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Rough waters ahead for Scotland if the UK votes 'no' in EU referendum

If David Cameron's EU referendum gamble fails and the UK votes 'no', what then for Scotland? Will it be smooth sailing to being an independent country in the European Union or tough battles with London and Brussels?

By Kirsty Hughes
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Current polls suggest a UK 'yes' vote as most likely but polls from as recently as 2013 and 2014 suggest the opposite – an English 'no' and a Scottish 'yes' to the EU. So it is too soon to call it for the 'yes' side. And with the EU referendum possibly less than a year away – perhaps even June 2016 – Scotland's government would need to move fast if the UK retreated from Europe, or it might find Scotland on the outside of the EU too.

A UK 'no' to Europe would be a big shock – for both the UK and EU. Yet the political pressure after a 'no' would be for the UK to exit the EU rapidly, and so the fundamental questions and details of the UK's future relations with the EU would need tackling quickly.

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Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0