The five steps to Scottish independence

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

@modstudies http://leftfootforward.org/2011/05/professor-robert-hazell-the-five-steps-to-scottish-independence/

RT @I_Whyte: @modstudies http://leftfootforward.org/2011/05/professor-robert-hazell-the-five-steps-to-scottish-independence/

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

Great analysis by Prof Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit on the 5 steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr

Interesting analysis on Scots Independence. Clear a 2nd ref is the only way, but I can see why the SNP dont want one http://bit.ly/mtu96o

So the Scots have to vote again on something they have already voted on?
When the UK joined the EU i don’#t recall any ‘here are the terms’.
Didn’t get anything for Lisbon either if I recall.

You seem to want Scotland to vote NO on independence and to continue to vote until that result comes up.

You are Herman Van Rompuy and I claim my 4.87 euros.

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

No problem with Scotland getting independence, but it must mean INDEPENDENCE….Scotland will be bordering one of the worls’s biggest economies with a population of 54 million and Englnd MUST NOT subsidise an independent Scotland in any way, All scottish MP’s MUST leave the Westminster Parliament immediately independence is declared and all people who consider themselves Scottish MUST return home. England must declare the border and control it. When Scotlan’s economy begins to crumble we don’t want thousands of independent Scots coming south to benefit from our economy

I for one would withold my taxes if ANY of them were being used to subsiise an independent Scotland

Mr Slamond’s astonishing victory now raises some fascinating questions.

I’m sure your book deals with things comprehensively, but what you do highlight here is the fact that, in the (inter)national debate, the surface has barely been scratched.

Any campaign against Scottish independence will necessarily include many arguments along the lines of “not having one’s cake and eating it”: welfare and healthcare; the EU budget. What would Scots make of the true cost of these?

Scots enjoy many of the same benefits that the UK offers to Crown Dependencies and British Overseas Territories, which they would be unwilling or unable to provide for themselves.

Most notably, perhaps: rock-solid military defence, backed up by NATO’s second largest budget, and which still buys a permanent seat at the UNSC. In Scotland, this goes beyond the basic security provided to the Falklands and Isle of Mann etc. The MoD is an important employer, and one whose activities have massive sensitivity among voters: witness Gordon Brown’s ridiculous aircraft-carrier contracts. The building of ships, and the Scottish infantry regiments are potent sources of the very national pride into which Salmond must tap. None of this comes cheaply.

All Britons are represented at the top table of international diplomacy. It’s unlikely that voters could be convinced the EU would look after Scotland similarly.

And let’s not forget the pound. Issuing one’s own banknotes is one thing. Who is to be in charge of monetary policy? A glance accross the Irish Sea and voters will avoid Frankfurt like the plague. A resurrected, Edinburgh-based Scottish Dollar would go down like a lead balloon with business leaders.

Salmond is a genial and bright man who has, for many years, given a very good account of himself in the media.

His electoral achievement deserves (and is likely) to be recognised by any Westminster Govt with regards a referendum.

But he will have to tread carefully to avoid his massive bluff being called. A brave call for true independence will result in humiliation.

There are many good reasons for which people from all over the world seek a British passport. The SNP surely knows this.

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence http://bit.ly/jCpbIP – #Scotland #Alba #politics

Unionists running scared trying to confuse the issue with misinformation as they have done for over 300 years, the empire is over move on.

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

@cyncicalHighlander

You won’t see me shedding a tear for the loss of the Scottish financial burden or their socialist MP’s, whom I can assure you, are most welcome to take their West Lothian question back to the Bathgate Labour Club.

There’s a huge difference between boorish chanting by Murrayfield fans (ever hopeful of closer relations between Englishmen’s digestive tracts and their transport), and biting the hands that feed you.

And the Scot in me knows this.

cynicalHighlander – Put it to the whole of the UK I say and you may be surprised to see just how many of the English actually want Scotland to have independence.

Without the support of the Scots the Labour Party is finished in this country – particularly when the boundary changes are introduced.

As poor a leader as Ed Miliband clearly is, I still believe that Labour must have been aghast when they saw how poorly the party did May 5.

No overall majority in Wales – the Tories vote increased nationally – more voted Tory than Labour overall and then the staggering loss in Scotland along with AV must have had people crying into their wine.

