Scotlands finances.

Just picked up this excellent post from the Scotsman forum:


Plank @ 2, chew on this.

"London is one of the world's great cities"

Kind of not surprising given the level of investment
channelled into the British Capital
and the rest of the South East,
including the portion which
is spun as a Scottish "investment" :

. £30 billion subway upgrade program
see - tinyurl.com/6sxrgv
. £5.9 billion on one London railway station
see - tinyurl.com/6yheht
. £16 billion For another London rail line
see - tinyurl.com/yphdwl
. £1 billion to upgrade an existing railway station
see - tinyurl.com/5sn8mm
. three quarters of a billion on a Dome !
see - tinyurl.com/6h6ezn
. Followed of course by yet another
London regeneration project £5 billion
see tinyurl.com/5l3jp3
. £6 billion Channel Tunnel Rail Link
see - tinyurl.com/4pg53n
. £2.5 billion -Roads just around the
Docklands in London
see - tinyurl.com/55wh6b
. £3.2 billion For Another Tube line
see - tinyurl.com/5qjoao
. £1 billion improvement to an existing Light Rail Line
see - tinyurl.com/6q2424
. £20 billion for a Second Thames flood barrier planned
see - tinyurl.com/5uf79a
. A £4 billion greenhouse tower over
Batersea power station
see- tinyurl.com/6ac8hn
. £9.3 billion for the Channel Tunnel -
see tinyurl.com/6s4vsb
. £4.3 billion for a 5th Heathrow Terminal
see - tinyurl.com/2h5hx6
. £5 billion Upgrade other London airport upgrades
see - tinyurl.com/5oe82n
. £10 billion Plans for Heathrow link to Channel tunnel
see - tinyurl.com/568dzq
. £13 billion for a third runway Heathrow runway
see - tinyurl.com/3bgdtt
. £9 billion for Brown's plans to transform Thames Gateway
see - tinyurl.com/4kr3pt
. £18 billion London Olympics (
including £200 + million stolen from
the Scottish Lottery)
see - tinyurl.com/olympicscam

The London Olympics is just another example
of Scotland building up the infrastructure
of the South East and British Capital, and of
course we are told the breadcrumbs we will get
will be sufficient for us. 2% of the contracts
Scottish companies are currently getting
is hardly even a breadcrumb -
see - tinyurl.com/3jbu2d

So just what benefit is Scotland going to get from
the London Olympics.
From the official Economic Impact analysis
of the London Olympics (see tinyurl.com/6my6gp )
we have :

"The implication of this is that for the rest of the UK (excluding London), London 2012 will have a negative
impact on GDP of c.£4 billion caused by the displacement of resources and activities towards London."

"A change in the number of businesses created is also
forecast and implies a considerable negative impact to
the rest of the UK (excluding London) resulting
from business closure or displacement towards the
London economy."

"Again this implies a huge negative effect on jobs in the rest of the UK (excluding London)"

And this report was before the massive and obscene
cost over runs from the original estimate of
£4 billion to now at least £14 billion see - tinyurl.com/6p43bv

Additionally £200+ million has been taken from the Scottish lottery. see - tinyurl.com/6pyd43

On top of all that the "positive" impact we
are told the games will means that it counts towards
Scotlands expenditure in the latest GER Report and
will do so in subsequent GERS reports !! As of
course do our involuntary contributions to Trident,
The Iraq War, etc.
see - tinyurl.com/6m9lsm

Scotland is just being treated with absolute disdain and likely the most we will get out of this that our begging for breadcrumbs from the masters table might, just might mean we recover a small portion of our "investment". Scotland needs to be rid of these British parasites as quickly as possible.

SLEAZY LABOUR

Fishermen have been ruined and sent to jail thanks to a ruthless war waged by the marine agency, says Christopher Booker.

=================================================================
Having read the article regarding these fisher men, I am left with an overpowering feeling of rage and hatred for these bureaucrats and politicians who really do not know how to or where to draw the line. Day after day after day all we see is more and more sleaze and greed from these bastards.

