Category Archives: Devolution

The English white working-class and the British elite – From the salt of the earth to the scum of the earth

Robert Henderson

1. How it used to be

Thirty years ago the Labour Party primary client base was the white working-class, while the Tories still had remnants of the heightened sense of social responsibility towards the poor created by two world wars. Fast forward to 2006 and the white working-class are treated by the entire British political elite as a dangerous, almost subhuman species.

The mixture of contempt, fear and hatred which the white working-class now draws from the political class is echoed by the elite generally, indeed by not just the elite but the middleclass as a whole. Where once the white working-class were next to uninsultable publicly, sneering references to “chavs” and “chav culture” are now commonplace in the mainstream media where they pass with barely a critical public word, while ethnic minorities seemingly have licence to publicly insult the white working-class with impunity, vide the Coronation Street episode in January 2006 where a male Asian character accused his sister of behaving like “poor white trash”.

What caused this immense change in the status of the white working-class? There were three direct primary engines of change. The first was the success of Thatcher and her ideology, the second a critical point was reached in post war mass immigration, the third Britain’s membership of the EU and other restrictive treaties which tainted her sovereignty.

2. Globalism and laissez faire economics

When Margaret Thatcher became Tory Leader in 1975 the neo-paternalist stance the party had adopted since the smashing Labour victory of 1945 was changed to one of laissez faire non-interventionism, with its an inherent disdain for public provision and service. Thatcher threw away the protectionism which had sustained the white working-class, allowed much of British industry, especially heavy industry, to go to the wall, and privatised the nationalised industries. Unemployment, already at a post-war high at the end of the Callaghan government, rose dramatically to around 3 million. The unions were then weak enough to successfully attack with severe legal restraints on strikes and a ban on secondary picketing.

Unemployment has remained high since the early 1980s – the current official employment figures are bad enough taken at face value (around 2.7m by the international Labour survey method) – but in reality it is probably considerably higher – there are 2-3 million on long term sick benefit now compared with around 600,000 in the early 1980s ago. Common-sense says the country cannot in 2012 have four or five times the number of seriously incapacitated people it had 30-odd years ago. This high unemployment has kept the white working-class largely quiescent and the unions emasculated.

Thatcher also threw away the post-war consensus that the white working-class was admirable, or at least deserving of special consideration because of their disadvantaged social circumstances. Thatcherite Tories were only interested in the working-class insofar as its members were willing to buy into the narrow aspirational template which Thatcher promoted. If you were working-class and wanted to buy your council flat and were happy to gobble up the shares of privatised national industries, the Tories approved of you; if you wanted to maintain traditional working-class employments and communities, you were a soldier in the ranks of the enemy.

Labour did not immediately cast off the white working-class as clients. That took 18 years of opposition. Through four election defeats Labour gradually jettisoned all that they stood for in their cynical quest for a way back to power. The end result was a supposedly Labour Government headed by Blair which became, quite bizarrely, even more fanatically committed to “free markets” and “free trade” than the Tories.

3. Immigration reaching a critical level

By 1979 immigration had swollen the population of blacks and Asians in Britain to a point where their numbers were significant enough to pose a serious threat to British society if racial conflict got out of hand.

Until the end of the 1970s the official line on immigrants from all the mainstream parties was they must assimilate. Towards the end of the decade it was obvious to even the most fervent advocate of integration that assimilation was not happening. Rather, large populations of various ethnicities were stubbornly continuing to form ghettoes in the major British towns and cities and were attempting to lives which as far as possible replicated those of their ancestral countries.

To avoid having to admit what a disaster immigration had been, the British liberal left adopted an ideology to fit the facts of what was happening. That ideology was multiculturalism, a creed which rested on the fantasy that a coherent society could be produced by allowing every ethnic group in Britain to retain its separate identity. Indeed, the multiculturalists did more than say we should allow such a development, they positively encouraged ethnic minorities to remain separate. The kindest interpretation of their behaviour is that these were people enthusiastically pouring paraffin onto a fire in an attempt to put it out.

But the multiculturalists were faced by a most awkward fact. The white working-class was and always had been resolutely opposed to mass post-war immigration. Not only that but they were willing to say so publicly – the dockers had marched with Enoch Powell. Therefore, the liberal left had to do two things to prevent the white working-class from expressing their discontent both with the immigration which had occurred and with the new policy of multiculturalism , in which the native British culture was to have no privileged place but was to be merely one amongst many competing cultures. Worse, in practice the native culture (or cultures if you prefer) was not even to be allowed to compete because to do so would be to give the native population a public voice and a focus for their discontent.

The Labour Party at the parliamentary level was generally willing to espouse the new ideology uncritically because it fitted with their internationalist rhetoric. It also helped that the immigrants overwhelmingly voted Labour and were neatly consolidated in ghettos in the larger towns and cities where their votes were likely to elect Labour candidates more often than not.

Of course there was the seemingly ticklish problem for the multiculturalists of Labour being out of power for 18 years. In practice it did not matter, for it was not only the overt liberal left who embraced multiculturalism. Whatever their rhetoric, in practice,

the Tories climbed on the multiculturalist bandwagon quickly enough. Thatcher had spoken not long before being elected in 1979 of Britain being “swamped” by immigrants. But once in office she did nothing and the position continued to worsen, not least because she signed the Single European Act in 1985 which granted any person legally resident in another EU state the right to work in Britain. And of course throughout the 18 years of Tory office, people with the “right” multiculturalist views controlled the media, academia and increasingly the civil service. They were always on hand, both behind the scenes and publicly, to ensure the Tory Government did not actually do anything to disturb the multiculturalist programme.

Worse was to follow. In opposition the Tories followed the course of the Labour Party. Three election defeats in a row persuaded them elect as leader David Cameron, a man who adopted the same strategy for the Tories as Blair had pursued when he dumped everything Labour stood for. Cameron quickly got rid of everything which was considered “Old Tory” . This included wholeheartedly embracing multiculturalism. The electoral circle on immigration was formally closed. There is no major party to vote for if you do not want further mass immigration.

The silencing of the white working-class voice on immigration was achieved by a number of means over the past quarter century. Most potent was the mixture of legal threats such as the various Race Relations Acts and associated legislation such as the Public Order Act of 1986 and the religious exclusion of anti-immigration views from the mainstream media. British culture was gradually relegated to a less prominent place in schools. Pupils were taught, if they were taught anything about the past, of white wickedness. The Atlantic slave trade was represented as the greatest crime of history, the British Empire nothing more than a cruel invasion and subjugation of defenceless peoples. Any sign of publicly expressed native English pride was jumped on from everyone from politicians to teachers and denounced as xenophobia at best and racism as worst.

It did not take long for anyone who was not a supporter of multiculturalism to be beyond the liberal elite Pale. By 2006 multiculturalism had been formally embedded into public life through a mixture of ideological sharing amongst the elite and their auxiliaries and the law, most notably in recent years by the Race Relations (Amendment Act) of 2000 which effectively places an obligation on all employers who receive public funding to demonstrate that they are not being discriminatory.

The contemptuous mentality of those who currently permit and advocate mass immigration to Britain is epitomised by a speech in 2006 to business leaders by the Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King:

“If the increased demand for labour generates its own supply in the form of migrant labour then the link between demand and prices is broken. Indeed, in an economy that can call on unlimited supplies of migrant labour, the concept of output gap becomes meaningless….The UK is not in that extreme position, but the inflow of migrant labour, especially in the past year or so from Eastern Europe, has probably lead to diminution of inflationary pressure in the labour market,relative to previous experience.

“The Home Office estimates that around 120,000 workers entered the UK from the new member countries of the European Union between March 2004 and March 2005. Without this influx to fill the skills gap in a tight labour market, it is likely earnings would have risen at a faster rate, putting pressure on employers, and, ultimately, inflation”.’ Daily Telegraph 14 6 2006.

There you have the elite view of the day: human beings are to be treated purely as factor of production along with land and capital. No greater contempt for the masses, including the white working-class, can be held.

4. The EU and other treaties

Whatever their public words, both the Tory and Labour parties were generally nationalist in their behaviour until well after the second world war. Traditional Tories were nationalists by conviction, while even the Labour left were in practice protective of the nation state because they strongly opposed the importation of cheap goods and cheap labour. British membership of the EU (then the EEC) from 1973 onwards changed the rules of the game for both parties.

The Treaty of Rome made Britain generally subordinate to a foreign authority. It was not like a normal treaty such as that of NATO which is formed simply for a particular limited purpose and which can be ended or withdrawn from cleanly. The Treaty of Rome was a full blown political project with the specific aim of creating a supranational political entity. Even when Britain joined, the EU’s powers to interfere with British political decisions were substantial, although nothing like as extensive as they are in 2012. It simply was not possible to be a wholehearted nationalist any more. That undermined traditional Toryism and paved the way for Thatcherism, which was predicated on the individual rather than the community.

For the Labour Party learning to love the EU took a long time. Their 1983 manifesto advocated withdrawing because the EU was viewed as a capitalist club. But as the Party painfully lurched towards accepting the globalist market-led creed, there came the realisation on the left that both globalism generally and membership of the EU were wonderful promoters of internationalism. They did not deliver the internationalism which the left had traditionally sought, all brotherly love and material sharing, but they accomplished a central part of the internationalist dream, the destruction of nations. This realisation, together with the fear they would never hold power again drove Labour away from their practical nationalism.

As the years passed the entire political class also discovered general benefits from globalism and EU membership. Being in international clubs such as the EU and the WTO effectively destroyed democratic accountability. Any policy relevant to a treaty could be pushed through with the excuse that Britain was legally bound by treaty to do this. Membership of the EU in particular ensured that the excuse could be used over vast swathes of policy. This loss of democratic accountability removed the last vestiges of white working-class power because there was no mainstream Party with a chance of forming a government to speak or act for them. The white working-class might as well have stopped voting then for all the good it now did them.

5.Devolution and demonising the English

Up to 1997 the white working-class in the UK as a whole suffered much the same decline in prestige and strength. Blair’s victory in that year altered matters fundamentally. Primarily for the self-serving political reason that Labour normally depends heavily on Scots and Welsh MPs to achieve a working majority in the Commons, the Party adopted a policy of devolution for Scotland and Wales. (Northern Ireland was also brought into the devolution mix but for other reasons). It was one of the first major pieces of NuLabour manifesto-promised legislation to be enacted.

Devolution created a ticklish problem. How could it be that England, where more than 80% of the population of the UK resided and where even more than 80% of the UK’s GDP was generated, should have no national representation? Why did England not deserve its own political voice if Wales and Scotland and even tiny Northern Ireland did? Because there was no reasonable answer to that question Labour (and the liberal left generally) invented unreasonable ones: England was too big, there was no such thing as Englishness, the English had no desire for a parliament, such a parliament would only mean more politicians and expense and, most tellingly, the English could not be trusted with nationalism, a claim best translated as “The ruling liberal elite are determined at all costs to prevent the English having a voice because if they do they will look after their own interests which are currently being outrageously neglected”.

When I say ruling liberal elite I am of course including the entire political elite. A prime example of the cross-party agreement on the “dangers” of English nationalism came in a BBC Radio 4 programme Brits which went out on 10 January 2000. The then Home Secretary Jack Straw and the Tory leader of the moment William Hague appeared. This is what they said:

Straw: “[the English] are potentially very aggressive, very violent [and had in the past] used their propensity for violence to subjugate Ireland, Wales and Scotland”.

Hague:” English nationalism is the most dangerous form of nationalism that can arise in the United Kingdom, because England is four-fifths of the population of the UK…Once part of a united country or kingdom that is so predominant in size becomes nationalistic, then really the whole thing is under threat…”

The unresolved question of English devolution within an otherwise devolved UK led to a shift by politicians from the denigration of the white working-class generally to denigration of the English in general and the English white working-class in particular, the latter being commonly portrayed by politicians and the media as brutish people with the unspoken subtext “they cannot be trusted with power”. As most of the British white working-class are English, the white working-class were further marginalised.

