The Union with Scotland Act 1706 is an Act of the English Parliament and applies to England and Wales.
The Union with England Act 1707 is an Act of the Scottish Parliament and applies to Scotland.
The 4th Article of both these acts state:
'IV That all the subjects of the United Kingdom of Great Britain shall, from and after the Union, have full freedom and intercourse of trade and navigation, to and from any port or place within the said United Kingdom, and the dominions and plantations thereunto belonging, and that there be a communication of all other rights, privileges, and advantages which do or may belong to the subjects of either kingdom, except where it is otherwise expressly agreed in these articles.'
Both these Acts relate to the establishment of the Parliament of Great Britain and there are currently no known effects to either Act that have not yet been applied. UK Parliament is surely obliged to justly and fairly govern its people.
The first part of these articles, as refer to trade and navigation, they are protected enactments under schedule 4 of the 1998 Scotland Act at devolution. I have written to the parliamentary information office to clarify where this act stands now, after the new Scotland Bill, I received the following reply
The House authorities cannot provide a legal interpretation or commentary on statute law, but it is a matter of public record that paragraph 1 of Schedule 4 to the Scotland Act 1998 provides that “ An Act of the Scottish Parliament cannot modify, or confer power by subordinate legislation to modify... Articles 4 and 6 of the Union with Scotland Act 1706 and of the Union with England Act 1707 so far as they relate to freedom of trade...”.
I have subsequently written to the Parliamentary Information Office to ask if either of these acts had been modified by the UK parliament
The reply from www.legislation.gov.uk was
'Both these Acts relate to the establishment of the Parliament of Great Britain and there are currently no known effects to either Act that have not yet been applied.'
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Announcements made on the 28th and 29th June by the UK and Scottish governments on university funding seem to clash with the 1706 Act of Union.
On the 28th of June Mr David Willets announced the creation of a competitive financial market in university education, which fairly and squarely places it as a traded commodity.
On the 29th of June the Scottish government announced its intention to charge students from England a different fee for a university degree than would be charged to Scottish student. There is certainly the possibility that Scottish students will also pay less in English universities, as explained in section 4, page 12.
No matter how this difference is dressed up as loans or fee payments it will in fact result in the following: if two students, one from England and one from Scotland were both to start the same course, at a Scottish, and possibly an English, university in 2012,and subsequently both take identical jobs, on identical salaries in the same, or different, parts of the UK the student from England will be subject to a charge of 9p in the £1 for everything they earn over £21,000, the student of Scottish origin will not.
Although this is put forward as a loan repayment it is obvious from the escalating loan interest and early repayment penalties it is not designed to be repaid and is based, as a tax, on salary, therefore there is a strong argument this could be regarded as a tax.
As such it would be a tax on a commodity traded within the kingdoms of the union to which only the English subjects are subjected, and are subjected to neither by ability to pay, nor by local taxation in the locality at which they reside at the time of payment, but purely by whether or not they were deemed citizens of Scotland or England in the three years before entering university education. Therefore there will not be ' full freedom and intercourse of trade' in education for English and Scottish citizens as required under article 4 of the union.
Is the recent difference set in tuition fees for citizens of Scotland and England unconstitutional? Six Scottish MPs supported the government in the December vote.
I have made enquiries with trading standards as to whether or not I am permitted to trade goods at one price to Scottish residents and another to English residents. I am awaiting a written reply.
