A late-night hypothetical
Posted on
November 01, 2012 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The Yes campaign wins the referendum in October 2014.
Labour wins the May 2015 UK General Election, securing a majority of 21 with the help of 35 Scottish MPs, who have to be elected because Scotland still needs representation at Westminster until the independence arrangements are completed.
That happens in early 2016, just in time for an independent Scotland’s first elections.
The rUK now has over 50 foreign MPs in its Parliament, who if removed would reverse the balance of power, turning a Labour government into a Conservative one overnight, with chaotic ramifications. To the best of our knowledge, no country on Earth permits citizens of another country to elect members to its Parliament. So what now?
You like posing conundrums don’t you 🙂
Surely this will be just another thing to be negotiated, to be added to the list.
Otherwise, they would need to run another GE… Would/Could they?
Parliament dissolved and another election in rUK.
What Peter said. The other possibility is that Scotland is excluded from the 2015 UKGE and is represented in Westminster by some sort of delegation of MSPs.
“Parliament dissolved and another election in rUK.”
On what grounds do we sack the 600 non-Scottish MPs, who were democratically elected for five years? Remember, the Tories have pledged to introduce fixed terms in this Parliament.
Hypothetically the Tories would put up a vote of no confidence and a new General Election would be the result.
The English finally get their own parliament they have quite rightly moaned about for long enough. I do so look forward to seeing all those Scots MPs getting their P45s..no wonder they will cheat, scam and sell their grannies to keep Scotland in union. There comfortable lifestyles will be in jeopardy. I’m sure they can all write tell all books though;)
I thought that the Fixed Term Bill had already been introduced, and been passed, hence my “Would/Could they?”
The most dubious part of this hypothetical is the 35 Labour MPs from Scotland after a YES in the referendum. That’s not credible.
I should point out that a deal would be done for the Scottish MPs as their term would be limited. They would get some sort of Redundancy package to ensure it was worth becoming an MP for such a short period of time.
Simple, Labour would become a minority Government, or broker a deal with LibDems (if any left), Cymru, NI parties, etc. and try to hold out. Not pretty lol.
@Adrian B
Paid by whom?
It’s funny how everyone says the answer is simple, but everyone’s answer is different.
😉
To paraphrase knuckledragger Davidson – who cares – good luck to them – we’re off!
AndrewfraeGovan
Paid by whom?
You, me and every other TAX payer, in the same way that we already pay for all of them and their expenses.
“[N]o country on Earth permits foreign citizens to sit in its Parliament”. Well, we do. Candidates for Holyrood must be one of UK citizen, elegible Commonwealth citizen or EU citizen. You don’t need to be a UK citizen to stand for Westminster either. There it’s UK citizen, elegible Commonwealth citizen or Irish citizen. And Scottish people who are UK citizens today would, on past precedents, still be UK citizens after independence. What we’d have to say is something like “no country on earth has another country electing MPs to its Parliament”. So, with the usual nitpicking out of the way …
On Peter Bell’s idea, that’s a non-starter. There was no dissolution when the Anglo-Irish Treaty came into effect in 1922 and there would be no need for one in the event that Scotland became independent either. A hypothetical Treaty and act of (Westminster) parliament would include an appropriate clause and that would be that. No more MPs for Scottish constituencies come i-Day.
That’s the House of Commons dealt with. How about the House of Lords? What happened there when the Free State was set up? I haven’t a clue. Do you think we might be so lucky as to be able to leave the poor English with Lords ffoulkes and Forsyth? Looks like it. A whole minute of in-depth research suggests that Irish peers who were sitting in the House of Lords in 1922 remained as individuals until the last one popped his clogs in 1961.
(Of course the real answer is that Westminster can do whatever it likes and it’s no concern of ours.)
@Adrian B
Aye, but Scottish or fUK. Can’t see either keen to pick up that bill.
