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As a Brit that didn’t want Scotland to be independent last time around: good luck to them. Brexit has shown very clearly that Scotland wants to chart a different path to England and IMO they should be allowed to do it.

…just be generous to English folks seeking asylum from Tory rule, yeah?

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For non-UK people:

There are four nations in the UK (England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland).

But England has roughly 90% of the population of the UK. So what England votes for in an all-nations referendum, the rest of the UK gets.

England voted for Brexit by a narrow-ish majority. But Scotland voted against Brexit by a huge margin -- 62/38, or approximately 3:2.

Ironically, the year before the Brexit referendum there was a Scottish independence referendum where "remain part of the UK" won, 55/45. One of the promises the remain campaign made was that staying in the UK was the only way to guarantee Scotland could stay in the EU.

So there's a strong sense here in Scotland that we were misled, and presented with a bait-and-switch last time round.

Finally, Scotland has a very different political climate from England, with a much weaker far right, stronger far left, and a dominant centre left government. While since 2017, England has increasingly drifted towards the far right.

> stronger far left

I’m not sure there’s any significant ‘far left’ in Scotland. What groups are you thinking of?

There’s also of course a very large nationalist component.

Significant is your get out clause. The SSP had six or so members and in electoral terms has been significantly more successful than any English or British equivalent except perhaps sinn fein, who were at least notionally socialist and left of labour.

How far left do you want to go? Cenfuegos press was Scottish, that's a former angry brigade member.

Isn’t he dead? Hard to argue a dead person is strong!

I dunno, in my home state dead men can still win elections! /s https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-hof/dead-rep...

Jimmy Maxton is dead as well: Red Clydeside long gone. There were scots Trotskyists, the rock climber Dougal Haston's family notably (he's dead too. I don't think he was political btw)

The point being made here is Scotland has a socialist history and has had explicitly socialist candidates elected to parliament in recent history. Like.. 2003-2007. I'd hesitate to call it dead just yet.

> explicitly socialist candidates elected to parliament

I think it’s pretty unreasonable to call these people ‘far left’. I don’t think they’re planning to take up arms like the IRA for example.

Did they tried to change how institutions work to add stuff like random nominations, split/defund the police, self determination for smaller bodies (decentralization towards cities basically)?

Or did they try to subvert capitalism by forcing half+1 workers representative on every company boards?

There is not a lot of far left ideas left to implement. Societally, there is basically nothing left since women are allowed to vote and segregation ended. Socially, it is impossible to advance without political or economic far leftism. So this only leave political far left and economic far left.

I think 'far left' implies terrorism or other armed insurrection or revolution? The things you're talking about are acting peacefully within the existing establishment. That's not 'far left'.

You are right, most people on the far left (i'd say two third of them, maybe it changed in the last ten years) would say that participating in elections is supporting the institutions and the dominant class.

But right now radical left == far left for most. Worse, right now in France, a lot of people really think the reformist left is the far left, and the rest believe they are radicals. Saner, but still wrong. This is mindblowing, but i am not a professional historian or political scientist so it doesn't really matter to me, i won't loose any sleep. It just says a lot about how low our political culture fell. They aren't even anticapitalists nor they push for worker ownership. And i've read today that the overton window was pushed to the left?

One thing still that can explain this: it seems that the 19th century history lessons were erased from our western memories. And even the years between WW1 and WW2 are not that clear for western europeans.

> try to subvert capitalism by forcing half+1 workers representative on every company boards

As an economist, this is far from far left -- it's a fairly middle-of-the-road policy that is used in market economies that are more stable successful than the UK's, e.g. Germany. (And at 33% representation, it is the default across western Europe, where you would be laughed at if you tried to characterise them as far-left...)

Firstly I'd agree that there's not a significant far left political party in Scotland (Scottish Greens, perhaps?) but it is still more left-leaning overall. But re the "nationalist" bit - that word is overloaded. So the word usually means a couple of things:

1. "far-right beliefs that centre on religious and ethnic hatred"

2. or, "a desire to become an independent nation"

In this case when people say the SNP is nationalist it's the second - their policy is that Scotland should be an independent country. For what it's worth they seem to have a strong pro-immigration stance[0] and a belief in racial equality[1], which are usually things type #1 nationalists are heavily against - so take from that what you will.

[0] - https://www.snp.org/policies/pb-what-is-the-snp-s-policy-on-...

[1] - https://www.snp.org/policies/pb-what-actions-are-the-snp-tak...

Nationalism in the context of SNP (and as a concept in general) simply refers to the desire/belief that the state and nation should be synonymous. The problem is that not everyone's interpretation of national identity is the same, so the in the end all you get is populism used to push a belief. The answer to the question "What is Scotland, anyway?" is not as clear as politicians would like it to be.

Ok but in real-world usage "nationalist = far right = nazis = bad". So I was clarifying that while that is not untrue, nobody is saying the Scottish independence movement or the SNP are that.

It might be regional or very US/UK specific. In many parts of the world nationalism is also associated with left wing separatist movements. For example, in Spain we have ETA[1], and in Turkey the PKK[2].

I've never specifically associated it with neither left nor right because in my country we have both right and left wing nationalist movements. Yes, far right nationalism is often fascism, nazism, jingoism, etc. but this isn't the only type of nationalism, and we don't use nationalism as a synonym for nazism/fascism, except when speaking specifically in the context of right wing nationalist groups.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ETA_(separatist_group) 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan_Workers%27_Party

I’d say post-Brexit England has drifted away from the far right. The whole EDL/Britain First/UKIP sentiment has only waned massively since then. The ruling government has not come close to far right at any point.

Perhaps the fringe far-right parties have all but disintegrated, but the Tories have certainly drifted rightward and they're essentially untouchable in England in spite of ... well, everything

That's my point.

UKIP and BXP disintegrated because their more competent members colonized the Conservative Party, which is now much more radical and far-right than it was under Cameron.

The only surviving cabinet minister from Cameron's era (2010-2016) is Michael Gove. The rest are all new faces with far right credentials and a commitment to the hardest of hard Brexits.

so they haven't drifted away from the right. the centre has moved right

> new faces with far right credentials

I'm not sure what your definition of far right is but that statement is quite far from the truth.

That statement is very much the truth. I don't know whether you follow politics outside the UK, or whether you remember the UK from 10 years ago? In both cases the policies of the current government -- from hard Brexit to unilaterally renouncing the GFA to interning asylum seekers in Rwanda to deporting pension-aged Windrush people to the Caribbean to the "hostile environment" for legal immigrants and foreign students etc etc -- are far more to the right than the derided far-right parties espouse in France or Germany, and far more to the right than the UKIP or BNP ever asked for...

To be fair, I've only lived in the UK for just over a decade. That being said, I do remember BNP and the EDL. Whilst there's an intersection between EDL/BNP and present-day Brexit (i.e. Conservative party) supporters, I wouldn't say the government represents the views held by the former. In fact, groups like the BNP advocated for compulsory deportation of non-whites (during Tyndall) and later pivoted to a modern version of politely asking us to leave[1]. Whilst Windrush was comparable, I don't think it is to the scale of what a BNP majority would've ever looked like. Regarding the GFA, I'm obviously lacking context and perspective, but I see it more as an oversight and bad leadership than an intentional break away from it, but with the current government I never know what to think.

1. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2009/oct/20/bnp-members... "...firm but voluntary incentives for immigrants and their descendants to return home".

Nothing says "British far right" like a Cabinet full of ethnic minorities.

Our Home Secretary has just instituted an illegal policy of deporting African and Asian refugees to Rwanda.

Irrespective of the colour of her skin, her actions are those of the far right.

I thouroughly disagree with the practice and it’s morally repugnant, but hasn’t it just been court-tested and declared legal?

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/10/uk-deportati...

No, it hasn’t. The court ruled that there’s nothing in U.K. law that bars specific flights but they didn’t rule on the legality of the policy itself.

This will be challenged at the court of appeal and will, eventually, be found a breach of international law.

So it’s illegal in your opinion but not in actual fact?

It’s normal for the high court to side with the government in these cases only for them to be overturned on appeal. That’s not my opinion, that’s the experience of immigration lawyers.

So yes, the policy is unlawful _in fact_ but the legal process needs to catch up to that.

Except the Supreme Court have said they will not consider an appeal.

So it is not illegal.

They’re not ruling on legality, they’re refusing to grant injunctions on the flights.

This doesn’t mean they’re legal, it means the courts won’t stop those individuals from being deported while the legal case for the policy is being argued. The decision to grant, or not, an injunction is not in itself a judgement on the underlying policy. The court did the former, not the latter.

What would it take to convince you that this policy is not illegal? (For clarity, I agree with you that it is an awful policy.)

Very simply the Supreme Court would have to rule that the policy was legal and detail how it was in line with UN conventions on refugees.

The English courts haven’t done this yet, they just said they won’t issue injunctions to prevent certain deportations.

Do you expect the Supreme Court to rule on all government policy? Is it the case that you feel government policy is illegal until ruled legal by the SC? Sort of guilty until proven innocent? If the SC decides not to rule, say it just dismisses the case (not sure what the mechanisms are here) would the policy be perpetually illegal or would that be taken as tacit legality of the policy?

This does seem logically consistent to me, just trying to understand your position better.

I expect the Supreme Court to rule on extremely impactful and controversial government policy that interacts with international law. That’s a huge part of its job.

Whether I think it’s legal is based on what the policy is, whether it was passed into law by Parliament (in this case, there’s no Act of Parliament), what legal experts have said, whether it’s been tested by the courts.

You know, how most sensible people make decisions: they look at the information available and make a decision based on that.

Yeah I guess it's just interesting because there's a difference between saying its "immoral" vs "illegal". An Act of Parliament has been passed (Nationality and Borders Act 2022) which gives the legal backing for this, explicitly says that refugees which still have a pending asylum application can be moved to a "safe third country" which is willing to take the asylum responsibilities. Does this change your mind that the policy is legal, given that the information available has expanded to include, you know, all the Acts of Parliament?

No for two reasons:

- it might still violate the Human Rights Act

- it’s still a matter for debate whether Rwanda is safe for refugees

Just reading one Act isn’t enough because real life is complicated.

Okay but we can agree that your point about there being no Act of Parliament is not relevant then.

It being a matter for debate whether Rwanda is safe is, I think, not something the SC is going to rule on.

It violating the Human Rights Act seems to be the only real issue for the SC then? Again, I just wonder whether this policy is likely to be illegal under that Act given that the relevant clause says "No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”. I just doubt that deportation would fall under torture, inhuman, or degrading treatment _in the spirit of this Act_. I agree that this policy is immoral but kind of doubt that the SC is going to find it tantamount to torture. But maybe there are other arguments here that I'm unaware of?

What is your legal basis for your assessment?

That many other (EU) countries who have implemented the EUHR directive deport asylum seekers to other countries, and those countries SC equivalents have not found it to be illegal.

I guess my legal basis is precedent.

Your legal basis on which you base your opinion on U.K. law is (supposed) precedent from countries that are not the U.K.

Forgive me if I find your entire premise suspicious and decline the opportunity to debate further.

Since when is dealing with illegal migration under coverage of refugees „far right“?

When it’s refugees legally seeking help? This policy has nothing to do with illegal immigration.

Because nowadays vast majoritie of „refugees“ are not refugees in a classic sense.

E.g. my country had thousands of „refugees“ hoping over border from Belarus last year. Last time I saw statistics, not even 1% was eligible for „refugee“ status. Even skipping the part that, according to international law, refugee is legit for the first safe country.

That last sentence is completely incorrect and is enough for me to safely disregard everything else you just said on the basis you don’t actually know what you’re talking about.

Even if some people try to challenge it and enable refugee shopping, calling it „incorrect“ shows that you don't know much about this topic.

It’s easy to prove me wrong: point me to the relevant lines in the relevant treaties or conventions that state this.

You can’t because they don’t exist. There is no obligation to seek asylum in the “first safe country.” This is a common trope trotted out by right-wing mouthpieces which is where I’m assuming you got the rest of your “facts.”

If you cross border illegally and don't ask for asylum, then you're, well, illegally crossing the border.

For EU, there's Dublin agreement.

Quote or reference the lines in the Dublin agreement that state this. Also, point out where IN U.K. LAW the Dublin agreement and these lines apply.

Your first sentence is irrelevant because this applies to refugees claiming asylum.

As I understand it — IANAL — the asylum seekers which the UK is sending to Rwanda, are actually allowed under international law (i.e. treaties the UK has signed) to seek asylum in the UK.

Rwanda in particular is an odd choice if you are genuinely concerned about the well-being of people who are fleeing persecution, given the UK government travel advice for its own citizens.

It is also a very expensive choice (about the cost of giving them free food and accommodation in an average bit of Hull for over 2 years); but even in its own terms, it does not appear to have changed, nor is it likely in the future to change, the minds of the extremely small number of asylum seekers who have not been put off the UK by virtue of it being a damp sheep-filled rock in the North Atlantic where they will be banned by law from seeking employment.

It's not expensive if it stops people from faking refugee.

What percentage of asylum seekers in the UK were eligible for asylum?

> eligible

Even using “granted” as a proxy for “eligible”, hard to tell as every source I found contradicts all the others, somewhere between 25 and 75 percent.

However, this isn’t the right question, for two reasons.

First: The number you want to compare against is the people whose minds were changed by the latest policy. Given how few people were seeking asylum in the UK even before this, the maximum is already low.

Second: this policy does not improve the expected accuracy of government judgement regarding the legitimacy of any given claim.

"Illegal"? There is no right to settlement of anyone in any sovereign country of which they have no citizenship in. It's entirely dependent on the laws of that sovereign country, and those laws are (usually) in place because of the preferences of the voting constituents, ie, actual citizens of the sovereign nation.

You are throwing around "far right" as a slur in this discussion and that doesn't address facts or the truth of the matter.

The policy addresses refugees which are covered under a number of UN conventions. Deporting them is illegal.

I’ve already explained why it’s far right policy but let me explain in simpler words:

Only black and brown people are sent to Rwanda under this scheme. White Ukrainians are not. That’s why it’s a far right scheme. One might even call it racist.

Her views on immigration are indistinguishable from those of most people in India or Bangladesh. They’d do the same thing if the shoe were on the other foot. And those are definitely not “far right” countries.

There's plenty who think India has drifted to the far-right in the past decade.

What’s happening in India is merely the westernized elite losing their grip on culture: https://unherd.com/2021/04/the-culture-wars-of-post-colonial.... But the desire of Indians to have their country without other people in it goes back to independence from Britain.

Calling it “nativism” would be inappropriate because that would make it seem like a thing that needs a label. To the contrary, that’s just how most societies are. What we need a label for are the small minority of folks who feel the opposite way.

> What’s happening in India is merely the westernized elite losing their grip on culture

It can be both simultaneously.

> the desire of Indians to have their country without other people in it

It's a bit more than that though. I don't think you know enough, sorry.

Feel free to educate me. I’m from neighboring Bangladesh, and the situation with pluralism in India seems like the situation with secularism in Bangladesh. Western educated elites trying to impose it on a larger population that doesn’t want it. Or at least has a vastly narrower conception of it than the elites do.

At the end of the day, Bangladesh exists because Bangladeshis wanted a country for Bangali Muslims. Most Bangladeshis subscribe to that core premise. So it’s bizarre to me when people attack Britons upset about immigration from Bangladesh using accusations of “racism.” The Brexiter and the average Bangladeshi are ideologically on the same ground. Their differences arise due to conflicting interests, not conflicting ideologies.

> The Brexiter and the average Bangladeshi are ideologically on the same ground.

Except you forgot to include the part where Greater Pakistan military overturned the democratically elected Bengali prime minister, so that Bhutto could hold onto power as Bengalis are unfit to lead. You also forgot to mention that Pakistani military killed a million plus Bangladeshis.

Please point out where the EU sent in an army to kill a million Brits.

You make so many bad faith arguments, its really nauseating to sit around correcting all of your Gish Gallops.

Waiting to hear from you how the independence of African nations and the overturning of Apartheid was an act of racism/ethnocentrism by black people against white people.

He knows enough. Trust me. Here is a crazy conversation I had with him. Most of his arguments are in bad faith.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31348078

Rayiner is an ex Muslim, currently Christian, brown Bangladeshi immigrant to USA who wants the brown people to leave the United States - so that white people can have a white United states - just like "Indians/Bangladeshis want a country for themselves" a need that Rayiner made up on behalf of the citizens of India and Bangladesh.

Significantly, Rayiner excludes himself from the list of brown people who need to leave USA. I have heard of Jewish Nazis and watched the Clayton Bigsby comedy sketch- but it is surreal to interact with someone like this online.

Instead of white, he uses the word "culture" which is the hip dog whistle in urban circles.

This is such a wrong summary of the thread you linked that you are obviously just trying to stir up a flame war. Flagged.

India is definitely becoming a far right country. Once you attack republicanism not to add more democracy but to remove transparency and to add imbalance within the legislative power, you are far right.

In fact, it is easy to distinguish political far right from political far left. Both wants to remove/weaken the institutions. One will push for more personal power(aka: strengthen executive, weaken judicial and legislative power (you can add push media concentration). The other will push towards revocative referendums, random selection for public committee, and overall a weakening of the executive power (refund/divide the police and stuff). As long as with stay within economic center (basically modern capitalism shades).

If you don't think moving toward a less republican government is enough, we can go historically: a marker of far right is treating/talking about the country like a living organism.

I'm talking myself into believing that India is already far right, i should stop arguing :/

The...legal policy?

The policy so legal, everyone is now pulled from the flight and it was cancelled after a challenge to the ECHR.

Who exactly in the cabinet is far right? Truss, Sunak, Javid, Raab and the rest hardly come across as the right wing mob. Rees-Mogg is the only one who maybe comes remotely close and he’s got one of the most minor positions.

Truss is moving to break a treaty to appease the far right nutters in her party.

Javid, as Home Secretary, stripped a teenager of her British citizenship, leaving her stateless and stranded somewhere in Iraq or Syria.

The teenager is a terrorist sympathiser who left the UK to join Isis. And she isn’t a teenager any more.

Irrespective of what she may or may not have done, her citizenship was stripped on flimsy legal pretexts to satisfy their racist supporters.

That's total bollocks.

For those reading along, the "teenager" being referenced is Shamima Begum, who ran away from home when she was 15 to allegedly join ISIS.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shamima_Begum

There's an interesting discussion to be had about whether a government official can strip someone of their citizenship (even though in the UK it seems to be part of their powers under the Nationality Act) - it's not correct to frame this emotionally under "deported a teenager" when there are specific issues at play here. Same with slandering anyone who is not politically aligned with you as "far right".

I didn’t say he deported a teenager. I said he stripped her citizenship, leaving her stateless to die in service of appealing to racists to vote Tory.

If I’m thinking of the same person, she’s ethnically Bangladeshi. But Bangladesh wouldn’t let her back in the country even though it has a right of return for people of Bangladeshi ethnicity: https://www.aa.com.tr/en/asia-pacific/bangladesh-will-not-ac...

Bangladesh is an officially socialist country. You’re just defining “far right” to include everyone who disagrees with a narrow view of immigration.

