The most tedious question we ever get asked when we criticise the SNP – because we’ve explained it a hundred times already and none of the people asking have ever bothered to look – is “But what would YOU do to secure independence, clever-clogs?”
We’ve outlined that plan in detail repeatedly – you can read it again here if you want. But maybe we need something a bit simpler for the hard of thinking, so let’s have a go.
We just noticed a finding from the most recent opinion poll that surprisingly seems to have escaped the attention of every Scottish newspaper except the Press & Journal.
As far as we can ascertain, the P&J was alone in reporting the obviously newsworthy fact that just a quarter of Scots believe the First Minister’s ridiculous cock-and-bull story about “forgetting” the occasion when she first heard that her friend, colleague and mentor of 30 years was facing charges of trying to rape some of her other friends.
But the figures are part of a wider and depressing trend.
We’ve just received the most extraordinary Freedom Of Information response from the Scottish Government, readers. Trust us, you want to go and make yourselves a strong cup of tea before you read it. Or get this guy to bring you one.
It doesn’t take a master analyst to see that the Salmond inquiry committee is running out of patience with the Scottish Government’s endless attempts to obstruct its work.
This afternoon it issued a statement, with obvious irritation, making clear that it did not wish to see documents the Scottish Government was trying to submit to it, which the committee had not asked for, and which had previously been struck down as unlawful by Lord Pentland in the initial judicial inquiry.
The Scottish Government’s only purpose in doing so was to try to put the details of the discredited and disproven-in-court allegations into the public domain with the intention of smearing Mr Salmond yet again, and the committee has made its displeasure with the plan clear, telling the Scottish Government to abandon its intended legal action to release the documents and get on with producing the ones the inquiry HAS asked for.
But there’s a little bit more to the story than that.
We’re grumpy this morning, readers, because it’s Sunday and we were planning a long lie and then someone told us about this. It’s the First Minister appearing on the Sophy Ridge show on Sky News at around 8.45am and you need to see it.
In the light of yesterday’s revelations, we’ve sent the following Freedom Of Information request to the Central Enquiry Unit (CEU) of the Scottish Government.
Back in the 1980s there was a hit game for the ZX Spectrum home computer called Worse Things Happen At Sea. In it you play a robot whose job is to get a heavily-laden cargo ship safely to port, except that more and more disasters keep befalling it.
It springs leaks, it veers off course, the engine overheats and the robot’s power runs down, until eventually the catalogue of catastrophes overwhelms the harassed metallic custodian and the boat slides down into the murky depths.
We wonder if that feels familiar to anyone at the moment.
On 23rd March this year, after Alex Salmond was found not guilty of 13 criminal charges in the High Court, I called on the Scottish Government to set up a judge-led inquiry into the allegation that he had been the subject of a conspiracy involving the Scottish Government, which resulted in him being accused of criminal behaviour.
There’s an especially interesting post on the blog of Scottish solicitor-advocate Gordon Dangerfield at the moment, pointing out that there are no legal reasons whatever for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) to be withholding documents relating to the allegations against Alex Salmond, and indeed issuing dire threats of prosecution against him or anyone who might put them into the public domain.
(All of the blog’s coverage of the inquiry in general has been expert and revealing, and should be the first stop for readers seeking to understand proceedings.)
The items in question include the infamous WhatsApp messages exchanged by the group of people attempting to have Salmond imprisoned for crimes he didn’t commit, among them SNP chief executive Peter Murrell.
When two of Murrell’s messages were leaked recently it was front-page news in the Scottish press, and generated a huge amount of subsequent coverage. Commentators as diverse as Mandy Rhodes of Holyrood magazine and Alex Massie of the Times and Spectator have noted that while they’d initially disbelieved talk of a conspiracy, the Scottish Government’s actions have given them the opposite impression.
The message log is absolutely central to Salmond’s claim of a conspiracy against him, so the last thing that either COPFS or the leadership of the SNP wants is for it to become public knowledge. Indeed, COPFS has denied that the messages exist at all, which makes it a bit weird that the police are currently conducting a serious criminal investigation into who leaked some apparently entirely imaginary documents.
So it would be quite astonishing if they suddenly disappeared, wouldn’t it?
Readers, we can’t tell you how much we want to get back to just dissecting Scotland’s hopeless Unionist media for a living. It’s a lot more fun than what the current political circumstances are obliging us to do, so you can hardly imagine our excitement when we spotted what looked like an open goal in yesterday’s Mail On Sunday.
Our ears pricked up immediately at the sight of the words “up to”, which is invariably a sign of dodgy doings on the way, and so it proved. The article contained no solid data at all about the size of Scottish Government special advisers’ pay rises, only how many SpAds there were and which general pay bands they were in, each of which spans a wide range of between £14,000 and £23,000.
But while the Mail had spooned the sitter six feet over the crossbar – because the crude spin they’d put on it was total rubbish – there was still a loose ball just waiting to be knocked into the back of the net.