Oh and you can have the useless Dougie Alexander and Gordon Brown back as well if you like…

Based on most of these comments, no wonder Scots voted SNP.

@Anon E Mouse

No thanks they call themselves North British.

@13eastie

Ignorance must be bliss you’ll need to find berths for some Trident carrying subs and decommissioned hulks.

cynicalHighlander – nice!

Surely any referendum on independence will require a two-thirds majority.

Dave Citizen – Labour got a good caning and deservedly so. Stop sulking man and move on…

I understand Alex Sammond wants a Referendum on Scotland becoming independent. Please, Please let them have it. They can then pay for their own Security (Police, Defence, Judges, Prisons and Border Controls), Health Service. Take responsibility for the roads and infrastructure. Provide housing, education, employment and find jobs for those out of work and pay the unemployment benefits for those that do not. They can pay for their own membership of the EU. They can pay for all the Pay for their own Parliament and infrastructure that comes with that independence. They can have their own Scottish passport. All those who profess to be Scots living in England can go back home.
If they believe whisky, water and what remains left of Oil and taxes on those that remain will give them a better life carry on or will they become another the PIGS like the economies of Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain.

Anon – I thought the result in Scotland was genuinely uplifting. It confirms there are parts of the UK where people think for themselves and have the guts to go their own way. Compare the positive ideas and attitudes in Scotland to England’s timid “there is no alternative”, “we can’t cut banker’s bonuses” and “you only have to pay your student loan back if you earn over 21k”.

@cynicalHighlander

Trident could have been part of the cheapest divorce settlement ever, but if the Scots don’t want it after all…

Don’t forget flagships HMS Mothball, HMS White Elephant and their squadrons of the Fleet Air Arm’s most flightless birds – a snip at only £10bn*. We’ll have those back too.

It might take us a while, though**, to figure how, if Scotland really didn’t want the jobs/investment/skills/prestige, we’d be able to come up with a way to service a strategic nuclear capability for which every single bit of the intellectual property was owned by a really big ally of ours with 18 similar boats and naval bases “even bigger than Faslane” on two different oceans.

Keep plugging away with your chippy paranoia; everything will be fine because your compatriots are too canny to allow it ever actually to be put to the test.

And to think, a couple of posts back you were calling me a “unionist”!

*Price “negotiated” by a Scottish socialist, in secret, with English tax-payers’ money; contract put out to tender to every ship-builder in his Scottish constituency.

**Maybe as long as 15 secs

The point is independence itself is only nominally Plan A.

Plan B, and realistically the more likely plan A, is to keep beefing up the powers of the Scottish Parliament, until Scotland is effectively independent within the UK anyway.

This could be avoided as long as Salmond was a Minority administration, because the Unionist parties could reasonably block it. But with a Majority in the parliament the Unionist parties can go whistle. He can put whatever he likes through Holyrood and there’s almost nothing anyone else can do about it.

@Mike C

Surely any referendum on independence will require a two-thirds majority.

Nonsense or dont you believe in democracy

@13eastie

There’s an awful lot to be sorted like 40 years of oil revenues stolen and Trident provides less than 1000 jobs and is constantly polluting the seas with radiation leaks, park them on the Thames then the politicians can give them a loving pat every day they go to work.

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @HitchinEngland: RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL …

RT @HitchinEngland: RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL …

RT @leftfootfwd The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

@cynicalHighlander

You want neither the Trident base nor the carrier contracts?

You’re my kind of nationalist. My advice would be to tell your Govt to get in touch ASAP with the gentleman below. I’m sure he’ll be able amicably to offset some of Scotland’s share of the £1.5 trillion national debt against the North Sea revenues.

The Rt Hon Gideon Osborne Esq.
HM Treasury

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence http://bit.ly/jCpbIP

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @trakgalvis: RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Con …

The five steps to Scottish independence http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr (@leftfootfwd)

While the rest of the UK clearly cannot refuse Scottish independence in principle, should not the rest of the UK be entitled to vote on the terms agreed with Scotland, especially if significant concessions are being made to the Scots?

I am totally opposed to breaking up the union.

