I wish there had been a Scottish parliament and Salmond had been leading it in 1975. The Scottish people were so badly mislead and made fools of with the hiding of the McCrone report. Saddest of all the same tactics are still being used today by the Westminster government and Scottish unionists.

The McCrone report wasn't "hidden" at all. The report prepared by Gavin McCrone was never intended for publication - and your assertion that it was "hidden" simply confirms that you have been conned by Alex Salmond and the SNP. Civil servants produce reports for Ministers on a daily basis - civil servants working for the Scottish Government produce such reports every day just as civil servants working for the UK Government do so. The McCrone report was just another such report - written to advise Ministers and not intended for publication.

A more pertinent question to ask is - why is Alex Salmond hiding from the people of Scotland the advice on an independent Scotland's membership of the EU that Alex Salmond has now received? Under the terms of the Ministerial Code of Conduct, Alex Salmond could request the agreement of the Law Officers to publish that advice but Alex Salmond has refused to seek that agreement. What is Alex Salmond hiding from the people of Scotland and why is he hiding it?

"A more pertinent question to ask is "

And that has - what exactly to do with oil and Westminster's fibs?

I would quote mod guidelines at you but I canny be, errr, bothered.

For once I will agree with some of what you say. The report by Gavin McCrone was an internal government document, and like most others was a discussion document and not planned to be published. HOWEVER, what then followed was that successive governments mislead the public in Scotland as to the probably value of the Oil to an Independent Scotland to diminish the support of Independence.

It is that hypocrisy that is the real issue, and given their propensity to be "economical with the actualité" why should anyone believe what they say now?

Couldn't agree more. The myth of the subsidy junkie Scot was formed in the same establishment that held the McCrone report. Westminster, duplicitous to the end. Which hopefully is coming soon.

I trust Salmond more than I trust any other British politician. Westminster has spent decades telling the Scottish people that Scotland is a poor country which will go into a decline when the small reserve of oil is gone. Scotland is so poor that Westminster governments both Labour and Tory campaign hard to prevent it leaving the union. No unionist has ever explained the logic of that argument.
Who should we trust Salmond or Miliband/Cameron ..?...mmm..that's an easy decision.

Westminster MP's had access to the report. When ever the issue of how much oil was left or its value came up they lied to the electorate. For example;

Timothy Eggar MP (Tory): "Would not my hon. Friend agree that one of the deepest concerns and one of the results of the BGC monopoly is that some private oil companies now predict that we will run out of gas or cease to be self-sufficient by the end of the 1980s?"
Peter Rost MP (Tory): "Undoubtedly this is accepted..." - Hansard, 19 January 1982
"...the benefits of North Sea oil will run out faster than was previously expected..." - Jack Straw MP (Labour), Hansard, 21 February 1983
"...when the oil has run out in 25 years." - Tony Benn MP (Labour), Hansard, 21 May 1979
"North sea revenues will be running out before the end of the decade." - Jeff Rooker MP (Labour), Hansard, 10 April 1984
"...the oil will run out in 30 years instead of 50 years..." - Tony Benn MP (Labour), Hansard, 10 November 1981
"...the oil will last for another 25 years..." - Stuart Bell MP (Labour), Hansard, 19 March 1986
“North Sea oil will run out within the next two decades. It will no longer he there in 30 years' time.” - the late Ioan Evans, Former MP for Cynon Valley (Labour), 1980
"North Sea oil will run out before long" - the late Lord Hampton (Liberal), Hansard, 20 December 1989

They are doing exactly the same thing again today. The reason they are lying is that in the north sea alone there is between 1.5 and 4 trillion pounds worth of oil still to be extracted. It is time for Scos to take control of this resource and use it more wisely in future.

Not only that Steve, but they explicitly and deliberately rubbished the SNP claims during the 1970s about the value of the oil, knowing as they must that McCrone had told them that the only thing wrong wiht their estimates was that they were TOO LOW. Shades of the current debate?

Exactly - history repeating itself - but this time we know better and the outcome will be different!

Claims that oil would be a problem for the Scottish economy are spectacularly ridiculous. As McCrone said himself all those years ago;

'This paper has shown that the advent of North Sea oil has completely overturned the traditional economic arguments used against Scottish nationalism. An independent Scotland could now expect to have massive surpluses both on its budget and on its balance of payments and with the proper husbanding of resources this situation could last for a very long time into the future.'

