1001 reasons to support independence...

Number 336...
 

They don't understand us, dae they?

Ah mean the English. Really, they don't understand us Scots. 

"This man walks intae a cake shop and points to one o' the items on display.


'Is that a doughnut or a meringue?' he asks?


'Naw ye're right, it's a doughnut' says the woman behind the counter."

Ah mean. Is that funny or no'?

Well, ah telt it tae mah mate fae Liverpool. He didnae get it!!!

They jist don't understand us......
 
It's nae wunder we want to destroy the UK, is it?


As for that Geordie accent... don't get me startit man!!!

a doughnut

a meringue


........or am I wrong?

Nationalist Omnishambles goes Uncommented

So many things going wrong with the Nats these days....where to start

Murdoch?

Wife beating?

Anti-Catholic rants?

Nato membership?

Keeping secrets from Parliament?

Tartan Tories?

hospitals with no blankets?



Murdoch is today's shambles.

When Eck hitched his star to the waggon the esteemed Australian-American patriot and billionaire phone hacker, many predicted disaster.....

And it wasn't long in arriving. Today's session of the Leveson Inquiry had many revelations, including emails showing the Blessed Eck offering to lobby for Murdoch's empire to be increased with the addition of BskyB, an outcome positively abhored by thinking Scots.

 
Never mind, "it wasn't for any sort of quid-pro-quo" according to the FFM. So that's all right then.... that nice Mr Murdoch wouldn't be so corrupt, would he? Nor the oily one.

I could expand on all the other issues on the list, but it's late....

But just one thing: where are the

"SNP in Meltdown" headlines..?

Certainly not in the Sun...

But actually, nowhere else either. Strange. If it was Labour there would be no end of edmusgo and johannsanumpty, but it's the Nats, so the revered Scottsh Media doesn't see the problem......

The public, now there's a different kettle of beans....

Salmond "the Craig Whyte of Politics"

Johann Lamont, the leader of Scottish Labour, is in that probationary period to which all new leaders are subject. Her performances at FMQs has been encouraging, with a quietly sensible persona, well chosen questions and the odd shaft of wit to puncture Alex Salmond's ego-driven pomposity. You can see that Salmond is more afraid of her than any previous FMQs opponent.

In TV interviews her schoolmatronly presentation (she actually is a school teacher) commands a hearing and limits interruption allowing her to her meassage across. Respect.

Another aspect of leadership is the ability to generate a good phrase or slogan that captures and communicates an idea (this can be the work of the leader or her advisers, it doesn't really matter as long as it is  appropriate and sums up a situation succinctly and memorably).

Yesterday, at the launch of the Labour local election campaign, she delivered such a bon mot: Alex Salmond, she said was "the Craig Whyte of Scottish politics".

And it's spot on. A snake oil salesman selling a false prospectus based on nothing but misdirection, grandiose but empty promises and the monstrous ego of the self-addicted confidence trickster.

I had previously labelled the Salmond as "the Wizard of Eck" .

Maybe we've found our Dorothy....

Glasgow -v- Edinburgh

There's been a lot of comment recently on Amazon's tax avoidance (see this Guardian article).

By structuring the company in such a way that all the revenues are controlled via Luxembourg it seems that Amazon has created a position where £billions of its UK sales are not subject to UK corporation tax. The result is that Amazon's profits increase and the company pays hardly any tax in the UK.  So when you buy through "amazon.co.uk" you are actually contributing plenty to "amazon" but not a lot to "uk".

Some would say that this is merely clever accounting by Amazon and good luck to them. Others might point out that, if UK sales are not subject to UK taxes then the UK Government has less than it would/should have to pay off debt, support Government costs, cut other taxes, improve schools, hospitals and etc. etc.

Tax Research UK linked the Guardian story to one in The Scotsman last year in which Alex Salmond fronted a £10million grant to Amazon to open up a warehouse in Fife. There followed criticism of the SNP's stance, but also a defence from Professor Brian Ashcroft.

