Autonomous Regions/Nations/What?

[Alan]

From the post on the blog (http://www.notesfromspain.com), I can't help but feel that I've missed something somewhere. Yes, I knew that Cataluña was independent in much the same way as Scotland is independent at the moment. That is to say, it basically controls all of its affairs, but when it comes to something of national importance, it has the same say as the rest of Spain - i.e. warfare, economy etc. However, the stories seem to be suggesting that Andalucia is actually a country - separate from Spain. I'm sure that I'm reading too much into this, and that Andalucia will still be part of Spain, but any clarification would be good.

So, are we going to see Spain split into a million pieces within the next 20 years?

[Ben]

My take on it is that Andalucia wants what Catalonia has got at the moment. But many Spaniards think that the Basque Country and Catalonia will in fact gain total independence one day, in which case Andalucia could follow suit as well.

[Marina]

I don't think there is much of a separatist feeling in Andalucia, nothing compared to Catalonia or the Basque Country. However, I suppose it might suit them to have a new "estatuto" to get the control over some issues and of course more money from the central government.

[greytop]

I´ve been trying to follow in the Spanish press what they are all wanting but it is not clearcut to me (or most other non-lawyers probably!). There is a statute that the Catalans are trying to get through that seems to have rattled a few cages and brought up the spectre of a split Spain. I believe they want more say over raising taxes etc and less central control over how they do things. I think this can be interpreted as going slightly against the "Constitutión Española". This is a different problem to that of the Basques who want outright independence from France/Spain.
The Valencians (Castellón - Valencia - Alicante) have also defined the role of their provincial government and issued the "Estatuto de Autonomía de la Communitat Valenciana". This defines the region and how it is organised and run.
There is also national opposition to the terms used to refer to the regions e.g. "kingdom" or "country" not liked but "community" OK.
The biggest argument the Valencians seem to have is over their language, with many politicians and linguists stating that Valenciano is merely a dialect of Catalan, a view not popular around here but that is maybe for another thread!
There must be some better informed people than me so let´s be having the real story.

[cubix]

Can someone elaborate more on the spanish government, I don't really understand how it is set up...

[Alan]

A good summary from Wikipedia:

Administrative divisions

Administratively, Spain is divided into 50 provinces (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provinces_of_Spain), grouped into 17 autonomous communities (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_communities_of_Spain) and 2 autonomous cities with high degree of autonomy.
[edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spain&action=edit&section=11)]

Autonomous communities

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/6a/Ccaa-spain.png/400px-Ccaa-spain.png (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Ccaa-spain.png) http://en.wikipedia.org/skins-1.5/common/images/magnify-clip.png (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Ccaa-spain.png)
Autonomous communities of Spain


Main article: Autonomous communities of Spain (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_communities_of_Spain) Spain consists of 17 autonomous communities (comunidades autónomas) and 2 autonomous cities (ciudades autónomas; Ceuta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceuta) and Melilla (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melilla)).
Andalusia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andalusia) (Andalucía)
Aragon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aragon) (Aragón)
Principality of Asturias (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asturias) (Principáu d'Asturies in Asturian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asturian_language)/Principado de Asturias in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language))
Balearic Islands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balearic_Islands) (Illes Balears in Catalan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_language) / Islas Baleares in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language))
Basque Country (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_Country_%28autonomous_community%29) (Euskadi in Basque (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_language)/País Vasco in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language))
Canary Islands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canary_Islands) (Islas Canarias)
Cantabria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantabria)
Castile-La Mancha (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castile-La_Mancha) (Castilla-La Mancha)
Castile and Leon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castile_and_Leon) (Castilla y León in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language)/Castiella y Llión in Leonese (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asturian_language))
Catalonia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalonia) (Catalunya in Catalan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_language)/Cataluña in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language)/ Catalunha in Aranese (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aranese))
Extremadura (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremadura)
Galicia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galicia_%28Spain%29) (Galiza in Galician (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galician_language)/Galicia in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language))
La Rioja (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Rioja)
Madrid (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madrid_%28autonomous_community%29)
Murcia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murcia_%28autonomous_community%29)
Navarre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navarre) (Nafarroa in Basque (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_language)/Navarra in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language))
Land of Valencia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_Valencia) (Comunitat Valenciana in Valencian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valencian_dialect) /Comunidad Valenciana in Spanish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language), as official denominations).[edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spain&action=edit&section=12)]

