By way of example
With reference to our post from earlier today, we couldn’t help but notice Scottish Labour whining loudly this morning about the award of the ScotRail franchise to Dutch state-owned railway company Abellio. (On what sound like very good terms.)
We asked the party’s infrastructure spokesman James Kelly what Labour would have done instead had they been in power, and got no reply. So we went and had a look, and it turned out there was a clear and simple answer.
Labour’s “Powers For A Purpose” document from March 2014, outlining the party’s proposals for further devolution, spends just two of its 298 pages discussing the subject of the railways, with most of the content cribbed from a Co-op Party paper last year. It supports some vague notion of a not-for-profit franchise – starting AFTER the end of the period just awarded to Abellio.
In other words, Labour would have done exactly what the Scottish Government has just done – given the contract from 2015 to 2025 to the best tender from the available private-sector bidders (public ownership being currently forbidden by UK law, in the shape of a 1993 act not repealed by Labour during 13 years of Westminster power).
Labour would have done nothing differently to the SNP for at least 11 years, which in political terms might as well be forever. Readers will, we’re quite certain, be just as astonished as we are to see them bleating piously about it anyway.
Totally astonished.
I am giddy about the prospect of May 2016.
Cannot wait to see Labour take an absolute thumping!
And here’s why we still need Wings.
Any newspapers picking this up, or is that the most stupid of stupid questions?
Pure astonishin so it is by the way…
Does this mean the Coop goes on the boycott list?
Seriously do you not think that there will be more than enough of this sort of hypocrisy to keep you going as long as you want to and that people aren’t willing to pay to be informed?
Not astonished.
Big problem people is that this is SLab we’re talking about so its not really astonishing, only to be expected.
I guess James Kelly MSP would rather the money leaked out to the shareholders of private companies? Or award the contract to a substandard UK-based company of any kind?
Another political titan from the Labour stable.
Labour party, hypocrisy?- astonishes me not never
Is it just me? No twitter link/icon
Whining from the sidelines – It’s what Labour do.
Bereft of policies, ideas and initiatives, what else are they going to do with all that time on their hands?
You have answered your own question from earlier Stuart. You have to keep doing what you are doing and shine a light on these ("Tractor" - Ed)s to Scotland
Why would anyone on earth want to vote for these selfish cretins astonishes me.
Roll on the GE when we can kick the buggers out.
I’m not surprised at all.
Isn’t this how Labour swung the no vote, relying on people not doing any background research of their own.
Thanks for pointing it out Stu.
Doug Daniel says:
8 October, 2014 at 12:50 pm
And here’s why we still need Wings.
Any newspapers picking this up, or is that the most stupid of stupid questions?
Too right. Our long term aim remains, but in the meantime, our main objective ought to be the destruction of the main remaining barrier to progress, namely the Red Tory party.
Not only did they fail to repeal the Railways Act 1993 – or, for that matter, the Transport Act 1985 (bus deregulation) – but I am sure Tony Blair is on record as having said that Labour would have gone ahead with rail privatisation even if the Tories hadn’t.
Anyway, James Kelly MSP – what’s wrong with Scottish profits being used to support Dutch public transport? I thought you people were are all in favour of ‘pooling and sharing’.
The old cliche is that railways run much better on the Continent. It will be interesting to see if they are able to improve the train service in Scotland.
You have just answered your last srticle.
End of.
‘Labour would have done nothing differently to the SNP for at least 11 years, which in political terms might as well be forever.’
And, if I’m not mistaken, the SG have inserted a break clause in the new franchise after 5 years.
When everyone else is robbing Scotland blind, why should we exclude the Dutch (Orange Order) from exploiting the dim and dumb Scots.
After all, Fred the Shred led the way with ABM AMRO, and we all know how well that turned out in 2007/08.
PFI – with TTIP on it`s way, sponsoring BLAB Ministers.
The majority voted last month to be screwed – so hell slap it into `em.
Pure, free market competition for creation & management of large capital infrastructure projects such as
railways
airports
seaports
electrical distribution
water etc
is simply not possible. For example, it is inconceivable to have multiple wires from different suppliers of electricity, telephony & internet being run into your house simultaneously. Thus, also we don’t have 4 railway lines running in parallel between Glagsow & Inverness.
But the UK Gov, apparently revulsed at the idea of state ownership, has cobbled together a half arsed strategy of defining a cost/margin/profit/safety envelope & then inviting private companies to bid to operate within them.
It sits somewhere between a free market & a price controlled market but never achieves the efficiency it might if left to pure market forces but is nevertheless driven by the opportunity for a shareholder to make some money.
Thus, the margin that would have been kept & reinvested by a State run operator is actually given away as a profit to a hedge fund, investor, private equity firm or just some greedy non exec director who just happens to be a Westminster MP with connections to the transport sector.
The motive of course is that the cost of running these hugely expensive operations is kept of the government’s balance sheet.
But as consumers, we pay a heavy price, literally, because any financial benefits gained through efficiencies disappears down the pockets of institutional investors, instead of being reinvested.
South British Labour had years to reverse this Thatcherite philosophy but of course did nothing but tinker with the parameters of the franchise of any number of similar, half arsed, public private partnerships.
It is all to do with they furriners speaking furrin, like?
I bet the Dutch train drivers, maybe even the asylum seeker sweeping Amsterdam Station speak better English than most Labour (S)MPs
dissin the Shite they feed us.
In reference to this and the last article:
Interesting. I suppose going down the route this article does runs the ‘risk’, if there is one, of being a Scottish Media Lens. I personally think that would be no bad thing. I think Wings would do brilliantly at it and it’d be something that Scotland and Scottish people could get into the habit (if they aren’t already!) of checking this site immediately after seeing a story somewhere to see how this site analyses it.
An issue arising from entertaining this as a direction is that reasoned analyses of a largely unionist-oriented media will inevitably be looked on as biased or partisan, even if you do analyse ostensibly unbiased msm [guffaws at the notion].
Personally, I think the analyses of news/press-releases etc in the way this article does would be brilliant for Scotland and would love to see Wings carry on with it. Whether the msm does so intentionally or not, it is remarkable to see the continuing attacks on a democratically elected government which is still very popular being reported as fact. An alternative view available quickly would continue to be much welcomed and, i’m pretty sure, the public immediately checking the alternative view is something that will continue to grow in Scotland. Why not stay mining the rich seam and further benefiting the people?
Echo Doug Daniel above. Wings is the only objective journalism in Scotland. I get a very, very creepy feeling that it might be the only journalism anywhere. Could be near time to talk about subscription, Stu, rather than the occasional appeal for help.
FFS, people give the BBC £145 a year to be told lies – surely an attempt at truth commands a better price?
I agree entirely with Croompenstein. This article answers your questions.
@Doug
The MSM in Scotland are simply not interested in holding SLAB in particular to account for their actions, their policy, or their behaviour. In fact, the reverse is true, Lamont, Kelly, Bailie, Alexander, Murphy etc can say whatever they like, safe in the knowledge that they will never, or very rarely, be taken to task for their deceit and stupidity.
It simply wasn’t practical to either ‘gift’ the franchise to FirstGroup, or indeed to take the whole business into the public sector. The Labour comments (and the union’s comments, for that matter) are simply silly.
The real need for clear public control is in the network, not the franchises – I think that the current arrangements work better than they are given credit for, given that any railway is going to need lots of public money. The need is to ensure that the franchise delivers what it says it will.
Ha Ha Ha, Kelly is the one who moaned at the Scotlandshire guys about being invisible..LOL
link to tinyurl.com
nae police libdem conference
owe 800k
walofs
Nothing surprises me about the Labour Party. They strive incessantly to maintain the lowest political standards that they constantly fail to achieve.
You have just answered your own question about the road ahead.This is, and many items like this, is what needs to be outed constantly by Wings.
You do a great job. More strength to your arm Rev.
They are at it. Labour continuing the lie-based politics!
Can’t fool us anymore.
(Yes, you are bad at holidays..lol)
I thought, according to the so-called ‘Labour internationalist’ outlook, that there is no difference between and Scottish railway worker and a Dutch one.
The Bain principle seems to have negated that one.
They could eventually have had the powers to change it to the way they wanted, had they supported a yes vote. Could’ve been in power backed up with control of everything within 18 months,but they preferred the Tories.
Here is what you could have won…
I thought, according to the so-called ‘Labour internationalist’ outlook, that there is no difference between a Scottish railway worker and a Dutch one.
The Bain principle seems to have negated that one.
Scottish Labour would bicker with SNP even over the colour of grass. Such is their bitterness, that in denying the Scottish people a chance to enrich themselves with independence, that they have literally sliced their own throat in doing so. They would gleefully see the end of their own existence, just as long as they believed it would take the SNP with them.
For Scottish Labour, the next two years will prove that their actions and statements during the referendum debate is going to be even worse than the pyrrhic victory that they believed that they had won. What’s the point of victory, even a bitter one, if you are wiped out over the next two years.
By the way, am I the only one who thinks a Dutch influence in transport can only be good for Scotland?
Thae mere fact that he refers to “ScortRail” rather than “Scotrail” demonstrates just how detached Labour officials are from Scotland.
Yup, agree with most of what’s been said here and on the earlier post. This is exactly the sort of nonsense that needs to be exposed – and since there’s no-one else doing it… did you see any squirrels?
ScortRail
He was only trying to emulate Flipper’s pronunciation!
Tick tock, tick tock for SLAB
‘Scottish labour’ they really think we’re thick do they not?
Well, when the Unionist deliver promised Devo Max, of course all transport policy will be devolved. Then, when the current franchise ends, SG can renationalise the railways. Simple.
Now all we need is for the Smith commission to deliver.
I’m not holding my breath!
This piece of journalism will not be replicated anywhere in the mainstream Scottish media. And done by a bloke on his holiday, makes you think eh?
Stu,
Is this article the first in what I hope is the strategy of Wings carrying on as before? 🙂
WooHoo! WooHoo!
RED alert! RED alert!
Just when you thought it was safe to come out from under the bomb shelter guess what … SHE’S BACK! 😉
They’re coming to take me away ha ha!
They’re coming to take me away! 😛
Oh and just in case no one else says it … I’m astonished! 😀
@Lesley-Anne
Missed you!!
The whole international business structure is insane. So we have a Dutch rail company running ancient Scottish diesel trains (trains in Holland are electric and relatively new). And here in my part of Holland we have the massive French transnational Veolia running the buses.
Get this straight: It’s not that there will suddenly be lots of Dutch folk working on the Scottish trains and we don’t have French folk driving buses in Holland. The same people stay in the same jobs, except without their say so they are effectively working for a new company.
To be honest any twat who can write good tender applications and temporarily show some optimistic financials (I’m sure Goldman Sachs can sort that out) could win a contract which boils down to:
“I take over your network, staff, paint my logo on your vehicles and get tax payer subsidies and your existing customer base and you still do all the work. Meanwhile I run it into the ground and pocket the money and bugger off to some other hapless place in 2025, whereupon you need to bail out the whole system using tax money. Once it’s on its feet again you invite another transnational to take it over for a pittance. Rinse and repeat.”
Yup, astonished. 🙂
@benarmine
Spot on!
@Lesley-Anne
Hey babe, ready for round two? 🙂
I’m assuming our friends in the MSM, written and broadcast, being the professional journalists they are, will have taken that same simple step rather than regurgitating press releases, and will be giving us the full story.
That’s precisely why we need you to continue doing what you do Stu.
Hi Nana.
I just needed time away from everything, most importantly all things computeristically minded. 😛
I’m back now so look out folks the Sarcasm Kid is back and looking to get doing some good old fashioned sarcasmy thingyamagigerrypokery! 😀
@Lesley-Anne
Don’t blame you for wanting some down time. Mine is coming soon…
Looking forward to some sarcasmy thingyamagigerrypokery!
I’m under the impression, that Keith Brown can’t pick a Scottish based firm, due to some act of which I’ve forgotten, Mr Brown therefor must pick a foreign company, I also think Westminster have a say in the matter.
I also recall the west coast line fiasco when it was awarded to a company closer to home, and this iccurred a £50 million pound fine.
Labour had the power to quash the act, but didn’t that’s why Mr Brown can’t give the contract to a home company.
RMT spokesman on radio Scotland news, condemning Keith Brown for giving the contract to a Dutch firm, even though Mr Brown, can’t legally give the contract to a home grown firm.
Ah wish they’d learn a new tune!!
Hi Macart.
Yup, sure am! My Sarcasmy jiggerrypokery battery whastimajig has been recharged and the engine is now purring like a kitten … or should that be a Queen? 😛
I’ll try my best Nana not to disappoint you or the rest of the motley krew too much! 😉
Transport hasnt been James Kellys forte since he tried to transport a bunch of visiting Labour lovebomb MPs from Central station to Buchanan Street only to be met with Rick Shaw shouting “BOW TO YOUR IMPERIAL MASTERS”.
On the video you can clearly see wee James in his brown velour jacket is well affronted, or not!
@Lesley-Anne
They’ll not be purring for long kiddo. First port of call is to put a savage dent in their egos this coming spring. Next up will be building on that 45% and the momentum for change. I don’t think we’ll be waiting anywhere near twenty years for another bite at the cake. I think another opportunity will present itself and by popular demand, a LOT sooner than many think. 😉
My initial reaction to Stu’s question about covering wider political issues was that he shouldn’t go down that route and should stay focussed on independence. But on reflection, and having read some of the comments, I have changed my mind.
There is a risk that the high level of unity amongst the Wings community could be lost. Independence is a unifying force for Wingers, but if we start dealing with wider issues we could fragment. A rampant free marketeer, a socialist, a libertarian and a nationalist can all agree on a common aim of independence – at least in theory. But get them talking on wider issues and they will tear each other apart.
However, if Stu and all the commenters operate on a basis of exposing lies and hypocrisy, not indulging in prejudice and forming opinion based on facts and reason, then there is an opportunity to raise the game of Scottish politics beyond the rather unsavoury business that it has become. If all the politicians are forced to be more careful and reasoned in what they say and argue for, that has to be a good thing. And if we believe that independence for Scotland is genuinely the best constitutional arrangement, then we should be happy to let reason prevail because that is where it will take us.
So on balance, while there are risks, I think that Wings should widen its scope and continue to be a monitor that politicians fear. After all, the mainstream media are not doing it – and it needs done.
There’s an article on Newsnet basically outlining how the referendum was stolen, ie Scotland’s Independence stolen by a fraudulent system with incoherent recourse procedures.
Now I know some people can’t bring themselves to accept the possibility of perfidious albion acting in such a manner but the point is this.
This article, about one of the many side effects of No has been tweeted 200+ times.
A very serious one about the possible methods used to defraud us of our freedom only 50 something tweets.
We have until 30th October to do anything about this democratic travesty.
I suggest we get on it.
Plenty time to prepare for the next offensive after that.
If the Dutch railways take over Scottish rail, maybe you’ll get a free Edam or Gouda for each ticket bought?
Smocking joints will be free inside the coaches, naturally.
This article, for me, suggests the answer to the question you posed in The Way Ahead. I’d like to see pieces like this where you analyse and comment on current issues, from wherever they arise. At the same time, of course, keeping independence to the fore as one of those issues. To a great extent, isn’t this what you’re already doing for some time with, for obvious reasons, the emphasis on indy.
I think it’s really important that there are as many alternative voices as possible to msm – particularly BBC Scotland, which I loathe and revile. It’s like an alien occupying force.
To be honest Macart I reckon that despite all the faux bravado we are seeing from Cameron he is actually keeching his breeks! Let’s face it HE won yet despite that it is the SNP who are winning the members game with over 100,000 members. As of last night that was 77,777 NEW members since 19th September, I wonder how many new members the Tory party have, oh wait a minute they don’t have any NEW members they just haemorrhage old members to UKIP don’t they? 😛
I like the idea of having to wait 20 years though, well that’s what I tell the NO voters, it kind of gives them a nice wee warm glow inside. I’d hate to think of what the news of U.D.I. in 2016 will do to the poor wee souls. 😀
@Lesley-Anne
Oh they’re bricking it alright. Three conferences and three calls for the SNP to tell us to move on. HAH! Like that’s going to work. 😀
I don’t think they expected the amazing response to the referendum result that has occurred in Scotland. I believe they thought we’d be covered in sackcloth and ashes hiding away in a corner full of depression. Don’t know about anyone else, but I’m pissed off and ready for that round two. I’m f**ked if I’ll lie down and give up on my beliefs because somebody tells me to.
Now their worst nightmare has come to pass and they’ve got an angry, polarised and up for it public rushing toward their independence parties of choice to sign up and put their cash and shoe leather to good use. 🙂
And cue the never ending resignation calls by Labour in the run up to the general election. They will try to discredit and tarnish every SNP minister for thats all they have. Vision? None. Policies? Forget it. A clue? You have to be joking! If you think they fought a dirty campaign in the referendum, you aint seen nothing yet! Did you see that smirking, smarmy lil stick of shit Graeme Pearson on Scotland Tonight last night?
I meant: “Joint smocking will be permitted inside the coaches.” Pfff… I’m plum’ tuckered.
LA
The Tories are haemorrhaging their members to the big Blue Rinse heaven in the shy.
Stu,
Have you thought of changing your name to Moses.
(He was a guy who ended up leading a nation to their Promised Land – sorry, I’ve no link, but I’m sure I read that somewhere.)
I’ll just get the lead
Here boy . . .
The funniest aspect of this is watching Labour complain that they’ve had the temerity to award it to a State railway. Just errm not a British state one. The state ones that they forbade to bid.
lamont has outlined in her speech today some plans, that depends on the fiscal powers, productivity, and freedoms, that can only be provided/achieved/delivered by an indyscot.
how thoughtful.
Well I suppose when you have three non descript parties led by three non descript millionaires then what else can we expect? They all come from the *ahem* ruling classes and as such when they tell us to be cow towing to them for every little morsel and tit bit of nothingness they assume that we will be doing just exactly that. What a pity they have no real recollection of what life is like in the REAL world, I wonder if Milliband has figured out what the weekly cost of a bag of groceries is yet or is he still dumbfounded by that one! 😉
I am feeling the same as you, seriously p****d off. In fact that was part of the reason for my recent absence, too p****d off to face anything or anyone for that matter. Still that’s behind us all now. The good news of course is that our wee darling Ruthie and her best mate John McTernan may yet be providing us all with some good old entertainment when they appear in front of the beak on charges of interfering with the referendum. I guess neither one of them understands yet the power of the internet and the ability of individuals to capture wee moments like these. 🙂
link to tinyurl.com
link to tinyurl.com
I love it when a plan comes together as a certain TV individual might say. They think they are so smart but in their smartness they actually let the cat out of the bag and I feel certain a great deal of keech is about to fall on them and their *cough* assistants who did a wee extra curricular counting in the lead up to the vote. 😀
O/T What are the chances of trying to get the Smith Commission proceedings televised? It would make for some very interesting viewing as we would get to see what is being offered rather than have to wait for the sanitised reports from the MSM… who would of course only report what suits their masters.
As usual the BBC have been giving Slab a good backing for this via air time with various Slab numpties over the day, particularly this morning.
So nothing has changed folks, the BBC are not going to change, Slab are not going to change,SNP are bad. So they mean to carry on and try and damage it while promoting Slab.
Seriously,something needs to be done. They are the enemy of Scots, blatently obvious.
Imagine: a part-time journalist in Bath uncovers a hidden story and screams it out on the internet with almost no effect on the majority of the population because they never get to hear about it – MSM schtum.
OR – a national independence daily newspaper picks up the story and yells it out in big headlines on every newsstand or newsagent in the country reaching the majority of the population at home or at their workplaces. Forcing the MSM to take notice of the facts and not hide them by ommission or “forgetting” it.
Thanks for that info BtP, I was wondering where the blue rinse set had gone. I knew one place they had NOT gone and that was to the Tory party conference! 😛
@Lesley-Anne
They deserve it. 🙂
link to scottishstatesman.com
link to newsnetscotland.scot
The ballot paper for the Referendum
was ideally suited to electronic counting.
This option must have been rejected for a reason.
But what is that reason ?
The Electoral Commission and Board present themselves
as staffed by highly competent and qualified people.
A class of primary kids could have done a better job.
.
Still outstanding is the 800,000 spare ballot papers;
No exit poll allowed;
And no recount allowed after the official announcement.
Over to Mary Pitcaithly OBE, Chief Counting Officer.
Slightly O/T.
The creepiness of Slab knows no bounds.
link to benefitsandwork.co.uk
See how the main charities are backing Slab. This is grim reading.
link to tinyurl.com
I think that holding unionist politicians and the MSM to account is an important role for Wings.
Lets face it Westminster wants to get back to business as usual and the partisan press will line up behind their favoured parties. The Mail and the Telegraph etc behind the Tories and the Daily Record and Sunday Mail etc behind Labour. Their tribal hostility towards the SNP Scottish Government and the Nationalist movement will carry on much as before.
During the Referendum campaign , Rev Stu. and Wings played a key role in questioning stories in the unionist press and the outpourings of unionist politicians. This is good investigative journalism and something that the Scottish public are crying out for. It is also why the number of people reading the articles and posts on this site has rocketed .Long may this continue and I’m forward to seeing how Wings develops in the coming weeks and months.
@Rev
See that’s what you do well Rev, stick at it and welcome back!
The knives are out even more than ever now for the SNP and therefore the Scottish Government and its ministers, not just to prop up Labour, but to prevent there ever being a Referendum on Independence again. One scare too many for Westminster, and if they could destroy the SNP the main Independence pushing party, they would.
However, this negative campaigning lost the Labour Party any chance of getting back in 2011 to Holyrood, and actually made the Referendum possible. But it needs constant highlighting, while at the same time, holding the SNP to account, and on the straight and narrow.
Good Luck!
Labour created the financial disaster that is the Edinburgh tram project.