Devolution also had a direct material effect on England and in particular the English poor. The amount spent per head on public services has for a long time grossly disadvantaged the English, viz:

According to official figures from the Treasury, 2010/11 projected average UK government spending per person was £10,212 in Scotland, compared to just £8,588 in England. Spending was also higher in Wales (£9,829) and Northern Ireland (£10,706). (http://tinyurl.com/cxmgwly)

The rate of increase of the per capita payments accelerated after devolution and consequently weakened public provision in England compared with the rest of the UK . That diminution of provision has struck most profoundly at the English white working-class.

6.The ethnic minority problem

Where do ethnic minorities stand in a devolved UK? German-born Labour MP Gisela Stuart writing in online magazine openDemocracy.net in December 005 described the problem, whilst also gaily insulting the English: “It as only been in the last five years or so that I have heard people in my constituency telling me ‘I am not British – I am English’. That worries me.

“British identity is based on and anchored in its political and legal institutions and this enables it to take in new entrants more easily than it would be if being a member of a nation were to be defined by blood.

“But a democratic polity will only work if citizens’ identification is with the community as a whole, or at least with the shared process, which overrides their loyalty to a segment.” (Quoted in Birmingham Mail 18 11 2005)

The problem for people such as Ms Stuart is that Britishness was destroyed by devolution. There is no longer a comfortable overarching label of British under which everyone can be placed. All that is left for the people of Britain to cling to are emotional ethnicities.

The situation is most acute in England because that is where the majority of ethnic minorities in the UK live. There is hard evidence that ethnic minorities in England routinely do not think of themselves as English. In 2005, the CRE commissioned from the research firm Ethnos a poll designed to discover how Britons identify themselves (http://www.cre.gov.uk/downloads/what_is_britishness.pdf). A couple of passages are particularly telling:

“In England, white English participants identified themselves as English first and British second, while ethnic minority participants perceived themselves as British. None identified as English, which they saw as meaning exclusively white people.”

“Britishness was associated with great historical and political achievements, but only amongst white participants (whether from England, Scotland or Wales), not those from ethnic minority backgrounds”.

This tells us two things: ethnic minorities in England routinely reject the idea of Englishness and ethnic minorities everywhere in the UK have no identification with Britain’s past. So much for Britishness.

7. Balkanising England

Recognising the danger that English nationalism represented to Labour’s domestic political hopes (and quite possibly to the EU’s wish to divide the UK into a series of regions), the Blair government attempted to create a political structure which would make an English Parliament next to impossible. Their method was to Balkanise the country through the creation of regional assemblies (the artificial regions chosen just happened to fit the regions into which the EU bureaucrats have decided England should be divided). But this plan fell over, at least for the foreseeable future, when a referendum to set up an assembly in the least artificial of the regions, the North-East, was humiliating by an overwhelming NO vote.

8. The gradual demoralisation of the white working class

If laissez faire economics, immigration reaching a critical level and international treaties were the immediate reasons why the white working-class has fallen so far from favour, the ground for their realisation was prepared during the thirty-five years which followed the Labour victory of 1945.

It is important not to be sentimental about the white working-class before their desertion by the British political class. Britain was far from being a peaceful society. Industrial relations were seriously fraught from the Eighteenth century onwards, long before nationalisation and the modern welfare state. Much crime went unreported because working class communities refused to report it. Vicious fights regularly took place in places such as the docks and the mines. There was considerable football hooliganism. Until the Irish Free State was founded, Irish nationalism was a constant running sore. Violent criminal gangs controlled places such as the Elephant and Castle and Brighton.

British education until after the second world war (and the Butler Act’s implementation) was seriously flawed, with most children leaving school at 14 having received no more than a primary education – only those who committed themselves to staying until 16 received secondary education. The general standard of education was not high, although, unlike now, the members of the political elite were frequently well educated.

There was also a great deal of abject poverty right up to 1939 with many working people living from wage packet to wage packet, often with the aid of a weekly trip to the local pawnbroker. There was only a rudimentary welfare state and to fall ill if you were poor was to place yourself at the mercy of the charity of others.

Despite these shortcomings, at the outbreak of the second world war working class society was much more coherent and secure than it is today. Most important was the fact that mainland Britain was racially and ethnically a very homogeneous society, even the ancestral cultural divisions between the English, Scots and Welsh were largely shadings within a single cultural spectrum rather than violently competing ethnicities. Across the water Ireland was a problem, but even there the divisions were political and religious rather than matters of profound ethnic difference. Such serious ethnic tension as there was resulted from the influx of Jews fleeing Nazi Germany, but even there the persistent failure of Mosley’s Blackshirts to gain electoral support in the midst of the Depression tells its own story: vehement anti-semitism was not a widespread problem.

The homogeneity of Britain generated a sense of security because the mainland British at least did not have the distraction of chronic and serious ethnic strife. That sense of security was bolstered by the fact that each of the four home nations had their own territory which they dominated in terms of occupation of the land even if they did not formally control their territory. The white working-class generally did not feel threatened by people whom they felt had no place in Britain. Most felt, whatever their personal troubles, that at least they were secure in their own land.

Added to, and arguably arising from, this marvellous ethnic and territorial security were potent and well established social support mechanisms of the working class, viz:

1. Unions, including their large welfare role.

2. Co-Operative Societies – Harrods for the working class.

3. Friendly societies.

4. Homogeneous working-class communities which mutually supported their members.

5. Large scale manual employment for the working class.

That was the position at the end of WW2, and for a considerable time after 1945 the condition of the white working-class actually improved as a full blown welfare state, rising wages and very low employment significantly increased their security and advantage.

The 1944 Butler Education Act gave all British children the chance to go to a grammar school and even those who did not gain a grammar school place got an extra year of schooling, schooling which went beyond the primary level. It was a far from perfect educational system but it was a considerable improvement on what had gone before. Most importantly, for the first time it gave large numbers of white working-class children the chance of a first rate education and, for a significant minority, the chance to go to university.

Unions remained strong and both major political parties were committed to maintaining by protectionist measures the British economy, a fair slice of which was in any case nationalised. The white working-class were both the electoral bedrock of the Labour Party and courted by a Tory Party which realised it had to abide by the Attlee Government’s social reforms if it was to be elected (in the mid-fifties one of the proudest boasts of the Tory Government was that they had built 300,000 council houses in a year).

To this growing advantage was gradually added a de facto censorship of criticism of the white working-class. Throughout the period 1945 to 1975 there developed a pernicious habit amongst the British elite whereby public criticism of the white working-class became unacceptable in much the same way that over the past thirty years ethnic minorities have ceased to be publicly criticised.

Like any powerful class which is exempted from criticism the white working-class abused their position, or perhaps more correctly, allowed their elected representatives whether in politics or unions, to lead them into abusive ways. The unions were all too ready to call strikes, strikes which when they affected the nationalised industries had the power to cripple British life.

The unions had become too powerful and it was their extreme propensity for “industrial action” – strikes, working-to-rule, demarcation disputes and violent picketing – which began to break down the public silence over white working-class abuses. Gradually it became acceptable for politicians and the media to criticise the white working-class. They needed little prompting because politicians of all colours and mediafolk were more often than not were middleclass, and the middleclass had very little natural empathy with the white working-class, just as today politicians and the media have no natural empathy with the ethnic minorities who are their current client class.

By 1970 the white working-class was outwardly as secure as a class as they had ever been and would be again. But even at the seeming height of their class advantage they were weaker than they once had been, naturally weaker than ever before in fact because sociological rats had been gnawing away at their natural cohesion since 1945.

The mass post-war immigration began in the late 40s but it was not a major problem for the white working-class until the 1960s. More immediately damaging were the slum clearances which dominated the twenty five years after the War. These destroyed many working class communities by the simple expedient of dividing them up between different housing estates. The working class were still living together but they were no longer the tightly knit coherent communities which had existed for generations. Instead it was strangers living together and living together not in housing which allowed an easy social life to develop, but more often than not in high rise buildings which destroyed social intimacy.

Ironically the new welfare state damaged the white working-class because it weakened the informal traditional social supports deriving from a well established community (help from friends and extended family) and led to the decline of formal supports such as friendly societies and the co-operative movement.

9. Education subverted

In the 1960s came the disaster of comprehensive schools and progressive educational theory. Comprehensivisation took away the ladder by which the bright white working-class child progressed, the grammar schools. The secondary modern -technical school- grammar school established by the Butler Act was far from perfect because it left large numbers of children labelled as educational failures, but that which replaced it was far worse a system. Most comprehensives simply did not have the resources or the will to provide a grammar school level education for their brightest pupils.

Progressive educational theory caused a general diminution in educational standards through a combination of its “discovery” method of learning, ie, do not actually teach them anything, and a self-denying ordinance which forbade any criticism of a child’s work. Stir in the lunacy of producing school exams to be taken by children of all ability (GCSE) and the incontinent expansion of higher education from the late 1980s onwards, season with the quasi-commercialisation of schools and universities through money following the pupil or student, top with school examination boards becoming overtly commercial, and you have the recipe for the mess which is modern British education, where exam grades rise inexorably while performance moves just as remorselessly in the opposite direction.

The percentage of working-class children at university is actually lower in 2012 than it was forty years ago. Of course the numbers of children in higher education has expanded massively since the mid-sixties and in absolute numbers far more white working-class pupils go on to university in 2006 than 1966. But it counts for nothing. If more white working-class pupils may have GCSEs, A Levels and degrees now, the standard of the education they receive to gain such qualifications is so degraded from what it was forty years ago that the qualifications are next to worthless as guides to employers of a person’s ability and the education received while taking them fails to equip students for the world of work even at the basic level of literacy and numeracy.

Had the major sources of traditional white working-class employment not been largely destroyed in the 1980s and 1990s, comprehensive education would not be so dire in its consequences for the white working class, because they would still have been employed in secure jobs which do not require much education. Instead, millions are trapped in unemployment (admitted unemployment or disguised as ill, retired early or attending worthless courses in higher education) or in insecure and ill-paid jobs, stranded without the education to find decent, well-paid work.

Any society also has to take into account the fact that any population contains many people who are naturally poorly equipped to do anything other than unskilled jobs. Ten per cent of the British population has an IQ of 80 or less. An IQ of 80 is the level at which psychologists generally agree someone begins to struggle to cope with the demands of an advanced society such as Britain. Such people require jobs they can do. Immigrants take those jobs and depress wages. The white working-class are being left with less and less.

With their traditional employments largely destroyed, subject to a state educational system which leaves them ill-equipped for any job other than the unskilled, beset by cheap immigrant labour competing for unskilled jobs and crippled by the cost of housing, the white working-class are ever more dependent on public provision. That provision is becoming increasingly uncertain as immigrant demand for social provision multiplies, public spending soars to dangerous heights and Blair’s mania for introducing private money and companies into public provision runs riot.

What were once the public utilities – gas, electricity, water, the railways – are becoming dearer and dearer despite providing an increasingly poor service through a lack of investment in maintenance and the shedding of jobs (the government cannot do anything to subsidise utility prices because of our membership of the EU). The poorer you are the larger part of your income is taken by these vital products and services.

Benefits and the state pension are linked to the Retail Price Index (RPI) but this understates inflation substantially, primarily because the cost of housing, i.e. what it costs to buy a property, is not included (only average mortgage repayment costs and rents are). This understatement of inflation means that benefits and the state pension are gradually losing their value in real terms.

There are also many people for whom the basket of goods and services is unrepresentative. For example, 14% of the index is devoted to motoring expenses which means that the RPI figure is barely relevant to non-car owners. RPI also excludes from its spending pattern such inconvenient people as OAPs surviving on the state pension because they are not “typical”. Generally, the poorer you are, the less representative of your spending RPI will be.

Wages are also affected by official inflation figures because they are used as a benchmark for both public service and private industry wage increases. I say inflation figures because more than one index is used. The Consumer Prices Index (CPI) is the index used these days to give the headline rate of inflation. This is even less accurate a guide to the true rate of inflation than RPI because it excludes housing costs altogether. Where this figure is used to guide wage increases the real value of the wage decreases even more rapidly in real terms than benefits and the state pension.

Then there is taxation. The poorest people in work in the population pay by far – in direct and indirect taxes combined – the highest proportion of their income in tax of any part of the population.