Provinces

Main articles: Provinces of Spain (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provinces_of_Spain) and Comarcas of Spain (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comarcas_of_Spain) The Spanish kingdom has also a provincial structure. Spain is divided into 50 provinces (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provinces) (provincias). This structure is prior to that of the autonomous communities (dates back to 1833). Therefore, autonomous communities group provinces (for instance, Extremadura (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremadura) is made of two provinces: Cáceres (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A1ceres_%28province%29) and Badajoz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badajoz_%28province%29)). The autonomous communities of Asturias (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asturias), the Balearic Islands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balearic_Islands), Cantabria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantabria), La Rioja (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Rioja), Navarre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navarre), Murcia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murcia), and Madrid (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madrid) (the nation's capital (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_city)) are each composed of a single province. Traditionally, provinces are usually subdivided into historic regions or comarcas.
[edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spain&action=edit&section=13)]

Places of sovereignty

There are also five enclaves (plazas de soberanía (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plaza_de_soberan%C3%ADa)) on and off the African (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa) coast: the cities of Ceuta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceuta) and Melilla (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melilla) are administered as autonomous cities, an intermediate status between cities and communities; the islands of the Islas Chafarinas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islas_Chafarinas), Peñón de Alhucemas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penon_de_Alhucemas), and Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penon_de_Velez_de_la_Gomera) are under direct Spanish administration.
The Canary islands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canary_islands), Ceuta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceuta) and Melilla (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melilla), although not officially historic communities, enjoy a special status.



-------------------------------------------------------

And just to be legal about all this . . . :)


Wikipedia contributors (2006). Spain. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 21:29, May 4, 2006 from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spain&oldid=51573733.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_Licen se) (see Copyrights (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Copyrights) for details).
Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.



Incidentally, this is a very good message board. Pictures, formatting, the lot!

[cubix]

Seems like a lot of government for a country not that big

50 provinces, are those governed like states or such?

[greytop]

Thanks Alan - I´ll be following some of those links later (Presently mastering Opera you'll be pleased to hear!)
There is a very good Spanish site (some pages in English) about the workings of the Spanish governent & I attach a couple of links. La Moncloa is the buildings where the government is situated in Madrid.

http://www.la-moncloa.es/Espana/ElEstado/LeyFundamental/default.htm

http://www.la-moncloa.es/Espana/ElEstado/OrganizacionTerritorial/default.htm

You can even find some of the Presidents speeches translated into English. Now that´s enough excitement for one post!

[ValenciaSon]

One fast way to get my Valencian father riled up is to tell him that catalan and valenciano are the same. His car bears the bumper sticker stating "Soc Valencia, Non Catala".

Having briefly researched that subject myself I found that some sources will tell you that they are both the same language with only some colloquial differences, other sources state that there are enough differences between the two to recognize them as 2 distinct languages.

I know that the Comunitat Valencia recognizes Valenciano and Castellano as the offical languages.

Does anyone have an opinion? Is this something that people will have to always agree that they disagree?

[Alan]

You get this same argument everywhere. In linguistics, this is called a dialect continuum, and it exists across large land masses where the differences between the languages depends very much on where you want to draw the line. A lot of what I'm saying has changed a fair bit with the advent of the information age, where, as people want to be understood more widely, they adopt a more standardised language and hence language barriers actually form around national barriers. For ensaumple, am no bletherin tae ye wi ma raiglar iveryday tongue (For example I'm not speaking to you with my normal everyday language). There are a few examples of dialect continua in Europe - the one which goes right across through Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium and the Romantic one which connects Spain, Italy, France. But, it was also possible to walk between France and Germany and only very slowly pick up on the differences between French and German, and they are very different languages.

Yeah, okay. Let's call Valenciano a different language, but it's just part of the Romantic dialect continuum. I call Scots a different language, but plenty of people call it a dialect. The people of Manchester speak a very different English to the people of London. The people of Texas speak a very different English to the people of New York. They're different, but is it a different language or a different dialect? I think it is certain that Valenciano and Catalan are not the same.

This is one of the things that makes the study of language so interesting. Make up your own mind. Where do you want to draw the line?

Edit: Incidentally, all European languages plus Hindi are part of the Indo-European language group. Maybe we all just speak different dialects of that :)

[Alan]

I was very pleased to find the following language chart on Wikipedia which clearly states that Castillian is separate to Catalan and that Scots is separate to English, but makes no such claims about Valenciano . . .

