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The General Election


delboy

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I don't blame 'the english' that's just rather stupid to do. There's plenty Scottish MPs who've done far more to harm Scotland than any Englishman...

i'm not suggesting every scot blames the english but there is those that do. to be honest its not as bad since the scottish parliament was set up.

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The argument shouldn't be whether Scottish independance works' date=' but whether it would work better than the status quo.[/quote']

I think so.

you have a tendacy to squabble amongst yourselves far too much....

It's inherited... it's been like this for at least 700 years, why should it suddenly change?

:p

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i'm voting tory as i do in every election because their economic policy is one i agree with. Labour wastes far too much money on beurocracy and their only solution is to keep hiking up taxes. Did anyone see on the news about how generally we're worse off financially because tax increases in the form of national insurance was higher than inflation. and yet they want to add more increases, including a 40% flat tax on any capital gain from property, a proposal which will completely freeze the housing market and thus kill a huge chunk of the economy. plus i hate gordon brown in general. the stealth tax he charged pension fund companies in his first year as chancellor is exactly equal to the money missing from pension funds today. but no one in the media seems to pick up on these figures. and now they want to raise council tax in scotland to pay to police the smoking in pubs ban that nobody wanted.

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i'm voting tory as i do in every election because their economic policy is one i agree with. Labour wastes far too much money on beurocracy and their only solution is to keep hiking up taxes. Did anyone see on the news about how generally we're worse off financially because tax increases in the form of national insurance was higher than inflation. and yet they want to add more increases' date=' including a 40% flat tax on any capital gain from property, a proposal which will completely freeze the housing market and thus kill a huge chunk of the economy. plus i hate gordon brown in general. the stealth tax he charged pension fund companies in his first year as chancellor is exactly equal to the money missing from pension funds today. but no one in the media seems to pick up on these figures. and now they want to raise council tax in scotland to pay to police the smoking in pubs ban that nobody wanted.[/quote']

fair enough but do you really trust michael howard?

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Guest Zeenat Aman
no' date=' believe it or not members of sinn fein dont run around northern ireland in balaclavas ordering people to get blown up.

at this stage i dont know who i'm going to vote for....[/quote']

Hmm that maybe so, but it's obvious that they are the powerful/legal face of a certain terrorist outfit. A fact that cant be fully proven, but there are numerous cases of obvious sinn fien links though...

The guy getting killed in that pub, then the family out cry followed by the public bit of 'advice' from sinn fien not to meddle in politics(which I believe they then took back/apologised for?) for instance.

I believe Gerry Adams even knows who did the killing, hence the offer to have them seen to.

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Guest Jake Wifebeater
well' date=' they don't have a candidate for one of the Aberdeen seats as yet.[/quote']

We do. A friend of mine is standing in Aberdeen North, a guy called John Connon.

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Hmm that maybe so' date=' but it's obvious that they are the powerful/legal face of a certain terrorist outfit. A fact that cant be fully proven, but there are numerous cases of obvious sinn fien links though...

The guy getting killed in that pub, then the family out cry followed by the public bit of 'advice' from sinn fien not to meddle in politics(which I believe they then took back/apologised for?) for instance.

I believe Gerry Adams even knows who did the killing, hence the offer to have them seen to.[/quote']

you should read the irish press for conspiracy theories about sinn fein and the IRA!!!!! the main reason i would vote for sinn fein is because catholics over here do still get widely persecuted and get a raw deal and they are striving to improve this plus i'm not totally against a united ireland but yes the suspected terrorist links do concern me, i mean mcguinness and adams were members of the IRA in the 70's, i've still a lot of reading and catching up to do on the history and politics in ireland. thing is and if anyone knows please tell me, i dont know if any of the loyalist parties have affiliations to loyalist terror groups who are equally as evil as the IRA but it wouldnt suprise me....

derry is literally a divided city seperated by the river foyle. the predominately catholic side (the city side) have to pay higher council tax, higher insurance and higher house prices whilst it is cheaper to live in the predominately protestant waterside, this happens a lot over here.

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Guest Jake Wifebeater
I stand corrected' date=' there had been no news.[/quote']

He was the fall-back candidate. We were supposed to have a woman standing, I forget her name, but she bottled it as she was worried being an SSP candidate would fuck up her chances of getting a job! Politics.

