678 A Yes vote in the Scottish Referendum will end the Thatcherite era

A Yes vote in the Scottish Referendum will end the Thatcherite era

Newsletter published on 15 September 2014

(1) A Yes vote in the Scottish Referendum will end the Thatcherite era
(2) Class Basis of the Referendum
(3) Scotland independence vote hinges on Working Class resentment of
Austerity
(4) Working-class Scots reject free-market evils of the London
government - The Economist
(5) YES to Scottish Independence - escape from repressive Big Brother
police state
(6) Revenge for Thatcherism: Scots Aren't the Only Angry Bunch
(7) Working class Scots want Independence from the Westminster elite
(8) George Monbiot: A Yes vote in Scotland would give us all Hope
(9) Yes Campaign is centred in Glasgow, the jobless capital of the UK
(10) Scottish Socialist Party: Independence will free us from yoke of
British imperialism
(11) Scottish Independence spooks City of London; Scotland’s banks say
they'll relocate
(12) Panic On The Streets Of London ... Can Scotland Ever Be The Same Again?
(13) British Communist Party opposes Independence
(14) WSWS Trots oppose Independence

(1) A Yes vote in the Scottish Referendum will end the Thatcherite era
- by Peter Myers, September 15, 2014

The Scottish Referendum is less about Nationalism, and more about
escaping from the Class War of the Thatcherite era - the Privatisation,
Deregulation, Free Trade, Inequality, Joblessness  and Austerity.

The headquarters of that Class War is the City of London, the financial
hub of the British Empire. As long as it keeps issuing KBEs, DBEs, OBEs,
MBEs & CBEs we'll know that the Empire still exists.

The Scottish Referendum is a serious threat to the Empire. If it
succeeds, the name "United Kingdom" will have to be changed, just as the
name "Soviet Union" had to be dropped. The name change will have
profound effects, among which will be blaming the Thatcherite legacy for
this result. The change in consciousness will likely occur not only in
Scotland, but in England as well - and hopefully here in Australia too.

A Yes vote in the Scottish Referendum will end the Thatcherite era.

The "mainstream" political parties are campaigning for a "No" vote, as
are the big banks of the City of London. The British Communist Party and
the WSWS Trots also support the "No" vote. Capitalists and Communists
often join forces against Nationalists, because they are Internationalists.

The Scottish Socialist Party, on the other hand, is campaigning strongly
for "Yes". Their policy is a National Socialism, a Socialism in one
country - it's hard to find a term that was not co-opted by Hitler or
Stalin, but many of us remember Postwar Governments of the 1950s & 60s
that pursued policies of this kind. I strongly back them and wish them
the best.

(2) Class Basis of the Referendum

http://leftunity.org/the-scottish-independence-debate/

The Scottish independence debate

April 27, 2014

Allan Armstrong of the Radical Independence Campaign debates Alan
Mackinnon of the Red Paper Collective.

The case for Left Unity to actively support a ‘yes’ campaign in Scotland

Allan Armstrong, Radical Independence Campaign, Edinburgh branch

In the lead-up to the September 18 independence referendum, Scotland is
currently awash with political debate. There is a direct correlation
between class and voting intentions. The more wealthy and privileged you
are, the more likely you are to support the unionist status quo; the
more exploited and oppressed, the more you support independence. [...]

The ‘No’ side dominates the official media. Never a day passes without
the mainstream press and the BBC warning of the dire consequences we
face if there is a ‘Yes’ vote. [...]

The ‘Yes’ campaign has countered this with public meetings (scores
throughout Scotland every week), street campaigning, mass voter
registration and canvassing. This campaign has placed much emphasis on
the social media and blogs such as bella caledonia. New books and
pamphlets appear almost every week, reflecting the real thirst for
politics, which the referendum campaign has opened up. There is a
political buzz in the air. [...]

(3) Scotland independence vote hinges on Working Class resentment of
Austerity

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/9/14/scotland-referendumanalysis.html

Too close to call: Scotland independence vote hinges on working class

Economic divisions are key in this week’s vote on whether to break away
from UK and become fully sovereign

September 14, 2014 5:00AM ET

   by James Maxwell

[...] The transformation of Scottish working-class attitudes toward
secession has been gradual. The erosion of Scotland’s manufacturing base
from the 1980s onward, the weakening of a once powerful British trade
union movement and the explosion of poorly paid, insecure work have all
undermined Westminster’s authority in Scotland.