10. How could the present position be remedied?

Britain needs to do four things. (1) withdraw from the EU and repudiate any other Treaty which prevents the country exercising her sovereignty over immigration and her economy. (2) Recognise that public provision is generally best supplied by the state directly providing it. (3) Substitute for the globalist ideology an unaggressive nationalist one which steers a middle course between protectionism and manic free trade and which clearly distinguishes between the status of citizens and foreigners. (4) End mass immigration.

The first two are essentially acts of domestic political will. Withdrawing from the EU and treaties such as the UN Convention on Refugees would doubtless cause a great deal of political huffing and puffing but would be unlikely to produce any profound ill-effects because the EU would still wish to trade with Britain and the UN is becoming increasingly irrelevant. Public services – by which I mean genuine public services such as the NHS and prisons – are essentially a domestic matter and should concern no one outside this country.

The last two are more problematic. Adopting an unaggressive nationalism and clearly distinguishing between the status of citizens and foreigners would be no difficulty in practice because those are decisions which have little practical effect on other nations, but what of our trading treaty relationships, especially our membership of the World Trade Organisation? If we remained within the WTO would that make a middle course between protectionism and free trade impossible?

The WTO in practice permits many protectionist measures – readers will recollect how the USA suddenly slapped tariffs on foreign steel a year or so back. There is a good deal of wriggle room which Britain could use to protect her domestic economy. For example, if another WTO member is doing something protectionist and getting away with it, and many are, then the WTO will scarcely be able to penalise Britain. If the worst comes to the worst and we had to leave the WTO, bilateral agreements with other countries could be made – Britain has too large an economy for other states en bloc to forgo the opportunity for trade.

11. The end of mass immigration

That leaves mass immigration which I shall deal with in some detail because it is the most dangerous threat to the welfare of both the white working-class and the native British population as a whole. The stopping of further mass immigration alone would do more for the white working-class than any other single action by government. It would tighten the labour market and improve their employment opportunities. That in turn would improve their status. The pressure on public services, transport and housing would be lessened making access to them cheaper and easier for the white working-class. More generally, the moral climate would change because the ending of mass immigration would signal that there is a clear distinction between the rights of British citizens and the rights of foreigners.

With control resumed over our borders through withdrawal from the EU and the repudiation of other treaties, there would be in principle no problem with stopping further mass immigration. But what about the economic effects? The liberal internationalists tell us that the woes of the world would come upon us should we do such a thing, although, like Lear threatening retribution, (“I shall do such things ….I know not what they are”) they are strangely unable to quite say what the woes will be. If reality, there would simply be a manageable period of economic and social reconstruction.

The immediate economic effect would be a redistribution of labour. Labour would move into those occupations which are essential and which cannot be provided at a distance, for example healthcare and education. We would discover how occupations rank in terms of utility. Wages would rise in those occupations which had most utility to attract staff from elsewhere.

Employers would respond to labour tightening by using labour more efficiently. Automation would increase and employers would change their attitude to the older person and the disabled.

Both employers and government would take vocational training more seriously. Government would provide incentives to employers to train their staff and increase the training of public service professionals such as doctors and dentists. Government would also be forced to tackle the mess which is our public education to ensure an adequately educated workforce.

Employers who could not find the labour to run their business in this country would have to accept they could not do so. No one has a right to engage in an enterprise regardless of the effects on the welfare of the community as a whole. Capital which cannot be used in this country can be invested abroad.

12. Would there be an unmanageable labour shortage?

The idea that Britain is short of labour for most purposes is demonstrably absurd. The official figure for those under the state retirement age who are economically inactive in the UK is 7 million. Clearly not all of those would be able or willing to work, but equally clearly a large proportion would be able and willing to work if the conditions were right, i.e., wages rose, employers became more accommodating and the benefits system was tightened as the number of opportunities for work rose.

The claim that the indigenous population will not do the jobs immigrants take is demonstrably false. In areas of the country with few immigrants native Britons do them willingly. In many instances where foreign workers are employed it is not because native Britons will not work. Take the case of the cockle-pickers who died in Morecombe Bay several years ago it was widely reported in the media that the Chinese cockle pickers clashed with British cockle pickers who resented them invading their territory. These Chinese were not filling jobs which were unfilled by the British but competing with the British for the work.

The experience of the cockle-pickers is found elsewhere, not least because employers, particularly gangmasters, are frequently immigrants. They generally prefer to employ people of their own ethnicity. The consequence is that the British are not found in some occupations in some places because the immigrant employers deliberately avoid recruiting them.

The other thing which prevents native Britons taking jobs in some parts of the country is the fact that the native Briton does not want to work for employers whose workforce is predominantly formed of immigrants or native-born ethnic minorities. Like every other people, native Britons do not wish to be forced to work in their own land in a employment where they are in the minority.

It is also important to remember that the menial jobs immigrants take are worth far more to them than a native Briton. If you earn as little as £250 a week net – many immigrants work cash in hand – and live in accommodation either supplied by an employer or in crowded accommodation for very little rent, you will probably still be able to save a a substantial amount, say, £2,000 pa.

If you come from China where wages even in the big cities are 50 pence an hour, you would earn œ1,000 pa for a 40 hour week. Working at a menial job in Britain allows you to save double the average Chinese big city annual wage in a year. That money remitted to China takes on the local purchasing power. The multiplier for Eastern Europeans is less but even there œ2,000 saved in a year would be a good professional salary in places such as Poland. Give native Britons the chance to save the equivalent of a British professional’s salary in a year doing a menial job and they will flock to the work and put up with basic living conditions. Of course, no such employments are on offer to Britons.

13. Conclusion

The crime of the post-war British elite of all political colours has been to destroy the social and economic structures which gave security and viability to white working-class society without replacing them with something else. The elite mashed their communities through slum clearance, thrust mass immigration into the areas in which the white working-class lived, destroyed through “free trade” the great industries which traditionally employed them and hamstrung the unions by a mixture of legislation, cheap foreign labour both at home and abroad and the creation of a perpetual “reserve army of labour” from the native population. At the same time the white working-class were deprived of the means to create new lives and social structures through a decent education. Whatever the white working-class are now, they are the product of decisions made by the British political elite since 1945.

I am not a sentimentalist who imagines that the ideal world would be one in which the white working class continued unchanged as noble “sons of toil” or that ” working-class culture” should be preserved in aspic. Had every white working-class person in the country been converted into part of the middleclass by an unforced process of improved education and rising wages I would have seen that as part of a natural sociological change. But that of course did not happen, probably in principle could never have happened in a country the size of Britain. The white working-class have been disenfranchised. The British middle class have been at best complicit in the attack on the white working-class and at worst have taken an eager and active part in it. For decades they thought themselves personally safe from the consequences of immigration and, later, imagined that they were immune from the effects of globalisation. They find themselves unable to buy houses because of the absurd prices They are beginning to learn the hard facts of sociological life: mass immigration and globalisation eventually affects all but the truly rich, a poetic justice but one which harms the country.

Can things change? For the first time in half a century British politicians (and the liberal elite generally) are beginning to display realism over the effects of immigration. This realism is coming from both the major Parties. Here is the Tory MP Julian Brazier writing in a pamphlet for the Cornerstone group:

“Overcrowding is a key cause of many of the factors which are destroying quality of life: mortgage slavery, over-development, congested roads, water shortages, flooding and overstretched public services. We should do everything we can sensibly – and fairly – to reduce the level of immigration to well below the level of emigration.” (The Times August 01, 2006)

On the other side of the political fence is Labour MP Jon Cruddas, MP for the Essex seat of Dagenham. Writing a commentary on a Rowntree Trust study THE FAR RIGHT IN LONDON which deals with the recent success of the BNP in his constituency he comments:

“…it [the Blair Government] has tacitly used immigration to help forge the preferred flexible North American labour market. Especially in London, legal and illegal immigration has been central in replenishing the stock of cheap labour across the public and private services, construction and civil engineering…

“For many of my constituents the value of their social wage is in decline. House prices appear to rise inexorably upwards whilst thousands and thousands seek nonexistent, new social housing. Public service improvements fail to match localised population expansion let alone the long term legacy of underinvestment…

“At work their terms and conditions are under threat as they compete for work with cheap immigrant labour. In terms of access to housing and public services and their position in the workplace many see immigration as a central determinant in their own relative impoverishment….

“Those communities that must accommodate the new immigrant communities are the ones least equipped to do so they themselves have the most limited opportunities for economic and social mobility…”

But realism from a few politicians acting as individuals is worthless if the major political parties do nothing or indeed, with our various treaty obligations, can do nothing legally while we are bound by them. The only way Britain could meaningfully regain control of immigration is to leave the EU and renounce all other treaties, such as the UN Convention of Refugees, which prevents Britain from controlling her borders. There is absolutely no sign that any major party or even individual politician is willing to contemplate such a policy.

Immigration is only one part of the problem. There is still very little realism from even by individual MPs over the effects of laissez faire economics and freer trade, both of which severely undermine the condition of the white working-class (and increasingly, much of the middleclass).

The manic drive to privatise everything in sight, whether by outright privatisation or the introduction of private money into public services, shows no sign of abating. The immediate consequence of this is all too often reduced services at greater cost, while the long –term effect may be to reduced public provision generally, either because the costs simply go out of control or because the fact that a service is provided by a private contractor rather than by direct labour public provision makes it easier to reduce the service or stop providing it altogether..

On the education side so much damage has been done to our education system, from primary schools to universities, that it is difficult to see how things could be changed in less than a generation.

Perhaps the greatest problem is the current state of our political system which has become utterly unresponsive to the needs of the British people in general and the white working-class in particular.

The Labour MP John Cruddas wrote this recently in his commentary on a Joseph Rowntree Trust report “The rise of the Far right”. “The [Blair] government is not a coalition of traditions and interests who initiate policy and debate; rather it is a power elite whose modus operandi is the retention of power.” The words could be as readily applied to the modern Tory Party.

Compare this with George Orwell’s words in 1984:” “The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness: only power, pure power. …We are different from the oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and Russian Communists came very close to us in our methods, but they never had the courage to recognise their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just around the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard arevolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship.” (O’Brien speaking to Winston Smith during his interrogation).

That is the political system we have now: a simple desire for power. The only thing which will change it is fear, fear in the political elite that things are running out of control, that they may be brought to account. Then they will shamelessly amend their ideology, what they said was black yesterday will become white tomorrow. Elites only have one settled principle – to do whatever is necessary to preserve their power and privilege.

Bring the Nuclear Deterrent to England now

Robert Henderson

A Daily Telegraph report of 27 January 2012 ”Nuclear subs will stay in Scotland” ( James Kirkup –http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/defence/9043092/Nuclear-subs-will-stay-in-Scotland-Royal-Navy-chiefs-decide.html) is most disturbing. The essence of the story is that should Scotland votes for independence the UK nuclear deterrent would for years have to remain in what would then be a foreign country.

Why could the subs, warheads and missiles not be brought to England? Kirkup claims the Ministry of Defence (MoD) believes the provision of new facilities for the nuclear deterrent in England could take up to ten years to build.

The Trident missiles carrying Vanguard-class submarines are based at Faslane on the Gare Loch; the missiles and warheads are stored and loaded from the nearby Royal Naval Armaments Depot Coulport, on Loch Long. Kirkup quotes an unnamed source: “Berths would not be a problem – there are docks on the south coast that could be used without too much fuss. But there simply isn’t anywhere else where we can do what we do at Coulport, and without that, there is no deterrent.” In other words, the subs could be accommodated immediately in England but the storing and arming facilities of Coulport could not.

The official description of Coulport is:

The Royal Armaments Depot at Coulport, eight miles from Faslane, is responsible for the storage, processing, maintenance and issue of key elements of the UK’s Trident Deterrent Missile System and the ammunitioning of all submarine-embarked weapons.

It also stores conventional armaments for Royal Navy vessels.

Because of the nature of its work, the site is subject to the most stringent external security regulators who authorise the depot to process nuclear weapons and provide support to nuclear submarines berthed at the Explosive Handling Jetty. (http://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/The-Fleet/Naval-Bases/Clyde/RNAD-Coulport

The claim that there is and will be the “most stringent external security” is questionable because the site has fallen prey to the privatisation mania with the day-to-day management moving in February 2012 from the MoD to a commercial consortium led by the Atomic Weapons Establishment in alliance with Babcock and Lockheed Martin (http://wmcnd.org.uk/news/nuclear-power-fukushima-and-chernobyl and http://www.nti.org/gsn/article/lockheed-group-to-manage-uk-nuke-installation/).