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Guest Zeenat Aman
you should read the irish press for conspiracy theories about sinn fein and the IRA!!!!! the main reason i would vote for sinn fein is because catholics over here do still get widely persecuted and get a raw deal and they are striving to improve this plus i'm not totally against a united ireland but yes the suspected terrorist links do concern me' date=' i mean mcguinness and adams were members of the IRA in the 70's, i've still a lot of reading and catching up to do on the history and politics in ireland. thing is and if anyone knows please tell me, i dont know if any of the loyalist parties have affiliations to loyalist terror groups who are equally as evil as the IRA but it wouldnt suprise me....

derry is literally a divided city seperated by the river foyle. the predominately catholic side (the city side) have to pay higher council tax, higher insurance and higher house prices whilst it is cheaper to live in the predominately protestant waterside, this happens a lot over here.[/quote']

From what i know(which isn't all that much really) both the legal and the illegal parties/organisations have always been linked. Maybe that is changing now though.

Would those of us who vote for the SNP still do so if they were linked to terrorist organisations?

I myself, have never voted in a general election.

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From what i know(which isn't all that much really) both the legal and the illegal parties/organisations have always been linked. Maybe that is changing now though.

Would those of us who vote for the SNP still do so if they were linked to terrorist organisations?

I myself' date=' have never voted in a general election.[/quote']

now why doesnt that suprise me phil? :love:

i think you should vote if you can...

one thing that suprised me about northern ireland is the incredible amount of bickering, in fighting and feuds between loyalist sections, just been reading a book on notorious loyalist terrorist johnny 'mad dog' ahair interesting reading, before the peace process kicked in when he was in charge (and his terrorism acts were born out of pure hatred for the catholic faith), they really did come close to a civil war here and thats only just over 10 years ago. another thing i found out was that it was actually gerry adams who first used the term 'peace process' the IRA antics got more press coverage because of their mainland campaigns.

whilst remaining a pretty violent country (the local news is always an interesting watch usually covering a feud, armed robbery and the odd violent rape), most of the violence is kept to certain sensitive areas and i've found most people whichever side of the religious fence they sit, very welcoming indeed. i think even those politicians with past terrorist links realise that violence is not the answer. and it has natural beauty to match scotland, growing up in england in the 80's my vision of northern ireland was somewhat blinkered.

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I'm unsure about this one. Theoretically, I'm an SNP voter. However, I've been a bit put off by them ever since John Swinney was on a Question Time special and basically said that if we got independence from England, we would straight away sign up for everything the EU has for us. I don't see the point in seperating from one group of countries just to completely align yourself with an even bigger group of countries.

However, I've always thought Alex Salmond is one of the few politicians who doesn't have any of the usual smarminess about him, so I'm more inclined to vote SNP again. Although I'm still not convinced about what will happen if we DO get independence.

Besides, there's no fucking way I'm voting for Labour or the tories. Might go for Lib Dems since it's the general election and not the Scottish elections though.

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Guest tv tanned
I'm not denying that' date=' in the long term, Scotland could emulate Ireland's successful economic model, for example. The problem, as I see it, with the immediate effects of independence is the fact that we would immediately be competing with the rest of the UK for investment from foreign companies. Meanwhile, responsibility for defence, health, education, unemployment, arts funding, transport and all other governmental matters would be fully in the hands of the Scottish Parliament, with no subsidies forthcoming from Westminster. The tax revenue raised in Scotland as it stands is not enough to fund all these departments to their current levels.[/quote']

I'm interested as to why you think we would not be in a position to compete if we were able to set our own corporation tax levels etc.

What you may be reading here is a fiscal deficit, which the UK has as well, and ask yourself how they pay for part of that deficit? The same way Jim Callaghan did in the 1970's. As was reported after his death.

"Yet in two years, helped by the North Sea oil bonanza and $4 billion in bailout loans, the sterling recovered, inflation retreated to a single digit and most workers voluntarily restrained wage demands. "

Quote available in the following:

ABC News

Los Angeles Times

Globe & Mail Canada

Boston Globe

CTV News Canada

Washington Post

New York Newsday

The Guardian

But just to move things a little further, let's test that tired old cliche of poverty sticken Scotland shall we? Let's look at GDP levels as an indicator of wealth.

Office of National Statistics - Regional Gross Value Added

Regional GVA 2001

Area_____________Per head ()

United Kingdom___14,500

England__________14,800

Wales____________11,400

Scotland_________13,700

Northern Ireland_11,300

13,700 (Scotland) of 14,800 (England) is 93%.