But the political shift has been consolidated over the past year by the
efforts of small locally organized pro-independence groups operating in
Scotland’s poorest neighborhoods. Outfits such as the Radical
Independence Campaign (slogan: “Britain is for the rich. Scotland can be
ours”) have brought a youthful, left-wing credibility to Scottish
nationalism and boosted the yes vote in working-class districts across
the country.

Although Radical Independence and the Scottish National Party represent
distinct forces, their campaigns have converged, loosely, around the
idea that political separation from England offers the quickest and most
convenient escape route from London’s austerity policies. The hotly
disputed claim that an independent Scotland would preserve what remains
of the post–World War II welfare state has become one of the defining
themes of the referendum debate. By forcing Labor into an alliance with
the Conservatives, the yes campaign has been able to occupy (in
rhetoric, if not necessarily in policy) Scotland’s progressive political
center.

(4) Working-class Scots reject free-market evils of the London
government - The Economist

http://www.economist.com/news/britain/21595429-battle-scotland-will-be-decided-group-people-who-rarely-get-change

Ayes to the left

The battle for Scotland will be decided by a group of people who rarely
get to change anything

Feb 1st 2014

[...] Working-class Scots are more drawn to independence than are others
(see chart). [...]

In most referendums, undecided voters drift into the conservative camp
towards the end of the campaign. Scotland’s independence vote may turn
out to be an exception. Undecided voters are more left-wing than the
average Scot, more hostile to the Conservative-led government in London
and more inclined to think that Scotland would succeed alone; in short,
they are “almost undoubtedly more favourable to independence,” says John
Curtice, a psephologist. They worry unionists keen for a decisive win,
and excite nationalists longing for an earthquake. [...]

In the battle for undecided voters, nationalists will try to drag the
debate onto the free-market evils of the London government. The Tories,
Yes Scotland has concluded, are the best recruiting agent for the
pro-independence cause. His eye on undecided voters like Cathy and
Thomas, Mr Salmond has repeatedly demanded a televised debate with David
Cameron, Britain’s patrician prime minister. For the sake of the union,
Mr Cameron should keep declining the invitation.

(5) YES to Scottish Independence - escape from repressive Big Brother
police state

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/vote-yes-on-scottish-independence-scotland-finally-has-a-chance-to-get-free-from-the-british

Vote YES On Scottish Independence – Scotland Finally Has A Chance To Get
Free From The British

By Michael Snyder, on September 11th, 2014

Scottish voters finally have the opportunity to fulfill William
Wallace's dream of a Scotland that is free and independent of England
forever.  All they have to do is vote yes next week.  Without a doubt, a
divorce from the British would be quite messy, and life would probably
be more comfortable in the short-term if Scotland remains part of the
United Kingdom.  But hopefully the people of Scotland are looking beyond
short-term concerns.  Today, the United Kingdom is a horribly repressive
Big Brother police state that is dominated by bureaucratic control
freaks.  You can hardly even sneeze without violating some kind of law,
rule or regulation.  And the London banking establishment is at the very
heart of the debt-based global financial system which is enslaving so
much of the planet.  Scotland finally has a chance to get free from all
of this.  All it is going to take is a yes vote on Scottish
independence. [...]

(6) Revenge for Thatcherism: Scots Aren't the Only Angry Bunch

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-09-14/scots-aren-t-the-only-angry-bunch

Scots Aren't the Only Angry Bunch

By Pankaj Mishra

6 Sept 14, 2014 6:03 PM EDT

This week’s referendum in Scotland could result in the U.K. losing
almost one-third of its landmass, and 8 percent of its population, and,
very likely, its present prime minister. In a summer rich with shocks,
the breakup of a United Nations Security Council member suddenly seems
more likely than the long-predicted fracturing of Iraq.

Most people I spoke with when traveling through Scotland last month
expected the battle for independence waged by the Scottish Nationalist
Party to have been lost. Recent opinion polls, however, show that almost
half of Scottish voters hope to break free of their London masters on
Thursday.