Regarding your sibling comment: is Bangladesh “racist” against Bangladeshis for not taking her? What an absurd smear.

I never said Javid was a racist, I said the policy to deport black and brown refugees to Rwanda, while not treating Ukrainian refugees the same way was racist. This should be self-evident by just looking at the facts.

You’re making another false equivalence with Bangladesh when Begum was born and raised in the U.K. and had never been to Bangladesh. And then trying to use that in bad faith to insinuate things I never said.

In a sibling comment you said he was “appealing to racists” by blocking Begum’s return. My question is whether Bangladeshis are racists for the same reason?

And it’s not a false equivalence. Bangladesh has special rules for return of children of people of Bangladeshi origin. My brother was born in Virginia but could travel back to Bangladesh without meeting the usual immigration conditions by showing proof of our parent’s birth in Bangladesh. Begum was in the same position. But Bangladesh isn’t as sympathetic to terrorists as some folks in the UK.

Notwithstanding the bizarre "far right credentials" point:

- Liz Truss (current Foreign Secretary) was SoS for DEFRA under David Cameron.

- Sajid Javid (current Health SoS) was BEIS SoS under David Cameron.

- Grant Shapps (current Transport SoS) was Minister for Housing under David Cameron and later party chairman.

- Brandon Lewis (current SoS for Northern Ireland) was Minister for Housing under DC.

- Ben Wallace (clearly ultra right wing (/s), and SoS for Defence), Minister for Northern Ireland under DC.

I don't think this is an exhausive list, these are just the SoSs I can think of off the top of my head. Your statement is just so untrue it just makes me think you don't know much about UK politics and don't really care enough to even google your "facts".

> The rest are all new faces with far right credentials

What does that even mean? That anyone who wasn't a member of the SWP in their youth is automatically a closet fascist?

Ben Wallace probably gonna go home and have a silent cry if it he hears someone has been calling him "far right".

The Tory party of higher taxes, pride flags covering every government social media account and currently minting coins with the "progressive pride" flag? Sounds like they're about to burn down the Reichstag.

They're also the Tory party of criminalising dissent, corruption, Russian influence, and offshoring refugees.

The fact that homosexuality isn't as controversial as it once was doesn't preclude their authoritarian nature.

Are they pulling that “it’s zee Russians!” in the UK too? Seems to be a very popular bogeyman all over the Western world.

Considering the amount of dirty Russian money ( Londongrad), the fact that Russian spies tried to assasinate a former Russian spy, murdering British civilians by accident, and Russian support for Brexit...

It's not a boogeyman, it's part of the reality.

None of those things actually infer Russian interference. At least not any more than say Chinese, or French.

Dirty money in the tens/hundreds of billions doesn't infer interference? Including sizeable donations to the Conservative party?

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/12/world/europe/russian-mone...

Hardly proof of Russian control.

So we've moved the goalposts from "Russia boogeyman" to "you can't prove Russia controls everything", which nobody is claiming.

Russia is involved and dangerous.

Yeah, it's really weird that when you:

- Take a bunch of Russian money - Hang out with a bunch of Russians - Ignore the recommendations of your national security apparatus to appoint Russians to permanent positions in your upper house - Employ a bunch of people who have ties to Russian interests. - Delay investigations into how your government didn't do anything to prevent Russian interference in a national referendum.

People make the completely illogical conclusion that you're somehow sympathetic to Russian interests.

Seeing as London has been corrupted by Russian money, numerous Russians have been murdered/attempted to be murdered by the Russian state in the UK, and the current PM is the former mayor of London, it’s more than valid to discuss Russian influence in the UK.

Further reading: https://amp.theguardian.com/books/2022/mar/21/butler-to-the-...

I mean Canada has been corrupted by Chinese money (see Vancouver home prices recently?) and has a pro-CCP member of the government in British Colombia.

Yet I keep hearing about Russians.

It can be both, you know.

Sounds like both are more just political point scoring?

Brexit in UK and US exit from nato were both Russian propaganda projects.

Lip service while they tried to backtrack on banning conversion therapy.

Labour has come to be run by London elites that hate the values of the party’s working class base. In that climate, Tories simply need a pulse to win elections.

I think they could still enjoy success while being run by London elites, if they even pretended to stand up to the Tories or painted themselves as a meaningful alternative they'd clean up. They just seem to be very content sitting as in opposition to the Tories administering the UK in a very slow, sleepy decline.

Labour has made it clear what they really stand for: the liberal culture values of the urban elite, while paying lip service to, you know, labor. The more they “stand up” on those grounds, the more they will alienate both traditional Labour voters and the working class BAME voters they have become increasingly reliant on.

Honestly, I feel you. I don't know who I'd vote for if I was in England, from the outside I don't see any party I wouldn't hate myself for voting for.

Exactly. People stopped voting for UKIP when the Tories took on UKIP's 'policies'.

To lump UKIP in with the other two is absurd.

Not really.

https://images.app.goo.gl/HnsR6uZ436wRQxhf6

UKIP when it was actually popular was first and foremost an iteration of the Nigel Farage vehicle.

Now, UKIP had existed before Farage, and it existed after Farage, but as with a typical far right party it's full of nutters who don't know which part of the message you can say out loud, so it's unelectable. Indeed, in actual UK parliamentary elections even Farage was unelectable, which is why he got into the whole "Brexit" thing because EU elections are seen as less important yet they're also multi-member PR so you can get 20% of the vote in a four seat region and expect to come away with a seat even though the vast majority of people in that region hated you.

Mostly though, for Farage this is and always was a scam. So the subsequent parties unlike UKIP were founded from the outset as scam operations e.g. "The Brexit Party" was a private company, owned by Farage and co., profits for the owners not members (indeed for ages you couldn't "join" that party), and paid for by the candidates who Farage then promptly sold out because it was convenient for him personally. You should see all that family of parties as just "The Nigel Farage Party" much more so than e.g. Republicanism is "The Donald Trump Party" because while you're not going to see Republican leadership actually say Trump is a piece of shit any time soon, they'll be here in ten years and he won't whereas the Farage parties without Farage just wither away and die.

Anyway, my point is, the popular UKIP was just the Farage Party, it's primarily about putting your money in Farage's wallet and the bigotry is a side show, without Farage that's the main event.

I’d argue that deporting immigrants to Rwanda has a certain far right timbre.

Even worse: refugees

Was reading recently about how the EU also sent refugees to Rwanda.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people...

I think in the context of today specifically with the Rwanda flight I would find it hard to agree with you.

True they aren’t all far right, but they do capitalise on decisive policies to invigorate their core supporters.

Excuse me, but literally today is the first day that the government starting flying asylum seekers to Rwanda[1], and yesterday they published legislation with the intention of breaking international law[2]. They've also recently curtailed rights to legal protest[3]. The Prime Minister has a history of law breaking including illegally shutting down our parliament[4]. This government only got their majority when UKIP candidates stood down in favour of the Tory party at the last election. By any reasonable definition England is currently governed by the far right.

[1]:https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-61791994

[2]:https://news.sky.com/story/a-mess-unrealistic-doctrine-of-ne...

[3]:https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-56400751

[4]:https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/11/uk/scottish-court-uk-parliame...

Denmark's left-wing government is planning to send away asylum seekers too.

It's interesting times when protecting borders from illegal immigration is seen as „far right“. It's not „far right“ rising, it's some people pushing Overton window extremely to the left.

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/denmark-talks-with-rwan...

> protecting borders from illegal immigration

Asylum-seeking is not illegal immigration.

right, and they're going back once the situation in their home country stabilizes, correct?

What happens when/if their asylum application gets denied though? At least in France they don't get forced to leave and they find themselves in a strange grey area.

They can seek asylum in or from Rwanda then, right? I mean, it’s not like they are trying to immigrate to UK, they are just running for their lives, so safety in Rwanda should be good enough, no?

> Asylum-seeking is not illegal immigration

Economic migration under the guise of asylum seeking is though. And pretending that all the people who make the attempt to gain Asylum in the UK are legitimate non-economic migrants is absurd.

> Economic migration under the guise of asylum seeking is though.

Correct. As is murder, theft, etc. I don't think anything in my comment suggested they're not?

I don't think even the most fundamental left leaning people are against sending illegal immigrants away - the problem is that UK is choosing to send people away to Rwanda, basically telling them that it's a safe African country, good luck there. Ministers have confirmed that yeah, it's "possible" that for instance Ukrainian refugees could be sent there if they didn't follow the right procedures and are deemed "illegal".

I can only imagine that if not for horrible optics, UK would send them to Australia.

But oh well, I guess if your dream is to resurrect the British Empire, having a foreign penal colony is one of the requirements.

What’s wrong with Rwanda?

From the point of view of Africans, we see this as a Rwanda led initiative to take care of refugees in a country that is safe, and in an environment that is closer to their homelands. Although in the past Rwanda has had is troubles but … so did Ireland and the UK on different scale. Rwanda of today is a different place, and the current president has long experience in handling refugee situations and defusing the natural tensions of people in a refugee crises.

Is it absolutely necessary for refugees to leave to go to a different continent, to live on an island where they will forever look like an “other” and have a culture and weather that is totally alien to them?

There should be more to this equation than the thought of sending people to the most prosperous country that they can.

I have literally never heard an African perspective on this before your comment. Thank you for this, it's very enlightening!

The UK can't send asylum seekers to Australia because Australia is a sovereign entity and wouldn't accept them. Indeed Australia already has anti-asylum policies locally, and these influenced the model for the UK's decision.

Well of course, it was a tongue in cheek comment - that UK would probably send people to Australia, just like it used to. I'm not saying that it's possible, realistic, or even a good idea in the first place.

> it's some people pushing Overton window extremely to the left.

Everyone that learns about the Overton window is immediately convinced the other side has been pulling it in their direction for years.

Are you trying to say that migration laws and practices and coverage in mass media didn't drift in certain direction compared to 20/40/60 years ago?

20? Probably not hugely. 40? Maybe in some aspects of policy. 60? Probably.

But you're talking about Denmark and I know nothing about Danish domestic policies - which is why I was intentionally broad in my wording.

The Overton window is poorly named. It's an irregularly shaped blob rather than a rectangular frame. Some things can move in different directions at different times.

What’s your reasonable definition of far-right?

There's a saying about the UK's far right parties (the likes of UKIP, National Front (1) etc) that in the long run it's not a winning proposition, as the Tories can always adopt the same rhetoric, and they always have better suits.

This has indeed happened.

1) https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/old-poster-sparks...

UKIP is not far-right. You can't just label anyone you disagree with as "Far Right". You have to base your argument on facts.

You can't just label someone as "not Far Right", just because you agree with them. That's denial.

I would say the onus of proof would be on the accuser.

Immigration enforcement raids against mostly black/brown people. Putting them on flights to countries they left as infants. Sending asylum seekers to Rwanda for "processing". Sending British citizens to the Carribean because we were too disorganised to issue them passports in the 50s.

The Tory party has absorbed the UKIP/EDL/etc vote. It rules by populism alone at this stage.

LoL. This is not a definition.

There’s a whole lot of working definitions provided by the 20th century that can be used as measuring sticks on the passage to the right. Signs include a breakdown or suppression of a free press, simplification of the political spectrum, identification of and processing of enemies of the state, weakening of the rules and protections of government and so on. A shift from the idea of equality of all (protection of minorities) towards the will of the majority.

There dan also be an anti-rational or anti-scientific aspect. And as an old history prof lectured, the political spectrum is not linear it’s a circle. The far ends turn out to be the same part of the circle. Power for the in group and problems for the rest. Read animal farm.

You're conflating "the right", "far right", fascism, and totalitarianism. Which, I think, is why the term "far right" was invented - so leftists could basically call other people fascists without having to substantiate the claim.

Being "on the right" is about policy. Someone on the right believes in democracy, freedom, capitalism, human rights, etc. They hold policy positions such as lower taxes, controlled immigration, and greater punishment for criminals. These policy positions put them in opposition to those on the left.

Someone "on the right" is not a fascist, and is not nearer being a fascist than someone "on the left". Fascism means the abolition of human rights, democracy, free capitalism, and everything "the right" believes in.

It's common to cherry pick little policy points from previous facsict states and use that as evidence that the right is facsict. "Hitler limited immigration, the Tories want to limit immigration, the Tories are fascist!!!!". That makes no sense. "Mao raised taxes, Biden wants to raise taxes, Biden is literally a communist!!!".

Facsism is not about policy. It is a fundamentally different, totalitarian, way to structure a society.

Ok, then socialism and communism aren’t associated with the far left. This makes right/left terms about where they sit in parliament. We’re trapped by common usage when it comes to jargon, and your usage of fascism vs. Nazism shows you’re not parsing them correctly. The former was a corporatist state that preserved trappings and some legitimacy of existing governmental power. The latter, well, didn’t.

How about: leaders <- government <- owners <-> workers -> government -> leaders. Which I can’t format in a circle. And the presence or absence of “for all” can be a tell about where on the political spectrum people or groups sit.

It’s generally accepted that the red states sit to the right vs. the blue states and the us sits to the right of Western Europe. There’s a spectrum of countries as there’s a spectrum of states (or provinces in Canada). The “political middle ground” can be constructed from this set and then decorated with secular or religions states from elsewhere throughout.

> communism isn’t associated with the far left

In what world? :-))

The same world where fascism isn’t associated with the far right. Where jargon is fluid and arbitrary. Was responding to previous post trying to separate fascism/right wing.

How do you like Umberto Eco's attempt to characterize ur-fascism?

> The same world where fascism isn’t associated with the far right.

I made no such argument. Fasicm isn't associated with the actual, modern day right wing of politics.

This is why "far right" is such a slippery and nefarious term. It allows you to conflate right wing politics and facsism.

If you think the Tories are fascist, then make that argument. Don't hide behind this newspeak.

In the same world where fascism isn't associated with the far right.

There are many possible axes to divide politics, in many (but not necessarily all) conservative politics and fascism tends to be projected to similar spaces and Soviet-style communism and socially-progressive politics to the same.

Once you start looking at multiple of these at the same time, things do tend to look quite different.

> Signs include a breakdown or suppression of a free press, simplification of the political spectrum, identification of and processing of enemies of the state, weakening of the rules and protections of government and so on. A shift from the idea of equality of all (protection of minorities) towards the will of the majority.

The Chinese Communist Party has all the stuff you listed here.

True, and I stated the spectrum is a circle with absolutism or totalitarian being a leader-only political setup. The workers might own the means of production in China but they damned well better not try to act on that thought. Ask jack ma.

Well that is a good question as no real solid answer. I do know that what has been classed as far-right in the media has shifted more and more towards the center to the stage that if Hitler was around today, most things on the current far-right would appear centerist-left. Though I like to look at that as progress. Though equally some people class what is on the left as far-left and it's all just got very silly with focus upon labels and arguing over rational logical debate with facts.

If you look at various media outlets, their own definition of far-left or far-right varies so much that you can end up being labeled as both very easily.

Another issue would be cultural aspects and you will find what is far-left or far-right will vary country to country and with that. Subjective labels have and always will be a can-of-worms.

> I’d say post-Brexit England has drifted away from the far right.

> By any reasonable definition England is currently governed by the far right.

These can both be true, IMHO you're talking about different things - 1) the position of the electorate and 2) the position of the government.

And the growing gap between them.

In the year to March around 3/4 of people seeking asylum in the UK were granted it. This is the same PM that granted foreign students 2 year work visas on graduation. Hardly the actions of a bunch of Nazis. The huff and puff about immigration is entirely superficial, because at heart the conservatives are a party of business and they know full well immigration benefits the country. Their stance on immigration is best seen as a law and order issue, with a veneer of pandering to Daily Mail readers.

The refugee crisis is a global issue, and it shouldn’t be left to any single country to shoulder the burden simply because it is the first port of a refugees arrival.

Rwanda is a country with a recent successful history of rehabilitating refugees, and the president reached out to offer a home to those who need it.

For geography alone, the UK would be a better destination for the flood of Ukrainian refugees coming in, where as African asylum seekers would be better served by a country close to home.

As a member of an ECOWAS county, I’m happy to see that once again counties on the African continent are handling their own refugee situation. Immediately post WW2, this was more common practice and it lead to deeper economic and social ties between the counties of my region.

Our stepping to perform a social good is in no way a support of right wing sentiment.

> Rwanda is a country with a recent successful history of rehabilitating refugees, and the president reached out to offer a home to those who need it.

Not sure how well there success is measured after recently finding out about this:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people...

Israel also had a similar arrangement which collapsed after it was found to break Israeli law. Apparently some journalists tried to track down the refugees involved in that scheme some years later and found barely a handful had remained in the country.

My suspicion is this is just a short term attempt to boost the PMs popularity among the segment of his support base who think mistreatment of refugees and immigrants is a good thing. It's not a serious attempt to change substantive policy.

It's just sweeping a problem under a carpet approach.

Real solution is alas one that eludes us today. The real issue is the blur in lines between economic migrant and refugee, with one used to bismish the other and anything to address the former being classed as an attack upon the later. Hence the whole subject is just a can or worms that just does not get dealt with.

As for the UK, when the majority of the economic and refugee's arrive via safe countries like France then it kinda adds a whole layer of debate that you just don't get with other countries migrant/refugee problems.

Honestly should be that people who need to escape a country for fear of their life should be able to walk into any other countries embasy and apply for asylum. That though is still not a thing, which only helps fuel illegal smugglers who will take refugees and economic migrants equally if they have the money. Which is the bigger sadness of all with how things are working currently as how many true refugee's in fear of their life have died as they had no means to pay for a way out! That whole aspect of thought is just sadening and yet, overlooked as the focus is all about those who had the means or morals to pay smugglers and can imagine there are those who probably had the means but equally ethics and morals that meant they were unwilling to pay in effect crimininals.

So I guess changing how people apply for Ayslum and the ability to walk into the nearest forign embassy would certainly be a start in solving things.

Then distibution equally needs to be fair around the Globe, so no one country becomes burgened, though that would be a whole area of debate the UN could work out. Certainly the ability to apply at embassys would be huge improvment.

> As for the UK, when the majority of the economic and refugee's arrive via safe countries like France then it kinda adds a whole layer of debate that you just don't get with other countries migrant/refugee problems.

I think a country which in the last 3 years had a melt down because they couldn't buy toilet paper; Crashed the supply chains for petrol and diesel by sheer panic; and thought it was a national crisis when KFC ran out of chicken should perhaps wind it's fucking neck in.

It is only natural that people fleeing persecution or not attempt to find a place which gives them the greatest opportunity to have a decent life. There are many contributing factors here everything from prior knowledge of English, family connections and reunification laws.

> I think a country which in the last 3 years had a melt down because they couldn't buy toilet paper; Crashed the supply chains for petrol and diesel by sheer panic; and thought it was a national crisis when KFC ran out of chicken should perhaps wind it's fucking neck in.

I'm reminded of a quote though darned if I can find a source, but it's something like "Don't judge a place by the idiots it keeps".

Not what my ex-tory MP who left the party feels.

UKIP sentiment hasn't waned, they won. Until there's a serious movement to re-join the EU, the UKIP sentiment is the UK's sentiment.

