We’ll be honest with you, readers, we’re not looking forward to 2017 one little bit. It’s going to be the most tedious year in Scottish politics since we started this website, and perhaps since the advent of devolution.
Other than the mild distraction of the council elections in May – which are likely to be a bit of a damp squib due to the deadening effect of STV and the propensity of Labour and the Tories to do deals to keep the SNP out of power – pretty much nothing even a little bit interesting is going to happen.
All we ARE going to hear about is Brexit and the EU, over and over and over and over again, and everything we’re going to hear is the same empty, pointless, space-filling speculation we’ve already been hearing since June. So let’s just get it down, and then we can link to it every week and go and do something useful with our time instead.
This is a lie. There are in fact no “tax hikes” in the budget at all. The threshold for the higher rate of tax is increasing with inflation, ie in real terms it’s staying the same as it is now. Councils are being ALLOWED to raise Council Tax but not FORCED to.
But the Mail lying is a reflex action. What about the rest?
Figures released yesterday indicated that the number of full-time teachers employed in Scotland had risen by 253 over the past year, despite budget cuts imposed by the UK government’s austerity programme. This obviously presented the Scottish media with a dilemma: how could such statistics be presented as an “SNP BAD” story?
Luckily, we’re dealing with experienced professionals here.
We often say here on Wings that our job is to teach people to instantly recognise the sneaky tricks used by the media to try to create false impressions without saying things that are technically untrue. (Because despite the tiny size they’re allowed to print corrections at, they’re still rather embarrassing.)
A key technique is to look at a headline or story and immediately ask what you’re NOT being told. So here’s an easy example from today’s Scottish Daily Mail.
Just a brief update on some legal shenanigans. Having received no response to TWO lawyers’ letters, I’ve filed a court claim against Express Newspapers over false and defamatory claims made in an article by Siobhan McFadyen (sourced by JK Rowling) on the Sunday Express website of 30 October, as detailed in this Wings article.
The court fee was partly funded by popular politics pundit John McTernan.
Alert readers will remember that last month we debunked a front-page story from the Scottish Daily Mail about SNP MPs’ expenses, which made the spectacularly untrue claim that they were more expensive than their Unionist predecessors, when in fact they cost significantly less and did far more work.
A couple of days ago the Mail finally ran a “clarification”. And we thought you might like to know exactly how much more the Mail values lies than truth.
The highlighted areas on the picture above occupy 440,107 pixels.
We’ll be honest, there are some bits of this that make us wince, and unfortunately most of them come in the first two minutes where they’ll do the most damage in terms of getting a persuadeable voter to watch the rest of it. But it’s an important piece of work, containing stuff even we didn’t know about, and it should be seen.
Particularly alert readers may recall a phenomenon we haven’t covered much recently, whereby aspects of politics magically transform as they cross the border between Scotland and the rest of the UK. But this week we’ve had a sighting in a new area.
