Quoted for lies
We just noticed this from The Observer in January 2012:
After David Cameron reignited the debate about independence a week ago, demanding that Scottish National party leader and Scotland’s first minister, Alex Salmond, come clean over the timing and scope of a referendum, Darling was immediately punted as the best man to lead the “no” campaign. He is respected, he is not a Tory, and he is a fervent unionist. Perfect for the job. But he wants none of it.
A man whose word can clearly be relied on, there.
But those last two sentences are interesting. Just out of curiosity, does anyone know which of Alistair Darling’s homes he’s currently claiming as the “real” one? (We assume these things are recorded somewhere, but also suspect that such information isn’t freely available to the public. Any friendly MPs reading?)
The reason the No camp refuses to have David Cameron debate Alex Salmond is, we’re told, that Cameron doesn’t have a vote in the referendum. Are we absolutely categorically certain that Darling will?
According to that fount of all internet knowledge Wikipedia, Alistair has two residences; one in Edinburgh and one in the Outer Hebrides. No mention of an official residence, London based or otherwise.
It doesn’t matter which of his homes he designates as his “real” one for Westminster expenses purposes. He can still be on the electoral register of the one in Scotland. He could switch his vote to his Scottish address a month or two before the referendum irrespective of where it’s registered now.
(It used to be possible to be on the electoral register at two different addresses simultaneously, and that was quite legal so long as you didn’t actually vote twice in the same election. However, going by the paperwork when I moved house in 2007, I don’t think they permit that now – you have to state the address you moved from.)
Darling, January 2012: ‘I am too busy as a Westminster MP’
Darling, Scotland Tonight, September 18 2013: ‘I don’t speak for Labour’
That’s right, a Labour MP who’s presumably still ‘busy’ at Westminster says he does not speak for Labour.
There are however a few A Darlings resident in Lothian according to 192.com, which I believe gets its premium information from the voters roll. None of them are Alistair btw. And there is only one A Darling registered in the Grampian, Highlands and Islands area.
Of course he will, he’s got to have his photy on the beeb casting his vote. I’m more worried by the 1000s extra Albert, Anthony, Andrew Darlings that will appear on the registers and claim postal votes
The Guardian ran a laughable ‘In Praise Of…’ piece for Darling . co ple of days ago. Funnily enough, comments were disabled. I always like to point out what a sleekit character Flipper is on their forums.
Darling will do anything for a buck, note how he tried to distance himself from Brown during the meltdown, rat in a sinking ship comes to mind.
His pockets will be getting filled for his role in the Bitter Together campaign, and then of course his MP wages, pensions, thoughts of Ermine etc.
The Union is most certainly his area of golden aspirations, just like many many more of Scottish politicians,who have tramped that way, and of those like him that really fancy being a Lord.
He is the worst kind of sneak, and he can hardly be called competent given his record. No wonder he and Brown seem to hardly speak anymore, he stabbed him in the back!
So he has no conscience nor any thing to deter him in fulfilling his chosen path to riches and status not the aspirations of his homeland , and his cohorts, well Robert Burns said it better than I ever could.
In Blackadder, Darling is coward who will do anything he can for a cushy life. With constant toadying, Darling does whatever he is told with the sole aim of survival. Darling will stop at nothing to escape the pain and hardship faced by the rest of the common people involved in the on-going conflict.
Blackadder is fiction.
Anyone interested in this? – link to change.org
I know exactly where AD’s house is in Morningside – just round the corner from where we were staying at the time. We saw him one Sunday, at the height of the banking crisis when he was Chancellor, calming trimming his hedge and putting the bits in a wheelbarrow (with Fred the Shred’s bonus presumably cunningly hidden beneath the privet cuttings).
I nearly said to him, “surely there are better things you could be doing with your time, like saving the economy?” but it is never wise to confront a man with shears in his hand and a thousand yard stare in his eyes.
Since David Cameron’s ‘130 words’ performance, I’ve been wondering if any MPs on Westminster’s coin should be sticking their oars in for either side of the Independence debate. It’s too late, now, of course, but I’m inclined to the opinion there should have been a clause in the referendum agreement to officially make the whole Westminster government a neutral party to the issue until the people of Scotland had independently decided the matter.
It’s a curious feeling to be agreeing with David Cameron about anything but it really is none of his or Michael Moore’s business.
OT
i was looking for a sticker for my motorbike helmet and i can across this
link to cafepress.co.uk
Do you have something with just the wings on it mate?
I imagine the promise of a Lordship probably changed his mind.
So you think an MP for Edinburgh wouldn’t be entitled to vote in the Referendum??
I think there’s vanishing to no chance that he isn’t. And even if he wasn’t registered, he could easily rectify that. And as the Major said, he’s there cutting his hedge at weekends.
