I was recently contacted out of the blue by a Norwegian friend of mine who I hadnt seen in years and years who wanted to send a message of solidarity from the nordic countries for the independence campaign. I asked him if there was much talk about the referendum in the nordic regions and said that in the event of a yes vote, many of us would see Scotland as the gateway into the nordic regions. I thought his response to that was very interesting -- Hello Colin, Yes it has been very much talked about in the Norwegian news lately. nrk.no/verden/_-sonderknuses-uten-skottland-1.11925952 vg.no/nyheter/utenriks/storbritannia/skottland-derfor-vil-de-bli-uavhengige/a/23292070/ I happened to watch a BBC program last week (from a debate in Scotland) with a pro independence guy and a pro-London guy. The pro-London guy had no argument except constantly talking about the pound over and over, and he ignored all the arguments about how we have a sort of a voluntary union(or cooperation) in the Nordic countries that makes it easy to move from Sweden/Denmark/Norway for jobs, schools etc. No problem to cross borders here at all, also we have had a sort of Nordic krone (pound) that had the same value for a while in the 50ies (for Danish, Swedish and Norwegian kroner), but since our economies are a bit different (Norwegian fish/Swedish wood/Danish farmland-economy) it was better to have them close, but not at the exact same value for foreign trading purposes. So the pound argument is totality BS, and if the London bankers want to move out of Scotland they will at least leave very nice buildings in Glasgow and Edinburgh for very rich Norwegian banks that will certainly move in at the first opportunity they will get. But I do not think that economy should be an argument for independence or not, I am more concerned about the prospect of peace in the world in this time of uncertainty. I believe that Scotland should have a its own voice in the UN and other international forums to speak it own mind, and I believe that Scottish people should not vote out of self interest at all, but out of greater concerns than personal living standard. As a sovereign unity Scotlands say would be listened to outside the British isles. This goes for environment issues, peace work and fair trade. But this is of course yours decision alone so you must ignore all this and make up your own mind. All the best anyways, Regards from K. Wehn,
Posted on: Sun, 14 Sep 2014 14:01:28 +0000