Transport Initiatives Edinburgh (TIE), a company wholly owned by the City of Edinburgh Council (i.e. Labour), signed contracts with CAF who supplied the vehicles and with BBS (a consortium of Bilfinger Berger and Siemens) who designed and constructed the network.
But before any of that took place, a bunch of stuff in the ground had to be surveyed and moved. That was done by Parsons Brinckerhoff & SDS.
SDS is English
Parsons Brinckerhoff is American
CAF is Spanish
Bilfinger Berger & Siemens are German
Hey Labour, is the nationality of a vendor only important when it’s the SNP awarding contracts?
I totally agree Macart. Still at least if wee Ruthie gets sent down it will give her a wee break from all the tongue lashing she has been receiving from the First Minister the last couple of FMQ’s. 😛
Oh and remember when we were constantly being told that the NHS was safe in Westminster’s hands. Well take a wee gander at this folks in the Daily Mirror. I can’t archive it cause it freezes at the point of archive so you’ll have to bear with me, and the link, to the Daily Mirror. 😉
link to mirror.co.uk
Midgehunter – ‘Imagine: a part-time journalist in Bath uncovers a hidden story and screams it out on the internet’ er, PART TIME? Stu’s put in more hours on behalf of indy than most of us put together, inc 16hr days 7dpw, for over 2 yrs.
If we want him to continue his forensic analysis of ALL Scot or UK politics which impact on Scotland, we need to pay him more, for a starter, as he and this site have to continue.
1.6 million of us voted for indy, how can we assure all these indy supporters vote for non – unioinist parties in the WMGE and HE in 2016?
Well, I think keeping Stuey’s beady forensic eye on proceedings will help enormously, as will his readers’ input.
We need to keep the focus on the unionist parties’ duplicity and dismantling of the NHS + welfare, not to mention all unionist parties support fracking inc in the leafy enclaves of wealthy Scots, in the lead up to both elections and send a strong anti-unionist message to WM.
Then we win. 😉
And Malcolm Bruce has just indicated that the S.N.P. Should be put back into a box, ( thereby leaving the 3/4 U.K. Political parties to continue thier comfy position in Westminster of fighting like ferrets in a sack, it’s a “game”they are all familiar with.)
And you wonder Stew, what “Wings”should concentrate on,I think that your, (and the posters on here) anger at the political situation over the next three, to six months,will dictate the direction of investigations and comments, in short Stew, dinna even think of taking your foot off the accelerator!, keep the motor running.
@Lesley-Anne
Every publicy funded body being stripped bare by wastemonster.
Would be interesting to see who in the Scottish pro union parties have their grubby mitts in the NHS pie.
Yes Guy: the folk who vote for S Lab mostly do it out of force of habit. They recall a time when they could put their hopes in Labour.
I agree that they’ll get what they deserve. They voted for this last month when they changed sides after being bribed by the folk that know they can be bribed to change sides. Hell mend them all.
Not only did they fail to repeal the Railways Act 1993 – or, for that matter, the Transport Act 1985 (bus deregulation) – but I am sure Tony Blair is on record as having said that Labour would have gone ahead with rail privatisation even if the Tories hadn’t.
Anyway, James Kelly MSP – what’s wrong with Scottish profits being used to support Dutch public transport? I thought you people were are all in favour of ‘pooling and sharing’.
Ah, the paradox of the Labour Party. They claim to be left-wing, but only when talking about British people. For “dirty foreigners” its right-wing “I’m alright jack” policies all the way. When it comes to nationalism. sub-state level and supra-state level nationalism is to be despised as a great evil, but British nationalism is a cherished ideal of fluffy goodness.
There is a term for this strange muddle of nationalistic left wing rhetoric and right wing xenophobia, but I shan’t mention it, because most people know its name already. It is a favourite insult of the Labour Party though.
I don’t know any who have Nana but I certainly know a great many who would LIKE to have their grubby mitts in the NHS pie and it starts with Lamont and works on down from there!
@ TJenny
“Midgehunter – ‘Imagine: a part-time journalist in Bath uncovers a hidden story and screams it out on the internet’ er, PART TIME? Stu’s put in more hours on behalf of indy than most of us put together, inc 16hr days 7dpw, for over 2 yrs.
If we want him to continue his forensic analysis of ALL Scot or UK politics which impact on Scotland, we need to pay him more, for a starter, as he and this site have to continue.”
Keep calm TJ, it’s a literal comparison between multi-million pound newspaper groups (MSM) with hordes of journalists and a, by comparison, small(?) but highly effective blog.
AND YES I do know what the Rev. has done, I’ve also been here for the last three years and made lots of donations. 🙂
@Albaman
Malcolm Bruce, what a jolly wheeze this expenses lark. Able to ’employ’ the wee wife at home as well as claim on two properties. link to archive.today
link to agirlcalledjack.com
It would be nice to have a list of the connections the Labour MP’s since 1997 past and present have had to all board appointments on Defence Industry Companies, non-NHS Health Companies, Transport Franchise Companies. I suppose why stop at Labour and see what all the other MP’s from other parties are on.
@Marcia
Good idea, would keep some keyboard warriors busy for a while. Then publish the results, name and shame each and every one.
I missed the earlier thread when at work but this post is exactly what Wings should be about for my tuppence worth.
My inclination is to keep WOS free from party backing, scrutinise the Unionist Parties, MSM and BBC to expose their lies and hypocrisy, and to keep the Independence momentum as high as possible in the meantime.
I think the production of a Wee Red Book (as mentioned many threads ago) where we expose the lies and failures of the Unionist parties to deliver on their Vow and other associated policies would be a fantastic contribution to the May 2015 GE campaign for all pro indy Yes supporting parties.
This article is just another great example that we need to counter, in this case, the British Labour aparatchiks.
Nana Smith says:
8 October, 2014 at 4:45 pm
@Marcia
Good idea, would keep some keyboard warriors busy for a while. Then publish the results, name and shame each and every one.
How about a Rogues Gallery? In a wee book to deliver to every household in Red Tory held constituencies.
Welcome back Rev…your leadership was sorely missed.
I was ready to abandon this site after yesterday’s internecine squabbling by people who should know better.
However, the point has to be made as per @Les Wilson, the same old agenda of BBC/SLAB attacking the SNP/SG on anything and everything has continued unabated and more importantly unchallenged!!
We cannot afford to let these institutions away with lying unabated. While the new media is assembling itself…these people who won the REF (i.e. the BBC) are setting up the unwitting 55% for more negative narratives.
They must be stopped…and only constant attacks and challenging of their reporting ,as Stu does so forensically on here, by our SG can really have the desired effect. ‘After you James’, playing by ‘Parliamentary’ rules is bullshit and failed us…just ask Blair Jenkins!
Silencing or at least curbing the BBC is the first priority..long before Yes Alliance deals are struck.
The weakness of the current position was reinforced to me when AS had to phone in to Call Kaye about the Poll Tax amnesty…I cannot believe that he hadn’t already requested a right of reply and been told to phone in. My own experience is that they will not allow me on to respond to the Unionist usual suspects on every other day.
I’ m still horrified by the Loyalist riot in George Square and the way that the msm and in particular the BBC lied about it…..This was a full scale concerted riot. Still no names or trials have appeared in the press ( to my knowledge) and no ringleaders have been charged with conspiracy to riot…..imagine if it had been ‘YESSERS!!
More sinister is the role of Police Scotland and their complete ‘unpreparedness’ and inability to contain said disorder. This from the force that has dealt with major football disturbances for over a century.
If we can’t depend on the Police to control the forces of loyalist reaction then we can forget about a proper new Scotland as we all want. There are known Loyalist N.I. terrorist residing in the North Ayrshire area who are apparently operating with impunity.
I wonder if any of these people were behind this disorder?
Unfortunately, the SNP and Yes distanced themselves from ‘Wings’ and Bella and even Wee Ginger Dug instead of using brilliant journalistic resources and commentary to back up the YES Narrative. We can’t let that happen again.
So, Rev Stuart, you have just proved that the SNP is no better than Labour! Not news to most of us. They’re all bourgeois parties, all wedded to neo-liberalism, that is to the rule of the corporations, against the people.
Our unions, by contrast, got it right: Manuel Cortes, leader of the TSSA rail union, added: “Only a few weeks ago, the Scottish people were promised the power to run a publicly owned railway which would put them first, ahead of private rail firms. Now the Scottish government wants to hand that railway to a firm run by Dutch state railways.”
And RMT general secretary Mick Cash told BBC Scotland: “We believe public ownership is better, is more efficient and it’s safer and it gives you great accountability. All you’re seeing in private ownership is that money’s being sucked out of the industry and given to the private sector shareholders, or in this case is going to go to subsidise the Dutch railways.”
So the SNP, again, works against the interests of Scottish workers, and boosts the profits, not of Scottish firms even, but of foreign corporations. Is that what you want? Is that the road to ‘independence’? Using our money to pay subsidies to Dutch capitalists?
Will Podmore
Please explain how you get around Section 25 of the 1993 Railway Act which is reserved to Westminster?
Even Alan Grogan has got in on the act of blaming the SNP for choosing a Dutch company saying the SNP could have delayed the decision and then nationalised the franchise at a cost of £30million.
”For those that are arguing the 1933 Railway Act prohibit us from nationalising the railways this is however not true.”
ASLEF say that:
” The key to doing anything is the powers under Section 26(z)(a) of the Railway Act 1993.”, so he agrees with the RMT.
O/T
Christine graham ripping through graham Pearson on his motion to get rid of mckaskill on RS just now.
It was a joy to behold. We certainly need fighters like her.
You seem to have a bit of problem with foreigners Will? Bad case of the ukips?
That position is a load of bollocks. Striving to keep a particular private company in control of the railways, and abandoning the franchise scheme would be utterly corrupt!
And the basis on which we should do this is some half arsed promise of future powers that might take years to materialise, if they do at all.
I would thank the scottish government, they have chosen to select the best competitive tender, aim to improve the service, and will not put scotland on hold for jam tomorrow promises.
Here is Section 26 of the Railway Act of 1993.
link to legislation.gov.uk
The RMT goon who was speaking (unchallenged, of course) on BBC Radio Scotland’s 3pm news actually accused the Scottish Govt of colluding with WM to give the franchise to the Dutch company.
For the record, and I know this may disappoint one or two who have already posted, under public procurement law the Scottish Govt had to award the franchise to the best bid.
Under UK law the Scottish Govt could not have set up a public body to take over the franchise.
An independent Scotland would still have the same public procurement laws (more or less) as they emanate from Brussels. However, it could have taken the railway operation into public ownership (on the Scottish Water model, perhaps) and avoided the procurement laws completely.
Allan Grogan seems to have a different take on this: can anyone confirm what he says in regards to th 1993 act?
link to allangrogan.com
/facepalm
Will and his foreigner bashing. It gets old.
I’d rather have a dutch company running the railway, than First, the biggest uber-capitalist scumbags in the industry. At least they know how to do it right.
See, all these labour backing folk who seem to be lashing out at the Scottish government for not nationalizing it need to understand one thing. Where is the money going to come from for such a grand project? Seriously. Please tell us. You would have a fair argument if Scotland was about to become an independent nation and had control over its own purse strings, however we remain in servitude to Westminster and rely on pocket money to get by. Get back to reality. Please.
Call me a cynic, but can anyone see a connection here between this contract for the SRN and the withdrawal of Virgin Airlines from Scotland? It is my betting that Branson invested heavily in a bid for this contract and having failed withdrew his airline from Scotland in a vindictive act of spite. It is the kind of petulant behaviour I would expect from this self serving egomaniac.
@Will Podmore “Only a few weeks ago, the Scottish people were promised the power to run a publicly owned railway which would put them first, ahead of private rail firms”,
And that’s exactly the point we need full control of all of our finances which would have occurred with indy but please tell me where is the finance going to come from, when WM is going to cut the Scottish block grant AND get rid of the Barnett formula?
It’s the thing that really annoys me about the so called socialists – moan, moan and moan again when the reality is the SG do not have the finances to fund everything, they have promised to preserve the NHS.
If in the future indy is achieved, then we can consider nationalising a lot of industries – the possible of new oilfields in the Clyde would be one I would push for.
Alan Grogan mentions Prestwick, but the reality was the SG hoped for indy where they could have reduced landing fees to encourage investment
Will Podmore
In my earlier post I talked about the downside of widening the scope of Wings and you illustrate this downside well. If we turn on the SNP, we will never get independence. That does not mean that we all have to agree with everything the SNP says or does, but to state the the Rev has “proved that the SNP are no better than Labour” is a. false and b. music to the ears of the unionists. They would love to see us bickering and undermining the one political party that has a chance of delivering independence any time in the foreseeable future.
Your comments are ill-informed and wrong – the SNP government is bound by legislation and could not nationalise the railways if it wanted to. And the Dutch company that has won the franchise are not “Dutch Capitalists”. They are a state owned enterprise.
I hope that your comment is not representative of the type of comments we will get if Wings starts dealing with broader topics. Informed comment, facts, logic, reason – that is the way to go.
Taranaich
His objection does not hold water as I wish it did as I want to see the Railways back under Public Control.
If you look at the legislation, the SG did open it to tender under the legislation and received a bid that was economically okay by the rules of the franchise bidding process. If they just gave it away to who they wanted to then expect a lot of legal challenges.
F126ZA
No adequate tender for franchise received.
.
(1)
This section applies in the case of an invitation to tender under section 26 for the provision of services if—
.
(a)
the appropriate franchising authority receives no tender in response to the invitation; or
.
(b)
it receives a tender but considers that the services would be provided more economically and efficiently if they were provided otherwise than under a franchise agreement entered into in response to the tender.
.
(2)
The appropriate franchising authority may —
.
(a)
issue a new invitation to tender under section 26 for the provision of the services;
.
(b)
decide to secure the provision of the services under a franchise agreement with a person who did not submit a tender; or
.
(c)
decide not to seek to secure the provision of the services under a franchise agreement.
.
(3)
Nothing in this section prevents the appropriate franchising authority, where it has decided not to seek to secure the provision of services under a franchise agreement, from subsequently making a decision to issue a new invitation to tender for the provision of those services.]
Will Podmore, are you really a fud?
Amazing. I agree with every post above.
Rev Stu – you must consider the many suggestions above.
It is the way to keep the movement alive and with a focus.
Independence and related matters are paramount.
However so are ‘party’ politics and should be aired and also discussed with an iron rod in your hands as moderator – no bad language, vindictiveness etc. etc. – we might then have political discourse in the new Scotland that is seen to be mature and the envy of many other countries.
@TD
He’s a Kipper. I remember his previous comments very well.
Viking Girl.
i have spoken to a few Labour supporters near me. Pensioners ,without the web. Their own families never discussed things with them. To many politics is “private”. i get a row when i bring it up.
They’re a funny bunch who have lived through war and the likes. They were too scared to vote YES, fearing not just for pensions, but the fear they’re kids would lose their jobs.
I was angry with them for a while. But you have to accept that at they’re age change is often too much for them. And make no mistake. they were singled out for an attack by every single area of the MSM. poor buggers never saw it coming….. and neither did we .
Younger labour voters i know don’t mention the party much. They have little faith in them and have an air of apathy about them.
If you take your time and talk about changing things they often come round on their own.
But there is a hard core of blind and deaf Party before country group. They are the nasty side. They fail to see how much to the right they have gone. Ignore them.
Next time i will talk to every pensioner weeks before the GE. many now see that the they were wrong. But they need constant support. We tend to forget that. wee reminders that their kids jobs will be safe, etc.
We learn from our mistakes. We plan better and we ensure everyone gets the info continually.
And sorry for going on VG. but i think the younger more tech savy are more interested now. They’re ripe for action. We should cash in on that before they get bored. They are the future.
ONCE A YESSER ALWAYS A YESSER.
O/T I thought unseating Charles Kennedy was a long shot but I just heard Clegg Pairing AS with Farage. Maybe it isn’t such a long shot as I thought.
James Kelly hasn’t read the Labour Party rule book:
link to labourlist.org
If he had, he would know that putting money into the Dutch public Transport system, which is by definition a European institution, complies with their Aims and Values, Clause IV Section 3:
” Labour is committed to the defence and security of
the British people and to co-operating in European
institutions, the United Nations, the Commonwealth
and other international bodies to secure peace,
freedom, democracy, economic security and
environmental protection for all.’
Giving money to a fellow European country demonstrates solidarity across Europe!!!
The Labour Party (North British branch) are utterly hopeless, long may that continue.
Stu, it looks to me as if you have just answered your own question as to the way ahead. Writing and questioning of this type is exactly what you should continue doing. This article keeps us alert to the absolute tripe being peddled by an empty and increasingly discredited Labour party as well as showing by example what journalism is supposed to be about.
OK, I cannot fathom these critics of the SNP award of the rail franchise to the Dutch state run railways.
1. The rules, controlled by Westminster, for tendering, exclude tendering by state run bodies from the UK.
2. The banning of state run tendering from the UK is enshrined in a Westminster law, which Holyrood cannot change.
3. The Scottish Government have on three occasions asked Westminster to allow tenders from public bodies (state run), and on each occasion Westminster refused to do so.
4. When in power in Westminster for 13 years, the Labour party could have changed the legislation. They chose not to.
So, to summarise, the SNP cannot change the rules, the tendering process followed the rules. Labour say the Scottish Government should have either (a) Broken the rules, or (b) waited at huge cost (over 30 million pounds), in the hope that Westminster would change the rules.
Seriously people criticising this decision by the Scottish Government are just too daft for words. The stupidity of Labour never cases to amaze me.
p.s Just for the record, when Labour were last in power in Holyrood, they awarded the franchise to the privately run First group, in 2004. They did NOT open the tendering process to state run bodies.
And another thing too. the Scottish rail system is still running on Victorian era infrastructure in some parts. Its going to take hundreds of millions in investment to bring it up to scratch. Gorgon really is deluded if he thinks it is in any way comparable to Prestwick, which in scale was a relatively modest investment compared to what would actually be needed to bring the Rail system up to 20th century standards, never mind first world, 21st century standards!
Juteman.
Superb. What aw way to answer Will the pod troll.
Chuckling away here thank you sir.
There you go wil.
Your a FUD.
everytime i see your posts i now know who to answer to.
c/o The FUD
Piss off back to your BNP page
Just seen a good meme, Jola saying, ‘Haud on, where’s that boy with the eyebrows’ It’s a good question!
Well Labour abandoned their own Clause 4 and did not repeal any privatisation act in respect of former publicly-run services when they were 13 years in office. They even encouraged privatisation with rampant PFI contracts!
But of course they may have something against Dutch state-owned railways but they certainly don’t have a problem with French state-owned power stations supplying us with electricity, especially when Ed Milibot was energy minister at the time.
Just wondering how many Labour palms were greased by First Group to get that contract in the first place?
We’ve been here before. John Mackay of STV News just boomed out, “Controversy, as Scottish Government awards Rail Franchise to Dutch Company”
Whether the story is true or not, whether it is a good deal or not, it goes right into peoples living rooms as, SNP bad, job done.
Same as Kenny Macaskill, SNP, must resign because he is bad. Job done.
Ponsonby, his unionist partner in crime, and most over rated reporter on the telly, will chip in with his bias view.
And why did STV feel it was necessary yesterday to tell the world how many Protestants voted NO and how many Catholics voted YES.
Was this their contribution to the Devide and Conquer theory?
thoughtsofascot
Thanks. I should have known – I’m annoyed with myself for taking his comments at face value. Mental note for the future: Ignore Will Podmore – he’s not worth the time to type a response.
I’ve seen a few posts on the older generation which I do agree with a fair bit of it. My Mother and Father both voted YES after being sickend by the Labour party after years and years of promises and nothing done.
I think we have to think a bit outside of the box. Talk to the older generation by way of perhaps involving them in Tea Parties where they are able to freely express themselves in a larger group. For most the MSM was all they had because some aren’t able to get out much and discuss things with others so they didn’t get the chance to hear both sides of the story despite people coming to the door to speak to them on Independence it doesn’t involve them to be challenged and sometimes it takes the likes of thier own generation who can see it to suddenly make them think different. I found that 91 Year old woman introduced on the day before the Indyref to be superb but sadly only us folk on the internet got to see that because the MSM weren’t for showing it. Time to change the game and get them away from the box of lies that sits in the front room ….
In the minds of the red tories, foreign = bad. They were given plenty of air time on the subject by BBC Radio Scotland today. BBC seem to be trying to help SLAB to avoid electoral wipeout, and, in the process, are employing the same approach to which we became accustomed during the referendum campaign. The only difference is that UKOK/NO THANKS have been replaced by SLAB.
Will Podmore quoted Manuel Cortes of TSSA. Is he still Katy Clark’s partner? If so, and maybe even if not so, his remarks about what we were promised a few weeks ago are potentially compromised by that connection.
Tea Parties? That’s a bit patronising, isn’t it? Let’s not revisit apportioning blaming on a specific group in generalised terms. Surely ageism just as bad as racism.
You can’t do that, we wanted to. Labour,Scottish branch, are like a spoilt brat, pointing out the errors of others, because it’s what they would have done but, the swat got in there first.
Hen Broon,
As regards the Virgin service from Scotland to LHR, the fact is, it was, in many peoples views, pretty bland. It offered nothing to compete with the BA service, which I personally found disappointing. As a result, BA will shortly have a monopoly on services from Edinburgh to Heathrow. This can only be bad for prices and service levels – BA has recently downgraded its domestic (including Heathrow) service, and its business class product across Europe from Heathrow has been downgraded too.
This, I believe is as a result of a loss of British Midland several years ago, as a competitor, on some key routes.
If you look over to the USA, Virgin America (domestic) launched a few years ago with a highly innovative service, loads of legroom, movies on board etc.. It has done extremely well. In Scotland however, Virgin put in what seemed like no real effort. They used planes which I believe were leased from Aer Lingus and painted red, with no difference in legroom, or significantly improved service provision compared to BA.