“What we’d have to say is something like “no country on earth has another country electing MPs to its Parliament”. So, with the usual nitpicking out of the way …”
Duly amended.
AndrewFaeGovan
Detail not worked out to my knowledge. The bill would be picked up across the UK as the whole UK system would be changing. Look at it this way we will already be negotiating for Scotland’s assets which would be worth Billions of pounds. Redundancy package for Scottish MP’s would be incidental when you look at it like this.
Here is a bit from Wikipedia about minority government.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minority_government
It’s not bed time reading – for most people anyway!
The Fixed-Term Parliaments Act is indeed law now:
http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2010-11/fixedtermparliaments.html
“Summary of the Bill
The Bill fixes the date of the next General Election at 7 May 2015, and provides for five-year fixed terms. It includes provisions to allow the Prime Minister to alter the date by up to two months by Order. There are also two ways in which an election could be triggered before the end of the five-year term:
Problem is, how are the Tories going to get a motion of no-confidence passed? Labour still have a majority. Same with the second provision. So they’re buggered unless Labour have a sudden outbreak of conscience and voluntarily surrender power when they don’t have to, and how likely are we finding that?
Problem is, how are the Tories going to get a motion of no-confidence passed? Labour still have a majority.
Labour wins the May 2015 UK General Election, securing a majority of 21 with the help of 35 Scottish MPs
Once Independence day happens. All Scottish MPs will be withdrawn from Westminster – no more Labour majority
Same with the second provision. So they’re buggered unless Labour have a sudden outbreak of conscience, and how likely are we finding that?
Here is what happened in 1974:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/politics97/background/pastelec/ge74oct.shtml
Vote of no confidence link (if this doesn’t work then do a ‘google ‘search)
http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN02873.pdf
“The most dubious part of this hypothetical is the 35 Labour MPs from Scotland after a YES in the referendum. That’s not credible.”
I’m not sure the SNP would even contest a rUK General Election in the event the referendum had been won.
Ive got it. The extra mp,s could be put onto the Trident fleet and sail away into deep water till they find somewhere to put them
“Once Independence day happens. All Scottish MPs will be withdrawn from Westminster”
By who and on what authority? I don’t see that the Tories can pass a bill in January 2015 saying “Scottish MPs only get elected for a year”. No government can bind the hands of its successor, and if Labour win in May 2015 they can say “Bollocks to that, we’re keeping all our MPs for the full five years” (and make any number of justifiable defences for it, including putting it in their manifesto).
That leaves them still able to tough it out and defeat the no-confidence motion. There’d be an outcry, but there’s been an outcry about the West Lothian Question (of which it’d just be a more extreme example) for about 40 years now and nothing’s been done.
By who and on what authority?
This will be worked out before the Indy ref – An Independent Scotland will have no part to play in the New Westminster Parliament for England and its Devolved counterparts in Wales or Northern Ireland.
Independence answers the West Lothian Question properly for all concerned.
There will not be any Scottish MPs sitting in Westminster.
I`m tempted to say good riddance to bad rubbish. Oops! Suffice to say, I`m with Barontorc on this one.
“I’m not sure the SNP would even contest a rUK General Election in the event the referendum had been won.”
I’m pretty sure the SNP would want a strong presence at Westminster while independence negotiations were ongoing. Perhaps even holding the balance of power. And the need for such a presence would be an easy sell to the electorate in 2015. As would the idea that only the SNP could be trusted to look after Scotland’s interests during this period. Having just voted for independence, what would be the sense in then voting for unionist politicians to oversee the negotiations?
In your scenario, I would expect a landslide for the SNP in 2015.
“This will be worked out before the Indy ref”
What, you’re saying Cameron will pass (or at least bring forward) a bill in 2014 that specifies provisions which will only be enacted if Scotland votes Yes? Firstly, politics just doesn’t work like that – you don’t create legislation hypothesising on your own defeat – and secondly the principle that you can’t bind a future government still applies. Whatever Cameron passes, if Labour win a majority they can say “Bollocks to it.”
