Pages tagged with "EU"

Thousands of people have flocked to add their names to a letter urging the European Parliament to guarantee that an independent Scotland could rejoin the EU.

The organisation Europe for Scotland published the letter just days ago. It had already been signed by 170 prominent culture figures in the UK and beyond.

Since its publication almost 8000 people have signed up to its demand. Most have come from Scotland but people from all over Europe have also signed.

Europe for Scotland co-coordinators Andrea Pisauro and Nina Jetter said they were delighted with the response so far. They said many of the Scottish signatories had attached messages saying how deprived and betrayed they felt by the UK government’s decision to pull Scotland out of Europe against its will.

‘There was a real feeling of sadness from many of those in Scotland who signed the letter,’ said Ms Jetter.

Some people we approached wanted to see the election result before committing to sign

She and Mr Pisauro had organised the project after being asked to get involved by their friend Anthony Barnett of openDemocracy. Cultural figures who signed it included actors Sam Heughan, star of Outlander, Brian Cox, whose long list of acting credits include Succession, former Scottish makar Jackie Kay, author Val McDermid and U2 and Talking Heads producer Brian Eno.

The organisers expect more cultural figures to sign up if a pro-independence majority is elected at  Thursday’s Holyrood election. ‘Some people we approached wanted to see the election result before committing to sign,’ said Mr Pisauro.

We want to build a bottom up citizens campaign demanding that EU institutions break the silence

The letter was published simultaneously in Scotland, elsewhere in the UK, Denmark, France, Italy, Portugal, Czech Republic and Poland.

The next step after the Scottish election will be to widen the campaign to involve more people living in Central Europe. Ms Jetter said: ‘ We want to build a bottom up citizens campaign demanding that EU institutions break the silence, express their solidarity and offer support to Scotland ahead of an independence referendum.’

Mr Pisauro added that many people living in Europe were not aware that Scotland had voted against Brexit and the campaign wants to raise awareness of that.

He added: 'We have an extensive network of contacts thanks to campaigns we got involved with in the past, including an open letter to Angela Merkel demanding European solidarity in response to the pandemic.'

You can sign the letter urging the EU to pledge to allow an independent Scotland to rejoin at europeforscotland.com, where it has been translated into 18 languages, including Scots and Gaelic. Sign the letter here.

Both the UK Government and the media headlines have suggested that the UK is leading the way on the COVID-19 vaccine roll-out. We recognised in a previous article, that the UK paid significantly more for vaccinations, causing delays within many EU countries as the manufacturers directed supplies towards the overpaying nation. Despite this, in terms of fully vaccinating the population, the UK is still trailing behind a large number of countries worldwide, including many of those in the EU. Let's examine the vaccination programmes in larger EU countries, with a similar population size to the UK, then compare smaller, independent countries to determine whether an independent Scotland would have been likely to have vaccinated its population more efficiently than it has as part of the UK.

Vaccination programmes in larger countries

As of the 9^th February 2021, the UK had fully vaccinated 0.77% of the population. Meanwhile, Germany had vaccinated 1.32%, Spain 1.9% and Italy 2.05% of the population. The only European country with a similar population that is marginally falling behind the UK is France, with 0.54% of its population fully vaccinated. This suggests that, despite the headlines, the UK is trailing behind most of the most comparable nations in reaching full immunity from the virus. Despite these countries all being part of the EU and its vaccination programme, that was hindered by the UK capitalising upon the vaccine, they remain significantly ahead of the UK in terms of fully vaccinating their populations.

A comparison with small independent countries

The table below demonstrates the % of the population that have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 in small independent countries, as well as the UK. The results highlight that all of these small independent countries have managed to fully vaccinate a greater percentage of their populations than the UK. Even a very small country, such as Estonia, has fully vaccinated nearly double the number of individuals that the UK has. Furthermore, the figures suggest that the UK’s progress is very slow and gradual, with the percentage of the population being fully vaccinated rising very slowly.

Share of the population fully vaccinated against COVID-19 (%)

Conclusions

Despite headlines such as “Vaccine success to give UK huge economic boost! PM: 'Jabs get us closer to beating virus'” from the Express, it is clear that the UK still has a long way to go in terms of reaching immunity and fully vaccinating the population. the only thing the UK Government has been winning at recently seems to be false propaganda about it's vaccination programme.  Its shouldn't be a race, nations should be working tother to beat this health crises but the UK Government has been misleading people about their calcination programme success and thus politicking the issue.  Despite spending significantly more on vaccinations than other countries, and consequently causing EU deliveries to be held up , the UK trails behind a number of countries both large and small. Importantly, our findings recognise that small, independent countries have been more than capable of vaccinating their populations and in fact, have fully vaccinated a greater percentage of their populations than the UK.

