We don’t normally ask you to watch videos as long as this, readers. (Although at 4m 22s it’s still not War And Peace.) As a rule the key part of any TV discussion can be boiled down to a few seconds, but this one needs to be taken in at a bit more length.
It happened on last night’s Question Time from Dundee, and was already 10 minutes into a discussion about whether there might be a second independence referendum and what might trigger it, in particular the prospect of Scotland voting to remain in the EU in June but the rest of the UK voting to leave, dragging Scotland out forcibly.
At that point, host David Dimbleby made an inexplicable intervention, abandoning his position as supposedly neutral moderator to pluck a “fact” out of thin air with which to attack the SNP’s John Swinney. Here’s what unfolded.
This week Scottish Labour have been attacking the SNP’s rather timid plans for the reform of Council Tax, which is an entirely fair and legitimate opposition pursuit.
But as is their wont, Kezia Dugdale’s branch office just can’t help overplaying their hand and doing it in a highly dishonest way.
An alert reader just found this. It’s quite something.
We especially liked this bit:
“The growing practice of the socialist government is to take decisions vitally affecting Scotland in Whitehall… this is a process which we have every intention of setting in direct reverse.”
The dogged determination of Scottish Labour to insult the Scottish electorate is a source of constant slack-jawed astonishment to us. Over the years we’ve lost count of the number of times the party’s politicians have effectively said “People are just too stupid to vote for us”, in the apparent belief that abuse is the way to win back support.
But it’s not always so overt. The subtler ways in which the party treats voters like morons include the assumption that people’s memories only go back to yesterday’s newspapers, and there can surely be no more stark illustration than its recent adoption of the attack line that the SNP are standing “shoulder to shoulder with the Tories”.
The title of this article is a phrase that people use when publishing a transcript of someone’s intended speech, to signify that this is what they INTENDED to say, but that the reader should verify it with the actual speech to check whether they did, because sometimes there are last-minute changes or the person simply forgets bits.
It’s been a fair few months since we last documented the Daily Record’s increasingly panicky attempts to save its own hide over its infamous eve-of-referendum “Vow”.
In its growing desperation, the paper bizarrely turns today to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, demanding that SHE should be the one to fulfil a promise that the Record made specifically in order to thwart Sturgeon’s lifelong goal of independence.
The Labour Party has today published Margaret Beckett’s report into why it lost the 2015 general election. We were rather struck by this line:
Let’s just go over that one again to be sure: Labour believed that an SNP victory in Scotland would make it “impossible” for the Tories to form the government.
Which is weird, because that’s not quite what we remember them saying.
Ian Smith on Anything But That: “700kg of methane could fill far more than the volume of a four bedroom house, unless it had a double…” Sep 9, 14:56
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Sounds like they were very lucky they didn’t have 82+ incinerated corpses bobbing in the ocean. I guess “lessons will…” Sep 9, 14:54
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Not a bad program for the myopic. Nothing specifically about G@za. I guess it comes under Foreign Policy, but I’m…” Sep 9, 14:47
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: ““which means the pipelines are back on” Good one! Biggest laugh of the day so far. Perhaps to be exceeded…” Sep 9, 14:28
Willie on Anything But That: “Oh dear, news just breaking of the appalling developing country engineering standards in Scotland has just emerged. Seems that in…” Sep 9, 14:23
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Michty! Is it breakfast time already?” Sep 9, 14:20
sam on Anything But That: “I guess you didn’t read this. “OUR MISSION The Scottish Sovereignty Research Group was formed in December 2020, when it…” Sep 9, 14:16
Confused on Anything But That: “leah has a good blog, connecting scottish nationalism into wider geo politics https://archive.ph/gM0JM – she is an american woman and…” Sep 9, 13:55
Confused on Anything But That: “SSRG is perfectly fine – if it was a middle class wankers circle wank setup there would be a whole…” Sep 9, 13:54
Confused on Anything But That: “beggan is a just a turd with an 85IQ, here to disrupt. He is reminiscent of another turd, Mark Boyle,…” Sep 9, 13:53
Confused on Anything But That: “everything is made in china (more or less) ya fucking tit; let’s all buy english flatscreen tellies and english computers…” Sep 9, 13:52
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “The EU is moving at its usual glacial pace towards shutting out Covid Spreader unfair competition within its markets: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/sep/09/eu-buy-european-public-procurement-rules-china-goods-services…” Sep 9, 13:15
James Che on Anything But That: “I do not vote so neither left or right. Or even in the middle. When politics and election improve from…” Sep 9, 12:33
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Mark, Measurements of length have always been relatively arbitrary and it has only been in recent times that it has…” Sep 9, 12:26
James Che on Anything But That: “Mark Beggan. I wll retain my politeness as I have done on wings for the sake of he host of…” Sep 9, 12:21
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: ““differed in some degree from their English equivalents.” Which system would be the more accurate? Was the transition to the…” Sep 9, 11:35
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: “Aye Northy never trust the French. A wee eighth of a Scottish inch or a baw hair ken.” Sep 9, 11:24
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: ““professors, authors, policy thinkers, a Labour peer, a broadcaster, and Salvo/Liberation Scotland” I wonder if they will be taking questions.…” Sep 9, 11:07
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: ““move Scotland even a millimetre closer to independence” Sorry, Northy, but no True Sovereign Scot uses the metric system. Prior…” Sep 9, 10:53
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: “Just those who don’t agree with you.” Sep 9, 10:44
Hatey Mchateface on Anything But That: “An ideal opportunity for Burnham to promise a McLaren in every postcode.” Sep 9, 10:40
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: “Wrong city. The capital of the fascists was Rome. Germany was a National Socialist dictatorship. Benito Mussolini would have to…” Sep 9, 10:27
Northcode on Anything But That: “Maybe it’s just me, but the upcoming SSRG conference has a particular vibe to it. I’m not claiming any special…” Sep 9, 10:10
James Che on Anything But That: “It sounds like some people may now be on the anti Terrorism watch list,” Sep 9, 10:10
James Che on Anything But That: “Careful Willie or you to might end up on the fascist hit list of fanatics from Berlin headquarters for elimination,…” Sep 9, 09:58
sam on Anything But That: “It is likely right, as Aidan says, that the Act of Union will have little to do with whether Scotland…” Sep 9, 09:41
agentx on Anything But That: ““The British supercar manufacturer McLaren is to create 1,000 jobs in a welcome boost to the UK’s struggling automotive industry.…” Sep 9, 09:40
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: ““you do have to ask why this has happened” DEI? That’s what was blamed when the US NAT system screwed…” Sep 9, 09:15
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “OK, Mark, I’ll look forward to reading your currency proposals. I’ve written before about how quickly other countries manage to…” Sep 9, 09:11
