Implications of Scottish Independence

[Francesca R]

I wonder if that will earn me a point with the doubters in this thread who assume I am a unionist, rather than an independent (in the neutral sense of the word, not the Scottish independence one).

 

[Small Town Jesus]

...

By the way, that bizarre story from nearly a year ago about some anonymous punter walking into William Hill's and putting £200,000 on No has just been repeated by the Daily Record as if it just happened. The whole story gets less and less credible the more you think about it, never mind when it allegedly happened.

Anyone with better knowledge than I have of the betting system know what to make of it? Some people are saying you simply can't put on bets of that size without questions being asked, and your identity checked. Money laundering legislation for a start. I don't know what to think.

http://wingsoverscotland.com/against-all-odds/

Rolfe.

This is a real thing according to this story in the Independent.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...400k-wager-on-scotland-voting-no-9521636.html.

It includes quotes from William Hill the bookmaker involved and claims it's the largest political bet ever made at £400,000 on a No vote at 1/4.

Interesting picture of Salmond they've chosen to use.

 

[Francesca R]

Hmm well WOS appears to be rubbishing it as false?

 

[Information Analyst]

England is just a region then?

It's made up of multiple regions (geographies vary as per usage).

 

[Information Analyst]

Did Obama come out with the Better Together line that the Union has been the best political arrangement bar none, for more than three hundred years? I'd love to hear a US president say that. He would then logically require to bring the rebellious colonies back to their former allegiance to that union.

And New York City can rightly be renamed "Cheddingfield-on-Sea."

 

[Rolfe]

Hmm well WOS appears to be rubbishing it as false?

The story is still developing, and Wings was away for a while doing an interview.

The original story about a £200,000 bet was published in June 2013. It was then repeated the other day as if it was brand new. William Hill's analyst said no, there was no bet in 2013, it was now. Then vanished when linked back to his own article about it dated 23-6-13.

The £400,000 bet story seems to be new, now. Speaks of Surrey, not Glasgow, as the place. The consensus seems to be that it's other bookies laying money off to balance their books, or (maybe more likely?) an individual or a syndicate hedging an earlier bet on Yes so that they come out ahead whatever the result.

Rolfe.

 

[Rolfe]

It's made up of multiple regions (geographies vary as per usage).

So is Scotland, of course.

Rolfe.

 

[Francesca R]

The £400,000 bet story seems to be new, now. Speaks of Surrey, not Glasgow, as the place.

I can't see anything on the Daily Record about it anyway.

Well, let's hope it's not the second of two WOS posts I have ever looked at that is also erroneous

 

[Rolfe]

The DR pulled the story. (Pulled the repetition of the year-old £200,000 bet story, I mean.)

The WoS post isn't erroneous. He wasn't talking about the £400,000 bet story, because that hadn't broken when the post was written.

There is an error (well an implication that's an error) in the most recent post, which seems to have arisen from a mistake by one of the newspapers. Currently under review and will probably be corrected soon.

Rolfe.

 

[Soapy Sam]

What can you say about people who don't vote? Nothing other than that they're content to allow others to make the decision for them. That they are content to accept whichever option the majority of those who vote go for.

But they need not be uniform in their reasons:- Some of that group will be too uninterested to get off the sofa and some will be people who honestly can't decide which way to vote.

To say, oh look I lost but I claim the non-voters for my side so I win after all, is ridiculous.

But someone who could not make up his mind which way to vote has not "lost". He has, as you said above, decided to accept the decision of the majority - as everyone else does.

Claiming that abstention is tacit support for the status quo really does smack slightly of desperation to me.

Rolfe.

You yourself said that "yes" voters "will crawl over broken glass" to vote, so barring a few people stuck in lifts or delayed at Heathrow, we can be pretty sure that yes voters are unlikely to stay away. Non voters are either people who honestly cannot decide, or people who don't care about the issue enough to get off the sofa.

The issue is whether inability, or unwillingness to choose should be seen as a default vote for the status quo. I see it as fairly reasonable*, and not suggestive of desperation at all, but certainly this should have been (and may have been) made explicit when the referendum was arranged.

*They should not be counted as "no" of course , but they should be taken account of. If 40% of Scots failed to bother to vote it would be hard to justify any claim of a passionate longing for independence.

 

[Strawberry]

They should not be counted as "no" of course , but they should be taken account of. If 40% of Scots failed to bother to vote it would be hard to justify any claim of a passionate longing for independence.

It would be equally hard to justify any claim of a passionate longing to stay in the UK. There is ample time to make sure everybody knows the rules - a simple majority will win the referendum, regardless of turnout. So therefore anybody who doesn't bother to vote doesn't care about staying in the UK.

