Devolution, Breaking from British imperialism

[Kez]

Hello comrades
I would like to know a few opinions of how Scottish people and Welsh people feel about breaking from British rule after soooooo many years

Here are a few stats (from the Guardian)
1997 Sc. referendum 74.3% in favour of seperate parliament and 63.5% in favour of power over raising tax.

In Wales 50.3% voted for devolution with a winning margin of 6,721 (Why so low at 50.3%?)

A year on, 27% of Scots felt the Scot parliament was doing a good job, 34% doing a bad job and 38% didnt care

In England 62% thought twas best for England to be governed as it is in a UK parliament, 18% felt it would be best for England to have their own parliament

What are your views?

Comrade Kamo

also i was joking about a call to arms in Scotland + Wales although now thinking about it.........

[celticsocialist]

Both Scottish and Welsh parliments are nothing but gestures to try and keep rising nationalism at bay. It probably has done that because of how bad a job they have actually done. Scotland will eventually go the whole way and gain its independance but if it is with the SNP then we will still have the monarchy which defeats the whole point as the queen/king could take any government they dont fancy out of power. Ibeleive this was done in Australia at some point. The only solution is the SSP but I fear this is still a long way off.
There is a definite rise of nationalism in Wales but it is probably a few years behind Scotland. I have spent a bit of time in South Wales and apart from the Language it feels a lot more like England than Scotland does.

There are a few useless terrorist organisations in Scotland and Wales. Dont know much about the Welsh ones but in Scotland it seems to be restricted to the very occasional letterbomb hoax.
I dont see any point in this in Scotland because unlike Ireland the decision is in the hands of the people.

[Guest]

curious as to how "independence" will improve lives?

[gooddoctor]

the ssp government isn't that far off. the latest opinion polls show that we are closing on 10%, so by the time this crazy war's over, and blair's been shown-up for the fascist and incompetent that he is, we'll have soared past the tories. by the next election we hope to send atleast five or six more msp's to join tommy sheridan in the scottich exec. at the moment, the ssp is the only major political party in scotland 100% opposed to the war. we're getting massive coverage which i guess is kind of a silver lining. last monday, tommy was one of the first to be arrested at the biannual blockade of the nuclear base at faslane, just outside glasgow, and it was all over the news. the imperialist war should prove to anyone who doesn't know yet that new labour has betrayed them and doesn't give a shit. we on the other hand are uninfluenced by power politics and will uncover hypocracy wherever it rears its ugly head.

the future's bright, the future's red!

[Guest]

British imperialism is dying- it'll soon be european imperialism...

[The Invisible Hand]

gooddoctor-

these traditional "blockades" have been all over the news for about twenty years now and seem to me not only ineffective but also irresponsible. any act that brings even minor instability to an area that can have massive effects on millions of lives had better a)produce pertinent results and B) prove effective

great britain has done a damn good job of adjusting to the post imperial world...and has set itself up as a gateway between the United States and the EU. in addition, it is the largest european importer from asia, and is the ONLY nation ever in history to have had its trade balances throughout the world exceed its GDP.

if you really want to foster an international community rooted in cooperation and oriented for the eventual liberation of society from economic hierarchy then perhaps great britain and its real leadership need to hear that they are respected for the progress they have made and that they are a cornerstone of hope for future progress.

most people are not radical and do not deal well with change....evolution, not revolution. instead of supporting continued fragmentation and isolationist tendencies, shouldnt we be bringing people together and changing political systems as ascribed in their own doctrines? fundamentally your mentality seems to abandon the rule of law or any pretense of it.
as far as i can see, many of the movements of the twentieth century failed because they championed ideological hedgemony among themselves rather than evolutionary progress for the masses.

"Need brooks no delay, though late's oft better than never."

[celticsocialist]

Gooddoctor, If you stay in Glasgow then you will know that no matter what Labour does the majority of people here will vote for them regardless. Rags like the daily record dont help as people also seem to beleive whatever it tells the and they are in Blairs pocket. For years people have told me they have had enough of Labours lies and wont vote for them again but as soon as its election time they change their mind.

The SSP will continue to grow and will win more seats but I still reckon its a long way from overturning Labour.

Independance may or may not improve lives but it is about time people in this country stood up for themselves and stopped blaming England for so many problems.

