Officially, we used to be the fifth wealthiest country but now we are the sixth richest due to a combination of things, one being Brexit. There is another way to measure a country’s wealth which is far clearer.
We need to look at the Gross Domestic Product per capita. When I read these terms of economics, my eyes glaze over as I look at official terms which are decidedly unclear to me, as I am no economist. So I have decided to clarify it for you and me.
The gross domestic product of any country is an economic measure of a country. They look at all our final goods and services in a specific period of time and measure the market value of them all. In other words, how much would they be worth if they were put up for sale, and this includes 3 areas; Households, Business and Government.
For example if we still owned our nationalised industries they would have been included to add to our wealth. So thus it is a measure of a country’s standard of living.
- The GDP of England is £568.70 billion
- The GDP of Scotland is £205.00 billion
- The GDP of Wales is £ 77.50 billion
- The GDP of N. Ireland is£ 47.37 billion
I have shown the difference between our own regions and now you can see why Europe considered Wales a poor country and gave us millions to help us while we were in the European Union.
Now then let us look at the words ‘per capita’. Capita is from the Latin for head and means per person. So the economists measure our GDP with the number of our population. When that happens then things change dramatically. India has the fifth largest population but it is not the richest. Denmark has the smallest population but is much richer than the UK.
The next way of measuring to make it fairer is Purchasing Power Parity. This is where we compare individual wealth with the GDP measurements and the cost of living in each country. With that, the UK slips down from 5th to 30th richest country in the world. The island of Ireland is the 5th richest, still a member of the European Union. Most of the Western and Northern European Countries are richer than us.
We have thousands of children in poverty, homeless adults, poor healthcare (through no fault of the NHS workers who are doing their best) and now massive energy bills coming up while the energy companies make massive profits. We are in a very difficult position and schools are now having to provide breakfasts and free school meals in order to make sure that children have proper food. The schools themselves do not have sufficient funding and are finding that to provide a proper education is becoming more and more difficult. Unfortunately, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer and this new prime minister will not make it any different.
We receive 18 billion pounds from Westminster so we have to raise £58.50 billion ourselves. It is a long hard path, especially for Wales, which is why the desire for independence is growing stronger in Wales. This is not a bad thing and it is important to discuss ways in which we could achieve this.
We have to look towards our own future and make plans. I am not Welsh, but since I have the privilege of living in Wales as a guest in your country, I am learning Welsh and seeing how I could help Wales to gain the very best for herself and that could very well include independence. At the moment, about 30% of Welsh people support independence. However, I suspect that many more are getting fed up with rule from Westminster.
First and foremost we have to be able to finance independence. The Union takes away money from Wales, money that we can ill afford to lose. For example, we have no control over the crown estate, so off-shore land projects money goes straight to the Treasury with 25% for the Royal Family.
Wales pays towards HS2 although they do not benefit. Scotland gets £11 billion for the whole project and Wales gets ZERO.
Our GDP makes us the 70th richest country in the world.
For independence we need to have the following:
- Our own central bank
- Complete devolution of Justice
- Our own bill of rights
- National Welsh media
- Retain full influence on our voting.
- Better being a small nation- look at Iceland
- We don’t need to so much money on defence
- Charge the UK for electricity and water they get for free
Devolution is not working. We only have a limited power over income tax, we get some but the rest go to Westminster.
Wales has its own culture, language, and politics. Westminster is not interested so we have to fight to preserve them.
Wales has a National Library. It has museums and universities, and Wales needs to have control over its own sports teams. We need immigration that works for us; Wales is very welcoming to immigrants in need. If we do this, Westminster would take Wales more seriously, as it does Scotland.