As an ex skipper I know all to well what a cruel Mistress the sea is, recent events in the North Sea have shown us again. To have your life taken away by the sea is horrible. To have it stripped from you by your country is unforgiveable for such petty infringements. When I see these pigs of snobby elite officials and politicians breaking the law and walking away smirking it sickens me.

I used to wonder what had happened in places like France and Russia to cause their revolutions. I now understand why people become so incensed with anger against these people that they can so easily resort to civil disobedince and revolution.

They live in a bubble they have created. And the civil servants who keep the bubble intact are just as bad. They are detatched from reality. Look at these pigs in New Zealand.

Don't they understand just how vomit making they are?

The arrogant Smith, who has no shame despite her husband having to wank himself stupid, and charge us for it, whilst she racks up the expenses for sink plugs, barbies, plasma tellys, on and on and on it goes.

Look at the sneering liar Murphy.

This man has the blood of our forces on his hands and he walks away with cash falling out of his pockets. An Orange bigot who should never have been promoted to the level he was.

And why the fuck do we pay for their brats and wives to hog it.

MPs can use the allowance to pay utility bills, council tax, satellite TV subscriptions and buy household goods from the so-called "John Lewis List" of approved items.

They can also pay mortgages, and many are known to have acquired valuable properties which they retain after leaving the Commons.

More than 150 MPs claimed the maximum amount of ACA during 2007/08.

Despite his grace-and-favour Downing Street flat, Mr Brown claimed £17,073 under the allowance, spending the money on a house in his Fife constituency.

But when it comes to Joe Publics taxes, guess what?

A Cabinet minister claimed expenses on his constituency house and rented out his London home while living in a grace and favour apartment in Whitehall, it has been disclosed.

Guess who? Yes the supercillious, sneering, lying moronic Hoon.

And then as if the piggy bastards were not fat enough, the bubble protects them again.

There's more.

A classic line. "There are absolutely no economic benefits in subsidising Mr Timney to watch TV (and I don't care what he watches), except possibly a tiny performance fee to Green Emmanuelle, wherever she is, and some dosh for Virgin Media – and it is outrageous that these causes should be considered worthy of taxpayer support. There is no case for a fiscal stimulus if we continue to allow waste on this scale, and if Mr Timney wants any further physical stimulus he should blooming well pay for it himself."


I have ordered the book by Dale and Guido.

====================================================================

Labours sleaze:

The Little Red Book of New Labour Sleaze
Edited by Iain Dale and Guido Fawkes
Politico's Media, 2006, £7.99

Tony Blair came to power in 1997 pledged to be whiter than white. "You are not here to enjoy the trappings of power," he told his MPs, "but to do a job and to uphold the highest standards in public life."

How have they measured up? Not very well, this chunky little paperback suggests. Peter Mandleson's mortgage, Bernie Ecclestone's donation, the dodgy dossier... are all here.

The Little Red Book was written in a unique way. The editors had the idea on Blair's Black Wednesday - the day Charles Clarke admitted foreign criminals had been released without being considered for deportation, John Prescott admitted to an affair and the nurses booed Patricia Hewitt.

They compiled a list of 101 scandals and invited Britain's bloggers - people who write political weblogs on the Internet - to write them up. They did so over a weekend (my entry covers Downing Street's attempts to muscle in on the Queen Mother's funeral arrangements) and the book appeared a fortnight later.

Inevitably the results are uneven, but they are great fun too. This is a superior version of those little volumes bookshops keep by the till and readers keep by the loo. If there is too much sniggering over sex - Ron Davies' badger watching is the least of our worries - there is also plenty of serious stuff. And if it has a Tory feel, more Lib Dems should have got involved.

Are there lessons to be drawn? Any government in power this long would be frayed at the edges, and I have long argued that Labour's emphasis on sleaze before 1997 was a way of disguising how little they differed from the Tories.

But there is something new about the way this government uses the media to attack anyone who crosses it. When Iain Duncan Smith revealed a lady called Rose Addis had been neglected in hospital, rumours were spread that she was a racist who had refused to be treated by black nurses. The Women's Institute and Paddington rail crash survivors suffered similar experiences.

