Wings Over Scotland

A remarkable insight into how Scottish Labour MPs see the people of Scotland, and the future that awaits us after a No vote, from an article posted on Labour Uncut today:

“Uncut recently put the point to a Scottish member of the [Parliamentary Labour Party] that while it is hard to imagine Scotland voting for an uncertain future outside the EU, keeping the UK together by playing on these fears risks perpetuating Scottish grievance against the English. They were unrepentant.

‘They need to be told. It’s like a child saying they want to play in the rain. They can do if they want but they need to know that they’ll get wet.'”

Hear that, people of Scotland? For even considering taking control of your own affairs like adults, Scottish Labour (ironically) thinks you’re behaving like stupid kids too dumb to come in out of the rain. Mm, feel the respect from your representatives.

Read the rest of this entry →

We’ve written often about the contempt with which both the No campaign and the media regards voters, particularly in respect of their willingness to tell them even the most insultingly transparent lies in the assumption they’ll be swallowed anyway.

Allan Massie in today’s Telegraph may have set a new all-time record, though.

Read the rest of this entry →

From today’s Telegraph.

And there’s plenty more where that came from.

Read the rest of this entry →

… someone from the No campaign or a right-wing newspaper tries to tell you that Scotland’s attitudes to the EU aren’t actually very different to those in the rest of the UK, just show them this striking graphic and tell them to shush.

(And don’t take any “Well then we’d have to join the Euro!” cobblers either.)

If we choose to remain in the UK and the UK has a referendum on EU membership (which it’s highly likely to), there isn’t a whole lot of doubt about the outcome. There’s only one way to make sure Scotland stays in Europe. Businesspeople planning a No vote because they fear “uncertainty” might want to have a wee think about that.

A Radio 4 “Point Of View” programme by the writer and philosopher Roger Scruton on Friday evening attracted quite a lot of social-media ire from nationalists. We can only assume they were so angered by a few crass factual errors (“The Scottish economy is subsidised by the English”) and Dr Scruton’s rather patrician manner that they didn’t bother to listen all the way to the end.

“Suppose then we English were finally allowed a say in the matter, which way would I vote? I have no doubt about it. I would vote for English independence, as a step towards strengthening the friendship between our countries.

It was thanks to independence that the Americans were able at last to confess to their attachment to the old country, and to come to our aid in two world wars. Independence is what real friendship requires. And the same is true for those, like the Scots and the English, who live side by side.”

We can’t say we find anything there to disagree with. After some of the cross-border ugliness and bad feeling that’s been whipped up by the actions of Unionists lately, the only outcome of the referendum that will allow the people of Scotland and England to regard each other with dignity and mutual respect in the future is a Yes vote. Crawling pathetically back to London with our tail between our legs won’t do it.

(An update on this post.)

If the next Ipsos MORI poll shows a significant drop in the No lead, we can probably call that definitive. The days of the No camp being 30+ points ahead seem to be well and truly over. Five out of the seven British Polling Council members polling on the independence referendum now put the required swing for Yes at just 5-6%. Looks like Wings pollsters Panelbase were at the cutting edge again after all.

To save time, just take everything we said last week and repeat.

Perhaps the most telling thing, though, about this week’s edition of what now appears to be the BBC’s official late-night No-campaign propaganda slot is that Iain Martin used to be the editor of the Scotsman. Readers can draw their own conclusions.

Read the rest of this entry →

SATIRE:

REALITY:

At least, we THINK we’ve got those the right way round.

Read the rest of this entry →

The Scotpulse poll we mentioned last night in a frankly shameful outbreak of tooting our own horn actually released two sets of data, accompanied by an odd email apologising that the survey had featured an overly wide range of questions. We don’t know if we’re going to see the others at any point, but the second one released yesterday was intriguing.

And we’re not talking about the somewhat leading preamble.

Read the rest of this entry →

Here’s we’re-not-actually-sure-what-he-is Bob Mills earlier this evening on Radio 4’s News Quiz, hosted by Sandi Toksvig with a very quiet Fred MacAuley twisting his tartan bunnet in the corner and hoping for a pat on the head.

Whatever will they do for laughs without us?

Someone just forwarded us the results of a survey by STV’s polling arm Scotpulse. It’s a “wordcloud” of the sort we have on this very site (it’s over on the right hand side and down a bit, marked “Tags”), where the more significant something is the bigger its name gets printed. It pretty much speaks for itself.

You’re the ones who put the word out there, readers. It’s working. Thank you.

Read the rest of this entry →