Overton window in action: the far right is the new normal, so the old far right isn't necessary anymore. New 'parties' will soon aim to achieve another shift.

For the sake of balance see my other reply on this topic. ;-)

This is the funniest comment in this whole thread.

Many of the ideas of UKIP and the others have been adopted by the Tories! And the main opposition party (Labour) has been taken over by centre-right neoliberals. The left had a tiny bit of power pre-Brexit. Now it has none.

Yep, Labor has had neoliberal leadership since the 90s, but they finally thoroughly purged their left a couple of years ago.

If Scottish leave voters hadn't turned out then the referendum would have resulted in "remain". So it's interesting to say in that context that "Scotland voted to remain" as many people simplify it to. 3:2 is a big margin and it's meaningful, but it doesn't define Scots.

And if Scottish "remain" voters hadn't turned out?

...no difference to the result, but big difference to the interpretation (as it would be for leavers not turning out). My point is just that Scotland isn't one person, there were plenty of leavers there.

This is why, despite my reaction to Brexit (plus some other things) being to move from the UK to Berlin, I never really bought into the idea of a second referendum — even when broken down to individual constituencies, most were evenly split and relatively few were decisive either way.

(I did put my name to a few of the relevant post referendum petitions, but as a way to signal my opinions — it was already clear to me that the government doesn’t really listen to any of the petitions).

That's a really creative way to spin a majority "remain" vote into a "leave" narrative

It's not creative, it's just being precise. And it's not even pro leave, it's just not as anti-leave as the inaccurate narrative.

I voted remain: not everything said about Brexit is rhetoric.

Northern Ireland is not a nation. Ireland is a nation with four provinces: Ulster, Leinster, Munster and Connaught. Six of Ulster's nine counties are part of the UK, and the other three are part of the Repulblic of Ireland.

The Irish are a nation, a people with a unique language and identity. That is what OP is referring to. It the same definition of nation as in "nation state". Namely a nation state is a state with one dominant people. Germany, Japan, Thailand, Ireland, are nation states. US, UK, are by their nature not nation states.

So yes, North Ireland represents a nation seperate to the English, the Welsh, or the Scotts.

Ireland is not a nation state! Two sovereign states (the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom) each control part of the Irish nation / island of Ireland.

More directly, Northern Ireland is where the king of the English nation once sent the peoples of England to colonize the lands of the Irish nation. These peoples thus settled have remained culturally distinct as the favored elites of the ruling colonial power, and are presently the majority in the area, which is why the area did not join with greater Ireland during Irish independence.

The people of Northern Ireland today tend to want either continued union with the kingdom ruling Great Britain, or union with the rest of Ireland — depending whether their families are of British origin or Irish. The thought of post-Brexit passport control and customs for travel between the territories comprising Northern Ireland and either Great Britain or Ireland is thus a major political football (far worse in the case of the border with Ireland, because it is a land border and that requires walls.)

Yes but does it matter? How far do you break those stats down, it's just a matter of manipulating them to get whatever point you want.

Say you break it down to a single street which might have voted 90% remain, should that street then be declared independent?

There are always going to be areas that believe stronger in one idea or another but that doesn't mean those areas should be separate from each other, the whole point of Europe is the idea of being stronger together but then in which case why not keep Scotland part of the UK?

What really is scotlands issue, is not that they need indolence from the UK, they need a better UK government and plenty of people in England believe this also, independence is not required.

Yea I think you’ve really got a great point here overall. Personally I think smaller government is better, and it makes sense that Scotland could or perhaps should become a separate nation from the rest of the UK. But… you can’t support that without also supporting Brexit IMO because there is no meaningful difference in philosophy here.

The main challenge for Scotland is EU membership if they break away. It’ll get vetoed by Spain who doesn’t want Catalonia to break away. Frankly, perhaps unfortunately, I don’t see Scottish independence in the cards for that reason. Fostering nationalistic, anti-UK sentiment for political power is a dangerous game to play when you’re going to remain in the UK and is loosely akin to all the pillow-rattling that Texans do about seceding. It also somewhat contradicts the mission of the EU. Why stop at Scotland? Why not Catalonia? Or Brittany? How does this not give fuel to secession movements in the US as well? You can’t have your cake and eat it too. You can’t “support self-determination except when I disagree with who is self-determining”.

During the Brexit debacle, I joked with my Scottish ex-boss that, one day, Scotland will leave the UK, rejoin the EU, and then reabsorb the UK. And then the UK will be renamed United Kingdom of Scotland instead of United Kingdom of Great Britain. He laughed.

Will/Would the EU accept Scotland's membership though? What about the currency? It all seems so complicated

It is all complicated, but have you had a look lately how complicated brexit is? So I'd say we're at the point where it's about picking which kinds of complications you prefer.

WRT currency having Scotland use Euro wouldnt be any different to how Northern Ireland uses Pounds and the Republic uses Euro

It would be very popular move for every EU politician to fast track Scotland to EU. But yes, it would be complicated to separate from UK and become independent. Becoming EU member would not be that complicated.

I thought the problem was that Spain wouldn’t like it because that would set a precedent of rewarding independence movements they oppose like for the Basque region?

Not necessarily if the separation is agreed upon by the UK central government: Madrid's main problem is a unilateral declaration of independence.

Spain and France aren't super keen on encouraging the general idea that regions of a country can easily split off and become independent EU member countries.

But Scotland is already a country.

Ever heard of that thing called the "Basque <<Country>>", for example? :-)

In England we have "the Black Country"[1][2] but it's not a country or a nation (or anything to do with race or skin colour) or even a clearly defined area, but a region of early industrial pollution and coal mining. We also have "the West Country"[3] which has its own sea borders, regional dialect, Cornish language, but isn't a nation or a country.

And we have "God's Own Country"[4] which is a phrase but does have an independence movement[5], and a region (Mercia) which hasn't been a place since 527-897CE but still has an independence movement[6].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Country

[2] https://bclm.com/

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Country

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God's_Own_Country#Yorkshire

[5] https://i-yorkshire.com/yorkshire-independence/

[6] https://independentmercia.org/declaration-of-independence/

A country is a sovereign nation. Scotland is a nation, but it does not have full sovereignty and is not recognized as a sovereign nation by any other sovereign nations (to my knowledge), the same way that Catalan is a nation within the country of Spain.

That is the nomenclature in the United Kingdom, but outside we don't consider Scotland England, Wales or Northern Ireland to be countries. They are part of the United Kingdom, which is "the country" for our purposes.

Spain I understand. But I dunno about France. It's not the Auld Alliance is still a thing, but surely they'd relish an opportunity to give England a black eye.

Being French I can tell you we really discourage it because we don’t have just one region but several! You have Corsica who wants to be independent, Alsace who wants to be independent or linked to Germany and sometimes Basque linked with the Basque region of Spain.

But all that was at its apex years ago now it’s more stable.

There's also French Catalunya, of course.

At the time of the Scottish independence referendum in 2014, I remember there being warnings from the EU that rejoining would not be a simple matter of just applying for an independent Scotland.

I could try to find some links on that if you like, but the way I remember it is that the EU was against the idea of Scotland going it alone and EU officials actively worked to discourage any ideas that an independent Scottland would be received with open arms.

But of course, that was before Brexit and while the UK was still an EU member whose national interests were taken into consideration by other members (because EU). This is not the case now.

Still from memory -sorry for that- but when the last UK MEPs were making their parting speeches at the EU Parliament, one Scottish MEP finished his with an impassioned plea to the EU to not forget Scotland. Which I interpreted as a plea to make it easier for Scotland to join the EU if it ever gained independence from the UK.

The EU was against Scotland unilaterally declaring independence from the UK, because you know, Spain/Catalunya, Romania/Szeklerland, Italy/Veneto, Belgium/Flanders,... (the list is endless).

But otherwise, Scotland was part of a former EU member, I imagine they would not necessarily use the pound (a Scottish pound would probably be weak), so they'd probably adopt the euro in a short while, there is a ton of cultural affinity with the EU, probably more than for England in some regards, etc.

Scotland for sure could get an accelerated membership process if they do decide to become independent. They could even start some of the paperwork or at least contacts before they gain the official independence, I imagine.

Currency is one of these aspects that are the least problematic here (many EU countries have their own currencies, and it was the same with the UK). What is more challenging is that becoming an independent country takes time, and if it happens, Scots will have their own challenges. Joining the EU will definitely possible, but I can't imagine it would be a quick process. Whereas if the UK changed their minds and decided to rejoin the EU, you could expect it could happen within 3 years or so.

The EU would for sure accept the membership request. They'd probably accelerate it, even.

Before Brexit the only blocker was a unilateral declaration of independence, which will not happen. Scottish independence will most likely be a mutual separation.

And after that the Scottish budget will be hammered hard so I imagine they'd definitely want to join the EU ASAP to get help. Access to huge markets for exports, cheaper imports, EU funding for developing regions, etc.

> While since 2017, England has increasingly drifted towards the far right.

I suppose it depends on your definition of “far,” but from an English perspective this seems like nonsense.

Conservatives have been drifting right to absorb UKIP, so while you're not technically wrong that England has edged closer to the far right, the reality is that the government is more right leaning than ever.

I dare say even leaning towards fascism the way that they're rewriting rules to protect big dog.

This is called the Overton Window. It's typically the case for any system you are within, that the majority will consider the local "norm" to be moderate/centrist/etc.

Looking at international politics, or even (perhaps more relevantly) the history of UK politics, modern UK politics is extremely far right. Labour is a very good example (considered by many within the UK to be left). They have been right-wing since the "New Labour / Blairite" movement (verifiable either by comparing their policies to pre-Blair Labour, or to international socially democratic contemporaries). A similar example is the UK media coverage of Corbyn: his political views - which align very well with the Labour party historically & with international socially democratic parties - were portrayed as being communist/socialist. Corbyn's political ideologies never varied over the decades of his career, nor became more extremely left; rather modern UK discourse moved right, placing him left of the "new centre".

Corbyn self-identifies as a socialist.

Yup. Corbyn lives in the UK. Politics is relative.

The Economist recently described English political views as "nasty". _The Economist_.

Speaking of being misled, we were pretty much promised by the Scottish nationalists that this was a once in a generation choice. Seems we voted wrong the last time so here we are again with all the uncertainty to go with it.

Though right now I want the second referendum as it's probably the best way to end the uncertainty that SNP causing

I am an outsider on the topic, but wouldn't such a stark change of the political landscape as Brexit be a really valid reason to ask the question again?

After all, independence before would have meant exiting the EU, while it now could mean re-entering it. Independence is ultimately the question about how a region wants to see itself in the world, and the alliances you are in are a big factor in that qestion.

Specially since Scots voted to remain in the EU by a wider margin than voted to remain in the UK.

In my opinion no it's not.

The changes from brexit are minimal compared to what Scottish independence would be. Trade with UK dwarfs trade with EU. The Snp government basically buried their own economic report on the economic case for independence because there isn't one (let's see what's in the next one). Last referendum they couldn't even give a clear answer on currency as many nationalist don't want the euro (or EU for that matter).

Next up is defence, we would need to fund an army and navy etc. Given what's going with Ukraine and that russian jets regularly test our air response capability (jets scrambled from cooper airbase regularly I believe). Would we join NATO? Given what sweden and Finland are looking at I really hope so. Oh and the Snp government firmly want rid of nuclear weapons in Scotland (I'm not pro nuclear now hardly seems to be the time to disarm in northern European countries). Break up of the UK would be a huge win for Putin and loss for the west. Oh and have a read of our defence spoke persons bio:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stewart_McDonald_(politician...

It would be funny if it wasn't so serious.

"I am an outsider on the topic, but wouldn't such a stark change of the political landscape as Brexit be a really valid reason to ask the question again?"

You could argue that, but, the nationalists never did. Instead they said the issue would be categorically resolved by the referendum for an entire generation. Perhaps if they were a bit smarter they'd have thought ahead and caveated their promises, but they wanted to create artificial pressure that they thought would help them.

Then they lost and it was immediately revealed that they were lying. It wasn't going to be a once-in-a-lifetime vote unless they won, in which case of course, they'd never let anyone vote on the topic ever again (if you believe they'd host a "let's rejoin the UK" referendum even in 50 years you don't know the SNP).

Brexit meanwhile is not actually a stark change in political landscape. It has barely affected the lives of most people. It's not at all clear why that should make a difference when there are so many other wedge issues the SNP could also use to claim now it's all different.

Really, if they wanted to ask the question again and win the best way would be to campaign for English voters to also be given the vote. Polls show a significant number of English voters would quite like to be rid of Scotland - whilst politicians really want to keep the union together, actual voters aren't so in love with it. Scotland sometimes gets perceived comes across as more trouble than it's worth: a left wing heavily subsidy dependent one-party statelet mired in corruption and with leadership that vigorously encourages anti-English racism.

Well said

I am an Austrian living in Germany. If my nation would have exited the EU that would have massive effects on my life. So I don't buy into the premise that it has no effect on people in their everyday lives. Sure, for many this might just be about symbolism and things like access to the world's biggest single market, its regulations etc. But this matters. Scotland has a different relation to its London government within the EU than outside of it. Just think about environmental standards and worker rights. If I were a Scot I'd trust the EU more to do something good there than a UK government.

I am convinced there are (not just a few) Scots for which this would be similar.

But we're not talking an Austrian immigrant to Germany. We're talking about the UK.

The UK wasn't in the Euro and it wasn't in Schengen. These are two of the most visible aspects of EU membership for ordinary people.

The third biggest effect is automatic migration rights. A relatively tiny number of British people have ever moved to the EU. Losing "freedom of movement" is therefore an issue that a small number of people feel very strongly about, but those people were almost always not actually using it. They liked the idea of it, actually doing it not so much. Whether it's language or cultural barriers, Brits just mostly don't do it. Of my group of friends at school, only one ended up moving to the EU (France). All others stayed in the UK or moved to non-EU countries. Moreover it's not like Brits can no longer move to the EU: they can, they just need to get a work visa. This isn't a big deal.

Of those who do though, they were disproportionately represented in media, politics, academia etc. Hence why the Remain campaign ended up focusing on it, even though for the average Brit this was actually pure downside. They didn't want to move to France or Germany, but they had to compete against the millions of immigrants from eastern Europe who were willing to work for pittance.

"Sure, for many this might just be about symbolism and things like access to the world's biggest single market, its regulations etc."

The US is a much more unified single market. At any rate, every country has access to the EU markets, do you think the EU is cut off from the world? It boils down to more paperwork for those outside it, very often deliberately created but useless paperwork designed to annoy companies into not bothering, but it's still possible to sell for those who really want to.

As for the rest, really? The UK is way ahead of most of the EU on environmental issues. Germany especially is a disaster zone. It's a country that shut down nukes in favour of coal burning and now relies heavily on Russian natural gas as a consequence because it doesn't have sufficient LNG import terminals. You know which country is building new nukes, doesn't burn coal anymore, and has LNG import terminals that let it be no longer dependent on Russia? The UK! The idea that the EU is some sort of environmental and worker rights savior is nonsensical propaganda. The EU institutions don't care about the environment, it's just a wedge issue they can use to build up a support base of people who care more about stated intentions than delivered results.

Finally, re: Scotland. The EU is actually a seriously damaging issue for the SNP. They like to use Brexit as a way to attack the English but it poses major issues for keeping their internal coalition together. Effectively the SNP is an alliance of pro-EU leftists motivated by hate of the "Tory English", and the Braveheart contingent who actually want an independent Scotland but are somewhat conservative on social and fiscal matters. What keeps them together is their shared enemy below the border.

The moment the SNP tries to fight a new referendum, even the least canny opponent is going to point out that the SNP is supposedly a nationalist independence party. The EU hates nationalism, it hates independence, and it's not shy about saying so explicitly. The whole idea of it is to get rid of national governments and blend every country into one! So the core idea of the SNP, it's entire stated reason for existence, is to become independent of one union that controls it and immediately rejoin another. When membership was the status quo position they could mostly ignore this contradiction, but if they fight another referendum they'll have to face it and this will pose big problems.

The second problem is the question of whether the EU would even accept them. Although it is possible that the EU would do it just to spite the UK, in theory it faces major difficulties: Spain and other regions would want to block it to kill off Catalonian independence, and Scotland would immediately be in much greater violation of the budget rules than even Greece was. It certainly wouldn't be meeting the stated requirements to join. If it did join it'd immediately become a major subsidy recipient as one of the poorest states in the EU. It would also have to adopt the Euro, which is an unpopular policy with Scots. Would the other members be OK with that? This issue would be brought up in any second referendum and would force Scots and the SNP to face the fact that Scotland has not been laying the financial or political groundwork for independence, even though it could have been.

Honestly a common belief south of the border is that Sturgeon doesn't actually want independence at all. The lack of competence in organizing it is otherwise a bit hard to explain. The status quo suits her very well, actually becoming independent would make it much harder to blame London for everything whilst simultaneously relying heavily on its support.

Thanks for that summary and a slight correction just because you tickled my pedant nerve: Indyref I was in September 2014, so two years before the EU Membership referendum, in June 2016.

I worked for a company based in Edinburgh during the Indyref campaign and I remember the concern about being left out of the EU at the time. All my coleagues (obviously not a representative sample of Scottish society) really thought independence was not a good idea from a bussiness and financial point of view, although I don't reckon any of them were particularly friendly to the Tory government in England.

Edit: thinking of it now, I'm getting the feeling that Scottish people were much more interested in being in the EU than the UK, at the time at least.

*England voted for Brexit by a narrow-ish majority. But Scotland voted against Brexit by a huge margin -- 62/38, or approximately 3:2.*

Brexit wasn't a case of each nation 'winning' so to speak. The 38% of the vote went to the total number of leave votes. Which contributed to the overall Leave vote.

Point being Scotland did make a significant contribution to the Leave vote.

You missed out the part that Wales also voted for Brexit, (52.5% to 47.5%) and that England actually voted strongly for Brexit (53.6% to 46.4%) only to have that result diluted by Scotland and Northern Ireland. It was a UK-wide vote, not an individual nation vote.

But the fact remains that Scotland very strongly wants to remain in the EU, and only a year before voted to remain part of the UK in order to stay in the EU.

That was absolutely an ugly bait-and-switch, and I'd be incredibly upset about it if I was Scottish. I'm frankly surprised there hasn't been a massive independence movement directly following the Brexit referendum.

You can't make the statement that Scotland only voted to remain part of the UK in order to remain in the EU. That was just one of many factors.

More to the point is that EU citizens resident in Scotland were given a vote on the matter and apparently they overwhelmingly voted Remain because it was in their direct interests to do so.

And in no way can it be described as "an ugly bait-and-switch" when the Establishment had no desire to leave the EU, they were just as surprised at the Brexit result as everybody else.

It was one of many factors, but the independence referendum voted to stay in the UK by a fairly thin margin. Had this not been a factor, had the people who cared about EU membership voted for independence instead, the independence vote would have won.

They voted to remain in the UK because they thought at the time it was in their best interest to do so. They had no idea at the time that their country would leave the EU. In retrospect, it would have been in their best interest to leave and rejoin the EU.

