Cape Blue

Always noting that EU citizens can't vote in UK national government elections.

Lothianlad

I am an Edinburgh born and bred and educated Scotsman now living in England.....and my vote is now registered in the Gloucestershire Constituency of Cheltenham.

I will not be able to take part in the Independence Referendum, so that means one more "No" voted wasted....much like half the population of Corby, Northamptonshire.

formula

The clue was in the words you embolded "Labour have done a lot to import voters over the last decade".

A decade is 10 years. It's 5 years to PR for EU citizens and any non-EU dependants they bring them. It was instant voting in UK elections or voting after 2 years, for others.

It wasn't just the EU future Labour voters they encouraged. They also invented or amended the UK visas to allow citizenship to those who weren't skilled at anything much. Those visas have all been closed by the present government and other visas requirements amended. New criminality rules have been brought in too for those who commit crimes and were still expecting to be given citizenship.

Now they have voted for a welfare cap, so that those exisiting claimants and any new claimants, will now have to share out that capped welfare pot.

formula

Those Scots who don't live in Scotland will not get a vote? Others will get to decide your future citizenship? I'm going to adopt the lovely Scottish cashier at our local supermarket, if he has to return to Scotland.

dunroving

Correct. I think the SNP figured that Scottish expats are more likely to vote No because of the evil effects of the English, so better to exclude them.

However if this descendent of William Wallace gets his way, this may change.

formula

Oh my. Your soldiers, olympians and others who represent Scoltand in sports, can't vote either if they don't reside in Scotland. I guess that means Andy Murray and other Scottish sporting legends such as Kenny Logan, can't vote too.

Well that's easy to work out them, every Scot who resides outside Scotland gets to keep their UK citizenship, including our lovely Scottish cashier at our local supermarket. While those Scot's that reside in Scotland, don't. :-)

dunroving

Soldiers are entitled to a proxy or postal vote in the referendum, AFAIK. Kenny Logan is part of the petition campaign to allow Scottish expats to vote, along with James Wallace.

TheEmperorIsNaked

Well done!

Adding my good luck Rosalina.

formula

In that article you quoted it said

James added: “It is ridiculous that Scots soldiers in England can’t vote,


Perhaps only those soldiers living in Scotland can vote?

dunroving

I will have to vote either by proxy or post (I will be in the US on September 18th). When I looked online to find out how to do this, it indicated that military personnel could vote by proxy or post. One excerpt below:

"Service/Crown personnel serving in the UK or overseas in the Armed Forces or with Her Majesty’s Government who are registered to vote in Scotland."

- so I guess the only Scottish service personnel who would be unable to vote in the referendum would be those who for their own reasons have registered to vote in an English/Welsh/NI location rather than register to vote by post/proxy in Scotland.

formula

But, as I have already said, there is now an annual welfare cap which seems to have been capped at our present annual welfare bill. What financial support is available now, may not continue to be there and this cap has to be factored in if the OP is short of money in her retirement.

All claimants will have to share what is left of the annual cap after the annual state pensions are deducted and whatever out of work benefits they want to protect too. i.e. Jobseekers. Neither of which the OP will qualify for.

Cape Blue

By far the largest volume over the past decade have been EU citizens, very few of whom bother to take British citizenship as they don't need it to live and work in the UK. They therefore cannot vote.

formula

Unless it has gone up in the past few years, that wasn't what The Office of Statistics showed. I also remember the papers making a lot about it when Clegg got it wrong too as he hadn't checked the figures.

It may be that all the visas that have been stopped or amendments to other visas that have done in the last 4 years have now made the EU immigration route higher than non-EU route, but it wasn't like that for the rest of the past decade, not by a long way.

formula

It seems you are incorrect. By far, the largest volume over the past decade have been non-EU citizens - and they still are at the last count, even though many of their visa routes have been closed.

Migration Statistics Quarterly Report, February 2014

Office for National Statistics

209,000 EU citizens immigrated in the year ending September 2013, a statistically significant increase from 149,000 the previous year. 40,000 more EU citizens arrived for work than the previous year, another statistically significant increase.

Immigration of non-EU citizens saw a statistically significant decrease to 244,000 in the year ending September 2013 from 269,000 the previous year. This is due to fewer New Commonwealth citizens migrating to the UK for formal study.

There was an 8% increase in asylum applications in 2013 (23,507) compared with 2012 (21,843), although well below the 2002 level (84,132). The increase in 2013 was particularly driven by rises from Syria (+681), Eritrea (+649) and Albania (+507).

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/migrat...014/index.html

Cape Blue

We are talking of a decade and you provide one-years-worth that includes people coming on short-term study visas?