Scotland's Independence

Their disaffection was not the work of a day. It has been in the making
for at least three decades. Jason Cowley, editor of Britain’s leading
political weekly, the New Statesman, correctly points out that Britain’s
Conservative prime minister in the 1980s, Margaret Thatcher, did more
for Scottish independence with her regime of privatization, deregulation
and unfair taxation than any Scottish nationalist. By some estimates,
the deindustrialization that Thatcher presided over had more devastating
effects in Scotland than in England.

That's why Thatcher’s Conservative Party is almost extinct in Scotland,
and its current leaders, David Cameron, George Osborne and Boris
Johnson, evoke a visceral hostility and scorn. This isn't just class
hatred for privately educated and plummy-accented Tories, or for the
axis of Eton College, Rupert Murdoch’s News International and the City
of London that they embody.

Many Scots are unhappy, too, with the City-obsessed Labour Party, which
under Tony Blair, Thatcher’s self-proclaimed heir, placed itself in the
avant garde of marketization, initiating among other things the
privatization of the National Health Service.

Recriminations have now erupted in England as financial markets finally
register the prospect of Scotland’s secession. But blaming Cameron, who
fecklessly called the referendum and limited it to a binary choice,
obscures the fact that the Scottish mutiny is part of a larger worldwide
trend.

Governments everywhere that are unable to guarantee equitable growth and
social welfare have suffered a fatal decay of legitimacy. This has been
registered so far mostly by low voting percentages, political apathy
more broadly, or drastic upsurge in support for challengers to the
status quo from nonelite backgrounds, such as Joko Widodo in Indonesia
and Marina Silva in Brazil.

Events in Scotland outline a more radical possibility (likely to be
fulfilled in Europe itself in a few weeks when Catalonia may vote to
secede from Spain): Disaffected citizens can move very quickly to reject
unrepresentative governments by breaking up entire nation-states.

A quick glance at the last wave of self-determination in the early 20th
century shows that inept governance and loss of sovereignty, as much as
foolish wars and economic crises, can be preludes to swift political
fragmentation.

Few people in 1900 expected centuries-old empires -- Qing, Hapsburg,
Ottoman -- to collapse by 1918. Yet they struggled to cope with the
energies unleashed by the rapid growth of commerce and communications in
the first wave of globalization.

Modern education had created a new class of putative rulers and
modernizers. The Turkish, Arab and Chinese nationalists who built new
nation-states out of the ruins of old empires scorned their old,
decrepit rulers as much as they did the foreign imperialists who imposed
free trade through gunboats.

For almost a century since 1918, the centralized nation-state has been
the world’s default political form. Its various experiments in
industrialization, urbanization, mass literacy and consumerism have
brought more people into public life.

In the past, the extraordinary growth achieved by industrial capitalism
had largely enriched a tiny minority. Western governments forced
capitalism after its most severe crisis in the 1930s into a new compact
with the rising masses.

As George Orwell stressed during the darkest days of the Second World
War, Britain had no choice but to become a fairer society; the National
Health Service was the centerpiece of the welfare state that Labour
Party began to build after 1945.

That world of cohesive nation-states is now passing, more rapidly than
we could have imagined. As in the early 20th century, the elemental
forces of globalization have unraveled broad solidarities and loyalties.

The revolution in communications, for instance, has radicalized people
as much as it has facilitated faster movements of trade and finance.
Mobile phones, as I wrote in an earlier column, are as likely to promote
secessionist passions as efficient commerce and national unity.

The world today seems full of examples of decayed political systems that
have frittered away their legitimacy. They are vulnerable to being
undermined rapidly by anarchic revolts from within.

Scotland’s referendum will happen at a great remove from the failed or
failing states of our time. Whatever its result may be, it has at least
alerted us to other possible earthquakes along the political fault lines
of today's world.

To contact the author of this article: Pankaj Mishra at pmashobra@gmail.com.

To contact the editor responsible for this article: Nisid Hajari at
nhajari@bloomberg.net.

(7) Working class Scots want Independence from the Westminster elite

http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidnicholson/2014/09/08/scotland-independence-referendum-5-things-everyones-thinking-but-nobodys-saying/

9/08/2014 @ 10:39AM

Scotland Independence Referendum - 5 Things Everyone's Thinking But
Nobody's Saying

Now that Scotland’s independence referendum has sent shudders through
global markets – Sterling down to a 10-month low against the dollar,
major banks’ share prices leaking – it’s time for some uncomfortable truths.

