Talking-up Scotland

(c) The Times

The above idea was first suggested, to my knowledge in 2012 when the New Statesman suggested the Scottish referendum was ‘win-win for the Tories. If Scotland went solo, Labour would lose 41 seats and the Tories would only lose one. The article went on the make the following points:

1. The break-up of the Union and the removal of Scottish MPs for Westminster would dramatically reduce the chances of Labour ever returning to government.
2. Continuing to assume the Union is sacrosanct is not an assumption you can make any more. A 2009 ConservativeHome pollof 144 party candidates found that 46 per cent would not be “uncomfortable about Scotland becoming independent”.
3. To many Tories, an independent England – economically liberal, fiscally conservative, Eurosceptic, Atlanticist – is an attractive prospect.

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2012/01/tories-scotland-lose

What about more recently? See this extract from a letter to the National in 2016 on the same issue:

‘Something smells in the state of Unionism. Theresa May states that the UK is entering a golden era in trade and investment with China, while China cancels a memorandum of understanding with the Scottish Government. Allegedly this was caused by Unionists in the Scottish Parliament, and others, creating a negative climate which dissuaded the Chinese from proceeding with the Scottish Government deal. Although we can’t prove it yet, this is how we probably arrived at this sad state of affairs – Theresa May wanted the decks cleared for London to be seen to be leading on the China deals and relationships with China. It would never do for the Scottish upstarts to be seen to be leading on this. So the order went out from the Unionist parties’ HQs in London to the Unionist parties’ branch offices in Scotland to create as much negativity around the Scottish-China deals as possible, aided and abetted of course by the Unionist media. This was done through back channels. Discreet and sleekit. The blowback eventually surfaced, was deflected, and the SNP got the blame for the Memorandum of Understanding with the Chinese, falling through. Ask yourself this question: why would the SNP want to harm Scotland? They have the best interests of Scotland at heart. Then ask yourself another question: who does want to harm Scotland, and who does not have the best interests of Scotland at heart? Answer – the Unionists. I could be mistaken, but I don’t think so. The Unionists were too quick to blame the SNP and fell into their own trap.’

http://www.thenational.scot/comment/14895680.Letters_I__The_Tories_simply_don___t_care_about_Scotland/

 Just because we’re paranoid, doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get us?

In more recent times, it’s become clear that protecting the English financial sector, Nissan, the soft Irish border and Gibraltar are the priorities for Theresa May’s Brexit deal and she is prepared to gamble that the Scots are too chicken to fly the coop. See this for more detail on these:

Good News: Theresa May is ready to risk losing Scotland to win concessions from the EU that really matter to England

In March this year, a survey of Tory grassroots members conducted by the Centre for English Identity and Politics at Winchester University found:

29% would welcome Scottish Independence

66% believe that a break-away would be either positive, have no real significant impact on England, Wales and Northern Ireland or would be manageable

73% believe that the devolution settlement since 1999 has been harmful for England

93% of Party members in England believed that Tony Blair’s creation of a Scottish government and Parliament has been harmful to England.

66% do not want Teresa May to offer any new financial or policy powers to the Scottish government during any second referendum.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/tory-activists-30-back-scottish-independence-conservativehome-poll-centre-for-english-identity_uk_58b74f6ce4b0284854b3d6be

Clearly the Tory elite are determined to hang on to Scotland for various reasons – strategic security, energy security and a general sense of imperial entitlement, but their troops are not with them. Hopefully, to please them, May will push us too far. We can only hope.

© stationhotelportsoy.co.uk

Getting a little carried away, yesterday’s Press & Journal, kind of overstated the role golf tourism plays in the Scottish economy. I’m not sniffing at £286 million, but tourism overall, according to gov.scot accounts for around £6 billion!

However, it’s not nice to be grudging, the story is worth telling and makes important points about golf’s regional value:

‘Regionally, economic value of golf tourism to Aberdeenshire….. is £15.3million, with 360 jobs supported. Across the Highlands….the sport brought in £23.2million and supported 643 jobs. The study found the value has risen by 30% = or £66 million – since 2008. Across Scotland the pursuit supports 4,700 jobs. It also showed that overseas golfing visitors spend on average £338 per night during a trip to Scotland, which is more than 4 times the daily spend of an average overseas visitor. The North American market remains key, representing 30% of all overnight golfing visitors with 14% coming from Europe.’

I don’t play and yet I live in Ayrshire. Deportation must be a risk for me.

https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/business/north-of-scotland/1226113/golf-tourism-drives-scottish-economy/

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Business-Industry/Tourism

An Aberdeen-based firm, Interventek Subsea, have developed what is thought to be the world’s first safety valve. The valve can operate at 20 000psi and in temperatures up to 350 Fahrenheit. It was designed with the oil fields around Mexico in mind but presumably that ability to withstand very high pressure will be handy in the very deep waters west of Shetland too?