13,700 (Scotland) of 14,500 (UK) is 94%.

And in the small print.

"4. Excluding Extra-Regio and statistical discrepancy. The GVA for Extra-Regio comprises compensation of employees and gross operating surplus which cannot be assigned to regions. Including Extra-Regio and statistical discrepancy, UK total GVA was 874.2bn in 2001, an increase of 4.3 per cent on 2000."

Yes it's our old friend the Extra-Regio where they can somehow allocate GVA from fish caught a mile away from the Norwegian sector but not oil 50 miles from that point.

So let's crunch.

Wealth (GVA) per head

90% of Extra Regio to Scotland; 10% to England

UK_______14,888

England__14,846

Scotland_17,762

119.6% of England's wealth

119.3% of the UK's

80% to 20%

UK_______14,888

England__14,892

Scotland_17,311

116.2% of England's wealth

116.3% of the UK's

70% to 30%

UK_______14,888

England__14,939

Scotland_16,860

112.9% of England's wealth

113.2% of the UK's

60% to 40%

UK_______14,888

England__14,985

Scotland_16,408

109.5% of England's wealth

110.2% of the UK's

50% to 50%

UK_______14,888

England__15,031

Scotland_15,957

106.2% of England's wealth

107.2% of the UK's

40% to 60%

UK_______14,888

England__15,077

Scotland_15,506

102.8% of England's wealth

104.2% of the UK's

30% to 70%

UK_______14,888

England__15,124

Scotland_15,054

99.5% of England's wealth

101.1% of the UK's

20% to 80%

UK_______14,888

England__15,170

Scotland_14,603

96.3% of England's wealth

98.1% of the UK's

Wow. So we don't even need the 70-80%+ we'd be entitled to. We'd only get

poorer than England with between 30-40% of the Extra-Regio and then only

poorer than the UK with between 20-30%. Well within the comfort zone and

well into the future with declining stocks. Plus these figures are for 2001

when the price for per barrel was well lower.

A new Scottish Government would have to decide to either raise income tax and business rates, which would drive a lot of companies out of the country and out of business, or aggressively make major tax cuts, which would attract inward investment but fatally damage the infrastructure in the same manner as Thatcher's government did in the 80's. At the same time, social cohesion (already in a a bad way in Scotland) would break down further as schools, hospitals and the police force had to contend with staff cuts at the same time as trying to adapt to new systems of operations.

Either way, Scotland would be an unholy mess for several years after independence, and many Scots simply wouldn't tolerate it for very long, especially as England would continue to welcome Scottish immigrants to boost their own economy.

The problems you put up exist already under the Union, and I don't see it doing anything to fix matters, the Scottish Parliament has good ideas but cannot back them up without full legislative powers, it is that simple.

I support Fresh Talent, but it won't work without control of immigration.

I support the need for a competitive economy, but it won't happen without full fiscal powers.

I reject the need for a nuclear 'deterrent' based in Scotland, but we won't be rid of it without control of defence policy (which by the way needn't cost much, Japan has a policy of non-aggression and only spends 1% of GDP on defence)

The problems facing Scotland are a falling population, under-funded schools, hospitals, universities, police forces and transport, and the continued breakdown of social order. I don't see how independence could help to combat these problems.

I don't see how sticking with a Union that has created all of these problems is going to do anything. Bury your head in the sand if you want to though.

You're going to come back with a vengeance, I can tell...

I'm sure you, or someone else, will now to me. Probably some will just resort to negative scene points.

Hope this has been constructive.

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if there's a green candidate i'd be tempted to vote for them but i'll probably vote lib dem.

remember the contituency's change in scotland so it's not as cut and dry as it may have once been. v important that everyone votes regardless of who you're current mp is, as there could be big swings up here.

and to the person who won't vote lib dem because they proposed lowering the drinking age to 16, hello, it's the 'liberal' democrats :p

i don't particularly agree with that one either to be honest, it depends how they do it. i guess if it gets groups of kids off the streets it could work. though it would just lead to them being on the streets at 12 pissed up and lairy. meh. booze is what makes this country shit yet it's what makes this world bearable. whatcha gonna do?

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Wow. Comprehensive. Although my support for the SNP is more idealistic; I am supportive of secession/autonomy in practically every case from the Confederacy to the Basques. Any country that has had a distinct and independent heritage should be allowed the right of self-government, whether successful or not.

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