Far be it for me to argue with an economist as eminent as Prof Ashcroft, but I think he rather misses the point. By concentrating on the narrow point that some jobs have been created in Scotland and that's a good thing (which it is), he does not address the wider position of the SNP: the introduction of competitive corporation tax levels into;

a) a unitary devolved state.  

b) an "independent" Scotland (if it ever happens) on the island of Great Britain.

To take the second instance first: an "independent" Scotland which tried to reduce corporation tax would face several barriers. If it was a member of the EU then that organisation has made its displeasure with the tactic clear. Neither Ireland nor any other EU country will ever again be allowed the previous laxity to compete with other EU members on company taxation, nor would an "independent in Europe" Scotland. The recession has put paid to that scam. So an "independent" Scotland accepts the rules of the EU and tholes its punishment or it is no longer an EU state. So much for "independence" in Europe.

It would also face the wrath of its biggest trading partner and neighbour, the UK. It is unlikely that England Wales and Northern Ireland would sit back and take a tax avoiding strategy from their new neighbour. What sanctions there would be is not clear, but there would certainly be diplomatic pressure and other (overt and covert) sanctions.

As for option a): can you imagine a situation where Glasgow could cut corporation tax to compete with Edinburgh?

All of Edinburgh's businesses would hightail it along the M8 in short order and reap the rewards.  Fine for Glasgow and bad for Edinburgh.....if Edinburgh cannot respond. But what happens if Edinburgh cuts even lower?

We get a predictable and destructive downward spiral. Competition creates cutthroats: businesses bounce back and forth, changing the address of their HQs, and benefiting from a continuous reduction in its contributions to society while the cities face a reduced tax income and an unstable business base.

That's what the Nationalists want to do with Edinburgh and Newcastle and Glasgow and Birmingham and the ret of the UK landmass.

It's nuts and it's nasty.

To return to the original argument: are the Nationalists wise to give a subsidy to Amazon to create new jobs in Fife?

Answer: probably not. The short term boost is welcome of course, but history shows that companies like Amazon are ruthless in taking any grant or subsidy on offer locally but they have no commitment to any particular country or people.

They may stay in Fife for the duration, but they may not. And it won't be our £10million that decides that. Amazon have got our money already and their behaviour shows that they could not care less about the exact location of their workers or the morality of accepting UK tax-payers money while avoiding UK taxes.

That's a perennial for those who wish to encourage inward investment, an its one to which no-one has found a completely satisfactory answer. The SNP's particular folly is to invest in Amazon when it has been known for years that the company has a predatory stance toward paying its taxes in jurisdictions like the UK and other, non shelter, economies.

The Arc of Gullibility

In a letter to the Herald, Brian Quail, stalwart of Scottish CND, expresses his believe that “Only full independence can rid us of the menace that is the Trident system”. Perhaps Mr Quail missed the report in the Guardian of the previous day that the SNP is considering joining Nato (if they win the referendum which they will not, but that's a different matter). The report also reveals a 2008 survey showing that 53% of SNP supporters agree that staying with Nato is in Scotland’s interests. Even if an "independent" Scotland did not join Nato, there is a strong possibility that the UK Government would pay a generous amount to lease the Faslane facilities and an impoverished new country would gratefullly take the dosh. So, even if the UK is broken up, Trident is likely to stay where it is for the foreseeable future.

It's not surprising that CND and others were intitially taken in by Nationalist promises but I am surprised that they are still clinging to the belief that the SNP will deliver. In its desire to farm votes from any source the SNP has made promises to every protest group and sectional interest imaginable including anti-nuclear weapons, pacifists, (while keeping army and RAF bases) anti-nuclear power, environmentalists, anti-environmentalists, anti-abortion groups, pro-choice Christians, republicans, monarchists, students, teachers (while building no new schools), nurses, pro-business, progressives, homophobes, anti-tax Tories, pro-public service campaigners and a host of local pro and anti-development groups. 

