth billions, attributed to UK.
The Tories speak of this great trading nation, when England’s main export is services, and mainly financial services, which are in peril now, as leaving the EU loses the monetary passporting rights that are required.
WM are currently talking up wars. This will create demand for the thing they are known for, arms.
If you are a business, would you slam the door on your existing customers, saying we need to find lots of new customers out there in the world? The EU negotiations work all around the world on behalf of the bloc, they are a huge bargaining chip.
Norway has even said they do not a deal at this time perhaps never.