Ultimate outcome of the Midlothian Question

[dyvroeth]

What is our stance on ending the Union with Scotland ? Do we ask voters in England & Wales to ratify any Scots Independence issue ?

How will national assets, resources and liabilities be apportioned if we are faced with an Independent Scotland ? How will we apportion the National Debt, North Sea (and other) Hydrocarbons and bases, equipment and personnel of the Armed Forces ?

Can the Scots use Sterling as their currency, when it is underwritten by the Bank Of England and Scots currency will no longer be legal tender in England, Wales and N Ireland ?

[Floppy]

This is an interesting question. I've not read enough to have a decent opinion on it though, other than generally feeling that people have the right to self-determination.

[dyvroeth]

Interesting doesn't begin to describe it ;-)

All in favour of self-determination (I haven't started on the Cornish question, yet); I believe we need to understand the implications of the outcome of the Scottish Independence referendum and have a well-thought through posture, to deal with it.

Historically, we've been lucky (?) that much of Scots legal and education has effectively been "separate" already. It's the other stuff I'm concerned about.

What do we do about our Armed Forces, their equipment and bases ? If we carve them up does England, Wales and NI end up with a "Defence Force" only - and what does that mean for our NATO treaty obligations ?

How do we divvy up the fishery protection fleet ? How much "debt" does Scotland accept from the UK National Debt; should it be based on population, area or some dodgy "formula". Where do we draw national boundaries out to our economic zone limits ? Which Ministers / Ambassadors / High Commissioners will need their T-o-Rs re-draughted and which ones will need to re-present their bona fides to Heads of State ? The list is endless and these are just the easy ones.

[PaulJRobinson]

This is a huge area which, in my view, we shouldn't touch upon (at least
yet). The decision will be taken by Scottish voters in 9 months time. It
may be that we don't need to write anything on this if they vote to remain
in the Union, therefore why waste energy now trying to work out how to
separate two nations if that scenario doesn't come to pass? We could spend
a lot of time on this and, in my view, I doubt it will happen.

Having said that if Scotland does vote to remain in the Union I think it
will be a huge opportunity for rebalance (the West Lothian question should
then be settled; the Barnett Formula should be re-evalated; the devolution
project should be extended to England etc etc).

I propose leaving this subject on the shelf until we know the lay of the
land in the Autumn.

with kind regards,
Paul Robinson

about.me/pauljrobinson

On 4 January 2014 18:51, dyvroeth notifications@github.com wrote:

Interesting doesn't begin to describe it ;-)

All in favour of self-determination (I haven't started on the Cornish
question, yet); I believe we need to understand the implications of the
outcome of the Scottish Independence referendum and have a well-thought
through posture, to deal with it.

Historically, we've been lucky (?) that much of Scots legal and education
has effectively been "separate" already. It's the other stuff I'm concerned
about.

What do we do about our Armed Forces, their equipment and bases ? If we
carve them up does England, Wales and NI end up with a "Defence Force" only

• and what does that mean for our NATO treaty obligations ?

How do we divvy up the fishery protection fleet ? How much "debt" does
Scotland accept from the UK National Debt; should it be based on
population, area or some dodgy "formula". Where do we draw national
boundaries out to our economic zone limits ? Which Ministers / Ambassadors
/ High Commissioners will need their T-o-Rs re-draughted and which ones
will need to re-present their bona fides to Heads of State ? The list is
endless and these are just the easy ones.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHubhttps://github.com//issues/28#issuecomment-31585498
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[Floppy]

Similar thoughts had crossed my mind; we can at least wait until the
outcome of the referendum before we try to tackle this.

[Floppy]

We now have some language on moving towards a federal UK, and with the merging of #74 and #63 we'll be on the way to a policy on devolution of power, so I think we're working on a solution to this now.