Shetland Island declares independence

! This post hasn't been updated in over a year. A lot can change in a year including my opinion and the amount of naughty words I use. There's a good chance that there's something in what's written below that someone will find objectionable. That's fine, if I tried to please everybody all of the time then I'd be a Lib Dem (remember them?) and I'm certainly not one of those. The point is, I'm not the kind of person to try and alter history in case I said something in the past that someone can use against me in the future but just remember that the person I was then isn't the person I am now nor the person I'll be in a year's time.

The owner of the Shetland island of Papa Stour (renamed by it’s owner, Forvik) has declared its independence of the British government and the EU.

A lot of Shetland Islanders believe that the legal status of the Shetlands is that of Crown Dependency as they have never formally been incorporated into the UK.  The islands were given to King James III as a guarantee for a marriage dowry by King Christian of Denmark and Norway and were affirmed as a Crown Dependency on a couple of occassions.

Shetland Islanders – and the owner of Forvik, Stuart Hill, particularly – believe this is still the official status of the Shetlands and so Hill has declared independence from the British government and Federal Europe and staked a claim to the seabed and waters in a 200 mile radius around Forvik.  Most North Sea oil and gas would, in the event that Shetland became independent, be in Shetlands waters.  A large chunk of the rest would be in English waters if an English government asserted our rights to the territorial waters that the British government gave to Scotland under the Continental Shelf Act.

The calculators will be running hot at the Treasury today.

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6 comments

  1. Andi (82 comments) says:

    England? What was that again? It’s just a myth, right?

  2. deiseach (2 comments) says:

    “The calculators will be running hot at the Treasury today.”

    If by this you mean “the Treasury won’t give a monkey’s about a claim of sovereignty about as convincing as some druid who says that he is the direct descendant of Uther Pendragon and therefore the rightful King of all the Britons”, then you’d be right

  3. wonkotsane (1133 comments) says:

    No, I mean that the Treasury will be working out what it means to the UK Treasury finances if this is successful. It’s called risk management – they will present that Scottish fuckwit of a boss of theirs with the worst case scenario so that he knows what the score is.

  4. deiseach (2 comments) says:

    Do you seriously think the Treasury are worried about this? I mean, really? The best case scenario is that nothing happens. The worst case scenario is that . . . nothing happens. Use some common sense.

  5. Gary (1 comments) says:

    Actually, Constitutionally, Hill is on solid ground. This is part of a wider call for Shetland Islands independence.

    Shetland Islands Council Convenor Sandy Cluness, who in the past has been active in seeking greater local autonomy, is stated as not having dismissed Mr Hill’s actions “out of hand”, but was waiting “to see how this goes”.

    The UK Treasury should be concerned, as the Shetlands has a clearer historical claim to Crown Dependency status (independence from the UK and EU with the British Queen as head of state) than the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands, both of which are Dependencies and set their own taxation, and other policies.

  6. winst0nsmith (1 comments) says:

    Full independence might be better.
    The Crown does not mean what most think.
    It is the corperation of the city of london, where the queen follows and does not lead, the bankers enclave where they rule.
    Remember the golden rule- he who has the gold makes the rules.
    It’s fascinating when you look into it.

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