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/0/0d/IndoEuropeanTreeA.svg/800px-IndoEuropeanTreeA.svg.png

[Ben]

I was very pleased to find the following language chart on Wikipedia which clearly states that Castillian is separate to Catalan and that Scots is separate to English, but makes no such claims about Valenciano . .

According to Marina Valenciano is a dialect of Catalan, perhaps that is why it isn't on there. Great chart by the way!

[Seán]

Edit: Incidentally, all European languages plus Hindi are part of the Indo-European language group. Maybe we all just speak different dialects of that :)

Apart from,

Finnish, Hungarian and Estonian - Finno-Uralic group,
and
Basque - answers on a postcard - nearest relative, last I heard anyway, is Georgian in the Caucasus.

Seán

[ValenciaSon]

I don't know that it is that clear cut that Valenciano is a Catalan dialect. The Catalonians want to add Valencia to their desired autonomous region staking their claim that Valencia is a subset of Catalan. Maybe I'm biased (look at my nickname):rolleyes:

I've read that Valenciano as a dialect from Catalan is one theory as it relates to the local Mozarabics at the time combining the spoken Romance language and leading to the emergence of the newer local languages known today as Catalan, Valenciano amd others. The other theory holds that Catalan and Valenciano arose from Occitan which King James of Aragon made in vogue.

Etymology does fascinate me as it always uncovers events in history and how they impacted social development.

Thanks for the chart Sean, interesting.

[Seán]

Thanks for the chart Sean, interesting.

Ah, if only I could claim the credit... That was actually Alan who posted it.:)

You have me interested, though, about the political considerations regarding the Valenciano dialect issue. I have come across a saying quite a few times that, "A language is a dialect which possesses an army and a navy." Now wouldn't it be interesting to discover if there is much real feeling for separatism in Catalunya because, if there were then the matter of territorial viability would come to the fore.

A non-rhetorical question for anyone who can tell me: could a Catalunyan state be self-sustaining? I honestly know too little about the region to have an opinion. I do however have a whiff of a suspicion in the back of my head that the relative political and security provided by the EU offers an as yet untapped opportunity for the dismantling of large, multi-national/multi-regional states e.g. Spain, UK, France (the proverbial would hit the fan here even at the suggestion - ask the Bretons!). It could also give the north of Italy the chance to break from the south if the will was strong enough. I'm sure better informed people can think of other examples, perhaps involving Eastern European states too.

A Europe of the Regions???

Seán

[ValenciaSon]

Sorry Alan, I meant to thank you for the language chart.

[Ben]

A non-rhetorical question for anyone who can tell me: could a Catalunyan state be self-sustaining? I honestly know too little about the region to have an opinion. I do however have a whiff of a suspicion in the back of my head that the relative political and security provided by the EU offers an as yet untapped opportunity for the dismantling of large, multi-national/multi-regional states
Could the Catalans support themselves? Ask the Catalans and they will say definitley, ask the Madrileños and they will laugh. But, Barcelona is an economic force in its own right and the region does very well out of tourism so I imagine there is a good chance that Catalonia could get along just fine on its own, possibly better then the Basques in economic terms.

Multi-region states? How about 'The United States of Europe', based on the American model!?

[Marbella]

A few years ago I was introduced at work in England to a new starter. On hearing her name I said, "Ah, you are Spanish; my wife is Spanish!". She looked horrified and said, "I am not Spanish, I am Catalan". So of course I made a point from then on of introducing her to people as the new Spanish lady on the team. She was insulted to be called Spanish and I was insulted that she found any association with Spain so repugnant.

Catalonia would survive well at an economic level but I would question their passion for pushing the dominance of the Catalan language. Economic success these days depends on global trade and surely Catalan is useless on the global stage (anyone name another part of the world that speaks it apart form Andorra?). My dictionary says: Catalan - the romance language spoken in Catalonia, Balearic Islands, Andorra. A romantic attachment to the language in order to strike a divide between Catalonia and Spain is an error I feel.

I lived in Andalucia for a couple of years and I have never heard anyone show an interest in independence. Andalucia (wisely) do not have their own language although it might seem like that to me when I am trying to understand them.