So there is good reason to buy The Little Red Book - wherever you decide to keep it.

Labour has been accused by Sir John Major of presiding over a decade of "systemic sleaze".

The former Tory Prime Minister also claimed that Gordon Brown had squandered billions of pounds of taxpayers' money during his spell as Chancellor.

In an unusually scathing foray into domestic politics, Sir John protested that Labour had used "McCarthyite" tactics in opposition to portray the last Conservative government as sleazy. "What they did at the time was absolutely unscrupulous," he told BBC1's Andrew Marr show.

"Lots of people misbehaved in the 1980s and 1990s, but they were all individuals. It was never institutional. It was never related specifically to the Conservative Party or to the Conservative government."

He added: "The distinction is that sleaze has seemed to be systemic since 1997."

Referring to Tony Blair's pledge after his first election victory, Sir John said: "I think if they were to say today 'whiter than white' or 'purer than pure', people would just laugh."

The Porn Seceratary.

Dunfermline Building Society

If there was any doubt in anyones mind on the scale of treachery, malevolence and sheer bigotry now being appled to Scotland by the Westminster establishment, then the blatant lies now being told by Darling on The Dunfermline Building Society will erase that doubt.

The double standards and hypocrisy is just breathtaking.

Moridura has done a great article, much better than I could and covers all the bases.

Anglo Saxon Treachery

A loyal patriot has put the Diomhair, bbc Alba now on YouTube, well done. It is essential that this is given the widest possible coverage if you read this and you care about Scotland please please pass this on in e-mail, blog, word of mouth, and forum it will open a lot of blinkered eyes.

THE SOUTH FEAST

David Cameron said in a speech in Glasgow a couple of years ago:

"There's one aspect of Scottish-English relations that I want to address.

It may seem trivial to some but I happen to believe that it's almost more damaging to the Union than institutional or economic difficulties.

It's a question of attitudes.

And, in particular, the ignorance of English people about Scots and Scotland.

All too often Scots switch on their televisions to be greeted with ignorant and inaccurate stereotypes.

Even as an Englishman, I find it a bit embarrassing.

Another aspect of English cultural insensitivity that rears its head in the media is the vexed question of sporting identity.

Why is that Scottish sportsmen and women who win are habitually claimed by English media commentators as 'British' only to be promptly redesignated as 'Scottish' the moment they lose?

Instead of deriding Scots as chippy or difficult, isn't it time that English people of good will educated themselves?

Part of the problem is that some English commentators don't seem to know what to think of Scotland - when they can be bothered to think at all.

They appear seriously confused.

One moment they deride Scots as hopeless drunks and beggars.

The next they complain that England is run by something called the Scottish Raj, a race of superhumans led by John Reid and Kirsty Wark."
#########################################################################

Brown's £2bn Tube bail out...THE SOUTH FEAST.......


The Government is having to pay £2billion to clear the debts of failed Tube contractor Metronet, it was revealed today.

The Department for Transport must hand over the money after Metronet's backers called in their loans. It marks a major humiliation for Gordon Brown who as Chancellor was the chief architect of the private public partnership deal behind the debacle.

Metronet had originally raised the cash to cover the cost of its contracts to maintain and upgrade seven London Underground lines. But it went into administration last year with the debt outstanding.

Conservative transport spokesman Stephen Hammond said: "This is an extraordinary sum of money. The contracts should have been more tightly written. We,the taxpayer, are now underwriting the cost of Gordon Brown's failed PPP."

Under the arrangement, pushed through by Mr Brown in the face of fierce opposition, Metronet's backers are entitled to have all their debts repaid exactly six months after the company went into administration.

The Government has been forced to pick up the bill on behalf of Transport for London which is seeking to take over Metronet. "Metronet raised this money and should have invested it effectively, it failed," said a TfL insider.

The complex financial arrangement sees the Government hand over £2 billion to TFL which will in turn pay the money to Metronet's lenders.

TfL said the failure would not cost the London farepayer any more money. But it was unclear exactly how much the taxpayer would be out of pocket.

