And Then What?
Look, we know that mocking front pages on The National is low-hanging fruit, and this particular example could hardly be any more of a self-parody if it tried.
But just for the sheer mental exercise in that stone-dead last week of December when nobody even knows what day it is, let’s imagine if it came true.
We probably shouldn’t even do that, because there isn’t going to be a UK general election until 2029 and it basically just gives the SNP an excuse for another half-decade of inaction. But for the sake of argument we’ll picture the scene.
Nigel Farage has just walked into 10 Downing Street, somehow. The new SNP leader Karen Adam – look, if we’re imagining crazy stuff let’s do this properly – immediately slaps a demand for a second indyref on his desk, even though the SNP only got 31% of the vote (their current Westminster polling) and 26 Scottish MPs, on the grounds that polls now show indyref support at 60%.
PM Farage says “LOL no, I’m a Unionist to my core, you had your indyref in 2014”.
Karen Adam now does… what, exactly?
Because there’s not a single thing she could do in those circumstances that the SNP couldn’t do now, or that they couldn’t have done for most of the last decade. Since Alex Salmond resigned the SNP haven’t had anything even remotely resembling a coherent and practical plan for achieving independence. In so far as they had a strategy at all, it was “Whine occasionally and just hope that makes Westminster spontaneously cave in for no coherent reason”.
Yes support has already hit almost 60%. In October 2020 it peaked at 59% and spent almost a year consistently above 50% across dozens of polls. The SNP did absolutely nothing about it.
At the time the UK had a Prime Minister so bad he was literally a threat to life. But still the SNP did nothing except string its voters along with empty promises.
Any election resulting in Nigel Farage occupying Downing Street is likely to be one of such chaos and arithmetical volatility that a sizeable minor party could theoretically wield disproportionate power. But again, that’s somewhere we’ve already been, and we know how it pans out.
Back in the spring of 2019, as the UK Parliament was deadlocked over Theresa May’s hamfisted attempts to enact Brexit, the SNP held unprecedented power. Their votes could have ensured a much softer Brexit, and they could have attempted to secure any number of concessions from May for their support, whether that was a second indyref or just Northern Ireland-style special exemptions for Scotland.
Instead, of course, they did nothing. Too terrified of losing popularity to grasp the nettle and strike while the iron was hot (if you’ll forgive the mixed metaphor), they bottled it and sat uselessly on their hands and waited until the government collapsed, creating the conditions for Boris Johnson to win a whopping Tory majority and render the SNP an irrelevance again.
And if they were too afraid of criticism to work with/exert any pressure on the Tories, then just imagine their quivering, paralysing horror of being seen to do any sort of deal with Nigel Farage.
(Ironically, they could actually learn a lesson here from the Scottish Greens, who didn’t give a monkey’s about their colossal unpopularity with 90% of the Scottish electorate as they mercilessly squeezed the SNP’s soft and dangly parts during the Bute House Agreement, basically controlling the entire government with just eight MSPs. But the SNP learn lessons like Ian Blackford refuses pies.)
Nicola Sturgeon – who loathes heterosexual men with every fibre of her being and once said she hoped she’d never have to shake a man’s hand again as long as she lived – emasculated the SNP so thoroughly that it now doesn’t even know where its cojones are, never mind what to do with them.
(Because let’s face it, her credentials as a self-proclaimed “feminist to my fingertips” certainly don’t come from any interest in protecting women’s rights.)
There is nobody left in the party with either the tactical vision or the steeliness of character required to force change in difficult circumstances. Can you really picture Stephen Flynn or Kate Forbes issuing a unilateral declaration of independence? Both appear far more interested in a nice long career as a party leader than actually doing anything about the SNP’s supposed purpose. What sort of practical indy strategy have you ever heard from either of them?
It’s also vanishingly unlikely that anyone could lead the SNP back to the sort of electoral mandates it commanded from 2011 until 2024. Even if Labour’s spectacular post-election implosion has made the SNP the most popular (or to be more accurate, least unpopular) party again, the heady era of support in the high 40s and even 50s and leads of almost 40 points is gone for a generation. On a good day it now just about struggles fractionally past 30%.
(Thanks once again to Nicola Sturgeon, and the pivotal defining moment two years ago when she went all-in on the transgender madness, forcing the ill-fated and toxically unpopular Gender Recognition Reform Act through Holyrood in a series of midnight sittings in late December of 2022 and triggering the final collapse of the SNP’s unbroken decade-plus poll lead.)
Somehow the National manages to scrape by on feeding endless chump-fodder to the tiny handful of people who still subscribe to it. Either that, or it’s being maintained as a loss-leader for the purposes of undermining the indy movement by continuing to give amplification and sustenance to some of its dullest, stupidest and most counter-productive voices – a big Wings shout-out to Kelly Given, Stephen “genocide” Paton, Gordon Macintyre-Kemp, Paul “TORIES BAD!!!!” Kavanagh, Richard Walker and of course Gerry Hassan, a man so relentlessly vapid and tedious that if there were to be a mass popular uprising for independence the UK government would probably deploy him on the streets just to bore people into going back home.
But either way, nothing it puts on its front page ever has any meaning in the real world. It’s a fantasy comic for the intellectually retarded, about as convincing as a bout of WWE wrestling but aimed at a less demanding and sophisticated audience. It’s like if you made Pete Wishart into a newspaper.
Which means we’ve just wasted 1000 words on talking about it. But then, as far as the pursuit of Scottish independence goes, it’s not like there was much better to do.
I bought every issue for the first few weeks, so glad to have an indy paper. I haven’t bought it for years now. As disappointing as The Gruniad.
It is relentlessly ‘woke’ and, often, afraid of facts. Few written press outlets now have the balls to tell the truth when it happens to contradict the orthodoxy of any given day. Sad, but true.
The National is parodying Scottish independence. It reminds me of Brass Eye on Channel 4, apparently some people thought it was a real current affairs show.
And yet, and yet Reform has about 6000 of its 150000 members in Scotland. Not such a small beginning.
6,000 Reform members in Scotland means that Reform has almost as many members as Alba.
Plus, Scots actually vote for Reform, unlike 1% Alba and other fringe Indy parties.
Most of them are likely up in the e fishing stronghold North East of Scotland, taking votes from the Toerags
So, proportionately less than half what it should have?
Early days Rev.
But have you missed the heartwarming article about 5 grassroots Yessers? Surely you must be one of those 5?
I was so bored I actually did read it. The guy with the NET ZERO placard is definitely the saviour of the indy movement 😀
Oh my goodness. Mind you, Net zero describes the SNP performance since 2014.
The SNP is doomed to oblivion, one way or another. Independence will come, but it will come in the same ways in which almost every other independence movement has won its fight – when people have had enough and will not take any more. In Scotland’s case, that could be too late to save us from nuclear wipe-out, but, never mind, the men in frocks will be able to hide in the female loos till it’s all over bar the shadows on the walls. Won’t save them, but, hey, they’ll be incinerated as lay-dees. That thought should warm their cockles.
SNP doomed to oblivion.Couldn’t agree more Lorna.
But until they go they will be a distraction, an impediment to independence. That is their function.
And so they still get a bit of a vote only, and it is only because the alternative Labour and Tory are so awful – and because underlying is a national sentiment for independence.
A sentiment for independence but with no political movement and party to pursue independence is where we are.
And that is why the establishment had to destroy Alex Salmond in a coordinated strategy to enfeeble the drive to independence.
Willie;
“because the alternative Labour and Tory are so awful..”
and we must surely hope that Scots add ‘Reform’ to that list; a far-right disaster waiting to happen. There are obviously some terminally stupid Tory bumsniffers on here continually trying to big them up, but anyone in Scotland mad enough to vote for those chancers truly is a lemming. (And don’t the ‘UK’ mainstream media just love them.)
I don;t thing that Reform UK could be described as far-right.
Right of centre yes but I’m not seeing any jackboots, strange salutes or calls for genocide.
It’s a free country and citizens can vote for who they like.
Ad hominem attacks never a good idea…
Nothing ad hominem about it.
They’re bad news unless you’re some sort of Tory apologist. And historically Scots don’t approve of anything Tory/right wing.
Wasn’t the same said if Boris Johnson was made PM?
The National is part of the Herald group. Its purpose was to sweep up the nationalist into one echo chamber away from soft no voters, to insulate the thinkers from any thoughts of iny.
Todays headline does not visit the point the Farage and his team would not think twice about puting the army on the street to stop indy.
Reading their headlines today
Putin apologises
Albe wants Musk factory
Yes surge if if if if
Five indy supporters
Patrick Harvie !!!!
Emma Roddick !!!!!
Go puck seaweed
Sno need to rewrite information laws – they dont comply anyway
I have now given up reading the National
I am torn about going back the the rump SNP to see if it can be taken back.
I know one person who has gone back. Locally we do have an honest SNP candidate with principles. BUT the Good Guys tried in 2021 to regain the party from the undemocratic dictatorship at the top. It wasn’t allowed to succeed then and I can’t see it succeeding soon enough.
However it can’t do any harm if decent people rejoined. You could argue for co-operating with other independence candidates.
‘However it can’t do any harm if decent people rejoined. You could argue for co-operating with other independence candidates’
That is effort that could have been better focussed on Alba or any other independence party not in the pocket of the Brutish State. Lets face it the SNP is now beyond redemption.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New one Stuart!
Multilevel Regression with Post-stratification (MRP) poll released today by More in Common predicts a hung parliament if an election was held today. Sample population 11,024, field work 31st October to 16th December.
UK wide percentages: Labour 24.9%, Con 26.4%, RefUK 20.7%, LibDem 13.9%, Green 7.8%, SNP 2.3%, others 3.8%.
Distribution of seats as follows: Labour 228, Con 222, RefUK 72, LibDem 58, Green 2, SNP 37, Plaid Cymru 4, independents 8.
Seats per 1% of vote: Labour 9.16, Con 8.41, LibDem 4.17, RefUK 3.48.
RefUK and the LibDems would be King makers, and they’re both committed to proportional representation.
The SNP are nowhere. 37 seats in the current circumstances is pish poor. They have zero mojo. Their polling in Scotland lags 20 percent behind support for independence. They ain’t winning, they’re just benefiting from fragmentation.
None of this shall come to pass. The unusually long period of field work invalidates the prediction (during this time there was a 5% swing from Labour to Con & RefUK).
The Permanent State has no interest in Proportional Representation and the volatility it brings. Either Labour or the Tories will run a minority administration with the other mysteriously abstaining on votes of no confidence and Budgets.
The numbers you give show how the SNP could achieve Indy.
It’s simple. A Tory/Reform coalition would have 294 seats. The SNP’s 37 seats (plus the Ulster Unionists) would put them in power.
The SNP would demand another referendum vote as the price for their support. The Tories would be so hungry for power they’d agree to it–as they did 10 years ago.
Yes, the SNP would have to vote for Conservative measures for 4 years. But if Indy is the object, for true Indy supporters they should be willing to do that.
The SNP could try the same with Labour. But since Labour has so many Scottish MPs, they have more to lose than the Conservatives and thus would be less likely to agree to this.
I don’t buy that. The SNP is the LGBT party of Scotland which also has an academic interest in independence. It would be impossible to persuade SNP MP’s/members that voting with a Badenoch-led Tory party is acceptable in exchange for a second referendum. It would be like asking them to shoot their first born. The party would split. Likewise, for the Tories, the risk of losing a referendum would be too high a price to pay. They’d rather be in opposition than risk breaking up the union.
Aiden, I agree that the SNP is for LGBT more than Indy. Which proves that the SNP really isn’t for Indy.
But I think you overate the Tory Party’s devotion to principle. My proposal appeals to the Tory MP’s self-interest–power–the same self-interest that guides almost all politicians, of every party, and which trumps other considerations.
As to principle, the Tory Party agreed to a referendum 10 years ago, so their “principles” appears to be flexible.
The other proposed paths to Indy work AGAINST the mainstream party’s self-interest. My proposal appeals to that self-interest.
The bigger problem would be Indy winning the referendum. I have thoughts on that, too.
The Tory party has an ability to morph itself into whatever creature is best placed to win an upcoming election, but I think this would be a step too far. Cameron agreed to a referendum in 2012 believing (wrongly, but sincerely), that it was extremely unlikely that Scotland would vote yes. I don’t think they could be that hubristic this time around. I think the vast majority view would be that elections can be won in the future, but the consequence of a referendum could be that the union is lost forever. I don’t believe that’s a red line they could cross, especially not for an arrangement with party which would be unhappy and unstable, to put it mildly.
The last big referendum doesn’t seem to have left us a result that will last “forever” so perhaps you are reading too much into the immutability of the decision.
TBQH, the downsides of Brexit should surely be acknowledged as an anchor on Indy enthusiasm. After all, it’s much harder to vote to sunder a second union when the disadvantages of sundering the first union are in everybody’s face.
But then, if we were to see rejoining the EU as a credible idea, pro-Indy supporters could float the same idea to wavering Scots: if it doesn’t work out, we could go back into the UK too.
Sure, it would all be eyewateringly expensive, disruptive, and cause an economic downturn that would blight the prospects of an entire generation, but when has that ever held back our politicians, eh? 🙂
I don’t think it’s put the decision to bed as an issue for the people of Scotland. It is strongly supported by a sizeable minority and overall appears to enjoy support hovering around the mid 40% in the polls. Although, I’m somewhat skeptical about the reliability of the polls, and I think the variation is more reflective of the methodology used than changes over time, I don’t buy that support for independence could swing by ten points in a random week when nobody is really campaigning for or against it.
Brexit could have provided a good excuse for a legitimate call for a 2nd referendum if one of two things had happened. Either that it was 15+ years after the first Indyref and therefore the passage of time plus major changes in the policy/governing arrangements meant it was democratically legitimate to open the question up a bit. The second is if as a result of Brexit a clear and sustained majority of people could be shown to be in favour of independence as a result. Because neither of those things happened, it’s been easy for the U.K. government to say no.
I do agree that Brexit has made independence a more difficult cause to argue, I think it’s a big cause of the SNP’s let’s say ‘reduced’ enthusiasm for it.
Bluntly, I think the only way for Scotland to achieve independence is for a majority of people over a sustained period of time to demonstrate they are in favour of it (through election results, polls, community action etc.). If the U.K. government saw that this majority was settled, and the strength of belief was such that it was going to become increasingly difficult for the U.K. to manage, I think the U.K. government could be brought to the table to negotiate a managed and amicable exit following a referendum. Any other route (and I think this includes Stu’s unfortunately) risks it going into the “nice ideal, but too difficult/expensive/risky/disruptive” camp. I also think morally and democratically it is the right route. Scotland should only become an independent country if a majority of people have thought about it carefully over a decent period of time and decided that it should.
Away and take a flying fuck to yourself “Aidan”.
If 7 years between referendums is good enough for Northern Ireland then it’s good enough for Scotland.
Never trust a Tory, of any hue……
Scotland is f*cked for the foreseeable future – Sturgeon the Judas and her party really done a number on the country – and as you rightly say – there’s no one (politician) who has what it takes to rid us of this ball and chain union.
The inception of the National was only ever about cashing in on the Indy £. Surprised it’s still.a thing to be honest.
Is it though? Who actually buys the thing either in print or through a subscription? Precious few I reckon. It’s a comic.
It’s a lot more insidious than that
Probably not for much longer. Subscriptions below 3,000 and tanking.
So the SNP “strategy” for Indy shall henceforth be do nothing in the vain hope that somebody else comes along, at some point the the dim and distant future, who is so utterly detestable that the electorate are scared into voting for Indy.
Brilliant!
Even then they would find a way to f*** up indy. Its what they do!
“the hope that somebody else comes along, who is so utterly detestable that the electorate are scared into voting for Indy”
We already had some of those in the form of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, for example. Yet, the useless Sturgeon managed to fk up those opportunities as well.
I have to be honest. I find it incredibly frustrating that, after 10 years of continuous betrayal, carrot dangling and wasting opportunities by the dozen and by design, some people still harbours hope for the revival of the SNP as a pro-independence party. And even worse, some people think that adding them to the “united front for indy” is going to do anything other than the SNP mandarins trying to gain absolute control over the project so they can fk it up too.
How much more does it take for people to realise the SNP ceased to be a party of independence when the political fraud Sturgeon took over, and that ever since it has been actively working to protect the union (and their own salaries)?
This is what has put me off Alba and Peter Bell’s party: their insistence in holding hands with a moribund SNP that has reneged of his raison d’etre. It is as unrealistic as claiming that we will only make progress if we convince the tories, reform or labour to join the “united” front for indy.We know that is never going to happen, so for as long as those parties keep asking for the intrusion of this devolutionist and pro-union SNP, they will not have my vote. I refuse to vote for the SNP and I do not care if there are no pro-independence parties in my constituency to vote for. I rather spoil my ballot one hundred times than continue to endorse a party that has consistently betrayed us for 10 years and continues to do so.
We do not need the SNP. What we need is the people who continue to waste their vote by casting it for the SNP. For as long as that vote remains trapped within this devolutionist and pro-union SNP, all that vote will serve absolutely no purpose whatsoever because the SNP “leadership” will continue to hinder any movement towards independence, and because they will continue to keep that vote on a leash so the independence movement goes nowhere.
Our focus should be in fully exposing the SNP and on attracting those voters to a real pro-independence party and to Salvo/Liberation.
Sturgeon killed the SNP. It is time to bury it for good because its dead carcass has been stinking the place for quite some time now.
I agree 100% with all Mia says in her post, I too joined Alba after 53yrs os supporting voting for SNP also a member for 12yrs, it only took one conference for me to see that although I have always had and always will have great admiration for Alex Salmond, his insistence that another referendum would be run on the same Franchise was enough for me to cancel my membership of ALBA. I still think he was the best politician Scotland has ever had.. But he too got things wrong..
I had been following & reposting a LOT of Peter A Bells New Scotland Party, simply because it claims not be be a Political Party.. And he did talk a lot of sense, But I stopped posting or retweeting his posts as I can’t understand his take on insisting we NEED the SNP to get us Indy..
The last thing this country needs is keeping the SNP in government..
Swinney himself is a self declared Devolutionist, as leader he was scheming to get Margo McDonald so low on the list vote that she had to lose her seat, why?
Because she and Grace elder were too INDY minded for HIS party.. Margo was warned of his plans and she left the SNP & stood as an Independent.. THAT for me, is what ANY true Independent minded person should be doing, standing on their own ticket, & if Scots had half a brain we would vote for the Independents and Not for a party..
Then put them altogether as one hopefully large group, take over HR & get us the hell out of this Colony we R forced to live in, aided and abetted by SNP..
UKIP did it overnight, Reform is doing it now.. So all it takes is for Scots to waken up, and get a glimpse of the future because it sure as hell has to be better than what we have now or had in the past..
I had talked about how Trumps presidency is going to be the end of woke but while he is going to get rid of woke in academia, woke is still raging throughout our society and will take possibly a generation to get it under control.
The problem with woke is that it is based solely on postmoderism where everything has gone before needs to be destroyed and new one institutions put in place.
The problem is that woke is great at destroying old institutions but they have no ideas about what to put in place instead.
Radicals look to past figures for inspiration and ideas in the past that worked well and could be updated to work in the present.
Those obsessed with postmodernist woke can’t do this because everything in the past is either racist, homophobic, misogynist etc and they would have to do tremendous amounts of mental gymnastics to justify it and even at that, they are being hypocritical in their beliefs.
Because of this they don’t now how to create, only destroy with for example the constant hate we hear like labelling everyone who disagrees with them as extremists.
Herein lies the problem. This causes a vacuum and it makes the likes of Reform gaining the widespread support they are getting now. Reform doesn’t have the answers to their problems but at least they are trying to provide one, unlike all the other parties who are sticking their heads in the sand and pretending nothing is wrong.
There is plenty of things that the left can to provide an alternative but there is no genuine left wing party at the moment to provide this.
The question is what do people who don’t agree with what the likes of Reform stands for? Do they oppose them which is just playing into the hands of the establishment or simply don’t vote?
It’s a hard one. What is it they say, being between a rock and a hard place?
Trump won’t get rid of woke. Just as he won’t clear the swamp & neither will Farage. He’s already backtracking at pace regarding his anti warmongering stance by now championing invasion, imperialism & trade wars FFS lol
For any change to take place they’d need a 1st class ticket to Epstein Island & a word in the shell like of the WEF control freaks who frequent that establishment (if they’re not already).
It’s been a common theme throughout Europe too. Talk the biggest load of shit to win & then immediately do the exact opposite when they win regardless of public opinion. Even to the point of crashing their own economies & marching over a cliff.
Farage has zero hope of stopping immigration too. The Globalists don’t want nationalism, it gives ppl ideas & threatens their wealth, & the quickest way to get rid of it is to drown it out with immigrants who don’t give a shit either way…
On this point, I’ll give the Right the respect that you know that once elected, they are going to enrich themselves and their backers.
At least they are honest and upfront about it and when voting for them you are doing so in full knowledge of this and taking the chance that they will go ahead with some of the specific issues like electoral reform.
Contrast with the mainstream left who promise the world and once get elected says sorry when they can’t deliver on their electoral promises then implements their cappuccino communist agenda that nobody wants and was vaguely described towards the end of their manifesto.
“…Reform doesn’t have the answers to their problems but at least they are trying to provide one…”
You’ve nailed it on the head.
And the answer is? Private health care?
Make no mistake , that is all these ****s are interested in. Apart from making the poor poorer, obvs.
I wasn’t meaning this is as anything positive towards Reform.
I have tried to be positive about Trump’s victory and how at least, it could turn the tide in the war against Woke.
However I’ve come to the sad realisation that as Geri said, Trump has got the votes and is elected President. He’s already rowed back on some of his promises and most likely than not won’t be going to war with Woke in his own country.
Reform is trying to do the same. They are saying they want to turn the clock back to the way it was in the 50’s. That can’t be done and even Trump knows this as seen with his backtracking.
Once the likes of Farage gets a bit of responsibility of power, like Johnson, he will know of the difference between carping from the sidelines and actually having to implement his policies.
None of my business whether anybody votes for Reform or not because they won’t bring about any changes.
Sturgeon boxed herself into this situation by demanding a second referendum only three years after the first one. It was an easy request for the U.K. government to refuse at the time with few negative political consequences, and it’s now become accepted as the state of affairs on both sides of the border. Every so often someone comes up with “aha I’ve come up with X clever argument/slogan as to why a S.30 order should be granted”, but nobody pays any attention.
I also don’t buy the argument that going for a plebiscite election followed by a UDI is in any way sensible. There simply aren’t enough people who are committed enough to independence to risk the potentially very serious and prolonged disruption a UDI could cause. Going down that route and then coming away with 30% would kill off the independence movement.
“I also don’t buy the argument that going for a plebiscite election followed by a UDI is in any way sensible. There simply aren’t enough people who are committed enough to independence to risk the potentially very serious and prolonged disruption a UDI could cause.”
But that’s not how it works. Every election is a normal election, but with a line in the manifesto that says “BTW, if 50%+1 vote for independence, we’re declaring it”.
?If you get over 50%, by definition you have support for it. If you don’t, you say “Well, it didn’t happen this time, now we’ll shut up about it until the next election”.
“BTW, if 50%+1 vote for independence, we’re declaring it”.
Then what ?
I understand the concept but I don’t think it’s practical. For one, the British state won’t recognise it as such so it’ll be a UDI, and by the state that also means the judiciary etc. not just the government in London.
Secondly, independence is such a consequential issue that it would always dwarf all others in every election campaign, so there wouldn’t really be a ‘normal’ election if this route were to be accepted widely in Scotland. Every election would be dominated by independence, and I think the international community would expect to see that the issue had been thoroughly and individually considered by the electorate, not wrapped up in a whole lot of other public policy issues in an election.
Finally, to my point above, I don’t think there is anything close to 50% support for a unilateral declaration. I think if that is what is offered support will be limited to the 30% or so of people who strongly believe in it and are prepared to take significant risks to achieve it. The currency issue, which caused so much damage last time, will pale in comparison compared to UDI issues like recognition of passports etc.
In other words, when you say to the most rabid “magic routes to Indy” supporter, “Put up or shut up”, they shut up pronto.
They then will spend the next ten years castigating others for not having the courage of their convictions, but that’s another story.
“…the British state won’t recognise it…”
So what? Did they ever recognise any of the previous declarations, anywhere?
I know that it’s your job to talk down any notion of Scottish independence, as per your remit, but
It’s the rest of the world that will recognise it. That’s all we need.
My “job” ??
In many cases the U.K. left its former colonies by agreement, particularly in the post-war period. In other cases (I.e. Ireland) it left after a war. Do you think we should start a war?