So much contradiction is bound to lead to disappointment, particularly when “independence” is redefined on a daily basis by the whim of the First Minister. 

 Patent NatMed. Cures what ails you. Honest!

I’m no great fan of Trident renewal either: it seems like a lot of dough for very little bread, (especially when we are building aircraft carriers with no planes to put on them!), but I'm very much afraid that Brian Quail and CND must now join the republicans and public sector workers and pro-choice and students, teachers and parents and all the other people who voted SNP in response to promises that their particular brand of snake-oil would cure all ills, and accept that a pro-Nato SNP would never get rid of Trident, any more than it abolished student debt, or abolished the Council Tax or built schools “brick-for-brick” or any other of a string of empty Nationalist promises.

Nationalist Crocodile in Tears

The SNP likes to portaray itself as, and it's activists like to believe it is, a left-wing party. To listen to the Nats, the Tories are demons, Labour and the Lib Dems are just Tories in drag and the only real left wing party in Scotland is the SNP. This despite their embracing of many Tory policies and Alex Salmond's very public endorsement of Thatcherite philosophy. Somehow, despite all the evidence, the Nationalists like to pretend that they are somehow of the left, politically.

Anyway. Here, from the Caledonian Mercury, is more evidence in the argument. The Scottish Public Pensions Agency (SPPA) has revealed that the SNP asked for even more swingeing chnages to public sector pensions than even the ToryDem coalition dared to do.

Among the suggestions that John Swinney put forward to the Hutton Commission on public sector pensions are;:


Moving to a "defined contribution" scheme which would be much more like most private sector schemes and would leave many public sector workers considerably worse off as a result.
Increasing the contributions from employees.
Reducing the benefits available to pensioners, but not reducing the size of their contributions.
Introducing later retirement ages.

Tomorrow you might see some SNP politicians issuing statements of support for the strikers. "Every sympathy". "Disgraceful Tories attacking poor public sector workers". "Lib Dem Tory poodles". That sort of stuff. When you do, remember the truth: the nats want to cut public sector pensions even more viciously than the Tories.

Given the nats known previous behaviour, I'm not surprised.

I wonder what those decent SNP members who take comfort in their party's "liberal", "left wing", credentials, make of it, when the evidence mounts that they are anything but.....

Would Eck's referendum be legal?

Most recent discussion on the Nationalists' proposed referendum on "independence" has centred on when it will be and what the question(s) will be. TBH I'm beginning to doubt it will ever happen.

Lalands Peat Worrier has an interesting piece, linking to the UK Supreme Court  blog by Aiden O'Neill QC, questioning the legality of any referendum launched from Holyrood (whatever the question) and its openness to legal challenge.

The basic premise is that no referendum from Eck can be legal and any such referendum can and certasinly will be challenged....

Interesting reading.

Sublime...Ridiculous!

The SNP won a mandate in May for their referendum on "independence". Since then they have been toying with something they call "devo max".... should there be a second question on the referendum form offereing "devo max"?

Problem is, they have no definition of their "devo max" idea.

Now they are demanding that the other parties define "devio max" and put the second question on the ballot....!!!

Lats night's Newsnight Scotland we had a succesion of senior nats: Alex Neill, Alex Salmond and someone called Derek McKay demanding that the other parties tell him what his second question should be!

Watch it here...

It's bizzare.

Headlines, history and hysterics

When is a story not really a story, and what do headlines tell us?

The Herald is running this story, under the headline;

"Independence warning after SNP ‘historic shift’"

The story starts....

"THE SNP Government is to renew calls for greater economic powers north of the Border after claiming there had been a historic shift in the public’s attitude towards the party. The Nationalists were given a further boost after a poll showed a rise in support across the UK for independence."

It goes on to report that a poll has 39% UK-wide "supporting" "independence" for Scotland.

But look again: is the result so astonishing? We've been here before with even notional majorities in Scotland telling pollsters that they would support "independence", an outcome not reflected in any subsequent electio result.

