Alert readers can’t have failed to notice a desperate Scottish Labour dusting off the old “Tartan Tories” attack on the SNP recently, over the Nats’ unwillingness to join in with Kezia Dugdale’s kerrazy kaper of hiking up income tax.
So after today we can only assume they’ll be looking for some similarly pithy zingers for their colleagues in Wales. They can have this one for free.
It’s curious that as the Scotland Bill negotiations deadlock drags on, well beyond its original deadline of 12 February and now hurtling headlong towards the extended 23 February one with no sign of progress on the horizon, that nobody is remarking on one of the most striking facets of the new devolution proposals.
Remember “pooling and sharing”, readers? Whatever happened to that?
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!
It notes that in 2006, the year before the SNP came to power, 65% of Scots identified themselves as “Scottish not British” or “more Scottish than British”, but by 2014 – the year of the independence referendum – that number had fallen to just 49%.
It concludes, correctly, that just as we noted on Sunday, support for independence is fundamentally political in nature, not nationalist. But that only tells half the story.
So Scotland currently has no debt? No responsibility for any share of the enormous £1.5 trillion burden run up by the UK? We’ll take that deal. Where do we sign?
Barely a week – indeed, barely a day – has gone by over the last year or so without some angry, confused and hurt-sounding Unionist pundit or politician churning out yet another article on the theme of “WHY AREN’T YOU GRATEFUL THAT WE SAVED YOU FROM INDEPENDENCE, YOU APPALLING PLEBS?”
As far as the No side are concerned, the oil-price slump is a slam-dunk game-ender which finally conclusively proves that Scotland is too wee and too poor to run its own affairs, and their uncomprehending bewilderment as support for a Yes vote not only fails to disintegrate but keeps increasing even as the oil price sinks lower and lower has been quite a phenomenon to behold.
So we were interested to see today’s Sunday Times report a YouGov poll done for the comedy grumpy-old-white-guys support group (and spectacularly unsuccessful tactical voting enthusiasts) Scotland In Union, and somewhat miss the point of the results.
There’s nothing unusual about reading something in the Scottish media that makes your eyes widen. But a piece we saw in the Courier earlier today stretched ours out to Clockwork Orange-like proportions.
Now that’s a pretty intriguing opening (as the bishop said to the actress). At first we took it to mean that an independent Scotland could effectively take over Britain’s EU membership in the event of a Leave vote, ending any debate about whether and when it would be admitted on its own.
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.
Aidan on Shield Of The Phantom: ““The Articles, terms and conditions of the Treaty of Union cannot be touched by the parliament of Great Britain, and…” Jan 30, 11:03
James Cheyne on Shield Of The Phantom: “Lorna Campbell. Lorna Campbell / Aiden 29th Jan 8: 45 pm. ” History is not a record of What has…” Jan 30, 10:52
sam on Shield Of The Phantom: ““Alf Baird says: 29 January, 2026 at 9:31 pm “Over time their cultures merged.” Linguistic evidence rather sugggests divergence”. Robert…” Jan 30, 10:14
sam on Shield Of The Phantom: “Tribunal hearing in Edinburgh. Began on 28/1/2026. Still going. Tribunal Tweets has links to their coverage of the hearing from…” Jan 30, 10:07
Hatey McHateface on Shield Of The Phantom: “@sam You forgot to claim that support for Indy by True Scots can never be less than 100% By definition.” Jan 30, 09:37
Hatey McHateface on Shield Of The Phantom: “Sorry YL, I dinna understand your post. Stormy Daniel’s what? Haha, bet you could tell a tale or two about…” Jan 30, 09:29
Aidan on Shield Of The Phantom: “Of course YL, and as with any nascent technology you would expect unit costs to come down as it becomes…” Jan 30, 09:21