1          Support for independence is about class war

The Scottish National Party’s appeal to Scots is to stick two fingers up
to the wealthy, English-based Conservative Party currently headed by
David Cameron, the privately educated graduate of Oxford University.

Just as many working class Scots will support any national football team
that is playing against England, they have been roused to indignation
and fury over the ‘Westminster elite’ which the SNP claims is robbing
them of their natural economic birth right. [...]

The Queen is said by the Daily Mail newspaper (another object of hatred
for class warriors) to be ‘concerned’ and to have held a crisis
discussion with David Cameron. Cue further glee throughout working class
Scotland. [...]

(8) George Monbiot: A Yes vote in Scotland would give us all Hope

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/09/yes-vote-in-scotland-most-dangerous-thing-of-all-hope

A yes vote in Scotland would unleash the most dangerous thing of all - hope

Independence would carry the potential to galvanise progressive
movements across the rest of the UK

             George Monbiot
           o
           o The Guardian, 9 September 2014

Of all the bad arguments urging the Scots to vote no – and there are
plenty – perhaps the worst is the demand that Scotland should remain in
the union to save England from itself. Responses to my column last week
suggest this wretched apron-strings argument has some traction among
people who claim to belong to the left.

Consider what it entails: it asks a nation of 5.3 million to forgo
independence to exempt a nation of 54 million from having to fight its
own battles. In return for this self-denial, the five million must
remain yoked to the dismal politics of cowardice and triangulation that
cause the problems from which we ask them to save us.

“A UK without Scotland would be much less likely to elect any government
of a progressive hue,” former Labour minister Brian Wilson claimed in
the Guardian last week. We must combine against the “forces of privilege
and reaction” (as he lines up with the Conservatives, Ukip, the Lib
Dems, the banks, the corporations, almost all the rightwing columnists
in Britain, and every UK newspaper except the Sunday Herald) – in the
cause of “solidarity”.

There’s another New Labour weasel word to add to its lexicon (other
examples include reform, which now means privatisation; and partnership,
which means selling out to big business). Once solidarity meant making
common cause with the exploited, the underpaid, the excluded. Now, to
these cyborgs in suits, it means keeping faith with the banks, the
corporate press, cuts, a tollbooth economy and market fundamentalism.

Here, to Wilson and his fellow flinchers, is what solidarity meant while
they were in office. It meant voting for the Iraq war, for Trident, for
identity cards, for 3,500 new criminal offences, including the
criminalisation of most forms of peaceful protest. It meant being
drafted in as political mercenaries to impose on the English policies to
which the Scots were not subject, such as university top-up fees and
foundation hospitals. It meant supporting every destructive and unjust
proposition advanced by their leaders: the brood parasites who hatched
in the Labour nest then flicked its dearest principles over the edge.
It’s no surprise that the more the Scots see of their former Labour
ministers, the more inclined they are to vote for independence.

So now Better Together has brought in Gordon Brown, scattering bribes in
a desperate, last-ditch effort at containment. They must hope the Scots
have forgotten that he boasted of setting “the lowest rate in the
history of British corporation tax, the lowest rate of any major country
in Europe and the lowest rate of any major industrialised country
anywhere”. That he pledged to the City of London “in budget after
budget, I want us to do even more to encourage the risk takers”. That,
after 13 years of Labour government, the UK had higher levels of
inequality than after 18 years of Tory government. That his government
colluded in kidnapping and torture. That he helped cause the deaths of
hundreds of thousands through his support for the illegal war on Iraq.

He roams through Scotland, still badged with blood, promising what he
never delivered when he had the chance, this man who helped unravel the
social safety net his predecessors wove; who marketised and dismembered
public services; who enriched the wealthy and shafted the poor; who
pledged money for Trident but failed to reverse the loss of social
housing; whose private finance initiative planted a series of timebombs
now exploding throughout the NHS and other public services; who greased
and wheedled and slavered his way into the company of bankers and
oligarchs while trampling over the working people he was elected to
represent. This is the progressive Prester John who will ride to the
rescue of the no campaign?