This looks like a further example of the benefits of 40 years of experience for Scots in the North Sea. See:

Happy New Year Story: Scotland’s ‘renewable energy expertise’ in demand worldwide, says new research. At least 14 news agencies report it but BBC Scotland, STV?

In the above, I quoted the Aberdeen Evening Express:

‘Scotland’s “expertise in renewable energy” is in demand around the world, with businesses working in more than 40 countries, according to new research. Projects include advising the government of Japan, providing cranes to build wind farms in Morocco and South Africa and working with the World Bank in Chile, industry body Scottish Renewables said.’

It got little other coverage in the MSM.

https://www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/north-sea/137099/aberdeen-based-firm-interventek-subsea-launches-record-breaking-hpht-valve/

© kishornport.co.uk From Energy Voice, again, yesterday, this mysterious, intriguing headline suggests some very good news coming today. I’m writing this before I can see any such announcement.*

However, according to the report under a picture of the massive dock being drained with a view to becoming a working dry dock again, the owners, Kishorn Port Ltd and issued the teaser ‘sleeping giant’ and suggestions of a ‘major jobs announcement.’ I’ll check this out again later today. According to the report:

‘It is expected the move will see the site’s massive dry dock facility in Wester Ross, last used 24 years ago, brought back into operation. Details of today’s announcement were being kept under wraps until this morning and a spokesman for yard owners Kishorn Port Ltd declined to give any further information.’

 Kishorn is one of the largest facilities in Europe with obvious potential for work on offshore renewables, oil and gas fabrication and, of course, decommissioning work. The company presumably has evidence of demand in some or all of these sectors. At its peak in the 1970’s, 3 000 worked at the dock.

https://www.energyvoice.com/other-news/137116/major-plans-for-kishorn-dry-dock-expected-to-be-launched/

* It’s wind farm construction and 200 jobs.

© toughnickel.com

Again from Energy Voice yesterday, good news on Scotland. They’re becoming a regular source of these for me.

According to the report, GreenOre Gold, already a big ‘gold-digger’ in North-East Scotland has acquired rights in Ayrshire too.  They already have around 200 square miles under licence in the North-East. Some have suggested that the area near Towie in Aberdeenshire might contain ‘billions of pounds worth of gold.’

In partnership with Turkish company, Koza, they’re going to begin stream-sampling in Ayrshire this year then, perhaps, ‘scout drilling.’

The GreenOre Gold director says:

‘The addition of the Ayrshire licence agreement signals a commitment to develop gold prospects with real economic potential. Scotland has a vast unexplored mineral wealth waiting to be explored. ….the Scottish sites are part of the same geological “supergroup” as the massive Curraghinalt gold deposit in Northern Ireland. The Dalradian supergroup – thought to have formed more than 500million years ago – runs from Northern Ireland in a north-easterly direction up through Aberdeenshire.’

 Once more, we need to be an independent nation to get the full income from this kind of thing.

https://www.energyvoice.com/mining-and-commodities/137163/north-east-gold-prospectors-expand-horizons-across-scotland/

Reporting in Energy Voice yesterday, this is just catching up on the numerous reports already out there. See:

Oil predicted to settle at $60 to $70 per barrel over next three years!

‘Oil Market Rebalancing, Demand Expected to Rise’ One reason for Yes next time.

At least this piece in Energy Voice yesterday attributes the impending boost to the Scottish and not to the UK economy.

The writer even refers to a: ‘significant improvement in the prospects of oil and gas service companies has boosted the Scottish financial and business services sector this year, according to new research.’

The report also points to encouraging growth in the manufacturing and financial sectors. Strangely, it suggests decline in tourism yet other recent reports point to last year being a record year. See:

Visitors to Scotland’s historic sites surge by 470 000 to reach more than 4.5 million, breaking all records, in only 11 months!

Consumer demand is down but isn’t that a good thing for our GDP?

https://www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/137015/oil-firms-boost-scots-economy/

© KTH Royal Institute of Technology

Water supplies across the developing world are often contaminated with arsenic, killing millions. Now a Scottish University has come up with a solar-powered purification plant to remove the arsenic. Clearly solar power enables the plant to operate free of the requirement for local electricity supplies and is, of course, cheap to run.

The technology was developed recently by Professor Bhaskar Sen Gupta, from Heriot-Watt University and will be used first in Bangladesh where one plant will enable a safe supply of water to around 200 schoolchildren. There are plans, of course, to extend the use to other areas.