It can absolutely be described as a bait and switch. Maybe it wasn't explicitly planned as such at the time, but it definitely turned out that way.

> …just be generous to English folks seeking asylum from Tory rule, yeah?

As you know, UK asylum policy is horrific at the moment. The UK is sending asylum seekers to Rwanda, copying Australia's repugnant offshore policy. I hope we (Scotland) do better.

In 2014, the independence white paper had a points based immigration policy. I want a much more open immigration policy this time round. Scotland is enriched by migrants, whether from England or elsewhere. Moreover, we generally depend upon immigration to maintain modest population growth.

There is a big difference between people legally arriving under a points system and people rowing themselves over to live illegally.

> people rowing themselves over to live illegally.

Complete misdirection. It's lawful for asylum seekers to arrive by otherwise-unlawful transport. It'd be better if they didn't have to, of course.

I know France is awful, but it’s not that bad.

They aren't seeking asylum as evidenced by the number of places they could have stopped beforehand.

There's no legal or moral requirement for asylum seekers to seek asylum in the nearest safe neighbouring country.

This kind of difference is exactly what the home office are trying so hard to manipulate. There is no such thing as a refugee if you listen to the way the home office speak.

So what? They are mostly fleeing from the chaos that the Western nations are responsible for: Western "donations" of surplus food (to keep our prices from collapsing) have wrecked local farmers in Africa, Western "donations" of second-hand clothing (aka mitumba) have wrecked the African textile industry, Western shelters and laundromats for dark money have enabled countless dictators to steal from their people, and it was Western colonialism and the handling of the collapse of said colonialism that is directly responsible for many of the border and land conflicts in Africa. And now, with climate change where the Western nations have emitted the vast majority of CO2 responsible for said climate change, it is once again the Western nations that drive the next wave of people fleeing from droughts and hunger.

People risking everything on the dangerous migration paths out of Africa don't do that out of fun, they do it because they have literally no other option left. The chickens are coming home to roost, one might say.

Besides: the hurdles that "point systems" place are, similarly to many social security/unemployment insurance systems, set up in a way that allows deceptive politicians to claim "but we have a system!!!" while fully knowing that the hurdles allow only a tiny amount of people to actually use it.

Scotland doesn't have England's immigration problems because immigrants generally don't want to go to Scotland. It's easy to be virtuous when the problem doesn't affect you.

> immigrants generally don't want to go to Scotland

Fewer migrants come to Scotland than England, but again: migrants come to Scotland, they enrich society, and their population is demographically useful.

> the problem doesn't affect you.

It was shown very recently that 'concern' over immigration in the UK is correlated to newspaper reporting, not levels of migration.

There is a difference between asylum seekers and skilled migrants (the latter is what every country wants, the former is where all the political heat is on).

On asylum seekers, in reality, the plan to move some asylum seekers to Rwanda won't work - its too expensive, legally dubious, and lawyers/charities will fight it tooth and nail. Its more of a political stunt and won't really do anything.

Up to now, the UK is very ineffective at removing asylum seekers. Overall, its incredibly expensive to remove asylum seekers from the UK and even when this occurs often lawyers/charities continue to fight for them to be returned to the UK. The UK, also doesn't require ID cards, uses English, and 'still' has a very strong economy all of which are massive pull factors for 'asylum seekers'. When you look at the numbers of children from ethnic minorities in the UK its pretty astounding - we are going to see huge changes in the demographic in the next 100 years (note: that's ok, but its ok to be honest).

The only thing that 'may' have made a slight difference is ironically Brexit. Yes it looks like a disaster, but before Brexit lots of asylum seekers that claimed asylum in mainland Europe when they received permission to stay immediately moved to the UK for work opportunities (I don't blame them). But then again this may not work as Brexit has been such a disaster the UK really needs more workers to come and work in the UK.

Note: I am neutral on 'asylum seekers' in the UK. Its a massive political hot potato and generally avoid all newspapers views on them - but the left and right newspapers are both pretty bad at talking about all this in an honest way.

It's the first time we've built a concentration camp for in a long time

As a Welsh secessionist, I can't for the life of me square the idea of wanting to leave union that for all its massive faults is at least something you can understand and engage with, to replace that by joining a union that is distant, more artificial and certainly more vague and impenetrable to the common person.

Why would you leave economic and political dominance by Westminster with no control over the economics of your borders (the capital flows, the tax loopholes, the destabilising and exploitative 'investment', the primacy of trade which leads to the all encompassing trade for trade's sake, the depopulation of youth) to instead give that control up to Frankfurt and Brussels?

I think we (Scotland, and Wales) should define what we want to do first and why and where we want to go / want to be. Then in some cases trade agreements will be useful to promote these goals. but they have to be tightly controlled and compensated for.

Despite the image that British media have carefully crafted, Brussels (and Frankfurt?) are far more democratic and competent governments than Westminster. It is only vague because British government has had a deliberate policy of keeping that so (you should read some memoirs of other-EU diplomats on the issue). Convolution of governing is such a British tradition, that unfortunately you believe it is both everywhere and the particular strain present in Westminster is the least worst of all.

I think we should all have a healthy scepticism for leaders and politicians. We do tend to have that for those in Westminster.

The idea that politicians in Brussels don't have vested interests, are not the result of heavy lobbying, are not seeking re-election, are not corruptible or of questionable moral standing is rather dangerous. There seems to be a heavy degree of Blue-Washing. Take a politician like Donald Tusk for example, someone who would be in the fringes of the socially conservative right in the UK, yet is venerated during the Brexit discussions. Or Micheal Barnier, again venerated amongst so called liberals in the UK, yet now calling for an immigration ban in France.

On the economic side. Yes everything is very convoluted and remote for a reason. Power structures always get taken over by the interests of capital. The idea that the EU / Euro / European central bank is any different is again rather dangerous. This is an institution with economic interests written into its constitution. The goal here is to drive down the costs of labour added with the maybe unintended or maybe intended consequence that the EU has spend 20 years dealing with the contradictions and artificial constraints on public spending of a currency that it has created, when it could have been using that time and effort to do something transformational, especially in the direction of green technology and energy.

> The idea that politicians in Brussels don't have vested interests, are not the result of heavy lobbying, are not seeking re-election, are not corruptible or of questionable moral standing is rather dangerous.

That is why I never said anything of the sort. Let's start fresh, shall we?

I find it hilarious that all of the anti-EU arguments are more or less the same as the arguments against the United States government. The states joining up to form a larger entity certainly took some power away from the individual states and removed local control but it seems to have worked out OK.

US has some of the highest levels of comparative inequality in the world. There are also areas that have been depopulated and others where basic services cannot keep up with the population (housing for example).

but that aside, the US has broad political integration and economic integration and has a single demos. The EU is trying to impose economic integration without political integration (or at least without being honest with the scope of political integration) and that will never work. You can't have freedom of movement of goods, services, capital and labour over unequal economies without seriously compensating for it, both 'sides' of the transactions are damaged. Plus it doesn't have a single demos and I don't see how you can magic one into being.

a more apt comparison would be to look at NAFTA. It increased trade, but at great overall cost to both sides.

As a Dutch and EU citizen I fully understand their motivation. I also regretted to see England leave the EU.

Will you feel the same way when the EU seeks the end of veto powers (as is currently happening)?

https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/european-parliament-a...

Yes. My view on the EU is that it is far from perfect but the fact that we collaborate on a larger scale is necessary and we should only try to enhance it. At some point (500+ years?) we should be one planet, that should the goal. (Sorry; I am out-of-this-world-super-left).

One huge government ruling the entire world sounds out-of-this-world-super dystopian to me!

I don't think "One huge government" was claimed. The claim was "one planet", which I think more means people should be unified more than we currently are.

One could imagine lots of ways to have a unified planet without one centralized government. The EU is certainly one model you can achieve unification at large without "one huge government" as it consists of many smaller governments coming together.

Perhaps I did misunderstand, I was certainly interpreting it as a desire for concrete change in the political structures of how the world is run rather than a shift in attitudes amongst the people of the world. I'm definitely not opposed to less conflict in the world!

Personally I don't really agree with your assessment of the EU as a form of that though. In this context I would include something like the EU when talking about larger governments (maybe that's not strictly correct, but it is what I had in mind with my original comment). There are of course lower levels in the EU (i.e. the individual countries) but that's also true for many countries with a central government and smaller regional authorities (e.g. London & Edinburgh).

"One planet" is a slogan without meaning because we're already one planet, so the reader is forced to interpret it in the most likely way it was meant - as one world government. The mention of being super left wing, and the context of the EU makes that interpretation far more likely.

"The EU is certainly one model you can achieve unification at large without one huge government as it consists of many smaller governments coming together."

That's not really what the EU is. The EU is a One Huge Government that has taken over some of the powers of the Less Huge Governments that Europe already has. It isn't a talking shop or forum for collaboration. It's a government which creates laws and enforces them. The fact that it doesn't control everything yet doesn't make it not a government, and the EU's core supporters are like ivolimmen - they want one world government and see the EU as a step towards it.

For what it's worth, the UN could be reformed into such a government. The problem is only that billions of people live in dictatorships of one kind or another, and then the world would suffer under the collective rule of the dictatorships.

World peace sounds dystopian to you?

One planet means world peace? Wasn’t clear from the context.

One world government would be so ineffective, totalitarian and corrupt that it would be in a state of either constant uprising or permanent heavy handed suppression. It would definitely not be "peaceful" except in the sense that an effective police state is "peaceful" because anyone who suffers from it is crushed, before they even get to the point of being able to disrupt the peace.

How would an ineffective, totalitarian and corrupt goverment manage to supplant all the existing ones? I think that if a world government manages to form, it cannot be any of those things. To unite all the peoples of Earth it has to be efficient, democratic, and just.

By exploiting people with views like yours, and by hiding the truth about it's own nature? Look at the EU for an example of how to do this. The hard core remainers are all convinced anyone who doesn't like the EU is brainwashed, racist, stupid or all three but they struggle to keep up in a debate involving the details of what the EU really is and how it works. That's what converted (deconverted?) me: realising at the start that my pro-EU position was based on the sort of wishful thinking your comment implies. It's all about cooperation and world peace, right? Then I listened to the Brexit campaigners and discovered that I had no idea what was really going on in Brussels. It was very far from the friendly face.

The fact that you derive “one huge government” from “one planet” probably speaks more to your biases than anything else.

There are plenty of models that would allow for a small level of administration globally and local governmental control that is still considerably better than what we have today.

United Earth sounds super dystopian?

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/United_Earth

United Earth sounds nice, but the United Citizen Federation is a bit less nice.

Which is going to get introduced because nations like Hungary, led by oil oligarchs connected to Russia, want to fk over whole EU for their personal gain.

You should work towards stronger union not weaken it.

I am a Czech citizen and a mild Euroskeptic. I definitely do not want the EU to become stronger than it already is. We have had enough experience where obsession with "more power" leads, and I do not want to see this scenario replayed again in slightly different conditions.

What I value about current EU is precisely that it cannot just squash dissent by force, even from a single country.

> What I value about current EU is precisely that it cannot just squash dissent by force, even from a single country.

And this often means that the EU can't get anything done on an EU wide level

That is, for me, a feature, not a bug. Consent is a great thing.

Many people of smaller nations like Czechs, that regained sovereignty after a long period of subjugation to various powers, do not really want to give it up again so that the French-German axis may have their job easier.

Why did they join the EU in the first place then? Was it for the money and having some entity to blame for domestic policy failures? The last point is what politicians here in Austria like to do

For the money, and to get rid of their Roma travelers (because those now legally migrate to west.)

We entered a EU that had veto powers for each member and I, personally, would like to stay it that way.

The fact that you once joined an organization does not mean that you must agree with any subsequent development.

I am not a Hungarian citizen, but I am grateful that Hungary often has enough courage to call nonsense a nonsense and use or threaten with their veto to bring a bit of sanity in the EU.

Heck, I can say that Hungary voted more frequently in my interest than my government.

The EU is frequently used to push some regulations in favour of big corps that would never pass in any of the national parliaments without a big fight. That's why I'm glad that at least someone sometimes can stop this.

Can you give any example of Hungary and Poland vetoing in good faith ?

Lately it seems they only cover own ass, while all other states are in agreement.

When only you see a problem its often the case you are the problem not the other way around.

Ps. I say that as a Polish citizen.

> Can you give any example of Hungary and Poland vetoing in good faith ?

Hungary and Poland were the only countries opposing the unlimited migration. Hungary is the only country that pushes back on sanctions that harms us in Germany more than them in Russia. Austria and Netherlands were opposing a huge debt package to fight corona.

> Lately it seems they only cover own ass, while all other states are in agreement.

Maybe state governments are in the agreements, but not the majority of population. In Germany, some topics were truly polarizing, governments frequently voted for topics that had domestic majority against it, and Hungary and Poland voted for what represents the will of German population majority.

On the other hand, in capitalistic economic theory, the only way to get a sane system is if everyone acts only in its own self-interest. Asking humans to do something for "common or higher good" usually leads to one party exploiting the other.

> When only you see a problem its often the case you are the problem not the other way around.

I doubt that in Europe, we ever had that strong consensus between European citizens. It's usually that governments have strong consensus that is not always reflected in the population.

Instead of ditching veto right, I would rather go the other direction, to the more Swiss style direct democracy, where power would be brought back to people, and away from the governments. If citizen could decide on important topics, we would not need veto at all.

> Ps. I say that as a Polish citizen.

As a German citizen, I wish you more power to your citizens, as opposed to EU or polish goverment, even when we have different preferences.

Current goverment policy is to make everyone, beside selected few, poor. So that everyone will be dependent on social programs.

Its terrifying how their every law was to destroy middle and upper middle class.

Its terrifying how polarized and tyrranical their actions towards media and oposition are.

Being totally against immigration is just xenophoby and/or bigotry.

Yes. The veto power allowed individual countries to block major decisions. Require 2/3 majorities for important stuff if you want but requiring all country leaders to agree on everything makes the EU too slow.

Not OP but also Dutch. Yes I would definitely like the EU to abolish veto powers and move to a majority rule. Europeans are too divided and need to band together to form a realistic opposition to the US and China. Veto rule is no way to govern a large group, since you only have to bribe a single member to cripple the whole. This has been known since at least the ancient Greek citystate era.

Why does the EU need to form a realistic opposition to the U.S.?

Because we don't like a foreign power influencing our policy to their own benefit and our detriment?

Given that the EU has been happy to use America's defense guarantee to subsidize their own defense for a few decades that doesn't exactly ring true. That said, I do understand the need for EU strategic autonomy, especially since the U.S. has been pushing for it since at least the Obama administration but I just found it odd that the U.S. would be lumped in with China. One's influence I'd say is clearly malign, the other often at least tries to be mutually beneficial.

>One's influence I'd say is clearly malign, the other often at least tries to be mutually beneficial.

A Chinese citizen would say the exact same thing, countries switched out. Both countries do whatever is in their own best interest, it's naive to pretend otherwise. Now what's in the U.S. best interest might have historically been more aligned with the EU, but that doesn't mean it stays that way.

Sure they would, and one country is actively committing genocide and one isn't. I'd say objectively there are differences in the actions a nation takes in its own interest. If there really were no constraints on actions a nation would take this would be a much darker world and I think the U.S. would have taken much more coercive actions against the EU in preferential trade policy and beyond long ago.

Subsidise their own defence? Defence from what? The only time NATO called the arms was when the US invoked article 5.

Additionally this article is from 2007. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/sep/16/iraq.iraqtimel... We are as of today still helping out in Iraq.

>but I just found it odd that the U.S. would be lumped in with China

When SWIFT was transacting with Iran after our negotiations you forced our hand to fit your own geopolitics. You force decisions about nato procurement to favour you (At times Germany has done so too tbh) and your industry then whine we don't spend enough.

Whenever it comes down to it your allies end up being pushed to act like vassals instead (see Japan being forced to do technology transfers to the US, to import US goods, set monetary policy favouring the US,etc in the 70's/ 80's all to essentially bail it out)

Then there's various examples of government sponsored corporate espionage.

Then there's things like our refugee wave resulting political turmoil stemming from our dealings in the middle east and the arab spring after north african countries and co tried in vain to protect their pegs against the dollar.

All in all I do think there's countless opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation and alignment between the US and EU but hell don't act like the US is some saint who never acts in it's own interest. At least with China nobody pretends.

Ps. I think the US rethoric regarding china is laden with hypocrisy. That's not to say China is not authoritarian, etc

I mean, has the war in Ukraine not shown that having a strong defense is necessary, even in Europe? If you're trying to point out that there hasn't been a war in the EU while it's been under America's security cordon, point well made.

Point taken on Iran, I understand that was annoying from the EU perspective and potentially an overplay of America's hand; but I guess I just think that if the EU and the U.S. aren't tightly aligned it will open up more potential activities from China who has shown themselves over and over to be significantly worse "partners" than America.

I don't think blaming the refugee wave on the U.S. is fair, there were a lot more factors at play than just countries unable to achieve a dollar peg, besides wasn't a huge amount of the turmoil (at least politically) from the Syrian refugee crisis, not N. Africa?

> All in all I do think there's countless opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation and alignment between the US and EU but hell don't act like the US is some saint who never acts in it's own interest. At least with China nobody pretends.

Of course the U.S. isn't a saint, but it is a country that does actually try to have some values in its engagements. Does it fail constantly or make deals that I think are awful and work with terrible people? Absolutely, such is geopolitics (although we do often have unforced errors there). But it's such a funny way to equivocate-- America does some bad things but is hypocritical but China is just absolutely terrible and has no qualms about it so both are bad? That makes no sense to me.

>I mean, has the war in Ukraine not shown that having a strong defense is necessary, even in Europe?

True but what defines a strong defence is arbitrary. Buying missiles that we don't even have the platform to fire is not (My country can retrain it's anti air capabilities every few years with the help of another...). Focusing on power projection capabilities to go fight in the middle east has different costs associated with it. The expenses we do are hardly well applied/fitting and often disproportionally favour the US (or other big players as mentioned earlier) as opposed to us. To then hear someone say we are subsidised by the US as if that spending is some form of charity rather than self interest... I am sorry but we don't rely on that >10% US spending to keep Russia out of NATO and the only other conceivable potential threat to EU member states is in NATO. What keeps Russia out of NATO are the nukes and/or conventional collective defence paired with having 7 times the population against a country with an economy smaller than Italy. Meanwhile we spent a lot in Iraq and Afghanistan aiding or perhaps if similarly construed :subsidising US foreign interests.

Also meanwhile 99% of the time where i argue with notably left or right wing people apprehensive about supporting Ukraine, the conversation basically get pushed to include that foreign interventionism with the full expectation that I will defend it in the same breath.

If anything needs work it's not our spending like Trump & co cried about. It's our inter EU political commitment against non direct threats and influence.

Example: Who the fuck cares that Germany is going increase it's military budget so much and spend a shit ton on equipment that'll never see active self defense use?? Who cares about that whilst the likes of Gerhard fucking Schröder sit on the board of Gazprom and the country blocks equipment support from for example Spain from going to Ukraine and plays up an almost comical level of incompetence to not deliver meaningful support.