Re other countries recognising it, the UK’s democratic allies will definitely not recognise it. That’s the EU/USA/Japan etc. When the U.K. Government gets a judgement from the Supreme Court that the UDI is unlawful and as a result the Scottish civil service refuse to engage with it, and the Scottish Governments bank accounts are frozen, having a kindly worded statement from Iran and Russia welcoming Scotland into the international community won’t save it.
If you honestly think the likes of Spain/Italy/Portugal etc. are going to give an enormous boost to their own domestic independence movements (likely empowering them to copy) by immediately accepting a UDI in Scotland then you’re deluded. It’s not going to happen.
Who pays benefits in week 1 of UDI? Would DWP hand over the data to an “illegal” Scottish agency who wouldn’t have the capacity to process it anyway. Where would businesses pay VAT, PAYE and Corporation tax to?
UDI ? Scotland has not been in the TOU since the governing westminster parliament of England, Wales, France and Ireland dissolved the parliament of Scotland in 1707,
And that particular Scotland / England TOU ended in 1800/1801 respectively
The Westminster parliament still governs England and Wales separately whilst falsely claiming to be the governing Westminster body of Scotland.
-so the next election if you get 50.1% against independence then you have to revert?
2/3rds is the bare minimum and we shouldn’t be afraid of that. By the time we have a bunch of competent MPs and MSPs ready to form a government, we’ll get 2/3rds easy.
I have to say though, there is barely an independent-minded politician currently in either place that I would trust to run a whelk stall.
Why don’t we sort that out first.
Surely the safe-pair-of-hands guy could be ousted in a week if there was any competence left in the SNP. That would be a start, however Scottish politics is all about hate and envy. Until you get rid of the back-stabbers, you have no prospect of joined-up government.
Why would anyone vote for independence just now? Who are you giving the power to?
2/3rds – this old bollocks again?
Ok let’s vote on staying IN the ‘union’, 2/3rds required to stay. OK, petal?
I’ve given up now. Well past the 3 score and 10. I will never see Indy.
the Union flag is forced upon us by one group
the Palestine flag is forced upon us by another
the TransCult flag is forced upon us by yet another
the loony Green flag zealots demand I live and die within 30 miles of where I was born ( probably killed in a bike accident or freeze to death)
I have not changed since 2014 when I just wanted the People of Scotland to have the power to decide the future of Scotland.
Scotland is now like a Monty Python Sketch of causes you must support first before you can be deemed suitable to hold a Saltire.
The bottom line is all these sanctimonious bastards that demand “Their” vision of Scotland have done is divide and weaken us.
Westminster tested us with “Now is not the time” and they now know we will do nothing because we are too busy fighting each other.
Very well said.
So many leeching groups have grafted themselves onto the notable historical independence supporting vote only to then weasel their way into lobbying power campaigning for Scotland as a smaller entity than RUK to be an easier proposition to mould and create in their unpalatable and generally repugnant pet images and ideals.
Ex Labour types destroying the only real worthwhile cause.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again the National is a Unionist rag. If the paper did support Independence, it’s for far down the list of things to do and yet the morons keep going out and buying it why? It’s simple they’re mentioning the word Independence and knocking every single person trying to achieve it and yet the people who buy it can’t see that the paper isn’t really bothered if Independence happens and would prefer if it didn’t, but the paper doesn’t have the unionist balls to admit it. I’ll give you an example of where the paper loyalty lies, it’s the something like this What do you want Independence when do you want it now, we all go home and nothing is else is done about achieving it. For me Independence should have happened years ago but that’s me, for the people who make a living out of Scottish Independence like MPs, MSPs certain bloggers and of course the journalist who write for the rag they wouldn’t dare say I’d rather Independence happened when I retire in 20, 30 years’ time so what else can they do other than keep idiots clinging to the Idea just over the rainbow England will somehow grand a section 30 order and say I wish the people of Scotland all the best and don’t worry about the 2.8trillion debt England couldn’t afford to pay back if we let Scotland go. The people who keep conning and scamming us on every election night on the idea after we’ve voted for these maggots again, they’ll restore our nationhood are nothing more than Traitors and REDCOATS and not to mention fools.
If I was to put a nail in my head every time, I heard the RAG saying vote for the SNP 1@2 for Independence I’d look like the monster in Hellraiser but I don’t, because I’m not fooled by the same conn ever election night or by the RAGS bull in order to sell another year’s subscription to the RAG, I mean if the paper wants you to buy another year’s subscription should tell you alone it’s not bothered about Independence anytime soon.
I’m going to tell you how Fucking stupid people are. I don’t know if anyone has been watching the news in Georgia they’ve been protesting in the streets and forming a chain that’s how you win Independence by being noticed by the foreign media and bring pressure to bear down on the UKG what does the SNP run councils do, puts the AUOB marches on the outskirts of the town where no one notices and here’s another one The Chain of Freedom it was formed along a canal for fuck sake a canal why not round the Scottish parliament no one ever goes or knows where a canal is apart from a passing tourist from England on a barge.
I’ve stopped listening to the bullshit it’s upsetting the wife me talking about it all the time. For fuck’s sake why don’t we mass protest outside Butes house and see if Swinney answers the door and watch what’s written in the RAG the next day, it’ll be something like Cybernats on the streets with menacing behavior towards the FM family outside his country residence north of England.
I truly have had enough of the false starts and the bull.
“Vile Cybernats”, mind…
The latest National editor Laura Webster killed it as a serious publication. Student politics written by student journalists with a QWERTY focus and ADHD off the spectrum columnist nutters writing “right-on Yoof culture deviant crap” thinking this is a serious way forward.
How utterly utterly naïve and a determined turn off to older independence supporters whose efforts are downplayed by woke priorities from cool Yoof who either have never yet voted or minced around Labour and new age deviant adoring QWERTY doctrine.
They only seek an independent Scotland if it’s created in their intolerant woke deviant image and need dumped- fast!
In preparation for 2026 the SNP will/are raising the spectre of Reform as a reason to vote SNP 1+2
After the last 9 or 10 years of an SNP government mismanagement and providing black comedy entertainment for most of us they have created the condition where a promise of a referendum is only accepted by the rump of sheeple that live in the fantasy land of SNP party membership.
At the moment Farage and English nationalists are indeed our best hope for independence. Has Farage said he’d close down Holyrood if given the chance? If not I hope he does.
Sadly, they’ll also close down the NHS.
Scottish politicians will never get us independence from a colonial administration run on the English Bill of Rights. Independence must come from us without political interference. Once we are near our goal opportunist politicians will jump on our bandwagon.
For me we can only do this with Salvo/Liberation.
Your commodity are accurate as always and quite entertaining in places. Thank you.
Can anyone prove that Salvo/Liberation has more that 100 members?
Ever heard of the Declaration of Arbroath?
Not only heard of it, but read it–many times.
But that 1320 document has nothing to do with 2024 Salvo/Liberation membership.
So I repeat–will anyone try to prove that Salvo/Liberation has more than 100 members? Or is it just another tiny online fringe thing?
Gloriana
By “tiny online fringe thing” I take it you are making direct comparison with the Conservative party membership in Scotland?
Just asking..
Not even a very good try at deflection.
The challenge is still there: can anyone prove that Salvo/Liberation is anything other than a tiny fringe group.
Can you prove that it is tiny?
Do you even know what it is? LOL! My guess is no.
It seems to annoy you so that’s a win for them…
Everything but an actual answer…..
Demands that fanatics provide facts, usually results in everything but an answer.
What’s it to you how many members they have?
Are you planning on joining?
Whatever number they said you’d not believe them anyway so why get yer knickers in a twist?
Stop twitching yer curtains & go find something worthwhile to do or go ask Farage for all the names & addresses of his membership for you to cross reference off yer wee nosy parker anorak list…
Salvo/Liberation isn’t a political party.
The British state security services have already been trying to destabilise their emails and set up a fake website – so Salvo must be doing something right, eh Tory Clansman?
What are you so afraid of? Go on, tell us.
They’re apparently going to registered at the UN in January, there’s a delegation heading over on a flying carpet in the new year.
On a side note, making clearly false claims to elicit donations to an organisation is fraud by false representation, contrary to S2 of the Fraud Act 2006.
Gloriana
On the contrary, it’s a valid question.
As for deflection; I would suggest that rampant deflection- spiced with a dollop of agitation and smothered in “facts based on speculation” -are the sole purpose of your Westminster Uber Alles posts here.
The best commentators are those prepared to criticise and hold to account the party they actually voted for.
You on the other hand are the antithesis of this and rate about the same level of critical analysis as toilet cubicle door scribblings.
Why don’t you contact Salvo/ SLM and ask for an update on their signatories, it is a policy aimed on securing a certain number, somehow I can’t see them wielding the redaction pen like your lot.
As you know, I’ve challenged Liberation board member Al Baird a dozen times to release the figures, and like you and the SNP, he refuses to answer.
Do you like it when the SNP or Salvo/Liberation hides facts from the public? And if they won’t tell the truth about this, it’s reasonable to assume they’re not telling the truth about other things as well.
Why should he waste his time interacting with the likes of you?
Gloriana
No I don’t know.
Do your own homework you lazy so and so as opposed to spouting verbatim Fleet Street propaganda from the sidelines.
Write to them formally as opposed to sniping from your keyboard.
If they don’t answer then by all means you can get on yer soap box.
Otherwise you are just at it; agitating and spinning speculations masquerading as facts to create a “truth” of your and Fleet streets construction..
While you are at it, why not pursue your own party of choice over transparency, moral credibility and the mythical “positive case for the Union”?
And don’t hide behind “deflection” claims- the third rate excuse of the inexcusable trying to shut down analysis of their party and its doctrines failures.
Can you prove it’s called ‘Fifeshire’?
You should read it. It’s a racist, sectarian, gen0cidal rant.
(A bit like the Old Testament, but that’s for another day. By a curious coincidence, the DoA is also pro-Zonalist too, so if you enjoy reading the spittle flecked dumps of the antisemites on here, it’s amusing to consider their support for the DoA)
Bottom line – the Ancient Guff always needs to be approached with caution.
Salvo are a small bunch of moon howlers.
Says a Yoonhowler.
How so?
You’ve typed yer headline, but where’s the meat and veg to substantiate yer “claim”?
Serious question expecting a serious response..
I used to buy The National. Every day for years. I stopped as it was the same rubbish every day, but mostly because it was a cheerleader for the SNP. The columnists were so boring too. In fact I don’t think I managed to get through the first couple of paragraphs of a Pat Kane article on a Saturday.
WOW this blog is now becoming Wings over Scotlandshire , not only are the engerlish white flighters coming over the border in droves and buying up houses making homes unaffordable for our kids, they are now flooding wings with magnanimous helpful suggestions of how it would be so beneficial for independence support to vote for the various unionist greed driven tory parties , it is as if we are not already suffering the benificence of these assorted versions of corruption and vileness visited on us by our engerlish brethren, they actually want us to vote for these monsters ourselves
It must be some form of mental imbalance or sadism in these people that they can possibly think that the arsewipes they want us to vote for are actually any better than the arsewipes currently in power
It takes some mental gymnastics for them not to realise that they are as fucked as we are
“Which means we’ve just wasted 1000 words on talking about it. But then, as far as the pursuit of Scottish independence goes, it’s not like there was much better to do.”
Hmm, why were you supportive of Scotland returning to being a self-governing country in the first place?
If it was for the fundamental principle and was worth striving for then, then it’s still worth striving for now.
If your support was only for a particular type of Indy then just what were the basic headline principles you wanted for Scotland, because I’m fairly certain there is even more reason to be striving for that type of self-governing country now more than ever after the corruption we’ve seen rolled out over the past decade.
If you’re effectively done and have nothing left in the tank (which would be totally understandable after the shift you’ve put in), then why not just state that’s the case, and at least be neutral or supportive of other folk that are still trying to promote the cause, rather than endlessly stating there’s nothing going on.
You surely must comprehend that as a prominent and influential figure and site, continually stating that all is woe is not helpful as it saps motivation when folk read that, and is basically an utter kick in the teeth for the folk up here that continue to put in considerable effort to campaigning for the cause by putting their unpaid time into the likes of trying to sustain the funding and staffing of YES hubs, or who even make the significant choice to stand for election.
We will all have slightly differing views but the same overall goal, but jeezo, can we maybe try and create a bit of unity and support for one another instead of continuing with the ridiculously unhelpful divisive and negative antics.
It really doesn’t say much for Scotland’s supposedly finest political minds that they can’t come up with anything to counter the rise of Reform.
Be gentle, Dan. Stu has troubles – Dundee United just scored in the 94th minute and won.
BANNED
Oh you don’t mean it, Rev, do you? Living in W Ross I have to support the Staggies. That is worse. 🙂
On that note, Hearts appear to have morphed into Hibs…!
Oh ffs Dan, pay attention.
Lots of votes to be gained on the subject of beavers, Dan. Your efforts so far have been admirable, but maybe just a smidge off target.
Is it because you’ve successfully resisted linguistic and cultural colonisation? If so, we have here an example of why it’s necessary to know your enemy. Only then, can you communicate with them using the idioms and colloquialisms they can understand.
Sadly there are quite a few thick folk who still think sturgeon is wonderful
There’s even more that think Farages Tory party is the 2nd coming…
God help us…
Sturgeon the Judas. That evil Jezebel should be in prison. I’d rather Nigel Farage as Prime Minister. Than a roaming free Nicola Sturgeon in 2029.
Lock up Nicola. In Alex Salmond’s name. From a former SNP voter. And drain the loch!
Would I cry if Holyrood was shut down for good Naw I’d vote for it. The SNP turned the parliament into a joke along with every office it holds and the NEW Redtories have turned it into a branch office with Swinney as acting head of the county and loving it reporting to Ian Murray.
The place looks and feels like a prison, so shut it down and lets go back to the previous model of if we send more Scottish Nationalist MPs Westminster Scotland becomes Independence and Naw I don’t mean the SNP they’ve caused all the mess in the parliament under Sturgeon.
I used to live for Independence thanks to SNP and its useless membership of Union Jack waving chicken nugget morons I no longer believe that will happen in my lifetime. My only focus is 1 the SNP collapses as a political party for good and 2 GB News goes bust and the banks lose a packet.
How could we have went from 2014 to this, no clown could have done what Sturgeon’s done. I keep predicting that after 2026 Sturgeon will become FM again for god sake God take me before that happens it’ll be far to much for me to handle.
It is dismal, indeed, BUT there is a Holyrood election in 17 months. Many stout fighters are combining to organise a united independence grouping of candidates. If there is some success i.e. several real battlers with fire in their bellies get elected, they may even be like the Greens in being needed in government.
I too am getting up in years and am desperate for Scotland to escape the Union so I can’t give up.
Sarah, perhaps you can help us all on the “united for Independence” thing you advocate.
I’m trying to list all the Indy parties and movements mentioned in Wings Comments. The preliminary list of 22 is below. Did I leave anyone out?
SNP; Alba; ISP; Salvo; Liberation; Peter Bell Party; Mike Fenwick Petition; Alf Baird petition to the UN; Declaration of Edinburg; Stirling Directive; Scottish Citizens Convention; Business for Scotland; Believe in Scotland; Yours for Scotland; Barrhead Boy “summit;” Voices for Scotland; Scottish Independence Convention; Forward as One; Common Weal; STUC; Scottish Socialist Party; All Under One Banner.
But what do you think will happen if “Scotland escapes the Union” , sarah ?
I’m interested in your predictions for the state of the economy, standard of living,etc, but also the improvements in everyday life for ordinary Scots……..
Basically, what is the point of Independence ?
Our own fiscal decisions on what we spend our OWN money on, control over our own resources & a say on international matters.
What type of loon thinks another country should do it for us? Independence is normal. It’s abnormal to give a hostile nation full control over your own money & resources.
What is the point of dependence? Let’s face it, they despise Scots. They hardly make a secret of it in media & in parliament.
Hmm !
I was hoping for a sensible reply !
What’s wrong with the one I gave you?
Why do you never stop posting about the superiority of poot and the RF and BRICS, etc, yet when asked a direct question about iScotland, fail to list any of your heart’s true desires?
FFS, Geri, haven’t you sussed it yet? The people reading here BTL aren’t the neep-heids you seem to believe we are.
I gave a perfectly valid response. It’s not my fault nawbags didn’t like it.
& As for BRICS their record speaks for itself.
Independence to trade with whom they wish.Independent foreign policy.Cooperation & investment.Respect for international law & a people’s right to self determination.Forward planning & initiatives to secure a nations future security & self sufficiency.Unlike the Wests perpetual state of paranoia & control freakery of invasion, overthrowing governments, terrorism & blowing shit up & leaving nothing but chaos & rubble in its wake..
Colonialism is over, sunshine. The global majority have had enough shit & illegal sanctions. They outperform & outsmart the dud G7 across all measures. Economy, purchasing power, technology, medical advances, self sufficiency & lifting the average Joe out of poverty & dependency.
Again, unlike the perpetual state of the Wests living in a shite hole with zero prospects, zero standard of living, zero pay & their endless need for wars to protect only the wealthy few..
The future looks bright for an independent Scotland – not only being recognised under the true definition of the UN charter & international law (& not the made up pish of colonisers) but for cooperation & oodles of investment too on becoming self sufficient & secure.
Africa is getting it’s shit together & booting out the colonisers that deliberately make them backwards & poorer while they robbed them blind & had the audacity to class them 3rd world & Scotland will be right along with them in stopping the theft & plunder of Scotland by fuckwits that don’t even live here…
Suck it up, sunshine. Tick tock..BRICS is the future & more joining every day..
“Africa is getting it’s shit together
BRICS is the future & more joining every day”
I’d ask the three that drowned in The Channel yesterday about that, but they’re deid.
Good clock noises BTW. Are you available for stags and hens? That would be kind of apt, don’t you think?
The basic point of independence is to end the unlawful, unconstitutional, undemocratic and predatory governance of Scotland by England’s MPs. Their theft of Scotland’s sovereignty, and the many grievous harms done to Scotland and her people as a result, are crimes that will earn the Union its well-deserved and long overdue death penalty!
As for how an independent Scotland will look once its had time to heal, that can only be speculation, albeit fairly well-informed, but given its well-known and diverse natural wealth, there is no particular reason to suppose that Scotland will find itself in a worse state than it is in now, and there is every reason to think it will be in a far better state than most.
At least it won’t have its huge neighbour fervently impoverishing it every minute of every day.
Asking for specific details of a future that may be years away is stupid and dishonest.
Excellent reply, Xaracen..
As for..
“Asking for specific details of a future that may be years away is stupid and dishonest.”
It’s also against international law as clearly set out in the recent ICJ case regarding the State of Palestine. It’s none of their business to demand how a State will support itself post independence & it’s illegal to set conditions on it too.
It is not “stupid or dishonest” to enquire (a) what political parties propose (b) why they are proposing it and (c)and how they intend to achieve it !
This is known as democracy !
No, it’s known as stupidity.
You completely miss the point & the question on the ballot which is “should Scotland be an Independent country?” Yes/No.
It’s not shite like “When will my bins be emptied & will we still get BBC Englandshire for Dr fckwits Who? FFS
How can you predict any of the following:
1.What political parties will be established post independence?
2.What will be the seating arrangements in its reconvened parliament?
3.What their manifestos will say?
4.What political party will the sovereign Scots vote into power?
5.What the constitution of the new parliament will be like?
6. Who will replace Yoon political parties?
7. What our new arrangements will be over our own resources.
8. What Scots want as a head of state.
9. If Scots have continued referendums on important issues.
How we achieve it? 50%+1 majority voted through the ballot box.
Why are we proposing it?
Cause the Union serves absolutely ZERO purpose to Scots & has been plundered & mismanaged for centuries. It’ll never change. Even when given its final chance in 2014 it fckd up from day one.
It is stupid and dishonest if you only ever ask those questions of one party, and demand that it answers in unrealistic detail in a never-ending avalanche of whabouteries.
The bulk of voters will not be looking for such details, they will be happy if they are assured that the fundamental capacities on which Scotland’s future will rely are solidly founded.
So the answer I gave earlier, with one addition in (), still stands;
“Given its well-known and diverse natural wealth, (and its well-attested human skill-sets and ingenuity), there is no particular reason to suppose that Scotland will find itself in a worse state than it is in now, and there is every reason to think it will be in a far better state than most.
At least it won’t have its huge neighbour fervently impoverishing it every minute of every day.”
So let me ask you a question. What on earth makes you think that Scotland cannot thrive as an independent country?
And, wherever did you get such a cockamamie idea in the first place?
“At least it won’t have its huge neighbour fervently impoverishing it every minute of every day”
Ah well, Xaracen, the sovereign people of Ukr thought like that too at one time.
And here we see a problem at the heart of certain Indy support cadres, ever vocal on Wings BTL.
They’re not at all pissed at a former colonial, imperialist power deciding it wants its colony back. To the contrary in fact, they’ve been cheering on the former colony’s destruction and re-assimilation into the enlarged empire for coming up 3 years now.
And if that is not an absolutely non-negotiable red line for them, what hope that they will grow a backbone if puir wee Independent Scotland ever finds herself in the same dire straits?
“there is no particular reason to suppose that Scotland will find itself in a worse state than it is in now”
As I wrote above, there’s the example of Ukr.
And then there’s the example of Brexit, an earlier severing of a union that plenty of Wingers never cease greetin and gurnin about.
Should I raise the spectre of Scotland’s national finances being in the hands of the kind of Scots who are unable to organise a system for getting money back on jam jars?
The point at which we had to abandon “just have faith” and start demanding good answers to hard questions is long past, Xaracen. Sorry.
U started it with USA backing.
U & USA was fckn about with biolabs.
U has sold their country to the USA & BlackRock already – didn’t you know?
U turned off it’s own energy.
U ppl didn’t even want NATO.
U ppl didn’t want a conflict either.
Us UNELECTED dictator was offered a peace treaty, all territory intact, but the colonisers rejected it.
You’ll be delighted tho that the EU/NATO is about to implode & be destroyed with this U nonsense by coming to the aid of a non EU/NATO member state above the direct wishes of official EU/NATO member states & their populations. Latest being Poland over Slovakia in a long list of fuckwittery they’ve hitched their horses to..
You’re flogging a straw man, Hatey. As I’m sure you know, that’s a well-known type of fallacious argument, and it’s a sure sign of rank dishonesty and an utter lack of good arguments.
I rest my case.
If you say so, Xaracen.
If I’m displaying an “utter lack of good arguments”, it should be child’s play for you to refute the arguments I make.
Such as the example of the jam jar deposit scheme.
Such as the example of Brexit.
Such as the example of former colonialist occupier, R, taking back its former colony, Ukr, with extreme prejudice.
But you know best.
They’re just getting their quota in afore their New Year leave.
Wow….twathater has it right, it’s teeming with them; they are all coming out, blinking in the daylight, from under their collective stones.
Welcome to Wings Over Scotlandshire.
It’ll be double time minimum wage & a free Jaffa cake at the wateringhole.
The unreconstructed Marxists on Scottish Prism are not interested in the state of the economy/standard of living etc, in an independent Scotland. Their wet dream is a bankrupt, third world, socialist republic ……..as long as it’s independent.
Wasn’t that Brexshit?
Throbber.
lol. Don’t give up your day job. Beyond comical.
Have you ever watched Through a Acottish Prism……no, I thought not.
Holyrood has been gutted & hollowed from the inside out – just as it was predicted, repeatedly during indyref, by Dr Philippa Whitford.
She repeatedly said they wouldn’t be as stupid to close it completely – they’d dismantle it from the inside & make it a glorified parish council left talking mundane crap & that’s exactly what happened under Sturgeons watch. She stood aside & let Mayhem & BoJo strip it of over 80 powers & brought in the single market nonsense, Freeport’s & the great energy giveaway.
“just as it was predicted, repeatedly during indyref, by Dr Philippa Whitford”
Unfortunately, neither Dr Philippa Whitford nor any of the other MPs allegedly representing Scotland did anything during all those years they were sitting on the green seats to stop it. In fact, simply by sitting in those seats they were legitimising the sustained attack by England MPs on Holyrood.
They did nothing to ensure Scotland had another referendum either. They all knew Sturgeon was just stalling for time, but they did absolutely nothing to stop her or to protect the party’s raison d’etre.
The SNP held the majority of Scotland’s seats since 2015 until 2024, so they could have temporarily reconvened Scotland’s parliament and agreed to transfer Scotland’s powers from Westminster to Holyrood, so the referendum could have taken place. But they chose not to. They chose to abuse our anti-union votes to preserve the union and to endorse the savaging of Holyrood instead.
None of the SNP MPs lifted a finger to confront the political fraud Sturgeon and to stop her continue betraying the people of Scotland that voted SNP to deliver independence.
Every single one of the SNP MPs, with the exception of Neil Hanvey, Kenny Macaskill and Margaret Ferrier chose to look the other way and roll over so the political fraud could walk all over them, and over us, and continue to bludgeon the party destroying it as a vehicle for independence.