Stu, you pulled my earlier effort – in a nutshell all this is tied up with the prospect of an EU referendum.
RevStu,
I’d be interested in hearing what you consider to be a justifiable defence of Scottish MPs remaining seated at Westminster after independence. One will be plenty. I feel that even Margaret Curran, a recent and surprising enthusiast for the fine C18th theory of “virtual representation” which was in vogue at the time of the American Revolution, might have trouble with the idea.
On a more important point, I have to correct my earlier post. The 1922 election, held shortly before the Irish Free State became independent, didn’t include any seats from the Free State. I was thinking the election was in 1923. Oops!
Holebender’s idea can be workable. Remembering that negotiations only took six months in Czecho, it is possible that the expected i-Day could fall close enough to the planned May 2015 Westminster election that Scotland would not need to take part in that election. Given the nature of the parliamentary calendar at Westminster, i-Day could be as late as September-October 2015 without too much trouble being caused. No doubt someone will have good reasons why this is grossly unfair to me, and to everyone else in Scotland, but I don’t much care. I’d rather live with that small unfairness than with the much greater unfairness of imposing Scottish MPs on EW&NI for several years after independence. With even a hint of good will on both sides, and we’d better hope that there’s more good will around than that, the problems would be easily managed.
Holebender’s scheme has an interesting consequence. Alan Trench tweeted recently that his contacts in Whitehall expected negotiations to last 18 months and implementation to take 18 months more. But if formal independence can be established within a year of the vote, even if every last detail isn’t settled and there are a variety of Heath-Robinson temporary measures in place, that’d be much better all round. The present Prime Minister, who’d have a majority today without Scottish representation, has a very strong incentive to have the 2015 election held in EW&NI only. So this sort of deal would make for both a useful carrot and a decent stick. In any alternative, and especially in those where Ed is PM, things could drag on for a very long time.
“Stu, you pulled my earlier effort – in a nutshell all this is tied up with the prospect of an EU referendum.”
I didn’t pull it, I moved it into the appropriate thread.
“I’d be interested in hearing what you consider to be a justifiable defence of Scottish MPs remaining seated at Westminster after independence.”
Here’s one:
“We said in our manifesto that all MPs elected would serve their full term.”
If you put something in your manifesto and people vote for you, you have a mandate to carry it out.
On the question of time – is there enough of it between the referendum and the 2015 election to legislate any changes? – the answer is that there’s more than enough. The Video Recordings Bill 2009-10 went from first reading to royal assent in 37 days (which included Xmas and New Year).
If Michael Foot won the prize for the longest political suicide note in history, Ed Miliband could at very least get an honourable mention for the shortest one by making that the entire Labour 2015 manifesto after a Yes vote.
Thank you Stu – delete as
Going by past form, all Scottish Labour ex-MPs would be elevated to the Lords. Which is a pity, as I think it would be better for democracy is we had the likes or Curran, Murphy, Moore and Bain duke it out in a Big Brother style competition.
“Who is next to be evicted from the trough?”
“If Michael Foot won the prize for the longest political suicide note in history, Ed Miliband could at very least get an honourable mention for the shortest one by making that the entire Labour 2015 manifesto after a Yes vote.”
Whose votes would it cost him? Labour supporters who wanted to lose, or Tories who weren’t going to vote Labour anyway?
Scottish MPs can attend, debate but not vote.
Similar to Purto Rico’s position wrt the USA.
PR is a part of the USA but has not embraced statehood.
Will Labour ect need to register as Scottish parties to enable them to put up candidates for the Scottish Parliament after independence?
Gardham now says Scotland would be fast tracked into EU
Egg on face time and no comments allowd.
http://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/referendum-news/independent-scotland-would-get-europe-fast-track.19295327
Would Labour not claim that they had a mandate that overturned the referendum?