 

[Rolfe]

^ ^ ^ ^

Exactly.

Rolfe.

 

[LondonJohn]

It would be equally hard to justify any claim of a passionate longing to stay in the UK. There is ample time to make sure everybody knows the rules - a simple majority will win the referendum, regardless of turnout. So therefore anybody who doesn't bother to vote doesn't care about staying in the UK.

I simply disagree. Philosophically and logically, in this sort of referendum there's clearly a higher level of correlation between the null option and a "No" vote than between the null option and a "Yes" vote.

In the 60s and 70s, a number of unions in the UK were taken over by extremists who exploited exactly this sort of logical asymmetry to change union constitutions. They would announce that there was to be a poll of members, with the question being whether to leave a certain part of the constitution just as it was, or to change it (in an extremist manner). They knew full well that a large number of members equated not voting with voting for no change, and as a result a number of unions adopted extremist constitutional elements which might only have been voted for by an extremely small proportion of the entire membership. Fortunately, revisions to union law more-or-less put paid to this practice.

And one can apply exactly the same overarching principle to the upcoming Scottish independence referendum. It's stupid and incorrect (in my opinion) to suggest that non-voters are equally as likely to be either a) apathetic but in favour of No, b) apathetic but in favour of Yes, c) genuinely undecided, d) genuinely uninterested. And while yes, the rules state that the "winner" is the side with the most votes, I suggest that it's blindingly obvious that the turnout and the size of the vote split would become major issues if there's a low turnout and a narrow "Yes" majority.

But, as I have also said before, my reading of the situation is that this is all a moot point, as it appears to me that there will be a comfortable "No" majority in the referendum. And if that happens, I also confidently repeat my prediction that any "No" majority will shut down all legitimate discussion of Scottish independence, probably for a generation.

 

[LondonJohn]

^ ^ ^ ^

Exactly.

Rolfe.

^ ^ ^ ^

Not.

LondonJohn.

 

[Strawberry]

I also confidently repeat my prediction that any "No" majority will shut down all legitimate discussion of Scottish independence, probably for a generation.

Yes, it will. And any yes vote will shut down all legitimate discussion of staying in the UK for every generation to come. Therefore, I don't think your trade union analogy holds - the unionists in Scotland are every bit as passionate as the nats, so a non voter can't be counted in either camp.

However, this is all a moot point because the chances of a low turnout in the Scottish referendum are slim to none.

 

[LondonJohn]

Incidentally, there are sound logical/philosophical reasons why in UK company law, any change in a company's constitution requires a minimum agreement of the holders of 75% of the shares. By contrast, issues such as a change in the board of directors can be determined by a simple majority of votes cast, provided that there's a quorum.

There's a reason why there's a difference in the rules for changing a constitution than for changing the board. And while the rules of the Scottish independence referendum are different, there's a similar underlying principle at work: you need to be much more certain of the will for constitutional change in order to enact that change, with a correspondingly lower threshold for preserving the status quo. And it illustrates exactly why very real legitimacy problems might arise if (say) there is a 50.2% "Yes" majority on a 45% turnout.

 

[LondonJohn]

Yes, it will. And any yes vote will shut down all legitimate discussion of staying in the UK for every generation to come. Therefore, I don't think your trade union analogy holds - the unionists in Scotland are every bit as passionate as the nats, so a non voter can't be counted in either camp.

However, this is all a moot point because the chances of a low turnout in the Scottish referendum are slim to none.

No, it's not so much about who's "passionate" or not. It's about the situation where voters are being asked to vote for change vs no change.

And if you're correct about the turnout being so high (what's your basis for this? Research? Anecdote?) then yes, I agree that any "Yes" majority would have total legitimacy (which I discussed in an earlier post giving various hypothetical scenarios).

 

[Strawberry]

There won't be a 45% turnout. People get alot more exercised about membership of the UK vs. leaving the UK than they do about changing a company's constitution.

 

[LondonJohn]

There won't be a 45% turnout. People get alot more exercised about membership of the UK vs. leaving the UK than they do about changing a company's constitution.

That's why it's presented as a "what if" scenario, not as a prediction.

But as per my previous post, upon what do you base your prediction that there will be a very high turnout? I am not suggesting you're wrong, but I'm interested to know how you come to hold your opinion. And what kind of turnout level do you predict? North of 90%?

 

[LondonJohn]

Oh and by the way, why do you think that the population of Scotland, as a whole, are significantly more exercised by the independence referendum than a given company's shareholders might be by a change in that company's constitution?