Kirkup reports an unnamed source saying “Maintaining the deterrent is the first priority for any UK government, so ministers in London would have to pay Salmond any price to ensure we kept access to [the Clyde bases]…It would be an unbelievable nightmare.”

The idea that it would take ten years to replace the facilities Royal Naval Armaments Depot at Coulport is surely absurd. We know how quickly things can be done in wartime. This should be treated as a situation of equivalent urgency. Salmond must not be allowed to use it as a bargaining chip on the conditions of either independence or DEVOMAX.

Even if the referendum vote goes against independence, you may be sure that something like DEVOMAX will be granted to Scotland by the current Westminster Government which appears to have no sense of protecting English interests. That will simply be a stepping stone to full independence. If the nuclear facilities are left in Scotland in such circumstances they would ever be a hostage to fortune. The Government should not wait for a referendum, but begin the process of removing the nuclear deterrent facilities to England now.

If the nuclear deterrent was left in Scotland for years after independence it is almost certainly going to cause problems, not least with the Americans who supply the UK with the delivery system to for the British made and owned warheads. They might well be reluctant to allow their technology to be sited in what would then be a foreign country with all the security implications that carries. (Amazingly, you may think, the UK only leases the missiles and they are pooled with the Atlantic squadron of the USN Ohio SSBNs at King’s Bay, Georgia).

In addition, there could be no certainty about what a future government of an independent Scotland would do, or indeed how resolute a future Westminster government would be. The example of the three Irish Free State “treaty ports” the Royal Navy continued to use after the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty is not encouraging. This agreement was abruptly terminated in 1938, a year before the feared U-Boat menace to British shipping became a reality. The most dismaying thing with that episode was that the British government behaved in the most supine way – they gave and the Free State took – simply to end a long-standing trade war with the Free State.

The worst case scenario would be to do nothing before the referendum, the vote is for independence and Salmond then insists on the removal of the deterrent immediately because of the Scotch Numpty Party’s long-standing commitment to a nuclear free Scotland.

The MoD declined to discuss details of Kirkup’s story but a spokesman said “The UK government position is clear and we are arguing the case for Scotland to remain within the Union. However, any decisions on Scotland’s future are for people in Scotland to decide.” This points to the coalition taking the Micawber strategy of waiting for something to turn. That will be unreservedly to England’s (and the British Isles) disadvantage.

It must be no to Devomax

Robert Henderson

The leader of the Scots Numpty Party (SNP) Alex Salmond has a secret love. He has a long-time partner Independence , but also a burgeoning affair with the siren Devomax. No, this not a relative of the cyber personality Max Headroom, although it is just as artificial and improbable a creation.

Like all lovers with two mistresses who know of the others existence the SNP leader has been drifting into a fevered incoherence as he tries to keep both the objects of his affection satisfied. Only the other day he said that if Scotland votes for independence it will still be part of the UK: “That union, that United Kingdom if you like, would be maintained after Scottish political independence.” (http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/i_still_want_to_be_in_uk_says_alex_salmond_1_ 2085533)

Exactly what finery Miss Devomax should be clothed in when he finally presents her to the world, Master Salmond has not crystallised even in his own mind, but he knows that her garb would indubitably involve a skirt of full fiscal autonomy. As Scotland under the reign of Mistress Devomax would be technically part of the UK, her political clothes would also mean keeping the Queen as head of state, continuing to use the Pound and sharing defence, foreign affairs, EU membership and the servicing of the National Debt and all other financial obligations in the UK including Foreign Aid. (Strangely, when speaking of his ever less secret love, the SNP leader always omits to mention the “servicing of the National Debt and all other financial obligations in the UK”). In short , it would be Home Rule more or less.

The biggest fly in the Devomax ointment is fiscal autonomy which would mean Scotland raising all its government revenue from taxes which it imposed and collected itself. Some of those taxes would have to be used to pay a share proportionate to Scotland’s fraction of the UK population (around 9%) of the UK defence budget, the foreign affairs budget and the servicing of the National Debt and all other accrued financial obligations in the UK. (Devomax would also mean that Scotland would have to fund the cost in Scotland of welfare, education, housing, the arts, the NHS , transport, roads, the environment, PFI and PPP projects in Scotland, policing and justice . Some of this is already funded from the Treasury disbursement to Scotland but much is not, for example, most of Scottish welfare. )

A fiscally independent Scotland would radically change the relationship between Scotland and the rest of the UK. If the Scots were paying part of the expenditure on UK projects such as defence and Foreign Aid they would expect to have some say in those projects. This would cause immense difficulty both in terms of the level of expenditure and how the UK project expenditure was deployed.

How much would Scotland have to contribute to the UK budget under Devomax? It would be a substantial. Let us have a look at the financial year 2011/12. The UK defence budget for 2011/12 is £40 billion, National Debt interest is £50 billion, http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/2011budget_complete.pdf p6), Foreign Aid is £8.7 billion (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1391334/Britain-doles-aid-country-despite-savage-cutbacks-home.html ), the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is £1,6 billion (go to http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/publications-and-documents/publications1/annual-reports/business-plan and click on Business Plan). The net UK contribution to the EU in 2010 (the latest figure available) was £9.2 billion with the gross contribution being a whopping £19.7 billion. (http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danielhannan/100081949/britains-net-contribution-to-the-eu-budget-has-risen-by-74-per-cent-in-one-year/). The total (taking only the net contribution to the EU into account) is £110 billion. That would mean Scotland’s share would have been £10 billion. If the accrued liabilities of UK taxpayer funded pensions at the point of fiscal separation were dealt with at the UK level as well that would add billions more Scotland would have to put into the UK pot. In addition, there is the question of how much of the financial chaos created by the Scottish banks RBS and HBOS should be laid at the Scotland’s door. The headline amounts involved in rescuing the banks are large enough (£45 billion for RBS and £20 billion for HBOS via the Lloyds Banking Group rescue (http://money.uk.msn.com/news/articles.aspx?cp-documentid=152384309), but the true figure runs into hundreds of billions (http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/nov/12/bank-bailouts-uk-credit-crunch and http://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/06/02/the-wages-of-scottish-independence-public-debt/.)

That is the position now. By the time a referendum is likely to be held and a decision made, it is likely to be 2015. By then the national debt is projected to be around £1.4 billion as against £1 trillion in 2012. That would add something like £45 billion for Scotland to service. Foreign Aid is due to increase to £11.5 billion by 2014 (http://www.dfid.gov.uk/news/latest-news/2010/spending-review-2010/). The EU net contribution is also due to rise after 2013.

Although it is impossible to give more than a rough approximation of what a Scottish government would have to be handing over to the UK Treasury under Devomax, realistically it would be in the region of £20 billion per annum, a sum which would probably represent at least a quarter of the total Scottish budget by the time Devomax was a fact. That would put great pressure on domestic Scottish government spending and heighten the already natural desire of a Devomax Scottish government to demand a strong say in the UK’s affairs.

The general difficulty with UK projects is obvious. Scotland would expect a say on the amount spent and the nature of the spending , but the rest of the UK – which is 91% of the UK population – would overwhelmingly outweigh the Scots in any democratic procedure to make decisions. It is impossible have an arrangement which did not have one of two outcomes that would be unpalatable to one of the two parties. Either Scottish wishes would be ignored or the Scottish tail would wag the rest of the UK dog by giving them a disproportionately powerful say.

The situation would be exceptionally sharp in the case of defence. The SNP is ideologically against a nuclear deterrent. There is probably a majority of the Scottish public who support this view. Any likely Scottish government for the foreseeable future will have the SNP as at least a strong partner in a coalition. This state of affairs has three possible consequences. If things stay as they are with the nuclear facilities in Scotland continuing, they would be a high value bargaining chip for a Scottish government to extract substantial concessions from Westminster on other subjects, for example, the servicing of the UK national debt. Alternatively, if the nuclear deterrent facilities were placed entirely in England the Scots will cavil at paying a proportionate share of its costs even though they would benefit from the protection it offers. More generally, a Scottish government ideologically opposed to a nuclear deterrent might try to refuse to pay anything towards it.

The other great military problem would be action overseas which would have profound foreign policy implications. It would clearly be absurd to get into a situation where Westminster decided on foreign action and the Scottish government could veto the deployment. There would also be occasions where even if a fighting role was not being contemplated disputes could arise, for example, over the military being used in policing roles such as those in the Balkans or substantial amounts of the military budget being used to defend the Falklands. In addition, Scotland might well try to engineer a situation where there were military assets such as Scottish regiments which, while they were not formally under the control of the Scottish government, were in practice always stationed in Scotland or at least in the UK , with an understanding that they were not to be deployed overseas .

The second immediate and pressing problem would be foreign policy in general and the EU in particular. Apart from foreign policy relating to the armed forces, there would also be many points of potential conflict between Scotland and the rest of the UK. For example, Scotland might object to funding or facilitating the British arms trade while the UK government was in favour or the UK government could be in favour of restricting immigration and Scotland for increasing it.

But those problems would be nothing compared to the perpetual wrangles over the EU. Assuming the UK remains a member of the EU and the EU is not dissolved by the economic acid bath which is the Euro collapse, how would the UK’s relations with the EU be decided with a quasi-independent Scotland paying part of the annual membership fee? Scotland would undoubtedly ask for some form of official representation and however that was delivered it would weaken the hand of the UK government because it would seem to the rest of the EU that the UK was speaking with two voices. That could provide a lever for the EU to weaken the UK by playing Scotland off against the rest of the UK.

In any discussions of new policy or bargaining over such things as the UK rebate, fishing quotas or the disbursement of that part of the money from the UK EU budget contribution which is returned to the UK in various ways, the UK could find itself in a similar position to that UK domestic politics is presently in with the coalition government: no clear public voice but one perpetually moving as deals are done behind the scenes. Most dramatically, imagine a situation where there is a new EU treaty which greatly increases the move towards a United States of Europe. Scotland would be in favour: the UK government probably would oppose such a treaty. Even if the decision was left to a UK referendum would a quasi-independent Scotland accept such a referendum? Would they not seek a referendum for Scotland only? In the medium term the likely response by the EU would be to try to expand their long-held regionalist plan to dissolve the power of nation states within the EU to allow places such as Scotland a large and ever increasing autonomy within the EU while Scotland remain legally part of a member state.

The other great immediate Devomax problem would be the management of the Pound. Many of the problems associated with a supposedly independent Scotland continuing to use the pound also apply to Devomax– see http://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2012/01/22/an-independent-scotland-must-not-be-allowed-to-have-the-pound-as-their-official-currency/. Foreigners at both the business and government levels would begin to see the UK not as single economic sphere but as two separate economies. That would create uncertainty which would of itself weaken the Pound.

If Scotland had a much weaker economy than the rest of the UK under Devomax, which is probable because of the dangerous narrowness of the Scottish economy and its massive public sector, something similar to the Euro situation would arise. The value of the Pound against other currencies would be suppressed, just as the Euro has not reflected the strength of the German economy because of the other weaker vessels such as Greece and Italy. An artificially low Pound might sound attractive for exports, but it also means more expensive imports and creates a risk that the currency may slip into the dangerous territory of precipitously devaluing until the credibility of the currency itself is in danger. At the very least a Pound dependent on two separate fiscal policies would mean that the massively larger entity – the UK minus Scotland – would to some degree be dependent on the behaviour of the much smaller entity – Scotland.

Fiscal autonomy also means, in theory at least, no transfer of money from the rest of the UK (in practice from England) to Scotland if the Scottish economy runs into serious trouble. This could easily happen because of the size of the tax take Scotland would have to generate to meet their present obligations under Devomax.

The quick way of getting a quick approximation of the amount of money a Scottish government under Devomax would have to raise to fund present expenditure . The total budget projection for £2011/12 is £710 billion (http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/2011budget_complete.pdf p6). 9% of that is £64 billion.

