An act of provocation 480
Posted on
May 12, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We’re still on a break. But we’ve had another response from the BBC.
The stagnant pool 400
Posted on
May 11, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We’re supposed to be taking a few days off, but it’s been tipping it down outside for 36 solid hours, so when an alert reader emailed us a question relating to this article from Monday, we couldn’t help but go and research it just to pass some time.
They’d asked how many of the Tory MSPs elected last Thursday had been rejected by the voters of a constituency seat on the same day, and we were startled by the answer – of the 24 Conservative members of the Scottish Parliament elected on the list last week, every single one was also a failed constituency candidate.
And that got us thinking.
The separation of goals 790
Posted on
May 09, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
In amongst a torrent of pretty mad analysis of the election result at the weekend, we noticed the most insane reason yet suggested for the loss of the SNP’s majority:
The co-founder of a much-lauded but little-read pro-independence website asserted that the SNP were cruising to victory until the Nats got the backing of the Scottish Sun and Nicola Sturgeon was pictured posing with the front cover endorsing her party.
The whole litany of gaping flaws in that argument is something the Yes movement has needed to talk about for some considerable time now. So let’s bite the bullet and do it.
The chasm between words and actions 427
Posted on
May 08, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We’ll just leave this here:
Actual percentage of female MSPs returned in the 2016 Scottish Parliament election:
Labour 46%, SNP 43%, Conservative 19%, Green 16%, Lib Dem 0%.
Hmm.
The Unsackables 197
Posted on
May 08, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
A few weeks ago we rather cruelly highlighted an old post from Kezia Dugdale’s blog in which she bitterly bemoaned the practice of candidates who’d been rejected by voters in constituency seats still being able to get into Parliament via the “back door” of the regional lists.
Angrily Dugdale raged:
She also had a swing at a Lib Dem MSP:
So, y’know, she had this coming.
What happened and what happens next 356
Posted on
May 07, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The social-media reaction to this post yesterday was astonishing. Merely pointing out calmly and quietly that our warnings before the election had been entirely vindicated, and that everyone else’s unequivocal assertions of a guaranteed SNP majority had been the rubbish we always said they were, unleashed a torrent of abuse equal to any we’ve ever endured in the last four and a half years – distinguished only by the fact that so much of this one came from supposed Yes supporters.
But no amount of screaming and shouting will change the facts. Let’s look at them.
Don’t say we didn’t tell you 535
Posted on
May 06, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The first (and from our perspective, most important) thing to note is that independence is now categorically and unequivocally off the table for at least half a decade.
The failure of the SNP to secure another Holyrood majority last night (for the want of just 360 votes) combined with the Greens’ weasel-worded opposition to a second referendum – and make no mistake, opposition is what it is – will ensure that even if the rUK votes to leave the EU and Scotland votes overwhelmingly to stay in, there will be no indyref before the next Holyrood election in 2021.
Whatever else happens, you can take that to the bank.
The checklist 879
Posted on
May 05, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The cliffhanger 272
Posted on
May 05, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Polling day is here.
But there’s more to today’s election than the fate of Kezia Dugdale.
The independence dividend 393
Posted on
May 04, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
In so far as this Holyrood election has been a battle at all, the battleground for it has been tax. Not only the Unionist opposition but the pro-indy left have attacked the SNP for timidity over its plans to keep income tax rates the same as the rest of the UK, with only a tweak on the threshold for the top rate.
In their defence the Nats have deployed a line that’s been widely derided as an old Tory argument derived from the so-called “Laffer curve”, but in fact is nothing of the sort. It centres around the ways wealthy people legally shield their income from tax, but there’s a very specific and very important wrinkle that applies only in the particular case of a devolved, not independent, Scotland.
It’s not at all complicated but it’s absolutely crucial, and it’s barely been discussed on even the most superficial level in any supposed analyses of the situation undertaken in the media, so as usual we suppose it’s going to be down to us to do the job.
The football under the carpet 188
Posted on
May 03, 2016 by
Donna Babington
During this election campaign, there’ve been the usual bouts of political sparring, the tit-for-tat point-scoring frenzy played out through a plethora of media. One particular battleground, though, had a special resonance for me – the “Named Person” scheme.
I’m a former “looked-after” child. I’ve suffered the abuse and neglect that this scheme is intended to help protect children from. Having scrutinised the details for myself, I fully support it.