I actually used to like their international airline (until Branson interfered in the referendum), but their domestic offering from Scotland was just not competitive.
STV and BBC Scotland are not even trying to disguise their bias reporting now. Scottish Labour must be doing worse than we all thought.
Massive push to discredit the Scottish Government.
Between their two newsrooms, they cant seem to find ONE positive story to report about Scotland or the Scottish Government.
Quentin Quale
Worked with me . i took my time over a matter of weeks popping in for a chat, four pensioners in a row at the bottom of our flats. they were Labour and NO for months and i changed their minds over a cuppa. I also drove them to the polling booth and back.
One told me she voted No a day later and she got herself into a right state. i soon calmed here down, pointing out it was her choice alone , but the BBC and STV scared her by scaring her about jobs and services being cut.. Only a week later she found out her son voted YES.
Says it all when her son who lives with didn’t discuss the referendum with her. And voted YES.
TEA and a chat over a couple of weeks makes a difference. I’ve spoken to the rest and they are well up on issues.
It’s not an age thing , just a different approach. And 3 out of 4 isn’t too bad. Growing old comes with many changes that most cannot comprehend till they grow old. The world is a fast changing place and many , not just our oap’s , struggle with the pace.
I take it to the pubs too. I’m not fussy or pushy.
On the BBC website, that Labour t**t slating the decision – was going to post but it’s now “closed for comments”. B4stards…
I would like the Rev to take a look at unions in Scotland.How many members? What % voted Yes? Does their support for Labour reflect their members views?
Love the “balanced” way the BBC report the MacAskill fiasco
“Kenny MacAskill survives a Holyrood vote”
Or in another universe
“Kenny MacAskill easily sees off a challenge by a disingenuous and vexatious party to his iron grip on his brief, which he discharges with the confidence of the public”
Which one do you think was reported by the BBC?
“Whining from the sidelines – It’s what Labour do.”
Losing yet more MSPs and scottish MPs are what these cowardly Red Tories will be doing soon enough.
Well just read the comments on LfI and the vast majority are saying Alan Grogan has got it wrong.
Had the SG decided to take it under their control, they could have set themselves up to be sued by the 5 companies tendering – could you imagine the trouble that would cause.
As I said, I admired Alan Grogan sticking his head above the parapet to form LfI – but I think there is still a part of all Lab supporters that deep down hates the SNP
Breaking news
Malcolm Bruce woke a man up in liberal democrat conference
by shoogling him vigorously as he puts”the SNP BACK IN THEIR BOX”
WOOHAHAHAHAHAHA
@Mealer
I believe this should answer your question at least partly.
Chris Stephens ?@CStephenssnp Oct 6
Current @SNP_TUG membership now standing at over 11 (ELEVEN) thousand.
Matthew Egan ?@_MattEgan Oct 6
@CStephenssnp @theSNP @SNP_TUG That’s bigger than @scottishlabour!
If the Red Tories in scotland are still somehow unaware what is coming their way then hell fucking mend them.
Yesguy, yup, that’s fair enough. Like the sound of the pub discussion groups! wee smiley thing.
link to scottishsocialistparty.org
OT but I have just had a double dose of drivel by Mr Clegg.
Other half wanted to see the news and I had to stop shouting at the telly – haud ma wheesht and wait for comment.
I love it when he starts shouting at the telly – tends to be one rule for him and another for me – so I can play superior when he starts shouting ” lying ba$turd”
P.S I can spell!
Podmore Pads More: So, Rev Stuart, you have just proved that the SNP is no better than Labour! Not news to most of us. They’re all bourgeois parties, all wedded to neo-liberalism, that is to the rule of the corporations, against the people.
‘Us’ refers to your mystery pal? The EDL-BNP-OL thugs in George Square? The other panda in Edinburgh zoo?
Tossing out generalised crapology won’t win you adherents on this site. We are all too savvy in the ways of unionist piss-poor propaganda.
London based Union RMT rep is worried where all the profits will go when the Dutch Company takes over ScotRail. He says they will go straight back into they Dutch economy.
Does the Union rep not realise that if it came back into public ownership, the taxes raised would only go into rebuilding the South East of England, where most of our taxes end up. (HS2/3/4)
If we were an Independent Country, then we could maybe have another look at nationalising it, but not when we are still part of this rotten Union.
Ian Grays subway lament,
Cheers.Id be grateful if you could expand a bit on what seems to be the position in the unions.
Sorry to go on about this but we now have the SSP agreeing with Lab MSP about nationalising the rail line.
Aided and abetted by the MSM/BBC they will not let this go – sometimes I despair at the lack of forward thinking that exists in some groups.
Divide and rule at every opportunity.
Plodmore: Using our money to pay subsidies to Dutch capitalists?
Keep yer cap on. (The old ones are the best.)
Quentin.
A few beers certainly gets the mood right. I hope to share one or two with you one day.
Cancelled my BBC license a few weeks back.
Stopped shopping at iceland months back.
Boycott the rest.
Joined the SNP . This week.
Fired of copies of the cuts coming to my friends online and on FB.
These cuts coming and P.I.P rolling out scares the shit out of me. We knew it would bad but this is worse than i thought. I know there are some out there who say tough , they voted for this but the majority i speak to voted YES and it’s pretty clear the better off voted in numbers for \no.
Never forget the food banks. they are here to stay and that alone is unacceptable . They should not be the norm , it;s a disgrace.
came back from dropping off messages to one a couple of mile away earlier today and they are getting swamped. An awful lot of kids there.
We have to get labour out . They have kept the poor in this country down for their own benefits .
I would have that on the news 24/7
Just read this nonsense over on Newsnet re:Daily Record Are you being serious? They print the rubbish,so take responsiblity for it. With regard to employees,they know who they work for, bit late for the “Boo Hoos” now because sales are through the floor, that’s called freedom of choice for people not to buy
The Daily Record has not, and never has been a champion for Scotland, it is, and always was, a shit driven paper for profit, based on the gullability, and lack of education of the reader, at a time when the reader thought it was “The working mans paper”.The drop in sales has been coming for a long time, the referendum merely hastened the process
I for one will not bemoan its demise should it happen
“Gordon Brown”…I thank you
@Dr Jim
Yes, I urge all Wings readers in need of a pick-me-up to go to Newsnet and read that article defending the Daily Record’s coverage of the referendum, and indeed its coverage of the Rangers meltdown.
We’re WAAAY through the looking glass with this one..
lochside says:
8 October, 2014 at 4:53 pm
Welcome back Rev…your leadership was sorely missed.
I was ready to abandon this site after yesterday’s internecine squabbling by people who should know better.
However, the point has to be made as per @Les Wilson, the same old agenda of BBC/SLAB attacking the SNP/SG on anything and everything has continued unabated and more importantly unchallenged!!
1st Paragraph my exact sentiments as expressed yesterday.
2nd Paragraph spot on the money as well.
3rd My own point of view Rev, is stick to your original format which has been incredibly successful. Especially if you can maintain your incredible work ethic without damaging your own health or private life.
Finally CrowdFunding or other means of keeping you a float / salaried. I will go with the flow.
Lets get organised and all pull together for OUR COUNTRY.
All YESSER’s IN IT TOGETHER FOR THE GREATER GOOD NOT THE GREATER GREED!!!
by way of example link to youtube.com LipDub – Independence of Catalonia (La Flama – Obrint Pas).
Heaven’s above Rev, I’ve just finished responding to your Way Ahead article indicating that I believe that Wings would be best concentrating on the Independence issues and this article pops up. But then debunking Scottish Labour nonsense will work towards improving the prospects of independence minded MP candidates for the general election.
liz says:
Sorry to go on about this but we now have the SSP agreeing with Lab MSP about nationalising the rail line.
To be fair Liz has re-nationalisation of our railways not always been at the core of the SSP just as it is with Brother Tommy? 😉 I tend to look at their calls for the re-nationalisation of the railways in the same light, rightly or wrongly, as independence is the core value of the SNP.
Whilst they call for the re-nationalisation of the railways, without appearing to be insulting towards any of them which I do not intend to be, do we know if they are aware of the current standing regarding the laws covering re-nationalisation and the impracticalities that any Scottish government currently faces in achieving this, at least until such times as Scotland was fully independent?
Labour attack the SNP/SG over renewables, complaining about the ‘subsidies’ and blocking planning for new nuclear reactors… which is throwing money away to France et al instead of supporting a national industry.
Happy for money to go out of Scotland for nuclear energy, but not happy for money to go out of Scotland for rail services.
Square a hole, anyone?
@Will Podmore
“Didjy Aye” “Urye Aye” “Urye Daft Aye”
Somebody stop me!
@Lesley-Ann – they are criticising the SG stance re the Dutch franchise – if they don’t know EU rules then they should find out.
I’m not saying they should give up their principles but at least acknowledge the SG govs hands are tied at the moment
Robert Louis says
“Seriously people criticising this decision by the Scottish Government are just too daft for words. The stupidity of Labour never cases to amaze me.”
Remember Robert the Labour parties reliance on the media and their belief that the public cant remember a conversation from 5 minutes ago,
Like a goldfish in a bowl round and round it goes and on every circuit of the bowl thinks hmm nice wallpaper, round again hmm nice wallpaper, and again hmm nice wallpaper
eg Cara Hilton attaching blame to the SG for HER and her cohorts in the Fife Labour councils closure of Pitcorthy primary school, complaining “they could have stopped us”
Labour complaining about the A9 still being single carriageway in many places but conveniently forgetting Jack McConnell giving back £1.5 billion because he couldn’t think of a fucking thing to spend it on,
Jackie Baillie using damaging figures to attack Nicola Sturgeons stewardship of the NHS but had to find the figures from Labours watch to support her attack,
They count on the public being stupid enough to believe them, but the trouble is
some people ARE JUST THAT STUPID ,and while we have the BBC to support every facile and fallacious statement labour come out with they’ll go on making black white and white black while they laugh straight in our faces and ask WHATJA GONNA DO ABOUT IT?
@Gallowglass
Square a hole, anyone?
Easy, who does Dr G Brown’s brother work for? I mean family first or its not Labour
Oops!
Looks like wee Kevin Maguire is getting ahead of himself here methinks!
Which leader enjoyed the best party conference? My ratings: 1 Farage, 2 Cameron, 3 Clegg, 4 Miliband. What’s yours?
So I thought I’d put him straight as folks might expect! 😉
@Kevin_Maguire Alex Salmond and that’s BEFORE the SNP conference. I wonder how many OVERFLOW halls they’ll need this year 5, 6, or maybe 7
Rev, I do believe that man, king, is ready for the Alert Reader’s passing out parade
Sorry Liz, I wasn’t having a go at you I was just genuinely interested to know if anyone knows if either the SSP or Brother Tommy are actually aware of the outstanding rules that govern the nationalisation or otherwise of our railways.
I agree wholeheartedly with you on this Liz. If they are NOT aware of the current rulings that are in place then they really should make themselves aware of the relevant rules before someone more intelligent than me makes a fool out of them.
I agree in them sticking to their principles but as you say it would stand them in slightly better stead if they at least acknowledged that the SG’s hands are tied at the moment and they have done the best they could with a bad hand, to coin a phrase. 😉
John King.
You tell em sir.
Superb
Geez! You know what? Dutch trains use the right-hand track (yes, they are capitalists).
Argh! At the very moment the agreement will enter in force, all the trains will suddenly go backwards!
That’s going to be topsy-turvy!
We may not have won the referendum folks but rest assured I do believe that we may have just awoken a nightmare on Elm Street for all unionists. I found this link on Twitter from the Dunfermline Press. Let’s just say I don’t think either Thomas Docherty MP or Cara Hilton MSP will be revisiting Pitcorthie Primary School or the campaign team to save it any time soon. 😛
http://www.dunfermlinepress.com/opinion/letters/articles/2014/10/08/512107-opinion–pitcorthie-primary-labour-politicians-used-our-kids-distress-to-further-their-own-agenda/
@Lesley-Anne
Story is behind a pay wall, is there any way you can copy and post?
I said this morning that Nicola Sturgeon would be next up to be in the fireing line of the Muppets of Hollyrood lab/Ldem/Tory to resign. Revaluation step forward Mr Keith Brown MSP is your turn but keep singing( I will Survive )as did Alex Neil & Kenny MacAskill, the Busted Flush Political Parties will keep on calling for resignations, I hope the Public take note,of the waste of debating time.
Does the Scottish parliament allow people in the viewing gallery to boo and heckle. It would be great to see the discomfort on the unionists faces especially the slab lot.
I’d like to see Baillie’s chin flapping and the grin wiped off her gob.
Would be nice to have one or two local railways for the likes of Perthshire and the NE. Helps to keep the Tories away. And I don’t think it would do the Green element of the Indie Alliance any harm.
Then there’s the idea of making tracks for Methil. Am I right in thinking that’s in the constituency of Mr GB? A snip at £20 million. Now, about that £50 million saved on the Forth Crossing…
Right I have just come across another crowd funder for an independent Scottish broadcast service and I have been thinking. Yes folks I know, the doctor warned me that thinking was bad for my health but I can’t help it all right! 😛
Instead of these three crowdfunders trying to compete against each other if there was some way that they could be brought together as a single entity.
link to indiegogo.com
link to indiegogo.com
link to indiegogo.com
I’m sure there are the appropriate brains on here who can dream up something. 😉
It’s not a pay wall Nana, just answer the question about buying a video game for Christmas, the question disappears and you’ll see the article.
Ah, James Kelly, Labour Party(North Britain branch) that hard working MSP and Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities.
Is this the same James Kelly who is listed as member of the Cross-Party Group in the Scottish Parliament on Rail ?
The group was set up in November 2013 and its purpose was
To encourage the development and extension of quality rail services for the people and economy of Scotland.
To ensure that rail has a high profile in the Scottish Parliament.
To influence Scottish Government policy on rail, including on connectivity.
To liaise with Transport Scotland, Network Rail, franchise holders, trades unions, rail interest groups and other such organisations to ensure that MSPs are kept up to date on matters pertaining to rail in Scotland.
It would appear that Mr Kelly has not attended any of the meetings up to 13 May 2014:
link to scottish.parliament.uk
Is Mr Kelly a man with his finger on the pulse, or what?
Ah thanks Lesley Anne, just as well you’re back!
Nana Smith says
“Does the Scottish parliament allow people in the viewing gallery to boo and heckle. ”
Its just as well they don’t , or I would get arrested every time we go there, the wife holds my hand and if she starts to see the vein in my temple turn blue, she digs her fingernails into the palm of my hand just to remind me if I lose it she going to give me a kicking when we get outside. 🙂
SHAME ON CARA HILTON – LABOUR MSP
SHAME ON THOMAS DOCHERTY – LABOUR MP
They attempted to DECEIVE the mums, dads, children and people of Dunfermline.
WHERE IS THEIR HEARFELT APOLOGY?
WHERE IS THEIR REMORSE?
WHERE IS THEIR DECENCY?
WHO? Who would vote for DECEITFUL LABOUR?
I don’t watch much TV but decided on tune into STV News today. On the show there was one item of Clegg’s speech at the Liberal confernece where he compared Alex Salmond with Nigel Farage as well as the SNP to the UKIP as being divisive, xenophobic, anti-foreginer and in the case of the SNP anti-English. There was no political analysis afterwards. One of the other news items was with the rail contract and comments from individuals that the profits were going to a company in a foreign country instead of staying in Scotland and the Scottish government should have waited to see if powers could be devolved to stop this. Again, no political analysis afterwards.
It seems strange that in one clip the SNP is accused of being nationalist/xenophobic/anti-foreginer etc yet in another clip being accused of not being nationalistic enough. I don’t know if in this instances STV displayed intentional bias or not but I will say there is a lack of journalistic and editorial scrutiny in this instance. I don’t know if it is down to experience of lack of resources but it does goes to show the lack of depth we have in our MSM.
Lesley-Anne @ 7.58
Shirley Macdonald may have been polite on Tom Dochertys facebook page but I wasn’t,
I didn’t miss him and hit the wall, and amazingly he didn’t see my comments for several hours. 🙂
Angus Robertson for Prime Minister!
Apologies if this as already been mentioned. Labour could, and should, have re-nationalised the railways when Alistair Darling became Transport Secretary from 2002 – 06.
link to en.wikipedia.org
After Railtrack collapsed and was taken back into public control as Network Rail, the rail franchises came up for renewal. He could simply have let them lapse and taken the provision of passenger services back into the public sector. No compensation would then have been due.
Those Labour pols demanding re-nationalisation now, against the law as Stu points out, should ask Mr Darling why he didn’t do it when he was the Minister in Westminster.
@John King
It would be my husband holding me back. Poor soul has a heart condition as well so I have to try and control my rage.
Not easy when the likes of lamont,Rennie etc are on the loose.
No no no…Yes
You’re spot on about James kelly-didn’t even have thegood grace to send his apologies for absence for two of them. Think that really demonstrates how important those meeting were to him & he has the gall to criticise others.
Come on, you’ll need to work harder than that Rev to outsmart Labours ‘crack’ transport puddin’ James ‘sharp as a plastic party knife’ Kelly, who researches everything (nearly) before pouncing like an ‘ninja bagpuss’.
Jeezus and folk will still vote for these clowns and their Tory best buds..
Nana Smith says:
Ah thanks Lesley Anne, just as well you’re back!
Doffs hat and curtseys! 😉
“Does the Scottish parliament allow people in the viewing gallery to boo and heckle. ”
I think it would be kinda fun throwing in the odd boo or heckle. It would certainly allow the First Minister to save some of his expertly timed Lamont put down lines for another time. 😛
There’s a phrase springing to mind here piggy, something about nails and them being hit on the head or something!
WHERE IS THEIR HEARFELT APOLOGY?
WHERE IS THEIR REMORSE?
WHERE IS THEIR DECENCY?
WHO? Who would vote for DECEITFUL LABOUR?
To be honest though piggy in order to become a FAILED Labour MSP you must first of all undergo a series of minor surgeries, care to guess what these surgeries are for? 🙂
john king says:
Lesley-Anne @ 7.58
Shirley Macdonald may have been polite on Tom Dochertys facebook page but I wasn’t,
I didn’t miss him and hit the wall, and amazingly he didn’t see my comments for several hours. 🙂
Don’t tell me you were one of those kind and sweet people who overplayed the kindness card to the extent that he blocked you because he couldn’t take any more kindness and love bombing John? 😛
2011 Scottish Parliament elections,
Labour James Kelly 12,489
SNP James McGuigan 10,710
Kelly has under 2000 majority in Rutherglen, he is there for the taking.
Rutherglen Yessers, please come together as never before in 2016 and kick this arse**** out in his ear. A despicable human being. Where do Scottish Labour dig them up from.
Complete hypocrites. Remember SLAB’s ‘No Borders’ stance along with tories, libs? They also preached that THEY were not the nasty little selfish. ‘blood & soil’ ‘nats’ of salmond’s ilk; they were, along with their tory mates, champions of a truly international outlook. Ah, but then we discover, with this tweet, that what they really meant, was that British nationalism in all its ugly forms (British jobs for British workers), is fine, UKOK, just Scottish nationalism which is anti-international and parochial. Well now we know better, don’t we. With Dutch grandparents, I for one, am quite happy that the Nederlands wins.
Hooray! We’re going Dutch, everyone pays what they can.
Can we have a tunnel thru to Amsterdam?
On the last thread, Marcia posted the link to this short film called ‘Writing Off Scotland’ featuring a Glasgow guy who’s a Prof in a South African university and has done a forensic job on the last year’s newspaper output in Scotland.
It’s filmed in the Yes Bar, the guy has a nice direct style, and his findings (while perhaps not hugely surprising to most of us here) would surely reduce many ‘No’ voters to tears of utter shame.
Excellent work, and deserves to be widely shared.
link to youtube.com
Today’s performance from the BBC must surely have given the Rev a shot in the arm in terms of motivation to continue the fight.
One thing that needs to be done, IMHO, is leafletting on a YES scale pre ref with simple instructions on how to filter out the BS of the MSM and the BBC and ideally by that time, recommendations for alternative sources of info.
Here’s a draft of the text:
on the front ARE YOU STUPID?
on the back: The BBC, ITV, Sky, and every newspaper thinks you are. Please do yourselves a favour and either stop using them or apply the following rule of thumb:
if the message seems to be that X is bad, this means THEY think X is bad. Nothing more.
By the way, here is a link if you want to cancel your BBC licence and aren’t sure if it’s legal.
link to tvlicensing.co.uk
O/T
PLEASE REMEMBER FOLKS
Tomorrow Thursday, 12.00 is FMQs.
link to scottishparliament.tv
This is your very own Scottish Parliament TV service where you can watch every second of the debates. No spin, no cut-offs and no loss of sound.
It doesn’t matter where you live in the world, it’s open for everyone
You do not need the BBC bullsh***ers or any other livestream programmes or special software.
Bookmark it and if you can’t watch live you can also use the catch-up videos with the same above mentioned attributes.
Support the SG, not the BBC..!
Thanks for that link Midgehunter.
John King
jeesh. I pity anyone who crossed you today 🙂
For John King and others who would like to heckle from Holyrood’s public gallery.
How about a keyboard in front of every seat and a giant screen behind the Presiding Officer for comments of 140 characters or less. Would, of course, require some censoring to remove bad language etc.
I’m sure Jola and Bailey would welcome your comments/marks for presentation etc. 🙂
The Scottish Labour party is not genetically programmed to do anything for Scotland 🙁
Feel so physically sick everytime I go on to bbc news website or any of the other mainstream news websites that can no longer look at them. So at this moment in time I haveno idea about what’s happenin in the world except from websites like this or youtube.
