Wings Over Scotland

A couple of interesting passages from Hansard in January 2012:

“The Government’s decision in March 2011 to increase tax rates on the industry, which increased the top tax rate to 81% and the corporation tax rate to 62%, is inevitably and regrettably having a chilling effect on the leading indicators of investment.

The signs of lower investment in the future are already apparent. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary will see from the Department of Energy and Climate Change’s latest energy trends analysis a significant impact on drilling activity, with exploration wells down 50% in 2011.

It is from that exploration drilling that the future large capital investments will flow. The March 2011 tax increase reduced the value of future projects by 25% overnight.“

(Our emphasis.) The words of some dastardly separatist panicking about the value of Scottish oil? Not so much. The lines quoted above were addressed to Parliament by the Rt. Hon. Nicholas Soames, Conservative MP for Mid Sussex.

Read the rest of this entry →

We don’t say it very often, readers, but as a civilised human being with even the merest glimmer of empathy it’s hard not to feel sorry for “Better Together” sometimes. It must be absolute agony for them today, trying to talk about the slightly disappointing GERS figures without screaming “TOO WEE! TOO POOR! TOO STUPID!” at the tops of their voices, which is what they want to do so much they must be able to taste it.

Instead of naked glee, they must do their best to fake concern, and not appear too joyful to be reporting bad news for what they insist is (proudly, of course) their nation. We don’t envy them in having to maintain two faces and lie about their true feelings, no matter how practiced at it they are. The constant vigilance must be incredibly wearing, because dishonesty is exhausting.

The only way to never be caught out, after all, is to never have to remember which lies you told yesterday and to whom. So as always, we’re just going to give you the truth.

Read the rest of this entry →

We’ve just watched three hours of the Education and Culture Committee at Holyrood discussing the report on media bias by Professor John Robertson of the University of the West of Scotland, which featured the good professor himself and senior BBC Scotland executives including Ken McQuarrie and John Boothman.

The contrast between Prof. Robertson’s absolute frankness and candour – openly discussing his political views and his mild autism – and the BBC men’s evasion and obfuscation was quite something to behold. We’ll have some analysis this week.

One finding of Prof. Robertson’s report was that the anti-independence media (or for short, “the media”) had a strong tendency to personalise the Yes debate in the form of Alex Salmond, and a piece in today’s Scotsman provides us with a handy illustration.

Read the rest of this entry →

This sort of thing just won’t do at all, STV.

Because that closing comment isn’t true, is it?

Read the rest of this entry →

We seem to have hit a bit of a lull in the independence debate. Even the papers look to be just a touch bored of recycling the same “Project Fear” scare stories for the 14th or 15th time, and it’s hard to keep track of all the identikit “warnings” from various corporations that don’t actually amount to anything more than “if things change we’ll keep an eye on them”, or in other words the bleeding obvious.

Enjoy the calm while it lasts, though, because in 11 days time the phony war is over.

Read the rest of this entry →

It’s Monday, so it must be time for Gordon Brown to lumber into the independence debate again. The man who was the least popular Prime Minister of the last 50 years magically transforms into a respected elder statesman when the British left is desperately trying to lend some progressive gravitas to the floundering No campaign in the wake of a series of ill-judged right-wing interventions from Tory ministers and millionaire business tycoons.

So we suppose we’re obliged to spend at least a couple of minutes examining the latest pronouncements of the man who so famously ended boom and bust.

Read the rest of this entry →

We’ve commented before on the odd way that newspapers can reveal their bias in the way they phrase their reporting, rather than in the actual content of it, which can be entirely factually accurate. As we noted, a particular giveaway is the angle from which they view statistics, and especially opinion polls.

A poll showing 35% of people backing independence will almost always be reported as “ONLY a third back Yes”, whereas one with the exact same numbers for a different question might be presented as “OVER a third distrust Alex Salmond”. The proportion “one third” is in such a manner portrayed as being both a small and a large one, to suit whatever position the publication wishes to promote.

It’s in such a context that we invite readers to ponder today’s Mail On Sunday.

Read the rest of this entry →

This coming Thursday, March 13, former Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling will take part in an event at the Mitchell Library in Glasgow, where he will be put “under public scrutiny at the hands of James Naughtie”, the presenter of the BBC’s flagship daily radio news show Good Morning Scotland.

Mr Naughtie, who was brought up from London to head BBC Scotland’s referendum coverage last year, has been frequently criticised by a former presenter of the same programme, Derek Bateman, for a failure to display an even-handed tone when questioning representatives of the Yes and No sides.

So we thought of an easy way for Mr Naughtie to put a stop to such allegations.

Read the rest of this entry →

It’s still hard for some people to believe in poverty in Scotland.

You could argue the word has been trampled into meaninglessness by overuse. It’s a constant in news reports these days, which most of us watch on nice TVs in our houses filled with cosy centrally-heated air, shielded from reality with expensive gadgets and convenience food and a million distracting channels of celebrity fluff.

You need only look at the comments section below any online news story on foodbanks or deprivation and you’ll always find at least one comfortable middle-class person saying we have no poverty.

What about those in the developing countries, they’ll piously lecture, who need to trek miles just for water? Our “relative” poverty – having less than your neighbours – is an offence to those who go hungry and thirsty on a regular basis.

But next week, the gap between Glasgow and those benighted TV images of parts of the third world ravaged by famine or war is going to feel just a little bit smaller.

Read the rest of this entry →

Last weekend, Scotland on Sunday ran a major story entitled “Scottish independence: Pension funds seek answers”, the theme of which was self-evident.

“Pension funds will step up calls for clarity over the implications of independence this week as the industry’s leaders gather for a key conference in Edinburgh.

The National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) has warned that more answers are needed if its members are able to make informed decisions ahead of September’s referendum.

‘I’m not sure we’re any further forward in getting answers to our questions,’ NAPF chief executive Joanne Segars told Scotland on Sunday. ‘It’s not for us or our members to tell people in Scotland how to vote but our members face a lot of issues around ­regulation, compensation schemes and scheme funding.’

‘But it is the funding of cross-border schemes that most urgently needs to be addressed‘, she added. Under European Union law, pension schemes with members both in Scotland and elsewhere in the UK would need to be fully funded at all times. In the November report, NAPF said such a regime would result in more final salary schemes closing.”

(Our emphasis.) Since then, of course, there have been some developments.

Read the rest of this entry →

Some Friday-night entertainment, courtesy of an alert reader.

Remember, folks – a No vote in September is a vote to give UKIP a major influence over your life. A Yes banishes them forever. Your decision.

Read the rest of this entry →

From the Norwich Evening News, 4 March 2014:

“‘It is ridiculous that independence for Scotland is even being given consideration at all.

Much blood was spilled over centuries to bring the home nations together.

It’s disrespectful to the honour of those that suffered to think that a cross on a ballot paper can undo that. National pride and patriotism is what being a Scot is all about, and there is not a nation in the world that has more of it than Scotland. We don’t need economic independence to prove it.’

Blair Ainslie is managing director of Great Yarmouth-based offshore firm Seajacks. He hails from Dunbar, East Lothian and moved south of the border in 1979.”

That one’s making our head spin.

Read the rest of this entry →