The SNP hit the jackpot

Fatbloke on tour

HMacD

The basics are still in place.

AS is still a wee fish looking for a puddle.
The SNP are a personality cult not a political party.
Devo Max is a joke on both the Scottish and British electorates.

Russell

Excellent news. Presumably once Scotland has Independence, the UK no longer exists, and therefore England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland will no longer be in the EU.

Wilhelm 1

Hamish

What exactly is your point ? What are you trying to say ? Do you want them to hand the money back ?

The tories get £20 million from big business.
labour get £20 million from trade unions.
The liberals has some big backers too.

So this is a non story

PS. The SNP are not a nationalist party, they are true believers in multiculturalism. What's the point of achieving independence, when you are going to fill it up with Africans and muslims ?

Its kinda pointless, isn't it ?

AlanL

Can we please hurry up and let these people vote for independence. Most English people (according to polls) are in favour and we would be a lot better off without the financial drain.

Go already.

Kingstonian

Salmon is missing a trick. If he asked the English for contributions to his independence fighting fund, his coffers would be overflowing.

brownbutnotgordon

If I won £161m , as an englishman, I would gladly give Salmond £5m to ensure he gains independence.No more non entities from the Scottish Labour party in Westminster.No more incompetents like M Martin and thieves like J Devine keeping labour in power.

Wilhelm 1

Flat bloke on tour

What a idiotic moniker, were you up all night thinking of that dopey name ?

Edward Sutherland

Presumably an independent Scotland will wish to join the euro as soon as possible. The new euro regime, dominated by Germany, will ensure the Scots have precious little financial/economic independence. But no doubt to many Scots that will be a small price to pay to escape from union with England.

Dean Street

I wonder how much those millions will equate to in Euros when the newly independent Scotland is born ... I mean that's the plan isn't it? For the independent Scotland to use the Euro? Will the Euro exist when the new Scotland is born?

Will Scotland, with 1/3 of its population in public sector jobs, most of them in existence only because they were moved there from London, even qualify for membership of the Eurozone?

It will be a small country that will be gobbled up by Merkozy, who will kick out Salmond and install some Hendrik or Klaus to go in and run the Scottish economy for it. Like the Irish, they'll have swapped dominance from London, which is fair and benign, for a much harsher and less 'democratic' intervention by Brussels.

This whole Scottish independence thing is pure drivel. Salmond would freak out if he had to run a country. He's just a slick ad man who sells a dream to the Scottish people without any intention of making it real, and intends to get fat on the profits while pretending, in some kind of ham Braveheart irreality, to 'fight' Westminster for control.

I'm sure that any decent Scot sees this and knows this. Especially the Celtic fan.

Adam Nixon

Not independence. Scotland is already independent. The SNP seeks secession.

Dean Street

Sorry - meant Rangers fan

James

Excellent news!

I might even donate myself. I presume they won't be too sniffy about an Englishman donating to their cause?

wrinkled weasel

Cynics abound. The SNP, like anybody else, makes its own luck. They are kind of like The Beatles really. As a musician contact of mine said (with playing credits on 45 number one hit singles) said, "The Beatles came along and killed everything for everybody" Another told me, "They just blew everyone away".

Its no use moaning about the SNP. They know how to play the game and frankly, the opposition are totally to blame.

To use another musical anecdote, "When you are humming their songs in the dressing room, the game is over" - Alex Salmond is probably the only figure that anybody recognises, and they will be humming his tune long after the rest have squabbled themselves into oblivion.

Lonesome Dave

Splendid news! Well done Alex!!

Potential independence for England and all paid for by the Scotch - I'm genuinely overjoyed.

Cheap at half the price....

rjbh

spot on Wrinkled W......in a thousand years time... there will be a name that everyone will know.. as the father of an Independent Scotland...and Alex Salmond will be that name... Bless Him and the SNP... for once in my life.. Im proud of my government.