Insiders said that until TfL got its hands on Metronet's books it was impossible to tell how much work they had done and at what cost.

London Underground managing director Tim O'Toole said: "Our priority remains the removal of Metronet from PPP administration as quickly as possible. A great deal of progress has already been made. Tube services continue to operate safely and reliably for passengers, as they have done throughout the period of PPP administration."

Today's arrangement was triggered by the banks whichwere entitled to call in their debts - a process known as the Put option - from Metronet exactly six months after the company went into administration.

A Department of Transport aide said the deal was equivalent of someone having to pay off their mortgage early.

In a statement a spokesman said: "The settlement gives London Underground the resources needed to manage Metronet's administration and move toward a more stable long-term footing and continue the work to maintain, renew and upgrade the Underground.

"This will have limited net impact on public finances since Metronet's borrowing was already part of the Government's balance sheet."

Metronet, the largest of the two private firms upgrading the Tube, collapsed after running out of cash. Despite receiving around £70 million a month of government money to upgrade nine of the 12 Tube lines - all but the Jubilee, Northern and Piccadilly - it forecast a £2 billion black hole.

This put it in dispute with the Mayor, who frequently condemned the firm as incompetent and called for its directors to be "hung, drawn and quartered".

This condemnation, combined with delays in its work, caused its share price to crash. When it applied for an extra £550 million to keep it going but received only £121 million, the company was put into administration. Despite the collapse, TfL performed a miracle and kept services running - though many of the station upgrades have been put on ice.

http://www.alba.org.uk/scotching/greatdeception.html

THE SOUTH FEAST.Our collective pensions pay a lot of bonuses in the city of London. Scottish money is spent on educating a lot of people who go and live and pay tax in London.

Bureacrats who administer Scotland work and play in London.

Our soldiers go off and fight in Iraq and pay their taxes centrally.

We shop in shops who report profits centrally. We buy things made by companies who report profits centrally. We pay for media based in London..... When you dig down and add on the cash that is not included in the per capita amounts, you find that the SOUTH EAST U.K. is cushioned by billions of taxpayers money which pours into London from Scotland and the rest of the U.K.Scotland’s budget administers a geographic area covering one third of the UK landmass.

The present figures per head are. N.I. £9385. Scotland. £8623. Wales. £8139. England. £7121.These figures only take account of identifiable spending. ie. Money collated to the London account is monies that are spent specifically for the benefit of London.

The figures do not account for, thousands of Civil service jobs stuffed into London because it is “The Capital,”

The Foreign Office-

The MOD-

Dept.of Health-Culture and Sport-

The Treasury-

The Home Office-

MI5-

MI6-

Westminster including The Lords, do not count towards the London per capita account as they are regarded as for the common good of the U.K. as a whole.

A massive public subsidy pouring into London that does not show up on the books. These agencies by their very existence create in their wake thousands of spin of industries businesses and job’s to service them. As Scotland is finding out.

Professor James Mitchell of Strathclyde University say’s , there are billions spent on London that are never added to the account’s thousands and thousands of jobs centred in London simply because it is the capital of the U.K.

These jobs are counted as part of the shared U.K. total, never added to the London spend. It doesn’t matter if it part of the common U.K. effort, you can’t pretend that all the investment in London is doing any good in Aberdeen or Devon.

The Millennium Dome, cost £789 million, almost twice as much as Holyrood, for what a white tent?

Money plundered from the Lottery at the expense of the U.K..The Olympics are already at £5bn. And will plunder the Lottery again, starving Scottish athletes of funds for development, and with Scotland forced into a U.K. team many Scottish athletes will never see Olympic fame as they would otherwise in a Scottish team.

The Jubilee rail link at £3.5bn. 3.5 times the estimate for a Forth crossing.Scotland’s entire transport “allowance,” is £2.3bn. The new Euro Star London to Paris line has just cost us the thick end of £6bn. Great benefit to us here in Scotland.


The BBCs budget is £4bn. Half of the Scottish “allowance,” for health.