Where, in Scotland’s Labour party, are the Keir Hardies and Jimmy Reids
of our time? Where is the vision, the inspiration, the hope? The
shuffling, spineless little men who replaced these titans offer nothing
but fear. Through fear, they seek to shove Scotland back into its box,
as its people rebel against the dreary, closed future mapped out for
them – and the rest of us – by the three main Westminster parties.

Sure, if Scotland becomes independent, all else being equal, Labour
would lose 41 seats at Westminster and Tory majorities would become more
likely. But all else need not be equal. Scottish independence can
galvanise progressive movements across the rest of the UK. We’ll watch
as the Scots engage in the transformative process of writing a
constitution. We’ll see that a nation of these islands can live and – I
hope – flourish with a fully elected legislature (no House of Lords),
with a fair electoral system (proportional representation), and with a
parliament in which only representatives of that nation can vote (no
cross-border mercenaries).

Already, the myth of political apathy has been scotched by the
tumultuous movement north of the border. As soon as something is worth
voting for, people will queue into the night to add their names to the
register. The low voter turnouts in Westminster elections reflect not an
absence of interest but an absence of hope.

If Scotland becomes independent, it will be despite the efforts of
almost the entire UK establishment. It will be because social media has
defeated the corporate media. It will be a victory for citizens over the
Westminster machine, for shoes over helicopters. It will show that a
sufficiently inspiring idea can cut through bribes and blackmail,
through threats and fear-mongering. That hope, marginalised at first,
can spread across a nation, defying all attempts to suppress it. That
you can be hated by the Daily Mail and still have a chance of winning.

If Labour has any political nous, any remaining flicker of courage, it
will understand what this moment means. Instead of suppressing the
forces of hope and inspiration, it would mobilise them. It would, for
instance, pledge, in its manifesto, a referendum on drafting a written
constitution for the rest of the UK.

It would understand that hope is the most dangerous of all political
reagents. It can transform what appears to be a fixed polity, a fixed
outcome, into something entirely different. It can summon up passion and
purpose we never knew we possessed. If Scotland becomes independent,
England – if only the potential were recognised – could also be transformed.

Twitter: @georgemonbiot. A fully referenced version of this article can
be found at monbiot.com

(9) Yes Campaign is centred in Glasgow, the jobless capital of the UK

http://wire.novaramedia.com/2014/01/5-reasons-to-care-about-scottish-independence-particularly-if-you-are-english-nicola-seth-smith/

5 Reasons To Care About Scottish Independence (Particularly if you are
English)

by Niki Seth-Smith

Published 11th August 2014

[...] Marxists who see Scottish “nationalists” as the great betrayers of
the international proletariat should take heed. Working-class Scots are
far more in favour of independence than the privileged. It’s no wonder
that the Yes Campaign is centred in Glasgow, the jobless capital of the
UK. They want to give the boot to Cameron, Osborne and the rest of the
Tory toffs who Scotland never voted for and who care nothing for the
vulnerable. Politically disenfranchised and hence switched off from
elections, they are hard to get to. But if this section of the
electorate does go to the ballot box , it will be the working-class that
deliver independence.

3. Empire end-game.

[...]  Losing Scotland will be an existential blow to a Westminster
establishment still in denial about their diminished role in the world,
particularly for the Tory party and their stubborn faith in the British
bulldog. Scotland may keep the Queen, but the foundations of Britannia
as a pompous, blue-blooded colossus would be shaken to the core.

4. An alternative to austerity on the doorstep?

No-one thinks the SNP are out to bust the bankers. They may also win
less economic autonomy than they claim (there is terminal disagreement
over the fiscal powers possible under a currency union). But Alex
Salmond is only opening the gate: in the long-term, Scotland will slip
the grip of UK plc under the sway of London and the City. [...]

(10) Scottish Socialist Party: Independence will free us from yoke of
British imperialism

http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/case-independent-socialist-scotland-free-download/

Mon 15. Sep 2014

The Case For An Independent Socialist Scotland

Written by Webmaster on August 18, 2014.

The Scottish Socialist Party is pleased to bring you our best-selling
pamphlet “The Case For an Independent Socialist Scotland” as a free
download.

We welcome all to download, share and discuss our arguments against
continuing Westminster rule under a neo-liberal warmongering British
state elite and our unique vision for an independent socialist Scotland.