Gawain

Too clever by half. Knowing the Scots, they'll moan like crazy once they're independent whilst still blaming the English for all their problems.

Yam Yam

What a shame the Conservative Party doesn't pursue British independence from the EU with the same guile and gusto that Salmond pursues Scottish independence from the UK.

Wyrdtimes

Good luck to the SNP and home rule for England.

J H HOLLOWAY

I've just realised that Fat Bloke is Tom Watson and the 'on tour' bit is what the tabloid press is so interested in....

Iain

Excellent! I think it's only now that many folk in the English establishment (including its Scottish toadies) realise that Scottish independence is not a fantasy of a few daft, parochial, sentimental folk, but a serious cause supported by many with determination, full understanding and knowledge, and life-long commitment - as were similar causes of nations all around the world who have previously achieved autonomy from rule from London.

graham

What great news, my only disappointment is that the Weirs didn't donate even more money. But why wait why not let Scotland go independent from Jan 1 2012? A great way to start the year for all English men & women. Hopefully we'll be able to ditch Wales too!

Tommy

Scottish independence is a joke, and a disgrace.

holdsworth

Whenever this kind of thing come up there is a lot of deeply unattractive, low-brow jingoism coupled with stuff about Scotland being 'a drain' on the UK.

So boring.

Look at the GERS reports for some basic facts. Please don't rely on the Daily Mail.

tom jones

Good luck to the SNP on their independance dream. I really hope it happens for them. I do feel bad for the Scottish people when they end up with a government able to borrow and spend as recklessly as Labour, but it's their choice if that's what they want.

Forlornehope

Does anyone think that they can be persuaded to take Northern Ireland with them?

Ed Stevenson

I hope that Scotland secedes purely because I will enjoy seeing them go specatularly bankrupt. As long as we introduce strict border controls then it will be hilarious.

Also, they won £160 million and they STILL live in Largs?

Fatbloke on tour

Willi 1 et al.

I fear you are all going to be disappointed.
AS is only playing games, lots of hot air followed by a retreat.

Devo Max is not so much a policy more a fig leaf to hide his embarrassment when his figures don't add up and he has too retreat pronto.

Full independence will fail, no matter how much Dave the Rave plays ball and turns England into a nation of dog boilers and Maggie lovers. The ties are too deep and too emotional to let a political soufflé like AS to win.

Glasgow has more in common with Liverpool, Newcastle, Manchester, Derby and Portsmouth than it has with Edinburgh and Perth.

The SNP under AS are both small in stature, small in mind and small in outlook. To be fair they have made the most of what they had and they have made the most of the lack of quality in their opponents.

However AS knows that the game is up and fiscal autonomy / Devo Max is the best he could hope for.

He did very well in May 2011 but even he knows that is as good as it gets and that good as his figures were he is still 100K votes behind GB and 200K votes behind TB.

Please note that both independence and Devo Max will be bad for England. AS has only one economic policy left - tax tourism.

He will cut rates not to generate growth but to transfer company domiciles north so that he can cheat the Westminster exchequer out of revenue that is rightfully theirs.

Dublin is only the entree.
Edinburgh will be the main course.

AS and his political groupies are not the cuddly, left leaning progressives that they claim to be, they are neo conservative chancers of the highest order. They actually believe in the Laffer / Laugh a minute curve. To them it offers untold riches as they siphon off tax revenue from down south.

Zero sum game.
His gain is England's loss.
Consequently beware of what you wish for.

Mycroft

'as were similar causes of nations all around the world who have previously achieved autonomy from rule from London.'

It always amuses me to see Scots, who played such a disproportionate role in the British imperial enterprise, now presenting themselves as being victims of it.

Wilhelm 1

Fatso Bloke

Its a word salad.

Are you smoking a joint or on LSD, which is it ?

