Wings Over Scotland

That’s how often they tell us.

“The Barnett Formula, under which Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland receive more public spending per head than England, has long rankled south of the border. Even Joel Barnett, who was chief secretary to the Treasury when the system was introduced in the Seventies as a temporary measure, subsequently disowned it.

 If the Scots vote to remain in the UK, as we hope they do, it cannot be as a result of a bribe from the English. A few years ago, the Calman Commission recommended scrapping Barnett, reducing income taxes in Scotland and then allowing Holyrood to levy its own rate on top, introducing an enhanced element of accountability and fiscal self-governance.

Such reforms should be openly debated ahead of the referendum: for the Scottish people are entitled to know that even if they vote to stay in the UK, the current method of financing public spending should not be allowed to continue.”

Our emphasis, from today’s “Telegraph View”.

The Barnett Formula is worth, by our sums, approximately £7bn a year to the Scottish economy. Bear it in mind when you’re being told about the “black hole” in Scotland’s finances after a Yes vote, because even if you vote No you can wave bye-bye to Barnett, and then Scotland really WILL be looking into a black hole.

We’re getting fair warning, folks. Pay heed.

Visiting Scotland by train has always been an uplifting experience for me. There’s something very special about crossing the border into Dumfries and taking in those spectacular vistas as the train rumbles northwards. I’ve always considered this wonderful and spirit-enhancing landscape to be a metaphor for Scotland itself, full of glorious potential just waiting to be realized.

This journey also takes us through the lands of “Yr Hen Ogledd” (the old north), the heartland of the old Brythonic language, the prototype of modern Welsh and the seven kingdoms which established themselves in the intervallum of several centuries after the Romans left these shores in 400 AD.

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There’s pretty much nothing about Labour’s latest fearmongering anti-independence leaflet (revealed exclusively by us on Tuesday night) that doesn’t make us facepalm.

The only difficult thing is deciding which aspect is the most idiotic.

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We’re busy watching the mostly-inspiring equal marriage debate at the moment (Ruth Davidson’s speech was especially good), so in the absence of a more substantial post here’s our Unionist Of The Day – the failed Labour candidate, and still a Labour councillor, for Aberdeen Donside, Willie Young.

Looks like you dodged a bullet there, Aberdeen. The rest of you we’re not even going to talk to any further, because you’re plainly not real.

Keen media watchers could have been forgiven for stifling a yawn this week as the Scottish press leapt eagerly on a think-tank report which bravely professed itself able to see no less than half a century into the future of the Scottish economy.

The Scotsman’s take was fairly typical. But it had a certain ring of deja vu.

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We realise that while all the polls still have Alex Salmond’s party a long way in front, and the First Minister himself still enjoys record approval ratings for a leader midway through his second term of office, it’s a little early to be calling the result of the 2016 Scottish Parliament vote at this stage.

But then, we’re not the ones doing it. (And it’s not the SNP either.)

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Even as a supporter of independence with little interest in their wellbeing, sometimes you just can’t help slumping face-first onto your desk in sheer helpless despair at the spectacular idiocy of the Scottish Parliament’s clownish, dim-witted opposition parties. Scotland, to coin a phrase, deserves better.

Today’s demonstration appears, as it so often does, in the Telegraph.

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Earlier today, “Better Together” put out this bizarre graphic, before hastily deleting it.

At the time of writing it hasn’t reappeared on their Facebook page. We’re not sure why it was pulled – perhaps they were just embarrassed by the sheer absurdity of this latest “too wee, too poor, too stupid effort”, or the ease with which Yes supporters could mock it as a claim that an independent Scotland wouldn’t be able to afford buildings more than two storeys high.

Or maybe it was something a little more fundamental.

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There is no technical fault. This is really happening.

Anas Sarwar, there, raging about people not voting to abolish the bedroom tax.

Yes, THAT Anas Sarwar.

Don’t pinch yourself. You’re not dreaming. He’s actually doing it.  Go and see.

Yesterday, right-wing think-tank the Institute of Fiscal Studies issued a document entitled “Fiscal sustainability in an independent Scotland“. It’s rather less than glowing about the prospects of an independent Scottish economy.

For seekers of facts, the most important aspect of the report is not its findings but rather what data was used and from where it was gathered, which severely slanted the outcome of the report before it was even written. Because it doesn’t matter how diligent, honest and thorough an economic assessment is, if the input information that the economists are asked to work from is heavily skewed to begin with.

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Remember how the No camp is conducting a positive campaign, and definitely NOT saying that Scotland is too wee, too poor and too stupid to thrive as an independent country, and that only evil cybernats ever suggest that they’re saying that?

Here’s Danny Alexander on Sky News this morning. We’re not sure he got the memo.

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There’s a fascinating piece in today’s Daily Record about Andy Murray, and we’re not talking about the gormless expression Andrew Marr pulls in the accompanying photo.

It’s fascinating because it’s a gold-medal example of the art of reporting exclusively true facts while simultaneously saying flatly untrue things about them.

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