If I was feeling pretty happy this morning about a short but successful to Orkney – and, believe me, I was – then a refuelling stop in Kirkwall (the main town in a county which not incidentally has some of the highest levels of fuel poverty in Scotland) dampened the mood just a peedie bit, as the local language would have it.
Fuel today is at an all time high of 142.94p per litre, which is higher than the previous record from 2012 when oil was $126 per barrel, despite today’s price being around $86. I’m not an oil economist, but what I do know is that 60% of the price (86.44p) tax goes straight to the UK Treasury in tax and VAT.
In remote areas like Orkney – and I just checked my receipt – it’s 150.90p per litre, of which 91.74p goes straight to yer man Rishi. In a little over two minutes the guy got nearly £40 from me. Which is something to think about the next time you’re filling up your tank. Or voting on Scotland’s constitutional future, come to that.
In six decades, resource rich Scotland has produced infinitely more fuel than it would ever need. Every. Single. Year. And we don’t have anything to show for it. Nothing. Nada. Not a penny.
Being Scotland, we are instead obliged to pay a premium rate for that fuel and expected to finance the treasury of another country with wholly divergent spending priorities and run by a government we haven’t voted for since 1955 and who then use part of our revenues to tell us we are too poor and wee and stupid to manage our own economy.
We beg for a piece of what’s already ours.
It’s bonkers, an insane state of affairs that can only be resolved when we finally get the vote on self-determination that our government was elected to deliver.
For goodness sake, let’s get this done.
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What a spot-on piece, as usual, with which I could not agree more.
By allowing this outrageous situation to continue, we do indeed confirm our stupidity.
High fuel prices would be the least of your worries if we ever voted for the independence you keep banging on about.
In order to achieve any semblance of fiscal probity, Sturgeon would have to make drastic spending cuts and hike taxes to eyewatering levels, none of us will ever have experienced.
But when did reality ever stand in the way of a Nationalist’s argument?
Are you for real McDougal ? Scotland and it’s people are being ripped of by the tory crooks That by the looks of your uninformed post you voted for . Just get your nose out of the Yoon controlled media and do some unbiased research into exactly what is happening in the real world . As to the parallel universe you seem to reside in.
The quicker we escape from BJ and his cabal the better .
Nationalists cancel out any unpalatable facts and choose to ignore what is staring them in the face. An independent Scotland is all that matters even if it consigns future generations to poverty and hardship.
Already our health service, education system and industry are all suffering the effects of under-investment.
Education in particular has a pitifully low priority for the SNP. Grammar and spelling are not being taught and judging by your poor effort on that score, the consequences are glaringly apparent!
How would an independent Scotland be able to compete in the new world order when it’s unable to express itself, even in its own language.
Boy am I glad we we went electric.
Spot on.
Lauchlan Mcdougal. You dont even understand the economics of independent countries judging by that comment.