None of them, other than those three, had the balls to exit the party and fight for Scotland. Mr Angus Brendan McNeil left it, in my opinion, to the very last minute, and far too late to be credible. It had already been obvious for several years before that, that, under Sturgeon, our majorities of anti-union MPs had been completely defanged, had been rendered by her completely useless and their presence in Westminster was pointless.
I agree. Sturgeon was just stalling for time & feathering her own corrupted nest. Joanna Cherry did try to make a move (for leadership) but was quickly blocked by rule change that she’d have to relinquish her Westminster seat first. Obviously not a risk she was willing to take & I find her the most disappointing tbh – she’s a lawyer on our supposed team at Westminster but did fck all but become embroiled in side issues, Qwerty++ ,Brexshit & prorogation of parliament instead of furthering the cause she was elected to do & using her legal skills & obvious connections to better use..
The more I’m following geopolitical news these days the more I see it happening everywhere of CIA /MI6 involvement in every single parliament throughout the EU, across all EU member states parliaments as well as South America. The empire is still alive & well – they introduce endless NGOs, fake activists, spin off groups, charity groups, spin off groups (how many QWERTY++ groups are there now?);flood in donations & appoint ppl with very little background history into positions of authority & it’s this gargle of feckwits that get to sit on NECs, dictate conference agendas, advise policy, vote to select or deselect candidates etc to completely change a party from within.
I remember Craig Murray say in an article waaay back in 2017 that Sturgeon & the SNP had surrounded themselves with ppl in suits which just so happened to coincide with her turning “independence” into a dirty word that hadn’t to be spoken about in polite company & certainly not at conferences. McKenna also commented SNP conference was run by unknown groupies hiding in the wings shitting themselves someone would mention independence & have to be marched off stage early…
Sturgeon would have been ripe for the picking. A narcissistic control freak who’d have folded at the first sign of someone telling her how brilliant she was. Eager to please her handlers. In with the IT crowd. She was half way up Leslie Evans arse looking for an award, any award would do, the cheaper the better while she squandered three majorities & a triple in 2015/16 – the biggest award she’ll ever get.
Anyway, I’ve come to the realisation that it isn’t the actual MPs who rule the roost, it’s the legion of unelected fckwits that surrounds them. Unaccountable, unelected & foreign agents.
It’s happening all over. The West is completely corrupt. UK government is bought & paid for by Zzzs too. One wrong move & it’s anti-Semitism or a sex scandal for them.
USA congress is exactly the same as the EU. They’ve forgotten what country they’re supposed to represent. Their own or Yahoos. They even parade about their lobbies in full foreign military uniform & pick off senators who don’t toe their doctrine & cut their funding.
Romania & Georgia elections too. Trying to overthrown, yet again, a democratically elected party because they didn’t like the results.
No arguments from me.
Philippa foresaw it well. Where is she now? Those you are referring to as ‘they’ have simply been fulfilling the vow. That is to say, fulfilling the vow’s purpose. Which was to give more powers to Westminster.
When the vow said to ‘Holyrood’ it was a misprint. Why weren’t we aware of that? Murray Foote surely was, as editor. We should have guessed. One of these wee unfortunate mistakes the Record and similar publications sometimes make.
Maybe Murray will lay the blame on his copy editors. They’re probably all AI anyway (so that they can’t be held to account for all these misprints). And they keep missing out the ‘not’ in so many sentences. Thereby making sure that whoever vows anything always ends up vowing the opposite of what the readers think he was vowing. Purely by mistake, of course.
That’s how you get a good job in the SNP?
As for ‘Insider’, what’s he inside? Or, perhaps more horrible to contemplate, what’s inside him?
It wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if that paper is funded by external & internal agents to be a perpetual embarrassment to the YES movement & obviously to keep other independent voices out of the spotlight by having yoons write shite for it instead.
Scotland would vote indy no matter what twat England had as PM. They’ve all been useless & no friend of Scotland in over 300 yrs..
Scotland needs to take her independence. These mugs won’t offer it under any circumstances & neither will the UKs handlers.
Does anyone else have a terrible sense of foreboding?
I’ve managed to get masel a fiveboding, Mac.
But I’m no saying where. If you want one, put in the graft.
Five knuckle shuffle? Daily Heil front page?
\Whoar what a stunna!
Good one James. I was wondering when you would get back onto your specialist subjects – onanism and the male reproductive organ.
Let me guess – the rellies were visiting over Christmas – and you could never find a minute to yourself 🙂
So if you were in charge of the SNP how would you get independence?
The Rev’s answer was given to Aidan above. Every election manifesto by SNP should include a line saying “if we get 50% + 1 we will declare independence”.
Which elections qualify, sarah ?
Local ?
Holyrood ?
General Election ?
Local election wins across the board would consolidate the country at the local level. Holyrood win would show we mean business and could be used to declare UDI and refusing to co-operate with Westminster unless it is willing to enter into independence negotiations to divvi up the spoils.
Westminster win would just send a new batch of collaborators south. Ergo, we need to win hugely in both local and Holyrood elections. They made Holyrood the devolved powerhouse against the Treaty Articles, so tougheroonie. We must, in any case, win in Scotland itself.
If a united front, with or without the SNP, is formed, and if every Scottish seat is contested by a member of that united front, it will no longer matter about the SNP. Anyone who still votes for them if they refuse to join a united front is voting for the status quo, i.e. Unionism and devolution.
That needs to be spelled out to every SNP member, councillor, MP and MSP candidate – you will be treated as belonging to just another party of devolution within the pre existing Union. They will no longer be considered part of the independence unity. From there, I would expect things to move rapidly.
Lorna, I’m sorry, but the chances of a “united front” ever coming into existence, far less winning “hugely” in local elections and Holyrood are about the same as seeing Elvis walking down Auchtermuchty High Street tomorrow !
Why? We had it before. SNP also had a triple mandate before.
What exactly do you think the SNP are made up of? Various ppl from all political backgrounds surged it’s membership after indyref & abandoned Labour & Lie Dumbs. Even a few ex Tories too.
Oh, ye of little faith. It will come. Maybe not in 2025, but it will come when people have finally had enough. Nothing will come via the SNP. They will just try their old SNP 1 & 2 again. They are the equivalent of Redmond’s party in Ireland pre independence. Once it was removed, things started happening very swiftly.
I can see this makes some sense, but it takes two to agree so you need to be prepared for long haul of disruption with WM and likely so semi violent conflict.
It won’t be easy.
Nothing worth having is easy. It will take guts, and they are sadly lacking in Scotland, and non existent in the SNP. Winning a plebiscitary election and declaring UDI then and there, followed by resiling the Treaty in international law on the grounds of breaching. They might send in the troops, but I have my doubts.
ALL.
It’s a manifesto. It stands to reason it’d be applicable to all.
Westminster cannot deny a national vote. Unless it wants to look an even bigger arse than it does already. Democracy deniers isn’t a good look – especially when they’re never off the pulpit preaching *democracy & western vales* to anyone who’ll listen…
Do you think if Farage doesn’t win over 70% of the vote he should just be ignored?
What consequences have the Spanish government suffered from using the police to shut down a peaceful referendum and imprisoning the organisers for decades? Given the round silence on that subject, the idea that a plea to have a local council election treated as a de facto referendum is going anywhere is absurd. Nobody will take any notice, the U.K. will suffer no reputational damage.
Oh jeez, not this irrelevant shit again.
Spain has a WRITTEN CONSTITUTION. No region can secede from Spain. That’s an internal matter between Spain & Catalonia to sort out legally under international law.
The UK has no written constitution. The Union between Scotland & England is by consent of the Scottish ppl & voluntary. When Scots vote to end the Union it’s over. Finito. Done. Finished.
This has been explained a thousand times already. The UK is not Spain.
& just to be clear, a political party would have the same manifesto for ALL elections.
Therefore, when Westminster election rolls around, a triple mandate would be in place.
The situation is exactly identical to Spain, Scotland also cannot secede legally from the Union without an act of Parliament providing for it. The UK’s constitution might not be written in a single document, but it nevertheless exists and provides for exactly the same thing. Somewhat revealing that you describe Catalonian succession as an “internal matter” in which is exactly the phrase that would be used to describe a Scottish UDI.
Nonsense.
The UK’s so-called constitution says no such thing. The Treaty of Union asserts the permanence of the new Union, but that is not an absolute unbreakable commandment. It is only an aspiration, a declaration of intent by its two-crowned monarch, but it is fundamentally conditional on the terms of the Treaty being upheld. It is abundantly clear that breaches have been made, and all of them were carried out by England.
Whether or not Spain is a single unitary state which includes Catalan, the UK state is nowhere near as unitary as Westminster’s establishment likes to assert. It only looks like that from outside the UK, but internally, the UK is unremittingly binary in all sorts of ways. That the WM establishment has to resort to all kinds of pseudo-legal shenanigans to maintain the illusion of the UK’s internal unity tells you everything you need to know about its provenance, ie, it doesn’t have any!
The UK is a binary state whose governance is shared between two MP bodies which represent the two sovereign kingdoms that founded it and its parliament. Neither of those sovereignties gave up their sovereignty nor did either of them agree to be governed by the other. England’s sole justification for England’s MPs overruling Scotland’s MPs on any matter of that shared governance is the fact of England’s MPs vastly outnumbering Scotland’s MPs.
But that only works because of the use of a flat voting system that utterly ignores the two sovereignties the two MP bodies represent.
Neither of these sovereignties is entitled to overrule the other since there is nothing in the Treaty or Acts of Union that obliges it, nor is there anything that obliges the use of the flat voting system that vastly leverages England’s MPs’ greater numbers over Scotland’s.
You want to claim otherwise, then pony up the texts, formally agreed by both Treaty principals, in those founding documents that spell out that arrangement.
When Scotland regains its independence, it will NOT be seceding from the Union, it will be ending the Union. The UK is not Scotland’s mother country in any sense at all, since Scotland is one of the Union’s two sovereign parents, so secession is not remotely relevant.
Xaracen,
I note there is no pre- agreement or article in the treaty of union agreeing to Westminster parliament of England to become the seat of the Westminster parliament power of Great Britain or that the Westminster parliament of Wales , France and Ireland had the legal status to allow the monarchy of England from 1689 to proclaim the dissolution of the Scottish parliament from the parliamentary 1707 treaty of union with the English Westminster parliament of England and Wales.
The original Union referred only to Scotland and England, James. It is the original Treaty and Union that survives. Wales was an adjunct of England and NI became a British part of Ireland Proper, which resiled the Treaty between the UK and Ireland.
Lorna Campbell.
The contectual original union referred to only Scotland and England, the original Treaty of Union survives,
Does it survive?
It specifically states that the two parliaments would be joined as one parliament,
However the Scottish parliament was dissolved as early as 1707, leaving only the old Westminster parliament of England.now in accession
A dissolved parliament of Scotland cannot under any circumstances, terminology or phrase be joined to the Westminster parliament of England since 1707.
The reality of history to What happened was Englands parliament and Englands monarch presumed by dissolving the Scottish parliament after the treaty was signed they would subsume Scotland into their kingdom of England, however once the Scottish parliament was deleted through dissolution from the actual parliamentary union. And the pre-agreed treaty terms, The now extinct parliament members of the Scottish parliament entered the Westminster parliament of England as members of the one unitary parliament of England
A dissolved Scottish parliament and a active England parliament cannot Actually join together, it breeches the terms and conditions of the actual treaty of union,
And? Of course it bloody survives, James. The Union survives. No domestic legislation can overturn primary legislation (Treaty) and international law in this sphere supersedes domestic law. The Supreme Court got it wrong because it believed or pretended to believe the guff that comes out of Westminster and Whitehall.
If the Treaty is dead, so is the Union or it cannot stand on no sovereignty. What happened when the UK parliament set up in Westminster and Whitehall was that BOTH the Scottish and the English parliaments ceased to exist, but nowhere will you find anything at all that relates to the English parliament remaining and becoming England as the UK.
Therein lies the constitutional position. England as the UK has consistently overridden the Treaty Articles in its own favour – that is, England’s favour – and breached almost every one to the detriment of Scotland. Scotland was not swallowed up or subsumed whatever Crawford and Boyle tried to say in 2013. You have to read and understand the constitutional implications of the Treaty, all the workings around it and every speech made by Queen Anne at the time to understand how we have been conned.
Blimey Lorna !
“The Supreme Court got it wrong “
Have you told them yet ?
A UN constitutional lawyer did. So yes.
It was completely irrelevant & illegal to cite other countries constitutional arrangements & try squeeze them in to somehow being relevant to England & Scotland FFS. Who did they think would swallow that rubbish?
We’ve no fcking relation to Spain, Catalonia, Quebec or any other pish they tried to squeeze in as reference. What happens in other countries has no relation to our arrangement & the claim of right.
The Supreme Court aren’t Gods. So don’t be shocked. They’re ENGLISH lawyers appointed by the ENGLISH government. Of course they’d be biased & find in favour of their paymasters.
An external independent court would rule differently when presented with all the facts that actually relate to the treaty between Scotland & England & all the preconditions set out in the Claim of right – and not some made up shite involving something that happened in Timbuktu in nineteen canteen..
Lorna also believes Encyclopedia Brittanica and Wikipedia got it wrong about Scotland being a “country.”
Lorna is as nutty as “Geri” and “Mia”–assuming they aren’t the same person posting under three different names.
Brittanica? Who? That dinosaur still around? The one that doesn’t even grant Wales a detailed entry?
Wikipedia – written & edited by a handful of geeks & funded by the USA. Another discredited source.
Scotland is a country, ya muppet. and you wonder why yer Union isn’t selling up here? I dare you to tell the English there’s no such country as England. It’d be good sport seeing how long you’d survive…
Of course they got it wrong! They completely ignored the formal significance of Scotland’s sovereignty and of Scotland’s Treaty-guaranteed constitution. They could hardly have got it more wrong!
She is right though.
Uncomfortable?
Perhaps Blair’s creation; the “Supreme Court” requires your attention regarding the Act of Union terms..
Or, are you just satisfied with the NuLabour status quo just making it up as it goes along and claiming fabricated “legitimacy” (sic) as it’s mandate?
Would you hold such views if you were being so screwed over in a car sale transaction?
I doubt it.
James! For the umpteenth time, the English parliament did not dissolve Scotland’s parliament, it was Queen Anne who did that in her capacity as Queen of Scots, and she did so by proclamation as was her right as Scotland’s monarch. Only she had the authority to do that; England’s parliament most certainly did not, and she could do so any time she wanted because it was her parliament, and not the Scots’ parliament. Scotland’s people were represented by a different body, the Convention of the Estates, and that body had teeth, as several Scottish monarchs found out.
On top of that, it had already been formally agreed that 45 of Scotland’s MPs from Scotland’s old parliament would transfer to the new Union parliament, and that is what they did when the new Union parliament sat as such for the first time.
It was the merging of both English and Scottish MPs together within the same parliamentary debating chamber that formally effected the union of the two parliaments. That is what was agreed under the Treaty. Those Scots MPs didn’t sit at Westminster until it had renamed itself the ‘Parliament of Great Britain’, and actually sat as such on October 23rd 1707. That renaming acknowledged the WM parliament as having formally given up its old role, and adopted its new role as the new Union’s parliament. I have no issues with that, and neither should you.
Where I do take great issue is the unwarranted presumption by England’s establishment that Scotland’s MPs in the GB parliament could be completely ignored in all matters of governance of the new state of Great Britain despite them being the sole formal representatives of the entire Scottish sovereign half of that state. That has been an ongoing constitutional crime for more than three hundred years, and it is still ongoing!
Treaties can be resiled. The mechanism exists in international law to do so. Most treaties are resiled because they breach their own Articles. By the way, ‘Articles’ always refer to international treaties.
Lorna Campbell.
Englands parliament and monarch of England withdrew from the parliamentary union agreement by dissolving Scotlands parliament and Scotlands agreed terms to the union of a joint parliamentary union by dissolving the Scottish parliament,
That is Englands UDI from Scotland and its parliament,
No article in the TOU or pre- agreement and terms states that the parliament of Scotland should be dissolved by the Westminster parliament and the monarch of England and not therefore joined in a union with the parliament of England after the treaty was signed.
Dissolution of only Scotlands parliament is not one of the articles of the supposed treaty of political parliamentary treaty of union,
Subsumed, colonised,
No it is a breech of the terms and conditions of the treaty of union itself. That only the Westminster parliament of England has succession to the treaty of union and still remains the only separate government of England and Wales to this day,
So there is a dispute to carried forward on the behalf of Scotland that the parliament of Scotland was dissolved from a parliamentary union with the parliament of England and the treaty of union has not survived since 1707, when England declared itself the sole parliament successor and coloniser of the treaty of union
Queen Anne could not dissolve the Scottish parliament. She did not have the requisite powers s a constitutional monarch. The Scottish MPs dissolved the parliament at the behest of the Commissioners acting on behalf of Queen Anne, in her capacity as monarch of SCOTLAND, separately from her role as monarch of England.
If we are to get anywhere, we really do need to get our heads round the constitutional situation as it is in REALITY, not what so many appear to think it means because they have been told so, so often. There never was a joining of the Crowns. They remain separate today, although they are referred to as the ‘British Crown’. No such thing exists in reality, and it is actually unconstitutional for Charles to have been crowned only in Westminster and not in Scotland.
Don’t kid yourself: both the monarchy and the English lairdies and commons (and most of our own fearties) know this very well. What was joined were two independent states which became one state enveloping two nations and two peoples, with two crowns as nominal heads of state in one person.
“The situation is exactly identical to Spain, Scotland also cannot secede legally from the Union without an act of Parliament providing for it”
No, it isn’t at all. You have made that up. The situation in Scotland has nothing to do with the situation in Spain at all. Spain is a unitary country formed by regions. Great Britain is a political union that sits on an international treaty between its two constituent states: the Kingdoms of Scotland and England.
Great Britain is the fundamental part of the so called ” (UK of Great Britain) + NI”. If you remove “Great Britain” out of the above equation, what you have left is the Kingdom of England + NI. NI is effectively part of the Kingdom of England already. They can call themselves in the way they want, of course.
None of the regions of Spain is bound to each other by any treaty. None of them put their status of state voluntary on hold, like Scotland did in 1707. They were all conquered militarily.
If any of the regions of Spain wanted independence, they would not be revoking any treaty and restoring a former state. They would have to formally secede from a country and create a de nuovo state.
Scotland does need to “secede” from anywhere. It simply needs to revoke the treaty of union with England and restore its status as an independent state, which was simply put on hold in 1707. The geographical boundaries of Scotland and England have not changed since 1707.
What you are right about though is that the ending of Great Britain as a political union has to be ratified by parliament. But what I disagree with you on is regarding what parliament has to do so.
Westminster is a byproduct of the treaty of union, in other words, subordinated to it. For this reason, unless it is specifically empowered by BOTH Scotland and England in the form of their MPs to act on Scotland and England’s behalf, it cannot, on its own accord, revoke that treaty on behalf of Great Britain.
The parliaments that have full power to unilaterally revoke that treaty are the parliaments of Scotland and England. Holyrood can act as Scotland’s parliament, but but only after it has ditched the Scotland Act and has overruled Scotland’s MPs. England could use Westminster as parliament of England to unilaterally revoke the treaty on behalf of ENGLAND, but not as “the UK parliament”. NI has no and should have no say in the revocation of this treaty, and this is another reason why the UK parliament cannot and should not revoke this treaty.
This takes us to the reality of the last 10 years:
Despite Scotland sending three consecutive absolute majorities of anti-union MPs which could have ended this union at any time from 8th May 2015 to the last GE, the union between Scotland and England survived. Why? Because Scotland’s MPs refused to end it and chose to abuse our pro-independence votes to continue endorsing that union (and their careers) instead.
In the same way, Scotland’s MSPs chose to deny Scotland of that independence by continuing to swear allegiance to the English crown and by continuing to abide within the constrains of the Scotland Act instead of ditching it.
“Catalonian succession as an “internal matter” in which is exactly the phrase that would be used to describe a Scottish UDI”
This will only be the case if our useless and cowardly MPs and MSPs continue to actively hide under their self-serving arses the fact that Great Britain sits on an international treaty that can be unilaterally revoked by either England or Scotland at any time of their choosing. A treaty that should have been revoked and declared void 100 times over the last 300 years after blatant, continuous and sustained violation by the Kingdom of England of pretty much every one of its fundamental conditions.
Unfortunately for Scotland, we are “represented” by cowards and betrayers who rather sell their country, look the other way during those violations and bend to the wishes of a foreign crown for the sake of helping their careers and bank accounts.
In reality, Mia, the two kingdoms were never joined. They remained, and remain separate entitles. Again, this is a sleight of hand by England to convince the people that the Crown of England swallowed the Crown of Scotland, just as England has always claimed that Scotland was swallowed upon by England in 1707. Both are nonsense constitutionally. This is what I mean by a con trick.
Perfidious Albion will always seek to confuse.
There’s the Act of Union & the Union of crowns.
You are correct. A single state never happened. It was debated long & hard in Westminster & denied.
From UKgovs own website..
Unified state
James was not satisfied with this arrangement. He wanted a complete or perfect union that brought the two kingdoms into a single, enlarged and unified state.
In May 1603, within weeks of arriving in London, he prepared the way by issuing a proclamation for the uniting of England and Scotland.
Perfect union debated
A commission of English and Scottish MPs was set up in October 1604 to consider how a perfect union might be created. James was quick to grasp that it could not be achieved overnight, and that only modest steps should be taken at first.
But the idea of the unification of the laws, parliaments and economies of both kingdoms met with little enthusiasm at Westminster.
The commissioners’ recommendations were debated long and hard at Westminster between November 1606 and July 1607. Although there was agreement on the repeal of hostile laws against the Scots, there was none on union.
?
James accepted defeat on the issue, but never forgave the English Parliament, describing it as “barren by preconceived opinions”.
King of Great Britain
James’s failure to win hearts and minds with his vision of a single British kingdom under one imperial crown meant that he had to be content with symbolic reforms and gestures.
In October 1604 he decreed that he would in future be known by the style and title of King of Great Britain and not by the divided names of England and Scotland.
link to parliament.uk
We’ve been through the looking glass with this legal theory before and it’s nonsense, for the same reasons that I explained to you at length a couple of weeks ago. It does not describe how the U.K. is governed, and it is not accepted by anyone in authority anywhere as an accurate description of the constitutional structure of the U.K. It has no more authority than me declaring myself the rightful king, or that everyone has to pay me a special 5% income tax levy.
There is a single recognised state in international law, that of the United Kingdom. That is recognised in legal terms by everyone, both domestically and abroad. In terms of legal status, that is identical to the Kingdom of Spain. The fact that Scotland is more culturally distinct than Catalonia, has a separate legal system and a greater degree of devolution does not change the fact that neither Scotland or Catalonia are states in international law, and independence in both cases would mean the creation of a new state out of the territory of Spain and the U.K. respectively. The conditions that might lead to the acceptance of either Catalonia or Scotland are therefore also the same; that it has been agreed or at least accepted by U.K./Spain, that independence is necessary for the Scottish/Catalan people to exercise their right to self determination, or that Catalonia/Scotland have managed to establish themselves as a functionally independent countries and so it is sensible to recognise that diplomatically. Quite why you think a people’s being brought into a state by force in 1714 would give them more rights than under a voluntary arrangement to merge two states in 1707 is beyond me, but it is obviously a nonsense idea in the context of the principles of self determination and the territorial integrity of states. The fact is that an attempt at a democratic exercise in Spain was suppressed with considerable force, and the international community did nothing, so we can be virtually certain that they would also do nothing about the U.K. preventing a second referendum/UDI by much gentler means.
Again, if you think I’m wrong then prove it by pointing to sources of legal authority that back up your point of view. I can point to dozens, from the Quebec Case, to the hunting ban case, to the S.30 order, to the UNCRC case, all explicit and all heard at the Supreme Court. I recall last time you retorted with the phrase “my view . .”, unless you can point to where/how your view is recognised as legal authority then I refer you back to my earlier point.
That the UK is a single state and recognised as such by other countries has no relevance regarding the UK’s internal disposition, which is no business of those other countries. That disposition differs from Spain’s and that is what is relevant when comparing their constitutions regarding the independence aspirations of Catalan and Scotland, which is what you are doing. But you have to take all of the relevant details into account, and you are completely ignoring the significance of Scotland’s sovereignty and its Treaty-guaranteed constitution, as every unionist does.
What most people including you know about the UK constitution is based on decades and centuries of English-led propaganda, which extols England’s constitution and sovereignty as the sole basis of the Union’s constitution and sovereignty, and the denial of the very existence of Scotland’s sovereignty and constitution. But that propaganda is false, and provably so. This has been demonstrated on this site and others for years now.