According to the BBCs annual report, 44,234 hours of TV were produced in London, compared to 2,495 in Scotland. They spent a tiny £106 million in Scotland out of a £505 million outside London. Leaving £3.5 billion INSIDE London, no wonder BBC Scotland is so utterly dire and pathetic.

Institutions classed as “National Resources,” do not count towards London Government spending.

The National Gallery gets £26 million.

National History Museum gets £45 million.

The British Museum gets £45 million.

The National Museum of Scotland is classed as “just for Scotland,” and gets £15 million per annum.

Most of the UKs citizens will never visit these “national assets,” in London, as it is to expensive to travel and stay there.The London Centric Scotlandphobic Union is a giant con and propaganda machine.

And then there is GERS which was compiled by Dr. Goudie was ordered by the Tory’s primarily to undermine the truth put forward by the SNP and many financial experts that Scotland was economically viable as an independent country.

Dr. Goudie has urged politicians to treat GERS with caution as the figures used are pure mythology and propaganda, and have easily been discredited by many experts and the SNP.


The top secret McCrone report said:
It is not possible to compare these figures with an accurate estimate of Scotland’s present balance of payments position. From the state of Scotland’s economy one would expect a balance of payments deficit on current account and a rough comparison of income and expenditure estimates for GDP suggest that this could be of the order of £300m. a year in 1970/71.

Plainly this is a most unreliable figure and it will vary from year to year, but it is probably sufficient to suggest the orders of magnitude. What is quite clear is that the balance of payments gain from North Sea oil would easily swamp the existing deficit whatever its size and transform Scotland into a country with a substantial and chronic surplus.

No wonder then that the Westminster/ UK/ English parliament, (same thing) lies and contorts itself so badly to keep Scotland where they want her. Who wants a partner who you have to subsidise?

Micheal Lynch - Scotland; A new History - points out the the Scottish economy prior to the treaty was growing at around 2.5% per annum based on data from custom duties income.
Post Union there was a collapse of the Scottish economy as it was flooded with cheap imports from England causing major job losses in the burghs which 'free trade' with 'English colonies' did little to offset.

85% of of Scotland's trade prior to 1707 was with Scandanavia, Baltic, Hanseatic League and the Low Countries.

The Scottish economy did not recover to pre Treaty state until the late 1750's as its normal trading partners were blocked by England's European Wars in defence of Hanoverian possessions.

By 1713 the negative nature of the Union on the Scottish economy had been realised and was the main driver behind the Earl of Selkirk's attempt to have the treaty dissolved.

Given the natural resources in Scotland there is no evidence that Scotland gained any economic benefit from the Union during the Industrial revolution and given the many innovative engineering solutions invented by Scots - not the least vital among them being Nielson's Blast Furnace, Watt's Steam engine - the rest of the UK (aka England) would have been chasing an independent Scottish economy.

There is no historical evidence at any level that Scotland has ever had any economic benefit from the Union that it would not have accrued as an independent nation. According to Michael Lynch it would be a brave historian that would return to such 'Olympian pronouncements' on the economic benefit to Scotland of the Union Treaty.

Micheal Forsyth, an ex-Scottish (Tory) Secretary, in his book on the Union Treaty comes to the same conclusion and argues that the Union Treaty no longer has any great benefit to either party and should be revoked.

Meanwhile, GERS (Government Expenditure and Revenues Statistics) leaves North Sea oil revenues out from the Scottish account but Oil companies corporation tax is credited to London. And it puts the entire cost of Trident IN the Scottish account.
They are lying and the know it.

The McCrone report in the 1970's indicates that the Scottish economy would have had rapid and strong growth as an independent nation versus the reality of stagnation under the last 302 years of Union hegemony.


MURPHY'S LIES.

The evidence today is that 50% of all the base load from Scotland's two nuclear power stations is used to prop up the North of England and Northern Ireland as is Scottish Hydro power used to deal with peak demand. Hydro in Scotland is therefore not as viable as it could be.

To meet the UK requirement for re-useable power Scotland is being plastered with wind power and Hydro capacity 'ironically' reduced to ensure that 'UK' i.e. Scottish wind farms get EU grants.