“On Thursday 18 September 2014, Scotland will go to the polls to decide
whether to remain part of the 300 year old political union that is ‘The
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland’ or become the
world’s newest independent country.

The decision will have far reaching consequences either way. For the
British state, Scottish independence represents a huge threat, a
profound loss of economic and political power and influence at home and
abroad. Consequently, it is dead-set against it and it will do its
utmost to stop that from happening.

For the independence movement, the stakes are equally high. The
referendum offers a once in a lifetime opportunity to secure
self-determination for Scotland, to establish a left of centre social
democratic state and free five million Scots from the yoke of British
imperialism…”

(11) Scottish Independence spooks City of London; Scotland’s banks say
they'll relocate

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c79411a6-3995-11e4-83c4-00144feabdc0.html

September 12, 2014 6:08 pm

Prospect of another watchdog spooks Scotland’s banks

By Brooke Masters

The City of London showed its hand this week on the question of Scottish
independence. After months of studied unconcern, and neutrality, five
banks went public this week, saying they planned to relocate their legal
domicile and head offices south of the border in case of a “Yes” vote.
It is not clear how many employees would move along with the legal
changes – the two biggest banks, Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of
Scotland, specifically played down job losses. But it is hard to imagine
how the changes could be good for the Scottish economy. RBS currently
employs 3,000 people in its £335m Gogarburn headquarters on the
outskirts of Edinburgh.

Both banks are partly owned by the UK government, and their
announcements came right after prime minister David Cameron made an
emergency trip to Scotland to say that he would be “heartbroken” if the
Scots chose to leave. But they are not the only financial services
companies talking about upping sticks. Clydesdale Bank, Standard Life,
and the UK arm of Aegon also put out details of how they would relocate
towards London in the event of secession.

Some small investors are doing the equivalent at a personal level –
banks on the English side of the border are reporting a flurry of new
account openings by Scottish residents. These transfers follow concerns
over possible capital controls, or the chance that savers could end up
with something other than sterling if they stayed in Scotland.

For many of the financial services groups, the decision publicly to dash
independence dreams cannot have been an easy one. Many of their
employees are proud Scots and the companies have generations of history
there. In addition, moving will not be cheap. One banking analyst
estimated that it would cost between £500m and £1bn to move domiciles.
But from a practical point of view, many financial institutions must
feel they simply have no choice.

Banks based in Scotland would not be eligible for the UK Financial
Services Compensation Scheme. An independent Scotland would presumably
set up its own deposit insurance. But the scheme would be brand new and
it is not clear whether it would have a ready pot of money.

Back in the financial crisis, many of the depositors who queued outside
Northern Rock to withdraw their cash did so because they were not
convinced the FSCS had the means to pay them back.

Staying in an independent Scotland could also drive up funding costs – a
serious concern for institutions that are already facing sharply lower
returns on the equity than they had before the 2008 crisis. That is
because a Scottish bank’s credit ratings would almost certainly suffer a
little in comparison with its English peers because it would be backed
by a smaller, less established sovereign.

In theory, all of these costs could be priced in and Scotland could come
up with its own credible deposit scheme. But there is another intangible
element.

Britain’s financial institutions have just survived a massive regulatory
overhaul. The Financial Services Authority was dismembered and its
duties were split between two new and more assertive watchdogs. One of
these, the Financial Conduct Authority, has hit the industry with higher
fines and demands that they pay more heed to the needs of their
customers. The other, the Bank of England, has demanded more capital.

Staying in Scotland could well mean repeating the same unpleasant
experience. If you ran a bank, would you want to be experimented on by
Scottish leader Alex Salmond’s new regulator?

brooke.masters@ft.com

(12) Panic On The Streets Of London ... Can Scotland Ever Be The Same Again?

http://www.maxkeiser.com/2014/09/panic-on-the-streets-of-london-can-scotland-ever-be-the-same-again/
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article47316.html

Sep 12, 2014 - 04:38 PM GMT

By: Mark O'Byrne (GoldCore)

There is now less than one week of campaigning remaining before the
Scottish Independence Referendum, which takes place next Thursday,
September 18.

The pro-union ‘no’ vote campaign is back in the lead this week after the
latest opinion poll from pollsters YouGov put them at 52%, marginally
ahead of the pro-independence ‘yes’ campaign.