My feeling is that Catalonia will go fully independent in the next 10 years only if the socialists govern in Spain. The PP will put up many obstacles to this if they regain power. The Basque country which I personally love will go the same way in the same timeframe. Out of choice I would like the Basques to regain their confidence in the Spanish government and stay part of Spain but with a large amount of autonomy.

And then that just leaves the Galicians to go their own way....

That

[Alan]

There are a lot of parallels that can be drawn between Catalonia and Scotland. We both have a separate parliament, we both consider ourselves countries, we both have our own languages and identities which are quite separate from the "country" we are supposed to be part of and have a similar population (5.5 million in Scotland and 7.5 million? in Catalonia).

I am convinced that Scotland can support itself (and fully support Scottish independence). If Scotland is able to support itself, Catalonia definitely can, as it has more fertile land, more fishing rights, better links to Europe and a huge tourist industry. I also believe that the people want the country of Catalonia to work more than the people of Scotland, who are largely apathetic towards the cause.

I see your point about Catalan being useless as a business language, but we are fast approaching the point where everyone must speak English anyway (please don't confuse my acknowledgement of this with my approval of it: I think the richness of language is being diluted with English). There is hardly a job listing in Spain that doesn't require a nivel alto/medio de inglés.

And there is no romantic attachment. The languages of Spain, Portugal, Italy and France are known as the Romance languages (with a captical R). English and Scots are Germanic languages and Gàidhlig is a Celtic language. Hence, Catalan is "the Romance language spoken in Catalonia, Balearic Islands, Andorra" although it's not the only Romance language spoken there.

. . . and I'll take offence if you call me British :) This has nothing to do with a dislike of the English, Welsh or Northern Irish - I just don't feel British. I'm Scottish, so i can see where your workmate is coming from :D

[Seán]

Multi-region states? How about 'The United States of Europe', based on the American model!?

That's kind of the lines I'm thinking along. A sort of European 'super-state' made up, not of the existing blocks (Spain, France, Germany, UK, Italy, etc), but of their parts which were welded together through conquest or nineteenth century nationalism. Make a starightforward proposal to break up the existing states and regionalise Europe now and you'd be laughed out of it - or bombed out, perhaps, if taken seriously, but that may in fact happen almost unintentionally, with pressure on central governments from absorbed nations and regions claiming autonomy or outright independence.

Please, noone, shoot me down in flames, but I think that the various events of the twentieth century have shown the nationalism of the nineteenth to be a myth at best and at worst an excuse to demonise your neighbour. I wonder if this present nationalism and regionalism will paradoxically, undermine nationalism and foster mutual co-operation in the long term as smaller states and autonomous regions with questionable economic viability appear on the scene.

Seán

[Seán]

. . . and I'll take offence if you call me British :) This has nothing to do with a dislike of the English, Welsh or Northern Irish - I just don't feel British. I'm Scottish, so i can see where your workmate is coming from :D

I know how you feel exactly. I was born in Scotland and lived there for the first thirty-three years of my life before moving to my parents' country to live. When my friends and I made our university applications years ago, we were horrified to have them returned as incorrectly completed on account of the nationality box having been filled with Scottish and not British. Years later - and a chunk of Scottish history at Glasgow Uni - I discovered that the term 'British' was reinvented in the eighteenth century as an attempt to give a common identity to the four nations sharing the crown. We weren't supposed to ever become offended by being called British as it was hoped everyone would buy into it. Had the political situation in the UK been one of true partnership and not sometimes subtle, sometimes not, dominance things might have turned out differently.

To the best of my knowledge Spain made no attempt to create a common identity for absorbed peoples whereas France simply made everyone a citizen of the French Empire. I think this might indeed be the source of the resentment of the Catalans and Bretons.

Seán

[Marbella]

I guess it is up to the people to decide what they want to be via referenda. I don't have a strong sense of national identity so maybe I should keep quiet on the subject. A bit like muslims offended by cartoons I just don't get the passion.

I really love Spain and I don't like Catalans knocking the Spanish and harping on about the Franco era as appalling as it was.

[gary]

So when Catalunia becomes independent will it declare war on France to regain the occupied territories and reinstate Perpignan as the capital of the Kingdom of Mallorca?

[Seán]

So when Catalunia becomes independent will it declare war on France to regain the occupied territories and reinstate Perpignan as the capital of the Kingdom of Mallorca?