Hatey McHateface on Shield Of The Phantom: “You might want to consider that AI could already be sufficiently smart to be able to detect when it has…” Jan 30, 09:18
Hatey McHateface on Shield Of The Phantom: “Not by comparison with your lifetime’s achievements, no. You do well to disparage those so much less successful than yourself,…” Jan 30, 09:09
Hatey McHateface on Shield Of The Phantom: “Just off the top of my heid, I believe the peat in Scotland’s peat bogs has the capacity to generate…” Jan 30, 09:06
Young Lochinvar on Shield Of The Phantom: “H McH I doubt Stormy Daniel’s would agree (philandering), nor the worlds news editors who have to try and make…” Jan 30, 09:04
Hatey McHateface on Shield Of The Phantom: “Sure, we can run data centres on intermittent wind power. Once our entire economy is dependent on AI (because human…” Jan 30, 08:47
Young Lochinvar on Shield Of The Phantom: “I note with some degree of irony that many politicians while eulogising the passing of Jim Wallace claim he pretty…” Jan 30, 08:42
Young Lochinvar on Shield Of The Phantom: “Aidan Got to start somewhere.. Hey ho, once it’s up and running a pints bet on how the energy cables…” Jan 30, 08:10
Young Lochinvar on Shield Of The Phantom: “Good luck David Toshak. Yet another victim of the woo woo deviancy/ degeneracy agenda placed high up on the list…” Jan 30, 07:27
Aidan on Shield Of The Phantom: “Okay, but in his opinion on the subject Lord Hope of Craighead said explicitly that the treaty did extinguish upon…” Jan 30, 06:14
Young Lochinvar on Shield Of The Phantom: “AI; The nadir of the intelligent, talented, capable, skilled and thinking person IMO. Zero effort, zero time spent mastering a…” Jan 30, 01:30
willie on Shield Of The Phantom: “One thing to also consider is that with the rapid development of AI the industry needs two very key things…” Jan 30, 00:42
Alf Baird on Shield Of The Phantom: ““Over time their cultures merged.” Linguistic evidence rather suggests divergence. In most former Pictish areas from the lowlands to the…” Jan 29, 21:31
Saffron Robe on Shield Of The Phantom: “If a judgement is selective rather than objective, it ceases to be a judgement of law and becomes merely an…” Jan 29, 20:58
Lorna Campbell on Shield Of The Phantom: “Aidan: the Treaty could not have been spent on the accession of the two states into the one state, the…” Jan 29, 20:54
Cynicus on Shield Of The Phantom: “I have just encountered an “AI detector “ online: it is called justdone.com. I am afraid I cannot recommend it…” Jan 29, 20:32
Aidan on Shield Of The Phantom: “Do please tell us all about this sea power Northcode, is there any large-output tidal energy project anywhere in Scotland…” Jan 29, 19:46
Cynicus on Shield Of The Phantom: ““..the new evidence aqq A” ====== Sorry for this gibberish in my long post above. The phrase should read, “the…” Jan 29, 19:37
Northcode on Shield Of The Phantom: ““Scotland already possesses key competitive advantages in marine energy, including abundant natural resources and dedicated enterprise agencies. The country’s marine…” Jan 29, 18:50
sam on Shield Of The Phantom: “Gaels and Picts combined to face the threat of the Vikings. Over time their cultures merged.” Jan 29, 18:42
Cynicus on Shield Of The Phantom: “Lorna Campbell says: 29 January, 2026 at 2:12 pm “AI spews out according to that which you put in, Cynicus.…” Jan 29, 18:39
sam on Shield Of The Phantom: “It is not 25% of the Scottish population, It is a turnout of at least 50% of those registered to…” Jan 29, 18:36
Hatey McHateface on Shield Of The Phantom: “So you don’t even grant them the basic courtesy of calling our ancestors by their own names? Preferring to use…” Jan 29, 18:35
Northcode on Shield Of The Phantom: ““In summary, Scotland’s marine energy resources have the potential to significantly contribute to its energy output, aligning closely with the…” Jan 29, 18:34