Would they not make that a major part of their manifesto for the 2015 GE? A second bite at the cherry or somesuch nonsense.
The Scots MPs are all given ‘the chiltern hundreds’ and Westminster carries on as before but perhaps with a new administration.
Should Milliband try to tough out the situation as sketched out by the rev labour would never be elected again in England.
I suspect that there will be a lot of horse trading & haggling before the actual split occurs. My pennies worth is that 2016 will be the last election for the devolved parliament, and that a proper Scottish parliament election might not actually happen until 2020.
James Morton We need a very quick divorce after we win the referendum in 2014 .
We can all imagine what would happen if the labour party in Scotland won the Scottish elections in 2016 ! it would be ,we dont recognise the result of the referendum and we are going to hold it again on a date still to be decided . ie never
James Morton said:
I suspect that there will be a lot of horse trading & haggling before the actual split occurs. My pennies worth is that 2016 will be the last election for the devolved parliament, and that a proper Scottish parliament election might not actually happen until 2020.
Why on earth would we allow that to happen? Part of the reason for the three-year delay before the referendum is to allow arrangements and agreements to be put in place in advance of the referendum, in the event of a yes vote. Everyone concerned would be absolutely nuts to leave it all till the last millisecond and impose such a long period of upheaval on the entire country.
Once we say yes, we’re outta there. Pronto. A year to 18 months is acceptable. Six years bloody well isn’t.
May I urge those who place web page hyperlinks to The Herald & The Scotsman refrain from doing so as you are indirectly funding the NO campaign by raising the advertising fee rates set by the papers.
This is raised/lowered when the volume of clicks to their articles increases/decreases. By elevating the click rate, we help fund Unionist propaganda.
A complete boycott could help finish them off in a few months which they would deserve because they are both bare faced liars.
@morag and silvertay
There is a helluva lot of horsetrading that needs doing and a mountain to climb in terms of administrative affairs. I can tell you that most Scottish government institutions are already jockeying for positions with regards to ( and this is by no means a complete list) Replacing the DVLA, HMRC, Passports Uk, Customs & Border controls, replacing the BBC, new offices to replace other government functions involving development and trade, our own versions of the Home office, Foreign office & Transport ministries. Splitting up of Military assets, various UK military contractors will need to dealt with. Debates concerning our share of UK debt needs to be dealt with, the thorny issue of Oil needs to be addressed. There is a helluva lot that needs doing, on the UK side as well as ours. This is not last minute hectic activity, its a process and a process that will take time.
We will be more or less independent by 2016 but I don’t think a full Independent election will occur here until 2020.
The former (reasonably balanced) Tory MP, Matthew Parris, has just been on the BBC News channel talking about how last night’s vote on the EU budget has energised the Tory Eurosceptics. Although Parris can sometimes be prone to over-statement, he was arguing convincingly that, as a consequence of last night’s vote at Westminster, the Tory Eurosceptics have a discernible spring in their step. He stated that, for the first time ever, the Tory Eurosceptics at Westminster really are starting to “imagine the UK being out of the EU”.
Labour, including ‘Scottish’ Labour at Westminster, voted with the Tory Eurosceptics in last night’s vote. As ever, a Westminster opposition playing parochial ‘Briitish’ politics with the EU, no change there then. But this vote could come back to haunt ‘Scottish’ Labour. The Tory Eurosceptics are going to keep pushing on this. It’s not inconceivable that, even this side of a British general election, they could force a UK-wide referendum on EU membership.
The hypocrisy and sheer manipulative deception of Scotland’s voters by ‘Scottish’ Labour here should be brought out in our media? On the one hand, at Holyrood, Scottish Labour, in its scattergun FUD approach, is trying to make political capital out of its absurd claim that a vote for independence in 2014, will threaten Scotland’s membership of the EU. The MSM are running with this, of course, and the impression being created is that the Scottish government is threatening Scotland’s membership of the EU.
