The world's most-read Scottish politics website

Wings Over Scotland


Search Results

Scottish Politics For Dummies 142

Posted on May 19, 2016 by

As we write there’s a protest going on outside the Scottish Parliament regarding the privatisation of ferry services to the Western Isles. It was formally announced almost three hours ago that there definitely wasn’t going to be any privatisation and that the service would remain in public hands, but the protest still went ahead.

pscalmac

The people conducting the protest, who’ve got the exact thing they wanted, are now doing their level best to lose it again. Welcome to Scottish politics.

Read the rest of this entry →

Phenomenon Of The Week 140

Posted on May 18, 2016 by

Over the past few days, readers, we haven’t been able to avoid noticing a recurring theme among Unionist types on social media – namely that the Holyrood election results are proof that support for independence is declining.

idiotkipper

is1

But it’s not until you ask them to explain that it gets completely mental.

Read the rest of this entry →

The taxonomy of lies 246

Posted on May 18, 2016 by

For much of its life, this site has been warning readers that, as their default position, they should always assume newspaper headlines are a lie until proven otherwise.

headlie

Today, Britain’s biggest-selling newspaper admitted it in public.

Read the rest of this entry →

James Kelly is a liar 330

Posted on May 17, 2016 by

Last night the Labour MSP James Kelly – who was resoundingly rejected by voters in Rutherglen earlier this month but was forced on the Scottish Parliament anyway by his party – appeared on Scotland Tonight to debate the Offensive Behaviour (Football) Act. You can see the full segment from 15m 35s here.

Mr Kelly told a number of quite serious lies. We’ve edited them together.

Let’s examine them in turn.

Read the rest of this entry →

The politics of hatred 370

Posted on May 16, 2016 by

It must be bewildering being the SNP sometimes.

You win a historic third election with a second massive landslide, getting more than twice as many seats as your nearest challenger – the first time such a thing has ever happened in a Holyrood election – on the back of what’s (self-evidently) by and large a very popular policy programme and record, and before you’ve even taken your seats in the chamber all the parties you just thrashed out of sight line up to explain how you’ve been doing everything wrong.

obfatimes

And as alliances go, they don’t get much less holy.

Read the rest of this entry →

An act of provocation 480

Posted on May 12, 2016 by

We’re still on a break. But we’ve had another response from the BBC.

Read the rest of this entry →

The stagnant pool 400

Posted on May 11, 2016 by

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.

tarlair

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.

Read the rest of this entry →

The separation of goals 790

Posted on May 09, 2016 by

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:

kw4

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.

Read the rest of this entry →

The chasm between words and actions 427

Posted on May 08, 2016 by

We’ll just leave this here:

greenequality

Actual percentage of female MSPs returned in the 2016 Scottish Parliament election:

Labour 46%, SNP 43%, Conservative 19%, Green 16%, Lib Dem 0%.

Hmm.

Read the rest of this entry →

The Unsackables 197

Posted on May 08, 2016 by

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:

Alex Salmond will try every trick in the book to get elected to the Scottish Parliament. Standing for both a constituency and a list seat this May doesn’t even register in his party’s mindset as being inappropriate.

She also had a swing at a Lib Dem MSP:

“Mike Pringle has a majority of 158. He is I think, the third most marginal MSP in Scotland. Aware of his vulnerability, Mike has put his name forward for the Liberal Democrat Lothian List which means it’s nearly impossible to get rid of him at the next election. How unfair is that?”

So, y’know, she had this coming.

Read the rest of this entry →

What happened and what happens next 356

Posted on May 07, 2016 by

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.

angrymob3

But no amount of screaming and shouting will change the facts. Let’s look at them.

Read the rest of this entry →

Don’t say we didn’t tell you 535

Posted on May 06, 2016 by

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.

euharvie

Whatever else happens, you can take that to the bank.

Read the rest of this entry →

  • About

    Wings Over Scotland is a thing that exists.

