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The Grand Tour 154

Posted on June 10, 2025 by

Lacking anything better to do on a grey and cloudy day in Bath, we thought it might be a lark to go through every Holyrood constituency in Scotland and contemplate where it might go in next year’s election, based on the current state of polling.

And just to make things interesting, compared to our last assessment we’re going to give opposition parties the (often considerable) benefit of the doubt in a few seats for the sheer heck of it, and see if there’s any even slightly plausible outcome that means the SNP might win some list seats if all their voters vote for them on both ballots, or if they’ll waste a million votes for nothing and get dozens of Unionists elected like they did in 2021. [SPOILER: don’t prepare yourself for a surprise.]

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The Blindness Of Hatred 171

Posted on May 11, 2025 by

Warning: despite the quite zingy title this is actually going to be a very dry stats post, readers. It is, on the other hand, based on a man having something disturbingly close to a complete psychotic mental breakdown, so there’s always that for a bit of colour.

Because the paragraph above, and in particular the highlighted part, is without a doubt the most dishonest, diametrically false and wildly extreme lie about Scottish politics that we’ve ever seen anyone tell in the 13.5 years of Wings Over Scotland’s existence.

And folks, that’s a high bar.

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The same old tricks 247

Posted on January 16, 2025 by

Way back in the day, the Lib Dems in particular, but also other parties and the “Better Together” campaign, were infamous for the “dodgy barchart” tactic.

And so degraded is the modern SNP, it’s now scraping the same barrel.

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The Number You First Thought Of 99

Posted on August 22, 2024 by

We were very pleased to discover this morning that Johnny Ball is still alive.

But even the man who managed to make maths fun for generations of children would be hard pushed to make sense of the SNP’s membership figures.

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Outside the fence 108

Posted on June 03, 2024 by

We were a little perplexed by this story.

Because, for startlingly obvious reasons, even the SNP hasn’t had the brass neck to do a general fundraiser for this election, with the police’s inquiries still going on into the whereabouts of the cash from their last big appeals.

But in fact the party has managed to wring over £100,000 from the most gullible of its remaining supporters in the days since the election was announced. It’s just been a bit more subtle about it.

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The Longest Lie 130

Posted on January 05, 2024 by

BBC Reporting Scotland last night:

Truly, this is the bullshit that just won’t die.

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The Safest People On Earth 218

Posted on November 21, 2023 by

Yesterday was “Transgender Day Of Remembrance”, which was the 41st “special” day of 2023 so far for trans people.

(Including but not limited to International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia; International Pronouns Day; International Transgender Day Of Visibility; Transgender Awareness Week and of course the whole of “Pride Month”, which is now an almost entirely trans-focused event).

Citizens of Scotland and the UK were solemnly instructed to “remember the many trans people whose lives have been tragically cut short by violence”, although weirdly none of the politicians issuing the orders actually named any.

However, since we’re endlessly being told that trans people are the most marginalised, oppressed and vulnerable members of our society, and that an actual “trans genocide” is currently in progress, we expect there have been loads.

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The Infinite Idiot 291

Posted on May 24, 2023 by

He just can’t grasp anything, can he?

Because no, they don’t.

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The Hollow Crown 197

Posted on March 27, 2023 by

Today is the last day of Nicola Sturgeon’s record-breaking reign as First Minister of Scotland. In a few hours we’ll know who is to succeed her in the role. She was only the second SNP occupant of Bute House, and the legacy she bequeaths compared to the one she inherited from Alex Salmond is a matter of measureable record.

So let’s see the final scores on the doors.

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Astronomical numbers of boots 131

Posted on March 19, 2023 by

The SNP having a fondness for lying about their membership wouldn’t have come as quite such a shock to the Scottish press if they paid a little more attention to this website. Because we were pointing it out two and a half years ago.

It was in October 2020 that we told you how the SNP’s 2019 accounts revealed the party’s true membership figures weren’t the claimed 126,000 but more like 87,000.

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The truth will come out 230

Posted on March 16, 2023 by

How it started, just one month ago:

And how it’s going:

But it’s quite a lot worse than it looks.

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The feather-light touch 132

Posted on February 22, 2023 by

Yesterday, readers, we warned you that “online newspaper polls are self-selecting and vulnerable to manipulation”. Here’s what that looks like in practice.

Let’s crunch some numbers.