It’s got nothing to do with which house he claims as his main residence for Westminster expenses purposes.
@martyn
Like this?
link to cafepress.co.uk
So you think an MP for Edinburgh wouldn’t be entitled to vote in the Referendum??
You can be an MP for any area, even if your permanent address is elsewhere! (Malcolm rifkind??)
I had a quick look in link to parliamentary-standards.org.uk to see if any details but none.
I did see that Alistair repaid £305.75 in travel related expenditure 16/11, 9/11, 2/11, 26/10/2012. I am sure there is a valid reason for this though as he has a keen eye for detail and doing things right (since his “fingers were caught in the till”).
Read this quote earlier today and thought it could just about be the mission statesman for WoS
“Truth has to be repeated constantly, because Error is being preached all the time, and not just by a few, but by the multitude. In the Press and Encylopaedias, in Schools and Universities, everywhere Error holds sway, feeling happy and comfortable in the knowledge of having Majority on its side.” Goethe (who died in 1832).
So we can expect Mr Darling, or somebody, or anybody to comment soon on,
The publication of further results from opinion polling earlier this week has confirmed that people in Scotland want extensive powers for the Scottish Parliament that only a Yes vote will secure.
Additional detail from the YouGov poll for the Times has revealed that clear majorities of people in Scotland want to see control over welfare, pensions, taxation and drugs policy all rest with the Scottish Government while more people also want to see immigration run by the Scottish Government than by Westminster.
Even more damagingly for the anti-independence campaign, just 18% of people in Scotland believe that the powers of the Scottish Parliament will be substantially increased in the event of a No vote – meaning that 82% of people don’t trust the vague promises of anti-independence politicians that Scotland can secure substantial additional powers after a No vote.
From the SNP site.
Shhhh…. he might have forgotten…. and how nice it would be to see him get to the polling station only to be refused.
@nelliejean
Legend thanks
i was looking for a sticker for my motorbike helmet and i can across this
Be careful Martyn. I remember at motorcycle training classes they used to tell us that sticking stickers on a helmet weakened the structure and was liable to make the helmet less effective.
We need to dredge up some of the quotes where unionist politicians described further devolution (in the context of a third option in the referendum as “Alex Salmond’s consolation prize”, and vowed that he must not be allowed to have this. Are these the same people now offering the jam tomorrow?
@Morag
Good idea. Here’s this from May 2012:
SCOTTISH Labour leader Johann Lamont yesterday accused Alex Salmond of floating a possible second question on further devolution as part of the independence referendum because he “fears” he won’t win the vote to leave the UK.
Lamont, speaking at a Fabian Society conference, said the First Minister was striving to get a “consolation prize” and now appeared to be “fumbling for a reverse gear”.
Morag- yes I was told that as well although I understand its to do with the type of ashesive used on the sticker. But you’ve only got one head so Martyn best to be safe. Some pals I know get stuff airbrushed on their helmet (you at the back stop laughing) if you go down that road best go to the professionals.
No stickers on my helmet 🙂
Ploughing through D Alexander’s first speech in March re this National Convention this is the stand out line ……jam, maybe in a decade
‘So this evening I ask: Could we in 2015 gather togther a National Convention – “Scotland 2025” – to chart a new vision for an old nation for the next decade?’
link to newstatesman.com
Its been said a million times before on here but NO-ONE if actually offering more in respect to Devolution:
From BT site:
What the parties are saying:
• The Scottish Labour Party has set up a dedicated commission to consider how best to develop devolution in the future. It is looking at what further powers should be devolved, with a particular focus on whether more power should be devolved to local government.
Launching the commission, Scottish Labour leader Johann Lamont said: “Devolution can’t just mean powers going from London to Edinburgh. That means a radical look at not just what powers should the Scottish government have, but what powers does local government need, and which should be devolved further to local communities.”
Scottish Labour’s Devolution Commission will produce an interim report on its findings to the party’s spring conference later this month.
• Meanwhile, the Scottish Liberal Democrats believe “home rule within a federal United Kingdom is the best way forward for Scotland and for Britain.”
The party’s proposals would allow for “the expression of different identities within one system, but combines with it the additional influence and strength which comes from co-operation and common purpose”, according to party’s leader Willie Rennie.
Chair of the party’s Home Rule and Community Rule Commission, Sir Menzies Campbell, said: “It is now very clear that there are essentially two options: the breakup of the United Kingdom into its constituent units, or a modernised, federal United Kingdom.”
For more on the Lib Dems proposals, you can read the full report, ‘Federalism: the best future for Scotland’, here.
• And in a speech just last week, leader of the Scottish Conservatives Ruth Davidson said that her party was “committed to a new path; more responsibility for the Scottish Parliament and a strengthening of devolution.”
Ruth Davidson added, “A vote next year for Scotland to stay within the United Kingdom will be a vote to strengthen devolution.”