My personal hope for a Europe of the Regions is that it would bring an end to any form of expansionism and leave more localised administrations in a position to co-operate at the level of the European Parliament with their neighbours and anyone else to their mutual advantage. The situation I envisage is one which cuts across existing state, national and linguistic boundaries, so that the MEPs of peoples living in certain areas and facing common problems can act together in the EP without pressure/interference from governments with different priorities in distant capitals.

On a less Utopian level and returning to your own Mallorcan point, I have no fears of any attempt to re-establish the boundaries of the K of M, but I do wonder what will be the effect of a separate Basque state on the Basques of France??? Anyone familiar with the rigid centralism of Paris will know what faces any aspirations of a united Basque state on both sides of the Pyrenees!

Seán

[gary]

Extreme hardship is usually the catalyst for unrest - all but the extremists are too comfy to be bothered. 99.9% of the people in any autonamous region are happy (like the welsh and the scotts) to waffle on about their culture - and i agree that it is valuable and needs to be preserved - but unlikely to join any kind of armed or unarmed struggle which might inconvenience them in the slightest. Long live the armchair separatists - that from one speaking from the peoples republic of Yorkshire - which frankly has more chance of fiscal independence than wales.

[cubix]

English Wikipedia has a great article on Catalan Languages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_language

[Alan]

Speaking as a pro-independence Scot, I know what you mean gary. Yes, I do think Scotland would be better off without being a member of the United Kingdom, but would I risk my life for it? Not right now. Yes, the UK is annoying, and yes, there are a lot of unfair things about it (some of them are unfair towards England too!), but things are not as bad as to go to war over it. This is exactly the same in Catalonia. Spain is doing exactly the same to Catalonia as the UK is doing to Scotland: giving it enough power to shut it up (for a while).

I think your figure of 99.9% of people being happy is a bit high, though. You should visit here and speak to the people. Wait and see what happens when there is a different party in power in Westminster and the Scottish Parliament.

Ultimately, I think both Catalonia and Scotland will be independent, although I don't know if that will happen within our lifetimes. Probably Catalonia will be first.

[greytop]

Great thread people. Just a personal view of what is happening in and around the Valencia region - which stretches from Castellón in the North, down past Alicante in the South. I´ve lived here for 4 years now and there have been noticeable differences in the way things are done and happen.
There has always been a good deal of autonomy in the regions with the right to raise and spend taxes & run health, education etc. services. Even the local mayor and council who have a lot of power you will not find in an English parish! It is sometimes abused. Our last mayor fell foul of the environmental laws and ended up with a jail sentence, as well as leaving behind a lot of debts for us to pay off! Presently in southern Spain is another ongoing investigation around Marbella into the council activity. And many more examples in the local press.
I think Catalonia is trying for even more say in their affairs & good luck to them.
What I see locally is a move to make Valenciano more acceptable and more widely used. It used to be in official places you were greeted in Castellano but no longer, although if you speak Castellano to them they will reply also in Castellano. Most of our local council produced literature is now in either Valenciano or both. The new parking signs round town are also in Valenciano only. I believe this to be a similar type of positive discrimination that Welsh went through some years ago. This may eventually strengthen the case for more autonomy but so far Valencia seems content to stay Spanish.
Another bone of contention around this part of Spain is the apparent disinterest of the National government with problems such as water shortages, provision of high speed rail links and similar themes. Money promised fails to materialise. Agreed timetables continually slip and so on.
A problem particular to this region is lack of support for tourist needs (Spanish as well as extrañjeros) The medical services around the resorts treat many thousands of visitors a year but the money reclaimed from abroad goes into the national coffers and only a small fraction gets back to the point it is needed. The amount seems to depend on political allegiance as much as numbers treated.
Sorry if I´ve gone on a bit but thought this type of info would not be readily available to those of you not fortunate enough to live here. I´m no expert however so if you know better.....

Regards all and keep 'em coming! I´m off to sample some vino viejo @ €1.70 a litre from the Jalón valley.

[Marbella]

Oh dear, not Asturias as well...

From today's El Pais:


http://www.elpais.es/articulo/elpporopi/20060509elpepiopi_10/Tes/vieja/maltratada/lengua/asturiana

[gary]

You should visit here and speak to the people......

....as you say Scotland and Catalonia are the same I think, on balance, I'll do my survey in Barça!!! and you obviously have the same idea...

. . . y la razón que quisiera aprender el español es que espero vivir allí bastante pronto.