The authenticity of Westminster’s authority over Scotland depends entirely on the integrity of its conformance to the formal agreements made between the two sovereign kingdoms in the Treaty they both ratified in 1707. That integrity vanished almost immediately, to Scotland’s great and well-documented on-going harm.
Thus Scotland’s independence aspirations are entirely justified, because the so-called constitution of the UK that you allege is entitled to refuse them is utterly bogus.
I suppose that all refers to England as well then..
From where I sit it doesn’t really look that way, no matter the legalese sophistry you employ here.
UDI would be via the Treaty, Aidan, or, rather, its breaching. The act of parliament would ratify the Treaty resiling. It is the Treaty that underpins the Union, nothing else. This is where all previous ventures of independence have failed: they afford domestic legislation far too great an influence. It is, and will remain, inferior to the primary Treaty legislation.
That no one has even tried to challenge on the Treaty breaching is indicative of a complete misunderstanding of our constitutional position. Westminster/Whitehall know all this which is why, every so often, a new Treaty is offered as a sop, but which would be domestic legislation within the UK and not international law as per the Treaty.
It is a con trick precisely because they, down there, understand very well that they are in no better position constitutionally than we are, in reality. They have played a game of blind man’s bluff with us and have always won in the past. Take off the blindfold and see that there is no donkey on which to pin the tail. Just lies and deceit because their constitutional lawyers are not feart.
So to summarise, “everyone everywhere for hundreds of years has been wrong about the constitutional structure of the U.K., but I have it right”. My view of the law is correct, the courts have it wrong.
I’ve gone through this before and it’s tiring having to explain it again. The Treaty of Union does not exist as a treaty in international law. It is a legal impossibility because the effect of the treaty was to merge Scotland and England into a single state, and a state cannot enter into an international treaty with itself, for the obvious reason that there would be no distinct counterparty to that treaty, so no means of enforcing it.
“The Treaty of Union does not exist as a treaty in international law”
Don’t be ridiculous. Go on, go and read all over Hansard the many, many times the treaty is mentioned.
“It is a legal impossibility because the effect of the treaty was to merge Scotland and England into a single state”
And in what way, exactly merging Scotland and England under an international treaty makes it impossible for any of the two entities to unilaterally revoke that treaty?
The UK was “merged” with the other European countries into a union, which legally, under international law acts as a state. Treaties are not negotiated by individual EU countries. They are negotiated by the European Union as an entity. According to you, therefore, it would have been “a legal impossibility” for the UK to exit the EU, and yet, here we are.
“a state cannot enter into an international treaty with itself”
And what state exactly got into an international treaty with itself?
The Kingdom of Scotland and the Kingdom of England were (and still remain) completely separate entities. They were separate states and they will revert to separate states should the treaty be revoked.
What you need to understand is that the UK parliament of Westminster is not above Scotland or above England. It is a byproduct of the treaty of union, therefore subordinated to that treaty and subordinated to the two entities who ratified that treaty into Scottish and English constitutional law: the parliaments of Scotland and England. The parliaments of Scotland and England were and still are separate entities. They both were adjourned, but they can be restored at any time. For the Scottish parliament to be restored, the only thing that is needed is;
a. a majority of Scotland MPs agreeing to reconvene it, or
b. Scotland MPs being overruled by the people of Scotland and by designating Holyrood as Scotland’s full parliament after the Scotland Act is ditched.
“I’ve gone through this before”
And it seems you still learnt nothing and yet, you are still attempting to peddle here the same colonial nonsense.
Let’s go through and debunk a few of these things. Firstly and most obviously, Hansard is not a source of law. When George Galloway gets up and makes a speech in the House of Commons, that speech does not become the law of the land.
There is some debate as to whether the Treaty continues to have a legal effect in the U.K., but to the extent that it does or might, it would exist in domestic and not international law.
The Kingdom of Scotland and of England absolutely do not continue to exist as states, in no way do they exist either organisationally or functionally. England and Scotland continue to exist culturally, but not legally as states in international law. The idea that a 300+ year old parliament could be resurrected and that that would be recognised in any way by anyone is absurd, and again if you’re wrong they let’s see some evidence! Let’s see a source of authority describing how the respective parliaments might be convened and what effect that would have.
Finally, your analysis of the EU is again flat out wrong. The EU is not a state, and it does not claim to dissolve the statehood of the countries that join it. Countries within the EU remain independent states and indeed the Lisbon Treaty specifically describes through Article 50 how countries might leave it. It is true that the European Commission negotiates some treaties, but the authority to enter into these treaties comes from the member states. The EU and the U.K. are distinctly different unions, one is a state and one isn’t.
Re Hansard: she didn’t say it was. She said the treaty is mentioned, therefore it exists. It’s ALLLLIVE!
Alive, well & very much active or why the fuck is ‘The United Kingdom’ sitting at various international organisations representing two Kingdoms & not called Little Englandshire & it’s cousins occupying NI?
The treaty of Union is an internationally recognised treaty. Those treaties cannot be doctored or manipulated without the full consent of both parties & a referendum.
Scotland & England are separate states with sperate laws, royal institutions, education, universities, health, police & MPs.
Scotland, at no time in the course of the Union, ever relinquished her Sovereignty to become little Englands possession. It’s a condition of the Union even existing. Claim of Right.
Oh, for goodness sake.
“Hansard is not a source of law”
Who said it was? Are you being deliberately disingenuous? Hansard not only records debates from the House of Commons. It also records debates from the House of Lords, many of whom engage in debates from a position of great knowledge, some of them being constitutional lawyers themselves.
“There is some debate as to whether the Treaty continues to have a legal effect in the U.K”
The legal effect of the treaty of Union is not “debated” by the constitutional committees, the House of Commons or the House of Lords. It is only debated by people with little knowledge and by those who are desperate to avoid the issue because of the implications of the dissolution of the treaty for the crown of for current UK treaties and international agreements. I invite you to go to the Scotland Act 1998, section 37 and read:
“The Union with Scotland Act 1706 and the Union with England Act 1707 have effect subject to this Act”
What do you think the above quote actually means? Do you think it was put there just as decoration, or was it put there because the Treaty of Union is still extant?
“39. Any legislation should deal with the Treaty and Acts of Union that created Great Britain in 1707. The Secretary of State for Scotland told us: “The union was constituted by a treaty followed by two Acts. If it is now to be dissolved, it would presumably need that at the very least.”
The quote above was taken from “CHAPTER 3: Scottish independence: constitutional implications of the referendum – published by the UK Parliament Constitution Committee in 2014. Again, do you seriously think that if the treaty and the Acts which incorporated the treaty into domestic law were no longer extant, that committee above would be wasting their time talking about that?
“The Kingdom of Scotland and of England absolutely do not continue to exist as states”
They are not states today. They put their statehoood on hold in 1707 subjected to the Treaty of Union. The treaty of union have fundamental conditions, therefore it stands to the obvious that if those conditions are broken, which they were, the original signatories of the treaty have every right to revoke the treaty returning the Kingdoms of Scotland and England to their original status as independent states.
“England and Scotland continue to exist culturally”
Geographically, politically, legally, historically, economically, demographically, etc. They are not states NOW but can revert to their status as state if any of them revokes the treaty of union, which they are perfectly entitled to do under international law.
“The idea that a 300+ year old parliament could be resurrected”
You are being ridiculous again. The treaty does not need to be “resurrected”. The treaty is extant and very much alive. Would you dare tell the Spanish or those in Gibraltar that the 300 year old Treaty of Utrecht is to old to be “resurrected”? I dare you!!
“let’s see some evidence!”
I have already shown it to you with the quotes above from nothing less than the Scotland Act 1998, still extant today, and the publication from the House of Commons Constitutional Committee from 2014. I have also signposted you to Hansard, littered with mentions of the Treaty of Union.
“Finally, your analysis of the EU is again flat out wrong”
No, it isn’t. The quote below is taken directly from the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties:
“Article 5: ‘Treaties constituting international organizations and treaties adopted within an international organization’ – The present Convention applies to any treaty which is the constituent instrument of an international organization and to any treaty adopted within an international organization without prejudice to any relevant rules of the organization”
“The EU is not a state, and it does not claim to dissolve the statehood of the countries that join it”
You are being deliberately disingenuous again. The UK had a treaty of union with the EU, not with each individual EU country. The UK unilaterally revoked that treaty. If what you said in your previous comment was true (that dissolving a treaty of union was a legal impossibility), then brexit could have never happened because the UK would have never been able to unilaterally revoke that treaty. I have demonstrated to you that, by accident or design, your reasoning was completely wrong.
“Countries within the EU remain independent states”
Independent states or not, the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland are above the treaty of union and therefore above Westminster, meaning they can unilaterally revoke that treaty at any time of their choosing.
“the Lisbon Treaty specifically describes through Article 50 how countries might leave it”
And so does the Treaty of Union 1707: a violation of any of the fundamental conditions of the treaty opens the door to declare the treaty void in null under international law.
“It is true that the European Commission negotiates some treaties, but the authority to enter into these treaties comes from the member states”.
And where exactly do you think the authority for the UK gov to negotiate international treaties come from? King Charles? The authority for the UK to enter Great Britain into international treaties come from Scotland and England.
It was you who implied that because the Treaty was mentioned in Hansard, that gave it current legal effect. I don’t necessarily come down one way or the other on whether the treaty could still in theory be applied in any matter of law. It is a very old document and it’s far more likely in any given case that more modern statutes and legal principles would be applied, but I equally can’t exclude the possibility that it could have some significant relevance at some point. The Scotland Act reflects this caution, by making clear that parliament intended that where there is any conflict in law between the provisions of the Scotland Act, and the Acts of Union (which are not the same as the treaty), it would be the Scotland act that prevails.
The constitutional committee (I assume you mean Lord Hope considering the proposed changes to the House of Lords) explicitly states that there is a significant and unresolved debate about whether the Treaty of Union has any effect. That was the entire purpose of the constitutional committee considering the subject in the first place.
What we do know for certain is that the Treaty of Union does not exist as a treaty in international law between two sovereign states, and the idea of “statehood on hold” in this context is a factual and legal impossibility. You only have to consider the immediate implications to see that. None of the 1707 institutions exist, and the pre-1707 legal system is obviously not fit for purpose today. Should a newly independent Scotland be bound by the terms of the treaties it had pre-1707? It is obviously an insane idea on the face of it, and it’s a consequence of you reimagining the UK’s constitutional structure to suit your particular campaigning slogans. No sensible or objective legal analysis could arrive at such bizarre and obviously unworkable conclusions. And whilst you’re very happy to cherry pick out (and ‘interpret’ beyond all recognition) important documents like the Scotland Act or the Vienna Convention on treaties, none of these documents provide an explicit positive statement in support of your view. Even in the last ten years, there has been extensive litigation on the U.K. constitution both generally and specifically in respect to Scotland. Yet at no point in any of this has anyone ever described the U.K. as being formed of a live international treaty that Scottish MP’s can vote to dissolve, in fact this hasn’t even been mentioned or alluded to. The brightest and most experienced constitutional experts have considered important and consequential questions where this would be absolutely fundamental to the outcome, and yet apparently they’ve all collectively forgotten about this critical foundational principle in U.K. law? I think this is a classic case of “the experts are right when they agree with me, the rest of the time they colonisers/ideologues/vested interest etc.”
I don’t know what you’re trying to show with “the U.K. had a treaty of union with the EU”. That doesn’t mean anything. The U.K. joined the EU, but by joining the EU it did not give up its statehood. Therefore, the U.K. could withdraw from the EU, and did so in accordance with an explicit provision of the TFEU. Scotland and England both gave up their statehoods to join the United Kingdom, a single state. There is no equivalent withdrawal method from the United Kingdom.
300 years..
What different does that make?
The Soviet Union split somewhat sooner than that and nobody contested it, not least as Yeltsin played along over riding fallacious nonsense such as you purport to support the bigger partner in the mistaken assumption that somehow it legally gives them greater rights than the other partners?
I hope you don’t make a living in law..
Aidan, suit yourself. I do not say that “I am right”. I say that the documents say that it is the correct constitutional position. T%hat you so easily swallow the lies and deceit are your problem, not mine. I am not a career constitutional lawyer or I would be willing to argue our case at the UN, because I have spent years researching it all, with from a constitutional position and from a political position. I was researching this long before SALVO/Liberation, but they have unearthed stuff that I could not.
You go on believing that it was all wrong. You, and other Scots who think like you, are the reason that we will be going nowhere fast. I am far too long in the tooth for personal aggrandisement. I really can’t be bothered with intransigent refusal to see sense. Have it your way.
Mia and I are in agreement that the Treaty exists in reality and underpins the Union today. Take it away and what are you left with? A top-heavy English parliament telling Scots that they must do this or that or the other. If you can’t or won’t see reality, I can’t make you. Even if we voted to leave tomorrow and declared our independence, the Treaty will still underpin the subsequent negotiations – which is why we have to get our heads round it.
They already have their heads round the parts they want to keep us under the thumb, except that they have deliberately misinterpreted them in their own favour, and that is why the courts here cannot give us any relief. We have to go to the international court after any vote for independence.
I haven’t made any personal attacks, but please do show me these documents. I’m crying out for some evidence and yet none is provided.
You are crying out for some evidence, you say. Well, where is the evidence that backs your side of the argument?
It is a common feature in these threads that those of a colonial mind constantly and relentlessly demand evidence from those seeking independence but they are never forthcoming providing any themselves. You do not seem to be any different.
So go on, where is the evidence to back your side of the argument?
We are crying out for some evidence of these claims that the Treaty of Union 1707 is no longer extant and also some (ANY?) evidence of those great advantages that Scotland is supposed to receive from being in this union, all those advantages that come from Scotland having its resources systematically robbed for the benefit of England and the 1% and those supposed advantages of the Scottish people’s political inclination being systematically and relentlessly subjugated to the political views of England and subjected to a government of complete clowns.
Take your time.
You provide the compelling and positive evidence to support your novel interpretation and I’ll be happy to provide sources of authoritative law that demonstrate what I am saying
I have already provided you with evidence in one of my comments above regarding the Treaty of Union being extant. The Scotland Act 1998 makes reference to the Acts of Union which include that international treaty into domestic law. If, as you claim, the Treaty was not extant, those Acts of Union would be completely obsolete and would have been superseded. They have not because they are still extant. If they are still extant it means the treaty they ratify remains extant.
I have also provided you with a quote from the UK Parliament Constitutional Committee of 2014 where it indicates what was needed to formalise Scotland’s independence. Clearly in that quote, it was stated that the revocation of the treaty and the acts was required. If in 2014 it was still required revocation of the treaty for it to be terminated, it clearly means the treaty is still extant.
And here is another piece of evidence for you. This is perhaps the most definitive one:
“I understand that the Law requires that I should, at My Accession to the Crown, take and subscribe the Oath relating to the Security of the Church of Scotland. I am ready to do so at this first opportunity.
I, Charles the Third, by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of My other Realms and Territories, King, Defender of the Faith, do faithfully promise and swear that I shall inviolably maintain and preserve the Settlement of the true Protestant Religion as established by the Laws made in Scotland in prosecution of the Claim of Right and particularly by an Act intituled “An Act for securing the Protestant Religion and Presbyterian Church Government” and by the Acts passed in the Parliament of both Kingdoms for Union of the two Kingdoms, together with the Government, Worship, Discipline, Rights and Privileges of the Church of Scotland.
So help me God.” (September 2022)
Do you recognise the quote above?
You should. Those are the words of the current monarch of Great Britain, Charles III when delivering his oath relating to the Church of Scotland.
Now take a look at the following quote, extracted from Article XXV of the Union with England Act 1707:
“…And Lastly that after the Decease of Her Present Majesty (whom God long preserve) the Soveraign succeeding to her in the Royal Government of the Kingdom of Great Britain shall in all time comeing at his or her accession to the Crown Swear and Subscribe That they shall inviolably maintain and preserve the foresaid settlement of the True Protestant Religion with the Government Worship Discipline Right and Priviledges of this Church as above established by the Laws of this Kingdom in prosecution of the Claim of Right And it is hereby Statute and Ordained That this Act of Parliament with the Establishment therein contained shall be held and observed in all time coming as a fundamentall and essentiall Condition of any Treaty or Union to be Concluded betwixt the Two Kingdoms without any Alteration thereof or Derogation thereto in any sort for ever As also that this Act of Parliament and Settlement therein contained shall be Insert and Repeated in any Act of Parliament that shall pass for agreeing and concluding the foresaid Treaty or Union betwixt the Two Kingdoms And that the same shall be therein expressly Declared to be a fundamentall and essentiall Condition of the said Treaty or Union in all time coming”
Now, the above quote was extracted from the website: legislation.gov.uk just now. The heading of the page says:
“Changes to legislation:There are currently no known outstanding effects for the Union with England Act 1707″
Meaning it is extant as it is.
The first sentence of the Act of Union with England 1707 in that legislation.gov. uk page clearly says:
“Act Ratifying and Approving the Treaty of Union of the Two Kingdoms of SCOTLAND and ENGLAND”
Now, if the Act of Union with England 1707, displayed in the uk government legislation website is extant, it stands to the obvious that the treaty that Act is ratifying and embedding into domestic law remains extant too.
The monarch of Great Britain has very, very expensive advisors who would have never ever dare to put him through the humiliation of having to swear the above oath unless it WAS MANDATORY and UNAVOIDABLE for him in order to take the crown.
And who mandated that oath? The Parliament of Scotland mandated that oath, as a fundamental condition in all times for the treaty to remain valid. That mandate remains embedded both, in Scotland’s constitution and Great Britain’s constitution.
Why would Great Britain’s monarch ever bother to swear that oath to ensure the Treaty of Union remains extant?
The answer to the above is in article II of the Treaty of Union, reflected of course in both Acts of Union too:
“That the Succession to the Monarchy of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and of the Dominions thereunto belonging after Her Most Sacred Majesty and in default of Issue of Her Majesty be, remain and continue to the Most Excellent Princess Sophia Electoress and Dutchess Dowager of Hanover and the Heirs of Her body being Protestants upon whom the Crown of England is settled by an Act of Parliament made in England in the twelth year of the Reign of His late Majesty King William the Third entituled An Act for the further Limitation of the Crown…”
There you go. It is precisely that Treaty of Union you claim is no longer extant what is giving the current monarch the right to call himself Monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain. But in order to become Monarch of the United kingdom of Great Britain, he had to swear that oath.
It is that Treaty what is ensuring that the kingdoms of Scotland and England continue to have the same monarch. So, here is an important question for you:
If the treaty of union is no longer extant, as you claim, what/who on earth is giving the legitimacy to Charles the III and to his mother before him, to style themselves and act as “Monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain”? Do you seriously think the man is squatting in the palaces and the UK parliament?
Right then. I have provided you with plenty evidence to demonstrate the Treaty is extant. Now it is your turn. Where is your evidence?
By the way, are you going to be the one who tells Mr Windsor that, because you are of the opinion that the treaty is no longer extant, and therefore the Domestic legislation (aka the Acts) that continue to embed that treaty into Great Britain’s constitution are, in your opinion, obsolete, he, in your opinion, made a complete fool of himself by swearing that oath which, almost verbatim, reproduces the wording of a section of article XXV of the Treaty of union with England and which is categorically stipulated by the treaty as being a fundamental condition, in all times, for the treaty to remain extant?
Also, are you going to be the one who tells Mr Windsor that, because according to you, the Treaty is no longer extant, he does not have the legitimacy to hold the title of “Monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain” or sit in Parliament or sign any treaties on behalf of the UK?
And here is another one:
If, according to you the treaty is no longer extant, therefore the UK of Great Britain does no longer have a legitimate a monarch, is it really a “United Kingdom” anymore?
I cannot wait to see your evidence that the treaty is no longer extant and also your plan to break the news to Mr Windsor that, according to you, he should have never sworn that oath above because, put it simply, according to you, he has no right to call himself monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain because the treaty that has been underpinning for over 300 years both that united kingdom of Great Britain and the right of his family to the crown is, in your opinion, no longer extant and therefore worthless.
Don’t waste your time on he/she/it, Mia.
There’s more plants in here than the Beechgrove Garden.
Game, set and match Geri!
We should find out who (if qualified) Aidan works for and bear this back and forth badanage in mind when selecting legal representation when engaged through life’s up and downs..
So it is inherently unconstitutional or contractually inept, corrupt and void then..
Aidan, the state that resulted from the Treaty of Union very obviously did not exist prior to the Treaty, so no, Aidan, the United Kingdom of Great Britain did not enter into an international treaty with itself. The very concept is patently ludicrous, thoroughly dishonest, and cannot seriously be entertained.
The Treaty still exists today because it created authorities that did not exist before, and it set conditions that obliges their observance for as long as the Union itself exists. Those authorities and conditions depend on the continued existence and power of the Treaty because it is the funnel through which the two still extant, still sovereign kingdoms pour their authorities into the Union’s parliament even now.
That is exactly why both kingdoms still have their own exclusive representations in the Union’s parliament. Both representations are in the Union parliament because the Treaty put them there and it can keep them there only for as long as the Treaty itself is extant.
It is and always was a bullshit argument. Self determination isn’t subject to the gracious permission of the Spanish or British state.
Your sentence if taken literally is correct, but what you may be implying is wrong. You’ll notice above when I refer to the right to self determination I explicitly do not condition that on the approval of the Spanish or British state. If a people’s cannot exercise their right to self determination in their “host” state, the right to form a new state is not conditional on the permission of the host state in international law.
However, the right to self determination means the rights of people to pursue economic, political and social advancement. That can mean formation of a new state in the context of colonial or oppressive governance, but in democratic countries generally that advancement is within the context of that state. International law specifically does not provide for a right to form a new state just because a group of people prefer it or think they would be better off.
None of that means Scottish independence can never happen, but we’ve got to be honest about where we are.
It’s a disingenuous argument, often advanced by anti-independence unionists, that although self determination “can” mean the formation of a new state it is a right which either isn’t valid for cases like Scotland, Catalonia and Quebec, or that the hoops that would have to be jumped through are so difficult as to make it effectively impossible.
The Spanish state is of course not interested in negotiations with Catalans or Basques in good faith. That is unlikely to be resolved unless Madrid is pressured in to changing its stance by outside actors and is why Madrid is particularly worried about the prospect of Scottish independence.
They made the right noises about having no issue if it came about by mutual agreement rather than UDI. It’s the reason they still won’t recognise Kosovo’s independence.
The situation in Scotland and Quebec is rather different. I agree and have previously pointed out to proponents of UDI that the right of self determination is neither automatic or unlimited, but in the final analysis (as the Canadian Supreme Court pointed out) UDI isn’t specifically prohibited in international law (such as it is!) either.
In the Scottish case, much may rest in future on the interpretation of whether the British nationalist state is acting and negotiating (and seen to be doing so) in good faith. If it isn’t and it is regarded by enough of the international community and enough of the Scottish people themselves to be acting unreasonably in refusing to engage or negotiate or e.g. grant a referendum with broad support and a mandate, or refuse to recognise a pro-independence majority in explicitly plebiscitary elections, then all bets are off.
It isn’t disingenuous at all, it’s an accurate statement of what the position is in international law with respect to any right of the peoples of e.g. Scotland/Catalonia/Quebec to break away from a larger state and form an independent state.
You obviously understand the history and the nature of self determination, and therefore you understand the context in which it arose and the objectives it sought and seeks to achieve. There’s a clear distinction between the rights of peoples who are subject to severe oppression/colonialism/occupation, and people who live in a free and democratic society but would prefer to live in a separated state. The right to self determination does not provide for the latter group, a right of secession. Article 46(1) of the UN declaration describes that, but all that does is codify what is in the jurisprudence beforehand.
I cannot therefore see what you mean by an obligation on the U.K./Spain to negotiate. People are free to seek secession through political means in their own countries, but there is no obligation on that countries government to provide for it. An obligation to negotiate obviously means an obligation to provide an outcome, and or else for what purpose would the required negotiation take place?
You’re right that a UDI is not absolutely prohibited, but neither is it provided for other than in the circumstances described.
You’re right that in international legal and international relations theory there is seen to be a distinction between self determination in cases of classical decolonisation, and as it applies to peoples in liberal democracies like Canada, Spain or the UK (although given recent events one might cavil at categorising Spain as a liberal democracy I suppose!).
You’re wrong however to state baldly that the right of self determination is not provided for the latter group: it’s pure assertion often trotted out by those with an axe to grind against secessionist movements, whether Spanish, British, Russian or others. you only have to look at the countries who opposed Kosovar independence and who continue to do so: they are virtually without exception states with concerns about secessionist movements of their own.