Meanwhile the likes of France and Turkey are supporting opposing sides in Libya where one side has very strong ties to Putin and the other might help Turkey threaten Cyprus's territorial waters or we can look at Hungary and co doing their best to keep the gas flow going. Hell it's not like LukOil will close up shop here anytime soon either.

And it's not like the US is the adult in the room with all these examples of proverbial headless chickens in the face of the main realistic military threat lest we forget the Exxon deals, the propping up of places like Saudi Arabia as they in turn support Russia, etc.

These webs of self-interests are generally far more orthogonal to our clear and justifiable US-EU shared interests than most of our military spending or lack thereof.

>If you're trying to point out that there hasn't been a war in the EU while it's been under America's security cordon, point well made.

Why would there be a war in the EU? We're not exactly at each others throat anymore and it has it's own mutual defence clause. Hell remember some of DeGaulles reasoning for vetoing the UK from joining?

>Point taken on Iran, I understand that was annoying from the EU perspective and potentially an overplay of America's hand; but I guess I just think that if the EU and the U.S. aren't tightly aligned it will open up more potential activities from China who has shown themselves over and over to be significantly worse "partners" than America.

Nobody here sees China as partners in the same way outside of loose use of terms like trade partners which gets used for about every country on earth bar maybe north korea.

The US and we also need to realise we need to be a better "partners" than china in many scenarios outside of Europe. Americans especially like to harp on about predatory lending and the US even bribed african journalists to go of on it but at the end of the day China has been a less predatory lender than the IMF and the later is even forced to give african countries more breathing room due to the existence of the former as an alternative. I fully expect that China would be a lot lot worse if faced with less scrutiny and a similarly big ability to force hands. It only cuts it's losses in the face of a worse alternative... Luckily as it is it that competition exists and the US should probably adjust accordingly just the same to the benefit of those in the middle.

>I don't think blaming the refugee wave on the U.S. is fair, there were a lot more factors at play than just countries unable to achieve a dollar peg, besides wasn't a huge amount of the turmoil (at least politically) from the Syrian refugee crisis, not N. Africa?

I don't wish to point it solely on the US. It's just one of many factors but it's just one example of such influence that Americans generally don't consider. They (as do most) get a dumbed down news image painting a simple story of protests for democracy. Not a nuanced in depth view showing a mix of local nepotism, foreign influences, of cost of living skyrocketing being a trigger point and how that relates US monetary policy affecting other countries stemming from a relationship that has essentially subsidised US imports for decades and is protected by and a core part of it's foreign policy.

With someone who is honest and open about such relationships and what goes on to sustain them i don't have a strong urge to discuss. After all if we can agree on the fundamentals it comes down to a difference of opinion or personal factors that are hard for me to affect. Maybe that is one of my bad character traits. For example I have someone close to me like that supportive of a seriously authoritarian state...I dislike that but there was never an argument about whether it was authoritarian or the reasoning behind it's foreign policy so...I just leave it at that. There's no cognitive dissonance tied to someone plainly stating their self interest, selfishness or otherwise limited scope of support. When someone comes up with a holier than thou attitude and misconstrues the situation in their favour tho it sets me off.

And for the record I don't think the US, Russia or china for that matter are at all alone in this kind of stuff. Why France and the UK were so gung ho about Lybia deserves some more focus for example. Oil exploitation deals, political self-interests/nepotism and other things not happily spoken about openly are not limited superpowers after all.

>Of course the U.S. isn't a saint, but it is a country that does actually try to have some values in its engagements. Does it fail constantly or make deals that I think are awful and work with terrible people? Absolutely, such is geopolitics (although we do often have unforced errors there). But it's such a funny way to equivocate-- America does some bad things but is hypocritical but China is just absolutely terrible and has no qualms about it so both are bad? That makes no sense to me.

You yourself try to use these things as arguments tho? Even if the argument is pulled down to that of lesser evil it doesn't really do you any favours (see earlier article about the 1.2 million deaths for one) Also I don't see those values in it's engagements. Even when faced with a more clearly defined direct opponent of the past in the form of the USSR you don't get to champion certain values as something giving direction to your sides actions whilst at the same time supporting Pol pot, assassinating democratic leaders, etc. For those who are aware of the contradictions formed it has a backlash effect which is why today we see so many leftists picking unlikely sides or choosing non-alignment even when it does not make sense. See for example the imo silly takes of Vafourakis, Corbyn, melencon, etc regarding Ukraine.

I (and probably the previous commenter) don't want to move away from mutual benefit and interests regardless of all that but we do want more sovereignty. That's where the US get's put on the shelf with outside forces just like China (which has comparatively less influence). Nobody likes being in the position of an 80's japan or so because that's not how partnerships work at all.

> I mean, has the war in Ukraine not shown that having a strong defense is necessary, even in Europe?

In 2008 NATO Summit in Bucharest, NATO declared that Ukraine (and Georgia) will one day become a part of NATO. I read that France and Germany were against that decision for the fear of enraging Russia, but the US forced their opinion. Russia was enraged, and this is how we got to this war. My take from this war is that it's not always a good thing to let US orchestrate the security interests of Europe. Without US forcing their way through that summit, we might not have a war in Europe today.

Because we have learned the US to be an unreliable partner and a source for most of our problems, several times now. It's time to stand on our own feet.

Can I get a source on this? From my shallow understanding of history. Europe is the source of Europe’s problems.

Most does sound like quite a stretch but to be fair the U.S. has certainly caused some regional issues (e.g. slowing growth by cutting off trade with Iran, electronic surveillance in Europe on allies, pushing EU countries to buy American arms instead of developing domestic industries, pushing for large beneficial trade deals like nuclear plants that benefit American companies). But yes, most does not seem fair either to the U.S. or to Europe which does have some agency.

Don't forget about the countless wars of aggression the US has waged virtually everywhere on the globe in the last 80 years, or the constant 'regime changing' in unstable countries, most of them leading to an endless stream of refugees that end up on European shores.

Right about now, the US was a major factor in Euromaidan, in an attempt to weaken both Russia and the EU (say hello to Mrs. Nuland, will ya?), which directly paved the way to today's Ukraino-Russian war.

The US subsidizing defense spending has allowed the EU to vastly expand social welfare spending on healthcare and education.

Those $100B in arms Germany is about to purchase will be that much less spending on social programs.

Germany is essentially the 'why not both' girl [1]. No worries, those 100B Euros will come right out of additional taxes.

I want to point out that if we wouldn't get involved in foreign wars, we would not need that either. Last time we had a massive uptick of taxes for military spending (in the 1910s), we built a fleet to battle the British Navy (and we're still paying those taxes today).

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgk-lA12FBk

The EU has been far too dependent on the US. Just after WW2, and arguably during the Cold War, this was unavoidable, but things have changed. The EU is a lot stronger now, whereas the US is becoming less reliable as an ally; 20 years ago, they suckered the world into two long, harmful wars, there's been a movement towards extreme nationalism, away from international cooperation, and even away from democracy in recent years.

On top of that, there are a lot of principles on civil and human rights that are core the EU that the US doesn't subscribe too; they're still not member of the ICC, they rarely prosecute their own war criminals, use torture, extralegal assassination, and have a tendency to strong-arm other nations, including European allies, into doing what the US security apparatus wants.

Make no mistake, when tensions with totalitarian dictatorships like China or Russia rise, the EU will always jump into bed with the US, because the flawed humanitarian values of the US are still better than none at all, and we're still allies. But the US is not the beacon of human rights and democracy that it once was, or was presented as. The EU should be more independent and champion this values independently from the US. And that should include criticism when the US fails to live up to those values.

I think this is concerning and a misunderstanding of human and geopolitical behaviour.

Once some of the EUs more insane policies are forced on countries the desire to leave will spread.

> Veto rule is no way to govern a large group, since you only have to bribe a single member to cripple the whole.

Are you saying there is a corruption issue right now?

With majority rule (size TBD) a handful of countries will ride roughshod over others. Enjoy centrally set tax rates

> With majority rule (size TBD) a handful of countries will ride roughshod over others. Enjoy centrally set tax rates

The currently discussed quorum is 55% of the EU countries representing at least 65% of the EU population. There's a neat voting calculator here https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/council-eu/voting-system/... where you can figure out how majorities could work or be blocked. It's a pretty reasonable voting mechanism where small countries can block the vote if they group up, but also larger countries with substantial share of the population can as well.

Fact remains that larger countries with larger populations carry a larger weight - but individual countries can't hold the EU hostage any longer (Even Germany with the largest population share can't block a vote alone)

Also, the EU doesn't set taxes. It requires some minimum on specific taxes to prevent a race to the bottom (corporate taxes), but pretty much all taxes are set by the states.

That's the point. It wants to set taxes and has made moves in the past even with veto.

> Are you saying there is a corruption issue right now?

If you have followed Hungary's trajectory under Orban it is pretty obvious that there are corruption issues. Not that Hungary is the only country affected, it's just the most obvious

No mention of Russia interesting

Don't know why this was downvoted into oblivion. Seems like the point adds to conversation, isn't rude, ignorant, etc. Whether or not you might agree with them.

Because it is a loaded question (check the wording) that also mostly backfired.

It wasn't loaded. It was a genuine question. Did it backfire?

I voted remain. But the brexiteer argument was that the EU is NOT just a trading bloc and has conspiratorial designs on further reduction in national sovereignty. Indeed the EU commission are seeking this right now and have plans to campaign for it.

The remain campaigners and media denied this. They denied even that the EU wanted a military.

The responses to my question indicate that these people support further reductions in national sovereignty to be handed over to EUP and EUC. Tax setting powers and foreign policy powers included.

It literally proves the Brexit supporters correct.

Not OP but can't wait.

Yes, the veto powers are the one thing that needs to go real quick if the EU wants a chance at standing on its own legs on the geopolitical table.

Right now, we have governments corrupted by Chinese influence (e.g. by ports and other infrastructure being bought up in Greece and Italy), by Russian influence (just look at Hungary's Orban blocking EU sanctions) or by autocratic/fundamentalist politicians (Hungary, Poland, very nearly France).

Personally, I believe that the US will again fall victim to Trumpian populism in this year's elections and in 2024 they will either re-elect Trump or someone he has groomed to be his puppet. At that point, the US will cease to be an ally that the European Union can rely on, and we will have to be able to stand up to Russia and China - which is going to be impossible if the above-mentioned member states will always threaten to sabotage anything.

We need an urgent reform of the entire EU foundation: the veto powers have to go, the European Parliament needs the right to initiate laws (currently, only the Commission has that right), and there must be a way to suspend governments that grossly violate core European values.

You don't think the veto powers ending will precipitate the end of the EU as we know it?

Veto powers are a good thing as long as you don't have too many parties involved. With an EU27+++, they are unsustainable (as seen by what has become known as the Visegrad block).

So, as an EU citizen: Let's get rid of these.

Hell yeah. Single member states fucking it up over local posturing is a huge defect in the current EU. Getting rid of the veto is a win for democracy. The EU is getting better every day.

The veto isn't the only, or even the primary mechanism for countries to have a decisive say in EU affairs, the other and I'd argue far more important one is the opt-out. The UK had many opt-outs such as from the Euro, the Schengen Agreement, the working time directive, etc. Denmark also opted out of the Euro.

It's why I felt the Brexit argument about sovereignty and being forced into things was so spurious. The worst example of an EU rule we were 'forced into' I could find was some food labels (which BTW we still use). As long as a country is smart about what it does or doesn't opt into, there's plenty of scope to chart your own course within the wider EU program.

"It's why I felt the Brexit argument about sovereignty and being forced into things was so spurious. The worst example of an EU rule we were 'forced into' I could find was some food labels (which BTW we still use)."

How much did you look? Or did you find examples of rules the UK was forced into and decide you agree with them.

Here's an example of why the opt-outs were never reliable, like so much else about the EU's supposed democratic mechanisms.

When the European Convention on Human Rights was written - with major input from the UK - it was meant as a general statement of principle, and is thus filled with vague and contradictory language. It was never meant to be law. Many decades later the EU decided it should be transformed into binding law on every EU member. The UK and Poland quite sensibly pointed out that this would go badly and it would be impossible to predict the consequences. So they negotiated an opt-out.

The opt-out was called Protocol 30 and is written in the plainest and clearest English the negotiators could write. It even restates the same thing twice "for the avoidance of doubt". It appeared to contain no loopholes. Nonetheless, just a few years later the ECJ passed a ruling that the opt-out was void. They simply annulled it and because EU membership means accepting ECJ supremacy, that was the end of the "opt-out". Overnight, EU human rights law took effect in the UK too: exactly the thing the government thought it had prevented.

To rub salt in the wound, the case before the court was to do with sending an "asylum seeker" back to Greece under the Dublin Convention. This was a now dead part of EU law that stated the country that decides to allow an asylum seeker into the EU must process them. The ECJ decided that actually it didn't like this rule, because it was "unfair", and so annulled that too along the way, with the justification that Greece was such a hellhole it would infringe his human rights to send the asylum seeker back. Again, nobody reasonable saw that coming and the rules as written just evaporated the moment they came into conflict with EU ideology.

The history of the EU is full of stories like this. When you learn enough about it, you eventually realize that the treaties and rules are meaningless. It doesn't matter how clearly everyone seems to understand an agreement, tomorrow they might have come up with some Kafka-esque justification for why it didn't actually mean what everyone said it meant. These changes always seem to be to the benefit of the EU institutions themselves, not the people.

Such a system of government can never be accountable or trustworthy. Law has to be interpreted as written, not simply discarded the moment it becomes inconvenient. As such the Brexit supporters were right to claim the opt-outs were meaningless. Especially given the pro-EU sentiment of much of the establishment.

It's time they did, I'm sick of seeing my home countries (and other EU nations) government f** over the rest to push some agenda. Make it a 2/3 majority and the EU is forced to find a realistic compromise instead of an unrealistic expectation of unity. Have you ever tried getting 25 persons to agree on something?

A few years ago when the Union Jack had to go from the row of EU flags (because of Brexit), my city's council (of the Dutch town of Leeuwarden) replaced it with suitable alternative:

https://www.google.com/maps/@53.1969993,5.7943724,3a,75y,247...

Scottish folk seem to appreciate the gesture. :)

> As a Brit that didn’t want Scotland to be independent last time around

Not judging, I'm honestly curious why you didn't want them to be independent and thought that, "as a Brit" it was your position to have an opinion on Scotland's independence other than "whatever they want"?

Me, Australian living in England.

Because fracturing your country and making it poorer and smaller probably isn’t desirable?

A non Yugoslavian, I regret the breakup of Yugoslavia immensely but I do wonder if any of the former constituent states would agree with you regarding Scotland or me regarding Yugoslavia?

Note that it's an open question if the Scots economy would remain worse per capita, not disagreeing there is/was pain ahead in transition.

From former Czechoslovakia, our disintegration was a mixed parcel.

The best thing is that Slovaks had to stand on their own feet and their nationalists slowly had stop blaming everything on Prague. This kind of whiny nationalism embodied by then-prime minister of Slovakia Vladimir Meciar is somewhat disgusting and I can see its softer version in Scotland right now.

The worst thing is that yes, our international weight has gone down significantly.

But there was customs union between CZ and SK even after the split. I cannot imagine the economic pain if the former federation was suddenly divided by a hard border, as Scotland and England would be.

> I cannot imagine the economic pain if the former federation was suddenly divided by a hard border, as Scotland and England would be.

It doesn't have to be, even if Scotland was part of EU and not England.

UK and Spain/EU negociated maintaining some of the Schengen rules for the Gibraltar/Spain border despite its status still being disputed by Spain and a bumpy history. There is no reason Scotland and rest of UK cannot have a treaty allowing soft border.

Looking at the Irish situation right now, I am skeptical about any such treaty with regard to Scotland.

IMO the collapse of Yugoslavia has mostly made the newly-independent states doomed to be forever at the periphery of capital.

> "Note that it's an open question if the Scots economy would remain worse per capita, not disagreeing there is/was pain ahead in transition"

"Remain" is doing a lot of work here. Scotland runs a sizeable deficit with the rest of the union and with the decline of North Sea oil revenues that will only increase. Of course that might not "remain", but leaving the UK and then joining the EU is going to create a 5-10 year period of turbulence as well.

Still, there's more important things than GDP.

Smaller is desireable (leaner government, and fairer representation). Poorer is a matter of opinion -- Scotland has a healthy economy.

I’m talking from the perspective of a non-Scottish citizen. The UK - a healthy economy = poorer.

Smaller vs larger has arguments on either side. I think when you’re talking about major world powers there’s an appeal to not downsizing.

Decentralization is a key to robustness. I can't speak for this particular case. But generally I think it is desirable to have. Real sustainable progress often happens in the small and builds bottom up. People in different regions have different needs and ways of doing things. Distributed power leads to less exploitation.

You obviously haven't been to Belgium, which has 6 governments (and prime ministers) for a country that has the size of 1/10th of Italy. Decentralization has benefits, yes, but as for everything there are limits to it.

So what's the negatives Belgium is suffering from, because of their 6 governments? Comparing them to the rest of the EU, Belgium seems quite successful at whatever they are doing.

There's a cost, and it is often annoying and widely discussed, even joked about in highly federal countries. But there's benefits that are quite apparent I think.

I believed that the UK is better off as a united country. Not all that different from the logic for the UK staying in the EU: larger economic markets help everyone. A union of likeminded nations is better then isolation. I also have both English and Scottish relatives (one reason I consider myself a “Brit”) so you could say the concept plays into my self image.

> it was your position to have an opinion

I suppose I could have pretended that I didn’t have an opinion on it, but I did. The important part is that I didn’t have a vote so my opinion wasn’t anything other than my opinion.

Scotland can be independent _and_ be in the same economic market (ignoring UK and Spain willing to veto Scotland reentering EU out of spite / own political motives).

Spain would have a different perspective post brexit: one in the eye for Gibraltar.

Spain will only veto Scotland if the independence is not agreed between the UK and Scotland (in the same spirit of Spain's opinion of Kosovo independence).

Spain parliament is against unilateral declarations of independence.

> Spain parliament is against unilateral declarations of independence.

For background, it's because the Spanish government is afraid that recognizing independence movements legitimizes the Catalonian independence movement in their own country.

It's not only that. After the Civil War and Franco's regime, Spain's political tradition is to avoid conflict and wars at all cost.

> Spain parliament is against unilateral declarations of independence.

Very convenient of them isn’t it?

Aren't they allowed to have an opinion?

How would the UK veto an independent Scotland reentering the EU? They no longer have a vote to do so.

Not any more, but they could’ve after the previous independence referendum if it had gone that way.

It was a talking point during the Scottish independence referendum (pre-Brexit referendum).

As a Brit, Scotland is part of Britain - and independence would be (in a sense) losing a part of a birthright (to live and work in Scotland).

But it’s always been a separate country, and people are sovereign over history so it’s their choice.

Would be nice if there was a Common Travel Area with the UK afterwards, though.

As another Brit, a Londoner, who didn't want Scotland to go.

1. Because I enjoy living in a country that has the Scots in it - without Scotland the country would be diminished, less interesting and more insular.