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Yelling at the tide: “« Marx’s secularisation of the messianic seems to me to be accurate and precise, up to this point. But can…” Jan 23, 01:07
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Yelling at the tide: “Thanks TURABDIN. Good SPECTATOR article by MARY WAKEFIELD. “And look at Professor Gordon: they’re right to be scared. It’s not…” Jan 23, 00:09
Dave G on Yelling at the tide: “@Alf Baird 5:05pm Have you considered seeking professional help?” Jan 22, 22:55
Alasdair Roy on Yelling at the tide: “These positions as President of the Employment Tribunal (Scotland) are dangerous, especially given the backgrounds of these women. They carry…” Jan 22, 21:52
Alf Baird on Yelling at the tide: ““Which is precisely why there is no few dozen Scots prepared to organise themselves for Indy.” Och aye thar is:…” Jan 22, 20:34
Hatey McHateface on Yelling at the tide: “He also said a few pertinent things about the prognosis for small countries now that it’s finally becoming clear to…” Jan 22, 19:42
Hatey McHateface on Yelling at the tide: “What I know, Alf, is that our inalienable right to self determination needs but a few dozen of us to…” Jan 22, 19:32
Hatey McHateface on Yelling at the tide: “Aye, ah bet it’s an English cheese tae. Cheddar or Stilton. Haud oan though. Fit nationality were they Fanny and…” Jan 22, 19:23
sam on Yelling at the tide: “Link https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/2025/12/12/statement-on-the-closure-of-our-petition-pe1876-on-recording-sex-accurately-in-cases-of-rape/ “We would like to thank Tess White MSP, Carol Mochan MSP, Michelle Thomson MSP, Ruth Maguire MSP, Rachael…” Jan 22, 17:32
sam on Yelling at the tide: “From MBM Policy on 12/12 /2025 “Statement On Wednesday 10 December the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee closed our…” Jan 22, 17:29
Alf Baird on Yelling at the tide: “What we do know is that current “Diversity” policy totally ignores and is definitely not about prioritising the rights or…” Jan 22, 17:05
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Yelling at the tide: “TRANS ACTIVISTS HACK FREE SPEECH GROUP IN IDEOLOGICALLY DRIVEN ATTACK A free speech organisation has been hacked by a trans…” Jan 22, 16:07
David Rodgers on Yelling at the tide: “Fair points but I will take independence first – woke or no woke.” Jan 22, 16:03
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Yelling at the tide: “HEALTH SEC CHALLENGED OVER ‘IDEOLOGICALLY DRIVEN’ PUBERTY BLOCKER TRIAL ******* QUOTE: “… It is important to reiterate that gender incongruence…” Jan 22, 15:50
Michael McCoy on Yelling at the tide: “Brilliant! Unbelievable that this is necessary but thank god, someone is prepared to hold these chancers to account. Well done…” Jan 22, 14:38
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Yelling at the tide: ““Cha ro-innleachd cianalas.”” Jan 22, 14:10
sam on Yelling at the tide: “From the For women Scotland website. “Ahead of the judicial review of the Scottish Prison Service Policy for the Management…” Jan 22, 14:01
sam on Yelling at the tide: “Copy of letter sent on 6/1/2026 by For Women Scotland to John Swinney. Dear Mr Swinney, Thank you for your…” Jan 22, 13:52
James Cheyne on Yelling at the tide: “Sam, The Scottish government is under the legislation of the Great Britain parliament. Scotland Act, Scotland does not have a…” Jan 22, 13:15
James Cheyne on Yelling at the tide: “The parliament of Great Britain and the UK parliament having made no such international treaty with Scotlands 1707 parliament, Having…” Jan 22, 13:01
James Cheyne on Yelling at the tide: “North Code, A mythical and magical fantasy world of the parliament of England to be precise.” Jan 22, 12:36
sam on Yelling at the tide: “This is from the blog at Legal Feminist, Naomi Cunningham writing under the title “Three Questions”. “The second question arises…” Jan 22, 12:33
James Cheyne on Yelling at the tide: “Alf Baird . Scotland made a treaty of union with England 1707. Scotland did ( not ) make a treaty…” Jan 22, 12:28
James Cheyne on Yelling at the tide: “Alf Baird. Scotland does not hold nor ever has done a 1707 Treaty of Union with the parliament of Great…” Jan 22, 12:01
James Cheyne on Yelling at the tide: “Scots law. The laws that were to “remain the same as before the union” in the treaty of union. NOT…” Jan 22, 11:41
Alf Baird on Yelling at the tide: ““A magical tale set in a fantasy world” Indeed so, Northcode. Which follows on from the fantasy of a mythical…” Jan 22, 11:09
Northcode on Yelling at the tide: “Whit an erse am !… I only went and postit my laist comment up oan the wrang threed. Here it…” Jan 22, 09:40
Hatey McHateface on The Secondhand Amendment: “£20 says it can be trusted to inspire millions of Scots to vote for it in May.” Jan 22, 09:37
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Yelling at the tide: ““Nostalgia is not a strategy.” (Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada, Davos WEF, Switzerland, 20 Jan 2026)” Jan 22, 09:28
