The announcement that the Scottish Government would seek the uncontested legal right to hold a second independence referendum met with an outpouring of rage and ignorance from the massed ranks of the UK media that was in one sense entirely predictable yet still startling in its fury and ferocity.
Most prominent was the assertion, stated as fact by every pundit and broadcaster – including those required by law to be fair and impartial – that a second referendum would be conducted in the environment of a significantly worse economic case.
And that’s a remarkable claim, because the indisputable fact is that nobody has the slightest clue what the economic case for No will be.
We haven’t said much about the huge furore whipped up by the Guardian in recent days around spurious allegations of racism/online abuse by supporters of Scottish independence, made first by Sadiq Khan and then by a deranged “Better Together” activist who also thinks all vegans are racist (or something).
Partly that’s because we covered the initial speech by Khan and the fallout from it pretty extensively, and partly because we didn’t want to feed the Guardian’s clickbait.
However, when the activist who was allegedly “hounded off Twitter” in fear for her life – fear caused by supposed comments that nobody has actually seen – miraculously recovered her bravery less than a week later (coincidentally just in time for the launch of her book), we thought it was probably time someone started keeping some records.
As alert readers will know, one of the primary purposes of this website isn’t just to tell people when the Scottish and UK media is lying to them, but to teach readers how to spot that for themselves. And one of the keys to learning that is to ask yourself what a story in the press is leaving out as well as what it’s telling you.
So last week, when several newspapers went on an orgy of shock-horror reporting about SNP MPs’ expenses – focusing mostly on aeroplane flights and only quoting figures for a small handful of MPs who’d allegedly been claiming far more taxpayers’ money than their Unionist predecessors – alarm bells started ringing everywhere.
And just as we’ve taught them to, Wings readers leapt into action to do the hard work that Scotland’s professional journalists don’t want to do, in order to provide Scots with the facts that the media doesn’t want them to know.
It’s long been a bone of contention for Scots – and not just nationalists – that the UK government, by common agreement, wasted the vast wealth windfall of the North Sea on funding Margaret Thatcher’s 1980s programme of deliberate de-industrialisation, mass unemployment, huge tax cuts for the wealthy and bribes to the working class in the form of Right To Buy.
It did so rather than investing the proceeds in a sovereign wealth fund, as demanded by the SNP (and some elements of Labour) and practiced in Norway, whose fund – only set up in 1990 – is now a literal embarrassment of riches.
But the reality is even worse than that. Because according to a 2015 report by the National Resource Governance Institute that’s just come to our attention, the truth is that if the UK had managed its North Sea treasure better, it could have done both.
Fear and lies work. Over many decades (and really for centuries) the Unionist parties and the media have succeeded in persuading a large percentage of Scots that they’re beggars, scroungers, vagrants and “subsidy junkies” dependent on the ever-generous charity of England to keep them from starvation.
And in terms of the facts, that hasn’t always been an easy sell.
We originally wrote this article in March, in response to the Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland (better known as GERS) figures for 2014-15. We’ve updated it to take account of events since that time, of which there’s been one rather major one.
Today saw the publication (just five months after the 2014-15 GERS) of the 2015-16 stats, which are again triggering a convulsive orgy of “BLACK HOLE!” articles across the media, as every Unionist in the land falls over themselves to portray their own country as a useless scrounging subsidy junkie without actually using the exact words “too wee, too poor, too stupid”.
And once again, everywhere you look there’s a “Proud Scot” screaming about how the figures – showing an essentially unchanged “deficit” despite an almost £2bn fall in oil revenue – destroy a case for independence that those same people have spent most of the last four years stridently insisting never existed in the first place.
If your only source of news was the mainstream media, you could be forgiven for thinking that the consensus in the EU regarding an independent Scotland was bleak. Spain would, we’re told endlessly, veto Scotland’s place in the EU out of hand, and so, allegedly, would France.
And when Scotland’s First Minister went to Brussels after the referendum vote to meet with EU officials in regards to Scotland’s membership, we were told that this bold act of outreach fell on deaf ears.
The language of the press was hostile bordering on sadistic. The First Minister, acting to secure the democratic will of the people of Scotland, was apparently “running out of friends” and had to “beg” Ireland to help us out.
The reality, readers will be astonished to hear, is somewhat different.
The short version is “Everything Tony Blair said was a lie”. The full report can be read in 58 sections at the inquiry’s website here, but in the quite likely event that it gets swamped today we’ve uploaded the entire thing as a single convenient RAR file here.
[EDIT: individual sections now compiled into the print version’s 12 volumes.]
[EDIT 24 August 2016: This article has now been updated here.]
It’s Sunday, so there is of course one last convulsive orgy of “BLACK HOLE!” articles in all the papers, as every Unionist hack and pundit in the land falls over themselves to portray their own country as a useless scrounging subsidy junkie without actually using the exact words “too wee, too poor, too stupid”.
Everywhere you look there’s a “Proud Scot” screaming about how Scottish revenue this year being 1% lower than it was last year has comprehensively demolished a case for independence that those same people have spent most of the last four years stridently insisting never existed in the first place.
So before everyone moves on to a new “SCOTLAND BAD” next week, we thought it was worth a short recap of what we’ve learned about a devolved Scotland’s financial books this week.
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.
Newspaper sales figures in Scotland now come out in a patchy and unco-ordinated sort of way, with different frequencies and at different times of year, so we thought it’d be worth collecting them together for easy reference.
The numbers below are the most recent figures for each title that we know of – for papers classed as “national” that means November last year, and for those counted as “regional” (which includes the Scotsman and Herald titles) it’s this month.