On the other hand, at Westminster, Scottish Labour is standing shoulder to shoulder with the right-wing Tory Eurosceptics, voting with the Tory Eurosceptics at Westminster who want to take the UK out of the EU, and creating the real threat of a UK-wide referendum on EU membership. In these circumstances, there is a distinct possibility that Scotland might be forced out of the EU because, even though Scottish voters might vote to stay in the EU in a UK-wide referendum, Scottish votes would, in all likelihood, be outnumbered by English votes to leave the EU. Result? Scotland is forced out of the EU (because of its membership of the UK) in spite of a democratic Scottish vote to remain in the EU.
Meanwhile, we wait in vain for some Scottish journalist to press ‘Scottish’ Labour on the hypocrisy, not to mention the sheer recklessness, of their position on the EU. Instead, they’re still scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to discredit the Scottish government’s position. Scattergun FUD is all they have and scattergun FUD is all we’re going to get from them in the next two years.
I telephoned the Yes Scotland office in Glasgow (0141 221 4767) on Tuesday and ordered five lapel badges at £1 each. They arrived first class post next morning with some leaflets. I then sent off a cheque for £30. (£5 for the badges and a £25 donation.) They will receive it this morning. I’m sorry if this seems smug guys but action is better than words.
With the speed at which UK bureaucracy moves (Chiltern?) I’m sure the negotiations to round out Scotland’s independence could be made to last a full Westminster parliamentary term. Indeed even more than one term until memory of the independence vote fades.Prevarication is what they do best.
The Scots labour MPs could do the honourable thing and clear their desks at Westminster once the independence deal is signed off. Of course some compensating package would need to be offered to them. House of Lords? Lady Curran O’ Stairheid;Lord Davidson O’ A Doin (has a Gaelic ring to it no?).
MacWhirter has an article in the Herald today. “Never mind Scotland, will the…EU” etc. Are the first three words what’s called a Freudian slip?
The idea of Scottish MPs from any Party being in the Commons after Independence is not acceptable. The this Hypothetical assumes that Labour will recognise and respect the
result of the referendum. Will they? If Labour wins in 2016 it will be because they win in Scotland and night then claim to have overturned the Referendum result. The best way is for
and earlier Independence date, with Scotland out of the 2015 election. The agreement would be for Salmond to form a Provisional Govt. to manage the handover of powers while some
negotiations would be ongoing. It would be wiser if the first DIRECTLY ELECTED Govt. of an Independent Scotland did nit have to manage all of this from the start. The alternative
unwelcome scenario would be for Labour to drag out negotiations to keep themselves in power.
James Morton Thanks for all that info .
I just hope that Scottish-Skier is correct and that a lot of the negotiations are going on behind the scenes .
As an ex labour activist I dont trust the labour party in Scotland as far as I can throw them .
Any party that would rather demonise a man and another political party with lies and smears rather than putting forward alternative policies beneficial to the people of Scotland are not worth the trust of the Scottish people .
@G H Graham
May I urge those who place web page hyperlinks to The Herald & The Scotsman refrain from doing so as you are indirectly funding the NO campaign by raising the advertising fee rates set by the papers.
+1 Absolutely correct.
Furthermore, even if no-one clicks the URLs it still benefits those propaganda sheets as the number of inbound links helps their search engine ranking. Example: Google counts all the links going to The Scotsman and thus considers them to be a relevant or authoritative source, so, when someone searches for “Scottish independence” that paper is included in the top ten search results.
Don’t provide the links, just quote a relevant snippet from the article.
G H Graham says: ‘A complete boycott could help finish them off in a few months which they would deserve because they are both bare faced liars.’
Considering their impecuniousness, perhaps bare arsed liars?
Though I accept it may be difficult to differentiate.
YesYesYes
A British withdrawal from the EU would be a negotiated process which would take at least several years.