For more than seven years, the SNP government has done an incredibly good job within the limited powers it has without at any time doing anything it does not have the power to do.
Despite this, it has been relentlessly been attacked by the media and the ‘unbiased’ BBC with opposition statements presented as fact without any scrutiny.
Ironically, the SNP government’s excellent work made the protected elderly to vote No.
If the referendum had happened after seven years of Labour-LibDem mismangement in Scotland, they might have been tempted to vote Yes.
This might sound crazy but without Wings I don’t think I’d have had enough knowledge to “convert” some friends and folk when out doorknocking. It’s been an education to me and, as they say, knowledge is power. The analysis on the site is second to none. And the comments from the bloggers and links have been so amazingly useful. Plus, Wings has kept my spirits up. As a long time community worker it’s been amazing to see people with no power becoming engaged – and asking questions. Scotland is waking up and Wings has been a huge part of that. Keep getting the truth out there. Thank you to the Rev and all contributors.
I think this nails the new rail franchise in a nut shell.
link to facebook.com
Oh and apparently, I have no evidence to back this up at present, the new rail franchise also ensures that there will be board level union representation. Hmm, I wonder what dear Johann Lamont and her Transport spokesperson, whatshisname, think about that! 😛
@Lesley-Anne at 8.14 who suggested merging fund raising appeals
Agree it would be a good idea
I have been thinking about the people who support these fund-raising appeals
They are creating jobs, obviously they support each initiative and are confident the money is/will be put to good use.
in other words they are investors, could be considered share-holders even though monetary profit is the last thing on their minds when they make their donation.
Don’t know anything about the legal background but want to ask a question.
Could the various initiatives be set up on a national co-operative basis as the Scottish People’s (National) Broadcasting (Co-op) with different strands keeping their own donations and reflecting diverse points of view etc?
After all, unity is strength and so on.
Also gives the idea of independent news and views which would be a sign of political profit.
Down the line any eventual monetary profit should be shared out among the people who donate – hundreds of thousands of ordinary folk.
PS someone might also want to check out if EU funds are available for this type of enterprise
Further to my last post I now have confirmation that when the new franchise takes over running Scotrail in 2015 there will indeed be union representation at board level.
The contract contains commitments on 100 apprenticeships, training and staff development and, for the first time, trade union representation on the board of the company.
The full debate on the future of Scotland’s railways can be read here.
link to scottish.parliament.uk
If Wings is going to demontrate SLabs deceit why not start with James Kelly & Cara whatshername. Can’t think of 2 more deserving candidates after their latest antics (read lies)
I like the way you are thinking there Ben. For a wee while I thought I was asking too much, especially after all that we’ve been through recently. 😀
If there was such a thing as E.U. funding available I think that would be a great booster to the new (hoped for) set up but don’t forget about the possibility of Lottery funding either.
There you go, Rev Stu – you answered your own question and that wee holiday has already shown benefits. I highlighted another happening today on the previous topic that could have yielded another article exposing the hypocrisy of the old unionist parties in Scotland. The £800,000 rip-off by the LibDems Scottish Conference last year and who knows how much for this year’s conference.
In this one you highlight the Labour hypocrisy but miss a very salient fact from their paper that you exposed.
How about this hypocrisy from that very same paper?
“Labour is a party of both devolution and the union. For over 100 years, Labour has led the argument for Scottish devolution within the union, and it is a cause
we have advanced out of deep-seated conviction. That is why it was a Labour Government which set up the Scottish Parliament, delivering on what John Smith memorably called “unfinished business”.
In making the case for devolution, Labour has brought enhanced democratic accountability for decisions affecting the people of Scotland. Our desire has always been a simple one: meeting the Scottish people’s legitimate desire for more powers and enhanced accountability within a strengthened union. To lead in the twenty-first century, to preserve our values and advance the people’s interests, Scotland needs the United Kingdom and the United Kingdom needs Scotland.”
So what is that hypocrisy?
Not devolving power as a bipartite Kingdom or alternatively not devolving United Kingdom powers equally to the four United Kingdom countries.
It was none other than London Labour that set up the bipartite United KINGDOM Parliament as a quadratic parliament but with the COUNTRY of England’s overall majority of 533 members wearing the hats of both the United Kingdom & the Country of England. Making Westminster the de facto Parliament of England and in all respects the master race devolving the powers of the country of England to their three subservient inferior powered slave countries.
Now their Unionist partners in crime are about to pass that Country of England’s rule that the Scots, Welsh & N. Irish members be reduced to the status of underling members in the Country of England Parliament. Only one man told the truth when he claimed, “The Treaty of Union extinguished the Kingdom of Scotland and renamed the Kingdom of England as, The United Kingdom”.
Good to ‘see’ you LA, and as always you’re natural exuberance is a real tonic, was missing ya! 🙂
What is the story with Kenny MacAskill then? I have not been following it, only know the unionists are running around like blue arsed baboons again for some reason.
O/T
I have been feeling pretty powerless about the media bias since the result came in, and more so now it has become clear that there will be no let up and the BBC are running a similar anti-SNP campaign in the run up to May 2015.
Discrediting the SNP’s competent performance and in particular individual ministers is something we are going to hear plenty of.
Hand-wringing and self reflection on what could have been, and the broken promises, lies and crippling austerity, tax cuts for the rich etc: not so much on loyal Auntie.
Confused as to where to complain about the BBC rather than lodging a complaint to the BBC I stumbled on their complaint summary page and downloaded summaries for months Jan -July 2014.
link to bbc.co.uk
Interestingly, the numbers of complaints rose as follows:
January 17k, February 17k, March 16k, April 17k, May 19k, Jun 27k, July 27k.
So there is a bit of an increase as we head towards the referendum. Or could it be a spike due to the world cup?.
What I found incredible was that during that entire 7 month period, their summaries are curiously similar. They all start the same way:
For example: “The BBC answered over 27,000 complaints from the audience during July 2014. These ranged from a small number of complaints about alleged breaches of editorial guidelines through to a much larger collection of views about programme content and services.”
The only difference in this each month is the date and figure!
This is then followed by trivial crap about fitba, Wimbledon, some vague stuff about the Middle East and distressing images appearing on the news. So in other words, the multitude of complaints I know have been lodged are contained in the “small number of complaints about alleged breaches of editorial guidelines”.
And complaints on coverage of the referendum are not deemed worth including in this summary once in 7 months.
It will be interesting to see what September’s report will read, following the most intensive propaganda excercise in the BBC’s history (I think) when their political editor Nick Robinson lied his arse off in the most disgracefully biased, petulant and nakedly partisan episode in the entire referendum?
I’ll take a punt at it:
The BBC answered over 1,000,000 complaints from the audience during September 2014. These ranged from a small number of complaints about alleged breaches of editorial guidelines through to a much larger collection of views about programme content and services.
There were contacts from viewers when the outcome of the episode of Fake or Fortune? which aired on 18th September was revealed in advance by some BBC News outlets…..”
I am almost starting to feel sorry for Labour then i woke up and realised what they did to my beloved country.
Dutch run railways? Brilliant.
‘By Way of Example’, could we please, please get Thistle (aka Kevin) a bit further on with his Indiegogo appeal? I haven’t chipped-in cause I am well-skint, so it’s a bit dodgy, me asking others to part with dosh. (I did give him a tenner in Shawlands, about two years ago. Honest.)
But seriously – this man has done as much as any individual to grow the indy movement, and it would be tragic if he couldn’t afford to keep going. He’s amassed a library of raw material which is, literally, priceless, and will help form an accurate record of where, when, why and how the Yes movement grew.
And plenty of us are in that record, and we’re shown honestly, as we were, in the Counting House, or that great night in Broughty Ferry, or in Buchanan Street just a few weeks before the big day, and heaven only knows where else. What Kev recorded wasn’t the conspiratorial shenanigans of CyberNazis huddled in darkened corners. He captured ever-growing bunches of ordinary folk, from all walks of life, becoming friends and allies in an extraordinary adventure.
Let’s do it, please – if the man can forget about this fundraiser? that’s one less thing to worry about, and he can get on with his work (and, knowing him, he’ll have asked for well below what he really needs):
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/scottish-independence-live-events–2
The daily mirror link that LA referred to @ 3.48pm, archived;
Live counter: Watch how much NHS money is going into private hands
link to archive.today
Robert Peffers
“The Breakthrough
The heat was on the UK by now, and there was no longer any possibility of putting off
reform of the Scottish political and administrative structure. This hot potato initially
landed on the lap of the Conservative government under Prime Minister John
Major, who had no time to do anything about it before he was out of office at the
1997 election. He was no doubt extremely thankful that the matter immediately
bounced onto the lap of his Labour successor, Tony Blair, who had had no intention
of doing anything about devolution, but was now forced to take action, whether he
liked it or not. The lack of serious political opposition to the devolution legislation
may seem surprising, but it merely reflects the fact that all the party leaderships at
Westminster knew the background and were aware that it was an obligation that could
not be avoided.”
link to electricscotland.com
P.S.
Thistle’s ‘Scottish Independence Live Events’ Indiegogo appeal currently stands at £660. That’s 17% of the £4k target.
Come on…it’s exciting seeing the numbers go up.
K1 says:
Good to ‘see’ you LA, and as always you’re natural exuberance is a real tonic, was missing ya! 🙂
Thanks K1 it’s good to be back so to speak. 😉
Apologies about the natural exuberance, my doctor keeps warning me about that but you know things start happening, I start thinking, everything goes to pot in a hand cart and hey presto natural exuberance abounds a plenty! 😛
Disgusted with BBC’s reporting of the Rail Franchise story. It looks like, now the Referendum is over they have decided to continue with the SNP bashing. Not a mention of the enhanced union representation. The only mention of the FACT that the Scottish Government couldn’t nationalise was hidden in a quote ‘our hands were tied’ is it too much to ask that they could have mentioned that the Scottish Government could not legally nationalise the Railway.
@Grousebeater 6.55pm
Loved the ‘Plodmore’; wish I’d thought of that one!
Stu, I agree that independence should be the main focus of Wings, but that on the way there you should continue to expose lies as you have done with this latest article. Knowledge is power and the pen is mightier, etc. You provide us with the knowledge and wield the pen like a sabre. 🙂
Sounds a great idea Ben, if allowed would help all. AYE
Stu keep up good work lad, I’m more than willing to pay a subscription for your excellent and essential journalism
Lesley-Ann welcome back, have missed your dry wit and links
Nana, I agree with your post ‘re booing at Hilo lol And thanks again for great links
Finally thanks all for making this site interesting and informative
AYE
Robert Peffers
I presume Police Scotland were involved again this year. Any idea, given this debt, why they agreed or why there was not more of a stooshie made of this not inconsiderable sum.
Someone just lobbed £100 into Thistle’s Indiegogo.
The page doesn’t have the same format Rev used for his appeal(s), so you can’t see comments from donators as they come in…unless there’s a box I’m not clicking.
But hey, that’s brilliant, whoever ye are! Hoots!
(BTW, I’m not on commission or anything – I just think the guy is a hero and deserves all the help he can get.)
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/scottish-independence-live-events–2
I almost feel sorry for Grogan for finding something that does suggest that it would be possible to re-nationalise the railways. It’s such a shame he didn’t look at the previous section:
25. Public sector operators not to be franchisees.
link to legislation.gov.uk
Tam Jardine,
Very interesting figures on the numbers of BBC complaints over the last few months.
I submitted an FOI to the BBC Trust a few months back trying to get the numbers of complaints raised about BBC Bias against the Yes side and they tried to bury it by spelling both my name and e-mail address incorrectly. I finally got a response saying that they could not divulge these results as it would compromise their impartiality…
“The information you have requested is excluded from the (FOI) Act because it is held for the purposes of ‘journalism, art or literature.’ The BBC is therefore not obliged to provide this information to you and will not be doing so on this occasion.”
I dropped this issue until the BBC Salmond / Darling debate when it was announced in several papers ( you can guess which ones) the next day that there had been 130 complaints raised by the No side against the BBC handling of the debate.
I thought – that is a bit odd? How can they announce these figures that are in a direct contradiction to my earlier FOI. Surely they are showing a definite bias for the No campaign in doing so.
So I raised a further complaint to the BBC Trust …
The BBC released the number of complaints by the No side against the BBC for their handling of the 2nd Salmond v Darling TV debate. This was revealed as 130 the following day in direct contradiction to the previous FOI where it states they do not release such information as it compromises their “independence and impartiality”.
I did not receive a response from the BBC (unlike my other numerous complaints) and therefore contacted both the BBC Trust and BBC complaints and queried the status of my complaint. After some time and checking by a slightly confused Capita call centre lady they were unable to find it.
It had been deleted off their system.
I was hold on the phone for a considerable period of time as obviously this was not a normal event and caused some confusion with the call site operators. They were however quite helpful and understanding of the important nature of this issue so I resubmitted my complaint about why these 130 complaint numbers had been released for the No side whereas there has never been a release of any similar figures for complaints by the Yes side on any issue – ever.
I wait in anticipation…
I wonder why the BBC is so twitchy about Yes complaints over Bias against the Independence campaign?
I also wonder if Tam’s figures and my questions are in anyway related?
Dr Jim says:
Just read this nonsense over on Newsnet re:Daily Record . . . They print the rubbish,so take responsiblity for it. With regard to employees,they know who they work for, bit late for the “Boo Hoos” now because sales are through the floor, that’s called freedom of choice for people not to buy.
7.03pm
Couldn’t agree more with you , Dr Jim. It made me feel physically sick. How some people can look at themselves in the mirror every morning is beyond me.
@GH Graham
We have two telephone wires in our house from two companies: BT & Virgin. The latter being a cable doesn’t change this one iota. We have a landline with Virgin. The BT line is AFAIK still in perfect working order.
A couple of months after we switched I got a marketing call from BT, seems their system doesn’t update very often. Anyway woman on the other end was surprised we no longer had anything to do with her company. ‘But surely you are still paying line rental’ she opined somewhat desperately. I told her we were not and if the engineers from her company wanted to come remove their copper they were welcome to do so. They have not been and that was back in ’99 or so. I guess they figure someone else might buy this house eventually and it’s easier to leave it in place.
Since we took our number with us I guess I could ring BT tomorrow and get a second landline through them with a different number. Though why I would want to is beyond me.
Similarly with the proliferation of rooftop solar panels lots of places hereabouts in the sunniest city in Scotland this means they have two electricity suppliers, one of which they own, or at least rent (I understand rental deals are possible).
Ian Brotherhood
That’s 110 between me and yer man. Good on him indeed.
In 13 years Labour actually extended privatisation of public sector jobs, they did not roll back the Tory privatisation. To whinge about a policy they were in a position to have removed but did not is nothing short of pathetic. Given the current legal set up what option do the Scottish Government have but to accept the best service package from the tenders offered? To accept a lesser offer would not be fair to the customers that use the service day in day out. To whinge that the money made will help support the Dutch state owned railway is doubly pathetic. Ours should be a state owned railway too…except Labour were not brave enough to do that.
Just back from local WfI/yes group, planning and trying to organise how to move forward.
@Lesley-Ann – no worries didn’t think you were criticising me.
@Lollysmum – we have been slagging Cara whats-her-face on twitter complete with evidence that SHE and her BLAB chums were the ones responsible for the school closures and the newspaper article where she lies about it being SNP with all the comments slagging her off.
I have saved all the posters showing each BLAB member complete with expenses and lies told – I think we need to organist these into a folder, print them off and post through appropriate doors for GE campaign
Also plenty posting evidence that SNP can’t for various reasons nationalise the East coast – I am aware it’s only on twitter and the folk we need to get to use MSM/BBC
@Dr JM Mackintosh and Tam Jardine
I emailed a request to TV licensing on 25 September for numbers of Scottish viewers who had cancelled their TV licences in the past 4 weeks. A very silly woman tried to fob me off by saying that they could not release that information due to data protection.
I replied as follows:
Dear Heather Davies-Green
I am not asking for confidential details of individuals’ licence fee arrangements. I am asking for simple information about how many people in Scotland have cancelled their TV licences in the past month. If you are going to refuse to provide that information, at least have the honesty to give your real reason, which I strongly suspect is one of the following options:
1. You don’t know and can’t be bothered to find out.
2. You know, but don’t want to say because it would reveal that the BBC is haemorrhaging support in Scotland after its disgraceful behaviour during the referendum campaign.
Unfortunately for you, I am not stupid enough to be fobbed off by your inept attempt to prevent this information from being made public. I will be submitting a Freedom of Information request to obtain this information. Finally, as a teacher in a Scottish state school, I am well aware that I am paid by the public to serve the public; something of which you would do well to remind yourself when you consider who pays your salary.
Poor little Heather was too upset to respond herself and got a colleague to do it for her with some anodyne comment. I have now submitted my FOI and await the next fobbing off response with interest.
Graeme Doig says: 8 October, 2014 at 10:47 pm:
“I presume Police Scotland were involved again this year. Any idea, given this debt, why they agreed or why there was not more of a stooshie made of this not inconsiderable sum.
Haven’t a clue. Like everyone else here I was up to my lugs in the campaign. I would assume that it has been batting back and forth between Holyrood & Westminster since last year. It seems to have surfaced in the chamber at Holyrood today but I was out all day and thus never had a chance to watch any Holyrood TV.
@Graeme Doig –
🙂 😉 🙂
I am now heading over to the sleazepit which is ‘Off-Topic’ before I crack me final can and inflict some well-dodgy dance music on anyone daft or happy enough to listen to it.
Hello folks, just wanted to put in a little bit of my own thoughts on this one.
People in power have long understood that the more you can make people’s basic ignorance work for them the more things can remain in their favor.
When people start to get skeptical, when people start to question things and look for alternative explanations for events and when they try to put ingrained emotional bias to one side and attempt to discover the nature of any given thing from a logical stand point then the establishment of any power structure start to shit themselves and start to react.
We are going to see a level of propaganda and subversive techniques that many of us would never believe until recently.
This is far larger and far more important a matter than perhaps some of us realize. Scotland is just one part of a global struggle of humanity against dictatorship, whether that be a dictatorship of guns, information, fear, manufactured disasters/terror attacks, bullshit economic ideologies that promise ‘freedom’, religious subversion, debt etc.
This struggle is all the more obvious because information, thanks to the internet, has become decentralized. Ordinary people now have the ability to broadcast and receive to and from any part of the globe. This, as Jeremy Rifkin has pointed out, is the beginning of a new renaissance. Thanks to the printing press, books became more readily available to people and the proliferation of knowledge broke many of the chains of ignorance that monarchy and church kept securely locked. The response by the power establishment of the time was to burn the books, label the thinkers as ("Tractor" - Ed)s and heretics…and generally fail in their attempts to keep the status quo.
What is happening now can be seen in the same context and our little struggle (relative to the world as a whole) is just a microcosm of this.
We will win. The demographics of the referendum show this change of paradigm very clearly. Once someone wakes up then its impossible for them to be put back to sleep in this way. Every lie and piece of propaganda that comes from the British establishment is only going to further highlight their agenda to everyone who voted yes (45%) and to those who voted no who are slowly having the wool pulled back from their eyes.
Given that Stu was asking ‘the way ahead’ earlier then I think its obvious. We must personally get the raw facts out to our own family and social circles and as groups we must seek to challenge the broadcast media while maintaining and increasing our presence online.
Westminster is a relic of a dying paradigm, still very dangerous but on its way out. I think that it represents a now outdated system that globally is in the beginnings of its death throws. The bad part is that its going to be ugly for a while.
Is it just my imagination, or has the effing© LibDem conference been effing© wall-to-wall on the telly? Just heard Cleggy string together ‘salmond-separatists-farage-racists-windmills-poverty-blame-blah-blah’, like some effing© mash-up of Mary Poppins and Gary Cooper in High Noon.
Flatliners might be a more suitable analogy!
@AuldA …. Yeah, Diogenes of Sinope, crazy name, crazy guy! Are you named after a supermarket?
@Natasha –
More power to ye.
One of the most unedifying episodes to have emerged in the past year was Dr John Roberston (University West of Scotland) appearing before a Scottish Parliamentary Committee.
I don’t have the link to hand, but he turned up there to answer questions about his research which had proven BBC (and STV) bias in coverage indyref-related matters.
The substance of his findings, the questioning by the cross-party committee? They’re all on the record.
What the record will not highlight – but is there for all to see – is that no-one was behind the man when he faced that committee. I mean literally – the rows and rows of seats behind the man were all empty.
None of his own students or peers (and there are many of them working in the same field) were available, on the day, to lend even token support.
Shame on them all. They should never ever be allowed to forget it.
link to thedrum.com
@Natasha
I had a similar response from BBC Trust and was told to go to the BBC licensing.
However, as BBC licensing is not part of “Journalism, Art or Literature” there should be no problem in getting this information – in principle. But do the BBC have any principles left?
I may put an FOI to ask UK and Scottish figures over the last year as that may also be revealing.
Let us know how you get on.
STV have a local channel called STV Glasgow. I don’t know how much this station costs to run or how you would go about setting up a similar channel.
It does seem very basic but it is getting the viewers. It is also on mainstream TV.
Could an Indy friendly channel be set up along the lines of STV Glasgow. It seems fairly low tech and low budget but it does get a message out.
Just by coincidence we have just been discussing the future Labour party leadership qualities espoused by this guy. I wonder if he is any relation. 😉 😛
link to tinyurl.com
Ian: I don’t have the link to hand, but he turned up there to answer questions about his research which had proven BBC (and STV) bias in coverage indyref-related matters.
Once the Scottish media cold shoulder you, you may as well go huddle with the penguins in Antarctica.
I cannot believe what I have just seen and heard on BBC2’s Today at Conference (Lib Dums):
i. Malcolm the Bruce saying that the Scottish electorate had just voted to reject Independence by 2:1… can ANYONE within this earth’s atmosphere explain THAT ONE to me as a brainless Welshman?!?!
ii. Ali Comical… well what can one say… he looked (and sounded) for all the world as though someone had just woken him up from a deep hangover sleep, 30 seconds before a speech he’d forgotten to write. He said ‘if… sorry, when, we deliver the promises made before the referendum…’!!