Northcode on The Gulf War: ““The right of peoples to self determination does not provide anyone with the right to… exclude minority ethnicities from participating…” Jan 2, 18:15
Dave Hansell on List Voting For Cretins: “Only in your subjective opinion, Cave dweller. It says Daz on the side of buses, but they don’t sell soap…” Jan 2, 18:14
factchecker on List Voting For Cretins: “Alf Baird says: 2 January, 2026 at 5:26 pm “if Scots can’t assemble a pro-independence majority from pro-independence native born…” Jan 2, 18:08
Alf Baird on List Voting For Cretins: ““give some examples of countries in the world where the franchise is based on something different” You might consider UN…” Jan 2, 18:05
Andy Ellis on List Voting For Cretins: “@ Alf 5.26 pm Thankfully Alf you and the tiny minority of ethno-nationalist bigots don’t get to decide who is…” Jan 2, 18:04
Northcode on The Gulf War: ““… such policies are described as “abhorrent to the conscience of mankind” if anyone were to be in any doubt…”…” Jan 2, 18:02
Northcode on The Gulf War: ““…Ten years residence…” You’re very generous, James. That’s at least 290 fewer residency years than I was thinking. I think…” Jan 2, 17:56
Andy Ellis on The Gulf War: “@ James 5.27 pm There’s no precedent for anything more than a 24 month residence criteria for a self determination…” Jan 2, 17:56
twathater on List Voting For Cretins: “VOTE for the Scum Nonce Party OR Alba if you WANT to remain tied to this VILE , ABUSIVE uk…” Jan 2, 17:56
Alf Baird on The Gulf War: “” the civic nationalism which characterises the recent progressive self determination campaigns in liberal democracies such as Quebec, Catalonia and…” Jan 2, 17:55
Aidan on The Gulf War: “Absolutely Andy I agree with all of that, and I suspect the reason why we are treated to endless riddles…” Jan 2, 17:46
Xaracen on The Gulf War: “Aidan said; “Of course though the example you give isn’t human hallucination, it is an accurate statement of the UK’s…” Jan 2, 17:45
James on The Gulf War: “The twa Franchise Fannies circling round again changing the meaning of others posts. It’s easy. Ten years residence, or born…” Jan 2, 17:27
Alf Baird on List Voting For Cretins: ““if Scots can’t assemble a pro-independence majority from pro-independence native born Scots..” We did. The Scottish Referendum Survey established that…” Jan 2, 17:26
Northcode on List Voting For Cretins: “A fair amoont o whit a post is tongue-in-cheek in an attempt tae wrap a wee bit humour (humour in…” Jan 2, 17:09
Northcode on List Voting For Cretins: ““Are you telling us that English people living in Scotland should not be entitled to vote in any future independence…” Jan 2, 17:04
Andy Ellis on List Voting For Cretins: “Open franchises similar to those used in local government elections do however constitute the overwhelming majority of franchises in self…” Jan 2, 16:38
Andy Ellis on The Gulf War: “@Aidan 3.16 pm Are you telling us that English people living in Scotland should not be entitled to vote in…” Jan 2, 16:28
100%Yes on List Voting For Cretins: “Who? Did you mention Liberate Scotland because if you did, they will achieve no media attention at all and will…” Jan 2, 16:28
factchecker on List Voting For Cretins: “The professor claims “The irregular ‘local government’ franchise used for Scottish national elections (and national referendums in Scotland) based on…” Jan 2, 16:26
100%Yes on List Voting For Cretins: “How many do you believe come on this site and actually read what Stu has written, I’m going to say…” Jan 2, 16:08
Captain Caveman on List Voting For Cretins: “Hey Dave, the Guardian is on the political left – like fucking obviously. Too late to disown it now my…” Jan 2, 15:42
Alf Baird on The Gulf War: “‘Self-determination’, and here a key word is ‘self’, concerns ‘a people’ (usually defined by a common language, heritage, history, common…” Jan 2, 15:36
Dave Hansell on List Voting For Cretins: “A timely reminder that sticking a label on something (whether that label is “Metropolitan Left” (sic) or “Far Right”) -…” Jan 2, 15:22
Alf Baird on List Voting For Cretins: “Aye Northcode, Imperialism aims to obliterate national cultures (Fanon); by implication, this confirms that ‘the only bulwark against imperialism’ (Said)…” Jan 2, 15:21
Aidan on The Gulf War: “Are you telling us that English people living in Scotland should not be entitled to vote in any future independence…” Jan 2, 15:16
lothianlad on The Gulf War: “The SNP are infiltrated to the hilt by careerists, unionist sympathisers and brit state collaborators.” Jan 2, 15:12
lothianlad on List Voting For Cretins: “Great post again Stu! I have a half wit cowardly SNP list supporting friend who still believes both votes SNP…” Jan 2, 15:05
Alf Baird on List Voting For Cretins: ““what happens if unionist voters decide to vote tactically in the constituencies” This is already evident for some years in…” Jan 2, 14:58