Absolutely, and in fact McCrone suggested that an independent Scotland could deal with the problem of upward pressure on the value of its currency by lending to either foreign govts or buying foreign securities, which of course is basically what the Norwegians have done in setting up their oil fund.

"As McCrone said himself all those years ago; '... An independent Scotland could now expect to have massive surpluses both on its budget and on its balance of payments'"- Well, that was forty years ago! In the early 1980s, the oil prices (adjusted for inflation) were similar to today's, but oil production was three times higher. In the seven years of high oil revenues in the 1980s, the oil revenues were up to about £30 billion per year. In the last five years, they were only £6 to £13 billion, and they are not going to increase over that even according to the most optimistic SG's scenario. And with such oil revenues, Scotland has a big MINUS, and NOT a surplus on its public account. Scotland's public spending is just too high compared to the taxes it collects (onshore taxes + oil revenues) to the tune of some £7 billion which Scotland needs to save somehow. And there is no oil money left for the oil fund. This is the reality in 2013.

And this is what Prof McCrone said very recently, in 2013: "Scotland is a relatively well-off country and could perfectly well be independent. But that does not mean that the process of separation would be easy or painless. … The difficult circumstances of the recession, with unsustainable budget deficits and high public debt, does not make (2014) the best time to choose." … "in the immediate future Scotland would be unable to afford (the oil fund) . Public expenditure will then have to be paid for from non-oil tax revenue, which would be insufficient to cover it. … Despite many assertions that Scottish control of economic levers would result in higher economic growth to pay for this, no one has really explained how this would be achieved. Without it, cuts in expenditure would be necessary."

The Fiscal Commission Working Group of the Scottish government came to similar conclusions in February 2013: Scotland has a big deficit, it has to balance its onshore economy using cuts in public spending and/or increased taxes, all the oil money has to be spent on current public spending, there is no oil money left for the oil fund.

But best to base Scotland's independence on the findings of a forty year old report about Scotland's economic situation at that time. I suspect the EU members will laugh Scotland off if it presents such ancient evidence of its economic viability during the EU negotiations. 1974. Just ridiculous. Really, instead of regurgitating this forty year old report, maybe the Scottish government should make some sound and credible economic plan for iScotland's future which would not totally contradict the findings and recommendations of its own expert group.

Is anyone arguing on the basis of McCrone that Scotland should be independent? The report as you say is 40 years old now, but still has two aspects of signficance

1. it shows we were lied to in the 70s about the value of the oil. Had we not been lied to might Scottish politics have been different

2. had they been different, how close might Scotlandbe to the position that Norway has got itself into now with its oil fund?

THAT is why McCrone remains of contemporary importance.

Concerning his more recent intervention, as I have pointed out to you before no one imagines that it will be anything other than difficult. Independence is a change and with change there are gains and losses. Those of us who believe in independence take the view that the former will exceed the latter. Clearly you think differently, which is of course your right. However, you seem to imagine that things will also remain the same. You - and McCrone - are correct that Scotland currently runs a deficit, but so does almost every other country in the world, though the Scottish deficit is larger than many. However, again as i have pointed out to you, we are in this situation with our economy managed from London with a policy whose primary direction is the protection of the City of London (witness the determination to prevent the EU introducing a Tobin tax). With a policy that focuses on energy production (eg avoiding catastrophes such as Osborne's totally out of the blue tax hike on North Sea oil in 2011), tourism (perhaps by encouraging tourists to actually arrive in Scotland rather than having to go through London) and food and drink (for which Scotland deservedly has an international reputation for excellence - how much better could we do if we marketed this for ourselves, focusing on it more intently), might we not be able to encourage more growth from the Scottish economy and, even without oil, begin to close the deficit by means other than cutting expenditure? (not that I am disputing that in some respects this might be necessary - but how much and in what respects cant be clear till 2016 and the first independent Scottish budget). That would not in any way be in conflict with the Fiscal Commission recommendations.
Moreover your view of the Fiscal Commission recommendations is quite erroneous, while they did recommend that the macroeconomic "framework should ensure monetary and price stability, financial stability and fiscal sustainability", under fiscal framework they recommended that "The Scottish Government should look to establish a fiscal framework - including the use of fiscal rules and an independent fiscal commission - which maximises economic policy flexibility and provides opportunities to promote economic growth, deliver greater economic resilience and address inequalities in Scotland." (2.9) and "long-term sustainability through effective management of the public finances alongside ensuring growth, economic policy flexibility and creating opportunities" (2.10) and "a programme of work to identify and develop key economic and fiscal `policy opportunities and choices within the proposed framework to deliver economic growth, resilience, fairness, opportunity and
sustainability" (2.17) and "in particular, in addition to boosting economic growth, the Government should explore and prioritise opportunities to address inequalities and to promote inter-generational equity and environmental sustainability" (2.19)
Your last paragraph is utterly laughable, even for you.