I really feel sorry for them as a party south of the Border… but I hope the Scottish people just remember these remarks and the stance of these Brit-loving serfs (we have a word for them in Welsh – taeog/taeogion: servile) come May 15th, 2015. Please ALBA, don’t look back now… it has started… let’s finish it properly this next time – Unite against the Union!
@David
That sent shivers up my spine. No kidding. So very true. And brilliantly realised. Thank you.
@caz-m- I thought of that as well – my daughter was saying just about everyone of her friends who play music etc have featured on this station.
Would it be possible to get them to buy in some discussion progs.
We could have ‘balance’ by including No voters then get folk like the rev to tear the arse off them
Natasha
I submitted a FOI re complaints for both BBC Scotland TV and radio for the previous two years – got the ‘ it’s covered by journalism , art ‘ etc . I specifically said I did not want a breakdown of age / background etc just the numbers. According to them , this is all to protect the editors from undue influence.
Maybe you can word it better than me
@Ian B
one thing that should definitely happen in the coming months before the GE is a full scale Scottish Government enquiry into the BBC coverage of the independence campaign.
I think Dr John Robertson will get a lot more support from Rev Stu, NNS, Dr David Patrick and many others. He will not be alone anymore.
To me the BBC are an enemy of democracy in this country and this has to be addressed by devolving its control to Scotland instead of Westminster.
No, Lesley, it isn’t. I do wish people would stop repeating this mistake. It’s 77,777 members IN TOTAL as of Monday night, as Peter Murrell’s tweets make absolutely clear.
At least the people who kept trying to change the Wikipedia page to 100,000 have given up, as it’s been reconised that the 77,777 number is the correct total, but all over the internet the exaggerated figure is still being repeated.
I’m just waiting for the sneering article that “exposes” that the party has “less than 80,000 members” after all, framing it as if that’s a poor show – or even tries to imply that over 20,000 people just resigned.
Sigh.
@ Lesley-Anne 11.53
Just watched that Kelly video. Pathetic stuff. More interesting,for me, was spotting someone I used to know from a way back when. Sitting just behind Kelly, to his right & wearing red top below jacket, is Margaret McCulloch. She told me once that she always voted Tory, and hated seeing people get anything for nothing. No surprise then to see her quite at home with the Red Tories. Small world it is.
@Grouse Beater –
As it happens, I have found the footage!
It was right there on Youtube all the time!
(The very very impatient only have to jump to 28 secs to see how completely empty the seats behind the man are.)
What Professor Roberston says in his opening statement shows how little he needs any support, physical or otherwise – he knows what he wants to say, and goes on to do it brilliantly.
For me, this man is a hero.
link to youtube.com
Fear not peeps. I think I have a wee smile generator here for you. I found it over on Twitter, where else do I find such things these days 😉 , read, take in, absorb and ENJOY! 😛
link to twitter.com
Just for a wee bit of fun folks. Try entering the percentages in the spreadsheet I posted in my last post into the Westminster calculator here. Make sure you are sitting down first though BEFORE you hit “predict.” 😉
link to scotlandvotes.com
@Lesley-Anne
Great news – looks like the West Lothian Question is fixed then !
Evil sorry EVEL problem goes away.
Win – Win for everyone (except Lib Dems and Slab)
Err- Better together ?
Well, you need a health warning with that. It’s a subsample of a UK-wide poll. It’s a tiny number and it’s not weighted. It’s almost meaningless.
Next time the same thing could show Labour well ahead. Will you all be tweeting it excitedly and putting meaningless numbers into the electoral calculator when that happens? But it’ll be just as valid.
You need to follow Scot Goes Pop for opinion poll analysis. The actual position is pretty good, but even so there are caveats to do with sampling and so on. James covers it very well.
link to scotgoespop.blogspot.co.uk
It’s just like the error that attributed nearly 27,000 more members to the SNP than the party really has. People get all worked up and ridiculous graphics get tweeted all over the place, but it’s still a lie. It may not have been a conscious lie when it first happened, but enough people have been told the truth for the continuing repetition of it to be a lie now.
The SNP might be at 35% for WM voting intentions. That is little short of miraculous. Can’t we be happy about that and work to get it even higher, rather than perpetuating nonsense about it being 47%?
Don’t forget Doc that putting the percentages into the Scotland votes page just so happens removes everyone’s pet Tory, and my M.P. so it is not just Win – Win for everyone (except Lib Dems and Slab) but Win – Win for everyone (except Lib Dems, Labour AND Tories) 😛
Oh, Lesley, I love you to bits, but give it a rest. That’s a fantasy-number the tooth fairy brought in.
You’re in the same constituency and you know the score. The SNP is not going to sweep in and dislodge Mundell just like that. Gosh, are you planning a world cruise for next spring, if it’s all set to happen without any work?
Here’s the genuine position, based on realistic estimates.
link to electoralcalculus.co.uk
Note that the SNP leapfrogs into second place (from fourth in 2010) and becomes the main challenger. But it’s still a long way behind. The probability of Mundell retaining his seat is given as 78%.
Now we had a realistic discussion about this at Tweeddale SNP last night. We tend to find that’s more constructive than waxing hysterical about how it’s all a done deal because the SNP are polling 47% for WM (in your fevered dreams). It was pointed out that the seat is also UKIP’s top target in Scotland and that could work in our favour if they succeed in splitting the Tory vote.
We were told we were going to have a serious shot at it, us and Clydesdale and Dumfries working together. Although it’s still a big ask.
If Dumfries have decided they don’t need to do any work because they think an unweighted subsample of around 100 people is somehow meaningful, the rest of us might as well give up now.
So someone who has been arguing that all Scotland’s money should be given away to a foreign government is complaining that some other money is going a foreign company. Sometimes this is beyond parody.
@ Morag
As Lesley Anne said and I quote “Just for a wee bit of fun folks.” so lay off.
Please take your caustic divisiveness and your smatarse comments to some other site .
This site was almost back to its energetic free flowing forward looking self and then you turn up like a turd in a swimming pool.
I know Stu will bar me for these comments but keeping my mouth shut when I see an injustice is not in my DNA.
Stu doesn’t bar anyone for anything less than death threats (or maybe persistent concern trolling), so drop the martyr act.
I’m fed up with continual over-optimistic misrepresentation of the independence or the SNP position, whether it’s dressed up as “a bit of fun” or not. People were doing it during the referendum campaign and it wasn’t particularly helpful then either.
And I’ve got a perfect right to say so. So wind your neck in. Accuracy is important, and “fun” that doesn’t acknowledge reality isn’t really all that helpful in October 2014.
Ian: As it happens, I have found the footage!
Much obliged, Ian.
I saw the original committee meeting where he spoke and he seemed greatly isolated even then, trying hard to make people understand he is a genuine academic, his research justified. I think the BBC in particular did a good job in defaming him, dismissing his research as ‘flawed.’
Like the Labour party, BBC is a state within a state.
Abellio is delighted to announce that it has been selected by Transport Scotland to operate the next ScotRail franchise, starting April 2015. ScotRail provides passenger train services throughout Scotland with inter-city, regional and suburban rail services across the Scottish national rail network.
Jeff Hoogesteger, CEO of Abellio Group, said of the decision “This is a huge day for Abellio and indeed the Netherlands which has such a rich history of commercial and cultural trade with Scotland. Abellio is delighted and incredibly excited to have been given this opportunity to manage Scotland’s national rail network.”
Abellio acquires and operates public transport franchises with the aim of consolidating the position of NS in the European market as it becomes more deregulated. Abellio currently has rail and bus transport operations in Great Britain and Germany and through Qbuzz in the Netherlands.
The new ScotRail franchise will strengthen Abellio’s position in the UK Rail industry. Running Scotland’s national railway is a good fit with the NS Groep core network operation in the Netherlands; the characteristics of the two networks are similar in that there is a heavily populated ‘central belt’ around Edinburgh and Glasgow with less populated regional areas. With 346 stations, more than 2,000 train services a day, 800 train vehicles and 86.3m passenger journeys per annum the operation is extensive, and again similar in many ways to NS.
The franchise length is a minimum of 7 years from 1 April 2015. By mutual consent it can be extended to 10 years following a review during Year 5. Signing of the franchise agreement took place on 7th October 2014, allowing 6 months for mobilisation. this has been copied straight from Abellio’s website @ link to abellio.com
I’m so fucking angry about this.
@SquareHaggis
Can we have a tunnel thru to Amsterdam?
What’s the point? I mean, Amsterdam is a nice city and all, but unless you’re an art student interested in the 17th and 18th century, or you have a quirk for mills, it’s moot. Except if you’re a grass-hopper, of course.
@Muscleguy
Similarly with the proliferation of rooftop solar panels lots of places hereabouts in the sunniest city in Scotland
What? Rooftop solar panels in Scotland. No, that’s a figment. Come here, have seat. Good. Repeat after me: “Slate shingles. Slate shingles. Slate shingles…” Each time you experience that kind of hallucination, remember this little magic formula.
@Thedogphilosopher
Are you named after a supermarket?
Absolutely. I’ve got so many things in my stash I could not resist. You want Dutch trains in Scotland? That’s a breeze. Slate shingles looking like solar cells to pretend your generating your own energy? I’ve got that too. Saltire party favors for the next SNP congress? Be my guest. I have even “extra-bitter” chocolate tablets to send to your local Labour MP for Xmas. I’ll even tell you why it is so bitter, but, please, don’t snitch. Here it is: they are strychnine-enriched…
Morag,
you are,of course,correct about the current position in the polls.We need to be asking why so many people who voted Yes are meaning to vote for Labour in the general election in May.Then get knocking on doors.Having one to one chats with people we know.And generally working for independence.Its not going to happen just because someone says it will on Facebook.But there also has to be a realisation that independence has to be bolstered outside the political sphere.To keep it alive in everyday life.For that,there has to be a bit of OTT excitement to keep up the enthusiasm.A band playing an independence leaning song in a pub on a Saturday night has as big a role to play as the body sticking leaflets through letterboxes.We’re here.We’re there.We’re everywhere.We’re not going away.
Greame Doig says
“John King
jeesh. I pity anyone who crossed you today ”
(in the style of Paula-Rose)
Was that too Mussolini dahlings?
maybe I should go for a more Ghandi approach what do you think?
but thanks for the DELIGHTFUL feedback (as Paula-Rose might say)
mwa mwa,
now where’s my makeup man?
Boorach says
“How about a keyboard in front of every seat and a giant screen”
My vote is for a basket of eggs next to every seat!
Alex (Clark) Pointed out a photo in the Mail (I think) and in it is A guy laying in about Murphy in Kirkcaldy just as he’s being egged, and the sheer delight in my face (pictured) showed that even I can smile (when I’m happy)maybe if Alex still has it maybe he can post it up?
ps,
and before anyone says, it wasn’t me (dammit) who egged him, my hands were empty in the picture. 🙂
Muttley79 says
“What is the story with Kenny MacAskill then?”
Because he’s too good at his job so the other lot want rid of him, that creature Greame Pearson who criticized him for his handling of the “Megrahi fiasco” wouldn’t have had the courage to do what MacAskill did,
these pygmies cant lace the SG shoes and they know it and it royally pisses them off.
Tam Jardine says
“I have been feeling pretty powerless about the media bias since the result came in, and more so now it has become clear that there will be no let up and the BBC are running a similar anti-SNP campaign in the run up to May 2015.”
Dont feel powerless Tam, do something about it
link to you.38degrees.org.uk
As you can see from the link I put on (above)
I have started my first petition (blush), so lets see what we can do with it, they ONLY way we will get a level playing field is if Westminster are TOLD in no uncertain terms to chuck the unrelenting propaganda against Scotland and the only people who have the power to do that are the OSCE but currently the only people who have the right to request OSCE involvement are (surprise surprise) the UK government ,
We need that sovereign right to be devolved to Holyrood,
which will be akin to asking Westminster to give us everything we asked for and expecting them to give in without a fight.
They well know (as we all do) that without an iron grip on the media, THEY WILL LOSE SCOTLAND no ifs no buts and as such will fight tooth and nail to prevent Holyrood from having the right to have the OSCE expose to the world just HOW disreputable the UK government actually is.
LETS DO THIS!
@Thedogphilosopher
Oh, I forgot to ask: are you also living in a barrel?
Or over… ? 🙂
John King
More Mussolini is just fine John. We don’t have the time or the luxury of suffering fools any more.
Anybody fancy signing this?
link to you.38degrees.org.uk
@ Caz-M: No, STV Glasgow use the existing STV infrastructure or wouldn’t exist. It can run itself without really any new staff or technology. Local equivalents elsewhere over the border are struggling as they don’t have this advantage.
Greame Doig says
“More Mussolini is just fine John. ”
More Mussolini it is Graeme 🙂
@John King
“They well know (as we all do) that without an iron grip on the media, THEY WILL LOSE SCOTLAND no ifs no buts”
Well you clocked that piece over on NNS about the Record, John. Apparently we’ve not to be too hard on our meeja because people will be hurt and lose jobs. They were only doing as they were telt by their employers…
The premise appears to be that its ok for independence support in particular and indeed the greater population of Scotland to suffer or lose jobs through their current establishment so long as we don’t get too upset with those who tell us how to think.
Ah’m thinkin’ they’ll lose their jobs anyway in a market driven world. If someone out there provides 1.6 million people with a hardcopy voice and we continue to support the expansion of new media journalism, then that’s where my money is going. If I don’t feel represented by any organ of the current established press, then just like any end user I’m looking for someone who does.
Mealer says: 9 October, 2014 at 7:44 am:
“A band playing an independence leaning song in a pub on a Saturday night has as big a role to play as the body sticking leaflets through letterboxes.We’re here.We’re there.We’re everywhere.We’re not going away.”
You got that right, Mealer, I was at the checkout of a well known Pound-shop yesterday, (wearing the woolly hat with YES Badges pinned everywhere). The Young Lady behind the counter said, “Pity we didn’t win”. I said, “Oh it’s not that bad. The YES side are going nowhere. Did you know that SNP membership has shot up to around 80,000, that the Greens membership has tripled with the SSP & Labour For Indy memberships also shooting up? Many of those people must be coming from other parties so their support must be going down”.
As I turned to leave the shop a group of shoppers had stopped to listen at the end of the nearest two aisle. One guy in particular stood out like a sore thumb – his chin had dropped down around his knees in astonishment. He said to the woman with him, “Dae ye hear that, Hen, it’s no finished yit”.
Folks are still hungry for information and encouragement. Let’s give it to them, for the BBC and MSM are already off on their own agendas of unionist propaganda and they will never give it a rest.
The whole cabal:-
Westminster; Tory, Labour, LibDem, UKIP
TV & Radio; BBC, STV, Sky, CH4, BBC Scotland
Press; Daily Record, Herald, Scotsman et al.
Their conduct is beyond ethics, code, principle, or laws.
.
Even gangsters have a code of honour.
But all of the above are worse than gangsters.
.
Their every word and phrase is PR scripted
and carefully selected to entice and deceive.
Their entire outward appearance is itself a lie;
a gossamer-thin veneer of respectability and decency.
.
Behind the designer clothes and expensive grooming,
they are rotten to the very core
wherein lie their insatiable self-interest and greed
in a constant fusion
resulting in total corruption.
.
By comparison, sewage is a dessert.
.
Now then, where did I put that cup of tea . . .
@John King
Clicked on the link for your OSCE petition. It’s asking for a sign in which I don’t have. 38degrees usually just send to my email.
Is there another link you can post direct to the petition?
FFS Clegg and Massie on with Garry on GMS at top billing time this morning. This has to stop , do the media think they are in charge of our politicians ? Fifteen minutes of rubbishing the SNP with not a voice in defence , if this is the new 55percent solution then they are very very mistaken!
NEW MEDIA
I believe that the 1.6 million YES voters have been well served by the current range of choice. New merged and improved choices such as NNS and Derek Bateman will further improve the quality.
The challenge is to persuade sufficient numbers of NO voters to access these new media outlets on a regular basis.
To be effective in time for the General Election, it is simple, we all need to continue the one to one conversations at every opportunity and to use flyers, such as the Aye leaflets.Coordination at local Yes group level of the target groups will also be helpful.There is a lot of work ahead to get rid of these Unionist MPs.
Nana @ 09.05
Probably my fault Nana
I’ll try and fix it but thanks for going on to sign (I hope)
John King
Re the petition. By ‘share of assets’ i hope they’re not thinking they’ll be taking any of our oil.
I can also imaging Lizzy’s face when this arrives at her door. Like a bulldog lickin pish off a nettle (had to see that in black and white again) as one of our team mentioned the other day, i would imagine.
Doug McG @ 9.17
Hence my petition, because now the media have found just how far they can go and get away with it, we absolutely NEED the protection of the OSCE or they for the next several months will just run riot with lies, obfuscation, and bad news (for them) avoidance,
We HAVE to protect ourselves or instead of the SNP returning 30 (or more) MP’s to Westminster they will be annihilated by the unrelenting savage attacks by the press and BBC!
@John King
Will most definitely sign your petition, let me know when its up and running.
John King
Obviously referring to 38D petition in last comment.
Will be signing your OSCE one when it’s ready bud.
Avery useful read by the other James Kelly at Scot Goes Pop. A letter he has written as submission to the Smith Commission.
Apart from the ideas it does highlight another principle, that words must be made to mean something. All the assertions made in the weeks before the vote relating to more powers by together reps and politicians must not be allowed to become mere election speak.
@ manandboy says:
9 October, 2014 at 9:02 am
An honest question,
Why do your post look as though they had been set out for George Bush’s autocue?
🙂 ????
Greame Doig @ 9.42
that petition is by some numpty in England who will get the shock of his/her life when (if he/she ) succeeds in withdrawing England (please god let it happen) from the union. 🙂
Holyrood in drive to persuade more to use the internet
This drive must be encouraged. Last year there was a computer savvy course set up in our area for the over 60’s. It was started as a way to help combat loneliness but was so popular it was extended.
Can only be a good thing for independence, get people finding the real facts and show the media up for it is, state propaganda.
link to archive.today
OT but does anyone know if there is anything planned by the Tartan Army/45 for the game on Saturday. It would be at Ibrox!!
Compare and contrast two headlines / subs from the Herald:
“MacAskill clings on to job as quit call voted down”
JUSTICE Secretary Kenny MacAskill has clung on to his job after surviving a no confidence vote at Holyrood.
“Lamont in vow to cut cost of nursery care”
SCOTTISH Labour leader Johann Lamont has unveiled an ambitious long-term plan to slash the cost of childcare in a speech calling for a new era of post-referendum politics.
link to iol.co.za
Thanks Nana
I have contacted 38% to see if I’ve done anything wrong,
It would seem I AM the man who gets flatpack furniture and decides to build it and ignore the advice on the diagrams! 🙁
Thanks Marcia. I really don’t understand Allan sometimes.
This reminds me of that whole episode where Mrs Lamont was attacking the SNP for doing something that was actually done by Labour, and what’s more, Mrs Lamont’s OWN HUSBAND WAS INVOLVED IN IT.
And it’s never going to stop. That’s the scary thing, and why we MUST do something about the media.
That was fantastic, David.
You know Morag, I did a lot of growing up during the campaign. I think I aged about 10 years, politically. And I always truly believed in a magic number – 88%. I truly believed that would be the result, BUT it wouldn’t be the result unless we worked for it. Evidently we didn’t work hard enough, and knowing what I know now about the No voters, 88% was never going to be likely. But I don’t regret believing it would be 88%: just that I regret being so open and vocal about it. I know better now.
As such, I’m going to be treating 47% SNP at WM as the target to believe in. Whether we get that or not, I don’t care: we just have to get as many as possible.
Speaking of which, I’ve been working on a post regarding the various Scottish parties’ vote on the Scotland Act, and this one confuses me mightily:
link to publicwhip.org.uk
Now as ever, I’m not well-versed in political-speak, but I can’t understand why every SNP MP voted against this, yet almost every other MP voted for it. I can understand them voting against the Scotland Bill (they pushed for a second reading), but I can’t get my head around it. Is it because despite the page saying this was a vote for “more powers,” it was actually a vote for less? It seems preposterous that the SNP would vote against any more powers for Scotland, even piddling ones like “being able to choose what to put on food labels.”
I’ve found out a lot of interesting things, though, particularly about the supposed “party of devolution.”
Graeme Doig @ 9.42
Know what you mean,
I’ve had to repeat that comment as well, its just too good to use just once,
but someone on my facebook page came up with one to the effect
“She looks like her face has been set on fire. then put out with a shovel”
which made me laugh,
maybe we should start a facebook page for descriptions of JL et al. 🙂
Just read the Alex Mooney article on NewsnetScotland. Jaw dropping guff by Mr. Mooney and I am really surprised that NNS would publish such stuff.
Sounds like the Daily Record is shitting itself over the repercussions from it’s controversial referendum coverage.
If you want to tell Daily Record editor Murray Foote why he should be worried then drop him a line or two;
m.foote@dailyrecord.co.uk
@ AuldA,
Pipe dream?
@ Taranaich
A propos the food labeling vote.
One possible reason is that labels could have to carry two different versions, one for Scotland and the other for rUK.
If you look at the flow of foodstuffs between Scotland and rUK, we are a net exporter of raw materials and a new importer of finished foodstuffs. This means that rUK would need to produce dual labeled produce or a special one for Scotland.
Two possibilities come from that observation, the produce sold in Scotland would be more expensive, because of the “impossibly difficult logistics” and the rUK (English) would object to subsidising the extra labeling costs.
Nonsense but.
