Wings Over Scotland

We must admit, we’re perplexed by Scottish Labour’s apparent and oft-expressed belief that the Welsh (Labour) First Minister is the ultimate authority on currency unions. We’re not aware of any financial expertise on his CV, and as he’s not even a Westminster MP his opinion will carry no weight in any negotiations on the matter.

So we’re not sure why his view is singled out, from the entire population of the UK, as having special relevance. Still, Johann Lamont seems pretty worked up about it.

Let’s all agree: from now on, anyone who says “An independent Scotland would have to join the Euro!” is either deliberately lying or a dribbling slack-jawed imbecile without the faintest idea of what they’re talking about.

As such their views should be dismissed with contempt, and ideally they should be chased out of town by an angry mob with pitchforks and flaming torches. We’d say Dr Zuleeg was pretty unequivocal and definitive on the subject here.

Alert readers may recall a piece from earlier today in which we mused on the curious and perhaps unique unwillingness of the people of Scotland to seek more powers over their own lives. It was in part triggered by a curious moment from last night’s BBC Scotland independence debate from Kelso in the Borders.

A gentleman in the audience had asked the assembled panel of politicians “what they understand by the word ‘nation’, and which nation or nations do you belong to?”, and Labour MSP Jenny Marra’s reply was illuminating and perplexing in equal measures.

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A second Unionist politician in a week doesn’t want to face STV’s questions.

What is it with cowardly Chancellors at the moment?

Another scrupulously balanced panel from the state broadcaster.

The papers-review slot is turning into quite the little regular treat.

We’ve noted on several previous occasions the somewhat alarming way in which “Better Together” campaign chairman Alistair Darling can barely contain his fury at the sheer outrageous temerity of the independence movement in seeking to peacefully secure democratic self-determination for the people of Scotland.

We were all set for more of the same on BBC News this morning after Alex Salmond’s speech on currency, but were surprised to be met instead by a calm, softly-spoken and altogether more statesmanlike approach.

And in fairness, he kept it up for a good 15 seconds.

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As we’ve noted before, the Independent is by a large distance the most English of all the UK’s “national” newspapers. Alone among its peers, it has no Scottish edition, no Scottish news section, no Scottish editor, not even a full-time Scottish correspondent. It struggles to shift 3,000 (not a typo – THREE thousand) copies a day in Scotland.

So if we were conducting a panel debate about Scotland on a news channel, we’re not sure that the paper’s chief political commentator Steve Richards is the guy we’d call for expertise. But the BBC, bless it, has other ideas.

That notwithstanding, today’s edition of Dateline London was an interesting watch. Correspondents from the USA, China and Greece, and host Gavin Esler, offered some largely insightful comments, only occasionally interrupted by Richards butting in in a desperate attempt to get the discussion back on the standard UK-media line.

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Labour’s Michael Kelly on last night’s Newsnight Scotland, explaining that Scottish Labour MPs and MSPs would “to a person” back Ed Balls refusing a currency union, even if it damaged Scotland, because otherwise Labour might lose a UK election:

It’s nice to know clearly and unambiguously where Scotland stands as far as Scottish Labour’s concerned, isn’t it, readers? The only purpose of Scottish votes is to get Labour into power at Westminster, even if it means hurting Scotland to do it.

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The man the No campaign want to keep in charge of Scotland’s finances:

Just to tide you over while we pop out to the shops, readers:

Can you tell we just recently got some good video-capture software?

Sometimes it’s hard to shake the feeling that some sort of bizarre mass body-swap incident, such as those frequently depicted in comedy films like “Big” or “Freaky Friday”, must have happened in UK politics without anyone noticing.

Because on the day that David Cameron called on people elsewhere in the UK to plead with Scots to stay in the Union, English people are saying things like this:

(Warning: adult language.)

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This sort of thing really shouldn’t be so startling and unusual that we feel we need to preserve it for posterity, but here’s someone on a BBC current-affairs programme giving a fair and balanced analysis of Scottish politics:

Based on the BBC’s track record this section will be missing when it goes out on the iPlayer, so we thought we better grab it while we could.

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