@AndrewFraeGovan,
My point was a political one about the hypocrisy of ‘Scottish’ Labour’s position and how they are treating Scottish voters as fools, as well as how this is being ignored by the Scottish MSM as they promote ‘Scottish’ Labour’s agenda in the press. The other point I was making is that, historically, at Westminster, both British Labour and Tory parties, when in opposition, have used the EU largely as a means to score political points over each other. This is the worst kind of British parochialism.
In fact, it was a former Labour MP, the right-winger Edmund Dell, former President of the Board of Trade (1974-76), who went on to join the SDP, who made the point well, about both the Labour and Tory parties at Westminster. When discussing Churchill’s ‘support’ for European unification after WWII as a means of increasing the discomfort of Attlee’s Labour government (who were split on Europe), Dell said:
“The truth is that, despite the brave European vapourings of Churchill and his colleagues…the Conservative Party’s attitude in opposition was one of unprincipled opportunism. It began a tradition in which, with considerable damage to British interests, opposition parties exploit the European question against the government of the day by making speeches and proposals to which they have no intention of living, once back in office”.
That’s what Labour did last night and that’s what British Labour and Tory parties have been doing when in opposition throughout the last sixty years, and it’s done a lot of damage to Scotland’s national interests and it’s still damaging Scotland’s national interests today.
But those political points are kind of lost if we move on to a discussion of the legal and constitutional technicalities of how withdrawal might occur.
“Westminster carries on as before but perhaps with a new administration. “
Hang on, those two things can’t both be true, surely?
“Scottish MPs can attend, debate but not vote.”
But how do you get that rule passed?
YesYesYes
I was referring to:
“there is a distinct possibility that Scotland might be forced out of the EU because, even though Scottish voters might vote to stay in the EU in a UK-wide referendum, Scottish votes would, in all likelihood, be outnumbered by English votes to leave the EU. Result? Scotland is forced out of the EU (because of its membership of the UK) in spite of a democratic Scottish vote to remain in the EU.”
I suppose this could happen if there’s an IndyRef NO vote, but we all know that’s not going to happen.
@AndrewFraeGovan,
I see where the confusion has been caused. I was referring to the possibility that the Tories might force a UK-wide referendum on EU membership before the independence referendum.
YesYesYes
Yes, but even if they did it would take the UK years to negotiate it’s way out.
Quoting Rev Stu:
“Westminster carries on as before but perhaps with a new administration. “
Hang on, those two things can’t both be true, surely?
Tweedledum replaces Tweedledee – in my jaundiced view, a very small adjustment, especially compared to what will be happening in Scotland.
@Rev
I’m surprised no-one has suggested that the Scots MP’s currently sitting are givn a 12 month extension until I-Day.
OR ALTERNATIVELY…
That the MP’s stand down at the next GE and the Scottish Government provides a vote based on the equivalent percentage of MP’S.
Afterall, the second the people of Scotland vote for independence, they are saying they want the Scottish Parliament to speak for them.
@YesYesYes
Unfortunately, you are wasting your time if you are waiting for the Scottish media to question Scottish Labour’s position on EU. The Scottish media’s attitude to Labour was illustrated when Kirsty Wark went on holiday with Jack McConnell, and she did not see what the fuss was about. The support for Labour seems to be regarded as a given among many in the media. On the EU, it looks like the Euro-sceptics are again in control of the political agenda of the Conservatives. A Labour MP has said she supports withdrawal from the EU as well. I think we are about to see who the real ‘separatists’ are. Unfortunately for the media and the No campaign, it looks like it is those who want to withdraw from the EU.
@Silvertay
It’s pretty much going on now – my own agency are doing impact assessements and putting themselves forward to take over other functions. But expecting them to do this in a hurry? Trying to get them to move quickly to a resolution is like watching a one legged man in an arse kicking contest.
I agree with you on labour – I pretty much hold them now in the same contempt I used to reserve for the tories.
@AndrewFraeGovan,
Oh God, what I feared would happen is happening.