2. Generally, I think fracturing is a bad thing. I wanted to stay in the EU for similar reasons.

This isn't to say that I don't think that Scots should have self determination, just that I would be sad if they went.

I imagine some Australians would feel the sanme if - say - New South Wales decided to become an independent country

Well, I have always joked that Sydney should just succeed and become it's own city-state...

NZ was offered statehood and wisely declined. Our loss. Treaty now!

It would go a long way towards reversing New Zealand's brain drain.

I think NZ still has a standing option to join Australia though, no?

You probably mean secede, but it’s nice of you to wish them well!

Thank you! I did try googling and I thought i got it right (against my better judgement), but obviously not.

If it were Queensland, the rest of us would probably be okay with it.

Edit: just to clarify, that was meant as a good-natured ribbing. We’d definitely miss Queensland. Mostly Noosa.

Because Scotland is a part of the United Kingdom and their secession is therefore of great consequence for the rest of the union - how is that not obvious? I live in Scotland FYI.

I am undecided on independence, but clearly part of the calculus is how it effects matters of concern to the rest of the UK. Consider what is to me, the following con and pro:

(1) Scotland is more left-wing than the rest of the UK and its secession would condemn the rest of the union to indefinite right-wing government.

(2) The UK's nuclear subs would have to be restationed, but there isn't a suitable harbour anywhere in the rest of the UK, creating an opportunity for it to be scrapped.

> (1) Scotland is more left-wing than the rest of the UK and its secession would condemn the rest of the union to indefinite right-wing government.

Scotland's voters cannot influence the vote in England, under any circumstances.

If you want rid of the Tories, you have to teach England not to vote for the Tories.

I have no idea what you are talking about. In the UK general election citizens of all realms of the UK vote, meaning that Scotland being more left-wing has led to comparatively more left-wing UK governments than would be the case in its absence. So 'if you want rid of the Tories', Scotland is a great asset.

The union worked well as long as voters in Scotland and England voted similarly, but that hasn't been the case since the 1970s.

Scottish voters only rarely influence the outcome of elections to the Westminster parliament, because even thought they vote differently, they only make up about 10% of the GB population (Northern Ireland has different political parties). Almost always, whatever the English electorate votes for, Scotland gets, even when voters in Scotland vote differently.

In the few exceptions where England voted Tory but got Labour because of Scottish votes, how was that fair on England?

IMO any discussion about “fairness” is null and void while the U.K. has a FPTP electoral system. It’s inherently unfair and a poor representation of voters wishes, no matter which country they live in.

I agree - there are better systems, such as the one for the Scottish Parliament. There was a referendum on changing the system to a slightly better one in 2011, but that was rejected.

>"In the few exceptions where England voted Tory but got Labour because of Scottish votes, how was that fair on England?"

You can always say that if one region that voted for the winning party in a close election hadn't, the outcome would have been different. I don't understand how that's unfair, it's inherent in the arithmetic of majoritarian democracy. You could say the same thing about London or the northwest, which both err leftwards. Unless you're starting off with the idea that Scotland and England are fundamentally different units? Which begs the question.

You're very carefully dodging the main point made by DonaldFisk: that it rarely matters how Scotland votes. Whoever England votes for, Scotland gets. We could've sent 59 Scottish Labour MPs to Westminster in each of the last three elections and it wouldn't have changed a thing, because England wanted a Conservative government.

>Whoever England votes for, Scotland gets. We could've sent 59 Scottish Labour MPs to Westminster in each of the last three elections and it wouldn't have changed a thing, because England wanted a Conservative government.

In 2017, if Scotland didn't elect 13 Conservatives to Westminster then Theresa May would not have been able to form a government with the DUP. If it also didn't elect 4 Liberal Democrats then Theresa May would not have been able to form a government even if she somehow managed to establish a three-way power-sharing agreement with the DUP and the Liberal Democrats. In that event May probably wouldn't have been able to form a government, and there would have been new elections. And remember, May was in abysmal straits at the time.

> You're very carefully dodging the main point

Well, the 'point' wasn't a response to the existing conversation. It was a random interpolation, and I didn't find it very remarkable. In a Parliament of 650 seats no randomly selected bloc of 59 constituencies is likely to play a deciding role in the outcome. It will happen sometimes, but not often. But why would it be otherwise? Of course, if you start off with the belief that Scotland is an independent entity that merits complete self-determination, then that will be a problem. But that begs the question, again.

But that's contradicting the original point you were making about Scotland pulling the UK left isn't it? It sounds like you're saying "Scotland matters ... sometimes. Look, 20% of you helped elect Theresa May!"

That's not what we were talking about, which is that Scotland consistently votes to the left. And there is no way we can get a left-wing government, because England votes to the right. And it kind of doesn't matter that we seem to have picked the SNP, because even if we chose Labour it'd still not make a difference because England votes Tory and likely will do for the forseeable.

> In a Parliament of 650 seats no randomly selected bloc of 59 constituencies

This isn't a randomly selected bloc. This is very well defined and distinct territory - which is the topic of this ENTIRE article we're discussing might I add - so I don't know why you'd play daft and pretend otherwise.

I am going to keep my comments to a minimum because I think this is becoming an unproductive exchange.

> But that's contradicting the original point

You have said there's a contradiction, but have not said what it is. I have no idea what you think it is.

> Scotland consistently votes to the left. And there is no way we can get a left-wing government, because England votes to the right.

It is obviously possible for the UK to elect a left-wing government. I don't know why you think otherwise.

> This isn't a randomly selected bloc

My point is that there is no reason to expect a bloc of 59 constituencies to consistently decide the outcome of general elections. That is not in and of itself necessarily a problem. You need further, independent arguments to show why it is a problem for Scotland.

> You have said there's a contradiction, but have not said what it is. I have no idea what you think it is.

So you said Scotland moves the UK left. We said Scotland can't move the UK left, England is too Tory and too big. You said, but wait Scotland giving 13/59 seats to the Tories seats helped deliver Theresa May to victory. Wat.

> It is obviously possible for the UK to elect a left-wing government. I don't know why you think otherwise.

Again, that is entirely up to England and their best hope is Labour who don't seem particularly interested in either winning or shifting left. Hence our frustration.

> My point is that there is no reason to expect a bloc of 59 constituencies to consistently decide the outcome of general elections ... You need further, independent arguments to show why it is a problem for Scotland.

It would be weird if we "consistently decided" the outcome of elections, but I didn't say that. And please don't make me list all the reasons why Scotland isn't simply 59 constituencies, or even a region like Yorkshire. Absolutely no shade towards Yorkshire, it is a lovely place but I think we both know the difference.

I honestly think you might just be getting a kick out of winding up a Scot. If you were then, well I hope you had fun :) If not then I'm sorry I'm really not trying to be a dick. This might be something that's more based on what you identify your nationality as. If you consider yourself as "British" first, and "English" second (or, as is common British which equals English) then what I am saying will obviously not resonate at all. For me my nationality is "Scottish" - "British" is just an entry in my passport, it's not a thing I feel I particularly identify with. I get the impression you're a leftie overall, so whatever happens re indyref2 I think we're on the same side.

> In the few exceptions where England voted Tory but got Labour because of Scottish votes, how was that fair on England?

That hasn't happened. The UK gets the government England votes for.

As a Brit who voted for Scottish independence last time, against the wishes of many of my family and those around me, if this happens again then I'll vote against the SNP's wishes. They said it was a once in generation vote. I made my case, as did everyone else, we all had the chance to vote on it, and my side lost. Democratic votes need the consent of the loser, not I didn't get my way so let's have another vote. Brexit has nothing to do with it, a third of those voting for independence also want(ed) independence from the EU, it's just an excuse.

I don't even think they have the support this time as much as they did last time. It's opportunist, mendacious, unwarranted and ill-considered politicking that I will fight tooth and nail against.

And that, as they say, is why we vote the Prime Minister and parliament for life, instead of having repeated elections every 5 years.

If you think having referenda is comparable, then let's have them every 5 years too, on both Scottish independence or rejoining the the Union, and on Brexit or rejoining the EU.

It's just the same.

I voted against it as I didn't want to lose my EU membership; which we were told would happen.

A few years later, an unrepresentative (to scotland) tory government takes it from us anyway because they were frightened of nigel farage and some middle englanders don't like hearing polish in their local tescos.

A lot of my friends who were remain for various reasons seem to be leaning towards independence. 'We were told it was a one time vote' isn't a good enough reason to stay pegged to this ship. The worst outcome for scotland already happened, we lost our EU citizenship, so what's the use of carrying along with the UK?

That being said, I would hope that the SNP aren't running things after independence.

I think we'd continue with a proportional-representation system, so as-it-stands they'd sort of be running things but they'd need a coalition partner like they have in the Scottish Greens.

> A few years later, an unrepresentative (to scotland) tory government takes it from us anyway because they were frightened of nigel farage and some middle englanders don't like hearing polish in their local tescos.

You want a referendum because other people you disagree with were given a referendum that you then lost? And you paint this as "tory government takes it from us"?

I also note that millions voted, it'd be hard for them all to be middle Englanders. I just wonder why you need to paint it so far from reality and in a way that only suits you?

secession from a union that is not representing your interests is valid.

this was the case for brexit, why is it different for scotland?

I wrote that I voted for independence right at the top of the thread, did you miss that?

Reasons for wanting a referendum are none of your business. It suffices to say they want one.

If it fails, then not enough wanted to leave. That is all.

When they failed to do Brexit for years running, and it turned out the arguments for were lies, there should have been another Brexit vote. It would have failed, and a great deal of trouble would be saved.

It's strange that I was allowed to vote in the last one if it's none of my business.

> they want one.

Polls consistently show less than 50%. Perhaps the "they" you meant is the SNP?

The point is you don't know until the vote how it would turn out. If you did know, there would be no need for the vote.

You don't know why the overwhelming majority of them voted as they did. Maybe most of them can't be said to know. It suffices that they voted.

I think you're changing the point. Why is it none of my business?

It is nobody's business. A vote is a vote.

If I get to vote then it is my business, else I wouldn't or shouldn't get a vote.

It's none of your business why they want to call a referendum, or why anybody would vote as they would, or how they would vote, individually. There may be as many reasons as votes. You will of course vote on it as you please, or not vote, and it's also nobody else's business whether or how you voted, or why.

You are free to announce how you will vote, and why. And you can change your mind afterward, and vote the opposite, without telling anybody.

This is all absolutely elementary civics.

> It's none of your business why they want to call a referendum

The intentions of politicians are not my business and that is "absolutely elementary civics". That isn't credible.

As to the rest, obvious and irrelevant. When did I make any comment on someone else's right or reasons to vote? I didn't, thank for noticing enough that you refrain from attempting to use it to obscure the issue at hand - your claim about what is my business or not.

Politicians are expected to do what voters are demanding.

They can guess reasons why they think voters want it, and some voters may suggest reasons they think will be persuasive. The pols might offer reasons, too, but they don't really know, so you won't really know either.

And, it doesn't matter. You will vote for, against, or abstain, regardless. People can try to persuade you, but they are not obliged to tell you the truth about their own reasons. The pols, anyway, just want to get elected again and hope that supporting or blocking a referendum vote will do that for them. That is their actual reason. but it doesn't help you any.

If you really believe everybody is telling you the real reasons why they do, promote, or block this or that, I have a bridge to sell you.

I obviously won't believe the SNP from now on, not that I did. You can keep that bridge, perhaps find some less principled pro-independence voters to sell it to.

It's not quite as straightforward as that.

Scotland overwhelmingly voted remain. Scotland also is not represented by the Tory government in Westminster.

These are constitutional issues, and the people should be given the choice if they want this to continue or not.

I don't think being asked to chose is undemocratic, it's /exactly/ democracy. Let the people decide.

> Scotland overwhelmingly voted remain. Scotland also is not represented by the Tory government in Westminster.

Scotland did not get a vote, and there are Scottish Tories, and there are members of parliament from all the regions of Scotland. Scottish people are represented better than English people in all respects.

> These are constitutional issues, and the people should be given the choice if they want this to continue or not.

I agree, I voted in the last referendum and I will vote in the next. I disagree with the behaviour of the nationalists so I will vote against them.

> I don't think being asked to chose is undemocratic, it's /exactly/ democracy. Let the people decide.

Do you think that politicians making blatant lies to the public is democratic? I'm not asking if it happens or is likely or an unfortunate aspect of politics, I'm asking if you think it should be part of the way things are actually done and if the voters should overlook it - is it democratic?

> If you think having referenda is comparable, then let's have them every 5 years too, on both Scottish independence or rejoining the the Union, and on Brexit or rejoining the EU.

Yes, absolutely. Once Scotland is independent we absolutely should keep checking to see if everyone thinks it's a good idea.

If the majority votes to rejoin the rest of the UK politically, we should do that.

It's not a revolving door decision. You can't vote-force your way into joining a separate country or political institution, e.g. Ukraine can't simply gain a majority vote to be part of the EU and it happens.

This is why it's seen as a once-in-a-generation vote. The impacts are so huge, revolutionary and so long-term, that it's not a conversation you want to have every 4-5 years until one year you chance your way to the preferred result.

But we should still check that things are going the way people expect them to, right?

Of course the point is moot - can you point to any former part of the English Empire that has ever expressed a desire to get back to being ruled by them?

Multiple european countries have referendums multiple times per year, on topics whose effects are much harder to undo (like education plans).

I can't say that many, including myself, would agree that education plans are on the same level as independence.

But maybe I'm wrong. How often are independence referenda held in Europe?

> I can't say that many, including myself, would agree that education plans are on the same level as independence.

Perhaps not (your choice), but education plans definitely influence _at least_ a generation -- and they are changed almost on every change of legislative color without either a public vote or otherwise much fanfare.

This stuff eventually has a much more profound impact than independence (for starters, education plans can and do influence which % of the population is in favor of such independence; but they can also influence how much the culture diverges between the two "countries", e.g. by promoting regional languages). And this is just an example. Additional devolutions also have an impact that is at least on the same level, and again usually passes without much fanfare either.

> But maybe I'm wrong. How often are independence referenda held in Europe?

We had at least 2-3 last decade? And this entire thread is about another one...

> We had at least 2-3 last decade?

Which countries? I note 4 if Ukraine is part of Europe, but that would mean you have to recognise Crimea's referendum as legal and valid. Not a hill I'd die on. Catalunya's and Venice's were not recognised by Spain or Italy, so we're left with Scotland's.

Unless there were others?

Nouvelle-Calédonie/Kanak (3 times in the last decade), Scotland, Catalonia are the ones I had in mind, thus the 2-3 . I was not aware of Venice's one, so make that 2-4. I am sure there are others, considering my area of knowledge is limited to western european countries.

I mentioned Catalonia's, it was not legitimate or recognised by Spain. I sympathise with their movement but it's not relevant here, anymore than if I hold a vote in my bedroom to set up my own state.

Nouvelle-Calédonie is in the Pacific, not Europe, but I'll give you that one because it makes your argument look like a giant stretch.

> I am sure there are others

Forgive me, but are you expecting me to take you seriously if you can't be bothered to look it up? I could characterise my time on HN as wasting time, but I don't engage on here for a total waste of my time. Please, give me and everyone else here more respect than that and put in some effort, even if you don't have the knowledge or expertise or insight. At least that would be understandable and forgivable.

> a third of those voting for independence also want(ed) independence from the EU

Do you have a source for that? I only heard of the opposite, but that was mainly Reddit and HN where Europeans are usually pretty pro-EU.

No, because if I search for the polls that show it I only get results for this news! Sorry. There were a few polls that showed it at the time of both referendums, the BBC definitely covered it. If I find one in amongst the sea of bad search results I'll post it.

It shouldn't be a surprise logically, as the cases can be seen as similar, but the media prefer the simple black and white cases so we're a rarely spoken of breed.

Edit: sorry, typo, I wrote "It should be a surprise" when I meant "It shouldn't be a surprise".

Your sibling found an article, thank you for bringing this to my attention :)

No problem, I was amazed at their Google-fu! :)

There's this: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/scotland-blog/2016/may/1...

Perfect, thank you.

Relevant quote:

> In February, Ipsos Mori found 29% of SNP supporters would vote to leave while Survation for the Daily Mail put the SNP’s Brexit vote at 28%. On 2 May, the latest Survation poll, for the Daily Record, found 25% of pro-independence voters want to leave the EU – more than the 16% of no voters in that poll who back Brexit.

I am not British or Scottish and have no skin in the game, but what is the harm in revoting if things seem to have changed? Either things didn’t change and everyone votes the same anyway, in which case it was a waste of time but reconfirms the status quo, or things actually are different and then you know and can act on it. Is there a special history or feature in UK democracy where things are only ever voted on one time per generation for some reason?

How often do you think independence referenda should be held?

When it’s a close vote and circumstances are changing rapidly, I’d say pretty often. Maybe every two or three years until some kind of consensus emerges? It seems like an important topic you wouldn’t want to suppress except for once every sixty years or whatever, and might force some negotiation to get to a better place whether through independence or reconciliation.

This is assuming the role of the government here is to track what the people want and execute their will. Maybe it’s different in the UK (again, I don’t live there and I know it’s a complicated system).

> When it’s a close vote and circumstances are changing rapidly, I’d say pretty often

And if you hold the vote every 2-3 years, and the result alternates between Yes and No, at what point will you say "stop, this is a final decision"?

Several inconclusive outcomes don't add up to one conclusive one.

This is the democracy version of p-hacking.

About as often as a significant part of the population wants to hold them.

and the same for a rejoining referendum?

The same for any referendum.

52%? 66%? Under 50%?

What is significant here?

It would match the % required to pass the referendum. So if 65% is required, for example, and it seems like 65% might support it, then you should find out. What % is required to pass a binding referendum in the UK? What was required to determine the will of the people for Brexit?

You could do it for example like so: First you give volunteers limited time to collect a relatively small number of signatures, say about 1% of the voters in half a year, to start the process. If that is successful you transfer responsibility to the government and have the government determine whether at least 20% of the population is interested. If so, you hold the referendum.

Whenever the people vote for it. The SNP (and Greens) were crystal clear in their manifestos in the last elections and people voted for it. In general, people hope that the politicians should do what they said that they would. With Brexit and Tory policies over 10 years, it seems reasonable to have the vote. I would prefer one vote to start the process and final confirmation vote once the exact deal is established. Always a good idea to know exactly what is being offered before taking the deal (total opposite of Brexit) [scot living in Scotland]

How often do you think the entire government of a state should change? Some would argue every 4-5 years makes it impossible to have politicians with long term thinking. Why not have elections once every generation?

If Scotland votes for independence should they hold a referendum every 4-5 years on rejoining the UK?

If enough people want it, then of course? Why is this even a question? It is a democratic country last time I checked, if the chosen government representing the people decides that a referendum is what the public want....it should be held regardless of how much time has elapsed.

Sure, if they want to. UK should also feel free to say “eh nah” in that case.

Not so simple, UK will also have referendums on will they allow Scotland to join or kick them out. Also by nature of politics, the two referendums will not align so people would still be unhappy.