The plant can reduce the level of arsenic in water from 239 to only 2 micrograms per litre which is well under the World Health Organisation guideline level of no more than 10. Around the world, more than 137 000 000 people are thought to be affected by this problem causing a range of serious health problems including early death.

https://www.energyvoice.com/otherenergy/136982/solar-powered-plant-clean-water-supplies/

(c) bbc.co.uk

We’ve had so many recent reports on the massive growth in Scotland’s wind and tide-based renewables industry that I have to admit I’d though solar power wasn’t for us but that too looks like adding to the array of sources which must make post-independence Scotland a massive exporter of power to rUK and Europe. For the former, see:

Energy, energy, energy: Scotland’s renewables projects, oil and gas discoveries just keep on coming

Now solar power is coming to Scotland and not to the sunny corners of East Lothian or the East Neuk of Fife but to a disused airfield up in Moray. In this report form Energy Voice, yesterday, we hear that developer Elgin Energy wants to locate 200 000 solar panels because this area too has long summer days. I gather you don’t need clear skies to get solar energy. 200 000 sounds a lot to me. Will this be another ‘biggest in the somewhere’ for Scotland? The report adds that the local sheep will not be displaced but merely ‘skip’ between the panels. Do mature sheep skip? There would have been some irony if they’d been cleared like the crofters before them.

The project is expected to provide enough power for 21 000 homes.

The project manager explains:

‘With solar energy you don’t necessarily need sunny weather – you need strong light. The south of England is the best part of the UK for it but Moray, and the whole east coast between Inverness and Aberdeen, has long days in the summer to compensate for that. The first thing we always get asked is where we’re going to put the turbines, but these will be no more than 2.8m (9ft) tall.’

https://www.energyvoice.com/otherenergy/137026/solar-power-plan-moray-airfield/

The above headline comes from the Scottish Business News Network, yesterday, within days of news that less Scottish businesses are reporting signs of difficulty than those in the rest of the UK, as Scottish firms report massive increases in job opportunities for professionals, as general unemployment falls below that of the rest of the UK and as Scotland’s energy sector begins to surge impressively. You can see reports on all of this at:

http://www.scoop.it/t/talking-up-scotland

Something is happening to the Scottish economy and it is very good news indeed for Indyref2, if our mainstream media will report it. This report and another on the Aberdeen office market demand growth merely adds to the optimism. Here’s a quote summing up the first part:

‘New analysis from professional services firm KPMG indicates positive signs for the Scottish economy, with a significant drop in the number of Scottish companies failing in the first three months of 2017. In the first quarter of this year, the total number of business insolvency appointments decreased by 19% (170 down from 211) compared to the same three months in 2016 (Jan to March). This decrease is reflected in both liquidation appointments (down 20%), which tend to affect smaller businesses, and administrations (down 14%), which usually involve larger organisations.’

 Further evidence of positive signs for the Scottish economy and presumably related to the Third Wave of Oil and Gas profitability I’ve referrred to elsewhere recently (http://www.scoop.it/t/talking-up-scotland) comes in the same source, opening with this staggeringly positive statement:

‘According to Savills Aberdeen Offices Spotlight, the Granite City’s office leasing market has gathered pace in the first quarter of 2017 with take-up reaching 181,000 sq ft (16,815 sq m), the strongest quarter recorded since Q3 2013 and not far short of total take-up volumes for the whole of 2016 (183,000 sq ft / 17,000 sq m).’

 Once more, we have evidence that post-independent Scotland will thrive.

https://sbnn.co.uk/2017/04/20/fewer-scottish-businesses-failing-2017/

https://sbnn.co.uk/2017/04/20/aberdeen-office-market-reports-strongest-quarterly-take-since-2013/

© commonspace.scot

As Scottish unemployment falls below that of the rest of the UK, Scottish Financial News reported yesterday big increases in the demand for professionals. This can be taken as a clear sign of a strengthening economy especially in those sectors relating to the emerging third wave boom in energy production, I’ve written about numerous times recently. See:

Energy, energy, energy: Scotland’s renewables projects, oil and gas discoveries just keep on coming

It also ties in with the recently announced report on business health in Scotland significantly exceeding that of rUK. See:

Scottish businesses showing signs of greater health than those in the rest of the UK

Overall, vacancies in Scotland rose by 11% year-on-year to March 2017. Demand for engineers rose by an amazing 42% and for other technologists by 21%. These are, it is reported, above the rUK figures with the latter described as only ‘stable.’ Presumably this means little or no increase in demand?

http://www.scottishfinancialnews.com/12668/vacancies-in-scotland-rise-by-11-per-cent-year-on-year/