International law such as it is in relation to this issue is not authoritative or detailed enough, mostly because it has not (yet?) had to deal with an entity like Quebec, Catalonia or Scotland “winning” a popular vote.
The obligation to negotiate in good faith was inferred by the Canadian Supreme Court in its responses to the Clarity Act: again, it’s not an absolute, but the logic seems pretty compelling. In a situation where a majority of the Quebecois people voted in response to a clear question in favour of independence, then the failure of the Federal Government to negotiate would very likely be seen as a factor which justified UDI in the eyes of the international community.
That doesn’t mean it would happen, or that all or most states would recognise it, or that there wouldn’t be conflict. It would however be a significant stick to beat intransigent “unionist” powers in any democracy who were refusing to act in good faith.
The outcome is independence: it’s not for Canada, the UK or Spain to dictate with respect to the principle, although they can of course be expected to have an input on the detail of how the outcome is arrived at. What they don’t get is a veto, or the right to put up artificial or impossible hurdles on the road to independence, or to insist that even if a majority of Quebecois, Catalans or Scots vote for it, their wishes can be supervened by those of all Canadian, Spanish or British voters as a whole.
You completely misunderstand the constitutional position courtesy of the Treaty, and, therefore, the Union. Whatever happens, the Treaty will have to be resiled following negotiations and the divvi-ing up of the resources, assets, etc. The Treaty IS the Union and the Union IS the Treaty.
And where are we, exactly?
We are under the very heavy thumbs of England’s MPs, who exert an authority over Scotland’s MPs that is not mandated by any agreement in the founding documents of the Union.
New State?
Then who signed the act of Union?
A phantasm??
You are making this up as you are going along..
In fact, who even says YOU are a real person- that is after all the crux of your line of special legal pleading..
No, it really isn’t. Self determination is a jus cogens in international law. Purported constitutional bans by the ‘metropolitan’ power – in this case Spain – do not supervene the rights of the Catalan or Basque peoples to exercise their self determination. Such constitutional absolutism would make it effectively impossible for virtually any people to effectively exercise their independence.
You’re entitled to your own erroneous opinion on these matters Geri, but not to your own class of facts.
No people can be denied its rights by dint of appeals to principles such as constitutional prohibitions, historical unity or geographical dislocation. The right to self determination may not be automatic or unlimited, but it is definitively NOT subject to the permission of the entity a people is trying to assert its independence from.
So according to you, Orkney or Lossiemouth should have the same “right to self determination” as Scotland, and the UK, let alone Scotland, can do nothing to abrogate that right.
Regions. Countries.
Do you know the difference?
Do you?
More importantly, who determines what is a “region” and what is a “country.” You? Do others have the same right to determine these questions, or do you claim exclusive right to so determine?
I’d add that Brittanica doesn’t recognize “Scotland” as a “country.” See link to britannica.com Nor does link to history.state.gov or worldometer or Wikipedia. See link to en.wikipedia.org
Pay attention.
Have you checked for “scotland” CC?
I’ve never been there, in fact, I only know of one boy who claims to come from there, but he’s adamant it exists.
Seems to me that a lot of the confusion and arguments on Wings BTL might arise because some (all?) of us are confusing Scotland with scotland.
Brittanica is wrong. You are wrong. I have laid out the constitutional position in the comments. Accept it or otherwise. It is the real constitutional position. You have been brainwashed to believe any old nonsense that emanates from anything British/English. It is a disability that leads to a cul de sac in rational thought and ability to comprehend other viewpoints.
Clown.
You are being far too kind!!
What an absolute ignoramous Fifth columnist.
Wonder how his views would go down if reciprocated upon merrie olde Engerlund?
A region is considered part of a national whole. Scotland was an independent nation state in 1706/7, with Orkney as one of its regions. Orkney became a part of Scotland, the state entity. Very different international rules apply to each.
Now you’re just being daft, CC 🙂
Scotland will fission into four.
The borders region will stick with England. They’re rugby-playing Tories anyway and until quite recently, much of it was in the Kingdom of Northumbria.
The Central Belt and Grampian will form rScotland, at least until the grafters on the East side tire of carrying the grifters of Glasgow and surrounds.
The Highlands and Western Isles will be content to form a sort of “human zoo”, where they can provide a picturesque scene for their only hard cash sources – tourism and ecological bollocks.
That will leave Orkney and Shetland to return where they truly belong – Norway. If they bring their copious natural energy resources as a dowry, perhaps Norway will provide them access to her Sovereign Wealth Fund. Anybody who believes the Northern Isles will turn that down so they can stay with and selflessly bankroll iScotland really does believe in the existence of feral haggis.
The 4 regions I outline have the necessary criteria to pass Andy’s tests: Unique cultures, linguistic diversity and different ancestral populations.
The only thing missing is the political will, but that penny will drop once the idea of the UK itself fissioning gets traction.
At that point, it will dawn on most Scots that Scotland herself is an artificial political construct.
Huge bits of Yorkshire were also Nordic. Will they break from England? In any case, the actual dilution of both Orkney and Shetland from Nordic to English might well lead to their joining England. We could have Northumberland and Berwick back.
I dunno about Yorkshire, Lorna, I thought we were talking about Scotland.
As for the Northern Isles sticking with England, aren’t we all predicting that England, after Scottish Indy, will be a failed state? So why would they?
Perhaps you need to brush up on maritime sea borders, eg. check out Isle of Man.
Not seeing why, James.
Perhaps you need to brush up on “might is right”.
We’ve all been enjoying an historically rare period of relative geopolitical stability. There’s lots of evidence that period is coming to an end. History tells us that these reshaping episodes don’t occur without much bloodshed, and although we all now have mobile phones, that’s absolutely no guarantee that this reshaping episode will be any more enlightened and humanitarian than previous ones.
What we have in Scotland, particularly with the Indy movement, is a peculiar state of “nice, cuddly, harmless haplessness” which IMO will be spectacularly useless in a harsh world of competing political, economic and militaristic powers.
If Scotland won’t fight for herself, and every indicator suggests she won’t, then her independent international life is going to be a sorry and humiliating one. A short one too, because inevitably, she won’t be self-determining her own destiny for very long.
What a silly post.
Lothian and much of “Northumbria” was no more English than the Faroes till wrested from local control in the 7th C Ad.
Put to rights at Carham in AD 1018.
Western isles, Pictish then Scottish before over run by Vikings in the 8th/9th centuries.
Contractually recovered in the late medieval period.
Orkney/ Shetland; Pictish according to the Romans until over run by the Vikings with a hefty bit of ethic cleansing again in the 8th/ 9th century.
Again; recovered by the Scot’s in the 16th century.
Stick yer Uphellia up yer bahookie, invaders given the boot eventually..
Scotland whole and indivisible.
Focus rather on Cornwall never actually being legally incorporated in merrie older Engerlund..
Cynicism needs backed up by hard facts.
The “Passport to Pimlico” bullshit is another old britnat trope. In the end, it’s up to a group that defines itself as a people – and more importantly is accepted as such for the purposes of UN membership – to decide whether their rights are best served by staying inside a particular state, or forming a new one of their own, or accepting some form of federal solution short of independence.
No Scottish nationalist worth their salt should be in the position of saying that e.g. the Shetlanders should be denied the right of self determination if that is what the majority of them want.
As pointed out above, the right to self determination is neither automatic nor unlimited. There is also a presumption in both precedent and law that the borders of newly independent states are respected, not Balkanised in some reduction ad absurdam allowing residents of micro areas to declare UDI.
I take the point of your last para, Andy, but a government that officially believes in 24 genders can hardly complain if its people insist on self-identifying as different nationalities and then self-organising themselves into small political and economic entities!
The old shibboleths are being shattered. It’s just another one of the old shibboleths to insist that when the UK breaks apart, it will break apart along the lines drawn on the map.
These lines are convenient abstractions only. In the real world, they don’t exist!
No. “Peoples” have the right to self determination. Pay attention.
And who determines what constitutes “peoples?” You? Me? Lossiemouth?
Pay attention.
“Fifeshire”?
The discussion was in relation to the veiled threat of what happens when Catalonian politicians didn’t do as they were told. They ended up in jail, as would we if we didn’t behave ourselves .
They have a right to self determination – they have very different constitutional set up than the one we do. Yoons need to stop going round & round with the ‘look what happened in Catalonia’ bullshit as if we’ve suddenly all became Spanish & subject to Spanish law..
I think it’s vanishingly unlikely many (any?) of the current crop of Scottish independence political “leaders” would ever have the cojones of their Catalan equivalents and do jail time if it came to an existential conflict with Westminster.
That in itself is a good enough indication that most of them (all of them?) are at base devolutionists rather than true nationalists.
Indeed, given the events of the last decade, I’d say Sturgeon and her ilk are nationalists to their fingertips to exactly the same extent as they are feminists to their fingertips.
We are actually, if only people would see it, in a much better constitutional position, courtesy of the Treaty, than either Quebec or Catalunya. We entered the Union voluntarily. We can leave the Union voluntarily. If we would but press our case AFTER full understanding it.
I don’t know why yoons insist treaties cannot ever be broken but rush to tell us all Brexshit treaty could, no problem. In fact, over 70 previous overseas territories managed it too..just not you Scotland. You’re special.
They all demand economic flow charts & long range forecasts on the political outcome of indy but again, Brexshit slogans on a bus was perfectly acceptable & adequate. Running away & going into hiding for a week after a win was too – apparently ‘its up to the other side to come up with the plan’ Anyone remember that gem? Lolz! Obviously this doesn’t apply to Scotland either. No, we have to provide blueprints. We’re special.
It’s hard work being a Yoon. 24/7 hypocrite & lifelong sourpuss that their very world will fall apart if Scotland ever dares to leave them. Instead of seeing it’s what they actually want anyway – to be a Sovereign nation again, in charge of its own decisions & “taking back control” who knew that brain fart only meant at the channel?
Anyhoo, treaties end all the time. I like to remind yoons of that famous Brexshiteer who reminded everyone ‘there isn’t a treaty alive anywhere in the entire world that requires the other sides permission to leave it’ David Davis. (paraphrasing for pedants)
I think what is ironic is Westminsters dissing of Scotland yet it’s apoplectic knicker wetting hysterical reaction to the possibility of independence, good ol’ regime change Uncle Sam’s apparent indifference (aye right) to the subject of the break up of its closest “broke” European ally then the ruskies even more apparent indifference to the outcome.
It really is laughable, all we are/ have been doing is monitoring Russian subs getting close enough to Uncle San to fire.
They couldn’t give a dam about us..
“Aidan”;
“…the U.K. will suffer no reputational damage….”
BIG LOLZ that HAS to be the line of the year.
What reputation would that be, wee man?
The people who refuse to accept the 2014 Referendum results are the true “democracy deniers.”
Democracy isn’t stagnant. Referendums aren’t a one time event.
The Smith Commission even said so. You know, that commission the yoons organised, signed & agreed to?
“There’s nothing to stop Scotland becoming an independent country in the future if that’s what the majority of people in Scotland vote for”
Awwww shit! Nae luck…
Democracy doesn’t have time limits & fresh news just in, the opposing side doesn’t get to put conditions on it either. (ICJ international law re the State of Palestine hearing on the right to self determination)
Aww.. double shit!
A response both stupid and inaccurate.
The Smith Commission report did NOT say what you claim it said. Why do you feel you have to lie about it? Does the truth even matter to Democracy Deniers like you?
It actually does..
“It is agreed that nothing in this report prevents Scotland becoming an independent country in the future should the people of Scotland so choose”
The Scots are sovereign, pal. There is absolutely zero law, invention or jiggery-pokery that yoons can summon to cancel it. To do so would to render the union null & void. It was a precondition of the treaty of union & included in the claim of right.
Scots are sovereign & can choose how they are governed & there’s fck all yoons can do about it. Scots never gave authority to England. It’s a voluntary union until Scots say otherwise.
So it’s you that’s a liar. Typical made up shit we’ve all come to expect from
fascist’sthe yoonerati polluting this site of late with Yoon nonsense.Notice how “Geri” cites one supposed quote and then, when challenged, cites a completely different quote?
And neither time does “Geri” link to the actual Smith Commission report?
Admittedly, “Geri” can lie much faster than anyone can correct the lies.
Nobody likes it when the SNP doesn’t tell the truth. Nobody should like it when online Indy cranks do the same.
Go look it up, thicko. It’s not difficult. Google would even take you as a friend.
What’s up? Didn’t like the fact you were WRONG yet again?
Geri snarls when he/she’s caught lying.
The first quote you gave, which you said was from the Smith report, isn’t. Go look it up, thicko.
Oh dear, blown out of the water umpteen times…this is starting to look bad for the old Unatics…. Wonder if the Site Prick will ride to Clown Clansman’s defence….?
“The Scots are sovereign, pal. There is absolutely zero law, invention or jiggery-pokery that yoons can summon to cancel it”
Except …
Those Sovereign Scots in favour of the union are exactly as equally sovereign as those Sovereign Scots opposed to the union.
Simples, really, but nevertheless, cue pelters.
Poor Geri. However it’s dressed up, it always comes down to it, that her route to Indy is for only the wishes or votes of those in favour to be counted or acknowledged.
BOOM! Right on cue.
Every 7 years, chump. If it’s good enough for Northern Ireland, it’s good enough for us.
Now fuck off, there’s a good chap.
You are making a fool of yourself.
Best stick to opinions built on facts to make yer case, otherwise Geri, Mia and others will continue to rip you a new one, again and again.
Anyway, who are you?
Brainwashed, landed gentry, Tory Councillor or merely friendless?
Trolling went out in 1999.
and who might that be??
And what result would that be, the official one or the real one which reveals that Scottish natives voted for yes but their vote was frustrated because of a deliberately flawed franchise?
More democracy denying by “Geri.”
Which is what tin-foil-hat conspiracy theorists do.
Even Alex Salmond accepted that “Yes” lost.
Clown.
What do you mean by ‘democracy’? The Athenian variety for the British variety? In the former, no women or slaves could vote or had office, or jobs or earn money, etc. Come to think of it, maybe they aren’t so different, after all!
And the De Facto referendum of 4th July 2024?
If Reform gains seats at the next Holyrood election and Alba loses. Then English political parties will outnumber Scottish ones by 2 : 1
That must be colonialism by any definition
That’s why there shouldn’t be English political parties in Holyrood. They belong to another country & they only serve that countries (England’s) interests.
Holyrood is a farce.
I agree entirely.
But the worry is not only about political parties having their HQ in England and leaders that represent English constituencies. Another fundamental aspect is where those parties are getting the money they use to operate in Scotland.
Labour, Tories, Libdems and Reform use mainly money they raise in England, but also in Wales and NI. But they may have foreign donors too, so we will have direct foreign interference operating from Holyrood. I think we all remember the tory party auctions of Davidson’s, May’s, Gove’s Johnson’s etc time the biggest bidder among tory donors, some of them foreign. With regards to Labour, the interference of I through the so called “Friends of I” group is another example of direct foreign interference in what should be a democratic process.
In the case of Reform, if it comes to pass and Musk hands over a massive donation to them as it threats to do, we will effectively have an American Citizen abusing Scotland’s Parliament so it operates for American and, more importantly, his very own personal interests.
This is imperialism and absolute rule taken to the extreme.
Oooo, Dew baiting from Mia back again.
But hey, I’m not opposed to it per se. I just get riled when I see wee sneaks creeping about, dropping sly wee hints, and then claiming deniability and possession of the moral high ground.
I’m all for having it out in the open, because most of all, I want to know where my country, Scotland, stands.
So, Mia, you can always put together 1000 words of piffle at the drop of a hat. Give us 1000, or as many as you need to really vent, on how antisemitism is the key to unlocking Scotland’s Independent future.
Mia,
Scotland does not have a Scottish parliament,
Under devolution it come under legislation and statues of Westminster parliament.
We have a sub parliament of Westminster branch, and a first minister of Scotland, not a prime minister.
They all receive back door orders from their pay masters.
“Scotland does not have a Scottish parliament”
For as long as MSPs insist in continue to constrain Holyrood with the Scotland Act, Scotland’s parliament is Scotland’s MPs. Holyrood is just a colonial administrative unit.
Hence my saying that to restore Scotland’s parliament we need either Scotland’s MPs to grow a backbone and reconvene it by putting the union on hold (or terminating it), or by overruling Scotland’s MPs, transfer of Scotland’s powers retained in Westminster to Holyrood and completely disengage Holyrood from the Scotland Act via direct mandate from the people of Scotland.
Of course it is a farce and wholly unconstitutional. The Treaty never allowed for devolution and it certainly never allowed for devolution of Scotland but not England. Both should have been devolved at the same time, by agreement only, if that is what the people of both countries wanted. Did they?
Reform UK is a UK, not an English, party (clues in the name). It’s perfectly entitled to run in Holyrood.
No, it really shouldn’t unless it is registered in Scotland.
It’s registered in England, therefore has no business punting English pish in our parliament.
They ALL need removed. They don’t serve Scotland. They serve another country. Their only purpose in Holyrood is to be a fcking nuisance.
If it is a “UK” party, as you say, then it should only run in the “UK” parliament, not in Holyrood.
We should only have in Holyrood political parties with HQ in Scotland, that have Scottish leaders who run for Scottish constituencies and that use in Scotland money exclusively raised in Scotland. Anything else is a direct foreign interference, it is undemocratic and and should therefore be illegal under the electoral commission.
For the elections of each and every one of the countries of that other union, the EU, you have political parties with HQ and leaders standing for the constituencies of those countries, and operating with the money raised in those countries, not from the entire EU.
What country is their HQ in?
(Hint; the UK is not a country).
Yes, I’m afraid it is.
Geri,
Where are the Snp registered as a political party, Scotland or England? are they a limited company?
SNP is registered in Edinburgh, Scotland.
& Good question on limited company. I heard Reform is a limited company. Possibly to circumvent donors?
Holyrood really, really should take a leaf out of Georgia’s dreams book & register these Yoon political parties as outside foreign interest groups & have them declare donors & donations.
The UK freaks have the nerve to blame R for election interference while they do it right under our nose.
It is raw colonialism. Political parties with HQ in other country and with leaders representing the constituency of another country are using funds raised by members from another country to operate in Scotland and to frustrate the will of the people of Scotland. Yet nobody even blinks.
I am aghast that any of these parties or the government of the UK for that matter, was ever allowed to participate in the 2014 referendum and still was considered as a valid expression of the democratic will of the people of Scotland. It was an assault on democracy.
England parties used money raised in England, Wales and NI to stop Scotland’s independence. The Uk gov of the day, raided the UK taxpayers’ purse and abused its position of power to use money from taxpayers of England, Wales and NI to actively fight against Scotland’s independence.
UK civil servants from UK departments like Treasury, abused their position of power and their time to actively fight “to save the union”. The disgusting antics of Evans and co and the COPFS against Mr Salmond were just another expression of the above: UK civil servants and crown minions abusing their positions of power and actively colluding “to save the union”. And let’s not enter the matter of the flawed franchise. That the 2014 referendum was ever considered democratic must have been the biggest farce of the 21st century and the biggest ever laugh of the British establishment. It was nothing but a profoundly undemocratic expression of raw colonialism. And yet, the colonial parties continue to demand us to endorse it.
For as long as England parties using money raised elsewhere other than Scotland continue to operate in Holyrood, for as long as MSPs continue to swear allegiance to the English crown, for as long as an unelected representative of the crown, in the form of Lord Advocate, continues to usurp control over executive and legislative power from the people of Scotland, and for as long as MSPs continue to endorse the colonial Scotland Act, Holyrood is not and will never be Scotland’s parliament. It is a colonial administrative unit.
Yes, understanding Scotland’s colonial reality – political, economic and cultural – brings us to the realisation that independence is decolonization; and that colonialism ‘is force’, as well as ‘hateful racism’.
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
You forget that your hero Salmond resigned after losing the referendum – a sure sign that he knew that was the end of the road and that there was no practical way forward – no answer to “and then what” if he stayed on.
Feed the trolls, tuppence a gag…
If that was addressed to me – at no time did I claim that Alex Salmond was my ‘hero’.
Practical ways forward by legal (as opposed to illegal status quo) means are being explored currently.
What is this nonsense? “No practical way forward”
We’re either in a voluntary union or we’re not. Nothing says we’ve to remain chained to another country forever. It’s a Union. We’re not a possession. If we vote to leave there is nothing to stop it.
Salmond resigned because he said he would & he was a man of his word. He stood for election less than 7 months later & won his seat as an MP. Hardly someone believing a rigged election was the end of the road for indy. Difficult to believe eh considering the unscrupulous, entitled eejits English institutions seems to churn out on a frequent basis..
“We’re either in a voluntary union or we’re not.”
We’re not, we’re in an incorporating union. There’s nothing voluntary about it. It has been thoroughly documented and legally recognised for centuries. Talk of it being “voluntary” is a part of the ruse; the same ruse that seeks to convince the gullible that the parliament of Holyrood is “Scottish” (or can be Scottish) when it is actually a British institution, nothing more than a child of Westminster.
Power devolved is power retained. All 129 MSPs take the oath to join the British payroll. They all work for the British state. Some admit it, others use independence as bait to win votes from the diminishing number of fools daft enough to think that a British institution now steeped in 25 years of subservience can be a part of the solution when it’s a part of the problem.
“Nothing says we’ve to remain chained to another country forever.”
The incorporating union was designed to last forever. It says so.
We had a say in 1997 when we voted to remain a devolved nation and in 2014 when we voted to keep the status quo, although in reality these ‘democratic’ events were, like the so-called Scottish Parliament and devotion itself, designed to infantilised us and keep us infantilised respectively.
You can’t effectively start a crusade for independence without a clear starting point and a clear understanding of who and what you are crusading against. Devolution exists to keep Scotland down and the confusion the British MSPs cause helps to frustrate supporters of independence. Most literally don’t know where to start nevermind being able to identify the actual opponents of independence.
No, he resigned because he felt he had let Scotland down and thought that the fight would be carried on and forward. It wasn’t, and when he realized that, he tried to intervene. That was when the plot to bring him down was hatched. The so-called procedure was wholly to achieve this end, never to bring down anyone else on similar charges. Once you understand that, everything else falls into place. This was never down to Westminster or Whitehall, but was completely Scottish, hatched in Holyrood. That Westminster might have made hay with it goes without saying, but they were not responsible for it, and, indeed, warned of the potential consequences, which have played out as predicted. It was never in Westminster’s interest to bring down Salmond. That would always have created a martyr.
On a lighter note. The closest Nicola Sturgeon will ever get to a penis is if a man wears a pair of these:
link to notonthehighstreet.com
The reporting of this poll is a dellusion.
To gain increased support I believe you should abandon the transgender rubbish and stop the building of student accommodation throughout Scotland preserve the integrity of the Scottish legal system and it’s diversity of procedure and decision.
Then tell all MPs Holyrood will be permanent as stated by Gordon Brown before the referendum and say to the UK supreme court to abide by that policy or it will be abolished if it contradicts that or Scotland’s right to hold a referendum on independence if support is large enough.
Finally I am sure Farage has called for privatisation of the NHS and the relaxation of gun ownership laws challenge reform on this to see if he has changed his mind.
We the people of Scotland call on the president of the United States of America to intervene in the Scottish Legal system to bring to justice those people responsible for the systematic destruction of this country.
Scotland’s political, legal and media establishment resembles Kew Gardens these days, given the proportion of British plants.
Support could be at 90% and it wouldn’t matter.
We’re never going to attain a political exit from this Union and the sooner we accept it, the better.
In an upside-down world, we need upside down action.
I had no idea that Sturgeon had made that comment about shaking hands.
For that alone, she should have been driven out of public life, as it betrays an inherent bigotry that just cannot have any place in a democratic system that ultimately is required to represent every citizen, not just the specific tribe whose representatives are temporarily on top.
That she has said that, and because it was never the moment that defined her entire career, and because it’s not the one fact that every Scot knows about Sturgeon, tells me we’re not a serious nation, and we’re nowhere near to having the national maturity to run our own affairs.
Which is, of course, Rev Stu’s point, just arrived at from a different direction.
Nice try, but SHE is not representative of Scots.
I had to follow Rev Stu’s link to “Stephen gen0cide Paton” to find out which pretendy gen0cide was under discussion.
Man, there are so many these days, people can’t keep up.
They all have a common theme tho & common antagonists.
Colonisers. Everything they touch is fcked beyond all recognition.
‘…a softer Brexit’
What on earth are you talking about? Brexit never happened. It was blocked by Bercow, bungled by May and betrayed by the UK establishment who never wanted it in the first place (because they hate their own country and didn’t fancy actually having to work for a living – as opposed to nodding through every directive from Brussels).
Just ‘cos the UK isn’t an official member and isn’t included in the group emails doesn’t mean we aren’t almost as controlled by the EU as we ever were. And you can soon delete that ‘almost’ – Starmer, in a rare and unintentional moment of clarity was overheard saying he wanted to make our relationship so similar to official membership that no one would be able to notice the difference.