The UK has been running up a deficit for a long time. It has increased exponentially over recent years. Scotland has been dragged by Westminsters appalling economic governance into this debt. The debt is still rising dramatically and is unsustainable - Denmark, and several other small EU countries, have zero, or tiny increases, in their deficits. The UK debt as a % of GDP is 3 times higher than many small EU countries. I think an independent Scotland will be in a far better position to manage its economy and tackle debt.

If Scotland were to begin from day one to stop borrowing then sure - an oil fund may take a while to establish. But nobody is suggesting this drastic course of action - your quotes from McCrone refer to this scenario. He is pointing out he agrees with the SG that this is not the best way to proceed. Oh - and nobody is basing the case for independence on a 40 year old report - they don't need to.

Anyway - I'm off to read the latest report from the SG. I imagine it points out the benefits of having control over trillions of pounds worth of oil and that Scotland will organise its economy to set up an oil fund as soon as possible.

"It has increased exponentially over recent years. Scotland has been dragged by Westminsters appalling economic governance into this debt." - The UK debt is really high (90% GDP in 2012). However, in most EU countries the debt increased recently. For example, Germany's debt is 82%. There are 7 states listed in Eurostat with debt as big or bigger than the UK, and some of them are small, others big: France = 64 million people, Spain = 47 million, Belgium & Portugal & Greece = 11 million, Ireland = 4.7 million, Iceland = 0.3 million. So your claim big vs small is just not true.

"If Scotland was to begin from day one to stop borrowing more money then sure - an oil fund may take a while to establish.... your quotes from McCrone refer to this scenario" - You are making things up, as usual. Even if Scotland uses all the oil revenues for current spending and there is no money left for the oil fund, Scotland would still have to borrow money. Which part of this don't you understand? A state has to borrow each year the money to cover its deficit, otherwise it cannot pay its bills (e.g. wages in the public sector). Even when all oil revenues are used, Scotland still has a big deficit = minus on its account.

"having control over trillions of pounds worth of oil" - What trillions? Scotland does not owe the oil, it does not sell the oil, the multinationals do it. But it seems the misleading SNP propaganda is having a great effect on people like you. Adjusted for inflation, Scotland collected a total of about £280 billion oil revenues since 1980, and this includes the very high oil revenues of the 1980s.

"organise its economy to set up an oil fund as soon as possible" - The SNP do not have a budget plan for iScotland. They are just making things up as the go along. In fact, they do not even know what Scotland's welfare will be like - and they with not explain this in the white paper eithr, but maybe early next year. So they cannot make plans about setting up an oil fund until they find out what the public expenses in iScotland will be (including the costs of setting up a state etc.)

"there is no money left for an oil fund".

You continue to take the line that iScotland would do EVERYTHING the same as the UK does now. there in NO evidence that they would, in fact if you bothered to listen to the SNP (given that they are the favourites to form the first Independent government) they would do things very different.

I have already identified the military spend that iScotland could save in there are many others, please search for them.

The manifestoes for the 2016 Holyrood election will show us how each party hopes to handle the difficulties that iScotland will inherit from the UK.

Will the new Scottish Tories go with "austerity, austerity. austerity"?

Will new Scottish Labour parrot them or think of something original. Who knows, they may rediscover their socialist roots.

Will the LIbDems rediscover their principles?

Interesting times

And which part of an economic policy which focuses on Scotland rather than somewhere else at the other end of the country with which we have little in common will change our economic performance. This is your usual MO - take the now and project it unchanging into the future. Besides, are you arguing that the international financial market will make a judgement of Scotland on its oil or non-oil deficit? Surely it would be bizarre to do the latter? Surely if we can borrow at x% and invest for a return on y% (where y>x) that makes sense? The Financial Times opines that "By letting revenues flow directly to the Treasury, the Thatcher government hoped oil proceeds would reduce Britain’s public sector borrowing requirement, and in turn lead to lower interest rates and higher investment. But this didn’t happen: As joblessness rose in the early 1980s, much of the oil money was spent on increased unemployment benefits.
Mr Kemp says that if the money had instead been set aside, “we could have lived off the income from the oil fund rather than consume the capital . . . Instead, the revenues were mostly consumed, rather than invested.”