In 2009/10 – the last year for which there are official Scottish government figures for public expenditure in Scotland : Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland ( GERS) – Scottish tax revenues were £42,201 billion excluding North Sea oil and £48,132 billion with what are coyly called “an illustrative geographical share “ of North Sea oil revenues with expenditure for the year of £62.086 billion (http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/06/21144516/1). Even with the Oil revenues included there was a shortfall of £14 billion in tax revenue.

But there are problems with GERS which could well substantially understate public expenditure in Scotland. For many items there are no official statistics collected for Scotland alone. Consequently, the GERS figures are often based on extrapolations from UK statistics with methodologies which even the GERS compilers warn do not produce objective data: “… these methodologies are subjective and therefore the figures should be viewed accordingly” (http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/06/21144516/2). The other problem is the treatment of North Sea Oil revenues. The “illustrative geographical share of North Sea oil revenues” are based on a study by the University of Aberdeen (http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/06/21144516/7).

The fact that both the GERS estimates and the North Sea oil revenue estimate have been made in Scotland rather than by non-Scottish bodies puts a large question mark against their impartiality. If there is partiality favouring Scotland in the GERS estimates it does not have to be conscious. It is human nature to always put the best appearance on things from the individual’s point of view. That is particularly true when a study is commissioned by those with political power.

Even if there is no overestimating of the bare figures they would not tell the whole story. Scotland’s GDP is dangerously dependent on public spending. By 2012 it will be in the region of 67% of Scottish GDP (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scotland/4217793/Scotlands-dependence-on-state-increasing.html). The important thing to understand about tax collection is that tax collected from those drawing their pay from the public purse is that it is simply recycled taxpayers’ money. It is only the money derived from private enterprise which drives an economy. We can see this graphically in the present UK financial position. Only the private sector can grow the economy to allow larger tax receipts to reduce the deficit. To have two thirds of an economy dependent on public expenditure is profoundly precarious because the tax base can shrink radically very rapidly. It is doubly dangerous for a small country of only 5 million people which does not have much diversity in in the little there is of a private sector.

Even if 90% of the oil tax revenues were allocated to Scotland this would not, on average, compensate for the loss of a subsidy of some £8 billion pa which Scotland presently receives from the UK treasury through higher per capita funding resulting from the Barnett Formula. Not only that but revenues veer about wildly. In 1991/2 they were a paltry £647 million; in 2008/9 £13 billion; in 2009/10 they dropped dramatically to £6.4 billion. (http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/06/21144516/7). The remaining oil in Scottish waters is also declining rapidly and becoming more expensive to extract as the major oil discoveries run down (http://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/05/14/the-truth-about-uk-oil-and-gas/). While it is true that overall oil consumption is rising because of the countries such as China and India, which might be expected to keep the price of oil high, there are also dramatic developments around shale oil and gas so there is no guarantee that the price of oil will remain high or continue to rise. In any event it would be a rash government to base its future on a single crock of gold.

There is also the strong possibility under Devomax of the English public sector jobs exported to Scotland being repatriated (http://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/05/06/scottish-independence-yes-but-only-on-these-terms/) and of companies in Scotland moving out of Scotland if a Scottish government cannot afford to offer them financial incentives to say.

There would also be a problem with new national debt. With a fiscally independent Scotland neither England nor Scotland would wish to run up new UK National Debt. After Devomax Scotland would have to take sole responsibility for any new finance raised by the Scottish government, while the rest of the UK would assume responsibility for any new post Devomax debt it incurred. There is the risk of Scotland being unwilling to cut its public financial cloth much closer because it has become substantially poorer and running up unsustainable Scottish debt.

It is only to easy to imagine Scotland getting into the same mess that the Republic of Ireland and Iceland got into by a mixture of reckless spending and a failure to control credit or risky financial operations generally. The rest of the UK (essentially England for reasons already given) would either have to bail out the Scots or see Scotland go effectively bust with the dire effect that would have on the Pound and the UK international financial and political credibility. The latter would also bring large numbers of Scots to England after jobs, housing, schools and welfare which their own government could no longer afford. Which option would a UK government take? Almost certainly the bailing out of Scotland with English money because of the damage anything else might do. This might be done as a supposed loan, but there would be no guarantee that it would be repaid.

The best that could be hoped for from Devomax from an English perspective would be that Scotland would not be reckless and would pay their share of UK projects such as defence. But along with that would come a perpetual uneasiness and clashing of democratic wills. It would be, as mentioned previously, akin to the situation we have with the coalition government with no clear position on anything. Unlike the coalition government there would be no end to it. If Scotland is to leave the UK, it must be as a fully independent state asking no favours from England.

Salmond’s proposed referendum question is heavily biased

The Scotch Numpty Party (SNP) leader Alex Salmond’s proposed referendum question “‘Do you agree that Scotland should be an independent country?” is strongly biased. (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9040988/Alex-Salmonds-independence-question-is-loaded-and-biased.html).

The question is biased because it is (1) asking people to positively agree not merely choose from neutral options and (2) it would require a positive yes or no by the voter. It is well established that humans are predisposed to agree and say yes rather than disagree and say no, because both of the latter seem negative and confrontational.

A neutral question, as far as any can be devised, would be something like this:

Scotland to remain within the UK?

Scotland to be independent ?

With a box against each question and a cross put in one box. That would remove the need to vote Yes or No directly.

There would still be the problem of putting one question before the other which tends to make more people go for the first question. This could be obviated by printing half the ballot papers with one of the questions first and the other half of the ballot papers with the other question first.

A question in the form proposed by Salmond would never be used by a mainstream polling company or in academic research because of its slanted nature.

An “independent” Scotland must not be allowed to have the pound as their official currency

Robert Henderson

The Scottish Numpty Party leader Alex Salmond desperately wants to have his independence cake and eat it. He wishes to have DEVOMAX as well as independence on the “independence” ballot and, if the vote is for independence, he blithely imagines that the Queen will remain head of state, defence will be shared with the remainder of the UK (henceforth the UK) and , most tellingly because of his constant boasts about the robustness of an independent Scotland’s economy , that the pound Sterling will continue to be currency used by Scotland. It is the last which I shall concern myself with here.

It is vital that Scotland should not continue to use the Pound as their national currency whilst pretending to be independent, because of the potential and probable damage it could do to Pound and the UK economy .

If an independent Scotland was allowed to retain the Pound the situation would not be like that of a heavily devolved country such as the USA , a single state where general monetary and fiscal policy is set at national level and, most importantly, money can be transferred from richer to poorer parts of the country. Rather, the position of the UK and Scotland split into two independent states would be akin to that of the Eurozone where there is no shared fiscal policy and no ability to move money from richer states to poorer states and chaos currently reigns. Chaos could well be the state the UK and an independent Scotland arrived at and probably sooner than later.

The situation with a UK/Scotland currency grouping could be more extreme than that of the Eurozone, because the Eurozone at least has theoretical rules to prevent member states from debauching the currency. If Scotland simply used the Pound without any rules the situation could deteriorate much more rapidly than the Eurozone, a likelihood reinforced by the much smaller size of the economic grouping UK/Scotland compared with the Eurozone. Whether an independent Scotland would agree to restraints on what they could do with stringent rules designed to protect the Pound is dubious: even more dubious is whether, if they agreed to such rules, they would abide by them when shove came to push .

If there is one thing which international traders and markets do not respond well to it is uncertainty. That is what the sharing of a currency between two independent states would guarantee. At present the Pound is freely traded currency which still has enough international credibility to be held widely as part of national reserves. Foreign investors and traders would rapidly begin to harbour doubts about who was exercising control over a currency being used by two supposedly independent states. Nor would international investors be reassured by the idea that whatever form control took, there would be two economies almost certainly being driven by seriously different political agendas. Without Scottish MPs, the House of Commons would have, at least for quite some time, a Tory majority with a strong free market agenda, an agenda which it is improbable that any likely Scottish Parliament and government would follow. This international uncertainty would extend to British based industry and commerce.

Whether an independent Scotland had no control over the pound or whether it exercised some control there would be serious difficulties. If the Scots had no control over the monetary and fiscal policy set at Westminster, these policies might be directly at odds with the wishes and needs of Scotland. Should that be the case you may be sure that a continuous barrage of complaint would come from north of the Tweed with pleas for monetary and fiscal policies to suit Scotland which might well disadvantage the rest of the UK. These pleas could of course be ignored at Westminster, but that would come at a cost because any serious financial or economic crisis in Scotland would result in a weakening of foreign confidence in the Pound and the general economic performance of not Scotland alone but of the UK and Scotland. This would again create uncertainty at home and abroad.

If the UK and an independent Scotland shared the pound, its fortunes would be judged by those who matter on the economic prospects and performance of the UK and Scotland combined, not as two separate economies. That would leave the UK and Scotland with many new disadvantages and precious few if any of the advantages which the Pound currently enjoys as a currency used by a single nation state with a long history of meeting its obligations.

The worst case scenario would be an independent Scotland which became another Republic of Ireland or Iceland through reckless spending and/or lax credit controls. The Pound would suffer severe consequences no matter how prudently and successfully the economy of the rest of the UK, was managed just as the German economy is suffering because of the less disciplined countries in the Eurozone. In such circumstances the rest of the UK would be faced with a choice between a rapidly depreciating and unstable pound if nothing was done or the provision of vast amounts of English taxpayers’ money to bail out Scotland.

The splitting of Czechoslovakia into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993 is instructive. The official division took place on 1 January. Initially both countries retained the old Czechoslovak currency the koruna, but by 8 February they had set up separate national currencies (each also called the koruna) because the Czech Republic was substantially richer than Slovakia and having the same currency made no sense because she could only be a loser. In effect, the Czech Republic would have been subsidising Slovakia if they had continued to share a currency. (Once the new national currencies were established the Czech koruna traded at a substantially higher value than the new Slovakian koruna.)

In the case of an independent Scotland and UK sharing the Pound the UK (in effect England because Wales and Northern Ireland receive far more from the Treasury than they raise in tax) would be subsiding Scotland. This is because England is by population ten times the size of Scotland, has a much broader based economy and that economy is nowhere near as dependent on public money than Scotland. Even with Wales and Northern Ireland (both heavily dependent on public money) to support England is in far better economic shape than Scotland.

The Scottish private sector is very heavily dependent on a few industries: tourism, whisky, financial services and oil ; the proportion of Scottish GDP derived from public spending is above 60% (http://www.scotsman.com/news/scottish-news/edinburgh-east-fife/60_of_gdp_comes_from_public_sector_1_1412305) and a substantial part of the GDP is derived from the higher per capita Treasury payment to Scotland compared with England – the Scots currently get around £1,600 per head more than the English which gives them around £8 billion more pa than they would get if they were paid the same as the English. (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2031543/UK-government-spending-Scots-1-600-year-spent-English.html).

What would there be to stop people in Scotland using the pound as currency regardless of the agreement of Westminster? Nothing in the sense that any Sterling held in Scotland could be used by those living in Scotland just as using the dollar or the Euro in England could be done if people were willing to accept it. But an independent Scotland would have no means of printing Sterling notes or minting Sterling coins, so it would be impractical to run an economy in that way because it would have no means of readily expanding the money supply. In addition, if the Scottish economy deteriorated badly holders of Sterling in Scotland could rapidly shrink the money supply by moving it out of the country.

That brings us to the matter of the three banks in Scotland which at present have the authority to issue sterling bank notes: Bank of Scotland, Clydesdale Bank and The Royal Bank of Scotland. If the Pound was denied to Scotland by Westminster or the Scots did not choose to use it, their issuing powers would be removed.

If the Pound was shared between the UK and an independent Scotland the Sterling banknote issuing rights of Scottish banks would either have to be rescinded or strictly limited. If this was not done Scotland could print as much money as they chose. Such controls over banknote issue would not be difficult for Westminster to enforce regardless of the wishes of a Scottish government. As things stand Scottish banknotes are legal currency as authorised by the Westminster Parliament but not legal tender .(http://www.scotbanks.org.uk/legal_position.php). Not being legal tender means amongst other things that no one is obliged to accept them in payment. That alone would prevent an independent Scotland having carte blanche to issue as many notes as they wanted , because although they could issue them they would be worthless outside Scotland if no one would accept them as they certainly would not. In addition, the note issuing banks are effectively beyond an independent Scotland’s control. RBS is more than 80% owned by the UK taxpayer, the Bank of Scotland is part of the Lloyds group which is 43% owned by the UK taxpayer and the Clydesdale Bank is part of National Australia Bank Group.