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    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “Inspirational stuff, NC. Do The Collected Speeches Of Nicola Sturgeon next.Jul 13, 00:30
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “Stick around, Dave, all will become clear. OK, maybe not the posts in Scots.Jul 13, 00:10
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “Ah kent ye’d say that, Alf. Remarkable, no?, hoo muckle fowk pick up ootside o formal education when they’re interested…Jul 13, 00:07
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “Epic fail there, YL Sah! Mind and keep your UK passport and your UK driving license safe. It’s the “logical”…Jul 13, 00:02
    • Young Lochinvar on Just Good Friends: “🙂Jul 12, 23:05
    • GM on Just Good Friends: “Hackit.Jul 12, 22:48
    • Alf Baird on Just Good Friends: “A ‘mediocre meritocracy’ is the inevitable reality within a colonial society (Memmi), much as we see. But this is not…Jul 12, 22:28
    • Alf Baird on Just Good Friends: “” if Scotland is still in large parts a Scots speaking nation, there’s precious little evidence for it on here.”…Jul 12, 22:20
    • Shug on Just Good Friends: “It is very telling that the BBC is not making hay with this material. They will when that are ready…Jul 12, 21:25
    • Northcode on Just Good Friends: “This infernal heat has driven me mad and in my madness I’ve been forced to transcribe the first few paragraphs…Jul 12, 20:33
    • agent x on Just Good Friends: “http://www.manifestoforindependence link to petition.parliament.uk those links don’t work for me.Jul 12, 19:47
    • Young Lochinvar on Just Good Friends: “In reply to P3nisbreath McP3nisbreathface @ 4.04pm The sexual perversion thing is all yours, just trawl back through your posts,…Jul 12, 17:25
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “Alf, if Scotland is still in large parts a Scots speaking nation, there’s precious little evidence for it on here.…Jul 12, 16:11
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “If “logically” the UK no longer exists, you’ll have burned your passport and your driving license. Looking forwards to your…Jul 12, 16:04
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “Not too bad a post, NC, but it lacks fundamental clarity. Which union are you discussing? The UK or the…Jul 12, 15:59
    • Young Lochinvar on Just Good Friends: “Good post NC. One small correction, the construct was first called Great Britain. The United Kingdom came along later when…Jul 12, 15:34
    • sarah on Just Good Friends: “A lot of us do, Dan – just not speaking up much nowadays. I shall mention, again, several things that…Jul 12, 13:49
    • TURABDIN on Just Good Friends: “PILE it HIGH, sell it cheap in POUNDLAND. https://archive.is/VLCVd Everything must go!Jul 12, 13:23
    • TURABDIN on Just Good Friends: “FALSE FRIENDS. DEMOCRATIC SYSTEMS fail when people with ability don’t have authority and people with authority don’t have ability What…Jul 12, 12:45
    • Aidan on Just Good Friends: “Have you done any polling on how important the issue of the formation of the union in 1707 is to…Jul 12, 12:13
    • Alf Baird on Just Good Friends: “Yes Hatey, if we “look at voting preferences against geographical areas in recent times” what we find is that the…Jul 12, 11:49
    • Marie on Just Good Friends: “Thanks for the linkJul 12, 11:37
    • Dan on Just Good Friends: “Things going on in Scotland… (Not that anybody here seems to give a shit) https://www.isp.scot/july-5th-july-11th-2025/Jul 12, 10:23
    • Northcode on Just Good Friends: ““It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t…Jul 12, 09:52
    • Northcode on Just Good Friends: “Naebody wid hae thocht hit possible tae uise ersecheeks tae blaff oot Inglis lees oan a keybuird an hae whit…Jul 12, 08:38
    • James Cheyne on Too Tight To Mention: “Alf Baird. I apologise for late reply as busy thinking about re- locating.Jul 12, 08:33
    • James Cheyne on Too Tight To Mention: “Alf Baird. ” Thus the old Scottish parliament members became [English parliamentarians]when they entered the continued English Westminster parliament resting…Jul 12, 08:30
    • DaveL on Just Good Friends: “What the fuck are you talking about? What’s a ‘Da Dews’? I’ve never heard of it. While I’m here you…Jul 12, 00:28
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “I was confident you were going to morph onto Da Dews there, Confused, but you didn’t. Well done you. Bit…Jul 11, 23:55
    • Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “@Alf I must hae colonised masel! Partition is a possibility if the kind of eejits currently ruling the roost at…Jul 11, 23:45
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