And who says that it is "historic"? Well nobody really. To quote;

"THE SNP Government is to renew calls for greater economic powers north of the Border after claiming there had been a historic shift in the public’s attitude towards the party."

And there's even more confusion. Even if more people across the UK support "independence", that's no reason to say they would support any specific new or enhanced "economic powers" for Holyrood. It is quite possible that people in England, Wales and Northern Ireland might support "independence" for Scotland for any number of reasons. That's no guarantee that they would support more (or even less) tax raising power for Holyrood. And even if they did, so what? Within the Devolution settlement, Holyrood is quite entitled to ask for more powers from Westminster, but Westminster isn't obliged to grant those powers, particularly without a manifesto commitment to do so, a commitment which none of the UK parties has made.

So. Do we have an "Independence warning"? No. We have a demand for more tax powers, the same demand that has been made often enough in the last few months.

Do we have a "historic shift". Not really. We have an opinion poll. The results are as interesting and important as most polls, but they are not in any way "historic".

So what's it all about? It's all about selling newspapers. Many a nat wandering into the newsagents and not yet decided which paper to buy will have his/her eye caught by this "historic" breakthrough and eagerly buy the Herald to lap it up. What they lap up, the content of the article, will be a lot less nutritious and falvourfull than the hysterical headline has promised.

But hey, that's showbiz, as Alex Salmond regularly responds at FMQs.

The reported £800 million the UK Government is spending to extend the Council Tax freeze in England is almost an exact match for the amount of fees support removed from universities, thus enforcing a £9000 annual fee on new undergraduates.

In effect grateful middle class parents and grandparents get a tax windfall from the Tories which they then immediately divert to a subsidy for their university bound offspring. In this manner university fees are privatised and council services are cut, and we willingly pay up. How cunning is that?

And what is the SNP Council Tax freeze costing us north of the border?

Scottish Nationalist Police Force...

I’m not aware of all the arguments in favour of a national police force, but surely those who say that the Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) wants to create a Scottish National Police force (SNP) so that the new Scottish National Police force (SNP) can drive along our streets and highways with its snappy new acronym above a brand new badge, probably containing the Saltire, a flag that the Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) seems to consider its personal property rather than the flag of the country, are being too cynical. Aren’t they?

You're 'avin' a Laffer....

I'm no economist, but I do know that the SNP's plans to compete within the UK on Corporation Tax are flawed, as I blogged here and as Richard Murphy blogged here. A separate Corporation Tax in Scotland is contrary to the interests of the UK, it doesn't create new jobs but it does cause distortions in the market and any claimed benefits are not certain and will take years to appear... if they ever do. 

Meanwhile the EU is moving towards harmonisation of business taxes, forcing Tax Pirate economies like the Irish to toe the line, and making the policy that the Nationalists want in a devolved UK, i.e.cutting business taxes in isolation, impossible to implement if they ever achieved their dream of "independent in Europe".
So it's already a dog's breakfast, a fact emphasised by John Swinney's incoherence when trying to defend it on Newsnicht. 

Nevertheless the bold John yesterday issued this press release.....and now he seems to have swallowed the whole right-wing Laffer Curve nonsense... y'know the bit where Tea Party Republicans claim that lowering taxes always increases government revenues...

"There is clear evidence from around the world of the benefits from lowering burdens on business....Lower corporation tax is a vital source of competitive advantage in an integrated global economy, helping to attract new businesses and highly-skilled jobs. ......Corporation Tax has a significant influence on increasing the size, competitive strength, productivity and ambition of Scotland's business base. Lower rates of corporation tax boost incentives to invest in human and physical capital, and research and development, increasing firms' profitability and the ability to compete.....cutting the headline tax rate would not necessarily reduce tax receipts."

Proponents of the Laffer Curve are always willing to admit that it is counter-intuitive (translation "illogical") to believe that cutting taxes increases the amount of tax revenues gathered, but even they will only claim that it works if a country is "over taxed" in the first place. Say what you want about the UK, but it's not a high tax country for business in the first place. Corporation Tax is only around 26% and there are plans to reduce it, so the theoretical gain from the Laffer analysis wouldn't happen here (even if you believed in Laffer, which most economists don't).

