It’s an amazing country, people were saying. Only 20 years ago it was still just a region of the UK, now it’s one of the richest countries on the planet. It’s such a modern place. Reminds me of the cool countries, like Iceland, Finland and Denmark. Its technology is amazing. Who knew that Dundee would become a world leader in AI? It’s now bigger than its computer games sector and, man, that was already big.
And life sciences. And a space industry. And a satellite industry. And they supply Europe with most of its green energy. Wow! How does a little country do so much? Mind you, the money helps. And money attracts money, right? Once these guys split from the UK and joined Efta, the company head offices and the financial companies just rolled across the border from England. It was almost if they had been waiting since Brexit on the moment to move.
Its form of government changed too. It moved away from the UK system that had blighted it for so many years and began moving towards the Swiss system of government, way more democratic and accountable than it was ever possible to be in the UK. At the same time, its government systems moved online to make a digital society, taking what the Estonians had done and applying it to Scotland. Course it helped that it was already a country steeped in technology.
And digital wasn’t the only change. Infrastructure and transport improvements transformed the west and north coasts and the islands. Amazing tunnels linking the mainland to the islands and island to island like the Faroese have meant people flocked to live in these places, reversing the devasting depopulations of the Highland clearances. Old railway lines are being reopened and new lines are being built to service the growing rural populations.
Everyone’s got access to free broadband – pretty good, right? And because it’s completely self-sufficient in green energy, its electricity prices are easily the lowest in Europe.
Thing is that all these cool, modern, amazing changes are on top of all the traditional industries they already had. I mean, who doesn’t know about their whisky and food and tartan?
What I mean is that the old stuff hasn’t got in the way of it becoming one of the world’s most modern, cool countries that’s just so welcoming. It hasn’t forgotten or ditched its heritage – that really would have been crazy – but everyone just has this forward-looking viewpoint, from the oldies to the kids. It’s like they’re always looking to the future. They have this, I don’t know what you’d call it – a mantra maybe. Everyone is always asking how they can make things better for their people, their country and for the world.
It’s crazy. No wonder people want to live and work there. Who doesn’t want to live in a country that combines being the third oldest nation in the world with the coolest place on earth to live?