With the greatest of reluctance, and only in the absence of anything even remotely more interesting, then, let’s have a few words on Scottish Labour’s latest solemn and sincere declaration of its full, total, complete and utter autonomy.
Because while the media is reporting the development that UK Labour has decided to extend a few extra inches of lead to Kezia Dugdale’s branch office as if it had the slightest importance to anything, it seems oddly reluctant to ask the obvious question.
Eternally angry Conservative MSP Adam Tomkins has been even shoutier than usual this week, purple-faced with rage about the fact that the SNP has decided to spend some of its own money (not taxpayer cash) asking people for their opinions.
It’s a curious argument from a member of a party that’s been rejected in successive elections in Scotland in 1964, 1966, 1970, 1974, 1974 again, 1979, 1983, 1987, 1992, 1997, 1999, 2001, 2003, 2005, 2007, 2010, 2011, 2015 and 2016, but keeps turning up and barking orders anyway. You’d think the first 50 years might qualify as a hint.
The Scottish Mail On Sunday felt obliged this weekend to devote newsprint in what’s technically an actual newspaper to a piece of snark that might just be a new all-time low in the highly competitive barrel-scraping field of “SNP BAD”:
Half a page was given up to a bunch of sour complaints that the First Minister had built in FIVE MINUTES on her itinerary on a school visit (aimed at encouraging girls to take up traditionally male careers) for people to get selfies with her.
Dismayingly often, the thing that irritates us the most about the Unionist press lying to its readers isn’t the fact that they’re doing it, but the fact that they do it so insultingly badly. As an illustrative case in point, here’s the Sunday Times’ reliably dull-witted Scottish columnist Gillian Bowditch today:
Now, let’s be generous and ignore the honkingly stupid first paragraph, which paints a couple of exceptional bad years as a permanent status, and focus on the second one.
This is the demented, McCarthyite state of madness the Labour Party has reached:
This is a party now openly rejecting anyone as a member who has ever supported any other party. We’d take a minute to try to explain to them how the arithmetic of that one works out, but they’re a long, long way beyond the grasp of reason now.
So the official Westminster line is that Scotland will HAVE to become independent if it wants to remain in the EU. We’re sure the FM will be absolutely gutted to hear that.
Some of you will have missed this over the weekend:
Yes – Michelle Mone, of all the people on Earth, really did just go on TV and accuse Nicola Sturgeon of being all about ego. We’ll leave you to absorb that for a bit.
As we write there’s a protest going on outside the Scottish Parliament regarding the privatisation of ferry services to the Western Isles. It was formally announced almost three hours ago that there definitely wasn’t going to be any privatisation and that the service would remain in public hands, but the protest still went ahead.
The people conducting the protest, who’ve got the exact thing they wanted, are now doing their level best to lose it again. Welcome to Scottish politics.
sarah on There May Be Justice: “@ sam at 8.18. GlobalScot sounds a great organisation. You are right – the Scottish diaspora will help. Every Canadian…” Oct 8, 22:29
sam on There May Be Justice: “The Scots diaspora is likely to be a big help to a newly independent Scotland just as the Irish diaspora…” Oct 8, 20:18
Hatey McHateface on There May Be Justice: ““everything that happens in a colony is due to colonialism” I’m starting to come around to your way of thinking,…” Oct 8, 19:07
Hatey McHateface on There May Be Justice: ““the North Sea no longer has any oil that is economic to produce” It’s a fact not widely understood that…” Oct 8, 18:54
Hatey McHateface on There May Be Justice: ““you vote the useless shower out. We simply can’t do that to Westminster, the more alert of you may have…” Oct 8, 18:39
factchecker on There May Be Justice: “Fair comment, I think, Rob I can only see one way – vote the SNP out. Abstaining/spoiling a ballot paper…” Oct 8, 18:24
Alf Baird on There May Be Justice: ““You grab independence so you have all the levers to make things better” Indeed so. A colonized people have no…” Oct 8, 18:12
am firinn on There May Be Justice: “Sarah is right. The idea that you have to set up a perfect administration before you thrown off the shackles…” Oct 8, 17:44
Rob on There May Be Justice: “You would trust the current mob in any way at all, I think they make even Westminster look good and…” Oct 8, 17:40
Alan Austin on There May Be Justice: “The mines closed because the coal was not economic against oil so the miners lost thier jobs due to economics.…” Oct 8, 17:17
Aidan on The Love Of Big Brother: “@“James” – if you want some peace and quiet why don’t you log off the library computer and go and…” Oct 8, 16:50
factchecker on There May Be Justice: “sarah says: 8 October, 2026 at 2:44 pm Stay in the false union until we find better local administration? What…” Oct 8, 16:33
Aidan on There May Be Justice: “If you listen to Sam, insider, one of them could be our very own Alf Baird!” Oct 8, 15:58
Insider on There May Be Justice: “o.k. sarah! Spill the beans! Who are these honest,trustworthy,capable,inspiring leaders who will magically appear if Scotland becomes independent ? Where…” Oct 8, 15:12
sarah on There May Be Justice: “Stay in the false union until we find better local administration? What a very strange position to take.” Oct 8, 14:44
Aidan on There May Be Justice: “There are only two countries in the world with double or more GDP than the U.K. – USA 7.7x and…” Oct 8, 14:10
sam on There May Be Justice: “Source is BBC and UK government “England’s surface waters face significant chemical pollution challenges, with legacy substances like heavy metals…” Oct 8, 13:38
Hatey McHateface on There May Be Justice: “Exactly, Rob. We’ve had a number of examples since 2014 when it’s the WM government and the UK Supreme Court…” Oct 8, 13:06
Rob on There May Be Justice: “So we have two bad governors, one in Westminster and one in Holyrood. Removing Westminster, which on balance does less…” Oct 8, 12:40
Hatey McHateface on There May Be Justice: ““Things are even worse across the Channel” There’s the usual tensions between the “yoof” and the wealthy wrinklies. The French…” Oct 8, 11:44
Captain Caveman on There May Be Justice: “Ever heard of the expression “non sequitur?” Small NW European nations prosper (relatively) because of high productivity, low population density,…” Oct 8, 11:35
Hatey McHateface on There May Be Justice: ““The obvious lesson is that colonized Scots need to ditch Anglo imperial rule here asap” Sadly, just saying “we’re colonised”…” Oct 8, 11:33
Alf Baird on There May Be Justice: “You Britnats dinna appear tae notice how its the larger former imperial countries that are aye in financial freefall and…” Oct 8, 10:54
James on The Love Of Big Brother: “Aw, Adrian, petal; put a sock in it gie’s a’ some peace.” Oct 8, 10:37
Aidan on The Love Of Big Brother: “James – imagine being a grown adult man and writing something like that in response to losing an argument. Juvenile…” Oct 8, 10:20
Captain Caveman on There May Be Justice: “To be fair to Confused, he’s right about the water privitisation shitshow and its aftermath, as yet unconcluded.” Oct 8, 09:51
Captain Caveman on There May Be Justice: “It’s hard to know where all this is going to end – but end it most certainly will, sadly. “We”…” Oct 8, 09:50
Hatey McHateface on There May Be Justice: ““In the year to March 2026, central government spent nearly £100bn on debt interest alone, nearly 80% per cent of…” Oct 8, 08:20
