It
is vaguely assumed by many Scots that the oilfields off our coast are obviously
and inalienably Scottish. This idea is logically supported by the 1707
Act of Union. It is not so, according to
United-Kingdomland-of-London.
Without
the mineral resources that lie beyond our 12-mile-limit, full-fiscal-autonomy
becomes fool-fiscal-autonomy. It is wrong to even discuss something that
clearly implies English (as in United-Kingdomland is England) ownership of the
oilfields. To accept any such deal would set us up to be (even more of) an
Albania of Western Europe.
It
is long past time for the SNP to come to terms with the need to extend our
maritime limits. It makes legal and constitutional sense to divide the
United Kingdom Continental Shelf between the two parties who
signed up for the 1707 Union. Within that Union there is Scots’ Law
and English Law, there should be no more room for big-bone-us-piracy. The
oilfields and our territorial integrity are the rock on which we could build a
federal, confederal or independent state. Anything less fails the1320-test and
is not fit to be called Scotland.
We
have successively sent Liberal, Tory and Socialist-lite representatives to
Westminster. Every time things got worse, we felt betrayed – people voted with
their feet. This time, it is to be hoped that one of our 56 representatives
will turn out to be a talented (and fearless) diplomat, with steel in their
teeth.
It
is also to be hoped that we would see through the smoke and mirrors of the
imperial media and support such an individual, should they emerge:
good Scots leader =
vicious press smears
(à la
Neil Kinnock, Arthur Scargill, et al)
The
Norwegians wisely chose to vote for the Norwegian Constitution before they
discovered their oil. Despite having a very clear democratic mandate for
independence, they still had to face-down the might of the
Swedish Imperial Army on their border.
Louis
Mair
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