80s & 90s forgotten classics.

[Red Zone]

Let's assume we all want to help societies's most vulnerable members.
The argument is how that's best done.
One of the first things that needs to be taken into account is how we afford to.

A good start would be stopping the utter ludicrous nonsense of giving out "free" this, that and the next thing to the entire population. It is nothing more than a barefaced election bribe to be giving free prescriptions/eye tests/University fees/dentist check-ups/bus passes/baby boxes etc etc etc to better off people who can well afford to pay for these things themselves

[stewarty27]

Independence, like leaving the EU, is a process, the latter still having 53 months to go before its agreed conclusion date.

My biggest fear is the current FM, and the individuals in senior governmental positions in the Scottish Government, do not possess the intellect, negotiating skills, grasp of pan-national facts, energy, and basic political skills to carry out and complete any meaningful negotiations. Emotion and sentiment, powerful in election campaigns and public pronouncements, are hindrances in such a challenging arena.

The Scottish Cabinet is chockful of party loyalists whose portfolio management abilities are, to be kind, ‘limited’. There also now appears to be serious fatigue, or perhaps arrogant fecklessness among them, most likely due to their length of tenure in an executive.

I’d have no confidence in any of the current senior nationalists negotiating anything successfully on such a stage or in any such forum. I used to have high hopes for Keith Brown, and Swinney at Finance, but that’s gone.

It’s little wonder that the signs are there that the thought of leading and winning a referendum campaign is scaring the pants off them. Actually having to deliver something of that magnitude would seem to be out of their comfort zone, due to its likelihood of being fuucking hard work in comparison to dishing out baby boxes and building a bridge. I’m still waiting for the Local Income Tax, and buying at-cost gas from the Scottish National Energy Company. Nah, both too difficult, and ditched on the quiet.

Make devolution work, by empowering local democracy, as was the interntion of the Kenyon Wright subsidiarity model on which the 1999 Act was founded (and indeed the failed 1978 Act). I want to see the whites of my political servants’ eyes, and currently, Edinburgh is as remote to me as the dog-whistle “Westminster”. Good boy, Rover.

Other than those described above, I have no strong feelings on the matter.

I seem to remember in the event of a YES victory a team would be put together to include politicians from across the political spectrum, as well as key experts from outside politics. a non-partisan Team Scotland if you like. But I share your view if it was left to the current SNP Government I'd be worried. But if 62 other countries can successfully negotiate Independence from the UK Im sure Scotland can. Perhaps Bisconti's balls could put himself forward as part of the team

[57vintage]

Is that the old, "too stupid" or a new, " too incompetent" that we can add to the many reasons why Scotland should never be an independent country managing it's own affairs?

You’d need to ask Swinney, since the original quote was his.

Managing one’s own affairs is only possible after a fair, advantageous negotiated settlement. I think the individuals who would presumably be involved in negotiating that have already proven their incompetence, and probably laziness, in day-to-day management and would not give me any confidence going into the bear-pit of an independence settlement as ‘our’ representatives, supposedly our best people. FFS.

I worked fuucking hard in the 77-79 and 97-99 Assembly/Pariament campaigns, and among those giving local input to the Constitutional Convention during the 1980s and 1990s when nationalists were in the huff for 20 years, and I’ve watched the subsidiarity aspiration, the true extension of devolution, totally fuucked over by successive and quality-draining power grabs for partisan control.

Vote in some competent, knowledgable politicians with respect for all parts of the country, to the extent of empowering them, and then I’ll perhaps offer them some respect and support.

[Red Zone]

I seem to remember in the event of a YES victory a team would be put together to include politicians from across the political spectrum, as well as key experts from outside politics. a non-partisan Team Scotland if you like. But I share your view if it was left to the current SNP Government I'd be worried. But if 62 other countries can successfully negotiate Independence from the UK Im sure Scotland can. Perhaps Bisconti's balls could put himself forward as part of the team

If it comes to it, I would hope that there are not any politicians from any party remotely close to being involved in negotiations. It would need to be staffed by experts in the various fields whether from the civil service or from private industry not by people who are nothing but a big ego with no actual knowledge of how the real world works.

[donsdaft]

A good start would be stopping the utter ludicrous nonsense of giving out "free" this, that and the next thing to the entire population. It is nothing more than a barefaced election bribe to be giving free prescriptions/eye tests/University fees/dentist check-ups/bus passes/baby boxes etc etc etc to better off people who can well afford to pay for these things themselves

You're going to need to sit down and decide at which level you stop paying for your own medical care and opt into the NHS.

It was the Liberals who brought back the free eye test, not so sure about dental check ups though, we went so long without access to NHS dentistry that it's difficult to remember.



Things could be worse though, we could have the Labour party back with a meaningful say.

[Donanddusted]

Vote in some competent, knowledgable politicians with respect for all parts of the country, to the extent of empowering them, and then I’ll perhaps offer them some respect and support.

Perhaps if enough people actually believed that we could govern ourselves we'd see a better calibre of candidates come forward.
I realise that this is a chicken and the egg situation.
I would be far happier to rid ourselves of useless tw@ts than watch from afar as decisions were made on our behalf which we had no say in and had even less chance of voting the politicians making those decisions out at the next election.

[stewarty27]

If it comes to it, I would hope that there are not any politicians from any party remotely close to being involved in negotiations. It would need to be staffed by experts in the various fields whether from the civil service or from private industry not by people who are nothing but a big ego with no actual knowledge of how the real world works.

I take your point about the competence of some of our politicians, But I think it would be inconceivable not to have elected representatives on a team to lead Scotland's transition to independence. It would also leave a democratic deficit to leave the peoples representatives out. Anyway it's all academic as long as Westminster deny us the right to choose. And I'd rather talk about toons from the 80s & 90s on this thread.

[57vintage]

I'd rather talk about toons from the 80s & 90s on this thread.

Right.

Pick the bones out of THIS ****er, then.

https://youtu.be/fccUi40XWvY

[57vintage]

Or the third-best song about the neo-imperial Malvinas farce.

https://youtu.be/y9gDSxJpH_o

[57vintage]

A bit of Pete, sir? “And it’s hats off to Hatton” (before they shut the Simmers bakery).

https://youtu.be/ph57IaYdEsY