This is Conservative MP Dominic Raab, a member of the Brexit Select Committee, speaking on the BBC News Channel’s “Hard Talk” programme at 00.45 this morning. Perhaps imagining that nobody would be watching at such an ungodly hour, it seems he felt able to be unusually candid.
We left the last bit on in order to demonstrate that he was still talking about Scotland as well as Ireland. (He went on to recite the usual boilerplate about all leaving together as the UK etc etc, you can watch the whole show for yourself on iPlayer.)
But let’s just get that key early exchange down in writing for the record.
Readers familiar with our standing advice to newspaper customers that the headline is nearly always a lie might like to consider today’s Press & Journal.
The word “pyre” comes from the Greek word “pyra”, meaning “fire”. Surprisingly, it’s NOT the same root as “Pyrrhic”, as in “Pyrrhic victory”, meaning one that’s achieved by metaphorically burning your own city down. (Which in fact is named after the Greek general Pyrrhus of Epirus.)
The Sunday Herald ran an extraordinary article on page 2 yesterday, and by the time we’d finished being startled by what nonsense it was, it set us wondering about why.
Because when you really want people with their finger on the pulse of Scottish politics to analyse the implications of the Supreme Court decision on Brexit, where else would you go but to Channel 5’s The Wright Stuff, to hear from um, former rugby league star and haircut pioneer Martin Offiah?
Way back in October last year we analysed what now seems to have become the key plank of Unionist argument against independence in the wake of Brexit – the idea that because Scotland does more trade with the rest of the UK than it does with the EU, independence would be economic suicide because Scotland would be sacrificing “the UK single market” (a thing that doesn’t actually exist ) for a much smaller one.
It’s a completely idiotic position, but to be honest we didn’t do a very good job of boiling the counter-argument down to something snappy and quoteable, so let’s have another go and see if we can manage something a little better.
We followed with interest an exchange over the weekend between Times columnist Kenny Farquharson and the anti-Brexit QC Jolyon Maugham, regarding the difference between the UK government’s insistence that there won’t be a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland because of the UK leaving the EU, and its continued insistence that there WOULD have to be one between the rUK and an independent Scotland, despite the legal circumstances being indistinguishable.
Farquharson, who like much of the Scottish political commentariat clings doggedly to the implausible dream of a “federal” UK, was adamant that the rules would – and indeed that they should – be different for the two ostensibly identical situations, and his given reason was a deeply disturbing one.
Kenny, it seems, thinks Scottish nationalists should do a lot more murdering.
Actual Scottish politics news continues to be thinner on the ground than the crowds at a Donald Trump inauguration, so we sympathise once more with the gentle souls of the Scottish press as they endeavour to fill empty pages without doing anything more journalistically strenuous than slightly rewording a Labour or Tory press release.
Fortunately for us, of course, we’ve always got their dismal efforts to talk about.
I’ve always found that argument a bizarre one, firstly because it takes no account of people’s emotional attachments to either the UK or Scotland, and secondly because as this site has repeatedly pointed out Scotland is both a producer and consumer of hydrocarbon fuels, so low or high prices are neither an unalloyed good or an unalloyed bad thing for her citizens.
What is incontestable is that the revenue from 45 years of North Sea production has not been well managed by the United Kingdom in comparison to the other states who have benefited from this bounty.
So far so uncontentious.
Outside of constitutional questions, party politics in Scotland revolves around health, education and jobs, with every party more or less in favour of all three. But what if there was an existential threat not just to this trinity but to our entire way of life? Where would that fit in to our politics?
Dan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “@alan scott “When are you unionists going to” demand the implementation of devolution for The Kingdom of England, and stop…” Mar 24, 22:46
Cherrybank on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Sarah @ 8.15pm Jim Sillars published his final book on November 2025 titled ‘The New Case for Optimism ‘ costing…” Mar 24, 22:33
sarah on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Ask a French person when they will give up their nationhood. Or a German. Or the c. 200 other countries…” Mar 24, 22:22
agentx on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: ““When are you Nationalists going to say enough is enough and demand the abolition of Holyrood and the end to…” Mar 24, 22:18
Iain More on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I am told that the UK owns c £700 Billion of Yankee NAZI Debt. We are ruled by Brit/Sassanach FUCKWITS…” Mar 24, 21:57
alan scott on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I’m a Unionist who thinks Holyrood should be abolished. The cost of one election is peanuts compared to the cost…” Mar 24, 21:53
Alf Baird on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: ““the Scot heads to oblivion in his own land” This is indeed what postcolonial theory tells us, that a colonized…” Mar 24, 21:24
sarah on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Nae Need, can we take some comfort from Jim Sillars’ speech at Oran Mor recently? Jim said it had been…” Mar 24, 20:15
Northcode on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “On the bright side – once Scotland has been coloniZed to the maximum extent and her people and their culture…” Mar 24, 19:53
Nae Need! on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I’ve spent ages writing a post on here and then editing and then deleting it. Tongue tied, all fingers and…” Mar 24, 19:04
Young Lochinvar on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “NC 7 reported “new towns” in Merry ol’ Engerlund is where the money will go..” Mar 24, 17:55
Willie on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “The Scots Parliament has turned out to be exactly what Westminster wanted of it. Westminster never intended to be anything…” Mar 24, 17:24
Andy Storrie on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “The professionally superior spectre of wee Jim Kelly looms larger and larger over this site with every passing day, Campbell.…” Mar 24, 17:10
Cherrybank on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I think Craig Houston the You Tuber representing the SDP will be a surprise winner of a seat on the…” Mar 24, 15:42
Rob on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “The de Hondt system is skewed to stop having a majority but essentially if enough folk wanted the SNP out…” Mar 24, 15:29
100%Yes on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I’d say John Swinney couldn’t turn a car around never mind the Country. The man is so unappealing I wish…” Mar 24, 14:58
100%Yes on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “New poll predicts a 18 Pro-Indy majority lead for May’s election, so what? The parliament has had a Pro-Indy majority…” Mar 24, 14:46
Northcode on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: ““So what will we get for this £53m?” A cheap, and not very entertaining, second-rate circus laid on by Westminster…” Mar 24, 14:42
James Che on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Lets call the whole thing off is a good idea, This is meant to be a Scottish election, not parties…” Mar 24, 14:30
Cynicus on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “This was always on the cards- after Craig Murrays’s (latest) defection.” Mar 24, 14:00
Mark Beggan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Alright everybody. The electron’s here. Beautiful Scotland. Great people. Run by lunatics and morons. Ok. Everybody knows this. You have…” Mar 24, 13:53
sarah on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Well, this poll proves, yet again, that pollsters ask people who have no idea of what is really going on…” Mar 24, 13:36
diabloandco on Irony you can’t buy: “Speaking of irony , apparently the Minister for War in the US of A said ,”The problem with Iran is…” Mar 24, 11:10
diabloandco on Irony you can’t buy: “Thanks Alf! The Caledonian Isles is a bit elderly much like me!” Mar 23, 20:30
diabloandco on Irony you can’t buy: “Thanks Alf! The Caledonian Isles is a bit elderly much like me!” Mar 23, 20:25
Iain More on Irony you can’t buy: “Re Iran war . Poor wee stupid Norway is laughing all the way to the Sassanach Offshore Tax Haven Banks.…” Mar 23, 20:07