Whenever there's a seismic enough event like, I dunno, leaving the European Union. That was a fairly effective scare-tactic used by the No campaign - you'll kicked out of the EU, you won't actually meet the criteria! These were pretty huge points that spooked a lot of people into not voting or voting No.

It's not really seismic though, is it? Both options in each referendum were reasonable, there's plenty of countries in the EU and plenty out that do well, plenty have left the Britain and done well, those in the UK are doing fine.

I didn't like the scare tactics in either campaign on either side (though the status quo sides' in each were notably more on the scare side). I see it as an excuse from those who would take any excuse they can.

Yes it really is seismic, it is a huge stretch to claim it was anything less than that (otherwise it wouldn't have been such a big issue to threaten the Yes vote with). And furthermore as a Scot living in the EU, believe me it is not simply an "excuse".

> as a Scot living in the EU, believe me it is not simply an "excuse"

Your living situation does not obviate the SNP's pledge.

> Yes it really is seismic,

My living situation is to live in a region with actual earthquakes, big ones at times too. A change of a trade deal is not in the same universe, let alone world, of effect upon people's daily lives or political events as that. You need to calm yourself down and get some perspective.

If this referendum comes to pass I'll move back to give my vote against it (unless I get my chance from here). That's how much I'm against it, and keep in mind, I voted for independence the first time. It's slimy and I won't have it.

Edit: I accidentally left part of the responder above's comment that I pasted in, not quoted properly. It was confusing so I removed it.

Ok if you're going to be overly literal then substitute "seismic" for "very, very big and disruptive for many people". I think if we're at the point where you're picking away at my choice of adjective we might be done with this discussion :-/

What I'm doing is comparing the literal with the figurative, as that is how the figurative comes to be. It's not seismic, your passport will change colour and some immigration rules changed. You, as someone living in Europe will have a more bothersome time than before but you're still there, right?

What you are experiencing is nothing compared to what non-EU citizens (who are largely non-white) had to go through when coming to the UK - why were we favouring Romanians and Hungarians over Indians and Singaporians? I've no idea.

Still, it was a change in a trade pact.

> what is the harm in revoting if things seem to have changed?

Opportunity cost. Politics and diplomacy take time and effort. Time and effort that could be spent developing plans that have utility.

For example, we have many domestic matters in Finland that need political attention, but guess where all the resources have gone lately? Dealing with covid and russians.

The referendum was justified as once in a generation, and this phrase was repeated ad nauseam, and this deal was partly why the referendum happened. It wasn't said "once in a generation unless there's a big change", big changes happen in countries all the time, so by demanding a referendum now the rules are being changed.

The next generation will have a chance to vote on this, and if they think independence from the EU is a big deal, they can vote accordingly.

If a sizable number of people specifically voted against independence out of desire to remain in the EU, then their votes were undermined. Voting is supposed to represent the will of the people, and I don't think it's fair to treat it like a gamble that this generation just lost because whoops, England changed their circumstances and people said "once in a generation" a bunch of times. Did the voters agree to this "once in a generation" condition, or was it imposed upon them?

> Voting is supposed to represent the will of the people

The will of the people is always discovered within some rules, otherwise we could vote for many more things, instead of every four years. The rule in this case was to vote now, and wait decades for the next chance.

> England changed their circumstances and people said "once in a generation" a bunch of times

Circumstances always change, and they were bound to change within a generation, it was naive to think they wouldn't. Voting every decade with a 40% chance of independence happening means independence will happen just when the moods swing that way.

Let me ask you, were circumstances going to change if Scotland was independent, should the new Scottish government check for the will of the people on whether they should reunite with the UK? How often should they do this? Of course this hasn't even crossed the mind of any Scottish politician and will never happen.

That's silly.

I have no dog in this fight, but people are allowed to change their opinion, especially as circumstances change. If what your choice was based on changed, then it's perfectly logical for your choice to change in response.

Holding up to "once in a generation" promises is stupid, though so was making such a claim to start with.

> people are allowed to change their opinion

Since I've changed mine I think that is called teaching granny to suck eggs.

> If what your choice was based on changed, then it's perfectly logical for your choice to change in response.

I was told it was a once in a generation vote - has that changed? What constitutes a big enough change to bring a new vote? How often should these type of referenda be held?

> Holding up to "once in a generation" promises is stupid, though so was making such a claim to start with.

Yes, you must forgive me for thinking that principles and promises are worth sticking to. I should be as cynical as politicians and simply go by what is convenient, right?

Why is holding the pro-independence people to "once in a generation" okay but not holding the contra-independence people to "this is the only way to stay in the EU"?

The issue was a vote on staying in the EU as much as staying in the UK. Now these circumstances changed.

Also, the promises of further devolution weren't kept either.

Again, why are you so hung up on the (let's say) lie of "once in a generation" but not hung up on all the other lies told by the opposition?

> The issue was a vote on staying in the EU as much as staying in the UK

I don't even remember it coming up but if it means a lot to you then I can see you'd be aggravated, but how would it obviate the once in a generation pledge? Scotland can't join the EU if it goes independent anyway, the vote to remain really was the only practical way to stay in the EU.

> Scotland can't join the EU if it goes independent anyway

Why though? It's not like the UK could dangle a veto over their heads now. Spain already pledged not to veto.

The pledge you’re referring to is something every voter signed during the vote? Or something a politician had said?

Also curious why Scotland is not able to apply if it leaves the UK? Thanks in advance for the info.

> Also curious why Scotland is not able to apply if it leaves the UK?

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-scotla...

They're talking nonsense. There is sometimes talk of Spain veto-ing Scottish accession to the EU as a sort of warning to Catalonians (who closely identify with the Scottish indy movement), but realistically Scotland is aligned with the EU acquis so there's no really go reason not to. They won't be able to rejoin on the same terms as the UK were in, but that's something that was lost forever after Brexit.

What constitutes a big enough change to bring a new vote?

Leaving the EU?

As Scotland doesn't qualify to join the EU upon independence I'd have to say it's not.

What else would be big enough?

Scotland doesn't qualify to join the EU upon independence

What would be the problem, assuming the independence gets recognized by London? The border situation? The deficit? Or is there some more fundamental problem I'm unaware of?

You've mentioned two important factors but the harder standards to be met are economic. This[1] covers it quite thoroughly, is written by someone I would expect is in favour of joining the EU (though I'm not sure) but I think they've done a fair job, and some (some) of the comments too.

Once those are met then thorny issues like a hundred mile long border can be looked at. I don't think it's impossible, but, as is covered in the first link (and many other places, did you look?) Scotland cannot swan in to the EU in less than 2 years even at the very best. And without the Euro?[2]

[1] https://sceptical.scot/2020/03/can-scotland-meet-eu-economic...

[2] https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-independen...

> I was told it was a once in a generation vote - has that changed? What constitutes a big enough change to bring a new vote? How often should these type of referenda be held?

I don't think there's any fixed answer to such a question. But I'd say that if the population in general clearly changes their answer, then that merits putting that change in practice.

> Yes, you must forgive me for thinking that principles and promises are worth sticking to. I should be as cynical as politicians and simply go by what is convenient, right?

Yup. I'm a consequentialist. I care extremely little about iron-clad principles, and instead think that the thing we should be optimizing for is outcomes. There's no reason to live under the wrong outcome for the sake of some sort of idealism that brings no benefit to anyone. Rules can be changed as necessary, and promises can be reneged on (though IMO such promises shouldn't be made in the first place).

> I care extremely little about iron-clad principles, and instead think that the thing we should be optimizing for is outcomes.

The point of having principles is to optimise decision making for good outcomes.

> There's no reason to live under the wrong outcome for the sake of some sort of idealism that brings no benefit to anyone.

Having mendacious politicians succeed in their mendacity so easily is of benefit to whom?

Re-running votes because you lost is of benefit to the whole of society how?

Others in this thread have pointed out the opportunity cost problem, and the bias problem of re-running votes too often.

> Rules can be changed as necessary

Of course. In this case I do not see the necessity. The polling figures split yes/no in much the same way as they've been since the last time. The only thing that's of any significance that's changed is Brexit, and yet we had the SNP crowing the other day about how it's bringing in more outside investment than the rest of the UK (which was another mendacity, but what isn't from them?). They were also aware of UKIP and its support, and surely the anti-EU support within their own ranks at the time.

There is no necessity here.

> The point of having principles is to optimise decision making for good outcomes.

Having principles optimizes for consistency, not outcomes. To me, turning around on a dime 10 times a day can be perfectly justified, so long that in the end you end up somewhere better than before. Same as going forward in the same direction for a thousand years, so long that's the thing that works.

> Having mendacious politicians succeed in their mendacity so easily is of benefit to whom?

The voters who want the policy they propose.

> Of course. In this case I do not see the necessity. The polling figures split yes/no in much the same way as they've been since the last time.

That's quite unimportant to my point here. I'm not talking about UK politics, but specifically rejecting your view of "once in a generation choice". I wouldn't make such promises myself, and would ignore concerns about breaking such a promise.

"Once in a generation" to me is never a legitimate rule. "However often, and whenever needed" is. If somebody made that promise, I'm all for breaking it whenever it seems there's any benefit from it.

> Yes, you must forgive me for thinking that principles and promises are worth sticking to. I should be as cynical as politicians and simply go by what is convenient, right?

So principled that you are happy to stick with a leader who when asked about parties that went on in his house, confidently stated that no parties had taken place.

I don't support Boris Johnson, I'm not a Tory, I don't care about the stupid parties, cake and beer by anyone and I'd like to know why you're claiming the opposite?

Please, I'd like to know why you felt the need to write a completely false comment.

He is the current PM of the UK.

The Tory party is dominant in the UK. Now and for the forseeable future. And even in the unforseeable future, more years than not.

Independence is the only escape.

That is not an answer to the question I asked. Why did you state things about another member of HN that you cannot know and are in actual fact entirely wrong. I didn't see an apology either.

Are you sure you're in the right place?

Referenda that have a profound impact on your system of government should be rare. There is an impact on both economies in terms of investment and planning. They should be offered in a once in a generation basis.

Many (most?) countries have constitutions that forbid splitting up the country. UK is pretty unusual in providing for a referendum of the type that happened in 2014.

Or, you know, require a supermajority instead of disenfranchising voters. You could vote once a day if you did not put the threshold at 50% plus 1.

Why or? They are entirely orthogonal concerns.

The reason for the "once in a generation" promise is that it is widely recognised that holding regular referenda on non-reversible decisions biases in favour of the non-reversible option.

Let's imagine for example that genuinely 55% of the population want to remain part of the UK, and so remaining should win given a completely fair and accurate measure of the population's mood. However, every measurement varies for a variety of reasons, for instance what outrageous things some random politician has said in the last few days. If we were to hold a referendum every year, then you'd be bound to hit a year at some point fairly quickly where the random variation pushes the result over the 50% leave threshold. This would trigger the non-reversible transition, and the referenda would stop happening.

There's a reasonably strong argument for this reason that non-reversible decisions should require a greater than 50% majority. That's why amendments to the US constitution require a 2/3 majority vote to pass.

I think that's much better dealt with a greater than 50% majority requirement than with any kind of timing requirement.

There's no reason to believe that a time requirement is a good protection against random politicians saying outrageous things. In fact it probably makes things worse because it gives obvious timelines for a campaign, so whenever the possibility opens up it pretty much guarantees all the outrageous politicians coming out of the woodwork.

Yeah. The problem with requiring a greater than 50% majority is that politically the side that wants the change to happen will complain that it's unfair.

Does the UK really run these kind of referendum based on a simple 50% majority? That seems like a recipe for chaos (if true).

All referenda in the UK are advisory, and non-binding. Parliament doesn't technically have to abide by their decisions at all, but it would be damaging politically not to do so.

Brexit passed with 51.89% of the vote, so apparently.

Well that seems quite silly. You'd think you'd want a majority for a big, hard to reverse decision like that, otherwise it will oscillate back and forth.

Well not really. You do want to bias for dissolving a union.

If half the population is against it, it doesn’t matter if it’s 51% or 49%, it’s unpopular enough that it is tearing your nation in two.

Imagine the US civil war came down to a vote: “Sorry, 50.1% are in favor of slavery so we’re just going to keep practicing it in all of America”. Would the 49.9% be happy to live within that union? How about vice versa? The division is too deep.

If each 50% happens to be more or less perfectly geographically distributed, sure, but if not then you've just recreated the same problem twice (now something approaching 50% of each new division wants to immediately undo what you've just done).

> There's a reasonably strong argument for this reason that non-reversible decisions should require a greater than 50% majority

Cool. I like the idea of that. Other things that seem non-reversible...

  - building nuclear plants/weapons
  - burning fossil fuels
  - dismantling the NHS

Let's have a 75% majority required on any of that and I'll happily remain in the UK.

> Holding up to "once in a generation" promises is stupid, though so was making such a claim to start with.

It's not a bad way to try and skip a generation that seems to be skewing left, however, and keep power in the hands of the boomer generation. "Sorry, kids, I know you weren't old enough to vote for this before, but we agreed that we wouldn't do it again for a generation."

Would those kids not get a vote in 20 years? Those who are young tend to skew left anyway. As a Danish friend once told me "If you're young and you don't vote left, you have no heart. If you're old and you don't vote right, you have no brains."

Ever was it thus.

> Democratic votes need the consent of the loser, not I didn't get my way so let's have another vote.

That's only true till the situation changes. If the reason for your vote disappeared, then it's legit to reevaluate your vote.

> a third of those voting for independence also want(ed) independence from the EU

Which means two third, the majority, voted for the EU? Seems like a legit reason for a new vote.

Anyone can claim the situation has changed, every year. Life does not go backwards. I'm still not clear why that means "once in a generation" becomes "as soon as I can get what I want".

> > a third of those voting for independence also want(ed) independence from the EU

> Which means two third, the majority, voted for the EU? Seems like a legit reason for a new vote.

Has that figure changed dramatically? Even if it had, I would go back to why that means "once in a generation" doesn't mean "once in a generation".

>I'm still not clear why that means "once in a generation" becomes "as soon as I can get what I want".

Because Brexit, duh?

Please explain more, you clearly have some assumptions that I do not share.

> Anyone can claim the situation has changed, every year. Life does not go backwards. I'm still not clear why that means "once in a generation" becomes "as soon as I can get what I want".

So for you Brexit, a harder one than what anyone campaigned for ( the hardest one i recall hearing about was "Norway-style"), isn't a change ?

Perhaps I could've been clearer. There will always be changes, hence, anyone who wishes to claim there's been a change can.

That doesn't obviate "once in a generation", does it? Perhaps they should've been clearer and said "once in a generation, and if the UK has a referendum on EU membership and we decide to leave, and if…"

It would've been more honest, at least.

I'll also note, you're right that the vast majority of leave proponents wanted a Norway-style deal, it was remainers who presented this form as part of their machinations to try and wangle the UK staying in. Don't blame anyone else for that.

Why does the statement "once in a generation" completely obviate any nuance? It makes sense to evaluate things based on events and changes in situation and context. It makes sense to not bring up things over and over again in an attempt to change something that people don't want changed. It doesn't make sense to use a phrase as the sole justification for avoiding reevaluating a decision made in a different context. I don't think it's rational to read "once in a generation" as "once in a generation, regardless of any and all circumstances, with no room for any reconsideration ever".

Any statement should be considered to be taken in the context that it is given, and constrained by rational, reasonable bounds and circumstances. Assuming anything outside of technical and legal language to mean the most absolute and literal interpretation of the words isn't productive or useful in most cases.

A politician says "once in a generation". In that time a lot of things can happen. Think back a generation (about 30 years) and of the big things that have happened. The SNP leaders, when making this statement, were all well over 30 and hence, knew that big things happen in that time.

That's why the changes you might say would lead to re-evaluation do not.

Because it’s a spectrum. A minor change of policy? Not a solid basis to reevaluate a constitutional referendum.

Completely rewriting huge chunks of your country’s constitution and international relationships? Probably grounds to rethink your own constitution.

Were the SNP leaders unaware that many things can change over a 30 year period when they made the pledge?

Were the SNP leaders unaware that there was a strong movement to leave the EU within the UK as a whole and also within their own movement?

The answer to both is yes, so what's the excuse?

Given Farage was also preparing the ground to re-run the Brexit referendum when he thought he was going to lose it, I would think the answer is obvious.

How is that relevant? I also wonder how two wrongs make a right, perhaps you could illuminate me on that.

Where did I say it was wrong?

I said it was wrong for the SNP, so it would have been wrong for Farage. Are you going to state what is so obvious, because I can't be sure I or anyone else knows what you've alluded to?

Politics and rhetoric. It’s really that simple.

Didn't the UK made a rather unprecedented move of lowkey changing some Scottish sea-border since to get some potential gas fields on the english side?

In 1999. You can read a pro-independence argument on that here[1], as you can tell from this quote:

> In 1999 Tony Blair, abetted by the Scottish traitor Donald Dewar, redrew the existing English/Scottish maritime boundary to annex 6,000 square miles of Scottish waters to England, including the Argyll field and six other major oilfields. The idea was specifically to disadvantage Scotland’s case for independence.

Whether you think he makes his case or not, it's been a while and it didn't stop the first referendum.

[1] https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2012/01/scotlandengl...

> Anyone can claim the situation has changed, every year. Life does not go backwards. I'm still not clear why that means "once in a generation" becomes "as soon as I can get what I want".

Are we pretending that Brexit wasn't a massive change of situation?

Are we pretending that the SNP was unaware of UKIP when they made the pledge?

Am I missing that a mention of "once in a generation" is suddenly such a binding statement that the speaker can't go back on it?

"What are the odds?" 'Once in a generation, I should think'

"Things went badly, let's try again" 'Can't! Once in a generation!'

I'd say that if you don't wish to be held to a pledge like "once in a generation" then don't make it. If you're the sort of person who thinks words don't matter, that your promises and guarantees don't matter, then I get it.

Otherwise I would have to conclude that you simply wish your political goals to be made easier. We'd all like that.

I think it’s more about expectations that dishonesty. One might expect something is a once-per-generation event, but then things happen, stuff changes, here we are less than a decade later hoping to do it again.

> Anyone can claim the situation has changed, every year.

Yes, they can, and some do. But don't also need to convince the people and follow some regulations for this? It's not like they can randomly vote for anything and everything every day as they like, or can they?

> Has that figure changed dramatically?

Make a vote to figure out?

> "once in a generation"

What exactly does this mean? I mean, sure, back in 2014(?) this was a great term. But back then, the world was very different. The world was at peace and smoothing well, more or less. With Brexit, the climate movement in 2019, then the Pandemia and now the war this all changed drastically. Even if the Brexit had worked well somehow in the world back then, the pandemia and now the war destroyed all those chances and shifted the people views significantly.

I mean until some months ago, we still were convinced that pandemia was ending and the world was going to move smoothly again, continuing were it paused from 2019. Russia changed all that and made clear that the cozy times of the 201x years are over. The generation of 2014 is done, the world from then is no more, and a new generation takes over now.

> > "once in a generation"

> What exactly does this mean?

From the Oxford English dictionary:

> generation | dʒɛnəˈreɪʃ(ə)n | > noun > • the average period, generally considered to be about thirty years, in which children grow up, become adults, and have children of their own: the same families have lived here for generations.

