Featuring fresh takes and real-time analysis from HuffPost's signature lineup of contributors
Neil Scott

GET UPDATES FROM Neil Scott
 

Scottish Independence Will Be for People, Not Profit

Posted: 16/02/2013 14:30

How do I explain my want for an independent Scotland?

Ok. Lets do that using one example. Excess.

It's clear I am a socialist, so surplus in my independent Scotland would be used to ensure those with little access to something they need, get it. Excess or surplus or profit in my opinion, should not bolster the bank accounts of those who have so much they will never use it.

In Scotland, over 2000 people MORE die in the four winter months than they do in the previous four and the following four. A lot of those deaths are because of hypothermia in the home. This is in a country in which we have an excess of oil and an excess of electricity produced. This surplus is not given to our pensioners and poor to ensure they live through these harsh Scottish months. Both are sold in London or through a majority of London based companies for the profit boosting of the top six power companies who make more than £30 billion a year to cushion billionaires from the harsh winters on their yachts in the Caribbean or at the most local, their well heated second, third or forth homes they keep in Scotland for the Grouse shoot or a wee visit at Hogmanay.

£30 billion a year that is mostly generated in Scotland through our excess of power. And this figure does not factor in the oil drained from our shores to bolster those bank accounts of the millionaires and billionaires who can afford to invest in the oil companies. Money they will in all probability never spend, while the lives of the poor and old are sacrificed.

Fighting this greed and fighting to share out our plentiful resources to ensure people have better, longer and more productive lives has not happened with Scotland in the UK. The UK is not OK for Scotland's vulnerable.

Scotland has voted continuously and decisively for a more socially just system since the days of Thatcher and before. But what have we had? Our budgets and welfare controlled by the Tories, Liberal Democrats and New Labour- all who have deep relationships with the power and oil profiteers. None of the above really want to ensure our pensioners and vulnerable are safe and warm. In fact all of the above support welfare cuts and bleeding more money from the most vulnerable of our people in order to boost profits and pay off bankers.

Can staying in the UK change this? The evidence of the past forty years is evidence itself.

Can an independent Scotland change this? Personally, I believe so, as the people of Scotland have been proven to vote for fairness and increasingly so, from election to election through their rejection of selfish Thatcherism and the subsequent neo-liberalist experiment of the Tories, Liberal Democrats and New Labour.

2013-02-16-yesRed_whiteBG.png

 

Follow Neil Scott on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@nwsocialist

FOLLOW UK POLITICS
 
 
  • Comments
  • 16
  • Pending Comments
  • 0
  • View FAQ
Comments are closed for this entry
View All
Favorites
Recency  | 
Popularity
19:20 on 07/04/2013
Main Stream Media are a joke though. The pinned post here highlights the lengths some media will go to pour scorn on those who want a fairer society: https://www.facebook.com/cmisid
17:55 on 18/02/2013
YES YES YES!!!!! wonderfull personally i belive that through no fault of our own the hundreds of billions of our oil revenue has been taken away from our nation through the decades with no voice against this.ENGLAND do not or ever will want independance for scotland because they know the gravey trains coming too an end.
13:01 on 17/02/2013
The problem with Neo-Liberalism is that it impoverishes those who would, who must, spend to live, and enriches those who don't. And that impoverishes us all. Which is why the Scandinavian nations are so much more successful than the UK. And why I am voting Yes!
Population 2011/ GDP per head 2011 / Credit Rating and outlook 2013 (Moody's / Fitch /S&P)
Norway 5,037,365, $98,102 Aaa Stable / AAA Stable / AAA Stable
Denmark 5,564,219, $59,852, Aaa Stable / AAA Stable / AAA Stable
Finland 5,418,090 $48,823, Aaa Stable / AAA Stable / AAA Negative
Iceland 319,575 $43,969. Baa3 Negative / BBB- Stable / BBB- Stable
Ireland 4,600,000, $48,423 Ba1 Negative / BBB+ Negative /BBB+ Stable
Scotland, 5,284,800, $41,189 (2010). Credit rating as UK at present
Sweden, 9,453,000, $57,091 Aaa Stable / AAA Stable / AAA Stable
UK 61,000,000 ,$39,038, Aaa Negative / AAA Negative /AAA Negative
http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.CD
http://chartsbin.com/view/1175
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/0039/00390896.pdf
09:31 on 17/02/2013
There is no real demand for independence, except in the minds of those who want to divide people and create a socialist state.

Redistribution is not "Fairness" it's theft.
13:09 on 17/02/2013
No - exploitation is theft. Redistribution is ensuring everyone benefits from OUR resources and efforts. Scots are more left leaning than new Labour and the SNP for that matter, sadly politicians look out for business interests before the general population. Trickle down doesn't happen, the flow of wealth is all from the lowest income to the richest. Politicians of all the major parties support this in practise.
15:01 on 17/02/2013
North Korea being a good example of this philosophy. The bomb before food and a prison system Stalin would be proud of
17:19 on 17/02/2013
No "real" demand when 35% of the Scots in recent surveys say they will definitely vote for independence and another 20% say they are considering voting for independence. I wonder exactly what you would consider REAL demand. As for dividing people, are you saying there should be a world state? Otherwise, there will be divisions. Or is it only the ?who don't have the right to run their own affairs and control their own country?
This comment has been removed.