"Tim Roll-Pickering" wrote:

Bruce wrote:

What 'position in the world' would that be?

That of a third rate former Imperial nation? That of a third rate
former military power? That of a bankrupt former economic power?

Well to pull just one example off the top of my head, John Major always
believed that if Scotland went, so would the UK's permanent seat on the UN
Security Council (see his memoirs for more of this).

I'm not sure that you gain any credibility by quoting John Major, one
of the worst Prime Ministers the UK has ever had.

Major's stock is slowly rising.


Yes, the memory of the pain we felt does tend to dissipate after time.
I doubt that he will ever be granted the privilege of being remembered
as an average prime minister, and certainly not a good one. I don't
dislike the guy as he seemed reasonably honest and sincere, just not
competent in the job.


For one thing thanks to him we don't have
the additional burden of being in a single currency that's liable to
collapse soon.


You can thank the Tory Right for that, and subsequently Gordon Brown,
but not John Major, unless you are prepared to justify a major
re-writing of history. As Chancellor of the Exchequer under Margaret
Thatcher, John Major took the UK into the Exchange Rate Mechanism and,
as Prime Minister, ordered the massive rise in interest rates on Black
Wednesday. He was avowedly pro-ERM and pro-Euro.

I think some time spent reading about modern history would be very
helpful to you.