The Scottish Conservatives have established a working group to examine how best to strengthen devolution and the accountability of the Scottish Parliament by examining its structures and extending its powers over taxation.
An interim report will be published later this year and full proposals for devolution will be published before the referendum next year.
Farage giving his speech. ” We should never have been in this union. We’re different. We have different geography, history, institutions…..” Blah blah!
That’s the ticket Nige.
I’m at the point after listening to local Ayr Tories last night, that, if there is a NO vote next year that every SNP Councillor, MSP and MP resigns and doesn’t stand for re election and let the folk in Scotland get on with their Unionist agenda.. Burnt earth I fear.
Just get him on TV and ask the guy about his take on his personal political history, his allegiances, his expenditures, his politics and more importantly how he sees himself personnally as a real Scotsman and his vision as a true and genuine scot’s person feels about his country being an independent nation.
Jelly Baby, sorry, Jackie Baillie, is on Brian’s Roadshow right now.
‘I want to resist this with every sinew in my body.‘ – Jackie Baillie, on Royal Mail privatisation.
A good Reid read
..Lamont wants to unite Labour by cancelling devolution..
link to reidfoundation.org
Alistair ‘greed is good’ Darling is how I view him. He was both responsible for not properly regulating the activities of the banking cartels and subsequently responsible for bailing out those same criminals. should anyone have forgotton, some three hundred and fifty thousand million pounds has been handed to these criminal cartels since 2008. Darling along with many others should be languishing in jail for a very long time for criminal negligence and crimes against society.
If you live in the Dunblane, Alloa, Stirling area and plan to get to Edinburgh tomorrow by train, well there aren’t any due to engineering works. See Scotrail’s announcement.
link to scotrail.co.uk
Ian – WANTS to resist it, but won’t. The modern-day Labour politician, to a tee.
Tinyzeitgeist says:@ 12.33
Give the poor numpty a chance, he did not have a clue what hell was going on during the banking meltdown catasrophe. He was ignorantly railroaded by his banking masters to do what they thought was right to save their arses. He did that with aplomb and without conscioun, regardless of the people who he and his banking mates shit on… Some man of principle that guy!
Darling is not a Tory?!?
Aye he is, the former Lorretto public school boy who grew up in one of the most prestigious suberbs of London, is more Tory than most Tories.
Questions should have been asked about his part in the near bankrupting of the UK, and his mismanagement in Edinburgh, where £100,000s went missing during his period as head of finance, when investigated, nothing could stick, the teflon chancellor?
Darling is not a Tory?!?
Eh?
Rev you read my mind I was thinking about this just yesterday.
Slightly OT
Since we’re in quoted for lies, how about these?
It would have a detrimental effect on the defence of the UK.
There is little doubt that the vast majority have no desire for it.
The United Kingdom is not an isolated state. A yes vote would weaken the centre of power.
Things are better left as they are because your interests are already taken care of.
You already have vast influence through Westminster as things stand.
You’re too stupid and too weak.
You won’t be able to compete.
It is dangerous to change a system that works.
You are already well represented as things are.
It will damage the economy.
You’re incapable of defending your country.
Sound familiar – These are the reasons they gave against giving women the vote 100 years ago.
Flipper, whilst for once being properly interviewed on the BBC (by Alan Little on Hardtalk):
“Until the referendum I’m doing nothing else but leading the BT campaign”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b038rnsc/HARDtalk_Alistair_Darling_British_chancellor_of_the_exchequer_20072010/ …
“I will play my part, certainly. But I don’t want to do that. I am too busy as a Westminster MP. This campaign has to be run in Scotland.”
Aye right! u unscrupulous person. Please do the people of Scotland a big favour and GTF and do not come back to this country with your lies. You never wanted to be associated with Scotland and the people of Scotland in the first place so we do not want or need your likes here. Please go away and be happy in your London. Hang your head in shame.
Further to above post – Meant to add:
The YES campaign was hindered by the fact that many of their own kind were against it.
@ Morag -motorcycle helmet stickers. Yes “weakens the helmet” they said. I stuck one on anyway. Glasgow Mercury sticker (per legendary Bob MacIntyre), and at race events the Scottish ACU weren’t concerned. I still have my Cromwell pudding basin.
Cromwell! no lessons on him when I was at school.If had known of him I’d have bought another make of helmet.But then the helmet was likely secondhand.
@jimbo Your list is brilliant. I was thinking to myself reading it, ‘what’s the point of this post, we’ve seen these excuses a hundred times’. Oh..
“Alex Salmond’s consolation prize”,
Michael Kelly
“debate with” ffs
You’ll get a good idea of how “busy” Captain Darling is as a Westminster MP here. Slightly busier than his former boss is about the best you can say.
How do you know when a slab spokes person is lying? Their lips move!