Several people have requested the answer to the question “why would Scotland leave one union, the UK, to join another, the EU?”

To make sense, this question relies on the premise that the two unions are similar in how they impact on national sovereignty when they clearly are not.  

A better way to look at the question is to ask what are the differences between the two unions in terms of how they affect the sovereignty of a member-state? We researched the facts and we found the following:  

The Truth about Scotland’s Sovereignty 

Scotland is currently not a sovereign state, as a part of the UK, but an independent Scotland would still be a sovereign country even if it were a member of the EU.

The Facts

• Scotland is a nation within a union but in terms of statehood the union (UK) is recognised as the sovereign state. Scotland is not a sovereign state and will not be until it achieves independence from the union in a way that is internationally recognised.
• The power that has been devolved to the Scottish Government is power delegated by the UK government which it can technically remove at any time. So, even though Scotland's Government may for arguments sake have parliamentary control over between 20-30% of the laws that effect Scotland, ‘power devolved is power retained’ and Scotland is not a sovereign state.
• A basic definition of sovereignty, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary and the Oxford Living Dictionaries, is that it refers to superiority or supremacy usually in terms of the power to make political decisions within a territory.
• International relations theory, distinguishes between internal and external sovereignty. In short, internal sovereignty is basically a state’s right to self-determination, and external sovereignty refers to the international recognition of a state that enables membership and access to international organisations and resources.¹
• Nowadays, it is widely accepted that state sovereignty is the primary constitutive principle of modern political life.² This means that sovereignty is a prerequisite for joining international political unions and organisations such as the EU and United Nations (UN).  
• Participations in political unions and organisations is what what provides a nation with a voice in the international political arena.³
• Joining the EU is voluntary and so although membership requires the UK to accept and enact on EU laws and regulations that does not mean that the UK parliament’s supremacy over making laws has been reduced. This is because firstly the UK joined voluntarily, had a veto over new treaties and was able to leave when it deemed fit.  
• By joining the EU, the UK participated actively in the EU’s decision-making processes, which would had otherwise been impossible.
• The UK, much like Denmark, Poland and Ireland, had the opportunity to negotiate and opt-out from EU legislations such as using the Euro and adopting the Schengen agreement on full freedom of movement of peoples^4.
• The EU is also called a union but it does not require the sovereignty of its members to be transferred to the European Parliment.  Membership does require member states to align the laws that facilitate trade, quality and safety standards etc the elements of a function single market.
• The UK did not exchange its sovereignty for its EU membership; the ability to hold the 2016 EU referendum through an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom (European Union Referendum Act 2015) is the best proof of that. The resulting difficulties of negotiating withdrawal deal and any future difficulties over negotiating trade deals in the 2020 transition period are not a result of a lack of UK sovereignty but rather the lack of the UK’s negotiating power due to the relative sizes of the EU with 27 member states and the UK on its own. 
• To join the EU a state must be 100% sovereign and thus able both agree to align the required laws and also to leave the EU if it wishes to as the UK has proven.  

Verdict

Brexit represents a clear cut example that the UK has remained a sovereign country throughout its period of EU membership. This would be the case for an independent Scotland or any other sovereign states joining the EU as equal members. Ironically Brexit demonstrates that Scotland is not at all sovereign, as its democratic wish to Remain in the EU is being ignored as a part of the UK. Regaining sovereignty therefor, either as a member of the EU or otherwise, is one of the strongest arguments for why Scotland should leave the United Kingdom.

On the other hand, the voluntary sharing of sovereignty, in terms of accepting EU legislation, is inevitable in the same way it is inevitable for everyone that decides to be a member of a democratic society to follow its laws and norms as well as to participate actively in their making. This is actually something that enhances rather than reduces sovereignty. 

In an interconnected world with interdependent economies facilitating trade and prosperity through aligning a small percentage of a nations laws with others is what makes a functioning single market possible. This in turn allows sovereign states to gain access to a larger pool of opportunities for development alongside other member-states without the loss of national sovereignty which is required to maintain membership of the UK.

References: 

• James, A. (1984), `Sovereignty: Ground Rule or Gibberish?’ Review of International Studies 10(1), pp. 1-18, p. 2.
• Walker R.B.J. (1990), ‘Security, Sovereignty, and the Challenge of World Politics,’ Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 15, No. 1, pp: 3-27. 
• Wallace W. (1999), ‘The Sharing of Sovereignty: The European Paradox,’ Political Studies XLVII, pp. 503-521, p. 503.
• Briggs M. (2015), Europe ‘à la carteʼ: The whats and whys behind UK opt-outs, Euractiv: https://www.euractiv.com/section/uk-europe/linksdossier/europe-a-la-carte-the-whats-and-whys-behind-uk-opt-outs/