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I'm out of this conversation. A whole bunch of people are clearly in denial about what would happen in the real world and looks like deliberately confusing paying with funding. I'm not repeating myself any more.

So the UK gov builds up a pension liability, part of which is to pay Scottish pensioners, on the assumption they’ll be receiving tax receipts from Scotland to help fund that liability. Those tax receipts are taken away but the liability still remains and the Scottish taxpayer contributes nothing towards paying the pensions of Scottish people. In the meantime SG are laughing all the way to the bank for decades because they’ll have a trivial amount to pay out in pensions for that long? People are kidding themselves if they think thats even a reasonable stance let alone something that had the remotest chance of happening. I really am astonished at the views on this. The only scenario I could imagine that’s more ridiculous than this would be if someone suggested Barnett consequentials should remain in place post independence.

Do you ever see a bad Ajax side? Pretty sure they usually progress quite deep in the CL. Would be extremely surprised if Rangers don’t get a bigger hiding than Celtic got last night.

I think it’s you thats missing the point. In the example above replace the EU with the UK and replace the UK with Scotland. Scotland votes to leave then Scotland funds its share of the pension liabilities the UK accrued while Scotland was part of the UK, in the same way the UK funded its share of the pension liabilities the EU accrued while the UK was part of the EU.

So to go back to the EU point someone made earlier. Are you suggesting the UK should have just walked away and not contributed towards future EU pension liability. Those people were employed by the EU, who promised to pay them a pension so the liability is all theirs.

That's the exact opposite scenario. the EU's pension liability was an amount of money. Lots of that was accrued while the UK was part of the EU so it's only right that the EU contributed a sum towards future pension liability. What people seem to be saying here is the exact opposite of that. They're basically saying that Scotland should not contribute towards future pension liability and the UK should take it all.

If SG refused to contribute a reasonable sum out of their own revenues that is exactly what I can see happening. As I’ve said we’re talking hundreds of billions of pounds. I can’t see any scenario where UK gov will agree to pay pensions to people in Scotland without SG reimbursing the money. If the scenario is that payments are still handle by the UK for a period of time then a figure will be agreed that the SG have to provide every month out of taxation to cover the share of pensions paid to people in Scotland. I can’t imagine such a scenario lasting long though before responsibility for paying direct to Scottish pensioners is passed back to SG.

You are misinterpreting or not understanding what I posted. Of course the SG will pay it from day 1 (would seem an obvious solution but who knows) but the settlement in lieu of contributions already made to the UKG will be go towards the funding of it. No one is saying the UKG will fully fund it or pay it for years. There will be a settlement figure the terms of which (one off or ongoing instalments from UKG) will be decided during the negotiations. That seems to be exactly what some people are saying. Again, contributions you, I and the rest of us have made have been used to fund the pensions of people that are currently drawing their pension. That money is gone. That's how the state pension in the UK works.

So how are pensions funded just now. Are you telling us the UK treasury is quite literally living month to month on a hand to mouth basis spending every penny it receives each month ? When it comes to pensions pretty much yes. I can't remember the name of it but there's basically a buffer account that holds roughly two months or so of payments that is drawn from and topped up on a monthly basis. This account or fund or whatever exists to ensure that there is enough money to pay out if contributions for that month aren't as much as needs to be paid out. Current NI contributions aren't put into a ring fenced fund or invested. They are used to pay the pensions of existing pensioners.

What will likely happen there is there will be a reciprocal arrangement in place between Scotland and rUK entitling you to certain benefits, so an English person that lives in Scotland will be entitled to things like free healthcare, social security etc and the reverse will apply. Therefore whichever country you're in your pension benefits will still accrue but when it's time to receive your state pension it will be funded by whichever country you happen to be living in at the time. If you then happen to move country after you start receiving your pension it will still continue to be paid by whichever country you originally claimed it from (similar to a current UK citizen retiring abroad)

The newly formed Scottish government will pay for it out of tax receipts raised, in exactly the same way UK pensions are paid for and the liability will be passed to them. There are roughly a million people of pension age in Scotland. The state pension is approximately £10k per year so that would be roughly £10bn that has to be funded every year. Do you really think the UK gov are going to fund that for the next few decades (given that over time it will decline). We're talking hundreds of billions of pounds. Do you really believe UK gov is going to subsidise an independent Scotland to the tune of hundreds of billions of pounds? What settlement in lieu of the pre-indy contributions? The pre-indy contributions have been spent on previous generations of pensioners. There is no pot of money to claim a share of. Pensions are paid for on a month to month basis by the tax receipts. If there was a pot of money I'd agree Scotland would be entitled to a share but that's not how state pensions work in the UK.

We'll we'll see if and when it happens. Personally I believe there's absolutely zero chance of rUK funding Scottish pensions and therefore subsidising an independent Scotland. Anyone who thinks there is is deluded imo.

It really doesn't. You probably need to read and understand the entire article. It isn't leaning one way or another and discussing various positions that could be taken. I've already pointed out to you where the article clearly says the footnote is not set in stone. Just in case you can't find it it's here. "Since individuals have no ownership rights over their past contributions, the UK Government can change the qualifying rules for state pensions as its sees fit."

Does your bill not have meter readings on it?

I assume you're talking about the footnote rather than the summary. If you are that simply sets out the current pension rules. The article explains that those rules can be easily changed and even describes recent changes to them. That article in no way claims that rUK will assume the liability and funding.