The referendum question being asked is simply “Should Scotland be an
independent country?”

After being ahead significantly since the outset of the independence
campaign, the pro-union side was abruptly shocked last weekend when the
pro-independence side took the lead based on an opinion poll result,
also from YouGov, released on Saturday, September 6.

This forced the pro-union campaign into panic mode this week with the UK
witnessing an unprecedented coordinated campaign between all the main
political parties. who are pro-union, and a number of major UK companies
to try to convince the Scottish electorate to stay in the United Kingdom.

Scotland’s financial sector became one of the main battlegrounds this
week, with many Scottish headquartered banks and financial services
companies first threatening to relocate their headquarters to London and
then actually announcing that they will move south if the referendum
outcome results in a ‘yes’ majority.

The HQ move threats and announcements appeared to be part of an
orchestrated corporate campaign run by the UK’s Treasury department and
the Treasury did not deny this.

According to the banks, they are seeking to move because an independent
Scotland would create too much economic, regulatory and financial risk
and uncertainty for their headquarters to remain there.

Amongst the banks, two of the UK’s biggest banking institutions, the
Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), and Lloyd’s led the charge. Crucially,
since the RBS and Lloyds were both bailed out by the UK government
during the financial crisis, the UK government is now a significant
shareholder in both institutions, owning a whopping 80% of the RBS and
25% of Lloyds.

RBS has been headquartered in Scotland since 1727 and employs 35,000
north of the border. Lloyds owns various institutions including Bank of
Scotland (not to be confused with the Royal Bank of Scotland), Halifax
and Scottish Widows, the pensions and life insurance group.

Scotland’s third biggest bank, Clydesdale, owned by the National
Australia Bank (NAB) said it also planned to relocate its HQ to London,
again citing the uncertainty that a yes result would generate. Other
banks such as the TSB and Tesco Bank also followed suit and said they
too would move.

Many of the banks’ and asset managers’ share prices had been hit on the
London Stock Exchange this week due to the pro-independence movement’s
lead including the share prices of RBS, Lloyds, Aberdeen Asset
Management and Standard Life.

Financial services giant Standard Life joined in, saying that it would
relocate large parts of its operations such as pensions and investments
out of Scotland if the country voted for independence. Dutch asset
manager and insurer Aegon said it too would move operations to London.

Other industry leaders also sided with the pro-union alignment with the
CEO of the UK’s largest oil company British Petroleum (BP) saying that
the company and the economy was “best served by maintaining the existing
capacity and integrity of the United Kingdom”.

Scottish first minister and pro-independence leader Alex Salmond said
that the corporate announcements had been orchestrated by the prime
minister’s office in Downing Street in London, and that Treasury had
been ‘caught red-handed in a campaign of scaremongering”.

According to the FT, a Treasury official admitted that “Danny Alexander
and George Osborne have been making calls.” George Osborne is the
Chancellor of the Exchequer and Danny Alexander is his assistant at the
Treasury. The calls to RBS would have been quite easy to make given the
government’s 80% shareholding. Likewise with Lloyds.

As RBS and Lloyds are already essentially run from London, the HQ move
announcements do appear to have been more politically motivated than
anything. HM Treasury does appear to have been bullying and pulling
strings behind the scenes. On one hand it says plans by companies to
move were ‘understandable’, while on the other hand it has been making
phone calls encouraging companies to move.

Elsewhere, Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of England, became
involved in the debate which is slightly surprising given that the Bank
of England is supposedly neutral of political interference. Carney said
this week that a currency union between Scotland and the rest of the UK
  is incompatible with an independent Scotland.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch chimed in, hinting that he was on the side of
pro-independence, most likely because of his current coolness towards
the Westminster leaders,  while financier George Soros weighed in on the
pro-union side.

There is much to lose for the City of London’s financial sector due to
the economic uncertainty and sterling currency risk of an independent
Scotland and the loss of financial power, international standing and
resources that a smaller UK would represent.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) also became involved this week
warning that “the main immediate effect is likely to be uncertainty over
the transition to a potentially new and different monetary, financial
and fiscal framework in Scotland.”