Anyway - didnt the SNP get a bloody nose from you lot at the last election?


<rant>

Youre right Alan it is a bit unfair on all of us... do I actually get to pay for the upkeep of the Scottish and Welsh parliaments or do you fund it all yourselves?

In the UK it costs me £45 to fill up my car with deisel you can half this in Spain and cut it by 2/3rds in Belgium. Theres £4 tax on cigarettes (I dont smoke) and at almost 40p on a pint of beer. A bottle of 5% lager like Estrella costs €1 in the small bars in Barcelona - in a northern provincial town theres not much change from £3 (€4.50) for a bottle of Bud (not even the real Czech stuff), why is that?

The price of fuel is high so that I dont contribute to global warming - the whole of Russia and China are belching out fossil fuels and I get to pay £1 a litre - do I travel any less? No because I dont travel in the car for fun, I go to work and back - 10 mins in the car over an hour on two busses, and a 50 min walk, but my knees are knackered. A single cow farts more greenhouse gas in a day than my car produces in a week.

Incidentally I am old enough to remember the early 60's when the scientists were telling us that we had to do something about climate change as we were slipping into an Ice Age!!!

The price of beer and cigs support education (though sons tuition and accomodation at uni cost me an arm and a leg - dont you get it free in Scotland?) and the health service together with 17.5% VAT (IVA) and £200 a month in National Insurance. How many times do I have to pay?

Dont get me started on medication - Gill my wife suffers migraine and after years we found a medication in spain that worked - Comprimidos Hemicraneal - we asked our GP to prescribe them and he nearly threw a fit...not on the list... So he can prescribe heroine, methodone, marijuana but not some tablets containing mainly paracetamol and caffeine that are made by Boots in Nottingham...!!!!

I presume that Spain has no hospitals or schools as their duty levels are so low compared to ours.

</rant>

Oh dear, I can feel myself slipping off topic into grumpy old man mode so I'm done for now - off for a Larios (€8 per litre at the airport as opposed to Gordons at £14 (€21) per litre at the supermarket) & tonica to calm down....

[Alan]

....as you say Scotland and Catalonia are the same I think, on balance, I'll do my survey in Barça!!! and you obviously have the same idea...
yep :) But I didn't say they were the same, just that there were many parallels that could be drawn.


Anyway - didnt the SNP get a bloody nose from you lot at the last election?

I don't believe I mentioned the SNP, but yes, they did. A backlash from not having a proper leader in place and bad organisation of the party - the Lib Dems got the best of it, but there is a lot of tactical voting going on too. Scotland has a lot of people who are pro-independence, but hate the SNP. They have their reasons. But, remember that of Scotland's 6 (as opposed to the UK's 2, or arguably 3) main political parties, 3 of them support independence (SNP, SSP, Green) and 3 don't (Lab, LibDem, Tory). The SNP is the biggest pro-independence party, but not the only one. And unlike Westminster, the Scottish Parliament actually has proportional representation. That allows the smaller parties to count, and potentially add up to a pro-independence coalition. These smaller parties are maturing, and people are voting for them.

At the moment, Labour depends on the Lib-Dems to maintain majority government. This is very hard on the Lib-Dems as they have to maintain two fronts - they are an ally of Labour in Scotland while being in opposition in the UK (which contains Scotland remember!). The perceived hypocrisy of this is weakening the coalition in Scotland and I don't think it will last much longer. The increase in Lib-Dem support has actually come from their ability to put pressure upon Labour and achieve some of the more social policies. I can't believe that people are still under the misconception that Labour are a left of centre party.

Labour are losing support - inevitably after so long in power, the Tories are gaining slowly up here (they couldn't get any worse) and the other parties are gaining ground very quickly. We have the Scottish Socialists and the Greens, neither of which I would trust in power on their own, but they are attractive as part of a coalition - a lot of young people vote for them especially in their second vote. The SNP is more organised than it has been, and I believe will increase its share of the vote substantially There are other smaller parties which can gain a seat or two each, like the Scottish Senior Citizens Alliance.

Add to that another section of Labour's support that is, with the greatest respect to them, dying off. Labour has a lot to say thank you for from the days of Kerr Hardie and trade-unionism and the united British front that had to be presented during the Second World War. There is a large proportion of the country that simply votes Labour because they always have done, and therefore always will. To "do their duty". Losing these people who don't think about it is very harmful.