Scott

Thank you all for your comments, you speed up the march to independence. But just so you know when Scottish tax receipts are compared to Scottish public expenditure then Scotland actually gets less from the treasury than it pays in. It's all detailed quite clearly in GERS (Government Expenditure and Revenues Scotland) feel free to look it up. And GERS doesn't even figure in the hundreds of millions of defence underspend, the hundred or so million stolen from us via tv licence and the billions stolen for the olympics and the south east's special projects next of which is high speed rail. Oh yeah and actually the highest spending per head is in London, shocker.

Goronwy

@Ed Stevenson.

Given that the "United Kingdom" is spectacularly bankrupt at the current time, your sides must be aching and it has form on the matter too - I seem to remember that good Yorkshireman Healey securing a bailout for the "United Kingdom" from the IMF in 1976 - long before the Iceland's and Ireland's of this world ever needed help.

As least the Scots have resources of there own and things that they produce. With its indolent and workshy population, I must be missing those things that England produces and contributes to the world........

daniel maris

I think the SNP will win the referendum. And I think Scotland will do well as an independent nation. It has plenty going for it, not least huge energy resources.

dercavalier

holdsworth. I fully agree, but what do you expect? If an Englishman isn't whinging about Scotland he's whinging about Europe, or Oz, or the good ol' boys in the US of A or even aabout his multi-coloured compatriots. They can't live without whinging. They could whinge for the world in an inter-planetary contest. And of course the Spectator is now getting the troll dregs who have been routed by the intelligent Scots on the forums of the Daily Mail and Telegraph. We'll have to move on even though that will be difficult as they are like the plague. Wherever you gp there seems to be a whining English voice.

Peninsula

Hmmm.

The English are acting exactly as predicted.

Excellent.

Goldpanner

I don't know why some people seem think Scotland would be uniquely unable to manage it's own affairs if it was independent. Surely it couldn't do any worse than the UK.

Helen

Somehow, I can't see anyone being enthusiastic to the tune of £1m towards the cause of the preservation of the Union.

Certainly not here in England. No one has offered a single penny for the cause, so that proves my point.

Steve Tierney

The Scottish will get their vote and will vote to leave the Union and that will be that.

It's democracy. It's sad, but it's coming. Might as well plan for the future.

Holmes

Mycroft,
Huge generalisation. Perhaps you're hearing the small but vocal minority who like to bleat about these things while the rest of us sit back and consider how Scots were blazing trails across the Empire and ably administering it's borders as we gaze in pride at some artefact pilfered from the Summer Palace.
Seriously though, don't wish for Scottish independence if you don't like the Scots as you'll see more of us if Salmond gets his way and anyone with any sense bolts for England to escape the chaos.

Dimoto

I guess the £1M has already been deployed by Mr Salmond, judging by the shoals of Nat trolls on here recently.

daniel maris

I think Scottish independence would be a win-win situation. I think it would certainly enrich Scotland, but it would also be good for England. It would lead to a lot of reflection about how England earns a living and what the UK amounts to. I think Wales would move quickly to greater autonomy. Northern Ireland would probably enter into some sort of confederation with the Republic of Ireland which the Republicans could claim as being en route to full union and "Unionists" could claim was a recognition of Ulster's unique polity.

England would rediscover itself.

starfish

"As least the Scots have resources of there own and things that they produce. With its indolent and workshy population, I must be missing those things that England produces and contributes to the world........"

I do find it amusing that when an Englishman writes this about Scotland it is apparently beyond the pale, but it never seems to be true the other way

As I see it Mr Salmond has talked A Good Idea so far. To sell indep3endence he really now needs to get into the detail

What will 'independence mean'? How will he unravel the hugely complex web of connections between England and Scotland? Governmental, institutional, business etc.

No doubt he will airily dismiss this and appoint a committee, but I believe he seriously underestimates the complexity and cost of doing it

While he is free to argue for it - he should not be allowed to get away with brushing over it

Hexhamgeezer

Does Salmond want independence from Brussels as well, or is it Independence Lite he's after?