And as for ‘a unilateral declaration of independence’ legitimised by opinion polls…
What on earth are you talking about?
You didn’t get Brexit because the USA didn’t want it.
Brussels is run by the USA & NATO. What they say goes & it’s going to get a whole lot worse as the EU gives over it’s judiciary & sovereignty to the military industrial complex. It’s not Brexit that should’ve happened but NATO exit.. lol
& What they say is more military, more QWERTY++++ & more immigrants. Only their brand of nationalism is allowed. Everyone else’s is to be voted out by swamping the voting pool. That way their colonialism can tick along nicely without threats to their empire.
The monarchy and Westminster parliament of England, Wales & Ireland created UDI for Scotland in 1707 by dissolving the parliament of Scotland from the TOU, leaving new members from Scotland sitting in a Westminster parliament of England.
Phil.
UDI.
Westminster parliament and the monarch of England proclaimed UDI….from Scotland when they both dissolved the parliament of Scotland and therefore the agreement to be one united parliament of Great Britain.
The Westminster parliament of England and the monarch of England still continue to govern England and Wales separately from Scotland today.
It was England and their monarch that declared UDI from the parliament of Scotland in 1707.
Phil.
With the parliament and monarch of England declaring separation under UDI from the parliament of Scotland in 1707,
it poses questions as to wether the country and kingdom of England could enter the EU as a parliamentary union with Scotland or a united kingdom unit under the line of succession to the throne of England after 1707.
Brexit itself may be as a political red herring as Scotland chasing Scottish independence.
A very few excerpts from the the remarkable and commended book by David Allan, PHILOSOPHY AND POLITICS IN LATER STUART SCOTLAND: NEO-STOICISM, CULTURE AND IDEOLOGY IN AN AGE OF CRISIS, 1540-1690 (Tuckwell Press, East Linton, Scotland, 2000) —
“(T)his study…surveys the foundations on which a relationship arose from the middle of the sixteenth century between Neo-Stoicism and specifically Scottish moral and political thought” (p 1)
“Nowhere, perhaps, was the Stoical preoccupation with the timeless and legal questions of public life rendered more significant in the second half of the sixteenth century than in furnishing the embattled Calvinists of Northern Europe with reputable arguments for active resistance to their autocratic persecutors.” (p 17)
“George Buchanan brooks large in any survey of neo-Latin literature, in a European as well as merely in a Scottish context…Nowhere was this connection more far-reaching than in ‘De jure regni apud Scotos dialogus’ (1579). (p 48)
[…] The disturbing thrust of this text, essentially that tyrannical kings may legitimately be deposed by their subjects, posed an acute local topicality….Such was the immediate context in which ‘De jure regni’ first burst upon the public scene. Yet underlying its theory of resistance was a notion of popular sovereignty, of an elective Scottish monarchy dependent upon the consent of the political community, which, like the near-simultaneous claims of Hotman in France (the ‘Francogallia’ had in fact appeared in 1573), had very specific roots in ancient Roman philosophy. Indeed, in the form that Buchanan himself employed it, this idea was plucked straight from an impeccably learned classical text, Cicero’s ‘De inventione’. (p 49)
[…] Buchanan also saw that his didactic purposes required a rather fuller account of constitutional history. Not only would this help his somewhat questionable claim that Scottish kingship was elective in character. It would also provide the convincing details, which only a sustained analysis of real political action over time could hope to yield, of those particular aspects of monarchy which were to be admired and those which were at all costs to be avoided. These pressing requirements, too, were traceable directly back to the Stoical origins of Buchanan’s political thought. And soon after the publication of the ‘De jure regni’ they gave rise to a final published work, an almost equally contentious prose tract, the ‘Rerum Scoticarum historia’ (1582). A tendentious Latin history of the Scottish people and their government down the ages, this has become another key text to students of British and European political thought, further underlining how important was Buchanan’s achievement, most visibly seen in these two majestic late prose works, in introducing certain Roman philosophical ideas into sixteenth-century Scottish literature. (p 50)
[…] Such connections also mark Buchanan out as the single Scottish author situated nearest to the cultural and physical centre of Europe’s gathering Stoic revival.” (p 51)
I am glad you mentioned the Brexit business and how the SNP scuppered any hope of a soft Brexit (along with the LibDems). The Corbyn ultra-soft amendment lost by about two votes.The Borg-like SNP group all abstained. Their reasoning was they could not vote for any Brexit deal as they fundamentally objected to Brexit.
May lost, Johnson came in and we got the hardest of Brexits. The SNP grandstanding was so empty, meaningless and arrogant (though even they could not match the LibDem’s lunacy platform of simply revoking Brexit).
Without any real prospect of independence, a party in power whose main reason to be is independence, is on borrowed time, and the longer in power they are, the more likely of terminal implosion.
On a totally different and perhaps trivial note , did anyone else view BBC Scotland , our ‘special’ channel
last evening? It was a kind of documentary on Still Game where the half hour programme became an hour long programme through the simple means of immediately repeating itself , and no-one at the BBBC seemed to notice, or was my telly playing tricks?
Shortbreid tins like Alf says….one of the few independence supporters starring in Still Game was Canadian…
Says it all really.
Alba’s Ash Regan – wrote letter to Elon Musk asking him to open an electric car factory in Scotland – Musk was apparently up for the idea, but hinted that the UK government was blocking the investment.
Just another example of why we need to rid ourselves of this illegal union – Scots need give themselves a big f*ckin shake.
Oor ain gutless spineless treacherous Mayor Scotland -copying his boss, the Judas Sturgeon. If they bend their necks any lower they’ll be kissing their ain arses.
media/Gf4RQIoXIAAVOH9.jpg?name=small&format=webp (680×453)
media/Gf4RQIpXcAAUucP.jpg?name=small&format=webp (508×680)
As Stalin said “ it does not matter how many votes there are in an election, it’s who counts them which matters.” Ditto holds true for polls……did someone mention 59%?
That’s funny, there was a poll published a few days ago with the exact opposite result….
Read it and weep, Yoonster.
Yes there was…….in The National after they had only polled a few Natz’s (lol). Subscriptions less than 3000 and plumetting. My point is that polls are meaningless, how did the De Facto referendum go on July 4th 2024?
She thoroughly deserves this, for all her hard work.
The United Nations has voted Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the Occupied pPallessti0n territories as the Person of the Year
Thought there was a “gen0cide” going on there, Ros.
How did she avoid being “gen0cided”, or starved, crushed, kidnapped, ethnically cleansed, shot, infected with polio, dehydrated, blown up, beaten, raped or frozen?
Let me guess. She’s never been near the place.
Whoops, turns out that’s true, as a quick look at her biog shows.
Shame really, as she could have picked up some useful insider gen on the situation there with a year or so in the tunnels 🙂
She definitely deserves it. My favourite person at the UN. I love her press conferences. She’s takes no shit from occupiers posing as journalists either & takes no shit on the well worn anti-Semitism pish they try use to shut her up.
She was on Double Down news the other day too. Absolutely horrific that that regime has been allowed to murder & assassinat journalists, aid workers, UN workers etc The sooner they are booted from the UN altogether the better. Swanning around talking pish about being the most moral army in the world as they torch & blanket bomb hospitals & refugee camps. Bastards…
“My favourite person at the UN”
Somebody needs to tell you, Geri, your nose makes an audible squeaking sound when it elongates – so that’s just about every time you post lies on here.
Admit it, you’d never heard of Francesca Albanese until the boy sent his communique fae “scotland”.
Dinna be shy noo, your favourite person at the UN is Vasily Nebenzya. Shout it loud and proud, Geri.
“…you had your indyref in 2014…”.
?End of the debate surely?
An ar@e wipe n at best a chip paper
The Glen Sannox is less efficient in terms of CO2 emissions than the ferry it replaced. So runs the BBC headline. Needless to say, the devil is in the detail, or more specifically, what accounting protocol you use when calculating CO2 emissions.
What the article definitely highlights is the absence of an LNG terminal in Scotland.
Personally, I wouldn’t entertain any LNG terminals in the UK until all the Natural Gas in the North Sea and West of Shetland is exhausted, but that particular ship sailed on a tide of sanctimonious and technically illiterate virtue signalling .
The LNG that fuels the Glen Sannox (when it’s running on LNG which bizarrely isn’t all the time) has to come the 934 mile round trip from the Isle of Grain on road tankers.
Not that this in itself comes even remotely close to justifying the humongous expense of constructing an LNG terminal in Scotland. The main reason for doing that would be to facilitate the additional of Hydrogen into our Natural Gas network.
LNG imported into the UK is invariably of a higher calorific value (BTU / ft3). As such, it is diluted with Nitrogen to maintain equilibrium. The Nitrogen is generated not by cryogenic distillation, but by the more efficient means of Vacuum Swing Adsorption.
It is proposed to “augment” (this isn’t really an appropriate term) our Natural Gas supply (1011 BTU / ft3) with Hydrogen to a maximum rate of substitution of 20%.
Why not dilute the LNG being fed into the Gas network with Hydrogen (325 BTU / ft3) rather than Nitrogen? It’s a win win. For those of an environmentally puritanical bent, it would even reduce emissions of Nitrogen Dioxide.
Ineos at Grangemouth already have a Liquid Ethane terminal for feedstock in their plastics division.
In this authoritative published analysis of CO2 emissions for island ferry services (which incidentally won best paper prize at a Transport Scotland conference in 2012) the worst performing ferries were heavy displacement CalMac/Transport Scotland monohull types, whilst the best performing were advanced proven catamaran designs as used by Pentland Ferries and many other sensible operators worldwide:
link to sciencedirect.com
Whit? Sense? Awa wi ye, Alf Baird. This is Scotland and ye’ll get nae sense here! It wid gar ye greet.
Aye deid richt Lorna, an enslaved people, bocht an selt, rewards for the culturally assimilated protecting the colonizer’s interest:
“Broadcaster Jackie Bird is among the big Scottish names who have been recognised in the New Year’s Honours list alongside footballing legends and the head of the MI5.”
link to heraldscotland.com
There’s a banging article on the BBC Online right now. The headline is “‘Green’ ferry emits more CO2 than old diesel ship” and it’s about Scotland’s latest home-grown success – the Glen Sannox.
“The carbon footprint of a long-delayed new “green” ferry will be far larger than the 31-year-old diesel ship that usually serves the route between the Scottish mainland and the island of Arran.
An emissions analysis by CalMac has calculated MV Glen Sannox will emit 10,391 equivalent tonnes of CO2 a year compared with 7,732 for MV Caledonian Isles.”
The weasel words here are “equivalent tonnes” as the headline is slightly misleading. Methane is a much more potent greenhouse gas than CO2, and the GS will be breaking new ground by emitting methane, which pushes its carbon footprint into a different league.
Maybe somebody will post a reply here, pointing out that the BBC never accurately reports anything happening in Scotland.
Maybe I’ll wish the reply is true, especially with this story. We did used to lead the world in shipbuilding.
Are we surprised, I think not.
“The Middle East Editor of BBC News previously worked as “news editor” for US State Department.
While in post he was informed he was actually working for CIA + was “absolutely thrilled” about it.
For decades, MI5 had to approve every journalist the BBC hired. May still be case.
The 3rd largest funder of the BBC’s charitable arm is USAID.
This US government agency—which is often used as a CIA front—gives nearly £2 million per year.
BBC Media Action works with the World Service and local media in 35 countries to mentor and train journalists.”
The National Endowment for Democracy’s grant database has been removed from the web – the NED was meant to be a open and accountable body unlike the CIA – this will be a blow to many real journalists who use NED data to follow what the US is up to – who its funding and and where.
link to english.almayadeen.net.
The old page.
link to ned.org
The new page.
link to ned.org
Looks like it’s still there?
Why the West – had to stop Romanians from democratically electing Calin Georgescu, who said – on his country being used as a staging post – whilst the the authorities annulled the elections because this guy was winning.
“I have to take care of my people. I don’t want to involve my people…Everything stops. I have to take care just about my people. We have a lot of problems ourselves.”
https://www.kitklarenberg.com/p/after-natos-romanian-coup-where-next?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Romania already has a sizeable border with Ukr, so if poot’s war had gone as planned, no doubt the Orcs after subjugating Ukr would be at least looking over that border.
Then there is Moldova, which lies between Romania and Ukr, and is likely to be next on poot’s annexation list.
The major problem is the Orc’s usual MO. The politicians, civil servants, religious and cultural leaders, teachers, etc of the new colony are all destined for the gulag or the firing squad after the invasion. Anybody who could lead resistance, or form the nucleus of an insurgency movement against the colonialist aggressor, is liquidated or locked up.
You know all this, Ros. In fact, it’s the exciting idea of settling “old scores” that forms perhaps the major motivation for your perpetual pro-poot cheer leading.
We all acknowledge the existence of Lenin’s “useful idiots” but you take it so far it no longer retains any credibility when applied to yourself.
The Ukries and Moldovans should put an end to the pretendy Transnistrian entity pronto. It’d be another head ache for Putler who is already reeling, along with his other Axis of
FlatulenceResistence friends after the collapse of Assad’s regime and the Tehran mullah’s Shia arc in the fertile crescent.What delusional britnat shit you speak.
“Putler” is winning the war or haven’t you noticed developments way down there under yer rock?
He has no headache in Syria either. That’ll be the joy of two NATO countries going head to head along with their respective new terrorist mates. Get yer popcorn to the ready..
He only had to look at Libya, Afghanistan & Iraq to see how that cluster fuck plays out.
Good news tho – they’ll be using all their ammo on pointless shit for Yahoos latest paranoid neighbourhood watch reshuffle. All money they can’t afford to waste replenishing sparklers. Worthless Bonds aren’t in great demand these days & Martin is a business, profits, shareholders & paying customers come first above a tick book. Granted it won’t have many orders now since it’s world showcase ended up being meh…LOL
The F16s can’t get off the ground, and the sparkler weapons don’t work.
Am I right, Geri? Anything I’ve missed?
Aye – somebody won the lottery & an early Christmas present the other day by shooting one of them down.
How many do they have left now?
We need an explanatory diagram from you, Geri.
It’s not possible to otherwise picture an aircraft that can’t get off the ground being shot down.
It remains as much a mystery as the “gen0cide” brought about with weapons that don’t work.
Help us all out here, Geri. Only you have the smarts to explain these paradoxes to us. Use pictures, sock puppets, empty bucky bottles and tinnies – whatever comes immediately to hand.
BTW, has nobody told you Christmas in Orcland isn’t until 7th January? My, my, it’s almost like you know nothing whatsoever about anything you ever post on here 🙂
I said they won an early Christmas present didn’t I?
Learn to read.
Its the USA’s Naval Aegis System that’s f*cked – it very vulnerable – this was shown by R”s jets buzzing the USS Donald Cook
I heard the USS Donald Cook was actually sunk in that encounter, Ros.
But they lucked out, and the ship settled on an even keel in very shallow water. So to the uninitiated, it looked like she was still afloat.
No pulling the wool over your eyes though, eh Ros? 🙂
Yes RoS, postcolonial theory confirms that national identities/cultures and hence nationalism has always been the main bulwark against imperialism and its abhorrent colonial procedures.
Hence the importance of Scottish identity and the Scots language in this regard; and the reason why oor ain braw Scots langage still isnae lairnt tae Scots bairns in oor schuils.
Imperialism is about changing a peoples identity into something else (i.e. Scots and Irish into Brits), as well as economic plunder; here national identity/culture which is under constant attack is the only real bulwark. The colonized become nationalists in order to defend and maintain their own nation and culture, which is perishing under colonialism.
“The colonized become nationalists in order to defend and maintain their own nation and culture, which is perishing under colonialism”
Sure, some of us Scots do that.
The colonised become colonisers in order to propagate their own nation, culture and material well-being, thus ensuring the death (gen0cide?) of the people and culture they colonise.
Some of us Scots do that too.
Incidentally, you’ve been linguistically colonised when you write “colonized” and it’s “Ros”, not “RoS”.
So you need to do two things for improved credibility. Decolonise your vocabulary and start spelling words correctly, and accept that although Ros likes to make all the right noises on here, he still doesn’t think Scotland rates a capital ‘S’.
Nationalist, heal thyself, eh, Alf?
Get the details right and you’ll be in a much better position to preach the word.
Attacking an individual for their views shows you know nowt. Alf is spot on. Read about the topic before you mouth off.?
Sorry, Andy, but you don’t get to have “views” about spelling and grammar.
Why don’t you sue the school teacher who allowed you to believe otherwise?
Maybe you could actually do something positive for Scotland if you could restore our education system back to what it was when we were supposedly colonised out of all recognition.
Too late for you probably but never mind, eh?
“Wee John Main”;
“…Why don’t you sue the school teacher who allowed you to believe otherwise?…”
Audience; “Why don’t you just fuck off!”?
(with apologies to Ellen Ripley 😉 …)
“Wee”
Obsessing over size again, James?
If it’s not size, it’s onanism, and if it’s not that, it’s just penises, phalluses, dicks, pricks and cocks.
Is this all just a cry for help, James?
BINGO!
Weel said, Alf. Lang mey yer lum reek!
Wee Johnny Turncoat will be here ony meenit.
It’s 16 months to the next Scottish Parliamentary Elections. So difficult to be definitive about the outcome. Scottish Labour in freefall and are offering nothing to stem their losses. Operation Branchform to come and other legal cases. Watch out the SNP riding a wave of naebody to vote for. Their record in Government is catching up. I don’t agree with the view it will be a coalition between the SNP and Scottish Labour sharing the FM role on a six month basis. The deterioration of the Scottish Labour vote is existential. I maintain my view another 16 months of Starmer will put Scottish Labour in fourth place. Luckily the Scottish Electorate have wised up to the Scottish Greens and Lib Dems they voted for GRRB 2 years ago. In conclusion an open field with Scottish Independence polling above the long term average. Go figure!
It’ll be worth watching what Joanna Cherry and the few remaining adults left in the SNP do over the period in question. It would be nice to see them finally grow a pair and wrest control of the party back from the Sturgeonista Loyal and the Candy Floss haired Twitler Youth…..but ah hae ma doots!
Still, if a week is a long time in politics….?
The task for ordinary people in the movement as a whole, irrespective of their individual party political adherence, is how polling evidence of a pro-independence majority (especially in particular circumstances like the rise of Reform UK) can be translated in to an actual result.
The easiest way is still to ensure that, however much bad blood there is between the parties and personalities, they are all brought to their senses at least to the extent that they all sign up to the concept of a pro-independence majority in plebiscitary elections being an absolute mandate for independence.
No ifs, no buts, no maybes.
May be wrong but Joanna Cherry is no longer a MP and has joined Ampersand legal practice where she is likely to be in demand as a KC with a high profile and wide experience.
She has steadfastly refused to leave the SNP however, despite many of us begging her to do so as she and others may have had considerably more impact if they had left as a group and joined Alba far sooner.
Scots electors in general, many of whom as others have pointed out are only dimly aware of (or bothered about?) issues which exercise political anoraks, have once again contrived to bring about a curious electoral scenario.
Whereas recent polling suggests a general increase in support for independence, particularly in scenarios (e.g. where UK Labour collapse / fail to deliver / where we Reform UK increase greatly in support or horror of horrors get anywhere near government), “ordinary” Scots voters still appear to be happy to vote for the SNP, despite a decade of stasis, the apparent criminal conspiracy to jail Salmond, the missing £600,000, the fixation on gender woo and other policy failures.
Of course we can argue that the main reason is that the opposition are as bad, if not worse. But in the end, making progress on actually achieving independence means the SNP either has to be destroyed as an electoral force, or changed from within.
I wouldn’t bet the farm on either result frankly, but I suspect the latter can be achieved more quickly than the former, particularly if the legal shit hits the fan over Operation Branchform.
Time will tell. I couldn’t blame Joanna Cherry if she just washed her hands of it all given what she’s been subjected to by the party. Perhaps she’s one of these figures who will simply never leave the party under any circumstances. Sad if true and a huge lost opportunity. We desperately need a real pro-independence party to have enough seats to keep the SNP honest by holding the balance of power and ensuring the movement isn’t lost to a devolutionary cop out.
Why would Alba want her?
She achieved nothing in 10 yrs at the SNP while in prominent position at Westminster.
Crossing to sit with Alba wouldn’t have changed anything & the fact that she didn’t – tells us all everything we need to know. Same with the SNP rule change for her switching to stand for Holyrood elections (& possible leadership challenge at a vital time) she’d have had to give up her seat, she didn’t. Again, tells us everything we need to know..
When Alex sought international opinion on the SC decision, suddenly Joanna was a font of all knowledge on his show…wow..why didn’t she get off her arse then & do something sooner herself?
She’s such a disappointment. Fckn about with Brexshit & Qwerty+++ that’d have absolutely fuck all to do with an independent Scotland. The reason she was elected was to get us out – not settle in with mundane shit that was nothing to do with us & frankly an embarrassment trying to overturn a democratic election (Brexshit) while we were trying to get indy..can you imagine the outcry if some English tosser tried to overturn a YES vote?
Yes Geri, Ms Cherry sought legal opinion to confirm the sovereignty of Westminster when a Scottish nationalist should be desiring to confirm only the sovereignty of Scots, never the oppressor power, as well as treaty violations.
The SNP no longer claim to be nationalists and rightly so, which implies they are colonialists. Running a colonial administration and taking the British oath fits perfectly with their ‘co-opted’ reality and political ideology, and also with postcolonial theory:
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
Agreed.
Joanna isn’t stupid. Her seat was more important than Scottish Independence ever was.
Even under Dumbza she could assure everyone she’d had a wee chat at Dumbza HQ & everything was now tickety boo in SNP land – even though all of Twitter told her she was going to lose her seat if she stood as SNP. She wouldn’t listen.
& Yer absolutely right about Westminster sovereignty & Brexshit. Scotland voted remain & she should’ve tested this voluntary union/Claim of Right/Sovereign Scots/Equal partners to the absolute max – she didn’t. Instead she took up the cause of trying to overturn an English democratic vote & concerned herself with irrelevant English side issues & 2nd votes.
No one is that thick by accident. Who in their right mind tries to reverse their own TRIPLE mandate? Only eejits out to sabotage it & embarrass the YES movement. Imagine if Brexit had actually been reversed?! It’d have been precedent for overturning every YES vote forthwith.
Shed have been absolutely useless in Alba. It’d just have been more of the same… bricking it she’d lose her seat & salary.
I’m pretty sure Alba as a party would welcome her and see her as an asset, though as I said the time for her and others to have made most impact was soon after Alba was formed. I think history will judge that to have been a missed opportunity and a huge misjudgement on her part and those of others who chose to try and salvage a party which many of us saw as unsalvageable, nor indeed worth saving.
I agree that the SNP mishandled brexit: as I recall Rev Stu opined at the time, there was a golden opportunity for the SNP which held the balance of power at the time to have leveraged both a better outcome and concessions with respect to devolution and ensuring that the ability to call referendums was vested in Holyrood and not subject to veto by Westminster.
Doubtless Cherry and others saw their role as a necessary one for as long as Scotland remains shackled to the union. If the past decade teaches us anything it is that the argument of being there to try and wring concessions from Westminster, or at least to alleviate the worst aspects red in tooth and claw unionism, is a fallacy.
I’m not sure how much progress the case for abstentionism à la Sinn Féin, or simply being more “in your face” about repatriating powers from Westminster to Holyrood, is actually making. Not much amongst ordinary Scottish voters I suspect. That may change in the coming months, particularly as Labour seem intent on stripping exiting powers from Holyrood and having them done at local level, which is an old yoon tactic of course to try and hobble independence.
I think you’ll find Farage is quite keen on an independent Scotland, himself.
Every day another “astonishing” or “astounding” poll – who’s kidding who here?
“sitting a sofa on a Sunday afternoon.
Going to the candidates debate.
Laugh about it, shout about it.
When you’ve got to choose.
Everyway you look at this you loose.”
Nearly forgot.
Let’s throw Maggie Chapman a Christmas Carrot this Christmas.
And it’s not a relative.
Pete Wishart@PeteWishart has blocked you:
“What Pete ‘needs’ to do is block you……”:
link to tinyurl.com
ThePsyNick: Nothing Is Everything: Liberty (Track 01):
link to tinyurl.com
…Or Die Trying (Track 7:)
link to tinyurl.com
OMG, -9 prefer darkness and slavery –
Sickos
#LibertyForever
Alex Who?: This Is Who: Then & Now:
“There was a time
You pulled a wool over my eyes
March me in line
Like a lamb to sacrifice…
There was a day
When my heart was like your slave
Wasted away
‘Til I made my great escape
I did your bidding, thought you were the one
Now it’s too late, all the damage is done
You brought me right back to square one, square one…”:
link to tinyurl.com
The proscribed head choppers (HTS) now “running Syria, have announced they’ll be no elections for at least four years – also all citizens will need to carry ID cards which will be made in the Nato country of Turkey – but if you’re an Alawite or a Christian – you won’t be around long enough to get an ID.