Mr.Sensible – Then perhaps you shouldn’t have supported a Labour government that devolved Scotland…

Whatever the merits of a second referendum, it clearly would never happen. I don’t think any country in the world has been asked to jump through that particular hoop, and the Scottish government wouldn’t tolerate it. If necessary, a dissolution of the Scottish Parliament following negotiations would be sufficient for the people to give their verdict on the settlement.

The article doesn’t mention the process of drawing up Scotland’s new constitution. That really ought to involve a referendum, and it is a far more important fourth step than asking Scotland to decide on independence twice.

“it is not within the competence of the Scottish Parliament unilaterally to declare independence”.

That is an Anglo-centric view. According to existing British constitutional law it would not be competent for the Scottish Parliament to secceed unilaterally. But then the same applied to the American colonies, and the Irish Republic of 1919. A unilateral declaration of independence is an act of revolution; it would create a new political reality that the British government might have to recognise.

@cynicalHighlander

As if by magic, the SNP turns up to beg Her Majesty to keep her Air Force bases in Scotland! Who’d have thought it?
http://bbc.in/me2llr

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

RT @leftfootfwd: The five steps to Scottish independence: http://bit.ly/iqX6Tr by Professor Robert Hazell of the UCL Constitution Unit

@Modicum You’re absolutely right about Westminster having no more right than Holyrood to legislate for the dissolution of the Treaties of Union – although it may be the neatest solution to “create” that authority as a legal fiction after negotiations; it could be simpler than an argument over independence by “popular acclimation”.

I share your doubts about the legal requirement for a second referendum but it could actually work very strongly in the SNP’s – and Scotland’s – favour to have one. Cameron has just agreed that the matter for the upcoming referendum is a subject for the SP – that includes the question posed. That referendum (if won) could function as the agreement that Scotland will be independent – locked – and the Scottish Government will negotiate with Westminster for that. The second referendum can’t go back and change the fact the Union will end – just that the terms must be satisfactory to Scottish voters. This would significantly improve the Scottish Government’s hand.

Holding a second referendum may be one argument we want to tactically concede in the negotiations before the first referendum is held… in exchange for something else, of course.

This is a nice plug for a worthy but limited book that is quite dated now, even though it was only published in 2002.

Even then it was notably weak in parts.

And judging by the low buffoonery of most of the Unionist commentary on here it looks as though the remaining copies may struggle for a market even yet.

micoh,

“The second referendum …would significantly improve the Scottish Government’s hand.”

Good point.

I love the comment about Scots being forced to move home by Joe Stalls! I was in kinks at that one! Joe, if by any chance you pop back to catch up on the comments go and google “McCrone Report” – it should reassure you about your personal tax burden if Scotland gains its independence.

I’m astonished at how the tactic of convincing Scots that we are subsidised has come back to undermine the unionists. It is of course a lie, and it has been successful in convincing many Scots for many years. But the lie has eventually propogated beyond its target audience and has come to be believed by many in England also – which was never the intention. The resulting resentment has done more to finish the union than probably anything else!

[...] The five steps to Scottish independence – Professor Robert Hazell, May 7th 2011 Share | Permalink | Leave a comment [...]

Acclaimed constitutional expert prof.hazell on 5 steps to #scotindependence http://t.co/vH6ayk1H

A complex road me thinks! The five steps to Scottish independence http://t.co/tnUIwrkr

From the archive: Prof. Robert Hazell, of the UCL Constitution Unit, outlines the five steps to Scottish independence: http://t.co/zW9b6FCW

From the archive: Prof. Robert Hazell, of the UCL Constitution Unit, outlines the five steps to Scottish independence: http://t.co/zW9b6FCW

From the archive: Prof. Robert Hazell, of the UCL Constitution Unit, outlines the five steps to Scottish independence: http://t.co/zW9b6FCW

Prof. Robert Hazell, of the UCL Constitution Unit, outlines the 5 steps to Scottish independence on @leftfootfwd http://t.co/jTy4M5Lv #bbcqt

Prof. Robert Hazell, of the UCL Constitution Unit, outlines the 5 steps to Scottish independence on @leftfootfwd http://t.co/jTy4M5Lv #bbcqt

Prof. Robert Hazell, of the UCL Constitution Unit, outlines the 5 steps to Scottish independence on @leftfootfwd http://t.co/jTy4M5Lv #bbcqt

[...] The five steps to Scottish independence - Professor Robert Hazell, May 7th [...]