OK, let’s do it your way. If the UK were to vote to leave the EU in, say, the summer of 2013 then Scotland – irrespective of how we voted in a UK-wide referendum on the EU – would start negotiations to leave the EU. That decision would take immediate effect as it is the UK not Scotland that is currently the member state of the EU. The process itself would, obviously, take time to complete but we would, to all intents and purposes, be out of the EU in the summer of 2013.
If we vote No in the referendum then that’s it, we’re stuck in splendid British isolation until such time as our nation returns to its senses and has another independence referendum and votes Yes. If we vote Yes in the independence referendum eighteen months later, what then? We would have to negotiate re-entry into the EU but, before that, those who voted No in Scotland might demand another referendum on EU membership, particularly if the vote in Scotland in the earlier UK-wide referendum was close.
In other words, this might not be as straightforward as you seem to be assuming, No-one can speak with 100 per cent certainty about how any of this would play out. For example, how the EU would receive a new Scottish application for re-entry, assuming that, if there was a second referendum on EU membership in an independent Scotland, we voted to stay in the EU. This is another reason why I didn’t want to enter a discussion that distracted from the important politics of this issue. But those political issues are completely lost now, so I wish I hadn’t bothered.
I guess it all depends on how long the transitional phase of power being transferred is in the 2013 White Paper.
The SG is probably right in that we could have an Independent state up and running in 18 months…the transfer of the HMRC, Passport Agency etc can be relatively easily done by a simple TUPE transfer which you could in theory do the day after the YES vote…
But there will obvious practical issues to address as well….it will be cutting it fine to set up, recruit train and deploy the SDF for example in the same time frame and there’s obviously the ongoing commitments on both sides for Pensions, Debt etc…
I suspect the SG will go for a soft landing style of Independence with Holyrood regaining powers from Westminister in a stages rather than all in one go during the lifetime of the 2016 parliament…..so there could be a case for arguing for the retention of Scottish MP’s in 2015 albeit with restricted voting rights.
I also think this will be popular with the undecided YES voters who’d probably prefer a slower orderly planned withdrawl from Union to an immediate break…
As RevStu has often pointed out it’s the side that convinces the most undecided voters who’ll decide this referendum the smoother and softer the SG can make the tricky transitional phase the more undecideds they’ll attract.
I think a YES in 2014 and all conventional thinking goes out the window regarding 2015….
It will inevitably throw English nationalism and an English Parliament into the Westminister pot…..who’ll be first to make the grab for the English nationalist vote ?
Carwen Jones has already said Wales is f*cked without Scotland…does that open things up for Plaid or does Welsh Labour break away from Milliband and co ?
The Unionists in Northern Ireland will no longer have the Union anymore….how do they react….stay in a Union thats inevitably going to break up….an independent Northern Ireland or do the unthinkable and actually begin contemplating what a united Ireland would be like?
@TheGreatBaldo
Given that violence remains a painful memory for many, and a prison officer has just been murdered in Northern Ireland, I can’t see any change in the constitutional status there for decades. In regards to Wales, I reckon they will get more powers but will remain in the UK state, regardless of a possible Yes vote in the referendum. Remember the term ‘England and Wales’. Wales has been incorporated to a greater extent than Scotland to Westminster.
Aye muttley accept it’s all highly improbable but a YES in 2014 does bump the constitutional arrangements right to the top of the agenda in rUK perhaps even beating the Economy as the number 1 issue in the election…..
I think we all seem to be missing one thing. The simplest way to ensure that there wouldn’t be any Scottish MP’s to shore up the Labour number of seats would be to make sure the negotiations go quickly. The SNP don’t have to rush. It’s the Tories who do. The Tories will want the terms/negotiations done before the UK GE. If it’s all settled before 2015 the Tories are more likely to win.
This of course means that the Tories will probably cave in on issues slightly easier…Removal of Trident, oil, debt etc etc
YesYesYes
I wouldn’t worry about it. The tories aren’t going to be holding a referendum on EU membership.
