Freeeeeee-dom?

Earlier this week I received a (pointless, wasteful) leaflet from my local MSP and MEP about how well the new SNP government is doing in bringing a better standard of living to the people of Scotland. Now, to be fair, I should point out that they actually do seem to be doing a good job so far, although I am more than a little concerned that they'll have to put up taxes quite heavily to pay for all of this. Whether this actually happens or not remains to be seen, of course.

However, the leaflet did remind me of something I have been pondering at some length recently, and something I meant to blog about a couple of weeks ago.

I think it is extremely unlikely that Labour will win the next General Election. Gordon Brown simply cannot win the battle of personalities with David Cameron. They cannot win on policy differences, because there is now so little difference between the parties that they feel comfortable simply stealing policies whole-cloth from one another. And whereas he could have recently have stood on his economic record, the sub-prime mortgage disaster has nullified that advantage. (Labour supporters at this point might be inclined to tell me I'm being unfair; the economic problems aren't really his fault. To which I reply: when did fairness enter into the ability to win elections?)

So, anyway, I expect to see massive Tory gains, mostly at the expense of the Liberal Democrats (who, by the simple expedient of stabbing Charles Kennedy in the back went from being the principled opposition, who were steadily gaining ground, back to being a nothing party. Good work, there). And so it is likely that the next Prime Minister will be David Cameron.

In Scotland, the Tories will be lucky to get more than two or three seats. Scotland simply have not forgiven the Tories for Thatcher's shutting down so much of our industry, or for testing out the Poll Tax here, or various other things. It seems doubtful that we ever will.

The biggest consequence of this will be to draw a clear line between the socialist SNP Scottish Executive and the more right-wing Tory government in Westminster. It then seems likely to me that the SNP will leverage this, and also the "Scotland did not elect the Tories" thing, into a very strong platform for the next Scottish elections, and make big gains of their own, this time at the expense of the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties. And, having gained a mandate from the people that they currently lack, we head towards a referendum on independence, a likely victory, and a constitutional crisis...

Sadly, I don't think independence is the right move for Scotland. Firstly, I think there are a whole lot of hidden costs that haven't been considered (we would need to set up a civil service and armed forces of our own, amongst other things, and these aren't cheap). Secondly, I'm not at all convinced that Scotland's economy is really self-sustaining. Of course, the truth of this depends entirely on who you ask: the SNP claim that all that money from the North Sea oil will sustain us completely and in perpetuity; in England, meanwhile, they will tell you that they subsidise the higher quality of life in Scotland to the tune of some absurd number of billions per year. (Whether the quality of life is actually higher in Scotland seems doubtful, of course.)

But really, my biggest concern is for business. It strikes me as likely that an independent Scotland would elect a much more left-wing government than the rest of the UK would, and certainly more left-wing than we have now. It also seems likely to me that such a government would raise taxes somewhat, and in an attempt to avoid raising the base rate of income tax too much, they might well go for business taxes. Which seems fine, until you realise that the response of big business to this is to go elsewhere. While the company I work for are unlikely to make that move, I suspect many others might. And a single company, or even a fairly small number of fairly small companies do not an industry make.

The upshot of all of that is that I might have to move back to England for work. And while the notion of moving back to England isn't particularly troublesome, I would much rather choose to go than be forced to go.

Of course, any or all of this could well be wrong...