Of course the English government have told Scots – that they won’t get another indyref – and our Vichy government is fine with that.
Those head choppers have really embraced this Western culture malarky with gusto eh? Not just a shave & a suit but ID cards now too & delaying democracy until they can rig it – they’re doing it like a pro.
Question – given they’ve bombed the fck out of all government buildings & everyone is celebrating reducing the whole region to rubble – how they going to check who should be on the voting register?
Ah ah! Western style? 100 votes for me, one for you…?
How the English government did their big bit – to put the head choppers in charge within Syria.
“Beginning in 2011, Britain embarked on a campaign to overthrow the Bashir al-Assad regime in Syria, in cooperation with its key allies the US, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey.
Military training and weapons were given to armed opposition forces who were often collaborating with jihadist groups, in effect supporting and empowering them.
One major beneficiary of the secret campaign was Jabhat Al-Nusra, the Al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria founded by Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, who later rebranded his militant force as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
Al-Jolani now appears to be the key power-broker in Damascus after the fall of the Assad regime. He has been presenting his ‘moderate’ credentials to the West for some years, with great effect.
Former MI6 chief Sir John Sawers now says that HTS is more a “liberation movement” than a terrorist force, despite being a proscribed organisation in the UK.”
When Britain aided Al-Qaeda in Syria
“Military training and weapons were given to armed opposition forces”
The training will have been ineffective and the weapons won’t work.
Chill, Ros, Syria’s pro-poot government will be grand.
Fury: The Grand Prize: The World Is Mine:
“And in the end
I’ll be the one who’s standing tall
Will of the gods
I am divinity reborn
I will emerge messiah victorious
Supremacy defined
I’ll be the best of all of us, oh yeah!…
I was born to win, so let the show begin
And you will remember my name…
I’ll electrify like few have before
To become legend is my right
Do you believe in me?…”:
link to tinyurl.com
The Proclaimers: 17 EP: In Recognition:
“In spite of all your claims
It looks like you’re just the same
As every other clown, who likes put the crown
Before or after their names
Ohhhhhh Vanity
It gets them one by one
Patronage and Monarchy
And all they entail, rarely fail
In Recognition of your bravery up on the stage
In Recognition of your bank ability
You get to wait in lines with soldiers crippled by land mines…”:
link to tinyurl.com
McKenna’s tribute to Jimmy Carter, comments on his activity after leaving office :
“It didn’t entail touring book festivals, hurling false accusations and settling old scores while continuing to pick up a wage from an electorate that never sees you.”
l wonder who he had in mind?
Carter as POTUS wasn’t a good guy.
Carter played his part in helping to remove Gough Whitlam – a democratically elected Australian PM.
“As a journalist at ABC @4corners I tried to get former US President Carter to fess up the detail of what he described as the ‘US interference in Australian politics’.
You see, he had apologised to couped Prime Minister Gough Whitlam for the “interference” — the sort of thing that is the CIA’s clandestine work.
For ever loyal to the US deep empire, he didn’t spell out what the interference was, but he did secretly apologise. It was secret until Gough wrote of it in his memoir book.
Carter’s words passed to Whitlam:
“The US administration would never again interfere in the domestic political processes of Australia.”
An apology—from a US president, to a national leader two years after his removal in a bloodless coup—for interfering in the politics of the country.
Carter refused to answer my questions put to him in writing—and Carter’s archive people refused to assist.
They refused to provide minutes of meetings or notes of discussions Carter may have had with his messenger US Deputy Secretary of State Warren Christopher. ”
“There never was and never will be a (even remotely) GOOD US president.
The man who expanded Operation Condor to the whole of Latin America.
Allowed Suharto to genocide East Timor
Supported the Khmer Rouge, supported Zaire’s dictator Mobutu to crush socialist movements and supported the Guatemalan Junta government that committed genocide on the indigenous Mayans with IzZhe-li arms.”
Jimmy Carter’s Blood-Drenched Legacy – CounterPunch.org
“refused to provide minutes of meetings or notes of discussions Carter may have had”
Erm, you do realise that the “truth” of that statement also permits the “truth” of this statement:
“refused to provide minutes of meetings or notes of discussions Carter may not have had”
Could that be the explanation? There are no minutes or notes from meetings that did not happen?
On planet Scotland certainly, but on planet scotland, who can say?
“Allowed … gen0cide”
You would be greetin and gurnin on here if he’d interfered.
“supported … dictator”
Ah, come on now, Ros. You like dictators, remember?
“committed gen0cide … with Isr arms”
Jeezo, the unutterable barstard of the man. Gen0cide is quite bad at any time, but when done with Isr arms, it’s beyond the pale.
“There never was and never will be a (even remotely) GOOD US president”
And there you truly surprise us, Ros. Who’d have thought you would ever post a claim like that one, eh?
Of course now the USA is all over Australia – the country can’t put its forces on standby without US help such is its integration with American forces – its land mass is covered in US spying bases/listening posts such at Pine Gap – its economy is on the way down after it all but shunned its biggest export market China – because the Yanks said it must- its a bit like Europe – as Europe is the tip of the US spear to R00sshi-a, the Australis is the same to China – and all for the USA’s benefit.
Then there’s the AUKUS deal which will cost the Aussie taxpayer an eyewatering $368 billion dollars over three decades – and in return – Australia will get around three- American built nuclear subs.
Like the UK – Australia is f*cked – when it comes to US interference.
“land mass is covered in US spying bases/listening posts such at Pine Gap”
Oooo, Australia covers a sizeable chunk of real estate.
But the Yanks have managed to cover it. And you’ve provided a single example. Must be a ginormous base, eh?
Tell you what, Ros, maybe they’re watching for the next time the Covid Spreaders unleash a genetically engineered, novel viral infection on the world.
The last one killed an estimated 7+ million world wide, including over a million in the USA alone. I’m sure you want to lay all these deaths at Trump’s door, but here in Scotland, I’m confident that most Scots see that the ultimate blame lies with the Covid Spreaders – and nobody else.
For any Scot interested in money ( 🙂 ), the estimated cost to the world economy of Covid is something like 16 trillion USD.
Maybe you can tell us, Ros, what that’s worth in shitey BRICS. If you can stop greetin and gurnin about your perceived slights to your second favourite people, after the Orcs.
Wokism
2015-2025
RIP.
True
#NewNormalForever
BBC: Edinburgh Hogmanay celebrations cancelled:
“Edinburgh’s Hogmanay celebrations have been cancelled due to concerns over “extreme weather”…
The city’s street party and fireworks display have also been cancelled on public safety grounds after the Met Office issued yellow warnings for wind and rain on Tuesday…”:
link to archive.ph
World Economic Forum: Agenda Contributor:
Stephen Belcher: Chief Scientist, Met Office:
“…has overall responsibility for the leadership and management of the Met Office’s scientific programme, by providing strategic direction…”:
link to weforum.org
So the shite weather was caused by the WEF, right? Just sit right there, the men in white coats will be along in a minute.
Could have been worse, Michael, could have been The Dews.
But never mind that. Did you just assume the people’s in white coats gender?
Goannae no do that in 2025, Michael. Just goannae no.
re. “Just sit right there, the men in white coats will be along in a minute.”
You must be seriously deluded, Michael (not me) –
re. “So the shite weather was caused by the WEF, right?”
I didn’t say that – you said that, Michael.
Only -4 total imbeciles refute reality and believe otherwise ?
The Crusaders: Standing Tall: I’m So Glad I’m Standing Here Today:
“There were times, I remember
Had to fight just to hold my head up
Those times when even my friends
Tried to make a fool of me…
I’ll sing forever here in the sunshine
I’ve lived to see the sun break through the storm
I’m so glad, I’m standing here today
If your lost in your troubles
And the world just seems to forget you
If you remember sunshine
Even on your darkest day
Just follow what your heart says
And you will find the way…”:
link to tinyurl.com
4 hours later >
You’ve got a team behind you now, yet you contemptuous cowards remain hiding in the shadows
Can’t you losers stand behind your insinuations and face reality
No, the shite over dramatisation of the reporting is.
I’ve been constantly bombarded with alerts that there’s a flood alert in my area going back to at least July lol
& I was disappointed to look out my windae last week to see the sunny rain instead of the snow that was imminent…
If the WEF is now in charge of the charts – what’s the betting we’ll all be expecting a heat wave so they can punt more green shit policies & solar panels in Scotland. Forget that we get about 6 hours of daylight.. they’ve fixed that too. We’ve not to believe our eyes now either…that 6ft burley bloke is really a woman, the bod…Ellie MacPherson..
MET Office: Forecast: Edinburgh:
Tuesday: 18:00 to 23:00:
20 – 50% (precipitation)
21 – 22 (wind speed)
20 – 50 (gusts)
Wednesday: 00:00 to 10:00:
20 – 60% (precipitation)
14 – 21 (wind speed)
31 – 43 (gusts):
link to weather.metoffice.gov.uk
link to archive.ph
So just a bit blawy then? Not exactly Aunty Em weather then..FFS
*puts boarding & hammer away & removes weights fae the dugs ankles*
Yeah, Geri
According to UK MET extremist, you should be fearful for your public safety/safety of others – better to stay at home and not celebrate as one/Scotland.
Thankfully you won’t require that type of hammer (We’re holding the reality-hammer:)…
LOL!
Earlier my whellie bin blew over. You should’ve seen the destruction tae my gravel. I was just about to report the disaster to the environmental agency but lines are busy – they’re boming fck out of Yemen at the mo…I hope those bombs are smoke free & part of the rainforest alliance! WEF will huv a fit if their policies aren’t adhered to! They’ll stop everyone’s bank accounts for not doing as they’re telt…
“Earlier my whellie bin blew over”
Wow, a very close call (re. wee bit blustery). Thank God you’re safe and well, and that the gravel took the brunt of the force.
On a brighter note, BBC Weather is currently showing zero rain for the next 7 hours (re. for people in Edinburgh area), and this weather window has potentially saved thousands of people from extreme weather exposure – injury and drowning:
link to archive.ph
Trainspotting: It’s Shite Being Scottish: WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES:
(Tommy):
“Well, what are you waiting for?”
(Spud):
“Hey Tommy,
This is not natural, man.”
(Tommy):
“It’s the great outdoors!
It’s fresh air!”
(Renton):
“It’s shite being Scottish! We’re the lowest of the low. The scum of the fucking Earth. The most wretched, miserable, servile, pathetic trash that was ever shat into civilisation.”:
link to tinyurl.com
Ha ha, maybe with the cancellation and loss of revenue caused by the storm, Underbelly will be even more motivated to take up my prescient suggestion to extract cash from dumb subservient Scots.
link to wingsoverscotland.com
LOL at charging folk to get out the water…
I haven’t heard Underbelly mentioned; someone else (but I don’t remember the name). They may be an offshoot, of course…
Well they were involved up to recently. If the Nu Reekie Party is cancelled then the reduction in folk near the capital drunk enough to pay 15 bucks to jump into the sea will impact the Lonny Dook.
I’m hard and will jump in the river tomorrow. That’s well tough as the river temps are colder than the sea due to physics ambient temps and and water volumes, plus Scottish Water pump untreated effluent into the river and you cannae beat the free albeit diluted hit of aw the illicit drugs folk have pissed out into the urinals and toilets over the course of Hogmanay Parties. Based on population densities and river flow rates, optimum intoxication levels in my area should be around midday.
Life was so much easier when I was a bairn in Edinburgh, and Regular Music used to organise Edinburgh New Year. I could come home from school and find UB40 stoned in my living room as they chilled out before a gig. lol
I wouldn’t be surprised if it was them! Just haven’t heard their name mentioned.
Been swimming in the Forth on the 1st off Longcraig pier. Quite bracing. Might just go out for a bike ride instead…
There is definitely a niche (massive opportunity ?) to utilise the attributes of dumb subservient Scots.
Guardian (2017): New Year’s Eve celebrations to go ahead despite Storm Dylan:
“New year celebrations are being prepared as planned across the UK, despite Storm Dylan bearing down on the country bringing 80mph winds and the Met Office issuing four weather warnings.
Organisers said Edinburgh’s Hogmanay celebrations would go ahead, even though high winds were expected to batter the city…”:
link to archive.ph
So, the SNP ‘strategy’ is still to ask England nicely for permission to hold a referendum, and if they say NO (as they always will) whine a bit and then do nothing.
Honestly, at what point will anybody wake up to the harsh reality that Scotland is a cash cow for England. They will NEVER voluntarily give Scotland ‘permission’ for anything, never mind independence.
THAT is why they need a strategy. A set of events and processes, that backs England into a corner. THAT is what Alex Salmond did. He swept them up in a frenzy of fear, doubt and contempt that scared the bejeezus out of the English establishment.
Asking for permission from England is STUPIDITY on stilts. It is absurd. Just look at all the former English colonies. Not one, just sat back and politely asked, they shaped events to force England’s hand – and NO feckin referendums needed!
Their is a naivety and childlike folly to the current SNP. They think England is ok, and will readily let Scotland go. They rarely make the case for indy themselves (Alex Salmond referenced independence in almost every single sentence he uttered – go back and look at his speeches and you’ll see). Alex Salmond literally MADE independence the main political topic in Scotland.
The current SNP talk about indy for a few days, then go back to doing nothing again. They are utterly, utterly useless.
As for Sturgeon, well the fact she is deceptively running around implying that SHE was behind gay marriage rights in Scotland (she wasn’t, it was Alex Salmond and he actually recieved awards from several gay groups for doing so), just shows me the depth of deceit and lies she is capable of. How dare she suggest she was behind equal marriage in Scotland!! LIAR.
link to thenational.scot
The Section 30 is the SNP Gold Standard, they named it that themself. Its the only thing they’ve done in the last ten years, naming it the Gold Standard was Nicola Sturgeon dig at the nationalist who actual wanted Independence, how could you call the section the Gold Standard when its designed to entrap Scotland in this Union but it helps to keep the SNP Redcoats getting elected again and again .
Every day the SNP leadership treacherous behavior doesn’t surprise me its the monkeys flying the Yellow banner with SNP on it that does.
These are the people who put Party before Country. The leadership have settled down to the idea of England is the only Country on this Island and the membership are happy as long as they can keep waving their yellow banners and being told we’ll be Independent in 5yrs and they never do ask the Question HOW?
The SNP has turned Scots into a third class citizens within this Union, holding out the begging bowl while the SNP leadership allows the foreign Country to assets stripe Scotland of all its wealth. This all seems a very massive price to pay for chauffeur limousine with bigger pension pots, but what do I know I an idiot who wants UDI and who believes The National is a Unionist Rag with no interest in Independence.
Yes, the Section 30 mantra merely forms part of the ‘colonial corset’, tightened by the SNP colonial administrators and Whitehall’s finest, as is their role. Cesaire’s ‘confidential agents pensioned off at high reward’.
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
I was intrigued by your ‘colonial corset’, Alf, so I had a look at the link you provided. I couldn’t find it mentioned in there.
Would it be presumptuous of me to point out that IMHO, the majority of Scottish ‘yoof’ won’t have a scooby about what a corset actually is?
Regardless, I’m not thinking it’s a very useful metaphor. Corsets are usually employed to convert a perhaps rather superannuated lady, of a certain size, into a slimmer, younger, more shapely version of herself. That being the case, seeing her out of her corset and as nature intended can be quite a disappointment 🙂
We wouldn’t want the same expectation of disappointment to attach itself to post-Indy Scotland, would we? Once the ‘colonial corset’ was removed?
Its really not so complicated.
Put simply, removing the colonial corset = liberation.
Sorry, Alf, but removing the ‘colonial corset’ from 317 YO ‘Bonnie Scotland’ just leaves me with a troublesome picture in my mind’s eye 🙂
Each tae their ane I guess.
If you take all the perverts & the set*lerzz who want to change everything about the SNP & Scotland out of the SNP audience you’d probably find one Scot who’d probably end up being a Yoon who was only there cause the BBC promised him a fish supper if he clapped along for a laugh & another Scot who would like independence but *just naw the nooo…* Cause they’re no sure aboot XYZ & ASDA…
& There you have it. Twelve years. *POOF*
Aye, Scotland is a £150 billion+ a year ‘cash cow for England’, made so by the Union colonial hoax which ensures we continue to record the lowest GDP-per-capita in NW Europe despite much of the resources being located here.
Which confirms that the main purpose of a colony is to serve the interests of the ‘mother country’, whilst the role of the latter is to make any prospect of liberation for the colonized seem impossible.
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
The fact is, Scotland, with 8.3% of the UK’s population, pays 8.1% of the total taxes, and receives 9.1% of the total government spending.
It’s the rest of the UK that subsidizes Scotland.
As usual, whatever Alf Baird claims, assume the opposite is true.
And we all know that’s garbage.
You ignore surpluses generated in Scotland for corporations registered elsewhere incl offshore tax havens.
Fact remains that the UK Union hoax makes Scotland the poorest nation in NW Europe, as any GDP-per-capita analysis confirms.
Other published data shows Scotland held in the UK Union hoax has the highest electricity prices of all energy-rich countries and possibly the highest energy prices in the world. This for a nation that is more than self-sufficient in energy yet which retains nothing from its vast production and export surpluses:
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
The fact remains that Scotland’s GDP per capita (PPP) is higher than the European average.
The fact remains that Scotland, with 8.3% of the UK’s population, pays 8.1% of the total taxes, and receives 9.1% of the total government spending. You don’t even try to deny it.
Linking to your own writings is hardly proof of anything, except perhaps your paucity of proofs.
@revstu
I know you have little or no time for me even when the new zany “like” ratio on my last post ain’t that bad for me…
But why the fuck do you continue to let this shit by the likes of CC get posted?
The cause for returning Scotland to self-governing status has way better things to do than rebut this endless stream of yoon guff.
You’ve done it previously, so ffs why not let us evolve discourse into dealing with other more pertinent matters.
link to wingsoverscotland.com
link to wingsoverscotland.com
It says an awful lot about the unionists that they brag about Scotland’s dire economic situation whilst Scotland is in the Union.
It’s hardly a good advert for the supposed benefits Scotland has of being in the Union and under London Rule when…
SCOTLAND WITH ONLY 9% OF THE UK POPULATION HAS:
32% of the land area.
61% of the sea area.
90% of the fresh water.
65% of the natural gas production
96.5% of the crude oil production.
47% of the open cast coal production
81% of the untapped coal reserves
62% of the timber production
46% of the total forest area
92% of the hydro electric production
40% of the wind wave and solar energy production
60% of the fish landings
30% of the beef herd
20% of the sheep herd
9% of the dairy herd
10% of the pig herd
15% if the cereal holdings
20% of the potato holdings
90% of the whisky industry
70% of gin production
Now compare to those stats to England.
ENGLAND WITH 91% OF THE UK POPULATION ONLY HAS:
68% of the land area.
39% of the sea area.
10% of the fresh water.
35% of the natural gas production
3.5% of the crude oil production.
53% of the open cast coal production
19% of the untapped coal reserves
38% of the timber production
54% of the total forest area
8% of the hydro electric production
60% of the wind wave and solar energy production
40% of the fish landings
70% of the beef herd
80% of the sheep herd
91% of the dairy herd
90% of the pig herd
85% if the cereal holdings
80% of the potato holdings
10% of the whisky industry
30% of gin production
Now those resource to population stats for the Kingdom of England look a bit sketchy to me…
Dan,
Why do you persist in spamming every thread with this daft list ?
It’s been pointed out to you many times that these figures are just nonsense and do not bear any scrutiny !
Why don’t you actually post information that debunks what I’ve just posted then.
C’mon, step the fuck up and blow those stats out the water and make an arse of me.
For being a total basket case one ponders how Scotland can be using 3GW of leccy and still being able to produce and export 5.3GW down to England.
link to extranet.nationalenergyso.com
And that’s of little benefit to England either as so much of that generation infrastructure has been sold off to foreign ownership because London Rule is so utterly shite.
I can see you’ve started boozing early, Dan.
Never mind, with any luck you’ll wake up next year sober !
So the positives of Scotland being in the union are so obvious and impressive that a sober yoon is struggling to debunk a drunk Scot.
Every wee bit of pointless excrement you’ve posted since you recently rocked up btl hints that the only thing “Insider” about you is that your head is stuck inside yer arse.
A whole cocktail of illicit drugs & a free bar wouldn’t help find a positive for being in the Union. It doesn’t exist.
That’s why they come on here in their droves regurgitating the same debunked shite from over 12 yrs ago.. round & round they go like a Duracell bunny beating the same drum & still can’t find at least ONE positive that isn’t fake…
Andrew Bowie, Tory MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine admitted in an interview for the BBC “We now tax oil and gas companies 75% on their profits that they make, that 75% tax has gone towards paying for half of everybody’s energy bills in the UK over the past winter. Oil and gas is important and it will be with us for the next 25-30 years.”
How can a nation of 5.5 million that has 90% of the UK’s oil reserves and roughly 60-65% of the gas reserves subsidise 34 million peoples energy bills for a whole winter but run a deficit and apparently be subsidised by its southern neighbour? The answer is; it can’t. Someone is lying: look in a mirror, Yoon. It’s the establishment in our neighbour’s capital that benefits tremendously by having Scotland shackled to it.
That right, aye?
GDP-PER-CAPITA BY COUNTRY IN NW EUROPE, 2021/22 (US$)
Norway – $106,149
Ireland – $104,039
Switzerland – $92,101
Denmark – $60,345
Faroe Islands – $59,699
Greenland – $57,116
Iceland – $56,429
Sweden – $55,873
Netherlands – $50,546
Belgium – $49,843
UK – $47,923
Finland – $46,929
Scotland – $40,325
Household electricity prices worldwide in September 2023, for major oil+gas producing countries (in U.S. dollars per kilowatt-hour)
Scotland/UK 0.44
USA 0.17
Mexico 0.12
Norway 0.11
UAE 0.08
Russia 0.06
Venezuela 0.05
Saudi Arabia 0.05
Qatar 0.03
Nigeria 0.02
Iran 0.02
(Source: Statista)
GDP isn’t PPP.
& An economy reliant on financial services isn’t a tangible product. It’s speculative.
We don’t get extra spending. That bogus trick has been debunked a million times. Scotland gets *extra* because of OIL. You know, we exchange £BILLIONS of Scottish oil in exchange for some fucking magic beans & some insults that we should be grateful we get a grand extra or some such nonsense…
& The IMF has fucked up so many times with their GDP fudging that they’re a joke. The G7 is absolutely tanking yet they’re glossing over a pig in a poke. GDP is also, according to economists, a shit way to do sums. Purchasing power parity is the real way to measure an economy. Renters & savers don’t add anything to the economy but in the fudging the sums game that’s added as GDP. It’s not a product lol
But anyhoo, of our economy is shit then it’s the mismanaged of the yoons. Hardly an advertisement to remain chained to a sinking ship.
Got to laugh eh Geri.
Hogmanay and sad fuck yoons busy posting and disliking content on a pro Scottish indy site…
If the union was so great and secure they’d surely be out doing other more stimulating stuff.
And if Scotland is so shite then maybe they can explain why the fuck are so many English folk moving up here…
“Geri,” are you admitting that you really don’t know what the PPP measurement of per capita income (PCI) is?
Nobody is surprised at your ignorance.
Basically, PPP (Purchasing Power Parity) is the internationally recognized method of taking actual purchasing power of income. Every economist knows this, and accepts it as the best measure of PCI.
To simplify (and I’ll try to use one syllable words here for your benefit), if someone has a million Zimbabwe dollar bill, that doesn’t make the holder of said bill a millionaire by our standards, because that million Zimbabwe dollar bill can only purchase a loaf of bread. PPP takes such reality into account.
Then why are they so desperate we stay?!?
Can’t be anything to do with the announced exploitation of oil and gas reserves that UKs creative accountancy department claims isn’t actually ours..
You really are a Lord Haw Haw..
lol
Aye, it’s totes comedy. We also huv tae mind how the British Empire unions were so good for aw those other “poor” countries under the heal and exploitation of London Rule.
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
They don’t want a strategy to actually achieve anything, silly!
‘We’ll ask nicely – section 30nevercoming’ IS their strategy. It keeps them on the gravy train tucking in at the trough to infinity & beyond…
It’s the Yoon version of “once in a generatchun” & just as tiresome.
It’ll be 100 generations later with these clowns & they’d still be sitting in Westminster whining & embarrassing Scotland.