This needs to stop and the today's plan - and it says upfront its over 10 years to establish a fund - will do that, though sadly thanks to Thatcher and her utter mismanagement of this valuable capital asset, it wont be at the scale it might have been.

You refer casually to 280 billion - which is £280,000,000,000. What might Scotland have done with that? For illustration, govt expenditure in Scotland (all of it - Holyrood + Westminster) was 64.5 billion, which means that for four or five years (about 1/6 of the period referred to), Scotland could have paid all its bills ONLY from the oil tax from North Sea oil (from a Westminster inspired tax regime that many commentators has been deterimental since early in the 2000s, though Osborne did put the tin lid on it). There would have been no need for income tax, VAT, taxation on other activities. It would all have been paid from the North Sea - THAT is the scale of it.

As Tony points out, a detailed Scottish budget is not possible till all the financial details are available and the Treasury arent telling.

You are completely wrong on each and every count. I am too busy tonight to get into this but rest assured I'll get back to you on the why and wherefore in due course.

Before I go - your mean spirited approach is doing you no favours. You need more subtle and devious tactics if you are going to make any impression on people. We are far too savvy, serious and sensible to fall for the BT claptrap that forms the basis of your 'opinions'. Think on it.

How easy is it to live on unemployment benefit in Slovenia?

Well they dont seem to have been starved of infrastructure to the same extent Scotland has .

The land area of Scotland is 78,772 km2, with 380 km of Motorways, population 5.295 million.

The land area of Slovenia is 20140 km2. with 533.3 km of Motorways, population 2.053 million.

"Westminster MP's had access to the report."
How do these much cited quotes show thet these members had access to the McCrone Report which was classified as secret at the time.

Denis Healey admitted that they knew the true value of the oil and the SNP were correct in their claims. The report was availble to the Labour Cabinet and the MP's who comprised it.

I refer you to the right honorable Dennis Healey;

“I think we did underplay the value of the oil to the country because of the threat of nationalism but that was mainly down to Thatcher......Thatcher wouldn’t have been able to carry out any of her policies without that additional five per cent on GDP from oil. Incredible good luck she had from that.”

“It’s true that we should have invested the money in things we needed in Britain and I had thought about an oil fund, but it wasn’t my responsibility by then.”

Do you think that only Mr Healey had access to the report. Do you think these isues were not widely discussed by MP's over subsequent decades?

No one believed the SNP at the time. They were outplayed. Time to move on. Stop crying in the spilt milk of McCrone and lost battles. We woz robbed boo hoo hoo. Get real. In the 80's we could be sure oil was on the up and now we can be sure it is on the down. So who do we believe this time?

The SNP were right at the time. And they are right now.

At least half of North Sea Oil remains and with smart governance the massive revenues can be put to good use.

Your attitide is remarkable. Nobody is crying over spilt milk - we are debating the best way to put Scotlands resources to use. Allow Westminster to decide, given their thirty year track record, or give Holyrood and the Scottish people control.

We are debating what that our oil resource will generate at the surface. If it cannot be extracted economically it is worthless, just like coal reserves. The extraction game changer is fracking. Why waste time in the North Sea?

Sorry, I have no time for winging about McCrone, like lost battles and football games. Nor do I clutch at the notion that Holyrood will do any better than Westminster; or the Scottish people any better than the British people.

The oil industry has committed to 100 billion in investment with the possibility of up to 100,000 new jobs being created. That is without the oil resources of the atlantic or onshore being factored in.

But you think fracking - an industry that has not even started building an initial infrastructure and will meet with enormous public protest is a better bet.

That is one of the most ludicrous things I have read so far on this forum.

Fracking produces gas, not oil. Gas may be useful as an industrial and domestic fuel although we do not yet know how much gas is available under British soil. It could be the bonanza Osborne hopes for. It may not be. What gas will not do is act as a fuel for transport or act as feed stock for petro-chemically based products.

As for the controversy round the McCrone Report. Well, if you don't mind what appears to have been large scale lying by the political class to deliberately misinform the Scottish people then you clearly won't care too much about it. However, that then brings up the question if it's even bothering to pretend we still live in a democracy.

