[Magdalen] Another Scotland?

[Roger Stokes]

On 16/11/2015 03:01, Joseph Cirou wrote:
> I haven't read much about the Union of 1707. What were the circumstances? With the end of the successful Stuart dynasty in England less than a decade later, did the Scots think James or Charles III would be successful? The '15 and '45 were years away but not unthinkable. What was the advantage of Union. If there were no Union
> would George still have been King of Scotland? I always thought the Union was imposed by England not requested by the Scots.

The Union of 1707 was the union of the Parliaments.  From 1603 England 
and Scotland had the same king but were independent countries (mich as 
Australia, New Zealand and Canada are independent countries who still 
have the UK monarch as Head of State.)  My undewrstanding is that a 
century later Scotland was effectively bankrupt and sought a political 
and fiscal union.

Since then (taking oil revenues out of thge equation) Scotland has 
received a bigger proportion of UK government grants for local 
government expenditure than it has contributed to the exchequer.

Roger