Frankly, what a so-called "left wing" party like the SNP pretends to be is doing calling up neo-liberal mumbo jumbo to support an already discredited policy proposal is beyond logic and consistency. But then logic and consistency never were a Nationalist strong points. 

 

Payback Time....

Brian Wilson has an interesting piece about the political influence in the honours system, in particular the knighthood awarded to the SNP's main paymaster, Brian Souter, the bus and rail billionaire. Was it a straight reward from Nationalist politicians to the man who puts so much cash into their party? It's hard to avoid the suspicion that it was.

Today's Herald reports that Strathclyde Passenger Transport (SPT) is under threat of "review" by the Nationalist Administration. Is it a coincidence that SPT is a publicly owned transport organisation and that it has been calling for stronger regulation of the bus business, a regulation that might not be to the liking of Mr Souter or in the financial interests of businesses?

Call me an old cynic, but if a Labour or Tory benefactor was making such large contributions to the party and getting such obvious benefit from government actions, what would the average person think, never mind your cybernats?

The SNP's second most prominent donor is Sir Tom Farmer. What little gift can the Nats have lined up for him?

Open, Transparent, ...You kiddin?

I recently posted this on  the decision by the Nationalist Administration at Holyrood to go to law to block a number of Freedom Of Information Requests (FOI). They wanted to keep information on their proposed Local Income Tax from the public... the same public who would have to pay the tax if it ever came to fruition. It seemed to me that the SNP was deliberately delaying the information because of the Scottish elections which were ongoing at the time the FOIs were requested. Anyway, not very honest, open or democratic...

Today Catherine Stihler MEP reveals that she has raised an FOI asking about any legal advice the Nationalists have on whether an "independent" Scotland would be automatically accepted into the EU. The Nationalist Executive has refused to accept the FOI, and says that releasing the information would be "contrary to the public interest"!!! Honest! Contrary to the public interest! How can it be "contrary to the public interest" for the public to have the same legal information that the SNP has on such a key part of the Nationalist strategy?

Open and transparent are words which are obviously not in the vocabulary of our Nationalist brethren.

The Nats launched their attempt to get control of Corporation Tax this week. The aim is to reduce the tax in Scotland and give Scottish business a "competitive edge" against other British companies. it wouldn't work... see here for analysis.... but in any case, it's at odds with the EU's announcement that countries should harmonise and integrate business taxes, not the disintegration that the Nationalists seem to want.


P.S. I wonder which unfortunate SNP minister is (supposed to be) in control of the Nationalists EU strategy.....

Poor wee sowell, as ma grannie used to say..... 

Unsafe is as Unsafe does.....

Today is the second anniversary of Kenny McAskill's decision to release Abdelbaset Al Megrahi. Sky has an interesting piece about the circumstances of his diagnosis and release, with a prominent cancer specialist who gave his opinion on Mrgrahi's health showing his unhappiness at how his opinion was used in the decision to release Megrahi. 

Today it is also announced that Nat Fraser has been charged and will face a retrial on charges of murdering his wife.

This coincidence prompts the thought: why is the Nationalist government happy to release Megrahi on doubts over the safety of his conviction but the same Nationalist government is incensed by the Supreme Court ordering a retrial of Nat Fraser over doubts about the safety of his conviction?

Does justice come into it all, or is it, like most things to do with SNP actions, explained by the usual Nationalist politicking and posturing?

FFA's sake....

Devolution Max, It's the kite being flown by the SNP in the knowledge that Scotland doesn't want "independence". DevoMax would incorporate Full Fiscal Autonomy (FFA), the idea that all taxes raised in Scotland would be held and spent in Scotland, and that such charges as Corporation Tax could be varied  (i.e rduced) in Scotland so that businesses would move from England to Scotland to save money and increase profits.