But the issuing of banknotes and coins is only a part of the money supply, and a diminishing one at that because of the ever increasing use of credit cards, direct debits and other non-physical money means of payment (http://www.paymentscouncil.org.uk/files/payments_council/future_of_cash2.pdf). In addition there is the ability of financial institutions to expand the money supply by making loans directly to individuals and corporations, the use of state power to “print money” through procedures such as quantitative easing and the general fiscal tenor of a government in terms of such things as credit controls, taxation policy and regulation of the economy, especially the regulation of the banks and their ilk.

If all or any of these matters were left for the UK and an independent Scotland to decide each for themselves there would be inevitably serious political clashes. More fundamentally the effect of clashing policy decisions would be to undermine the Pound and by extension the economy of one or both countries. For example, if the UK introduced credit controls and Scotland did not, Scotland could run into the type of trouble created by the pre-2008 bubble while the UK did not, but the Pound would be weakened by the Scottish behaviour. If the Pound was shared between the UK and Scotland there would have to be very strict rules to ensure that reckless financial and fiscal behaviour was not possible. As mentioned previously, it is very doubtful that an independent Scotland would agree to such rules or observe them if they did officially accept them.

Allowing Scotland to use the Pound would have only disadvantages for England and would carry with it the risk of a sudden and drastic failure if Scotland became another Republic of Ireland or Iceland. For Scotland it would be all benefit because they would gain the advantage of using a recognised currency and know that the rest of the UK would have to bail them out if the Scottish economy went down the pan. Westminster should make it clear now that there is no question of an independent Scotland continuing to use the Pound.
The SNP are peddling a bogus independence .

If they really wanted Scotland to be its own master they would be seeking to establish their own currency not remain with the Pound or become enmeshed in the Euro.

SNP 2011 XMAS Novelties

Independence Puzzle

Based on the Rubik Cube principle, when solved the puzzle represents a map of the Scotch mainland with the word INDEPENDENCE in the its centre. WARNING: this is a very demanding puzzle and even the brightest players will almost certainly find it impossible to solve

Guess the English Subsidy Sweepstake

Each player puts part of their English subsidy into a pot. Players write down their guess for a given year. The winner is the person with the guess which is closest to the actual figure. They collect the pot. The other players say it isn’t fair and send a petition to Westminster asking for even more English money.

Educational moneybox

The money box is in the shape of mainland Britain. When money is to be saved it is put into an opening situated over central London from where it slides quickly to a point north of the Tweed. When money is to be spent a lever is pressed and the money is disgorged from another opening placed over Edinburgh.

Jock-in-a-box

When opened a figure modelled on Alex Salmond pops up saying with the characteristic whine of the Jock-in-a-box either INDEPEEENDENCE or DEVOOO MAXXX . The choice of word uttered when the box is random. Bet on which it will be every time the box is opened. Hours of innocent fun from this traditional favourite!

Independence Crystal Ball

Look into the Crystal Ball to see when Independence will be gained. WARNING: an inability to see any date is not evidence of the item not being of merchandisable quality.

Tartan Snap

The cards contain various tartans. When two cards with the same tartan are placed down consecutively SCOTT is shouted in honour of Sir Walter Scott who created the idea of clan tartans to amuse George 1V on his visit to Scotland.

Animatronic SNP Member

Dressed in a kaleidoscope of various clan tartans with a shape which resembles a beachball in human form, the toy Has a library of 50 phrases including “It isnae fair”, “t’Anglish are stealin’’ ouir oil”, “We wunt muir t’Anglish money” , “Independence an’ t’Anglish money” , “It’s the fault of t’Anglish”. Unlike the 2010 model , the phrases “Arc of Prosperity” and “Independence in Europe” are not included in the repertoire of phrases. Startlingly lifelike

The deep-fried cookbook

Contains SNP MSPs’ favourite recipes. Everything from the classic deep fried Mars Bars to deep fried porridge balls. Base your diet on these and look like your average SNP MSP!

My little Loch Ness Monster bath toy

Spends most of the time submerged but surfaces every now and then to display the words “Independence for Scotland Sometime! ” illustrated on its coils. Bright pink, it will appeal to girls as an alternative to My Little Pony.

Devolution Max Jigsaw

This is a jigsaw with a difference. It comes with the pieces marked with legends such as “Armed Forces”; Unemployment Benefit”, “Sick Benefit”, “State Pension”, “Westminster Parliament”, and “Continuing English Subsidy”. The trick is to form the jigsaw picture with the “Continuing English Subsidy” at the centre even though the pieces are cut so as not to fit together.

Oil Monopoly

A game for a maximum of six players. Instead of a board marked “Victoria Station”; “Mayfair” and “Gasworks” and so on , there is one consisting of squares carrying legends such as “Shetlands”, “Aberdeen Refinery” and “English North Sea Oil and Gas” . When players pass GO they receive £200 of English money. The Community Chest and Chance cards are marked with messages such as “There is a LibLab Coalition government, collect £1,000 extra from England” and “Independence is cancelled. Return the “Wee Pretendy Parliament money to England” . The winner is the player who accumulates most of the oil and gas assets around the UK. Oil and gas in English waters scores treble.

Porridge Oats Modelling Set

A kit consisting of a set of moulds, oats, mixing bowl and measuring jug. Oats and water are mixed and then poured into the mould. Moulds include Alex Salmond, The Wee Pretendy Parliament and the Edinburgh tram system.

Warning: toxic: not to be put in mouth

HURRY…HURRY…HURRY… WHILE JOCKS LAST

The complete “Wages of Scottish independence”

I have now completed the series on the implications of Scottish independence on the Calling England blog. They cover all the important ground relating to the question:

The wages of Scottish independence – England, Wales and Northern Ireland must be heard

Posted on July 22, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The wages of Scottish independence – If Parliament says NO

Posted on July 17, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The wages of Scottish independence – infrastructure

Posted on July 9, 2011 by Robert Henderson

Geographically Scotland is very isolated. It is a stranded at the top of mainland Britain with a single land border with England. Any goods or people coming and going to Scotland have a choice of independent access by air and … Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – a divided country

Posted on July 3, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The divided country is not the UK but Scotland. Its divisions are cultural, geographical, religious, demographic and racial. Demographically Scotland is a most peculiar place. It has a population estimated at 5.2 million in 2010 (http://www.scotland.org/facts/population/) set in an area … Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – membership of the EU

Posted on June 25, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The Scottish Numpty Party (SNP) leader Alex Salmond has a dream; well, more of an adolescent fantasy really. He imagines that an independent Scotland would immediately be embraced enthusiastically by the EU. In the more heroically bonkers versions of the fantasy, … Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – The monarchy

Posted on June 18, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The Scottish Numpty Party (SNP) has committed itself to the Queen being Scotland’s head of state should independence occur. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/wintour-and-watt/2011/may/25/alexsalmond-queen). As with so much of the SNP policy towards independence this presumes something which is far from self-evident, namely, that …Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – immigration

Posted on June 13, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The Scots Numpty Party (SNP) fondly imagines that an independent Scotland would continue to have free access to England. They recklessly assume Scotland’s position would be akin to that of the Republic of Ireland. However, that assumption rests on a …Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – Public Debt

Posted on June 2, 2011 by Robert Henderson

One thing is certain about an independent Scotland: it would begin life with a massive national debt. Exactly how much is problematic because the Scottish referendum on independence will probably not be held until 2015. The Scots Numpty Party (SNP) …Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – the currency problem

Posted on May 27, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The most problematic decision for an independent Scotland is the currency. There are three choices: to keep using the pound, join the Euro or create their own currency. If they choose the pound or Euro they will not be truly … Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – the loss of the military

Posted on May 23, 2011 by Robert Henderson

One of the most complex aspects of disentangling Scotland from the rest of the UK should Scotland become independent is defence. It is complex because of (1) the siting of the Trident submarines and other major ships at Faslane; (2) … Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – public sector employment

Posted on May 19, 2011 by Robert Henderson

One of the many major issues which an independent Scotland would have to address is the extent to which the Scottish economy is dependent on public spending and in particular the number of public sector jobs which would be moved … Continue reading →

These posts also address the same subject:

The truth about UK oil and gas

Posted on May 14, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The Scots Numpty Party (SNP) bases its case for the viability of Scotland’s independence on the idea that wicked England has been “stealin’ ouir oil” and that if only they had control of the tax revenues from UK oil and gas … Continue reading →

Make sure the costs of Scottish independence get into the media

Posted on May 12, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The letter below was published in the Times 10 May 2011. It is extremely important that the debate on independence for Scotland is conducted on the basis that Scotland will not be allowed to walk away from the financial obligations … Continue reading →

Scottish independence? Yes, but only on these terms

Posted on May 6, 2011 by Robert Henderson

The Scots Numpty Party (SNP) has managed to defeat the attempts of the unionists who deliberately devised the electoral system to thwart single party government (and hence leave independence off the practical political agenda) and get a majority in Scotland. The …Continue reading →

The wages of Scottish independence – England, Wales and Northern Ireland must be heard

In the matter of Scottish independence, the British political elite and the Scottish Numpty Party (SNP) are flatly ignoring the interests of the English, Welsh and Northern Irish. This is unreasonable for two reasons: firstly, the granting of independence to Scotland has considerable political, economic and security implications for the remainder of the UK and, secondly, the conditions on which Scotland might be allowed to leave the Union are of direct interest to the rest of the UK, because if they are too generous to Scotland they will disadvantage England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

The granting of over-generous conditions to the Scots is probable with the present Coalition Government, which has done nothing to abate the appeasement of the Scots so assiduously practised by New Labour since 1997 by continuing the Barnett Formula and tossing juicy bones to Edinburgh such as increasing the number of armed forces personnel in Scotland at a time of massive reductions in Britain’s defence forces (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scotland/8646134/Liam-Fox-Scottish-defence-footprint-to-increase-despite-RAF-Leuchars-closure.html). There is also the strong possibility that the present Government would attempt to placate Scots by going for devolution max or independence lite, either of which would shift major powers to Scotland such as fiscal independence and the revenues from the oil and gas in Scottish waters without the Scots taking on a share proportionate to their population of the UK’s financial obligations.

It is also true that even if the cutting adrift of Scotland was entirely equitable in terms of the division of debts and assets, the rest of the UK (and especially England) would have a serious interest in blocking the divorce. To begin with, an independent Scotland would not be able to guard its own borders or patrol the oil and gas fields in its waters because of its small population, the large territory in relation to the population and the sheer cost of doing so. The rest of the UK (in reality England because Wales and Northern Ireland receive far more from the UK Treasury tax pot than they put in) would in practice be providing Scotland’s defence, because no country could imagine that an attack on Scotland would not bring in England.

There would also be the threat of immigration from an independent Scotland to England. Scotland could operate an open door policy in the sure knowledge that immigrants entering Scotland would overwhelmingly head for England. Scotland might even act as a national people trafficker by selling entry to Scotland and/or Scottish citizenship. If both Scotland and England remain within the EU, the Westminster Government would be unable to do anything about the immigration to England via Scotland of any number of people from both within and without the EU.

Lastly, there would be the question of what would happen if an independent Scotland ran into the sort of economic trouble experienced currently by the Republic of Ireland and Greece. As sure as eggs are eggs, England would be called upon to bail her out. Even if that did not happen it is probable that an independent Scotland would not be able or willing to finance her share of the accrued financial obligations of the UK. There would be no way of guaranteeing that an independent Scotland could service even her 9 per cent share of the UK national debt (which is officially projected to be at least £1.3 trillion at
the proposed referendum date of 2015) let alone her PFI and other public service debt (http://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/06/02/the-wages-of-scottish-independence-public-debt/). The reality is that if Scotland had a nominal independence England would be the guarantor of last resort, underwriting Scotland’s obligations accrued both before and after independence.

