The Dirty Independence Question

[eFestivals]

20 minutes ago, LJS said:

I would  suggest if no one disputes David Cameron had a mandate to hold an EU referendum on 37% of the vote

erm .... YOU did!!  

Which is why you're being duplicitous when you now say... 

21 minutes ago, LJS said:

its hard to argue that Sturgeon on 46% of the vote doesn't. 

 

And Cameron's policy was front & centre of his manifesto, while the SNP one only really got prominence because of the tories pointing at it for their own campaigning.

[LJS]

 

32 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

erm .... YOU did!!  

No I didn't - i questioned their motivation for putting it in the manifesto which was clearly for internal Tory party reasons & not because of some great public clamour.

Once they won, they were perfectly entitled to hold  their referendum and to try & enact the result. 

32 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

Which is why you're being duplicitous when you now say... 

 

 

32 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

And Cameron's policy was front & centre of his manifesto,

Page 72 is front & centre?

http://ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/wmatrix/ukmanifestos2015/localpdf/Conservatives.pdf

 

32 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

while the SNP one only really got prominence because of the tories pointing at it for their own campaigning.

Its at least as prominent in the SNP manifesto as EU ref was in Cameron's and it doesn't really matter how people knew about it .. they knew what they were voting for.

 

[eFestivals]

 

10 minutes ago, LJS said:

Page 72 is front & centre?

http://ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/wmatrix/ukmanifestos2015/localpdf/Conservatives.pdf

 

Its at least as prominent in the SNP manifesto as EU ref was in Cameron's and it doesn't really matter how people knew about it .. they knew what they were voting for.

 

it was one of the major parts of his manifesto platform, so much so that it became the priority policy once elected (if not before being elected).

Whereas when the tories flagged up "the SNP might have another ref" via the SNP's "if this happens" policy, the SNP pointed out that it was unlikely it would happen.

Utterly utterly different.

And no promise from Cameron to fulfil of "once in a generation" either.

[kaosmark2]

20 minutes ago, LJS said:

 

No I didn't - i questioned their motivation for putting it in the manifesto which was clearly for internal Tory party reasons & not because of some great public clamour.

 

I think by the 2015 there was a lot of public clamour, but that's public clamour that was manufactured by the Tory party, and Nigel Farage (via his excessive appearances on Question Time etc.)

[zahidf]

Based on this, considering he isn't currently dead in a ditch, you should vote Tory to get a refendum!

[kaosmark2]

So Labour today have said that there will be no IndyRef2 in their first term, but that is an implicit invitation that they might offer one in the future.

Is that enough?

[LJS]

9 hours ago, kaosmark2 said:

So Labour today have said that there will be no IndyRef2 in their first term, but that is an implicit invitation that they might offer one in the future.

Is that enough?

Well, as is often the case with Jeremy, things change all the time...

 

Quote

 

Mr Corbyn told journalists in Glasgow that there would be "no referendum in the first term of a Labour government, because I think we need to concentrate completely on investment in Scotland".

This appeared to go further than the party's previous comments on the prospect of indyref2 if it wins power.

But a few hours later, Mr Corbyn reverted back to Labour's previous position by saying that he would "not countenance an independence referendum in the early years of a Labour government because our priorities will be elsewhere."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-50397033

 

The problem the SNP have is the compelling argument for a quick Indy ref depends on Brexit going ahead. They, not unreasonably, want a referendum while the UK is still in the transition reasoning that it will  be easier for us effectively to stay in the EU.

Of course, Brexit is most likely to happen if Boris wins a majority and all the signs are that he is not minded to allow indyref 2. If there is no Boris majority & we somehow get a EUref2 via some sort of Labour minority government, and the vote is to remain, then that weakens the SNP's argument as we won't have been dragged out out of the EU kicking & screaming against our will.

The other problem Sturgeon has is that a lot of SNP supporters are getting impatient with Wings over Scotland and his legions of followers even threatening to launch his own party to contest the next Holyrood election.

Unless the results of the election are remarkable, i think the question is academic as polling suggests there is unlikely to be a minority labour government that doesn't need SNP and LibDem support and that would be a very unstable alliance which would be unlikely to last for much longer than it would take to have EUref2.

Edited November 13, 2019 by LJS

[kaosmark2]

26 minutes ago, LJS said:

Well, as is often the case with Jeremy, things change all the time...

 

The problem the SNP have is the compelling argument for a quick Indy ref depends on Brexit going ahead. They, not unreasonably, want a referendum while the UK is still in the transition reasoning that it will  be easier for us effectively to stay in the EU.

Of course, Brexit is most likely to happen if Boris wins a majority and all the signs are that he is not minded to allow indyref 2. If there is no Boris majority & we somehow get a EUref2 via some sort of Labour minority government, and the vote is to remain, then that weakens the SNP's argument as we won't have been dragged out out of the EU kicking & screaming against our will.