@AndrewFraeGovan,
That may or may not be true, but you miss my point. It’s the Yes campaign that should be worrying about it. No-one cares what you or I think about this. It’s how the Yes campaign can and should use the politics of this to mobilise arguments for a Yes vote.
It’s in the interests of the Yes campaign to make as much political capital as possible out of the fact that the greatest threat to Scotland’s continued membership of the EU comes from the Tory (and some Labour) Eurosceptics at Westminster.
It’s also in the interests of the Yes campaign to keep drawing attention to the hypocrisy of ‘Scottish’ Labour on the issue of the EU, not to mention other issues, including how ‘Scottish’ Labour says one thing at Holyrood and does completely the opposite at Westminster.
It’s also in the interests of the Yes campaign to consistently draw attention to the fact that, historically, the British Labour and Tory parties at Westminster have used the issue of Europe for their own narrow, political British national interests in their little world of Westminster (the centre of their political universe), and how, for 60 years now and right up to the present day, this has done considerable damage to Scotland’s national interest.
That’s where I came in to this thread and that’s where I’ll leave it.
YesYesYes
Fair enough, but I would say the YES side is already doing these things.
RevStu, it could lose him votes from people in E&W – he can’t lose any in NI – who thought that there’s something just a little bit odd about letting Dougie Alexander, Jim Murphy and Margaret Curran vote on Westminster business post-independence. It’s not something that the media will ignore when there would be negotiations on the divorce settlement going on at the same time.
“RevStu, it could lose him votes from people in E&W – he can’t lose any in NI – who thought that there’s something just a little bit odd about letting Dougie Alexander, Jim Murphy and Margaret Curran vote on Westminster business post-independence.”
It doesn’t seem to make sense, though. Presumably people wanting to vote Labour want Labour to win, and therefore want Labour to get as many MPs as it can get its hands on by whatever means necessary. So why would they vote Tory (or anyone else) instead, and cut off their nose to spite their face?
Do the UK Government get to formulate the question put to the citizens of the UK in a Referendum on EU Membership or would they have to ask the EU Parliament how the question/questions should be worded ?
What if there’s a yes vote in 2014, and pending negotiations over the terms of the split, the uk holds an EU referendum and votes to flounce out of the EU. Would we be entitled to remain EU citizens?
RevStu, enough people don’t vote that way to make elections winnable for either Labour or Tories in the right circumstances. Alienating people who’d say “that’s not fair!” would be a good way to lose an election.
I have a fear that the two years after a yes vote is where we will see Westminster doing as much damage as possible before we officially leave. Stripping resources, increase taxation etc all before we leave
@Angus McLellan:
“Remembering that negotiations only took six months in Czecho…”
There’s a thought: what happened to the Os after the dissolution of Czechoslovakia?
We now have the Czech Republic and Slovakia – is there a wee village called O on the border? 🙂
What, you’re saying Cameron will pass (or at least bring forward) a bill in 2014 that specifies provisions which will only be enacted if Scotland votes Yes? Firstly, politics just doesn’t work like that – you don’t create legislation hypothesising on your own defeat – and secondly the principle that you can’t bind a future government still applies. Whatever Cameron passes, if Labour win a majority they can say “Bollocks to it.”
I am saying that an agreement will be made in a manner which makes withdrawing Scottish MPs from Westminster after the result of a Yes vote possible. The procedure for this I am not up on and I am not able to offer you any further direct information on where I would find this information.
The voting population of England and Wales also need to have a new Parliament as Scotland leaving the Union changes their Parliament. I am damn sure they will not want Scots MPs sitting in their Parliament discussing their business. The MPs will not at that point be representing their constituencies in Scotland either. Only Scottish MSPs will.
I think it will be very amicable, and sensible. After a Yes vote, all Scottish MP’s wil retire from Westminster, and a method will be agreed. No fuss.