Figures have all been rounded to the nearest 100, and increase/decrease stats refer in all cases to the corresponding sales for one year previously.
Since the astonishing election of 56 SNP MPs to the UK Parliament last May, the Unionist media – suddenly deprived of a whole contacts book full of friendly Scottish Labour bench-warmers ready to feed it cosy stories over a boozy expenses lunch in Whitehall – has raked through every bin and gutter in the land looking for anything (however pathetic) that it can try to puff up, distort, and rope into service as “dirt” on each of the Nat members, in an attempt to discredit them and the party.
So let’s just have a little look in here and – YIKES!
Mia on The Joker: “The main key indicator of how well a country is doing is always its demographics. Take a look at the…” Feb 8, 13:48
Alf Baird on The Joker: “Here’s a ‘clear fact’: Scotland’s GDP-per-capita today is less than half that of our independent neighbours Norway and Ireland, and…” Feb 8, 13:46
Hatey McHateface on Seeding the briar patch: ““including a good Scots but female” You’re revealing yourself too much there TH. Best tone it down, eh?” Feb 8, 13:44
gregor on The Joker: “Yup, so true: https://tinyurl.com/ywkbh4p2 #PureGenius” Feb 8, 13:44
Captain Caveman on The Joker: “Nowt wrong with a weak, warm pint of Greene King IPA on a warm summer’s evening at the village pub…” Feb 8, 13:42
gregor on Seeding the briar patch: “Lloyd Peters: The Joker (2025): Louisiana Man: “He was born in the shadows of the cypress trees Raised on the…” Feb 8, 13:36
Hatey McHateface on The Joker: ““fag end and non-perfect teeth, which I suppose these days marks him out as beneath contempt among the Chattering Classes”…” Feb 8, 13:34
Captain Caveman on The Joker: “See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_history_of_Scotland” Feb 8, 13:24
Hatey McHateface on The smirking scorpion: “Maybe the true owner/occupiers of the Crimea, the Tatars, should be brought back in, and the more recent colonisers shipped…” Feb 8, 13:22
Mia on The Joker: “Goodness me! I must get an appointment for an eye sight test ASAP. I thought the juggling balls were Swinney,…” Feb 8, 13:21
Captain Caveman on The Joker: “One of your many issues, Alf, is your point blank refusal to be even remotely objective, which for a supposed…” Feb 8, 13:20
Alf Baird on The Joker: “Aye, the independence wars, evictions, clearances and transportations of the 1700s; followed by the poverty, deprivation and England’s colonial wars…” Feb 8, 13:14
Cuilean on The Joker: “Just got it! Starmer! Duh!” Feb 8, 13:06
Cuilean on The Joker: “The wee juggling balls are Swinney, Trump and Lammy? But who is the 4th ball? I recognise the chubby coupon…” Feb 8, 13:05
gregor on Seeding the briar patch: “Joe Rogan: DOGE’S WORK IS FAR FROM OVER—THEY’VE JUST BEGUN TO EXPOSE USAID: “They haven’t even got to the Medicaid…” Feb 8, 13:01
Andy Ellis on The smirking scorpion: “Since when have they bothered with that? Do tell! They ignored devolution for decades & they’ve ignored so called legitimate…” Feb 8, 13:01
Frank Gillougley on The Joker: “Terrifying cartoon, Chris.” Feb 8, 12:57
Captain Caveman on The Joker: “Once again, I’m in total agreement with your sentiments, Hatey. Scotland’s “traditional” perma-left wing sentiments do present a specific danger,…” Feb 8, 12:55
Mark Beggan on The Joker: “Mea Culpa for the Woke and the horse it rode in on.” Feb 8, 12:54
gregor on The Joker: “The National Snake is a disgrace:” Feb 8, 12:48
Hatey McHateface on The Joker: “Be interesting to see the prognosis for a country in which the football team you support is significant. It’s truly…” Feb 8, 12:46
gregor on Seeding the briar patch: “Hey @YourAnonCentral I’m gonna crush your giant NWO butt-plug for all to see (promise) – What are you going to…” Feb 8, 12:37
Hatey McHateface on The smirking scorpion: ““The colonisers in London are shitting themselves Scotland is exiting the union” Jeezo, nae cant ever tells me onything! ?” Feb 8, 12:32
Hatey McHateface on The Joker: ““because they can pump out whatever views they feel are held by the majority of none woke, “left behind” disillusioned…” Feb 8, 12:28
Andy Ellis on The smirking scorpion: “I hear that nice Mr Macron has delivered the first Mirage 2000’s to our friends in the East too, and…” Feb 8, 12:22
Mark Beggan on The Joker: “” I almost don’t want to talk anymore about the extremists in the White House” These are the words of…” Feb 8, 12:21
Insider on The smirking scorpion: “Nah ! You’ve been caught out once again posting rubbish ! Rubbish about beavers ! Rubbish about solar panels !…” Feb 8, 12:21
gregor on Seeding the briar patch: “Elon Musk @elonmusk: “Fake anonymous”: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1888181125639471106 #DEMonymuous” Feb 8, 12:17
gregor on Seeding the briar patch: “Anonymous @YourAnonCentral: “#Anonymous message to the people of the United States and Trump” Video statement: https://x.com/YourAnonCentral/status/1887945825676091613” Feb 8, 12:10
agent X on The Joker: “Front page of The National online COMMENT Photo of Trump. Mhari Black: The powerful are taking money from the poor…” Feb 8, 11:48