The other problem Sturgeon has is that a lot of SNP supporters are getting impatient with Wings over Scotland and his legions of followers even threatening to launch his own party to contest the next Holyrood election.

Unless the results of the election are remarkable, i think the question is academic as polling suggests there is unlikely to be a minority labour government that doesn't need SNP and LibDem support and that would be a very unstable alliance which would be unlikely to last for much longer than it would take to have EUref2.

Well, my question was more on the "is it enough for Labour to win back some Scottish voters", but your assessment regarding outcomes feels very fair!

[zahidf]

https://twitter.com/afneil/status/1221831585730891776?s=19

 

Hard to blame the Tories for this.. 

[LJS]

2 hours ago, zahidf said:

https://twitter.com/afneil/status/1221831585730891776?s=19

 

Hard to blame the Tories for this.. 

Quote

 

THIS so-called “index of well-being” is not an official publication but is the work of a self-employed and self-styled “political economist” called John McLaren. McLaren previously was a special adviser to both Donald Dewar and Henry McLeish and is a staunch Unionist. 

McLaren’s index is poorly constructed, uses too narrow a range of only four benchmarks and draws unwarranted conclusions from tiny movements in the data. In fact, the SNP Government has been pursuing a national well-being strategy which benchmarks 81 national indicators.

...

THE newspaper reports of McLaren’s index claimed this was a comparison of OECD industrial countries. But a close reading of McLaren’s findings show that he has deliberately removed a number of OECD member states from his study. They are Chile, Israel, Ireland, Latvia, Luxembourg, Mexico and Turkey. His rationale is that “their inclusion overly distorts the results”. For instance, he drops Ireland (surely a relevant comparator with Scotland?) because “the behaviour of multinational companies seriously distorts its GDP per capita”. As a result of this manipulation, McLaren can claim that Scotland has dropped into the “bottom half of OECD nations”. But he has deliberately excluded the lowest-scoring OECD nations to achieve this result.

...

Scotland rates high in other, more scientific studies. For instance, the October 2016 EU Regional Social Progress study found that Scotland had the best quality of life among the four home nations.

Unlike McLaren’s work, this study used 50 benchmarks, including health, safety, access to education and personal rights. Scotland scored 74 out of 100. The highest performing region for quality of life was Upper Norrland in Sweden, which scored 82 out of 100 while the lowest-scoring region, south-east Bulgaria, scored 39.72.

The Scottish Government already has a National Performance Framework through which seeks to improve well-being and sustainable and inclusive economic growth. This framework tracks 81 key indicators. There is a regular progress report on the Scottish Government’s website.

 

 

https://www.thenational.scot/news/18186244.fact-check-claim-scotland-slid-global-wellbeing-rankings/

 

 

[eFestivals]

PMSL  

If that index is the fraud that *Nats* say it i, then surely you can find something saying so that isn't from *Nats*?

And the below is only valid criticism is iScotland intends to be a tax-fraud haven like Ireland.

Is that your indy dream LJS, or has Ireland been *fairly* excluded after all?

 

12 hours ago, LJS said:

For instance, he drops Ireland (surely a relevant comparator with Scotland?) because “the behaviour of multinational companies seriously distorts its GDP per capita”.

 

[LJS]

57 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

PMSL  

If that index is the fraud that *Nats* say it i, then surely you can find something saying so that isn't from *Nats*?

 

The rest of the Scottish press mainly unquestioningly regurgitates Tory and labour press releases.

57 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

And the below is only valid criticism is iScotland intends to be a tax-fraud haven like Ireland.

Is that your indy dream LJS, or has Ireland been *fairly* excluded after all?

 

 

If you're going to compare nations, it looks a bit dodgy when you cherry pick the ones you want to compare.

[eFestivals]

2 minutes ago, LJS said:

The rest of the Scottish press mainly unquestioningly regurgitates Tory and labour press releases.

there's no source anywhere saying it's crap apart from Nats? 

Then your criticism has a big problem.  

2 minutes ago, LJS said:

If you're going to compare nations, it looks a bit dodgy when you cherry pick the ones you want to compare.

Ireland has off-the-scale GDP, not because it's hugely successful, but because it's a tax haven.

If you want to compare iScotland with a tax haven, then we know what you expect of iScotland - and it'as very different to what you've always claimed (better politics & higher morals lol).

Oh dear.

[LJS]

27 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

there's no source anywhere saying it's crap apart from Nats? 

Then your criticism has a big problem.  

 

There is no analysis of the quality of the data anywhere else that I can see. Just a blind acceptance that it must be right.

27 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

Ireland has off-the-scale GDP, not because it's hugely successful, but because it's a tax haven.