The rest of the UK, and especially England, clearly have a pressing interest in the question of Scottish independence. How should that interest be given a political voice? This can be done either with a referendum on Scottish independence in which they (but not the Scots) vote on a simple question such as “Should Scotland be allowed to vote on whether they want independence” or by a referendum held in England, Wales and Northern Ireland on any conditions for independence which have been agreed between the UK and Scottish Governments and accepted by the two parliaments. It is important to understand that UK Government cannot simply decide to grant Scotland independence, because the 1707 Act of Union would have to be repealed by the Westminster Parliament and the Scottish Parliament would have to accept the conditions for independence and pass legislation preparing Scotland for independence if a YES vote was obtained. (The later Acts bringing Ireland into the Union and then adjusting the Union to include Northern Ireland rather than Ireland, would be amended by the doctrine of implied repeal. However, a new Act might be passed clarifying the new situation).

A vote on the simple question of independence should be held in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and a YES vote obtained before a Scottish referendum is held. If a NO vote resulted then Scottish independence would be off the agenda. Similarly, if the conditions are voted upon, this should be done before the vote is put to the Scots. A NO vote would mean that either Scottish independence was off the agenda or that the conditions had to be changed and put to the English, Welsh and Northern Irish electorates again. Nothing short of Westminster abolishing the Scottish parliament and government by repealing the devolution settlement as it applied to Scotland could prevent a referendum, being organised by the Scottish government and sanctioned by the Scottish parliament, but such a referendum would have no legal or constitutional status.

If Scotland declared UDI they would legally be in rebellion. That would not only lay Scotland open to catastrophic sanctions by Westminster but also put them at odds with the EU because an independent Scotland created illegally would not automatically have EU status. It would also be a very dangerous thing for the EU to offer any support on encouragement to part of an established EU member seceding from the member because there are so many parts of the EU which might do the same. In theory this might play into the hands of Eurocrats because it undermines the powerful national state, but in practice it would simply strengthen nationalism and in the most messy and chaotic manner with
micro-states popping up all over the EU. This consideration would also prevent the EU
pushing for Scotland to be made independent in the case of Scotland voting YES in a referendum which had no legal status. However, the EU might well push for greater
devolved powers short of independence for Scotland in such circumstances. That needs watching.

There is also the ticklish question of what the franchise should be for the Scottish referendum on independence. Like the rest of the UK, Scotland is far from being ethnically monolithic. The 2001 census showed 88 per cent of the population being White Scottish, 9 per cent White non-Scottish and 2 per cent black or Asian. (http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2004/02/18876/32939).
There are also different electoral qualifications for voting in Scotland and the rest of the UK, these varying between UK national elections, elections to the devolved assemblies, EU elections and local elections. Elections to the Scottish parliament include Scottish residents from other EU countries in the electorate, while elections to the Commons do not. Conversely, ex-patriot Britons are allowed to vote for Westminster MPs while they are not allowed the privilege in the election of MSPs to the Scottish parliament even if they are on Scottish electoral registers. As there are large numbers of Scots living outside
Scotland, this is no small difference.

The Scottish government Draft Referendum (Scotland) Bill Consultation Paper states “Eligibility to vote will follow the precedent of the 1997 referendum in being based on who
can vote at Scottish Parliament and Scottish local government elections. However, the draft Bill provides that those aged 16 or 17 on the electoral register on the date of the referendum will also be entitled to”. (http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2010/02/22120157/7)

That is all very well on paper, but there is no guarantee that the Commons would accept such a franchise because that would mean a large proportion of voters could be either without British citizenship or possessed of dual citizenship. It would in principle be possible to identify people from outside Scotland who would be willing to vote for independence, ship large numbers of them into the country shortly before a referendum, get them registered as resident in Scotland and effectively fix a YES vote.

There is also the strong possibility that there would judicial challenges from those excluded particularly ex-patriot Scots. In a country such as modern Britain they might well succeed, so hemmed about with laws and treaties obligations restricting what parliaments and governments may do. Most particularly Article 3 of the first Protocol to the Human Rights Act runs “The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature.” It is all too easy to foresee the type of legal wrangles over who comes within the definition of “the people”, especially in the case of ex-patriot Scots. Would a Scot have to live outside Scotland for six months, a year, five years or what to count as not being part of the people?

If the Scottish parliament could not simply lay down who should vote in the referendum large numbers of possibilities arise. Here are a few. Should every adult living in Scotland get the vote? Should it be every adult who is qualified to vote for the Scottish Parliament? Should it be only British citizens living in Scotland? Should it be only Scots living in Scotland? Should it be Scots living throughout the UK? What about Scots living abroad? Should they be allowed to vote as ex-pat Britons are allowed to vote in Westminster elections? Should it be any adult in Scotland entitled to vote in EU elections? Should it be every adult in Scotland entitled to vote in local elections?

The above facts speak for themselves: there is considerable doubt about when and in what form a referendum on Scottish independence might be held. It is vital that the many unresolved questions are answered before any referendums are held and that the political elite in the UK does not simply railroad an independence referendum through without giving the people of England, Wales and Northern Ireland a say in that which so directly concerns them.

The wages of Scottish independence – If Parliament says NO

Whether or not Scotland would vote for independence is debatable. Polls consistently show a majority against, although there are always a substantial number of “don’t
knows”. In a referendum held only in Scotland with the YES campaign headed by the Scottish Numpty Party (SNP) leader Alex Salmond and the NO campaign led by Scottish
non-entities or people from outside of Scotland such as Cameron, it is possible that a YES result might be obtained, especially if there is a low turnout and there is no minimum turnout required for the referendum to have force. If the referendum is held before the conditions for independence are decided, as Salmond wants, the chances of a YES vote would be considerably increased because voters would be buying into the idea of independence based on the wildly irresponsible SNP fantasy of a Scotland made rich by oil revenues rather than the reality.

From his public comments David Cameron appears to accept that the results of a referendum held in Scotland would be binding because he stated in June 2011 that
if a referendum is held he will campaign as vigorously as possible for a NO. But it is not in Cameron’s gift to say that a referendum will be binding, because the Act of Union of 1707 would require repeal. Before any referendum is held Cameron would have to persuade the Westminster Parliament to pass a Bill which granted Scotland independence in the event of a YES vote, with the YES triggering a repeal of the Act of Union. As a matter of practicality it would also have to contain the conditions under which Scotland would be granted independence, because it is improbable in the extreme that the House of Commons would give an absolute promise of independence, that is, allow the Scots to vote for independence without the conditions being agreed in advance of the referendum. (If the Commons did perpetrate such an act of folly it would create untold strife between the Westminster and the SNP because it is a fair bet that Salmond would ask for impossible terms). What could happen is that there are either two referenda, one on an undefined independence with a second after conditions have been agreed between Westminster and Edinburgh, or a single referendum on an undefined independence with a vote in the Commons on conditions for independence after these have been agreed between Westminster and Edinburgh. This would be the disadvantage of the rest of the UK because the SNP would be arguing for favourable conditions with the propaganda tool of a YES vote behind them.

It is unclear where Cameron stands on the agreeing of conditions for independence, viz: “ He [Cameron] has made it clear that the referendum question would have to be straightforward rather than the multiple-choice version favoured by the SNP: Cameron wants the voters to be asked a simple question, along the following lines “Do you wish Scotland to remain part of the United Kingdom?” Last night a Westminster source with inside knowledge of the new hard – line stance being adopted by Mr Cameron commented: “Mr Salmond must be honest and straightforward with the Scottish people in his phrasing of the question for the referendum. If he isn’t we will conduct the referendum.” ‘(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scotland/8565826/David-Cameron-might-take-Scottiish-independence-referendum-off-Alex-Salmond.html).
This does not indicate whether the conditions would be decided before or after the referendum, but, as mentioned previously, it is unlikely that the Commons would accept a binding commitment without knowing the conditions. Again, the Commons would have control of what happened because if Cameron wished for the Coalition to run a referendum new legislation by Westminster would be needed. If Cameron takes charge of the referendum it would provide the SNP with a recruiting sergeant for independence because they could march under their favourite banner of “the English are oppressing us”.

Bt whatever the result of a referendum, there would still be the need for legislation to dissolve the Union and it is by no means certain that the Coalition Government or any other would be able to force such a Bill through the House of Commons. There are three reasons for this. The first is the self-interest of the Labour and LibDem parties, both of which rely disproportionately on Scottish seats in their representation in the Commons. At the 2010 General election 41 out of 257 Labour seats were in Scotland, as were 11 of the Libdems total of 57.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/scotland/8663161.stm). If the 59 Scottish seats were removed from the House of Commons, it would be very difficult for Labour ever to form a government by themselves. A coalition of Labour and the LIbDems would perhaps stand a better chance of forming a government in a rump UK, but it would not be that much better , especially in the disillusionment of LibDem voters in the aftermath of the formation of the Coalition which has seen them both break election promises, most notably their written pledge on university tuition fees, and attach their
name to many unpopular policies such as the rapid reduction of public debt and further
privatisation of the NHS. There are also sincere unionists in both the Labour and the LibDem parties who would vote against on principle.

But it is not only Labour and the LibDems who might vote against a Bill to dissolve the union. It would be in the interest of the Tory party to see an independent Scotland because it would greatly increase the likelihood a Tory Government in the rump UK. But the Tory Party is by history and inclination a unionist party. Some Tory MPs might feel strongly enough to vote against the Bill on principle. The fact that Cameron is firmly in the unionist camp would give individual Tories, especially the backbenchers, encouragement to vote independence down.

The Bill could also be rejected by the Commons if were unduly generous to Scotland, for example, it did not require Scotland to take a share proportionate to their population of UK National debt at the time of independence.

It is also a moot point whether MPs for Scottish seats would be allowed to vote on the repeal of the Act of Union. If they argue to be allowed to vote it could be argued that if the whole of the UK, as represented by the Commons, is voting on the matter, the referendum should include the whole of the UK. There is also the possibility that before the conditions for independence as agreed between the Government and the SNP (or
any other Scottish government) are accepted as binding, they should be put to a referendum in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. This would be both reasonable and emasculate any Commons objection to conditions.

There is also a potential delay of several years lying in wait in the Lords. If the Lords rejected either a Bill enacting Scottish independence or a Bill laying down conditions thought to be unacceptable, the Parliament Act would have to be used which entails both a statutory delay of one year and possibly (although this would be highly unusual) further substantial delay when the Bill returned to the Commons for re-presenting to the Lords. It is also worth remembering that when any Bill goes to the Lords initially there are plenty of opportunities delay matters.

What would happen if the Commons rejected Scottish independence after a Yes vote? It would depend to a substantial degree on the turnout and the size of the Yes majority. If the
turnout and majority were small, say 35 per cent voting and a majority of a five per cent or less, it would be uncomfortable for the Government and would provide a very strong propaganda tool for the SNP and any other party supporting independence to either raise the number in Scotland wanting independence at any price or to extract serious concessions from the Government which could be anything from the continuance of the Barnett Formula and massive funds for infrastructure projects in Scotland to arrangements leading to an independence lite or devolution max settlement. The latter course would be much more likely because the Alex Salmond has been pushing independence lite or devolution max very heavily since the SNP won a majority in the Scottish parliament in May 2011.

If a referendum resulted in a low turnout but a large majority voting for independence, it would become more difficult for the Commons to vote against independence. It would also give the SNP more bargaining power to reach independence lite or devolution max. A high turnout with a narrow majority would probably give Salmond less bargaining power because the Government and the Commons would be able to point to the large minority of the electorate voting against and claim that such a serious step as independence needed a solid majority of the people behind it.

The most problematic situation would be a high turnout with a substantial majority for independence. That would cause problems for both the Government and the SNP. The Government and the Commons would not be able to argue that the vote was not conclusive because either only a small proportion of the population had voted for independence in the case of a low turnout or that almost as many had voted NO as had voted Yes in a high turnout. The difficulty for the SNP would be that with a clear mandate the pro-independence Scots would not accept anything less than full and unambiguous independence. The other great unknowable is what the political situation at Westminster will be in 2015 or whenever a referendum is held. The Coalition Government may say that they will not go to the country until 2015, but there is no certainty about that. Even if the Bill stipulating that Parliaments must run their full term is passed, it will still have a mechanism for going early, for example, sixty per cent of the Commons voting for dissolution. The relationship between the Coalition partners is looking increasingly fractious and the News Corp phone hacking scandal bids fair to both make that worse,
strengthen Labour and conceivably force Cameron from the Premiership as more and scandalous associations between Cameron and News Corp power players and journalists comes out.

