Ok, well what has Scotland got in our favour:
- we are a poor country, I’ll come back to this controversial opener
- we have some good heritage brands in whisky, wool and cashmere and the likes, and a decent ‘punch above our weight’ technology capability
- we have an accent that - weegies neds aside - is recognised for its clarity and how people respond positively to it
- we provide access to England and Northern Europe from a logistics and distribution point of view
- we command some ancestral loyalty, nostalgic sentiment from America’s WASP elite
- we are still a coherent nation as England, France and Germany increasingly are not
What have we got against us
- a profound delusion about how the world works and a Pygmy political class that arise directly from not being a real nation state and living as a client of England …ironically many nats are among the most wedded to it
- a poor education system traduced by antiquated thinking - which is criminal given our history
- a chippy resentment and inclination to bite the hand that feeds us, in everything from scorning oil and gas to our refusal to admit our delusions are subsidised by the English tax payer
So, what could we do; and per EG himself on an another thread, this is not a dissertation. Nor is it a costed plan. It is at best directional, ie things we should generally tend towards if the numbers stack up.
- Ireland is the template - but we are between them and mainland Europe so we have an advantage
- slash corporation tax and otherwise incentivise the amazons of the world to use us as airstrip one (I hate this by the way, but the world is what it is, not how id prefer it to be)
- cut back the state drastically and bear the short term - 20 years or so - pain
- Reform education; dump all the bammer stuff and major on stem, and vocational training - as well as foreign languages, German, French, Spanish and mandarin, maybe Hindi
- back to the hilt our tech sector
- I don’t know how this is done, but if WM is hellbent in net zero, try and get our oil and gas off them and exploit to the hilt
- combine that with our relative poverty and cheapness vs Western Europe, and rhe aforementioned accent boon to become a relatively cheap nearshore service centre - I have no idea of the wider implications but a truly radical move would be to devalue an independent currency, so as to be like a Poland. An end to foreign hols and imported stuff but as they have shown, it pays in the long run. I’m quite ready to accept this one should be filed under mental though as I really don’t understand the wider import,
- pre-empt the profound social disaster heading England’s way by somehow getting the birth rate up, or exploring migration agreements with Central European countries. If we can’t do the former Scotland as it is won’t exist much longer so we need to think about what Scotland 2.0 looks like. I suggest Poland is a better target than balkanised strife.
- see if we can expand heritage manufacture; could a Pringle do what Burberry has done (after the chav interlude) and become ultra high value fashion brand. Or alternatively do a Barbour, spin out from a legacy core identity to become a much more diversified fashion brand with global manufacture but a ‘made in Scotland’ premium range. That kind of thing across our heritage.
- do more with golf, prestige universities (before they stop being so), tech, tourism - don’t stop till more than Edinburgh is screaming too much. We have everything from landscape, to Protestant nostalgia, to gowf, to science and philosophical innovation to market.
I’m sure none of it works, but this is my attempt to move from my usual counsel of despair. It’s a long shot, but better than rUK and the European giants have got.
The more concrete and well defined core and first steps is to cut Irelands grass. The eu threaten to kill their golden goose but we are not in it. We are a better accsss point to continental Europe. Replace them as airstrip one.
Oh, and never ever again be seen as a country where Patrick Harvie could sit in government.