The Elephant in the room is what advantage would unique Scottish food labeling legislation, would give.
Rules on food labeling are harmonising and language will become the main difference not colours or layout
Hi John, I tried to sign too but I think it is the link to set up a campaign. I’ll definitely sign your campaign though as I’ve noticed and am finding unbearable, is BBC radio Scotland and TV,s relentless SNP bashing already! They obviously think that project fear worked well for them!!
Gillie , much like I would love to send Mr Foote a Disgusted Dorothy e-mail – I can’t as I am happy to announce I have never bought a copy in my puff.
Sadly, my maiden name is the same as his – I hope we are not related . If we are I will happily disown him.
Thanks FoS
Ive emailed 38% to see if I’ve set it up wrong or something, maybe it just takes time to bed in or something since I voted (first of course) on it and it doesn’t register my vote.
Someone just tweeted the following figures. Let’s have these printed on billboards and displayed across Scotland from now until May 7th 2015.
MPs expenses for 2013/14
Top 3 (“Scottish” Labour)
1. Anas Sarwar £204,606.89
2. Jim McGovern £201,808.49
3. Jim Murphy £196,969.33
@ John King, 7:47am
I have signed your petition, but, the link does not work.
You need to remove the last word “manage” from the 38 Degrees petition address and :
link to you.38degrees.org.uk
FoS
I had a look there and a couple of people (thanks folks) have already signed it so it seems to be ok, I must admit when I access is I have to click on a “veiw” button before I can see it, I don’t know if that’s what your seeing though?
@ John King, 7:47am
The following link to your petition works (the word “manage” needs to be removed from the link):
link to you.38degrees.org.uk
I have signed it. 🙂
Sorry for the information posted twice – having a strange pc day 🙁
@john king –
Nice one. Have signed.
Small suggestion – might be good to add another sentence, telling folk what OSCE stands for and why its protection would be useful. I saw that you’ve provided a link to their site, but a lot of folk won’t bother to click.
Jim McGovern £201,808.49 … Who he?
Marcia dear, deep breath and count to ten, the rest of us don’t have the pleasure of knowing the little git like you do.
Betty Boop @10.55
What?
Like this you mean
link to you.38degrees.org.uk 🙂
Thanks a lot Betty Boop Flower of Scotland for persevering.
Nana Smith says:
9 October, 2014 at 9:58 am Holyrood in drive to persuade more to use the internet.
Could this be something that YES groups might be willing to do particularly as they seem to be searching for something concrete to get their teeth into.
link to secure.38degrees.org.uk
The Smith commission looking for views from the public, devolve broadcasting now.
@John King
Signed now and passed it on!
@Ian Brotherhood:
Is that the top 3 Scottish, or tOP 3 Labour only. Particularly shocking if it’s for all Scottish MPs, given the travel expenses of the Highlands and Islands MPs.
Overnight, Scottish Independence Live Events’ (‘Thistle’, to you and me) Indiegogo appeal has surpassed 25%, now sitting at £1,050.
Superb…let’s keep it going.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/scottish-independence-live-events–2
Ian Wood, David Cameron and Ineos. The story of how the land from under our feet was sold.
Controversial new fracking laws have been announced by David Cameron, allowing right of access to private property.
The government and a few select energy firms have been preparing for this moment for a considerable amount of time, just outside the public eye.
With the help of Government funding, chemical industry giant Ineos have managed to build one of the largest shale gas refineries in Europe, directly in the heart of Scotland’s shale gas region at Grangemouth.
They also secured a licence to drill under our most populated area.
On the 20th of August 2014, two days after Ineos secured their licence, Sir Ian Wood dropped his impartial stance in the Referendum and went against his own previous predictions, announcing there is very little oil left
bfh—forget the bbc–its grangemouth next
@John King
at 10:07am
Re Lamont. Dookin for chips?
First Minister Alex Salmond claimed a total of £9,691, including expenses for travel, printing, stationary, mobile phone and newspaper subscriptions.
Labour leader Johann Lamont spent £19,697 on bills for taxi and rail travel, hotels in Edinburgh and office costs.
Conservative leader Ruth Davidson claimed back £17,184 of travel, office and accommodation costs, while Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie’s expenses were £16,394, the majority of which were for travel costs.
link to archive.today
“I have no idea how to reach out to No voters because I find the majority of them stupid beyond my understanding. This is not because they desired an end result different to that I desired. That is a perfectly legitimate choice. It is because, by voting No, they are going to get an end result which is not what they wanted at all, and that was very obvious. Asking me to reach out to these unbelievably thick people is like asking me to go for a drive with someone who, against my advice, drove the wrong way down a motorway, causing a lot of people to get hurt as a result.”
link to craigmurray.org.uk
Nana Smith says:
9 October, 2014 at 9:58 am
“Holyrood in drive to persuade more to use the internet”
Hindsight is a wonderful thing Nana, but if only this drive had started a year ago. However, we live and hopefully learn.
Hi Fred, I feel so much like Craig Murray. there are still too many people here in Scotland who are ill informed And it is their choice. Politics are not for them is the cry and my own sex is one of the worst. It doesn’t affect my life is the other, oh yes it does. How many made their mind up with regard to prejudice regarding their political viewpoint and the state of what they saw was THEIR state of finance etc. It was uplifting to see that at least a load of people, mostly those with nothing to lose saw that an Independent Scotland could be their saviour, whilst the complacent middle looked at the prospect as something which they did not want. Well I would say to all of those, that once the Tories have finished with the poor, where do you think the remaining money is coming from to feed the Greedy Rich, you that is whom.
In 20 min. it’s FMQs. 12.00
link to wingsoverscotland.com
The main dog trainer gets to bring the mongrels to heel again.. 😉
Nana, it leaves me speechless that someone can rack up that sort of money for Hotel and travel, I doubt Ms Lamont needs to stay in Edinburgh at any time, there are trains and buses home to Glasgow surely. Same goes for the other two muppets. Willie should remember that there are trains heading home for him on a regular basis and we all know what they cost, he can certainly travel third class with the rest of us, nonentity that he is.
I’m sorry but I’m still of the belief that the real evil here is the BBC. I listened to the BBC news report yesterday dinner-time & Ken MacDonald made the point that the government’s hands were effectively tied. And yet on every subsequent news bulletin the only substance granted to the story was the direct quote from the Union numpty about how the SNP were now showing their “true colours”.
I’m also firmly of the belief that unless we get control of the BBC in Scotland in these proposals for further devolution we will lose the next referendum too. No matter how good this site is we simply can’t compete with the ‘stream of consciousness’ ability afforded to the BBC via its passive TV & radio output.
It’s the BBC we need to fight!
John King, signed the petition.
Can anyone give me a good reason why Anas Sarwar needs to spend £140,784 on staffing his constituency office for the tax year 2013/2014?
Is anyone living nearby able to have a look and double check that at least half a dozen folk are in there beavering away on his constituency business. The address is 9 Scotland Street.
I am struggling to get my head round this. OF course, with some of the poorest folk living within his manor, there is plenty of work to be getting on with. Maybe he is trying to lift as many as possible out of poverty by employing an army of them, Oskar Schindler style?
@BtP:
You mean, it’s still like when I was young? I remember, Scotland exported mammoths to England and imported carved ivory amulets for pendants.
Blast it. Where did I put my quern stone? I’ve got einkorn to grind.
Bon appétit !
@R-type Grunt
Definitely agreed.
Remove the source of the brainwashing of those who voted No, provide them with the real facts, and you’ll have a larger percentage of the population waking up and suddenly becoming very angry.
No matter how good Wings/Newsnet/Bella/etc. are, there will always be that section of the population who don’t read them, either out of lack of tech savvy, or the view that these sites are full of “vile cybernats” and anything they say is automatically distrusted.
Online media has taken a huge chunk of the BBC’s monopoly on information broadcasting, but they still hold most of it.
@SquareHaggis:
Pipe dream?
That’s “Pipe line”: link to youtube.com
Helena Brown
to me it boils down to common sense, it’s like willingly getting into someone else’s car as a passenger, without 1st noting it’s condition.
scotland already has an economy, the well noted point is, as in the whole working class economy, of a lack of investment and high levels venture capitalist speculation leading to very low levels of working class productivity.
productivity 35% lower than it was 35yrs ago the reasons for that are dazzlingly obvious but then a check with BfS the jimmy reid foundation et al will provide all of the evidence that is required.
uk pensions have already been paid for which initially requires very little input from SG, except for pensions top ups.
as far as further austerity via wastemonster the writing was/is already on the wall.
to me then it points to fear and lack of self esteem, caused by generations of being crushed by imperialism, rather than a lack of detailed info.
the devil you know!
Just listening to Lamont, she is getting even worse than normal. She appears to be having trouble even pronouncing privatisation…
Ian Brotherhood @ 10.59
thanks for the advice Ian I’ll do that.
@Taranaich
The way I read it was a clause would be inserted to give regulation of food labelling and content to the Scottish Parliament BUT they were not allowed to make any legislation on this.
In other words, all of the responsibility but none of the power. It also doesn’t say where the funding would come from.
@R-type Grunt
Indeed. Radio Scotland this morning might as well have been Radio Norfolk: items on English football, the Great British Bake Off, and the British Army.
Clearly the BBC has decided to ‘homogenise’ even further, and as quickly as possible.
@Muttley
The only consolation in listening to the idiot Lamont is that she will not be able to be hidden in the coming months as much as our MSM hid her during the referendum campaign.
Ian Brotherhood
Here is a handy link, type in the year and the Name of your MP and all the expenses are there.
From the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority,
link to parliamentary-standards.org.uk
John King, just signed the England Petition and had to comment that with only 10 signatures in a day we would have had ten thousand by now. Anything to help our “Friends in the South”.
link to blog.38degrees.org.uk
Certainly, listening to the BBC propaganda, I can now understand why people in Scotland thought that voting for Labour over the last 30 years was somehow saving them from the Tories.
Salmond just slapped down poor old James Kelly, auch….
John King
Signed.
Signed John. 🙂
Nana Smith
my response is here; dear smith,, please refer to all of the info contained within the whole of the YES campaign, ie BfS the jimmy reid foundation, radical independence campaign, et al, it is all exceedingly well documented.
refer also to the relevant promissory documents and inputs of BT.
do we really need to be as in an endless repeating ourselves loop?
I am glad that there are many people agreeing with that Craig Murray quote. I have to say I agree with it 100%. It made me sad and scunnered when someone wrote on here about canvasing in Newton Mearns, and feeling there was little interest there in the likes of free prescriptions, lifting children out of poverty. I have said before, I would herd all these folk into the Borders area and just present it to England!
I also agree that HALF OF THE WHOLE BATTLE lies in gaining control of the BBC (and the print media). Only I just do not know who to do it. But it must somehow be done. Or else you can go on printing wee blue books until you’re, well, blue in the face, and it will make very little difference!
Anyone else watch and grimace at 2 performances on TV last night.
James Kelly on Scotland Tonight repeating the same phrase over and over regardless of question just like JoLa does..who coaches these folk?
Then Newsnight with RMT Union leader,thats one sad wee limited man there trying to be next Bob Crowe it seems…curiously kept repeating same Labour “Scots Profits to Holland” phrase while shouting about possible ballots and taking action when asked “Isnt No redundancies and a living wage for all workers a good thing?”
The fight to destroy the SNP has begun..and no mistake
In short: it’s the BBC, stupid!
Macart 8.36am
Spot on Sam. Read the NNS article regarding the poor DR employees. I nearly chocked when i read his sympathy yarn. That bloody rag has be a disgrace for years.
The writer even then had the temerity to mention poor Rangers getting the same. WTF ???
I hope the DR close and the whole gang get their books.
They lied continually. Even today they have pages full of the shit that the SG didn’t buy the Scotrail franchise ??? How many times do we , the non paid , amateur hacks find the facts and Laws preventing such a thing happening but they can’t. They are supposed to be the professionals . (Aye right)
Far too many times the MSM have been found out by wingers and we know the buggers love to lurk on here. I read the DR article and noticed we cannot comment now.
Did anyone else have this problem. NO Comments.
Stinks and if it smells like shite, looks like shite then it is shite.
Now i don’t expect to agree with all of the NNS articles but this one, in hope of sympathy for the worst of the union rags , really gets my goat.
I will not be visiting that site for a while .
Just noting that the Radio Active waste ship ‘Parida’
isn’t actually off Wick as reported by the BBC on their website.
Its actually moored to Saltburn Pier at Invergordon
Thanks to marinetraffic.com 🙂
@desimond – Yes that RMT union spokesman I was thinking last night I wonder if you voted NO.
If he did stuff him.
@John King
Signed John (but in my real name)
It really would try the patience of a saint to listen to the likes of Lamont, Kelly, Baillie, Curran etc go on and on about how we cannot govern ourselves. These people are deeply, deeply mediocre. It really is the final insult.
Morag says:
9 October, 2014 at 1:07 am
Oh, Lesley, I love you to bits, but give it a rest. That’s a fantasy-number the tooth fairy brought in.
You’re in the same constituency and you know the score. The SNP is not going to sweep in and dislodge Mundell just like that. Gosh, are you planning a world cruise for next spring, if it’s all set to happen without any work?
The person who wrote the above does not come across, to me, as a natural leader of men/women.
Yet again we have cause to thank Blair Jenkins for his view re BBC bias – so helpful.
For a perfect example of why we need Wings:
My wife picked me up at the aiport last night and she says “Did you see the railways given to a Dutch company, whats that about?, Theyre kicking up hell!”
I then told her the facts, all from Stus article including years of Tory and Labour negligence and cue a cry of “Thats a disgrace!”
We need to get such information and analysis out to as many folk as possible at every possible opportunity as most people will only know what they are told. Sad but true.
@YESGUY
Yeah, left a comment in reply to yours over there. Couldn’t believe it when I read the piece. Basically be nice because they’re just doing what they’re told and they might lose their jobs.
And the rest of us can suffer in silence and just put up with it? Be unrepresented, be misrepresented, be lied to, be mislead? Seriously? FFS!
But they’re just doin’ the day job, nothing personal you understand.
The “Scottish Statesman”,
“FirstGroup comes last in bid to run Scotland’s railways.”
link to scottishstatesman.com
Yay! That’s it, my submission to Smith, now I can go back to sleep. Glad I worked it up in a text file first though, as thnking about it over time, I managed to improve it before submission.
Great wee story on ” we are the 45″ via The Irish Times. Theresa May, she of the manned scottish border crossing, has just signed a groundbreaking visa sharing deal with Ireland yesterday. It will allow foreign visitors to travel to both countries on one visa. Front page of Irish times… Anyone seen it in our MSM? I no longer buy a paper. 🙂
‘Freedom from poverty and from poverty of ambition’ – Johann Lamont’s speech Wednesday October 8th –
there is no such thing as poverty of ambition.
poverty is caused by lack of vitality giving vitals of life.
the brains of human beings are MASSIVE, and are easily controlled by restricting access to vitality giving vitals of life.
notwithstanding that, where is the well funded peoples business start up investment bank?
find out why the country of iceland’s economy is doing so well?
See more at: link to scottishlabour.org.uk
Rev,
I would echo many of the comments above regarding your holding both the press and the politicians to account. Labour in Scotland’s response to the rail franchise and child care announcements and the MSM media parroting of the Lab line without any critical analysis make this imperative IMHO.
I hope you continue to hold all of them accountable YES supporting parties too – I hope that the tens of thousand new SNP members can influence a significantly more robust stance on fracking for instance.
Good to have you back!
I suspect that the MSM are concerned about the growth in the SNP’s membership, as well as the Greens and the SSP to a lesser extent. I think that is why we are getting all the misinformation about the railways.
I’m wondering what, exactly, NNS is up to. First they have an article by someone supposedly at the WFI in Perth, saying it was useless. Article later withdrawn.
Now this justification for the Record subverting democracy.
Something stinks in the state of Denmark!
Did you all see the “mouth crash” of James Kelly during “F.M.Q.s today?!, how on earth that man got into politics is beyond me, oh wait he’s Scottish Labour, ah well that explains it, as does Clara Hilton’ s disgraceful “u” turn on a school closure in Dunfermline, the two local politicians (C Hilton and Thomas Docherty ) then issued a joint statement to the local paper the Dunfermline Press, blaming the Scottish Government for the closure!!, I won’t go into the” why’s and where knots”, you, the reader can research the article in the Dunfermline Press and the comments under the article .
James Kelly on Scotland Tonight repeating the same phrase over and over regardless of question just like JoLa does..who coaches these folk?
James Kelly on a rehearse loop. The fool did not seem to be capable of constructing a simple sentence by himself.
How much do we pay those Red Tory monkeys?
@Muttley
The MSM aim during the referendum campaign was primarily to undermine the confidence of the Scottish people in their ability to run their own affairs. In this new phase their aim will be to undermine the confidence of the Scottish people in the competence of the SNP. They have largely failed to do the latter so far, but not for the want of trying.
It remains to be seen how far co-ordinated paeans to the Labour Party (e.g. of the type which appeared on the BBC and in The Herald this morning on Labour’s ‘vision’ for child care) will get them.
@Albaman
Absolutely shocking behaviour from Hilton & Docherty.
Seems to be the way with slab nowadays anything and mostly fabricated stories to slate the SNP is their agenda.
Lesley Anne put up the link at 7.58pm last evening.
here’s lamont’s speech again if anyone wants to suffer it that is.
link to archive.today
Training Day (Just for you)
Remember your duties for tomorrow and every other day.
Cancel your Labour Party membership.
Cancel your BBC TV License.
Cancel your Daily Record newspaper.
The political Holy Trinity of Scotland.
We defeat these three organisations, we win Independence.
If you have already done all of the above, then it is your duty to persuade someone who hasn’t.
Join a Pro-Indy Party tomorrow.
Vote SNP 2015. YES ALLIANCE
@Training Day
I agree with your analysis of the MSM. They are covering for SLAB because they know they are in real trouble. This is why they are promoting their policies. The propaganda continues unabated.
Read thro all the comments and the absolute must is we get some form of control over the media – a hard one I know.
Remember the amount of abuse that AS had to endure over spending when he was actually promoting Scotland and it turns out JoLa claimed much more – the media drove that one on and a lot of folk were slagging AS off.
I woke up angry again about the misinformation re the rail franchise – I wish there was some lawyer person who could find out if we could sue the BBC or at least individual reporters who peddle lies.
I’m also pissed off at the likes of Alan Grogan jumping in with the same stuff – deep down labour folk ex or otherwise really do not like the SNP.
What kind of worries me about the massive upsurge in new members is that some of them will be the dirty tricks brigade.
At one point the labour party were the good guys but they must have got infiltrated over the years.
@caz-m
Cancel licence fee? Check. As for the other two no action required 😉
How many of us are going to George Square in Free Glasgow on Sunday?
Whatever Happened to the Judicial Investigation Into Child Sex Abuse in Westminster?
link to caltonjock.com
Any word on when the English FA will be pooling its resources with the Scottish FA?
@liz
I would not be too hard on Allan Grogan. He campaigned well for independence as far as I can tell. He is bound to have different opinions on policy. It is not his fault that the MSM are carrying on the disinformation from the referendum.
I’m much less worried about possible infiltration of the SNP by the dirty tricks brigade in the context of a whopping 52,000 new members. Even if SLab or another unionist body thought of sliding in a few fifth columnists, how many could they realistically organise? Where would they find even hundreds of people to do that, never mind thousands? With tens of thousands of new members, any infiltrators will be well outnumbered.
” but we can still rise now – and be a nation again,”
Still need a lot of work on that first part.
The second bit will take care of itself.
Raising, or increasing, the Yes vote is the only thing we
should be thinking about.
But already, some are distracted.
We can sometimes be our own worst enemy.
.
Meanwhile the BBC & Press,
with John McTernan at the PR helm,
are busy firing ahead, REDUCING support for Indy,
while Yes seem to be in neutral with the handbrake on..
The BBC is in ‘campaign mode’ – why aren’t we?
Bugger (the Panda) says: 9 October, 2014 at 9:54 am
Why do your post look as though they had been set out for George Bush’s autocue?
__________________________________________________________
Bugger, you may be overestimating Dubya’s reading
capabilities – and by a distance !
@muttley79 – I know Alan Grogan did well with LfI ,that’s why I’m so annoyed at him quickly jumping on the band wagon and blaming the SNP for something which is outwith their control
Surely he is intelligent enough to check the facts, it’s bad enough having the entire media against us and actively promoting JoLa as an alternative FM.
The reason that the likes of James Kelly et al are in the position they are, is because more intelligent folk would be embarrassed to spout the rubbish they do.
They are promoted way above their intelligence and they know it, that’s why they will fight to the death to keep those well paid jobs, if society was fair they would be at the bottom of the food chain.
@Morag
Bus them up from down South like they did during the campaign? It’s not like they have much in the way of support to draw on up here.
@Muttley
Demonisation of the SNP has been going on for a while.
Labour Councillor Jim Montgomerie over here in the North Ayrshire constituency sends out regular newsletters telling people what a great job he’s doing.
And he’s always very quick to jump on anything he can use to turn locals against the SNP and paint himself as a lone voice of sanity in the council.
I’m sure the same thing is happening everywhere else too.
Like people are saying on here. Until we can prise the control of mainstream media from Westminster’s grip, the majority will continue to be poisoned against the Yes parties.
No doubt the propaganda will be churned out with increasing frequency over the next few years as Westminster hurries to break up the growing “rebellion” up here.
Does anyone have a link, please, to the story of
the Labour Councillor of 18 years,
who quit after witnessing
the threatening calls to pensioners
during the Referendum ?