Get these wasters out of office. They’ve turned into Labour & do not serve Scotland. They’re giving it away at bargain discount & we all know they’d introduce just more zany policies. Swinney/Flynn is Scotlands Olaf Scholz! See a cliff – run for it while amputating both legs along the way..Just gotta get over that cliff…
What a farce the Royal New Years honours list.
Awards to the likes of long term loser Gareth Southgate,
the most hated Mayor of London Sidiq Khan and for services suppressing Scotland on the BBC Jackie Bird.
Fiona Bruce must be a shoe in for a gong serving in that same overpaid role.
Labour’s Emily Thornberry gets a gong for achieving nothing in politics over many decades.
Each of the above are millionaires, how about their reward has already been delivered and awards are given to those dedicated to public service.
Congratulations to the Post Office workers who have awards for
Facing up to corrupt U.K. governments.
They received a documentary, sympathy, an Inquiry but they are still not getting their compensation 15 years later.
I wonder if their mortgage companies have change of a gong?
Radio Clyde News story from a Senior Scottish Doctor declaring that the NHS that we knew is finished.
I can’t find the story on-line but isn’t that story the biggest headline that Scotland wants to focus on.
It’s just miles ahead of my interest in an English football manager in retirement.
Just been reading that august organ of news informatio they call the Daily Mail where the media stalwart is reporting a story about gang bangs or should I say line ups being de rigrur on the nuclear attack sub the HMS Vanguar
Seems that not all of the crew are untirely happy with the jolly jabbing with one nineteen year old crew member being particularly unhappy about being on the Roger list. Rostering for togering seems to be the thing.
Now with the Royal Navy having a proud history of rum, sodomy and the lash running back to the glory day one does wonder to what extent these jolly Roger pastimes are indulged in.
Cruising at sea, these long dark days and nights certainly must have an effect on those in our senior service and old habits die hard.
Reports like this,about what is one of our premier nuclear tooled defence weapons of mass destruction are utterly concerning.. The Royal Navy is reported however to have declined to comment.
And we are worried about CO2 emisions.
“…nuclear tooled…”
I see what you did there.
I see Jackie Bird – is it receive her obedience gong (MBE) – for her years of dedication to propaganda and gaslighting Scots whilst reporting for the BBC – Bird is your typical treacherous House Jock.
There’s to be an investigation at Tammany Hall – aka Glasgow City Council.
“A top Lockerbie lawyer has been drafted in to investigate Glasgow Council’s fat cat exit payment scandal. Douglas Ross KC will carry out a probe amid growing anger over six figure golden goodbyes at a time of deep cuts to public services.
Annemarie O’Donnell, the former council chief executive who retired this year, received a £357,845 “in year” contribution to her pension. Elaine Galletly, former Director of Legal and Administration, received a £223,065 pension contribution and £59,971 for “compensation for loss of office”.”
Let’s hope this doesn’t join Operation Branchform somewhere in the long grass.
Nothing connected with our devolved administration ever seems to arrive at a successfull conclusion … not even a couple of Ferries made on what was once the home of shipbuilding.
Its been spreading for four years – and will continue to do so, could, this be why there’s so many flu cases about now.
Article on Mark Hirst’s feed.
(USDA) United States Department of Agriculture.
Mark Hirst (@Documark): “Another reminder that the capture of the regulatory authorities by the food processing industry, is a real and active threat to human and other animal health. Food processing needs a regulator with actual teeth.” | nitter.poast.org
“so many flu cases about”
What’s this then, Ros, deflection?
Anybody know of anybody who genetically engineers infectious respiratory viruses in the lab, releases them or lets them escape, encourages mass population movements until the infection has spread worldwide, lies about it, covers it up, imprisons anybody they can catch for telling the truth?
Ringing any bells, aye, naw?
Aye, U’s 46 bio labs rings a bell as does over 22 CIA funded offices dotted around U.
& Now that you mention it, there’s the R intel, presented to the United Nations, they were planning a bio attack on R & that’s the whole reason they acted when they did.
Pentagoons finally admitting the Rs were right – despite months of denial cause now their secretive & unregulated bio hazards “may fall into the wrong hands”
Thanks for reminding everyone…phew!
Yer welcome on the recap…
Disgraced US puppet, South Korean President Yoon, was planning a false flag attack in South Korea.
link to nitter.poast.org
My last keek at Wings for 2024.
What do I find?
I am constantly amazed how the intelligentsia of the likes of Geri and Ros have so much inside knowledge of just about EVERYTHING that is happening in the world today. All gleaned from the comfort of their own living rooms. Of course, maybe all the World leaders and influencers are in constant contact with them providing updates which they then unselfishingly share with us mere mortals.
Alfie boy never disappoints. The same post repeated time and time again. With the usual link to some dross penned by some other no-hoper by the name of……… Alf Baird! I wonder if they are related?
It seems that 59% of the population are now in favour of Independence. I wonder what the figure would be if the question asked was ‘Would you vote for Independence tomorrow?’ Given all the questions that remain unanswered I would be astounded if 20% was achieved. Incidentally does any one know of a person who has actually been involved in any of these surveys? Do they ask the same people all the time?
Lastly it is time for New Year Resolutions.
I have set one. In 2025 I have decided I am not going to moan and criticise any more.
Mind you, I am not going to moan and criticise any less!
I have signed up to several polling companies, and I have been asked the independence question a few times, though nowhere near as frequently as voting intentions.
Invitations to surveys are sent to panel members – I have no idea if there is any sort of screening before the invitation is e-mailed, but there is often in-survey screening (for all topics, not just voting intentions; eg I am screened out of surveys about gambling after telling them I never do it). Then the answers will be weighted for age, sex, social class, recalled vote, and other characteristics to make the results more representative of the population as a whole. But yes, the number of people asked is limited, they have all signed up to be polled (for online polls; telephone and face-to-face will be different) and may be signed up to more than one company as I am. Weighting is designed to counter the effects of that.
Thanks for that.
The fact that you sought out and signed for such companies and that invitations are sent out to ‘panel membets’ (what panel) suggests to me that it is not ‘joe public’ who is being asked. Those with a vested interest are being polled. The very fact that some form of ‘weighting’ is used could easily be manipulated to provide the result which is desired.
I accept that i may be ovely suspicious but I seriously doubt opinion polls together with any Government statistics that are issued.
The “panel” is everyone who signed up to that company to be polled, with whatever filters they use to screen before inviting to a particular survey. All volunteers/opinionated. The financial rewards are not enough to be a significant incentive.
The British Polling Council has rules which companies that wish to be taken seriously have to sign up to and abide by. Weighting could be manipulated, but it is nevertheless quite transparent; data tables must be published within a certain length of time.
What bothers me more is that when I’m asked how I’d vote if there were an election/referendum tomorrow, I know perfectly well there won’t be one. So although I answer honestly, some respondents might take the opportunity to give the government a bloody nose, as they do in by-elections, safe in the knowledge that at most one seat will change hands and the PM etc will remain the same. That will never be counteracted by weighting.
Or people might quite like the idea of voting a certain way when they won’t actually have to and we can’t know what they’d do when the crunch came. That’s why it annoys me when posters on here use polls to claim 2014 was rigged; it might have been, but polls that differ from the declared outcome don’t prove it. There are too many other variables.
“..My last keek at Wings for 2024…”
Can you not make it your last for 2025-2035?
Trust me. No one would miss you.
Speak for yourself James: many of us would far prefer to hear more from Chas and less, or indeed nothing at all, from you and the usual suspects. Hopefully some of you will follow Ruby in to the void. We can but hope! 🙂
And up yours.
Fake BBC Rebel News: Foreign fighters given senior Syrian army posts, reports say:
“The army is being re-organised by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) – the Islamist group that is now effectively in charge of the country…”:
link to archive.ph
UN: The de facto authority in Syria is a designated terrorist group:
link to news.un.org
UK Gov: Proscribed terrorist groups or organisations:
Al Qa’ida (AQ) – Proscribed March 2001:
“Inspired and led by Usama Bin Laden, its aims are the expulsion of Western forces from Saudi Arabia, the destruction of Israel and the end of Western influence in the Muslim world.
The government laid Orders, in July 2013 December 2016 and May 2017, which provided that the “al-Nusrah Front (ANF)”, “Jabhat al-Nusrah li-ahl al Sham”, “Jabhat Fatah al-Sham” and “Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham” should be treated as alternative names for the organisation which is already proscribed under the name Al Qa’ida.”:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/proscribed-terror-groups-or-organisations–2/proscribed-terrorist-groups-or-organisations-accessible-version
UK Gov: Proscribed terrorist groups or organisations:
Al Qa’ida (AQ) – Proscribed March 2001:
“Inspired and led by Usama Bin Laden, its aims are the expulsion of Western forces from Saudi Arabia, the destruction of I***el and the end of Western influence in the Muslim world.
The government laid Orders, in July 2013 December 2016 and May 2017, which provided that the “al-Nusrah Front (ANF)”, “Jabhat al-Nusrah li-ahl al Sham”, “Jabhat Fatah al-Sham” and “Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham” should be treated as alternative names for the organisation which is already proscribed under the name Al Qa’ida.”:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/proscribed-terror-groups-or-organisations–2/proscribed-terrorist-groups-or-organisations-accessible-version
Mi5: Countering terrorism:
“What is terrorism?
Terrorists use violence and threats of violence to influence the government or an international governmental organisation, or to intimidate the public. They do this in pursuit of a political, religious, racial or ideological cause…
Islamist terrorism:
Islamist terrorism is the most significant terrorist threat to the UK by volume.
Islamist terrorists are generally driven by an extreme interpretation of Islam or perceived grievances against ‘the West’, particularly those propagated by terrorist groups such as Daesh (also referred to as ISIL, ISIS or the Islamic State) or al-Qaeda.”:
link to mi5.gov.uk
MI6 (sir John Sawers) must be responsible for that down-vote ?
re. Al-Qaeda’s Liberation Movement
link to archive.ph
BBC (2020): US commemorates 19th anniversary of 9/11 terrorist attacks:
“Nearly 3,000 people died when four hijacked airliners were crashed into the World Trade Center in New York, …on what is the worst terrorist attack in US history…
The 9/11 attacks were a series of four coordinated attacks on the US by the Islamist terror group al-Qaeda…
The so-called ‘War on Terror’ has stretched decades and American intervention in the Middle East continues to be a quagmire…”:
link to archive.ph
Wikileaks: Hillary Clinton Email Archive:
“AQ is on our side in Syria.”:
link to archive.ph
AI will get a lot more weaponised if this goes ahead.
“FT Exclusive: Palantir and Anduril, two of the largest US defence technology companies, are in talks with about a dozen competitors like SpaceX and OpenAI to form a consortium that will jointly bid for US government work.”
Worldwide proscribed terrorist – but Western/Nato/IzZhel-i backed Al-Jolani, the new Leader and chief head chopper in Syria – has appointed a Turk as the new Syrian Brigadier General.
Turkey has 2nd largest standing army in Nato and hosts, at Izmir, the Alliance’s entire Land Command. At Adana, close to Syrian border, Turkey hosts a huge US airbase and 1,500 American soldiers.
Syria is now a Nato protectorate.
Comments on tis that an another. Allow me to inform you of a real situation. January marks a watershed in Scottish born Doctors leaving for Australia. Lot’s of Doctors leaving next week. So enjoy your new year just don’t get ill. The silent crisis that nobody is reporting. Have a good one when it comes. My own is on A and E rota tonight expecting a nightmare. Spare a thought for him and his remaining colleagues.
George,
In 1971, 31% of English GPs were trained abroad. It’s a cost constraint.
Aussie is doing it.
Current numbers here
link to turasdata.nes.nhs.scot
“On 30 September 2023 there were 5,168 GPs (including GP trainees). Scotland’s numbers.
As of November 2024, there were 38,508 individual (headcount) fully qualified GPs working in the NHS in England. In Full Time Equivalent (FTE) terms of 37.5 hours a week, this equates to 28,139 full-time fully qualified GPs.
The overall number of GPs (including GP trainees) has seen little growth since 2015, while the number of GP partners has declined significantly during this time.”
As well as having more GPs per head of population than England, we also have more hospital beds per head though not enough.
To have the optimum number of hospital beds Scotland need to increase the number by 3% while England needs to increase the number by 8%.
I was in A&E Royal for 4 hours recently. Interesting experience. Everything was handled with excellence and care , even the extreme. Commendable NHS
Cheers Sam
But you missed my main point. The tipping point has passed. Your probably quoting SNP Stats I am quoting real relayed experience. I can give you names of excellent Doctors leaving next week for Australia. They have been in my house for dinner. Meanwhile the SNP play games. It was ever thus. We have lost a lot of good people. My own was assessed at top 0.05 % of Scottish Doctors. His best mate and brother on a par with him leave next week. I am totally scunnered with the relentless SNP spin. Millions spent on spin. 2 years in February I am on the waiting list. A failing SNHS and you or me are not on rota tonight.
What reasons did they give for leaving?
Scotland has always lost it’s brightest & best as we take in rUK OAPs who want to retire. That isn’t an accident.
Pardon me, George, I have missed your remark about a tipping point.
The numbers come from Public Health Scotland.
The SNP is certainly incompetent in a number of areas but the SNP is not the NHS.
The difficultirs of our NHS are structural. First, the UK governemnts since Thatcher made the UK populations unhealthy and in poverty by decades of neoliberalism.
Scotland suffered most having the greatest de-industrialisation.
Compounding that are decades of underfunding and understaffing.
We can’t know (perhaps?) why doctors go abroad.
My cousin went to Canada to study as a dentist stayed there. My niece, a nurse, went to USA because her American husband wanted to return.
I know one that’s going to New Zealand. (Radiography) She’s young & has a young family so the worlds her oyster – her reasons for leaving are much better living standards, pay & opportunity. She’s had enough of the cash starved NHS.
And yet, on a different day, my 89 yr old friend recently spent 19 hours in a waiting area in Glasgow’s Royal Infirmary before being seen by a Dr following a severe fall. His condition subsequently being serious enough to warrant 3 weeks in Hospital.
Not to mention another friend, having been removed to Gartnavel after suffering cardiac arrest spent an hour in the Ambulance waiting in line for entry to A & E.
I fear that your experience, though what we would hope for, is an atypical one.
Maybe.Maybe not.
I suspect Scotland’s NHS performance is much better than that of England. And, as a result of the Union and the unfair nature of the block grant, Scotland’s NHS is underfunded and understaffed and has been for a long time.
When the best defence we can make of a public service is that someone else does it worse, that’s just pathetic.
And whilst our devolved administration can prioritise squandering money on the follies of waste bottle recycling schemes, ferries which are a running joke instead of seagoing transport, untold money on subsidising trans and woke propaganda and untold other idiocies it’s fairly obvious that whatever funds our administration gets aren’t going to be used to improve our sNHS.
It isn’t pathetic. It shows the performance of the people in Scotland’s NHS is better than the performance of England’s NHS.
Sure we get more per head to spend than they do. But there’s research that says, based on need, we would get more than we get now.
£21 billion is now spent on the NHS. How much do you think the health spend should be?
Yes – correct & especially since 2014 unionists weaponised NHS Scotland & drowned out all discussion by confusing the issue – shouting all over the media & to anyone who’d listen that NHS Scotland is devolved when its NOT.
Limited decisions may be devolved but the funding/budget absolutely isn’t. When NHS England spends less – Scotland gets less too & the neoliberal cons have been deliberately on a path to grind it into the ground & herding ppl more & more onto the path of private health care.
So to all the yoons out there – when England goes private Scotland will get NADA, Nothing, Zero & will be forced to go private too because funds will be cut entirely from the block grant.
It still amazes me some unionists still persist in the myth that NHS Scotland is devolved & we can have it in perpetuity….
Ah, now we’re getting to the nub of it.
Soz to hear you’re still waiting for treatment.
TBH in my experience doctors could do a bit more for the taxpayers’ cash they get paid.
But I’ve reached the point a couple of years back where I no longer rely on any assistance from the health service and I’m just living life as it comes at me.
Generally I’ve been fit and well for most of my life and thankful that’s been the case compared to other less fortunate folks.
So hadn’t been to GP for over a decade as normally a fit healthy guy with a capability of obtaining cycling KOMs on Strava even at an age 2/3rds of life expectancy. Mind you the lazy kids of today seem to want to spend their time on playstation so that skews the stats on physical human sporting activity.
Incidentally earlier today the young prick in the black Volvo SUV driving like a complete arse declined my invitation to stop and discuss his ridiculously inappropriate driving standards, so this old fuck will take that as a win over youthful physicality and bravado. Anytime bud, drop by and you will wish you hadn’t.
But I digress… normal resting heart rate of 60 bpm. Then rock up at doctors with a clearly escalating health issue of being wrecked with all manner of symptoms and resting heart rate 120bpm. This was progressing over several years prior to covid and haven’t had covid or any shitey covid injections.
Three GPs at “good” in the scheme of things local surgery couldn’t give a single fuck.
The two young less well remunerated nurses at the surgery seemed more interested in analysing my bloods than the doctors to see if they could get to the bottom of what was wrong, but that still came to nowt.
I’d pretty much come to the point I’d made peace with myself and was on the way out as no way if the rate of progression was to continue I’d be around in a few years.
After discussions with another winger I ended up going off piste and took one single 12mg dose of Ivermectin which sorted me. An old cheap off patent drug that is less risky to take than paracetamol or ibuprofen.
I’m not like I was at 21, but still a massive health improvement clearing the elevated heart rate, chronic post infection fatigue symptoms like sleep, brain fog, joint & muscle weakness and pain, and digestion symptoms.
Have always been meaning to go back to GP’s surgery and let them know but why bother. They clearly aren’t interested.
Take a look at Dr John Campbell’s YouTube channel. We’re not getting told the half of it with regard to health matters.
I’ve commented before on health issues. Stop eating shite supermarket and processed foods as they are making you ill.
Plus in some genetic cases you can cure Basal Cell cancers with a simple Vit C tablet topically applied.
I could even post pics if you want.
Oncologist was a bit miffed that a few pence Vit C tablet stopped them having to cut half my nose off and graft a bit of my arse onto my face leaving me permanently disfigured at significant cost to taxpayers.
Yoons can come back with the cheap shot that I’m enough of a shit head anyway without having a bit of my butt stitched onto my face. But the reality is most, regardless of outlook on Union, would prefer to be left less disfigured should they be unfortunate enough to to be in the same health situation.
Did you swallow the vit C tablet, Dan?
Also I’m interested in the ivermectin. My husband has polymyalgia and some cholesterol issues so takes various tablets – they have unwanted side effects and now they say his platelet count is down.
It was just topical application Sarah.
Though I am sure a decent does of oral Vit C either in tablet or general food intake is a good thing.
Likewise Vit D. UK RDA for that is very low compared to other countries, but the powers that be here want us ill and health compromised so we don’t have the ability to revolt…
Crush a Vit C tablet into powder and add a very small amount of water to make a concentrated paste. It will dry out so just add a few more drips as and when required.
I used a plastic bottle lid as a small container for the mix, and a cotton bud to regularly apply the vit c paste to the affected area every couple of hours.
Basal Cell Carcinomas form a scab that sheds then repeats the process over a slowly increasing ulcerated area.
In some genetic cases Vit C solution topically applied can cure the issue.
After vit c application there may be a sight change in the scab formation in that it will turn black rather than normal brownish scab colour, plus the surrounding area may slightly inflame but this is normal.
It seems the vit C stimulates cellular activity around the area to fight off the cancer cells. After a few days the scab will shed as usual, but instead of leaving an ulcerated crater which would form a new scab as the BCC progresses, it just forms clear scar tissue instead.
Well done, Dan – it is very nice to read a success story.
LOL. Cure for cancer gets a down vote. There’s simply no denying that some humans are absolute fucking roasters.
You should’ve patented that idea, Dan. You could’ve been quids in!
It makes a lot of sense. They’re adding lots of vitamins to serums & skincare/makeup ranges these days targeting GenZ who make endless *content* for tiktok… including the QWERTYS+++ lol
Thanks for your comment Dan I always appreciate your input. I prefer to rely on years of medical study and years medical experience. My wife my daughter my niece my sister wants to pay the 10K to go private. I said No either the SNHS exists as an Independent entity or it doesn’t. A proper public debate is needed.
Best wishes, George.
A debate is needed on the NHS.
I second Geri’s remarks upthread.
It won’t exist at all unless we go independent.
Philippa Whitford gave an excellent speech during indyref. (Available on YouTube if someone can do links – ‘Philippa Whitford at Hamilton September 12th) just before indy vote. She explained, through first hand experience of spending her entire career in the NHS under Tories, the absolute state of the NHS, it’s constant reorganising, it’s cuts to funds, it’s outsourcing & how, as she explained it, was all the drip drip of how to fool an entire nation the NHS was in crisis when it wasn’t – it was amongst the top healthcare systems in the world as measured by the commonwealth fund in comparison to other countries.
They start with outsourcing the little things no one would notice first. The Tories want to be like the US & herd ppl onto private health care & the quickest way to achieve it was to underfund & understaff.
She also mentions the extortionate student fees at eighteen or so which drives talent away & she also touched on those who were quite happy to pay for little things on the NHS, but like you say, that wouldn’t be saving the NHS. It’s either a free health service or it isn’t.
Anyway, worth a listen if yer interested.
On another note regarding SNHS – procurement was stripped from Holyrood too in the power grab & at the time a thread on twitter explained that would also include even the drugs our NHS could source.
Nothing will get better staying in the Union. Soon all of us will have no option but stump up ten grand or just go off & die somewhere – handy that they also plan on offering us that option too! Uncanny!
i agree the general public are not being informed of the link between our animal/processed food diet and the tsunami of deaths from heart disease, cancers, diabetes, in the advanced world.
You may want to check out the work of Dr Dean Ornish, Dr Michael Greger, on you tube, if you want to be better informed, live longer and live healthier.
Craig Murray two-hours ago.
The UK and US are this moment bombing Yemen in support of jJen0c-ide
2024 was the year when millions of people came to realise that the Nato powers and their allies are the greatest force of organised evil in the world.
Well, well, well.
The war criminal Tony Blair, and Mi6, wanted to work with Syria’s Assad, to defeat Al-Jolani. Now British diplomats cavort with the proscribed terrorist Al-Jolani.
“Senior MI6 officials wanted help from Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad to stop terrorists entering Iraq in 2004, it has emerged.
US troops were coming under attack from foreign fighters with links to Al Qaeda, which had gained a foothold there following the fall of Saddam Hussein.
Among them was Syrian Islamist Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, also known as Ahmed al-Sharaa, who would eventually overthrow Assad.
British diplomats met Jolani this month in Damascus where he called for a terrorism designation on his rebel group to be lifted.
That group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), is currently listed under UK terrorism law as an alternative name for Al Qaeda.
Sir John Sawers, who was Tony Blair’s foreign policy adviser and went on to run MI6, has called Jolani’s group a “liberation movement”.
Yet 20 years ago when Blair was prime minister, Jolani and his associates were on the cusp of forming an Iraqi branch of Al Qaeda, which posed a real threat to Western forces in the region.
The risk was so serious that Blair was willing to ask for help from Assad, whose dictatorship was notorious for torture.”
link to declassifieduk.org
Peacemaking?
I wonder where else it happened. Oh yes. the UK. Blair was also a part of that.
Measurable benefits of the Union
Sir Michael Marmot notes, ” Since 2010, our five-year olds have been showing signs of reduced growth, a likely symptom of policies that have led to impoverished lives”. The greater the deprivation the shorter the child.
“Syria has made at least 6 appointments of foreign terrorists – to senior military position, including Uighur, Chechen, Jordanian and Albanian.
All 50 appointments are Sunni Muslim. Not one Christian, Shia or Alawite.”
Syria appoints some foreign Islamist fighters to its military, sources say | Reuters
It’s criminal what they are doing. Assad will be considered Mother Teresa at this rate.
Imagine inviting in a bunch of foreign head chopping mercenaries to run a country & then giving them keys to the weapons store..
What could possibly go wrong? Typical colonising barstewards – let the bloodshed & chaos commence while they bleed the oil, water & food dry…
On Alex Salmond’s birthday today Kirk J Torrance blog has a personal remembrance. Interestingly Jennifer Dempsie is mentioned. I haven’t heard or seen anything from her for a while.
The article is also on The Crossgate Centre facebook.
Tommy Scott: Scotland Forever: Scotland Forever:
“Days are gone
Oh my land, my home
When our fathers fought to be free
Now we have our say
We will lead the way…
Proud and brave, oh our fathers gave
For the right to think as we do
And in freedoms name, we would stand again…
High above the land that I love
There’s a flag that is dearest to me
Let the banners fly, neath a Scottish sky
Once more, oh Scotland forever…”:
link to tinyurl.com
#LoveYouScotland
The National – on its way to Sunday Post-style comic status, but with far fewer readers.