Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
North Sea oil is elephant in the room
SADLY, I believe the SNP has no choice but to pursue its independence agenda.
The people of Scotland, especially the newer SNP recruits, have been drawn into their Ponzi/pyramid scheme where if the people of Scotland invest in their vision of independence, we will all come out smelling of roses! It is just that — a scam. If Scotland did get independence and the people of Scotland put their hands out to demand their share of the SNP’s promises, the Ponzi/pyramid would collapse.
The MSPs sitting in their ivory tower at Holyrood may survive the resulting financial, political and social carnage but the average Scot would lose out.
Yes, we would be independent but we would be living in the highest-taxed part of Britain.
Our education system — once the envy of the world — would be rated below Vietnam. Our hospitals would face huge deficits. We would be dependent on oil as our core revenue but that is a dwindling resource.
The SNP is choosing to ignore the massive elephant in the room about the North Sea.
Rigs will need to be decommissioned. Do you think the oil companies will put their hands in their pockets to do this?
Scotland will either have to help pay the cost, which could be up to £23 billion, or we will have to give them massive tax incentives.
In other words, the dwindling returns from the North Sea would be even less.
The SNP seems to believe we would be able to swan in and sit at Europe’s top table, politically, if we were independent.
Get real. We might be “consulted” on matters but Germany, France and — heaven forbid — the remainder of the UK would still be the main power brokers in Europe.
We might be listened to, have our heads patted, then treated like children who should be seen and not heard.
To put it another way, if a scheme looks too good to be true, then it will be.
Non-believer.