@fred blogger says: 9 October, 2014 at 1:42 pm:
“here’s lamont’s speech again if anyone wants to suffer it that is.
link to archive.today
Thanks Fred, I think I better explain why anyone would thank you for giving a link to a Lamont speech. It’s like this – I have a strange hearing problem after being subjected to a ships gunfire while unprotected with ear defenders. I have severe tinnitus and cannot hear certain frequencies. I thus sometimes find I cannot hear certain people well enough to follow what they are saying. Particularly higher pitched female voices and children.
I had thought Johann Lamont was one of those people as I always failed to make sense of anything Lamont said. That is until I read your link to what she is reported to have said and I cannot make sense out of the printed text of what she said either.
;-))
Oneironaut
they are masters of scapegoating and demonetization of others.
murphy “lady asks a question”, abuse in ayr.
and “i’ll let him know what he is saying” sums up imperialists within the 1st few seconds of this clip exceedingly well.
link to youtube.com
So I take it BBC are no longer showing their “Version” of MFQ’s
Sorry thats a typo but manufactured questions seems more appropriate
Oneironaut 2:16pm
“Labour Councillor Jim Montgomerie over here in the North Ayrshire constituency sends out regular newsletters telling people what a great job he’s doing.”
This is what I was on about such earlier on in this thread. Local YES groups, what ever their flavour of pro-indy politics, need to get out their information to targeted sections of the NO voters. These voters need to be told what a bad job he is doing, and what the alternatives are.
The battle against the MSM is much harder.
manandboy;
Archived to Herald story of Labour councillor quitting after vote
link to archive.today
@fred blogger –
The woman wearing the blue jacket in that video is Alison, who’s a legend in the Ayrshire Yes movement. She knew exactly what she was doing, exactly where the camera was, and gave Murphy the showing-up he deserved. Some of the still photos of her making a face to camera as he rants on are priceless.
Check his body language after she asked the question – he was bricking it.
Still, the very idea that people such as Murphy are basking in any kind of ‘victory’ is just nauseating – his removal in May should be a priority.
Robert Peffers
apart from it being vacuous, she shamelessly try’s to attach herself to the passion and creativity of the YES campaign, which originally, as you’ll recall they cited the indyscot ref as a complete distraction and waste of time many months before.
the youtube archive is full of their negativity against the indyref concept.
she said she has spent a life time fighting poverty and the presenter piped up and to paraphrase said it has been a wasted lifetime, in that case!
Regarding the new single visa deal between UK and Ireland. It took me 20 mins to find the story on BBC news, tucked away under the N.Ireland section.
Ian Brotherhood
that clip sums up the negativity of the naw campaign, i cannot think of a better one.
i’m of an age where i remember many highly skilled questioners, such as she, (men and women) who knew that their voice would still have the power to make a difference.
no feart!
ManandBoy
Bugger, you may be overestimating Dubya’s reading
capabilities – and by a distance !
It was, believe it or not, a really genuine question.
I just thought it may have been due to a cut and paste from a pdf file or summat?
Just ’cause I was nosey.
ps we could do a Johann Lamont version of the autocue?
Where are Conan and the WGD when you need them?
BtP
Apologies manandboy that link is crap, can’t seem to find a copy which isn’t blocked by the ‘subscribe wall’ and that’s after deleting cache, and the only other referral to this was the greenock telegraph, couldn’t get beyond their subscribe stuff either…maybe someone else a bit more savvy than me can find a way to post a link to this?
@ Morag
“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the ("Tractor" - Ed) moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the ("Tractor" - Ed) appears not a ("Tractor" - Ed); he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.”
? Marcus Tullius Cicero
THE MAIN WEAPON: FOR NO; FOR YES
From the off and throughout the Indy debate
The No Campaign chose their weapon carefully.
They CHOSE the LIE.
Then by concentrating on those aspects of life
which have to be secure, like currency and pensions,
No was able to spread FEAR far and wide, and deep.
And furthermore, they targetted the elderly,
who are particularly sensitive to security issues
and who are easily frightened.
In the end, Fear won because of the LIE WEAPON.
.
YES chose the TRUTH in a positive campaign.
But while light dispels darkness,
The TRUTH weapon was not as effective as the LIE ,
particularly with the very large number of older voters
and pensioners.
The LIE was used unceasingly, almost robotically.
The Yes case was simply ignored by the No spokespeople,
who concentrated on telling their carefully scripted
and well rehearsed lies.
.
WHAT NOW FOR GE 15.
THERE IS A SAYING: change your losing game;
don’t change your winning game.
The Unionists are not going to change their strategy or
their weapon of choice for the GE Campaign
which has already started on the BBC & STV & in the Press.
So what of the Indy Campaign ?
Which campaign weapon shall we choose this time ?
For if we choose as for Indy, then Scottish Labour MP’s
will be marching into Westminster by the dozen.
If well chosen LIES can make an electorate AFRAID
what will make Unionist MP’s AFRAID and embolden the No
voters.
Answer- ANGER
LEGAL, CONTROLLED AND ORGANISED ANGER.
Anger at Labour who have embraced the Gravy Train culture
and who are only interested in filling their pockets at taxpayer’s expense.
Anger at Labour who have changed their spots,
to become the Red Tories
abandoning their constituents
so as to further their careers.
Anger at Labour’s lies over Pensions
and at Brown & Darling’s lies over Devo Max
Anger at Labour in bed with the Tories
and at Labour switching to Unionism.
Anger at Labour doing Cameron’s dirty work
and at Labour turning it’s back on Scotland’s poor
to become the enemy of the poor.
The list goes on.
The anger is everywhere but it has to be fanned into a
flame of political determination across the whole country
to become a force with one goal –
TO RID SCOTLAND OF ALL UNIONIST MP’S
@No no no…Yes says: 2:28 pm and @Oneironaut 2:16pm – agree we need to start soon.
I have copied all the posters showing SLAB troughers, expenses claimed etc, we need to get these or posters like these copied and posted thro doors.
@Snode1965 says: 9 October, 2014 at 2:44 pm:
“Regarding the new single visa deal between UK and Ireland. It took me 20 mins to find the story on BBC news, tucked away under the N.Ireland section.”
Thing is, were you surprised it was hard to find?
Perhaps there is a message that is rather hard for Scots to except? It could be interpreted as Westminster sending the message that Scots attempting to take their independence by wholly democratic means is resisted by Westminster with promised armed border controls, barbed wire, visas and passports while the independence won by bombs, bullets and bloodshed by the Republic of Ireland is open and free. (for the benefit of MI5 if they are reading this), Please note the message from the YES movement has been always a democratic effort but the message from Westminster has always been one of lies, half-truths and attempted generation of fear. We all remember what you did to Willie MacRae.
Thanks for your efforts K1, much appreciated,
although your link does work for me and I will use this story in tandem,
the one I am chasing is of a Male labour councillor
who was disgusted by the phoning of pensioners
with threats that they would lose their pensions
if they voted yes.
I have a contact with a guy from Greenpeace fund raising in Bristol who is interested to know more about it.
Ps K1, deleting the cookies for the herald will get you past the subscribe wall – if you need help with that I’ll be glad to send a ‘how to’ link.
Seeing as IPSO replaced the PCC on 8th Sept can we use them to complain about the MSM (not the BBC). IPSO are charged with enforcing the Editors’ Code of Practice and Clause 1, I) states “The Press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information, including pictures.”, would this apply with this story in the newspapers?
A link to the page is here: link to ipso.co.uk
@BtP:
Nice excerpt. Catiline orations I think.
Latin version maybe?
Lamont frantically trying to raise her profile, her gas was in a peep throughout the Referendum campaign but todays Herald carries an obsequious article on Lamont & childcare by Catherine MacLeod, the wummin is desperate so she is!
John King.
Signed buddy
This issue more than anything exposes the hypocrisy of the supposedly “Labour” Party. One of the key reasons this was signed that the firm has agreed
• a commitment to earnings of at least the living wage for all staff and subcontractors and the
• introduction of guaranteed trade union representation on every franchise Board meeting.
Both of these are measures aimed at improving the conditions for all employees something you would think the party of working class backed by Trade Unions would wholeheartedly support. Indeed this is especially so given the regressive measures introduced by the UK Government such as trade your rights away for shares and extending the period from 1 to 2 years for unfair dismissal.
@manandboy – “YES chose the TRUTH in a positive campaign.
You’re right – I remember having a conversation with a mate a month or so before the end of the campaign. He was of the opinion that the “don’t stoop to their level, keep positive” position was the correct tactic, whereas I was worried that I’d wake up on the 19th and I’d hear
“Ah! well we may have lost but at least we fought an honest campaign” – and from some corners that’s what I have been hearing.
Disappointingly with some of the comments on here and from Blair Jenkins, NNS etc. trying to justify some parts of the MSM, BBC et al I can see us falling into the same trap again.
To get it right this time it might mean we have to get down into the trenches with the them and metaphorically kick, bite and gouge and do what ever else is needed to stop their lies.
Bugger (the Panda) says:9 October, 2014 at 2:59 pm
It was, believe it or not, a really genuine question.
I just thought it may have been due to a cut and paste from a pdf file or summat?
Just ’cause I was nosey.
ps we could do a Johann Lamont version of the autocue?
Where are Conan and the WGD when you need them?
BtP
____________________________________________________
Bugger, I love the idea of an autocue for JoLa .
And a book as well:
‘The World beyond Dubya’ by Johann Lamont (Collins 2014)
Essays in Education by one of Britain’s foremost political
thinkers with a Foreword by her close political ally and
serial expenses claimant, Anas Sarwar, who said ‘No, my
expenses for 2013/14 in excess of £200,000 has nothing to
do with my kids being at a fee paying school.’
.
On text layout – I think I must have seen it somewhere and
liked it – it’s that simple, although I do most of my
thinking in images – doesn’t everybody? – maybe that’s got
something to do with it.
It’s not copy paste – I do all my comments straight into
this little box which Stu so kindly provides.
I have a question regarding the Smith commission. Given we have a democratically elected Scottish Government that was elected to represent the people of Scotland, why is the commission giving time to other political parties, who are not in Government, and were rejected by the Scottish people?
If, as unionists say, we should accept the referendum decision, then why is the Smith commission ignoring the decision of the last Scottish parliament election, and indulging parties who were rejected at the ballot box and are not in Government?
This is not how Westminster makes decisions, so why should it happen for such an important process in Scotland??
It effectively relegates the elected Government of Scotland to the position of just A.N.Other voice among many. Surely that cannot be right.
link to scoop.it
Politics and current affairs in Scotland
Curated by Peter A Bell
Another well crafted arrow for the quiver
I have to say, manandboy, I often skip your comments because I find the layout hard to read. But if you like it, then it’s your choice.
Hi all,
This news site does the damage for those in need of a stimulating blast of what is actually happening worldwide.
link to zapaday.com
Oneironaut, and Bugger, I don’t think anyone is bussing new members of the SNP up from down south.
If there had been no genuine new members after the referendum, then perhaps it might bave been possible to infiltrate some fifth columnists and get to the stage of influencing policy. Not easy, but possible. And it would have been a long-term project, given that you can’t just show up in the SNP and people start paying attention to you. But a number of new members, all pushing the same way from different branches – maybe.
Now, though? Forget it. It’s inevitable that the overwhelming majority of new members are genuine. It’s simply not possible for any anti-SNP agency to find tens of thousands of people willing to sign up to the party with a false agenda. And the people who have joined are quite obviously genuine, and tending to the naive side rather than the devious in my experience.
So what can our hypothetical dozen or so infiltrators do in that situation? Any meeting they go to is going to be dominated by genuine new members, with commensurately less opportunity for someone intent on entryism to make a mark The big numbers aren’t a red light as regards infiltration. They’re the best possible defence against it.
Jim McIntosh 3.43
Totally agree. I was disappointed on more than one occasion during the campaign when i felt Yes politicians had the chance to go for the jugular during debates. All too often the chance to put forward facts forcefully against a tide of misinformation was missed.
I am now looking for the same politicians to stamp firmly on SLAB and BBC attempts to set the agenda. They need to do this at every opportunity they get in the media. I was very impressed with the way Christine Graham dealt with Graeme Pearson on RS yesterday re Kenny McCaskill.
As for the wider movement, i think we need to get involved in as much anti establishment activity (you heard me right spooks) within the law obviously, in the way of protests in it’s various forms (including letters, petitions etc) and keep the pressure on them at every turn.
We need to fight hard and dirty to expose the establishment for what it is because that’s what it’ll take and to achieve this i think effective leadership is needed in each strand of the movement to get organised and focused.
@Fred
Catherine McLeod is a former adviser to Alastair Darling. That should tell you everything you need to know. Incidentally, does her column say this at the end? John Swinney’s former adviser always had this at the bottom of his articles (his surname was Crawford). It is an old SLAB/MSM trick, see Alf Young and Arthur Midwinter. Just one more reason to loathe our MSM. One rule for unionists, another for independence supporters.
Another prime example of Jamesyboy’s “logic” on show today’s FMQs. It’s about 25m30s in on link to scottishparliament.tv
Check out the labour party names involved…
link to theecologist.org
@Jim McIntosh
Definitely this!
Yep, we held the moral high ground and fought a campaign based on honesty and truth.
Sadly that fact isn’t going to mean much to those who were dependent on independence for their very survival, those now condemned to a shortened life of living off foodbanks as the “Tory revenge” cuts start to bite.
We can present the truth to people on sites like Wings, but that won’t matter if the ones we want to convince refuse to read and believe anything that conflicts with what the media brainwashing tells them.
We can post leaflets to these people, chances are they’ll just end up in the bin unread. Like all the SLAB/BT/NT/VNB/WhateverTheyCallThemselvesNow leaflets that dropped through my door.
Speaking personally, I have no idea how to reach people like this. But I get the feeling it’s going to take more of a shock to the core than simply telling the truth will provide. We need some way of reaching people in a way that can’t be written off as “cybernat propaganda”. Something that the MSM won’t be able to explain away with lies and scare stories…
How to do that is up to people smarter than me though. But I’ll be there to help if someone comes up with a plan.
12% tax on property sales over £1,000,000.
Grumbles already that this is punishment for those who probably voted ‘No’.
Aw, bless…
John King
Signed
@ Morag says:
9 October, 2014 at 4:17 pm
Oneironaut, and Bugger, I don’t think anyone is bussing new members of the SNP up from down south.
You lost me?
RMT general secretary Mick Cash told BBC Scotland: “All you’re seeing in private ownership is that money’s being sucked out of the industry and given to the private sector shareholders, or in this case is going to go to subsidise the Dutch railways.”
So the Scottish government has decided that Scottish taxpayers will be subsidising Dutch railways. The profits from Scotland’s railways should be used to invest in lower fares and better services here rather than in Holland.
If some think it is ‘anti-foreigner’ to support Scottish people rather than Dutch, well, well. It’s nice to see the SNP supporters backing someone other than Scottish people, but may not win them much support in Scotland.
Will Podmore 5:17pm
WILL ye no come back again?
Is Will Podmore James Kelly, SLAB MSP, in disguise?… 😀 😀
“Oneironaut, and Bugger, I don’t think anyone is bussing new members of the SNP up from down south.”
Yep, ok, I wasn’t being completely serious about that 😉
I doubt they’d need to bother with infiltrating the SNP anyway. They’ve had plenty of practice in demonising SNP-led councils by blaming them for cuts enforced by Westminster.
As Ian just said, it’s likely they’ll also be painting that as “punishment” for people who voted No.
No need to sneak people into the SNP when they’re already carrying out a plan to destroy it from the outside…
fred blogger quotes Craig Murray, “I have no idea how to reach out to No voters because I find the majority of them stupid beyond my understanding.” Yes, his understanding is indeed limited, if all he can do is insult the two million people who voted against reactionary separatism. A nation that does not act like a nation is not a nation. You are not a separate nation, you are still part of Britain.
The reactionary anti-trade union comments of all too many contributors here are shameful. Applauding the Scottish government when it awards a franchise to a Dutch company is not progressive. Attacking trade union members is playing into the hands of the employer. Some who think themselves progressive because they support ‘independence’ are proving to be reactionaries when it comes to any real economic decisions.
It’s a shame Plodmore doesn’t have any friends to go and play with.
@Will Podmore forless
Oh my sweet lord, did you finish your tea early but your mum won’t let you out because it’s been raining? Poorly researched nat-bashing on a site which doesn’t have or seek to have any affiliation won’t get you the commendation and approval you so naively seek from your betters.
Nice hat, ya fanny!
Will Podmore pops up like a BBC repeat. Still not answered any of the questions asked of him yesterday.
@Will Podmore
What the hell are you talking about? Are you Scottish? Your first post talks of Scotland as a nation, and then your next says Scotland is not a nation? You know fine well that we cannot renationalise the railways because the SG does not have the power to do this. Nobody was having a go at trade unionists or trade unions either. Typical present day SLAB smear merchant. Grow up FFS.
Muttley, I teach little brats like Plodmore every day. It’s no good telling a five year old to grow up. 🙂
SITE RULES. Please dont engage the TROLLS folks its injurious to your mental heath & wellbeing olso a total waste of your time. ( WILL PODMORE again ).
Will Podmore
“mother, father i’m leaving home”, is indeed reactionary separatism.
what did you have in mind?
ronnie anderson
apology, i won’t be reactionary again.
Is Will Podmore a paid agent of the British State?
@Juteman
No, he licks their boots for free.
Taxi for Kelly, awe cancel that, jist a white van wie a blue light & men in white coats.Is Carstairs still a secure hospital ?.
I must admit to a bit of irritation at this being awarded overseas. Similar to the Europe rules which trashed Dunoons passenger ferry service, I cannot but feel both SG and UKG slavishly follow these ‘legal requirements’ rather more assiduously than other European countries do.
When something relates to the core infrastructure (and profit/taxrevenue should be included in this) of a nation, common sense alone dictates the national govt should have the final say.
What part of legal do people like Will not understand about the rail contract? It had to be tendered, and was awarded to the best bid,EU law applies. It’s unfortunate, but then it’s not the first high value contract, and it is what represents Best Value.
Pakistani, they can’t do that! Illegal!
Omg! Sorry that was supposed to say osakisushi
@ fred blogger Ok apology excepted bit mind any mair o it an ah caw in John King hes the wan weildin the Lochgely Twase an you dont want touched wie the Lochgely Twase,ah dont know why I said the twase its the fumf fingered wan he,s goat.
Half ah pound of tupenny rice ( sos folks its Asda price)
Half ah pound of thupenny rice an through in some wevels ( whit free wevels at Asda, am breaking the embargo folks sorry. tammy’s on oota the door.
Just been having a look at the overseas operations of First Group Plc – presume some folk believe they should give these up as it stops profits going to those countries?
Will Podmore has, was the resident Troll on Yes Scotland for over 2 yrs,he’s not new to me as a Troll.
@Paula Rose
All I really know about First Group is they used to run a fleet of buses around my area which were good competition against the resident Stagecoach company service for a while, until they started getting sloppy and just disappeared eventually.
I heard they’d run trains as well, but I didn’t think they were much of a widespread business any more.
The fact that their buses were all red might have been a hint actually…
@muttley79 5:25
As to sense and understanding its entirely Kelly but as to supporting trade unions and being semi articulate I fear these are beyond your suspect so you’ll get no £5 from me
Could be – the strange thing is that just about every non-SNP Scottish MP who bothered to vote voted in favour of the legislation – if this was indeed the reasoning behind the SNP’s vote against (ie preventing cost rises/beaurocratic rigmarole), what the hell are New Labour/Lib Dems thinking?
Yyyyyyoink! Will have to look into other WM MP expenses for my grand project.
Me too. As long as the BBC dominates Scottish broadcasting, we’ll forever be dwelling in Scotlandshire. If the question of broadcasting ever comes up, I dearly hope we don’t forget to tell people about Blair McDougall’s role in stopping a Scottish news program.
This is a running theme in a lot of the votes relating to the Scotland Act: if it’s devolving a “responsibility,” then NuLab/Lib/Cons are all over it, but if it’s actual powers, then they voted against it. Should have a post up sometime this week.
Here’s a brainteaser for you: out of the NuLab/Lib/Cons who voted on the proposition to devolve all matters relating to Scottish coastguards and maritime agencies, how many do you think voted in favour?
@ Manandboy
Thanks for sending that
link to Peter Bells
“Scoop it”.
I’d deleted his bookmark
after the Ref. He wrote
he wasn’t going to post
any links more so I
thought, that’s it. 😉
Normal service will resume
again thank goodness.
@ Morag re manandboy comments, you got to grips with my comments & mispelling in my dark days. Morag you have proven to all nothing is beyond your Ken,& is much appreciated xx.
Well, your comments were intriguing, like a clever puzzle. And you weren’t doing it on purpose to be “interesting”.
Maybe I’m just in a bad mood.
OMG – just watched that eejit James Kelly getting his arse handed to him on a plate re rail franchise – LOL when AS questioned the ‘talent’ in the Lab back benches
What a steaming pile of bovine ordure from Alex Mooney in Newsnetscotland pleading the case for the Daily Record. Basically, what he’s saying is they knew they were peddling pish to their Scottish readership but were only following orders from “Dahn sowf”. Apparently, it’s not the job of journalists to report factually but to follow the party/owner’s line!!! In that case make that absolutely clear before styling yourself as Scotland’s Champions! Poor little “journalists” scared for their jobs…aw diddums…not a backbone amongst them. It is in fact criminal to peddle lies as truth…it’s perpetrating a con on a massive scale, but Alex wants us to feel sympathy for them!!! Well fuck that! They gladly aided and abetted in the biggest fear and smear campaign against the interests of their own country. If they’d been honest then they might have seen their sales increase and would be guaranteed jobs. But by being the snivelling little cowards they are they might all be out of a job soon. Hell mend them.
Is the ‘Vow’ a Record breaker?