    Stats: 6,790 Posts, 1,222,606 Comments

  • Recent Posts

  • Archives

  • Categories

  • Tags

  • Recent Comments

    • Xaracen on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “@Stuart; “The Treaty was entered into without limitation of time and some articles express quite plainly that they were intended…Jul 24, 22:27
    • Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “For general info, here is a link to PROF ROBERT BLACK KC’s presentation about the UNION: Professor Robert Black KC…Jul 24, 19:33
    • Stuart on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Xaracen. 2:14 How wrong can one man be? Well in your case very. Your argument (feeble though it is) re…Jul 24, 18:43
    • Northcode on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “When their buttons and switches and knobs – and they have many – are pushed or flicked or twiddled… they…Jul 24, 18:40
    • twathater on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “@ Lorn you said “I believe implicitly, that those men who transgress the rules of normal, decent behaviour have a…Jul 24, 18:14
    • Dan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “@ Lorn at 4:15 pm It’s definitely okay to blame the Scots for the prevailing Union, and jist ignore things…Jul 24, 18:02
    • Aidan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “@Dan – I mean the cost per MwH quoted as £150, Hinckley Point see originally struck at c.£85. Yeah I…Jul 24, 17:59
    • twathater on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Oh there’s Bastard TAX MOAN back from his holidays in Is rahel, has he been updated on the plans to…Jul 24, 17:56
    • Dan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Chas spotting across the yooniverse…Jul 24, 17:33
    • Dan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Hmm… but when did pretty much anything built in the UK ever come in on proposed cost? HS2, a couple…Jul 24, 17:30
    • Mark Beggan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Hats off to that! Respect.Jul 24, 17:09
    • Mark Beggan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “It’s been a busy week for the Eton rifles. “What a catalyst you turned out to be. Crashed your van…Jul 24, 17:03
    • Mark Beggan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “The favourite rant from the Parasite Class; ” It’s good for the economy!” Who’s economy?Jul 24, 16:55
    • Chas on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Rather than the readers ‘chipping in’ Andy, you could gift him some of yours!Jul 24, 16:35
    • Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “LABOUR MP CALLS GENDER-CRITICS ‘SWIVEL-EYED FANATICS’ A Labour MP has revealed his contempt for those who believe in the reality…Jul 24, 16:32
    • Chas on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Alfie Boy can’t lose. Either we accept we are living in a colony. Or, if we don’t, it is proof…Jul 24, 16:22
    • Lorn on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “I think that it is less that we are colonized than that we have allowed ourselves to be treated as…Jul 24, 16:15
    • Chas on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “It’s competition time. Spot the Loony.Jul 24, 16:07
    • Lorn on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Young Lochinvar: no, decent men did not barge into female spaces in the past, and any who were indecent enough…Jul 24, 16:06
    • Stuart on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Name checking your own homework does not count Professor Baird. Your narrative (feeble though it is) is inaccurate and clutching…Jul 24, 16:06
    • Aidan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Who is “Scotland”, every single person in Scotland who has been polled on the subject, or a tiny bunch of…Jul 24, 14:49
    • James on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: ““Aidan”; “I think we’ve all just got to face up to that fact…” Who’s “we”?Jul 24, 14:32
    • James on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Good old “Aidan”, the true BritNat defender on every subject. Scotland doesn’t need (or want) nuclear, but hey, when did…Jul 24, 14:15
    • Xaracen on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “@Stuart; We are talking of a union of two sovereign kingdoms, neither of which in 1706 owed any obeisance to…Jul 24, 14:14
    • James on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Can you elucidate what these “fish” might be? England has been meddling in Scotland’s affairs for nigh on 1,000 years…Jul 24, 14:01
    • Rob on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “The simple fact is that Scottish politicians have shown over the last 10 years that they are simply so incompetent…Jul 24, 13:54
    • James on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Willie; Witness; your point is made.Jul 24, 13:48
    • Aidan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “It’s a case against nuclear power, I don’t know where she got the numbers from re costs, they seem around…Jul 24, 13:08
    • sarah on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Further to my comment at 11.18 a.m., coincidentally Gareth Wardell, Grouse Beater, has retweeted today the speech that he would…Jul 24, 12:59
    • Mark Beggan on Everybody’s Normal Nowadays: “Put your colonial feet up on the colonial stool. Make some colonial tea and have some Corbyn and Sultana cake.Jul 24, 12:40
  • A tall tale



↑ Top