As for the blockades being irresponsible. You say the blockades have been all over the news but what about the recent reports that a bus load of pensioners on holiday from Ireland were found in the base when their bus got lost.Or the time a reporter made himself a fake ID and gained access to all sorts of restricted sites of which Faslane was one. These are the people with the ability to blow up the world. I am sure you will agree, The Invisible Hand , thet they really could have a "massive effect on millions of lives"

[gooddoctor]

i'm sorry invisible hand but i have absolutely no idea what you're talking about when you mention things like progress and real leadership. you're full of the worst kind of misconceptions - ones that only serve those in power and help to keep the majority of people frustrated and hopeless. first of all, why would a democratically elected socialist government not be "real"? what sort of infantile arguement is that?
and progress? don't be so bloody naive. last week's big issue was the world poverty week special. it states implicitly that our society has done nothing but regress, unequivocally. one in three children in this country are born into poverty as defined by the un. the gap between rich and poor is widening not only at home, but between developed and developing nations. i suggest that if you want to learn about progress you can't do it from analyising your own bourgeois lifestyle, but must turn towards those that have no opportunity to enjoy your so called progress: the ones who live on decrepite council estates, parents who miss meals to feed their children, old people who can't afford specialist healthcare and die in the winter cold in their thousands, the 6000-7000 homeless, communities that are watching their amenities being closed down by the councils that are supposed to be representing them, the people who can't breathe clean air because profits come before the enviroment, whole workforces that are betrayed because their expertise does not come as cheaply and they aren't as easy to exploit as an asians, south americans or africans. what do they care for your fucking progress? the only progress we've experienced is in the consumer market, and what has that got to do with people's real lives? just because tourists can go to any capital city in the world and buy a macdonalds or a pair of homogenous nike trainers doesn't equate to progress. feed, educate, understand, cooperate, aid, disarm and then you will see true progress. and i'm sorry, but the system of capitalism will not allow such a thing. the ruling class' interests rest on maintaining the status quo. i suggest you go to the people who are really in need of progress and ask them if they agree with you before you come here with your ignorant opinions. you must also speak to people who understand the world, enviromentalists, historians and economists and not just rely on the beliefs that you've been spoon-fed since the day you were born.
global violence has escalated since the cold war ended. we were promised an age where disarmament dividends should have made british lives better. but the arms race is more fruitlful than ever. arms shares were the only ones to experience a rise after s11, and whilst that week's tuc was posponed because it was considered "inappropriate" after such a catastrophy the arms fair experienced its most succesful event ever. how's that for stability and progress? the post-cold war world isn't a safer place, despite what blair is telling you, and if anything we've gone backwards on this issue. maybe this means that the capitalist system just cannot cope without violence. you have to ask yourself why, when we're supposed to be living in an age of stability, blair still feels the need to fight wars like afghanistan. from what i have learnt over the past 6 weeks is that it's nothing to do with justice or democracy, but only revenge, capitalist-imperialist interests and demagoguery. as a responsible member of this community i will do everything within in my power to thwart the arms race, in which there is now only one competitor, and to send the message to the incompetent blair that these awful weapons, whose only purpose is to kill entire communities and render vast tracts of land inhabitable, will not be tolerated as long as self-educated moral people like me live. they aren't a deterence, they just provoke a new arms race and promote recourse to violence. we may not have closed down the base yet, but some people just can't wait for the revolution, some people feel that we'll all be dead by then. in the meantime we're going to raise awareness and try to change brainwashed minds like yours.
do you honestly believe that this war has anything to do with justice? read a newspaper and don't be so blind, and find out who's really being fought against in afghanistan, because it certainly isn't bin laden or the taliban - they have already won this war. no, the only people who are suffering are the afghan families who couldn't afford to make it to the borders and were trapped like rats in cities that were facing imminent destruction, the millions of refugees who are fleeing the bombs, sick people who are being left to die in the streets because the yanks bombed the health service to kingdom come, the red cross workers whose compound has been bombed not once but twice, the four afghan un mine clearers who were killed in their bed, the world food programme compound that was damaged by shrapnel. this amounts to terror tactics, exactly what we are supposed to be fighting against. some justice for the dead of s11, i expect they are turning in their graves.

if this is your progress then you are indeed a selfish and blind individual.

oh, and on the subject of the invisible hand, don't you think that that's a bit of a wishy-washy basis for an economic system that is threatening to conquer the entire world? i do...

(Edited by gooddoctor at 11:44 pm on Oct. 28, 2001)