You’ve got to give them credit for audaciously shameless timing.
3 April 1989
3 April 2018
Still, though 29 years (and counting) is quite a while, it’s not even nearly a record.
There’s an interesting article on the Holyrood Magazine website today with some fascinating background details about how Scottish (and Welsh) devolution came into being almost 20 years ago, so we thought you might like to see this piece from the time, not least because we suspect it might also be the first recorded citation of the nonsensical concept of the “UK single market”.
(Click for readable size.)
It’s remarkable how seamlessly much of it, especially the last section (from the giant “D”) would still work today with the word “devolution” replaced with the word “independence”. But we find it hard to disagree with Sir John’s conclusion:
“Nor would devolution truly give more powers to the Scottish people. Only independence would do that.”
Preach, brother.
There was (unintentionally, we presume) a very revealing turn of phrase used by Tory MEP Jacqueline Foster on today’s edition of Good Morning Scotland:
“Scotland held a referendum on independence a couple of years earlier, and if the Scots had won that referendum to leave the United Kingdom, they’d have left the European Union.”
We suppose it’s nice that even the Tories finally agree that Scotland lost by voting No. But it’s interesting to hear that apparently there has never been any way for Scots to stay in the EU – if they voted Yes in 2014 they were out, if they voted No in 2014 they were out, and even though they voted Remain in 2016 they’re going out.
Any fair-minded democrat would surely then accept that Scotland’s voters deserve one chance to actually make that choice in a meaningful way, no?
We’ve been scouring our picture archives all afternoon for something more surprising than the fact that the UK government has screwed over the Scottish fishing industry again after it voted Brexit and Tory in 2016 and 2017, and we found this one.
See also: literally anything else that has ever happened on Earth.
As the winter Scottish political news drought enters its 17th week, mainstream and alternative media commentators alike are scratching around desperately for anything to write about, which tends to end up in overlong reflective and/or hectoring essays about how to secure independence, invariably concluding that what we need is for everyone in Scotland to start thinking and acting exactly like the author of the article.
We’re going to aim for something a bit shorter and more practical, at least.
A timely reminder about how much 85% of British people (or to put that another way, English people) really value the rest of the UK.
“Lead us, Scotland, don’t leave us!” is going to be a pretty hard sell next time.
Wings Over Scotland is a thing that exists.