If the Parliament is dissolved before any referendum is held, that will potentially scupper any agreement which Cameron (or any successor) may have made with Salmond. Any new Government would not be bound to honour such an agreement and even if an Act is on the Statute Book which provides for a referendum and has a clause which repeals the Act of Union, a new Government would still be under no obligation to honour it – a simple Bill repealing it would be all that is needed to prevent a referendum.

To add to the Westminster confusion, Lords Reform is still on the cards. This will not be
reform but in effect the abolition of the Lords and its replacement with a new House. No one knows what the relationship will be between that House and the Commons. If it is elected in whole or part it would be difficult to deny it great powers than the Lords has. Those might be greater powers of veto, amendment of Commons legislation or delay of
Commons legislation.

An elected second chamber or one based on appointments to represent a greater range of British society than the Lords presently does would have a very different make-up from the Lords. This could mean a second chamber much less responsive to the prevailing British political elite culture and mores. Such a chamber might well be hostile to the idea of placating Scotland, as Cameron seems to be determined to do, because growing English resentment of the privileges given to the Celtic Fringe and the subordination of English interests would be likely to be expressed more strongly in a reformed second chamber, especially a an elected one under proportional; representation, than in the Lords which is overwhelmingly the creature of the mainstream political parties.

Speaking of English interests and resentment, there is the undelivered to date promise of “English votes on English laws” which Cameron made before the 2010 election. If that promise is honoured before a referendum on Scottish independence, especially if an English Grand Committee is formed, that would provide a focus and vehicle to either oppose such a referendum or influence the conditions for independence or the nature of the referendum to be held.

There is also the possibility that the SNP may cease to have a majority in the Scottish Parliament or even to be part of a Scottish Government before any referendum is held or conditions are decided. This is not that improbable because the SNP has the referendum on independence pencilled in for 2015, the very end of the present Parliament even if it runs its full term.

If the referendum has not been held by then there will be another set of elections to the Scottish parliament. The SNP could easily lose their majority because the economic realities are beginning to strike home in Scotland. The Brown Government agreed to delay cuts to Scotland’s block grant for a year and the Coalition honoured this when they formed a Government in May 2010 (http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/scotland/Tories-to-delay-cuts-for.6168741.jp).
This means that it is only in this financial year (2011/12) that cuts are occurring. But because the 2010/11 cuts were delayed, the cuts this financial year includes those plus any others made since the Coalition gained office. All the Scottish government did was put off
the pain.

If a situation is reached where a referendum has been held and a YES vote achieved but the House of Commons refuses to pass the necessary legislation or a referendum is held without conditions being agreed in advance and the Westminster Government is unable to agree terms with Holyrood, what would be the position? The Westminster Parliament and Government would hold all the aces if they chose to play them because the Scottish government is dependent on Westminster raising the money to fund them. Even if Scotland declared UDI (wildly improbable) they would not be able to raise anything like the money they would need to fund everything in Scotland that is now funded by the taxpayer. To take one example, the Centre for Economic and Business Research predicted in 2009 that by 2013 67 per cent of Scottish GDP would come from public spending (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article5489654.ece).
Anything short of UDI and Westminster could simply strangle Scotland by, for example, reducing the Treasury block grant to Scotland to the per capita level of England. That would remove around £8 billion pa from the Scottish government’s revenue. The only question at issue is whether the Westminster Government would have the will to take such action.

The wages of Scottish independence – infrastructure

Why does this matter? Two reasons: Scotland cannot assume free passage for goods and people through England in perpetuity. They might not have it immediately after independence if Scotland is unable to gain EU membership, either because the reduced UK (henceforth the UK) opposed it or the other EU members did. Alternatively the UK (or England on its own) might leave the EU. It would also be in the UK Government’s hands
to impose its own restrictions on the free movement of Scottish imports and exports.

In any of these eventualities Scotland would be severely hampered in its importing and exporting. EU law would prevent the free export of Scottish goods to and through the rest of the UK if Scotland was not part of the EU and to the EU through the UK if the UK did not remain in the EU. If the UK did not remain in the EU, exports to Scotland from the UK would also be subject to EU protectionism and even goods from the EU could become subject to tariffs and quotas if they passed through the UK. As for the UK Government taking steps off their own bat to impose restrictions, that could be a real possibility if the UK left the EU, either in retaliation for EU imposed restrictions on UK trade with the
EU or EU restrictions on the movement of goods to and from the non-EU nations of Europe to the UK . There might also be disputes between the UK and Scotland which could result in restrictions, for example, Scotland failing to pay the interest on their share of the UK National debt at the time of independence or Scotland operating too lax an
immigration policy resulting in immigrants coming into Scotland with the intention of moving across the border to England.

The precarious geographical situation of Scotland shows the importance of it remaining on good terms with the UK in the event of independence. But it also means that the UK would have no incentive in improving railways and roads right up to the Scottish/English border. In the UK it may make sense for political reasons to build a high speed rail line from London to Glasgow and Edinburgh as is presently under discussion (http://news.scotsman.com/edinburgh/Scotland-must-be-on-new.6606935.jp),
although the proposed HS2 route is being fiercely resisted by those parts of England through which it will wend on its way to Scotland (http://www.rail.co/2011/01/31/why-britain-needs-hs2/). But if Scotland were independent , at best it would make no political sense for the UK to extend such as line further than Carlisle, a city ten miles short
of the Scottish border and 70 odd miles from Glasgow. More likely than extending the high-speed line to Carlisle would be a decision to extend it no further than Manchester, a city 170 miles from Glasgow. The same reasoning would be likely to apply to all rail and road access between England and Scotland, because there would be little benefit to the UK in improving the links right up to or anywhere near the Scottish border.

But even if the UK was willing to improve railways and roads up to the Scottish border, it is doubtful whether an independent Scotland could afford to extend the links to Glasgow and Edinburgh. HS2 if it ever gets built will cost tens of billions of pounds (http://stophs2.org/news/2368-hs2-bill-1000-family). A substantial part of the line, around a fifth of its length, would be in Scotland if it runs to Glasgow and/or Edinburgh. Bearing mind that Scotland’s GDP at present is less than £140 billion (in 2009 it was
officially estimated at £131 billion – http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/06/21144516/5), it is difficult to see how Scotland would fund the construction, maintenance and running of the HSE on their side of the border.

Poor communications, external and internal, would not hinder only Scottish exports and imports of goods . It would also adversely affect large sections of the private enterprise part of the Scottish economy such as tourism and dissuade talented individuals from coming to work in Scotland or businessmen to invest there. Poor infrastructure generally would be a disincentive to individuals and businesses. Existing well qualified individuals and companies located in Scotland might well decide to move elsewhere.

But infrastructure is about much more than main roads and rail links to major cities. An independent Scotland would have to fully fund all new capital projects in Scotland including the rail and road network over the sparsely populated highlands and islands, and maintain the existing networks. This would not be easy to do even under the present devolution arrangements because Network Rail (which has responsibility for the
railway in Scotland) is projecting considerable cuts in funding (http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/may/31/rail-industry-prepares-for-public-funding-cuts)

Amongst other things, an independent Scotland would also have to build new schools, universities, prisons, law courts and hospitals and maintain the old ones; prevent coastal erosion (a considerable task with such an extensive coastline for such a small population); fund most the local council’s infrastructure spending and maintain state-owned Scottish Water infrastructure . Of course much of this is already done via the UK Treasury block grant Scotland receives each year, but thereby hangs a tale: in the first ten years of devolution public spending in Scotland increased dramatically. Now it is due to fall, viz: “In the last decade, Scottish Government departmental expenditure has grown by over 5% a year on average in real terms. It is projected that between 2011/12 and 2014/15 it could fall by an average of 2.9% in real terms per annum and be £3.5 to £4bn lower.” (http://www.scdi.org.uk/downloads/SCDIBlueprintforScotland.pdf). That is the official estimate in the event of Scotland remaining within the UK with all the benefits that provides, such as assurance for business investors that Scotland is effectively underwritten by England and a massive annual subsidy from England. (Shortly before Labour left office in 2010, the monetary benefits to Scotland since devolution in 2000 were calculated by the Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy’s office at £76 billion, that is the difference between tax raised in Scotland and public expenditure in Scotland since 2002 – http://www.scotsman.com/news/Scotland39s-76-billion-39devolution-dividend39.6009619.jp).

In short, infrastructure spending in the ten years since devolution has taken place in the most benign economic and fiscal circumstances. Those circumstances would not exist come independence. Indeed, they would probably be far worse by the time independence was reached because according to the Murphy report the tax deficit is already at dangerous levels : ‘… an examination of “real money” government expenditure that excludes capital spending, Scotland Office economists found total expenditure in Scotland currently amounts to 145 per cent of all Scottish tax receipts.”

An independent Scotland would find itself immediately saddled with a massive national debt as the result of taking on a proportionate share of the financial obligations of the UK at the time of independence (this would be in excess of £200 billion – https://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/06/02/the-wages-of-scottish-independence-public-debt/), further debt in the shape of PFI contracts for work undertaken in Scotland
and local authority debt. On the other side of the fiscal ledger, the tax base in an independent Scotland would shrink because of the unhealthy proportion of its GDP which is dependent on public spending (https://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/05/19/the-wages-of-scottish-independence-public-sector-employment/) and the receipts from oil in Scottish waters would not compensate for the £8 billion pa Scotland receives in extra funding from the UK Treasury because the per capita funding is around £1,500 per head higher in Scotland than it is in England. The oil is also a rapidly declining asset. (https://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/05/14/the-truth-about-uk-oil-and-gas/).
It is also a fact that Scotland has a dangerously narrow private sector being far too dependent on oil, Scotch whisky, material and tourism. This means it could easily be blown off course by a sudden change of fortune in one of the main revenue earners .

With additional costs and tax revenue falling, it is improbable in the extreme that Scotland’s infrastructure could be maintained at its present level let alone substantially improved. Nor is there any reason to believe that an independent Scotland would be wise in its use of money for infrastructure investment. The Scottish parliament was estimated to cost £40 million and cost £414 million (http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons/lib/research/briefings/snpc-03357.pdf) and a tram scheme in Edinburgh which bids fair to waste £750 million with
precious little to show for it (http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/comment/Edinburgh39s-disgrace-II-Tram-fiasco.6783582.jp). Those are serious amounts of money for an economy the size of Scotland. A massive like England could shake them off, but a few fiascos of this magnitude could seriously damage Scotland.

The likely outcome for infrastructure in an independent Scotland is more ridiculously expensive projects, less of it and worse maintained.

Hertfordshire English Democrats Supporters Club

Not Left, Not Right, Just English!

Category Archives: Devolution

The English white working-class and the British elite – From the salt of the earth to the scum of the earth

Bring the Nuclear Deterrent to England now

It must be no to Devomax

Salmond’s proposed referendum question is heavily biased

An “independent” Scotland must not be allowed to have the pound as their official currency

SNP 2011 XMAS Novelties

The complete “Wages of Scottish independence”

I have now completed the series on the implications of Scottish independence on the Calling England blog. They cover all the important ground relating to the question:

The wages of Scottish independence – England, Wales and Northern Ireland must be heard

The wages of Scottish independence – If Parliament says NO

The wages of Scottish independence – a divided country

The wages of Scottish independence – membership of the EU

The wages of Scottish independence – The monarchy

The wages of Scottish independence – immigration

The wages of Scottish independence – Public Debt

The wages of Scottish independence – the currency problem

The wages of Scottish independence – the loss of the military

The wages of Scottish independence – public sector employment

The truth about UK oil and gas

Make sure the costs of Scottish independence get into the media

Scottish independence? Yes, but only on these terms

The wages of Scottish independence – England, Wales and Northern Ireland must be heard

The wages of Scottish independence – If Parliament says NO

The wages of Scottish independence – infrastructure