Professor Arthur Midwinter has an interesting post here on the difficulties and general impracticality of FFA in a devolved Scotland. I have always suspected that FFA was independence in disguise. Prof Midwinter shows that it is inconsistent with devolution and with the UK's economic arrangements.

But it is also at odds with the SNP's other main policy of "independence in Europe" (itself a contradiction in terms, but that's another argument). Events in the Eurozone have resulted in pressure for much more fiscal integration, the exact opposite of the SNP's desire to be a tax haven economy, at fiscal war with its supposed partners in the UK and the EU. 

As for the Nats desire to be corporation tax pirates, here's what the the BBC reports is the Euro Leaders opinion of that...

In another initiative to increase tax revenues, the leaders advocated harmonising corporate tax rates across the single currency - something likely to be strongly opposed by the low-tax Republic of Ireland.

That'll be the economically crippled Ireland that Alex Salmond thinks should be the model for Scottish economic management. And that'll also be the death knell of any Nationalist plans for an "independent" Scotland to undercut corporation tax rates in the Eurozone.

P.S. I've been wasting my time... read this by Richard Murphy....

Whither Eck's tongue....

After the Sun won it for the SNP in May, Alex Salmond “had a celebratory dinner” with News International executives.  This, and Mr Salmond’s four-year courting of the Murdoch empire, may seem to make him no better than any other politician with his tongue firmly attached to the Murdoch anatomy. But, in fact, the sin would seem to be worse for Mr Salmond. The man who constantly claims to be “standing up for Scotland”, and picking fights with far-away London, is in bed with a media company whose interests are not those of Scotland or the UK, but are firmly corporate with a United States bias, and with a wholly conservative political agenda.

                Given the power-broking influence of News Corporation in the relatively large UK, one shudders at the effects on democracy of such power and influence in a smaller so-called "independent" country with fewer resources to withstand, and as Mr Salmond’s behaviour has revealed, no real will or wish to resist, the blandishments and threats of Mr Murdoch’s bleak hospitality.

The Balloon Bursts....

It's interesting how the media changes its angle to suit (its interpretation of) the facts......

From yesterday's Herald... Labour Jitters....    Alex Salmond was apparently, "homing in" on the voters of Inverclyde. Seven (or is it eight) visits to the constituency by the FM, (and even reports that yesterday he was touring polling stations as if he was the candidate), had woven that special Eck magic. The SNP was poised for another stunning victory, Labour was on the run and politics in Scotland would (for the umpteenth time) never be the same again....

Then, the actual result...... Labour takes 54% of the vote, the SNP challenge is respectable rather than sensational or even dramatic. The  Herald opines Labour relief...SNP surge...

According to their report ....

".... the result allows Mr Salmond to claim the momentum of May’s Scottish Parliament victory is still behind the Nationalists. He will say the result strengthens his case for increasing the scope of the Scotland Bill and that there is a groundswell in favour of the additional powers he wants. It will also be a confidence-builder for his planned independence referendum..."

But that's not how I see it. Labour needed to hold to feel better about itself, but the Nats needed to come a lot closer to keep their momentum going.

Labour will take more from this result than the Nationalist Party.

People who voted SNP in May voted Labour in June, which tells me that, whatever their reason for voting Nationalist in May, it was not to give the SNP a carte blanche to do what they want. And in particular it says "independence" is not on the agenda.

It also says that the people may have intended to give Labour a bloody nose in May, but they never thought that the consequence would be an SNP majority in a parliament that was designed to ensure that no party would ever get a majority. They voted Nationalist for any number of reasons, an anti-Labour vote being one of them, but they didn't vote for a triumphalist Nationalist Party to attack the courts or to rush through and consequently cock-up anti-sectarianism legislation and they certainly didn't vote for "independence".

Cuts are coming and the SNP, having been in power for four years, can no longer blame everyone else for the outcomes. They're the government and they will have to begin to govern and take their share of responsibility for the state of the country.

