I have written here before about how infuriated I get when Scottish nationalists invoke the National Health Service, as if it was part of Scotland. The NHS is one of the greatest facets of UK state or social infrastructure, yet people who want to split the country up and become a separate nation think they should still have a right to it if they get their perverse, shortsighted way. But they can’t have their cake and eat it: the NHS is funded by the UK and maintained by the UK; it therefore belongs to the UK, not Scotland, and Scotland should instantly lose any right to it if it decides to break away from the rest of it.
This kind of entitled attitude in the SNP really gets on my nerves. Scotland has been an integral part of the United Kingdom for the last three centuries, and together we have flourished. To think that it can now go it alone smacks to me of an extreme arrogance, as if the SNP think that the UK hasn’t done anything for it. Their new leader, Humza Yousaf, is probably a case in point: as a child of immigrants from Pakistan, his family would have been supported by UK infrastructure, educated in british schools through the national curriculum, housed via our social services, looked after by the NHS. Does it not strike anyone as a slap in the face that he now seeks to break the very country which welcomed his family apart? After all, unlike most SNP members or supporters, he will have probably no scottish ancestry.
Of course, I know I need to be careful, or risk veering into bigotry. Anyone can hold any political views they want, irrespective of where their family came from. Nor do I think that immigrants should necessarily be grateful to the country their family emigrated to. It just strikes me as odd that someone like Yousaf would now want to break the UK apart when it was structures put in place by the UK, not just Scotland, which supported him and his family. Wouldn’t such a person want to remain a part of the country which had taken him in and want to contribute to the wider community, rather than identifying with only a section of it and effectively abandoning the rest of us to the fate he and his fellow Scottish Nationalists would escape from?
The Ill-Informed Ramblings of a Cripple 
I can understand your point of view of not wanting to split in terms of unity and working together, but your other argument highlights why this won’t happen. That Scotland and it’s new first minister are beholden to England and that they owe it something. That Scotland should be thankful for a few meagre hand outs like a peasant or an unloved ginger step child. Your argument reinforces why a lot of Scotland are fed up with Westminster rule.
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Thanks for your comment mate. I know what you mean, but I still think that, to a certain extent, this all boils down to a kind of jealousy or resentment. As I understand it, The Act of Union came about when Scotland bankrupted itself trying to create its own empire. Envious of the growing English/British empire, Scotland tried to create its own and fucked up. England then had to bail it out. I get the impression that, since then, Scotland has been resentful that it was England, not Scotland, which rose to the top and became the dominant state. I think Scottish nationalists believe that, if it becomes independent, it will be able to reclaim the position they think England stole from Scotland. I think I heard somewhere that they think Scotland should have a permanent place at the UN alongside France and the US, for example. That strikes me as rather presumptuous and arrogant. I don’t think Scots should be grateful to the UK for handouts, but I don’t think they should get ahead of their selves either.
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Mate. I lived in Scotland for years. They don’t give a shit about the Union forged a few hundred years ago. No doubt that they are angry at the English, but not out of jealousy. They have a number of things to be pissed off about; the Highland Clearances, Thatcher dumping the poll tax on Scotland, years and years of suffering under a government that they did not vote for, banning tartan and trying to subdue Gaelic culture and on and on. I’m going to be honest here pal. At times you sound like a bigot. Your argument is essentially fast becoming”who do Scotland think they are??”, “Why should Scotland have seat at the table”, “They want to be on equal footing with us. Mighty England”. Imagine having that view about different races.
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I do not want to sound bigoted mate, and I certainly don’t think Scottish culture ought to be suppressed in any way. It’s just that Scottish people sometimes seem so entitled and self-pitying. Above all, though, I just think we should remain one country.
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Another massive, sweeping generalisation “It’s just that Scottish people sometimes seem so entitled and self-pitying.”. If I shared that with my Scottish friends they’d be fuming. This is the reason you sound like a bigot. You can absolutely not agree with Scottish independence, but you do it in a way that just dismisses Scotland. I’d be interested to hear you actually give an opinion as to why Scotland should remain without talking about some strange notion of coming together or having some weird angry reaction about the Scots being self pitying.
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Reading my comment again, I have to agree that it is a bit of a generalisation. I just have major questions about Scottish independence: how, exactly would it work? How would the border work? How would we share infrastructure, such as road maintenance? Would people be able to move between both countries freely? How do Scots intend to ‘keep’ the NHS? It would cause so many issues, arguments and so much division, it isn’t worth it.
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These are genuine questions that would need to be answered, but that’s not an argument as to why it shouldn’t happen. That’s about how it would happen. Plus you speak about the NHS as if it’s one massive organisation, when in fact it’s split up into hundreds of Trusts throughout the UK. It’s not like Scotland being independent would just make the hospitals and GP’s disappear. The infrastructure is there. Scotland has a lot of laws that are devolved (qualifying and working as a social worker in Scotland I had to be familiar with the Children’s Scotland Act that dictated my practice). There are of course laws that are UK wide; road traffic act, acts around immigration and asylum etc. But again it’s a question of how they would overcome this and I’m pretty sure that Scotland’s laws on immigration etc would be a damn site friendlier than our current government and Labours. Your views around wanting to remain together to build unity are fine and I understand them, but I get really annoyed when your argument quickly changes to “who do Scotland think they are?”. I think at times you need to look at some of your internal bias and views and think before you type. That view stinks of the right wing media and I think you are at time reactionary.
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