The pound sterling has fallen and risen this week based on the
prevailing sentiment expressed in the various independence polls.
Sterling strengthened today following the latest poll but had touched an
11 month low earlier this week against the dollar.

In terms of sterling, the gold price has not really moved significantly
over the last month, remaining in a £20 trading range between £780 and
£760, although the price did fall from the £780 range on Monday down to
£760 today, slightly more than the US dollar denominated price move in
gold, but in  in general sentiment to the weakness in the US dollar gold
price.

Scotland’s bid for independence has also crystallised nationalist
aspirations in other countries, most notably in Catalonia which is on
the brink of its own unofficial referendum to try to break away from
Spain. Yesterday was National Catalan Day and millions protested across
the region most notably in  Barcelona.

There has been much speculation this week about how the UK’s gold
reserves would be affected if an independence result emerges. The UK
Treasury said that all Treasury reserve assets would be up for
negotiation. Since this is a very general statement it does not provide
much clarity as to whether an independent Scotland would be able to take
any of the UK ‘s gold reserves, but this did stop various media outlets
from appearing to think that Scotland would get its share of the UK gold.

At this stage it is best to adopt a wait and see attitude since there
are too many unknowns for any factual conclusions to be reached on the
future of the UK, let alone future UK fiscal plans.

Whatever the outcome of next week’s independence referendum in Scotland,
it has illustrated that the UK is a economic entity which is in some
parts held together by groupings that do not have the same outlook. The
closeness of the results for the two campaigns suggests that if the
pro-union campaign wins, they will still have to address the concerns of
the large Scottish independence movement, and calls for a future
referendum on the subject may not go away.

Economic uncertainty in the UK will remain in the near term and it is
hard to see the UK economic landscape ever being quite the same again
after the heated campaigning on both sides of the independence issue.

(13) British Communist Party opposes Independence

http://www.scottishcommunists.org.uk/2014-referendum-on-scottish-independence/380-yes-or-no-the-city-and-the-eu-will-still-call-the-shots-on-the-19th

British Communist Website
Scottish Independence 2014

YES or NO, the City and the EU Will Still Call The Shots on the 19th!

Published: 15 September 2014

Chair of the Communist Party, Bill Greenshields, warns the promise of
false independence is a trap that will weaken working-class unity.This
article first featured in the Morning Star 12/08/2014.

[...] The acute problems faced by the Scottish people are not
fundamentally national in nature.

The exploitation, oppression and injustice are class-based. The Scottish
millionaire class is doing very nicely thank you, alongside their
English and Welsh mates.

The acute problems faced by the Scottish people are not fundamentally
national in nature.

The exploitation, oppression and injustice are class-based. The Scottish
millionaire class is doing very nicely thank you, alongside their
English and Welsh mates.

It is the Scottish working class who are under attack by the whole
British capitalist class and its government — the same capitalist class
that with its allies in the European Union is attacking all workers in
Britain as a whole.

The “nationalism card” is being pulled from the pack to deliberately
divert from the ruling-class attacks that will continue whether Scotland
votes Yes or No. It is not a liberating struggle … it is a trap.

The ruling class and its Westminster government are determined to
“rebalance” the British economy — ie re-establish the rate of profit
following the economic crisis by driving down wages, abolishing
pensions, undermining working conditions, extending part-time and
precarious working, cutting corporate tax and tax of the wealthiest,
cutting public spending, privatising everything that will make a profit
— throughout Britain. The nationalists offer partial escape from the
Westminster government — but no escape from the ruling class. [...]

(14) WSWS Trots oppose Independence

http://socialequality.org.uk/scot-statement/

Vote “no” in the Scottish referendum—Fight for a socialist Britain

Statement by the Socialist Equality Party (UK)

The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) calls for a decisive and unambiguous
“no” vote in the September 18 referendum on Scottish independence.

All claims that “independence” is a democratic demand, offering an
alternative to cuts and austerity, are lies.

The move for separation from the UK is being led by right-wing forces
espousing nationalism, whether or not they attempt to dress this up in
fake left language. [...]

The advocacy of Scottish independence is a reactionary response to the
bankruptcy of the nation state system, which no longer corresponds to
the global organisation of economic life. [..]

The only progressive response to the crisis of the nation-state system
is to bring an end to all national divisions by adopting the perspective
of socialist internationalism. [...]