If you want to compare iScotland with a tax haven, then we know what you expect of iScotland - and it'as very different to what you've always claimed (better politics & higher morals lol).

Oh dear.

GDP is a shite measure of individual wellbeing.

The answer to that is not to exclude Ireland because it has a high GDP. 

The answer is not to use GDP.

[LJS]

How's the search for evidence of Nicola saying "an SNP vote is not a vote for indy" going, Neil.

Ready to admit you were talking shite?

[eFestivals]

26 minutes ago, LJS said:

There is no analysis of the quality of the data anywhere else that I can see. Just a blind acceptance that it must be right.

and a blind denial of any validity by the Nats. 

 

26 minutes ago, LJS said:

GDP is a shite measure of individual wellbeing.

Yup.

As matey realised, so chose to exclude the ones outside of more-normal ... for which Nats and you then crititise him 

 

26 minutes ago, LJS said:

The answer to that is not to exclude Ireland because it has a high GDP. 

The answer is not to use GDP.

GDP is a very standard measure. As long as you understand what it means - and matey does, hence Ireland's exclusion (which Nats and you have complained about) - then it's a meaningful figure for comparison even if it doesn't say everything.

======

Can you see the problem here?

If there's anything which is inconvenient to the lies that Nats want to push then the Nats claim it's not valid.

Also see your lying moron of a First Minister and every Nat re: GERS.  

It must be because indy is so wonderful that you all have to lie and treat your countrymen as brain-dead mugs, eh? 

[eFestivals]

hey LJS, with Sturgeon's big push for an indyref because the UK is leaving the EU, is there much discussion about the customs border that will* have to be in place between England and an iScotland within the CU &/or SM?

(* 'will' based on the current tory plan for the UK's new deal with the EU).

Just asking.

[LJS]

42 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

hey LJS, with Sturgeon's big push for an indyref because the UK is leaving the EU, is there much discussion about the customs border that will* have to be in place between England and an iScotland within the CU &/or SM?

No.

42 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

(* 'will' based on the current tory plan for the UK's new deal with the EU).

Just asking.

Have you now withdrawn your claim that Sturgeon said a vote for the SNP was not a vote for independence?

Just asking.

[eFestivals]

1 minute ago, LJS said:

No.

so it's considered to be of no consequence...?

[LJS]

14 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

so it's considered to be of no consequence...?

Let's get a referendum first. Then we can get into details.

Have you now withdrawn your claim that Sturgeon said a vote for the SNP was not a vote for independence?

Just asking.

 

again.

 

 

 

[eFestivals]

1 minute ago, LJS said:

Let's get a referendum first. Then we can get into details.

you're wanting that ref supposedly because "barriers bad", but don't think there should be a discussion about barriers?  

Have you ever stopped to think that there might be a reason why Nats don't want these discussions?

[LJS]

4 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

you're wanting that ref supposedly because "barriers bad",

That's not my main reason.

4 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

but don't think there should be a discussion about barriers?  

Not with you and not right now. You are correct.

4 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

Have you ever stopped to think that there might be a reason why Nats don't want these discussions?

There will be loads of time for such discussions if and when we get allowed indyref2 

[eFestivals]

9 minutes ago, LJS said:

That's not my main reason.

so you're saying that wanting another indyref isn't really because of brexit after all?

Who knew? :lol: 

 

Quote

There will be loads of time for such discussions if and when we get allowed indyref2 

wouldn't it be better to have the outline discussions and then decide if there's the demand for an indyref?

Rather than treating the people of Scotland like mugs by trying to force an indyref onto them blind?

Edited January 31, 2020 by eFestivals

[LJS]

35 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

so you're saying that wanting another indyref isn't really because of brexit after all?

Who knew? :lol: 

 

wouldn't it be better to have the outline discussions and then decide if there's the demand for an indyref?

Rather than treating the people of Scotland like mugs by trying to force an indyref onto them blind?

There is already a mandate for an indyref. We don't need to establish a demand.

Poll yesterday showed majority in favour of indy. Poll the other day showed clear majority in favour of Holyrood deciding if and when we have indyref2.

Now .... About Nicola saying a vote for SNP not a vote for indy?

[eFestivals]

1 hour ago, LJS said:

There is already a mandate for an indyref.

weak and feeble.

If there really is, you only have to wait a year to prove it, and then you can make that claim with no bullshit.  

 

1 hour ago, LJS said:

Poll yesterday showed majority in favour of indy.

because no one has talked about the hard customs border with England, or the mega-austerity that an iScotland would need to do.

 

1 hour ago, LJS said:

Poll the other day showed clear majority in favour of Holyrood deciding if and when we have indyref2.

Then have a real poll in 15 months and be on solid no-bullshit ground.