In an independent Scotland, all the things you hold dear, aspire to, believe in, will become dry sticks in the wasteland. With us, just vote NO, and we’ll look after you. We’ll see you all right. We’re the only ones who can protect your ideals, all the things you cherish.
But just move the tone slider a little on this. Move it from slime, through cheese, double-talk and cant until you get the first hint of menace. Two clicks past innuendo and one before threat. Do that and these protestations have another meaning.
You love your family, don’t you? And your kids? You don’t want anything to… happen. We can protect you. The price? Stick with us. We’ll stop anyone else causing you trouble. First hint, and we’ll send in the big boys. We’ve got 'Nuke-You-Leer 'Nick. We’ve 'Last Resort' Carney and 'Desperate' Dave.
Anybody give you grief and we’ll send back Al 'Darling' Cicatrice or Seamus 'Mugger' Murphy. They won’t take anything for an answer. There’s never enough answers for these guys.
The price? Oh, aye. Just give us your pay packet and we’ll let you have enough to live on. Maybe some extra for holidays and the occasional bun-fight. We’ll see you right. But don’t ask any awkward questions of your own or we’ll duff you up or let 'Pie-face' La-la-la-Mont speak to you.
It’s a racket. Protection is a lie. Its how they keep us in line. They use the same fear, the same weapons, to bludgeon everyone, friend or foe alike. Our enemy is your enemy, right?
And the proof of it? Take the NHS in Scotland. We’re assured time and again that it’s already ours – to fund, fiddle with and generally run or ruin as we like. If we stuff up, it’ll be because we’re too crap to do otherwise.
Studiously avoided is the truth.
Part 1.
We may have the power to run our Scottish NHS but we don’t control the funds. They come up in a shabby wee wagon they detach from the Westminster gravy train. It’s the Barnett truck and what goes in it are wads of notes made up of sums in proportion to what Westminster doles out for its own public services.
That’s the real deal and, if they manage to cut back on what they spend, there’ll be fewer wads on the truck for us. Health spending squeezed means squeezed everywhere. Across the UK, England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, cuts or charges or deeper privatisation, privatisation without end.
Part 2.
Then there's the TransatlanticTrade and Investment Partnership - TTIP. This is a trade agreement being cooked up in secretbetween the EU and the USA. It effectively opens up areas of public services to corporate bids. It would give private enterprises, corporations, the right to bid for public sector contracts. More than that, it would make the NHS in the UK (and in Scotland too, if we vote NO) obliged to accept such bids. Also, if a government, after an election, gained a mandate to remove that right to bid or end any contracts given through it, corporations whose profits were threatened could sue the government.
This is undemocratic in the extreme.
Participating governments can exclude key parts of their services, like the NHS, for example. Phew! You say. Well, no. Vince Cable, the Business Secretary and minister responsible in Westminster, hasn’t put the NHS into the equation. Presumably because the coalition doesn’t want it there. So, if we do nothing the NHS will be privatised by cut-price healthcare corporates from the USA moving in and providing services for less (cost and quality). But the Tories won’t care because that’s where they want it to be. Labour will point fingers but they won’t lift a finger.
If you need more, Google 'TTIP', visit sites like http://ttip2014.eu/ or seek out sites like 38 Degrees at https://secure.38degrees.org.uk/ to petition against it.
The NHS is under threat. Labour isscreaming about it in England and Wales. They’re just not saying so to us up here, bedridden as they are with the Tories. Why the double standard? Why not admit ii? Because then they’d have to admit, no matter if we have devolved control, the Scottish NHS is threatened by, not just dwindling budgets, but by the access the TTIP agreement forces on us. Unless we vote NO and keep the NHS out of TTIP or resist it completely.
So, where’s the protection we’re told comes from the Union? With a NO, Nowhere. The austerity-privatisation agenda steamrollers on. The Mob are doing exactly as they please. You don’t want anything to happen to your family… your kids…
Exactly, when you need healthcare, nothing will happen. Otherwise, if necessary, they’ll do whatever they must to protect us from ourselves.
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