The only reason we look again at the McCrone report is because if we were mislead in 1975 we are probably being mislead again in 2013

The only reason we should think that Scotland has worthwhile future resources is because Westminster government is fighting hard to ensure a no vote in 2014.

The Norwegians are not any better or worse than their Fennoscandian cousins or indeed the English or the Scots, but thanks to independence it is their oil. We could do at least as well with it, including not using to fund a WMD system next our main population centre.

I'm not sure of the details on this, but I have heard the observation that fracking may not be as productive or intrusive as it has been in the States (and it has been intrusive in the States, what with water that you can set on fire etc) because the shale here is of a different structure than in it is in the US. Also the population density here makes it more difficult (as folk in Blackpool found out a couple of years ago). .

The UK is an artificial construct.

The peoples of the UK are no better than all the other people who inhabit this earth.

The people of all of the countries which make up the UK are no worse than the other people who inhabit this earth.

The people of Scotland are just people and in no way superior to any other people.

The people of Scotland do not need to subcontract their government, we can do it ourselves no better and no worse than anyone else

Scotland governed in Scotland
By the government of Scotland
Elected by the people of Scotland
What's not to like?

Right - so given two people a Scotsman and an Englishman who have to make a decision vis a vis a benefit to Scotland or a benefit to England which choice do you think they will each make?

Let's say THEN the SNP knew there was abundant oil and said so and UKGov knew there was abundant oil and said there was not. Then oil was on the up.

Let's say NOW UKGov knows there is no oil and says there is none and the SNP knows there is no oil and says there is pleanty. Now oil is on the down.

What counts today is not who is lying but what are the consequences.

That is as logical as a sack of cats.

The point is that there is plenty of oil left in the North Sea. The Scottish Government (Headed by an ex-oil economist.) believes so. Academics such as Professor Kemp believe so. The oil industry, as witnessed by investment plans, believes so. Individuals who I know working at reasonably high levels in the industry believe so. Most of these people and groups also believe that there is another oil rush in the offing in the North East Atlantic as well.

It is also the case that virtually everyone involved with the energy industry believes that the oil price is on a pretty one way route upwards over the longer term. Even Dr. McCrone apparently. What are you basing your views on?

Let's just say instead that nearly every country in the world governs itself and there is no eason why Scotland could not so the same. With or without oil.

and why dont we say in is out, up is down, black is white etc.

Dont you think that your view that there is no oil is cast into just a wee bit of doubt by the amount of investment going into the North Sea just now? The oil industry isnt associated as far as I know with throwing its money around for no reason.

"...What counts today is not who is lying..."

Believe it or not, truth still actually matters to people in today's world as it did in the past.

"the honest man the ' e'er sae poor is king o' men for a' that" - Burns.

YES for Prosperity - NO for Austerity.

In a court of law a person's reputation and past actions count a great deal with regard to their veracity. i.e, are they a reliable witness.

Once an individual is proved a lier it becomes well nigh impossible to ever be regard as a person of integrity.

In this case this applies to the current Westminster government - they have lost all integrity.

Steve,

With the greatest respect, the SNP were wrong at the time. Their estimates were too low at the time, they were lower than McCrone's estimates and they too were too low as time has told us!

You are 100% right. I over simplified a little too much!

You're forgiven, get up off your knees!

; - )

I can sleep soundly - night night......:-)

"the present is the key to the past." James Hutton, 'The Father of Geology.

ie, how things happen now is how they happened in the past and how they will happen in the future.

Westminster makes a conscious choice not to tell Scotland the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

In this way they show no respect for the concept of a political union of equals and no respect for the people of Scotland

McCrone proves this, end of.

Mary, I do think you are exaggerating slightly. All is fair in love and politics.

The people of 'Scotland' do enormously well out of this Union.

The people of Scoltand do not do well from the union. The Westminster government do well from Scotland that is why they are trying to prevent independence.
If they were not making money from Scotland they would be encouraging independence

You clearly do not understand from the wilds of Richmond.
You don't get to vote just chunter but who will listen to you?

No, I don't get a vote, sadly. But I love the Scottish Highlands and hate the idea that the people are being led up the lochside path by a strange notion that they will be better off.

You never managed yourselves before. What makes you think you can do it during a world financial crisis!?

Fortunately your irrelevant views are - irrelevant.

No broughupsy!

We can be sure oil on the up. That we can be sure of. More sure than a can of Sure in the desert. Surely we cannot be more sure that oil, right now, is on the up. Up in price and volume.