The SNP may wish to take whatever encouragement they can from the Inverclyde result, and the Herald may wish to encourage them, but it was not a good result for the Nationalist Party and it signals, IMO, the bursting of the SNP bubble, or at least the first hiss of escaping gas.....

How many makes a majority...???

A few weeks ago I posted this ....One referendum, etc....  Including this statement;

"...you cannot change the constitution of any organisation (golf club, drama group, whatever) without a solid majority in favour. A 51% vote in favour of change leaves just too many supporters of the status quo feeling denied and frustrated. You have to demonstrate a solid majority if you want to take everyone with you. Freqently in these cases a two-thirds majority is needed to bring about radical change...."

Today the Herald publishes an article by arch-nationalist columnist Ian McWhirter in which he writes ....

"...Well, in Canada....the Supreme Court did indeed rule on the wording of the independence referendum in the French-speaking province of Quebec in 1998. ...in a landmark ruling now internationally recognised as a definitive statement on the rights of secession by disgruntled minorities, it ruled there was no right at all in international or domestic law for one part of a state to leave unilaterally. And even if independence were to be agreed by the other parts of the state, there would have to be absolute clarity over what the independence question meant, and a substantial majority in favour of independence, not just a simple majority..."

Earlier this month the Scottish Football Association (SFA) changed its constitution to allow a different voting structure. The change required a 75% majority. The SFA is an important organisation in Scottish life, and many people have an interest in its effective operation, but its governance is far less important than the governance of the state itself or the country.It therefore seems unacceptable that the currently effective governance of the country could be overturned by a simple majority of Scots voting in a one-off referendum. 

If the turnout  at a referendum was at the same level as recent elections, a 51% vote in favour of independence would need the actual votes of less than a third, maybe even a quarter, of the electorate. This is no basis to create a new country. If the referendum is to go ahead there must be a threshold  - two-thirds of votes cast or 45% of the electorate, or some similar substantial proportion – that would secure the acquiescence of the minority in the upheaval implied by breaking up the UK. 

After all, if a majority threshold is a necessary requirement to change the constitution of the SFA, or your local golf club, it’s not a lot to ask in respect of radical changes to the governance of Scotland.

One referendum, two referendums, three referendums, four...

One potato,
Two potatoes,
Three potatoes,
Four...


Five potatoes,
Six potatoes,
Seven potatoes,
more......

The old children's rhyme springs to mind at the Scottish Secratary's announcement that he wants two referendums on independence. One, from Holyrood, would be "advisory", and the other, from Westminster would be decisive or "binding" as they call it. The justification for this position is that Westminster has the reserved power on referendums, and that any binding referendum would have to originate from there. While Holyrood could ask the question, no-one would be legally bound by the answer.

All very well, but it ignores the politics. If the result is decisive (say above 60% in favour of independence) of those who voted, the "binding" refrendum, while legally justifiable would be just a waste of time. The same people who voted would vote the same way again, with maybe even some who felt enraged at being asked to vote again changing their vote the second time.

IMO, the way round this is obvious and sensible: you cannot change the constitution of any organisation (golf club, drama group, whatever) without a solid majority in favour. A 51% vote in favour of change leaves just too many supporters of the status quo feeling denied and frustrated. You have to demonstrate a solid majority if you want to take everyone with you. Freqently in these cases a two-thirds majority is needed to bring about radical change.

The solution is that any referendum which is considered as binding should have a built-in threshold: two-thirds of those who vote, or 50% of the registered electorate, or some number, must vote in favour of the change. That would help to ensure that the defeated side is convinced of the suppport for, and goes along with, the proposed change.

There should also be a condition in any accompanying legislation that, if the "independence" side loses, the vote will not be repeated for a long period of time, say 25 years. Scottish and UK politics has been dogged for too long by constitutional issues. If the Nats lose their referendum they shoud show some respect to the people and call it a day. Normal politics is, or should be, about schools and houses and jobs, not about constant worrying over constitutional details.