You can't dismiss the idea of an independent Scotland. It might be a while away, but to laugh at it is naïve.


Youre right Alan it is a bit unfair on all of us... do I actually get to pay for the upkeep of the Scottish and Welsh parliaments or do you fund it all yourselves?
We fund it ourselves - I don't know about Wales. But I know we could argue about similar matters for weeks. Different studies show different results on the question of who exactly benefits from the UK - whether Scotland contributes its fair share or not, and I'm not going to get into that. I don't think it's a fair question, and I don't think the data exists to answer it. If you're asking about the actual cost of the Scottish Parliament building, then that was a decision that was made before the Scottish Parliament existed. But, in any case, when you have the same party or parties that believe in the Union in power on both sides of the border, you can make the sums say whatever you want them to say. I firmly believe that Jack McConnell does whatever he is told, and therefore Scotland does not have a "proper" government at the moment. I'm not questioning the fact that Scotland voted Labour in.






Anyway, let's get back to talking about Spain. That's the only reason I brought this up.

[gary]

We fund it ourselves


Thanks - it was a genuine question - I really didnt know.

My grandad used to say that whoever you vote for a Government gets elected.

I guess he's right and it probably turns out that the only thing most Politicians are interested in is being politicians. Human nature being what it is most governments will run into the kind of problems that the Blair lot have - except they threw stones at the lot before them about incompetence, slease and corruption and now its coming home to roost.

Youre right - back to topic.....

[ValenciaSon]

Maybe one day, Ben and Marina will end up saying "We are not from Spain. We are not from Madrid. We are from the Autonomous Neighborhood Lavapies". Then we'll be logging in to Notes From Lavapies":rolleyes:

[Alan]

Yeah, that's how Luxembourg started . . .

[Ben]

Maybe one day, Ben and Marina will end up saying "We are not from Spain. We are not from Madrid. We are from the Autonomous Neighborhood Lavapies". Then we'll be logging in to Notes From Lavapies":rolleyes:

Or the Autonomous region of our flat... now's there's an idea... we already have our own language, a dialect of Spanglish, some territory... time to contact central government and present our case!;D

[ValenciaSon]

Maybe the kitchen can be its own autonomous entity? It has it's own podcast category.;D

Seriously, looking into the future at an undetermined time, do you think Europe will combine as one nation, with the countries and other autonomous entities as one of its states? I know you sort of posed this question before Ben, I wonder what the pros and cons are of such an arrangement. What occurs to me is perhaps the EU could become a more efficient trading block with more uniform quality control standardization. The downside is that the current countries/autonomous entities might lose some of their cultural identitiy as the momentum for assimilation picks up.

Maybe all this has happened anyway in corporate Europe and the recognition via the government is all that remains and is really trivial by this point of time.

[Alan]

Even at the moment, it's difficult to define what Europe is. There is very little that I am allowed to do in Scotland/UK that I'm not allowed to do in Spain. Ben didn't need any permit to live in Spain (apart from his tarjeta de extranjero, but everyone needs to register to pay tax), and his UK driving license is good enough for them. Yes, each country has its own set of laws, but even these can be overridden by European directives.

But look within the member states of the EU. Even there, different regions have different laws. In some places it's hard to say who exactly is in control. Countries are split into their European constituencies which allows the MEPs of parts of countries to vote on an issue that affects them. What makes that different from the way the UK is run?

The EU is nothing like what it started out as. Even the name of it - The European Economic Community, or the "Common Market" as it was known, seems to be a loose trade agreement. Now, the EU is like a country although people don't agree on it. It may not be true in the UK, especially in England and Wales, but most Europeans FEEL European. I talk about my Scottish identity, but I feel European. I'm a nationalist in terms of the UK but a unionist in terms of Europe. I bet even the pro-independence Catalonians and Andalucians feel European.

On a business level, it is not uncommon for companies from other member states to own massive sections of the national infrastructure. This wouldn't happen without a massive amount of trust between the member states. Trade is so easy that it is not even necessary to set headquarters in a particular country. Dell computers does business with the whole of Europe from only a couple of locations.

Think about it:
The EU has a parliament
The EU has law-making power
The EU is a democracy
Europeans FEEL European
The EU has a flag
The EU has set bordersIs Europe already a country?

[Marbella]

Interesting piece in today's Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/spain/article/0,,1792096,00.html

[greytop]

Thanks Marbella - excellent link