Scottish News, News Scotland – Politics, Referendum, Economy, Culture and intelligent opinion | Newsnet Scotland, uniquely Scottish
NEWSNETSCOTLAND.SCOT|BY LYNDA WILLIAMSON
@Taranaich
Here’s another one for your list, since I happen to have tabulated it earlier using caz-m’s link:
2013-14
Cathy Jamieson £189,136.63
Must be a strong contender for 4th place. The vast bulk of it is staffing costs for her office, including £25k+ to her husband.
@Oneironaut 5:02
You still had to pick up the leaflet and decide to bin it. If, for instance, it had a mugshot of Gordon Brown and fluorescent LIAR on both sides it would still register even if they did not read the truth about his lies.
Whether this would work for someone unmemorable and unknown to most like Jimmy Hood or Thomas Docherty I don’t know but for Anas or Skeletor it would.
An alternative is to print something totally anodyne on the back like “Did you know that the Council will be paying your pension from 2016?” so if it arrives face down they turn over and get the full blast of the LIAR
As usual with the SLAB and their allies it’s all smoke and mirrors. The SG was on a hiding to nothing no matter who it gave the rail franchise to. Depending on who won the franchise the astonished outrage would be because:
Abellio – Dutch based company – money leaving Scotland.
Arriva – German based company – ditto.
MTR – Hong Kong based company – ditto.
National Express – has handed one franchise back early, and had another taken from them, unreliable.
FirstGroup – came up with the lowest bid, should have picked someone else.
Morag says:
9 October, 2014 at 6:57 pm
Well, your comments were intriguing, like a clever puzzle. And you weren’t doing it on purpose to be “interesting”.
Maybe I’m just in a bad mood.
____________________________________
No, its worse than that.
Can I suggest a signed letter to the Westminster Government from all the celebrities who begged Scotland to stay in the union.
“We the undersigned implore David Cameron., Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband to fulfill the solemn Vow which they made to the people of Scotland as described by their spokespersons, Gordon Brown, Alistair Darling and George Galloway. That Vow guaranteed Devo Max, Home Rule or Federalism within the strict timetable of 4 months ending in Burns Night.
The people of Scotland heeded our call and voted NO. We now demand that these promises are kept and those powers delivered in order to save the Union.
Yours sincerely,
David Bowie
David Attenborough
Bob Geldof
Dan Snow
Judi Dench
Paul MacCartney
Mick Jagger
etc etc
Someone just tweeted the following figures. Let’s have these printed on billboards and displayed across Scotland from now until May 7th 2015.
MPs expenses for 2013/14
Top 3 (“Scottish” Labour)
1. Anas Sarwar £204,606.89
2. Jim McGovern £201,808.49
3. Jim Murphy £196,969.33
——————————-
That sounds like American politics.
From what I read about the last US elections, negative politics is big business.
Special interest groups fund or threaten ‘attack ads’ to defeat politicians going against their agenda, and it is often effective.
The head of the NO campaign admitted that scaremongering won it for them, and Alex Salmond was demonised on a daily basis.
Perhaps we should have taken a leaf out of their book and had a more balanced campaign.
This might be a good idea for the UK general election, to target the worst offenders.
Instead of YES stickers on lamposts, we could have these little reminder stickers: Murphy – £196k expenses
@ronnie anderson
@ Morag re manandboy comments, you got to grips with my comments & mispelling in my dark days. Morag you have proven to all nothing is beyond your Ken,& is much appreciated xx.
I believe what AS said he wanted at the start of the campaign was “All or something”.
Hi, Slight change of subject.
I met a friend today A Yes Voter (the first time since the referendum) and she told me, that she had received a phone call from the No campaign thanking her for her No vote ( during the day of the 18th sept).
The person on the phone even knew her name. When my friend said she hadn’t yet voted the reply was she was down as a No voter.
Maybe the paranoia is setting in but were the votes actually counted or did the Westminster government along with the media make up the result?
Gary
Re First Group. They were an Aberdeen company, originally a “management buyout” for the former Regional Council public bus services when they were privatised during the Thatcher period.
They did very well, picking up international business including “Greyhound” buses in the US. I believe their head office soon moved to Hong Kong.
No longer “Scottish” in any real sense.
Totally off topic but thought there may be some interested in tonight’s bbc alba programme at 9pm.
Tells the story of HMS Timbertown some info can e found here link to wereldoorlog1418.nl
My grandfather was one of the Lewismen interned.
Scottish Independence Live Events appeal now at £1,340.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/scottish-independence-live-events–2
The fact is Blair Jenkins and all the other yes side failed and the Scottish government did not do enough to fight against the lies being told by the media I reluctantly came to the conclusion that they did not really want independence to me the grass roots were a100 per cent behind it but the people at the top were not I honestly feel we were let down badly I could have done better on t.v.than some of our so called big hitters so I say to A.S. And the rest of them get the gloves of and start getting back at them for gods sake
@ Nana Smith
If we had our own broadcasting service, this story would be recorded in film and become part of our common heritage. As it is, the “British” cultural hegemony ensures that only “British” supporting images are broadcast.
@Onwards (7.34) –
If we’re to clear the Blabs out we need to be every bit as ruthless and unforgiving as they’ve been for decades.
Ad hominem attacks? Absolutely, provided we stick to facts. Thankfully, their behaviour in the indyref run up was so appalling that we have a mass of solid documentary evidence which will still be fresh in a lot of voters’ minds. We don’t need to spin or exaggerate anything.
Even the ‘good’ Labour MPs are guilty – they didn’t speak out against what BTUKOK was doing, and they actively assisted in spreading the fear and lies.
They have to be hoofed once and for all – every single one of them – and it’s our duty to ensure it happens.
Since it’s quiet around here I thought I’d chuck this into the mix;
Our village council has just come up with a great idea
The referendum re-run
The idea is to set up a mock ballot box in the village hall and ask everyone who voted on the 18th to recast their votes.
They’re looking to identify whether or not we were a Yes or No area.
There were very few Y/N posters/stickers on display before the referendum so it will be interesting to see the result.
From what I gather there is strong support for the idea and a good turnout is expected. It will be taking place on Sunday.
I have a feeling this might just catch on.
@ Taranaich
“Could be – the strange thing is that just about every non-SNP Scottish MP who bothered to vote voted in favour of the legislation – if this was indeed the reasoning behind the SNP’s vote against (ie preventing cost rises/beaurocratic rigmarole), what the hell are New Labour/Lib Dems thinking?
Mischief, as per normal?
To add
They don’t accept postal votes but they will allow proxies. Priceless!
Completely anonymous with a simple Y or N required.
Gary45
Another anomaly and one that would not occur in a regular ballot.
There are just far too many anomalies scattered throughout
this referendum.
Had the voting been honest, the likelihood of so many quirky
things happening would be very small indeed.
With so much at stake for UK PLC, and given the lying strategy employed by the No Campaign particularly during Purdah, it would have required a campaign volte face to decide to run an honest vote, as well as to take a huge gamble. No. Better to guarantee the result and rig the vote.
As I’ve said elsewhere, a class of P7s could have done a better job.
O/T In the past three days, unprompted, five separate people have told me they’ve joined the SNP this week. They include a teacher, a doctor and a minister. The bandwagon is rolling, and it’s gathering people who wouldn’t normally jump on. I’m hugely encouraged.
Then I heard James Kelly at lunchtime. Are people still going to vote for him in 2016?
@osakisushi
There is something really fishy here. The UK has gone far beyond what European texts demand. In France, country which abides by the same rules, infrastructure is still under the control of a state run agency, RFF (French railway net). The SNCF, which is the historical operator, is also state owned. The only effect of the European directive has been the possibility for other railway companies to operate in France whereas before SNCF was a monopoly. But in no way France has delegated the whole train operation, let alone the infrastructure building and maintenance, to the private sector!
The situation in the UK cannot be explained but by the deliberate will of Westminster to ditch a difficult dossier and wash their hands of it.
-:)
🙂
@Taranaich
“Will have to look into other WM MP expenses for my grand project.”
Hmm, now I’m very curious about this grand project… 🙂
osakisushi
Tenders don’t have to be accepted purely on price, there can be terms of service and other things taken into account. The first problem is that unsuccessful tenderers can consider court action, and even get the tender reversed, as happened with Virgin on the West Coast line (I think).
The second is that there are derogations can be got from the EU, but the UK with its rebate doesn’t have a lot of leverage, so generally doesn’t bother. A Maggie Thatcher £3 billion a year (it’s been decreasing steadliy) ties the UK’s hands on a lot of regional development funding too, a problem Indy Scotland probably wouldn’t have.
The third thing is that income tax and profit go down to Westminster, and we get 8.4% or 9.1% back, so if those taxes total say £12 billion we get £1 back, but if it costs an extra £3 billion it ain’t worth it.
This is a problem that would disappear with full Devo-Max – FFA. The EU problem needs Independence and our own full EU representation.
In hindsight perhaps the Yes side should have countered the No side’s fear campaign by stating if you vote No we will soon no longer be able to support the much loved Free Bus Passes for the Over 60’s due to Westminster budget cuts?
I know it’s all in the past and it’s time to prepare for the GE in 2015 but we must learn to fight fire with feet to the fire.
It looks to me that NEWSNET has been got at and is now producing WM propaganda for the poor old ‘misunderstood’ Daily SHITE Record.So much for the age of enlightening new media.
Hope the others are up and running soon,they’ll need to be cos Newsnet can’t be trusted it pains me to say.What else can you think after that Alex Mooney pisstake?
Didn’t last long on after the 18th,and calls into question Derek Bateman’s complicity.(shame cos I quite liked some of his stuff,but he was a BBC employee previously?It’s a murky old world we live in.)
Pity but there you go.That’s the only conclusion I can come to.
Make no mistake the BT fuckwits brigade are on the case of divide and conquer BIGSTYLE and it would be naive in the extreme to think that this site is not very high on their most wanted list.Most wanted screwed that is.
It’s also looking seriously like the WM propaganda machine is back with a vengeance and needs to be challenged and outed for what it is.Right here and now today,tomorrow and for the foreseeable future.
So if everybody’s now got there breath back,looks like it’s back to business for the YES posse.
Let’s give it some!!!!
WIPE YOUR EYES.
ON YOU FEET
So that’s border controls sorted.
link to weeredsquirrel.wordpress.com
Just watched Independence Live Events “Conversation with Ivan McKee”.
It was excellent as was the quality of film and sound – no breaks with this new equipment folks. The interviewer was also very good – don’t know who he was but maybe Kevin could let us know.
Good job Kevin.
I know Ian Brotherhood has been promoting their crowdfund over the past couple of days and I shall do it again because this is worth it if you can spare a few bob:
link to indiegogo.com
Okay, for the first time ever, my last post seems to have disappeared into the ether. So, here goes with another try.
Just watched Independence Live Events “Conversation with Ivan McKee”. It was excellent in content and quality, sound and vision. No breaks in broadcast either – the new equipment works really well. Good work, Kevin.
I don’t know who the interviewer was, but, he was very good – perhaps Kevin can help out there.
I know Ian Brotherhood has been promoting their crowdfund over the past couple of days and I will do that here too. So, if you can spare a few bob, this is worth it:
link to indiegogo.com
Okay, so now the post has appeared – sorry for doubling up 🙁
@thomaspotter2014
It looks to me that NEWSNET has been got at and is now producing WM propaganda.
I wouldn’t worry, if they carry on down that route, they’ll soon lose readers/viewers and end up talking to themselves. Let them find out the hard way. And woe betide them if they ever try a crowd fund. I won’t be going back to them; my time is too precious to waste on liars.
Just watched Independence Live interview with Ivan McKee. A great programme and much better than the telly. If you can spare even a pound. I believe this project is well worth supporting.
We can only do what we can.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/scottish-independence-live-events–2
Most political struggles know that you have to stop the establishment broadcasting stations from broadcasting if you are going to have any chance of changing things by putting across your own political agenda.
On occasion this has meant a group having to physically take over their state broadcasting TV and radio stations. This is quite illegal of course and fraught with danger.
A chap explained to me how it would be simpler than that; all any group would have to do when a radio station (make your own choice) is obviously lying and showing blatant bias is overload their systems by sending in thousands upon thousands of complaining emails and texts at the same time to the station.
But I suspect that will never happen.
@BtP:
-:)
Is that a new emoticon for a happy Panda climbing a bamboo shaft?
This one has almost no chance to survive the filter: ????
Already donated to independence live days ago! (smug face)
@ Ronnie Anderson, 6:23pm
ah dont know why I said the twase its the fumf fingered wan he,s goat
LOL – thanks Ronnie. I haven’t heard anyone say “fumf” since my dad and he had a “twase” as well though I don’t think it had 5 fingers! 🙂
Got me all nostalgic now and needing to ready a wee bit o’ Billy Kay.
I see Michael McCann, the MP for East Kilbride, has been charged with breach of the peace.
link to scotsman.com
The EU Regs are all on the Scottish Govt site if anyone is interested. They are very strict, and being from local govt. I can vouch for that – you need lawyers and accountants in on it, to make sure you comply to avoid a costly challenge. Abellio has contracts down south, which will enable them to defray their operational costs, and I see that Firstgroup has lost their previous two tenders on work down south, so not looking good.
No-one wants to see work leave this country, but the EU does work both ways.
I just think it is so typically pathetic of Labour to try and make something out of this against the Scottish govt. when there is nothing they could have done – within the law.
The Rough Bounds
Transmitter masts. 😉
As to htf you could neutralise digital… Big Dish PQ, DDOS website.
Tell you what mate, you organise a million strong mob, i’ll do Auntie 🙂
O/T
Weather looks great for us on Sunday. The sun shines on the righteous 🙂
Sat and typed a post then lost the wi-fi so if this posts twice then sorry!
Was saying it was good to see yon alicsammin annihilating Kelly in parliament today – anyway!
If this is o/t sorry but…
My brother in law (no voter btw) texted me today to say “was the stamp duty reform in the budget a “boot in the baws” for Edinburgh and Aberdeen voting no?” (because anyone buying over £325000 would be worse off compared to the current system).
I took great pleasure in calling Customers today (yep I do mortgages in Dundee) to advise them of the changes made by the SCOTTISH Government – one guy was delighted that his Stamp Duty next April won’t be £1350 – it’ll be £20.
It’s one small power we now have but one small change to a more progressive form of taxation shows that we’re going in the right direction – i.e. those who can afford to pay more, pay more.
Now if only we had ALL of the powers we wanted on 19th September…
@ Natasha, 9:09pm
Already donated to independence live days ago! (smug face)
Good on you, Natasha – don’t turn it into a smug competition, cos I donated last week! :-))
Seriously, though, the quality is so good it could attract a lot more viewers to Independence Live. I think a lot of viewers gave up with all the breaks in transmission in the past.
@AuldA says:9 October, 2014 at 3:32 pm:
Nice excerpt. Catiline orations I think. Latin version maybe?
Have to agree with your reply to BtP. It typifies the entire relationship with the Kingdom of England since even before the signing of the Treaty of Union. The use of the English Transportation Acts, London Scot William Patterson’s setting up the subscription scheme that became the Bank of England,Daniel Defoe the proven spy.
“In 1688, The English Kingdom’s public finances were weak. The money and credit system were a shambles and a national bank was needed to sort out the kingdom’s resources. The English parliament deposed James II and imported William and Mary of Orange but removed from them the Royal veto over Parliament. This kicked off the Jacobite Uprising because England tried to force The Scottish Kingdom to accept the English monarchy but Scotland was still an independent Kingdom and country. Enter stage left London Scot William Paterson who proposed a loan of £1,200,000 to the Government and in return those who subscribers would be incorporated as the Governor and Company of the Bank of England. Then they got a Royal Charter.
In a few weeks the sum was raised and the Royal Charter sealed, (27th July 1694). The Bank managed the English Government’s accounts making loans to finance spending at times of peace and war. A was also a commercial bank and took deposits and issued notes. During this time England was operation the English Navigation Acts that was bleeding Scotland dry. Next thing we know, in June 1695, that same London Scot, William Paterson is in Scotland and setting up the disastrous Darien Expedition that bankrupted the Scottish Landed gentry who just happened to also be the parliamentarians. Then Paterson’s close friend, Daniel Defoe, (the author), was in Edinburgh working as an undercover English agent, (His letters home to his spy-masters are still on record).
Then began the blackmail, bribery and military threats and the forced signing of the Treaty of Union. Any Scot imagining this was all just coincidental either doesn’t know their true history or is a bloody trusting fool. That same London Scot ("Tractor" - Ed)ous behaviour is all too evident today. Burns was so very correct, “Siccna Paircel o Rogues in Ae Nation”. Paircel? The Bloody English didn’t even have the good grace to pay return postage on the blidy cheatin paircel”.
@ Betty Boop
Hi BB, do you have a link to the I McKee interview? I missed it and being a business man myself I’ve always liked hearing what BfS folk say.
Thanks..!
Betty/Ian
Trying to find interview with Ivan McKee. Have clicked on links provided. When i try your one Betty comes up with “Where did it go” page.
Help required for a poor luddite please ?
@ Midgehunter 9:49pm
Conversation with Ivan McKee
link to bit.ly
Something wrong with the website tonight. Posts either disappearing or taking ages to appear.
Midgehunter’s 9:49pm post appeared just before 10.00pm
Also, have to sign in every time.
If anyone is serious about blacking out the BBC, it can be done in 3 simple steps:
1). Connect up a [redacted] to a bloody big dish.
2). Set the [redacted] to [redacted] Hz.
3). Switch on and [redacted] to [redacted] and then [redacted].
Insertion of a [redacted] into the circuit enables you to transmit your own broadcasts over the BBC network.
Good Q&A post up at Common Weal (sorry no links but it’s allofusfirst then scroll down) including how Robin met Ivan and what plans they have together.
Good article by Derek Bateman on Visions of Johann
link to derekbateman.co.uk
@Oneironaut says:9 October, 2014 at 5:02 pm:
“Speaking personally, I have no idea how to reach people like this. But I get the feeling it’s going to take more of a shock to the core than simply telling the truth will provide.”
Aye! Oneironaut, You have the right of it but there really is not a lot to worry about for the required, “shock to the core”, is all there and already well on it’s way to their core. It is the promised shock that the YES campaign was warning them about throughout the entire campaign.
Indeed the swelling ranks of the independence seeking parties is perhaps testament that many on the swithering fringes twixt NO & YES have already realised where the truth lies and are now throwing their full weight behind the independence movement. The rest may just need a wee while longer for the shock to hit their personal core.
We may even find that the swelling ranks of members may cause the Westminster Mafia to have pause to revalue their false promises enough to grant FFA.
(and then – Tick! Tock!Tick! Tock!Tick! Tock!Tick! Tock!
BANG!
@ Betty Boop
Many thanks. Thats the same chair that Tommy Sheridan sat in last week – socialists and capitalist share the same chair. 😉
@ yesindyref2
That sounds a bit like pirates…! Nice and subversive..
@yesindyref2 –
What’s with all the (redacted) inserts? Did you put them there?
Is it possible to list the missing words?
I saw on itv last night that the SG used 65% cost and 35% service to decide the winning bid for the rail contract. Compare that to S labours 80% price to 20% service guideline. Abellio wasn’t the cheapest but offered the best value for money with better service offered. Glad to see the SG didn’t just go with price alone, as is so often the case with everything these days
Just catching up , well said manand boy at 0902am
Rtypegrunt “spot on” at 1141am
“BBC Scotland “the enemy within”
@ Ian B
In all probability it’s not quite legal tampering with the propaganda arm of WM. It’s tempting though.. 🙂
Ian Brotherhood
No probs:
[redacted]
[redacted] [redacted]
[redacted] [redacted] [redacted]
[redacted]
🙂
Just tweeted by Ray Brown:
Anas Sarwar claims £202,606.89 expenses for 28wks work for 2013/14. That works out at a staggering £7235.96 p/w worked!
@yesindyref2 –
Such a tease…just you wait until Paula Rose gets wind of this.
@ SquareHaggis 8:19 – do let us know the outcome.
@ AuldA 9:08 – BtP bamboo pole dancing?
xx darlings, all aglow, been at a Green party meeting – yummy.
Couldn’t believe the Newsnet article saying take action against the print owners for their lies and propoganda but not their journalists. How exactly are you meant to do that unless you refuse to buy their newspapers thereby directly affecting job security for the journalists.
What is worse a few journalists paid off or 1.6 million people being cheated of a fair referendum on such a massive matter?
Sorry, the whole thing has made me doubt the direction of Newsnet and I for one will not be using it as one of my outlets for information.
Got to laugh at the hypocrites slating the SG for handing Scotland’s railways to ‘foreigners’. Scotland’s railways have been controlled by foreigners since 1923.
In any case, I’m glad that the franchise has been won by professional Dutch Railmen rather than a shower of asset-stripping City carpetbaggers.
The UK may have invented railways but it’s traditionally been shit at developing and investing in them. As an example, whilst Europe and America/South Africa/Australasia adopted air braking and electric lighting on locomotives in the early part of the century (and we’re talking steam days here), British train drivers had to make do with a pair of 60W bulbs on the front of their diesels whilst pulling a train which might only have 25% of the goods wagons fitted with a vacuum brake, even as late as the early ’80s.
Electrification of the line from Carlisle to Glasgow was only justified by BR Scottish Region by sacrificing the main line through the Borders. The operational savings and scrap price of the latter’s infrastructure probably paid for the overhead wiring and signalling for the West Coast mainline.
If Abelio’s plans for the ‘Seven Cities’ network bear fruit, Scotland will have a credible domestic Inter City network for the first time in 25 years. Of course, the last time, our nice Inter City trains were stolen by, wait for it; Network SouthEast…
I’m working on your redactions boys- just seen your cumments.
Re NNS, I have donated to a few indy sites including them but have never commented.
Some of their stuff is good especially against the BBC but I hope Derek Bateman doesn’t lose his edge working with them.
Like most posters, I couldn’t care less if the Record goes to the wall, they have always treated the reading public as thick.
Ouch!