> With Brexit, the climate movement in 2019, then the Pandemia and now the war this all changed drastically.

I think you already covered that with "Anyone can claim the situation has changed, every year". Think back over 30 years and tell me there weren't big changes then too.

If you say to me "once in a generation" and you're over 40 then I'm going to hold you to it. You didn't come down in the last shower.

Obviously the status quo within the UK has changed a lot since the 2014 Scottish independence vote - the key aspect being Brexit. This change was sort of crucial to many of the key talking points in the vote: EU CAP subsidies for farmers, sole EU membership (now from a different prior state), border controls, etc.

The prior vote was relatively close (55/45) so it's reasonable to expect that 200k people might've flipped to the 'Yes' camp.

I honestly don't remember much of the debate being on the EU, though that could be my memory or just my experience of it. It's clearly important, I simply don't agree that it obviates the pledge. UKIP were around, and as I pointed out in another comment (and confirmed by a sibling's helpfully finding the polling info) there were (are) plenty of independence supporters who also wanted out of the EU. If we take the low percentage from those polls of 25% then that eats that 45% by around 500k.

I'm not saying that's how it would be this time but it doesn't make for a strong case.

When the last referendum was first announced, about 35% supported independence. During the campaign it went up to 45-50% and has hovered there ever since.

> not I didn't get my way so let's have another vote.

That's not what has changed. I do agree that the SNP would likely be pushing _anyway_ (the hint is in their name), but a huge amount has been changed since we voted to remain part of the . The promises that were made regarding devolution are still not in place, and England voted on behalf of Scotland to leave the EU.

> a third of those voting for independence also want(ed) independence from the EU, it's just an excuse.

That's great for them, that means that a supermajority of Yes voters want to leave the UK but remain in the EU. That's as defintive as you can get in a vote.

> England voted on behalf of Scotland to leave the EU.

The voting was done by British citizens, England and Scotland didn't get a vote.

> > a third of those voting for independence also want(ed) independence from the EU, it's just an excuse.

> That's great for them, that means that a supermajority of Yes voters want to leave the UK but remain in the EU. That's as defintive as you can get in a vote.

I would say that the actual vote results are the most definitive. One was remain, one was leave.

Exactly and this is the most important thing.

You can't just keep having a vote for no reason at all apart from the fact you didn't win last time and that is all the SNP are doing.

That would be true if the circumstances are unchanged that lead the public to make that decision. It's ok to support 'Leave', there is no need to sugarcoat it.

Which 2 consecutive years do not contain political changes?

> They said it was a once in generation vote.

Or, put another way, you are trying to bind future voters to a promise you agreed to. An arbitrary, ill defined promise at that. What are you telling the younger voters you want to disenfranchise?

Perhaps a supermajority was always the better solution to big questions that should have strong consensus.

> What are you telling the younger voters you want to disenfranchise?

Will they not get to vote in future?

they didn't say that it was a once in a generation vote (whatever that means), they said it was a once in a lifetime opportunity to make a difference. The actual difference in meaning between the two should be clear. The terms of the actual agreement signed by all parties agreed legally that there was nothing in it to preclude a further referendum, so even if by some chance your interpretation is what was meant then they have no actual power to enforce it.

> a once in a generation vote (whatever that means)

Surely it means a referendum on independence once in around 30 years. It's not difficult to parse. Once in a lifetime would be longer.

From the [Scotsman]:

> Speaking on the BBC’s Good Morning Scotland programme yesterday, he said: “My estimation was that political constitutional referendums are once in a generation and I was making the example of 1979 and 1997 - that is why I always put it in that context every single time I said that.

Of course, he goes on to say things have changed. What are the odds he would make the same case for another referendum if he thought things were changing against his favour?

Nicola Sturgeon in interview with the [Guardian]:

> And if the result is No? "Will there be another referendum round the corner? No. We can't bind our successors, but we've made very clear our belief that constitutional referenda are once-in-a-generation events."

From Sturgeon's conference [speech]:

> Next year, we have a once in a generation opportunity

There's *lots* of examples of them saying it and reiterating in, in several forms, that all mean it wasn't going to happen often. That's what once in a lifetime means, right?

Who knew that the SNP would bring me the real second life!

> The terms of the actual agreement signed by all parties agreed legally that there was nothing in it to preclude a further referendum

Very true. I'm not even sure if it's possible under the constitution, as Sturgeon pointed out above "We can't bind our successors", but that's why pledges about the circumstances of a vote are so important.

> so even if by some chance your interpretation is what was meant then they have no actual power to enforce it.

Right. What does that have to do with my voting intention? I'm also interested in what your interpretation of "once in a lifetime" means. Are you over 30?

[Scotsman] https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/alex-salmond-once-gen...

[Guardian] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/aug/24/nicola-stur...

[speech] http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/yesscotland/pages/3159/...

> As a Brit who voted for Scottish independence last time, against the wishes of many of my family and those around me, if this happens again then I'll vote against the SNP's wishes.

You don't believe they should hold the vote again so soon, and so in the event of another vote your reaction will be to... participate in the vote you do not believe should be held, but cast a ballot against the outcome you want? What is the crazy logic there?

> What is the crazy logic there?

- I do not control whether there is a vote

- Those proposing the vote said they wouldn't do it

- I will work to spoil it

I'd prefer that you work through the simple and obvious points yourself instead of implying some mental problem on my part, if only to remove yourself from the irony of such a claim.

> I will work to spoil it

You've failed to communicate the why? of this.

I can express it a different way: you have decided that you know what is best for yourself and your country regarding independence - a big and highly consequential topic - and you're going to act in opposition of that to spite a relatively small number of powerful people whose actions you disapprove of. Those powerful people will not suffer regardless of whether your country makes the "correct" (whatever that is) choice regarding independence, but you and your country certainly will. Hence my curiosity about your logic.

> You've failed to communicate the why? of this.

Because I'm against lying, and because their own statement contained the logic that it's bad to continually vote on this issue - I'm using their ostensibly given logic because, if we take their actual words as truthful, they are correct. Most people agreed at the time and it was one of the reasons they convinced the public to go along with a referendum.

Usually I can't really take into account the lies of politicians as each side does it and it usually doesn't make a difference anyway (e.g. their electoral promises can be compared to actual behaviour so I can vote based on the latter) and I don't usually get to vote on a specific instance of lying, nor to directly affect the ambitions of the liars. Here, I can.

> you have decided that you know what is best for yourself and your country regarding independence

Yes, I'm a voter so that's implied for everyone with a vote.

> and you're going to act in opposition of that to spite a relatively small number of powerful people whose actions you disapprove of

Yes.

> Those powerful people will not suffer regardless

They will suffer if they lose, as I alluded to above.

> but you and your country certainly will

The country will be fine either way. It may be better or worse but I'm not into eschatology generally, let alone when it's about politics unrelated to war.

> Hence my curiosity about your logic.

That's a more respectful way to put it, you might keep that in mind for future interactions on HN.

The idiom about cutting off your nose to spite your face comes to mind.

That would only make sense for SNP supporters willing to look past their political leaders' lies. The rest of us will do fine if we can punish corrupt and lying politicians. I wish we could do that more often, I always envy those who get by-elections and are able to vote against whichever party has been behaving poorly.

> As a Brit that didn’t want Scotland to be independent last time around: good luck to them.

As a Catalan that wants his country to be independent: I'd cry tears of joy if our western neighbors were half as nice as you the English are. I was not pro-indy before I got to know first-hand the callousness of even moderate spaniard unionists.

Just a heads up - this person is delivering all the "No" campaign's talking points in this thread so it's very unlikely they actually voted "Yes" in 2014.

Are you referring to me? My real name is linked in my profile and I can prove that:

a) I campaigned for independence in 2014

b) can prove that I was annoyed about the result

Of course, I cannot prove that I actually voted yes as it's a secret ballot. I can put you in touch with my mum though, who voted no. Perhaps she's lying too and she'll lie to you about what I said I'd voted for. She loves her son and we're into lying to people while using our real names… <insert relevant sarcasm emoji face>

Jesus wept. What is it with HNers who want to lie about others they disagree with politically, on HN? This isn't Facebook or Twitter.

I can't help thinking there is a certain tension between wanting to be an independent country, and then also wanting to join the EU and give up your currency. Most of the new powers you would gain under independence would be given away again.

> there is a certain tension between wanting to be an independent country, and then also wanting to join the EU

Not necessarily. For example, regarding official languages, there's no way that Gaelic would be an official EU language if Ireland was not directly part of the EU.

And if Catalonia gained its independence, then Catalan would likely become an officially recognized language in the EU (which it isn't, due to spanish interference). Actually, this is one of the most important motivations for many pro-indepencence supporters in Catalonia (of which nearly all of them are pro-EU).

So they could have a language, but lose most of everything else?

That's a pretty big deal, actually... imagine (assuming that you are an English monolingual) that suddenly the geopolitics around your city change, and you can not live your daily life using English anymore. You need to learn another, foreign language, that becomes the sole official language. Would you be happy, even if you kept "most of everything else" ?

> Brexit has shown very clearly that Scotland wants to chart a different path to England and IMO they should be allowed to do it.

i don't get this. to me, in 2022, all the countries of the UK are exactly the same. even Ireland in some aspects. same language, same history, more or less same laws. what's so special about Scotland, and what's their "different path" as compared to, let's say, Wales?

Is greater London exactly the same as Cornwall?

Scotland has sufficient tax base and legal structures to go it alone, whilst Wales arguably doesn't.

In your list, you exclude politics.

> Is greater London exactly the same as Cornwall?

considering how many people from London move to Cornwall, and judging by the number of Teslas on the road, yeah, it's pretty similar.

> Scotland has sufficient tax base and legal structures to go it alone, whilst Wales arguably doesn't.

there are lots of countries that went at it alone. that doesn't mean those countries have been successful. one can even argue that an ever closer European Union made lots of small countries be more successful by giving up part of their power.

also, there's no such thing as "alone" in this day and age.

> In your list, you exclude politics.

less politics, better for everyone.

Cornwall is one of the poorest areas in the United Kingdom and London is one of the richest. So not too similar in that respect.

Success is a different question, but the point made that most economists accept Scotland 'could' do it. Wales not so much.

> less politics, better for everyone.

We are discussing politics right now :)

Not the same distribution of revenue and resources though. London & Westminster have an excessive degree of power and might, and the other nations, as well as much of the rest of England, are powerless as a result.

I don't know why this is downvoted. If Scotland becomes independent then Scotland and the UK will probably be the most similar countries in the world.

When you are very close, small differences can seem much larger and more important than they really are.

Because it is factually incorrect. Scotland and England not sharing the same history as England invaded and occupied Scotland multiple times and I don’t think being invaded by a country and invading a country is a small difference. Also the languages spoken in Scotland are Gaelic, Scots and Scottish English.

Don’t most anti-Brexit arguments have direct anti-independence analogues?

Neither Brexiters nor Scottish independence supporters like to be reminded of this.

Yes, with one key difference: the Brexit campaigners insisted that the UK was being tyrannized and forced to implement policies set in Brussels by the EU (despite having full political representation in making those policy decisions), whereas Scotland is ultimately under UK control -- large elements of public policy are reserved for Westminster, which means control by a succession of governments Scotland hasn't voted for since 1955.

(The first part of this is a side-effect of UK governments since the late 1980s blaming their own unpopular public policies on the EU, aided and abetted by certain elements of the British media who made bank by painting the EU as some kind of continental political supervillain bent on tormenting the UK, rather than a political process the UK had full participation in. One of those most prominent of those journalists being one Boris Johnson ...)

Scotland hasn't voted for the government since 1955?

2005, largest party in Scotland was Labour, Labour won the UK election. same for 2001, 1997, 1974 (both elections), 1966, 1964.

Until recently Scotland always voted Labour, and Labour didn't always win. But you could say the same about most Northern English cities, that doesn't mean they should form a new country.

> that doesn't mean they should form a new country

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Independence_Party

And Scotland would be voting for independence so it could join the EU.

Not really, no. Can you give an example of one?

In full agreement. The UK is now a joke of a country, all the best to them.

Compared with whom and on what criteria?

For an easy case: compared to itself before Brexit.

Compared to what it was before brexit

criteria:prime minister, with whom: anyone ;)

1. A PM who lies about attending a party, and runs with the lie until he is forced to admit it by a report and photographic evidence.

2. A PM who lied to the Queen.

3. Food poverty on the up [1]

5. £350m a week for NHS post Brexit, and yet that was a blatant lie. NHS now struggling with many staff quitting post covid and as a result of increased work load due to brexit.

The list goes on.

[1] British medical journal (https://www.bmj.com/content/bmj/347/bmj.f7157/F1.large.jpg)

All those. Plus, threatening peace and stability in Northern Ireland, first by pursuing a hard Brexit at all costs, and now by tearing up the Northern Ireland protocol.

And all of these points so the Prime Idiots can remain in power. Brexit: promised by Cameron because he was scared of nationalist UKIP's rise. The years of Tory austerity and blaming foreigners for the lack of jobs didn't help him win the vote (he preferred Remain).

And now the middle finger to the NI protocol, which is just the current Prime Idiot's move to gather support from the "Fuck the EU!" members of his party so he can again, remain in power, free to booze, fuck around, and taking donations for apartment renovations...

Yes, it is entirely correct that the IRA determine the UK's custom borders. Completely foolish to think otherwise.

This is a nonsense comment, but you probably know that. Northern Ireland was opposed to Brexit, and the Northern Ireland Protocol is supported by a majority of representatives in Northern Ireland. Nothing to do with the IRA.

Unionists make up the majority of Northern Ireland and they are against having a customs border within the same country.

The whole justification for not having a border between Northern and Southern Ireland is "the peace process" which is a euphimism for not upsetting the IRA.

Also a leader of her majesty's opposition who lied about attending a party.

None of those really seem to make the UK worse than other countries.

1. A politician being a hypocrite. I'm shocked!

2. A politician who lied. I'm shocked!

3. Seems to be happening in many countries?

5. Nursing and doctor shortages are happening in other countries as well.

I always admired Brits for allowing people from Scotland (and maybe other parts) to actually vote and decide if they wanted to stay in the same country with them.

If people all over the world had the same right, I suppose a lot of the wars could be avoided. Just imagine Ukraine allowing people in Donetsk and Lugansk to actually decide their status themselves, instead of using an army to force them into Ukraine.

Selectively applying right to independence is maybe the single worst problem in the whole world, whose solution could lead to immediate benefits to everyone.

And before someone claims otherwise, I would even go as far as the community level. If a city in Scotland vote to stay in Britain, I would allow them to become independent of Scotland and stay. In the same ways as I would allow a city in Donetsk to stay in Ukraine if they want so.

Freedom of association is the basic human right, and no majorisation should be allowed to happen. Never.

> Just imagine Ukraine allowing people in Donetsk and Lugansk to actually decide their status themselves, instead of using an army to force them into Ukraine.

> Freedom of association is the basic human right, and no majorisation should be allowed to happen. Never.

Russia has cleansed the occupied territories of ethnic Ukrainians pretty well over the last years since they took them over. Any form of "referendum" to associate with Russia is nothing more than a plain land grab, a sham election.

In contrast, there has been no campaign in Catalonia or in Scotland to forcibly remove ethnic Spaniards/English people in order to stage a fraudulent vote.

> Russia has cleansed the occupied territories of ethnic Ukrainians pretty well over the last years since they took them over. Any form of "referendum" to associate with Russia is nothing more than a plain land grab, a sham election.

Without commenting your claims of supposed ethnic cleansing, I'd like to point out that such a referendum could've potentially been held before or after the Maidan coup in 2014. But since Ukraine regime decided to crush independence movement using their armed forces, people of Donbas had no other choice but to fight back and got help from whoever was willing to help them. Otherwise, this territory would be ethnically cleansed.

> In contrast, there has been no campaign in Catalonia or in Scotland to forcibly remove ethnic Spaniards/English people in order to stage a fraudulent vote.

I wish Spanish government reacted similar to British in case of Catalonia. Instead of helping to properly organize the referendum, they opted for using armed forces and criminalizing and arresting pro-independence supporters.

> I wish Spanish government reacted similar to British in case of Catalonia. Instead of helping to properly organize the referendum, they opted for using armed forces and criminalizing and arresting pro-independence supporters.

On that we agree. Spain knows they don't stand a chance in a fair and free separation referendum, which is why they went down the dirty route.

I think the issue in Donetsk/Luhansk is actually the Russian army forcing them into Russia, against the wishes of most of the inhabitants [1]. BTW it's interesting you use the the Russian pronunciation "Lugansk" rather than the standard "Luhansk", it hints pretty strongly where your loyalties lie.

[1] https://blog.politics.ox.ac.uk/most-people-in-separatist-hel...

> I think the issue in Donetsk/Luhansk is actually the Russian army forcing them into Russia, against the wishes of most of the inhabitants [1].

I would still trust an actual referendum held in 2014 than some random net article. Unfortunately, now it's too late for that, we have a bloody war and need to find a way out. And that was my whole point, referendums are good, and the British government is doing the right thing to allow them.

I write Lugansk since it was written like that when I learned it. Luhansk is a relatively recent transcription change. It's still written as Lugansk in most of the German and Polish media. French, Croatian, and Spanish name could also be the same.

Even in original Ukrainian, it is written as Луганськ, "г" being a Cyrillic "g" and not "h". As someone who can read Cyrillic, but neither Russian nor Ukrainian, I just tend to transcribe Cyrillic letters as is, instead to guess the right pronunciation.

> Just imagine Ukraine allowing people in Donetsk and Lugansk to actually decide their status themselves, instead of using an army to force them into Ukraine.

Apologies to everybody for continuing this huge tangent, but this is bizarre.

The Ukrainian army did not try to force Donetsk and Luhansk into Ukraine.

First, a linguistic quibble: they had been part of Ukraine from the moment of its independence (and in the independence referendum 80+% of the voters in the two regions had voted for independence), so they couldn't be forced "into" Ukraine.

Second, the conflict began when Russian and Russian-backed forces started an armed insurrection, so it's more the case that Russia tried to force them out of Ukraine, against their will.

I'm highly confident that if a free referendum had been held there in 2014, a majority of the population of the Donbas would have voted to stay in Ukraine. Obviously, we'll now never find out, due to Russia carrying out ethnic cleansing of the region (mass deportations and killings).

> I would even go as far as the community level. If a city in Scotland vote to stay in Britain, I would allow them to become independent of Scotland and stay. In the same ways as I would allow a city in Donetsk to stay in Ukraine if they want so.

This is a very interesting question, but it'd be very complicated to get right, since the support for independence of particular regions can be entangled. For instance, people in Aberdeen might support Scottish independence iff Edinburgh stays in Scotland; people in Edinburgh might support independence iff the border territories stay in Scotland etc. That is not to say that we shouldn't try, if possible.

These kinds of votes would happen more often if the independent country committed to running referendums asking whether they should join the original country after they became independent.

Many countries fear a referendum every twenty years with a 30% chance of resulting in independence, with these conditions, it's just a matter of time until the region becomes independent, and referendums, of course, stop happening.

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