Having never been part of a political party, an area where Wings lacks expertise is in understanding the nuts and bolts of their operation, and how a party’s rules can be used to usurp their members’ power. We’re delighted to have someone equipped to provide a valuable insight into how that’s happened to the SNP in the last two years.
The following line is still a definitive statement in the SNP constitution:
“National Conference is the supreme governing and policy-making body of the Party.”
But in practice it is no longer the case. The 2018 redraft of the constitution centralised power in the Leader and in the NEC. The party Leader has sole and total power over policy – both in the manifesto and in government – and the NEC has sole power over who represents the party and what they are allowed to say.
So in effect, since 2018 the party elite – not the membership – has ruled the SNP.
Something most people don’t know about the infamous Spanish Inquisition is that it was never the Catholic Church that actually executed heretics. Particularly if a prisoner had refused to confess their vile heresy even under torture, the Church instead handed them over to the “mercy” of the state to deliver their end.
So SNP MP Kirsty Blackman (or as we understand some are already calling her, “the Tiny Torquemada“) would have fitted right in with it.
Or more likely, they just wanted to try to bury all of their skeletons at once in a single giant avalanche of crookedness. But either way, enough is enough. Criminals accused of perjury don’t get to decide if they’ll answer for their lies or not.
The Fabiani committee has the power to compel witnesses to attend. They must now use that power without further delay, or they must call on the police to arrest the SNP’s chief executive immediately and drag him into an interview room by his ears if need be with a solicitor in attendance. (Doubtless also paid for by SNP members.)
Scotland is not GoodFellas. Nobody is above the law. Stop this damn rot now.
The reaction to it was absolutely explosive. Half of the Parliamentary SNP spent the whole night running around social media frantically firefighting their own members, who were absolutely furious about what they’d just discovered. Poisonous abuse from the party’s woke faction poured out like never before. We got called every kind of bigot under the sun by SNP officeholders.
(The article, of course, made no mention of any sort of bisexual people, Jewish people, trans people or women as a group, let alone actually being prejudiced against anyone. Ironically just about the only kind of prejudice that wasn’t alleged was ageism, possibly because it might have looked a smidge too ironic coming from a bunch of bedwetting children whose core ideological stance is that anyone over 29 is a Nazi.)
But there was one thing you DIDN’T read amid the torrents of hate.
You didn’t read anyone saying a single word of the post was untrue.
We don’t yet know what happened regarding the supposed definition of transphobia – our source thinks that it may have been postponed due to not being able to get the required 2/3 vote for an emergency agenda item.
But we know that something even madder DID happen.
There’s still a day and a half of January 2021 to go, but it’s already been the busiest month for traffic on Wings Over Scotland in several years, despite endless claims from detractors (both Unionists and Pete Wishart types) that we’re in tragic decline.
And since Saturday afternoons are the one quiet moment we get these days – and it’s not like we can go out for a nice walk in the sunshine or have a potter round the shops – we thought we’d take a deeper look into the stats.
sarah on Vibecoding A Better World: “It was starting to go wrong just before I took early retirement from HMRC in 2005. It was, I believe,…” Oct 29, 12:36
diabloandco on Vibecoding A Better World: “Can you no use babywipes for cleaning up Novichok ? I seem to remeber that’s what the folk of Salisbury…” Oct 29, 12:32
James Che on Vibecoding A Better World: “Sarah, I too am extremely appreciative that I had held on to old fashioned paper work and resisted going full…” Oct 29, 11:10
Minceheid on Vibecoding A Better World: “Are you sure you’re not thinking of Jet Set Willy? That game had a generous helping of bugs which made…” Oct 29, 11:07
Rev. Stuart Campbell on Vibecoding A Better World: “If you think the human-run aspects of HMRC are any better I have some extremely distressing news for you.” Oct 29, 10:45
James Che on Vibecoding A Better World: “Being deleted from AI automated computers led to extreme poverty in my case while trying to pay for funerals and…” Oct 29, 09:18
BLMac on Vibecoding A Better World: “Damn, we’ve just got past the SNP’s cabal of angry men in frocks identifying as women debacle. Are we now…” Oct 29, 09:17
Hatey McHateface on Faces In Sand: “Consensus across the MSM is clear – yesterday’s “do nothing” budget fired the starting gun for a WM GE in…” Oct 29, 09:04
sarah on Vibecoding A Better World: “Yes, you’re right. Plus a filing cabinet can’t be hacked. But let the Rev have a break and enjoy himself…” Oct 29, 09:01
James Che on Vibecoding A Better World: “The perfect example of Where AI and computers running government can go wrong that could effect and affect everyone on…” Oct 29, 08:59
Dan on Faces In Sand: “Sigh… Response held in moderation because the links must have had “bad” words…” Oct 29, 08:29
James Che on Vibecoding A Better World: “The suspicion that AI would have have any more humanity in its laws and policies than the SNP to run…” Oct 29, 08:23
Nicky T Naquetti on Vibecoding A Better World: “I remember the glory days of “Digitizer”. It is hard to forget lines like: “It’s not every day a large…” Oct 29, 08:13
Hatey McHateface on Faces In Sand: “From an article about Rosebank in the Guardian Online: “The Guardian also revealed on Tuesday that the Treasury had already…” Oct 29, 07:44
Hatey McHateface on Faces In Sand: ““Which explains what happens in a colony, ‘where the colonized wish to develop and the colonizer holds him back’ (Memmi)”…” Oct 29, 07:25
Aidan on Faces In Sand: “Okay – so reading between the lines this is another one of these schemes dreamt up in the public sector…” Oct 29, 06:54
twathater on Faces In Sand: “There is a very interesting post on Mark Collets blog if anyone is interested” Oct 29, 02:38
WhoRattledYourCage on Vibecoding A Better World: “Do Fairlight or Manic Miner, only without the fucking bugs in them that made them crash when you got near…” Oct 28, 23:39
Southernbystander on Faces In Sand: “I’m afraid the moon is merely made of cheddar so I think you might have been had.” Oct 28, 23:14
Alf Baird on Faces In Sand: ““as part of that study did ask any shipping or freight operators whether they’d be interested in shipping their goods…” Oct 28, 22:06
Spartan 117 on Faces In Sand: “You’ll get no argument from me Dan regarding any of your points raised. The closure of Grangemouth was an utterly…” Oct 28, 21:56
Dave on Vibecoding A Better World: “I’m glad to see you back and posting, Stu. I was a bit concerned by the silence and thought that…” Oct 28, 21:36
Aidan on Faces In Sand: “It’s not a question of NO aircraft flying. If; – independence significantly reduces demand on the rUK – Scotland routes;…” Oct 28, 19:51
Dan on Faces In Sand: “Ach, who knew in a self-governing Scotland so many folk would lose their jobs because we wouldn’t have any aircraft…” Oct 28, 19:12