Return of the living dead
For independence supporters of a certain age, the 1979 devolution referendum is one of the most infamous moments in Scottish history. While a wafer-thin majority of Scots voted Yes to devolution, an electoral fiddle conceived by a Labour MP meant that it didn’t happen, and part of the reason was that in effect, dead people were counted as No votes.
(We won’t go into all the details here, but basically an impossible threshold was set for turnout, and people who’d died but hadn’t yet been removed from the electoral roll were counted towards the calculation of that threshold.)
We were put in mind of it by an odd development this evening.
Earlier today we were a bit startled when the New Stateman’s George Eaton tweeted:
(Alert readers who click the image will note our series of sarcastic joke replies.)
But then this evening the story popped up on the Herald website under the title “Tony Benn would have opposed independence, says brother”, having also appeared in the Independent under the even more bizarre “Tony Benn opposed Scottish independence but died before he could say so in public”.
Which left us wondering if perhaps we’d been living in some sort of freaky dream world for the last couple of years, because Tony Benn having been opposed to Scottish independence is news on a par with discovering that Tom Jones is from Wales, and he spent half his life expressing that opposition clearly and unambiguously in public.
We’ve been writing about it on this site since October 2012, and then again in January 2013, and yet again in May 2013, and then on his death in March 2014. It’s perhaps the least well-kept secret since Elton John turned out to be gay. So what on Earth is it doing being reported as news when the poor man’s been cold in his grave for months?
We can only assume that the press was desperate to report something bad about independence, on a weekend where Jean-Claude Juncker has said an independent Scotland would get preferential treatment over EU membership, a former chief medical officer has said independence would be good for Scotland’s health, and a former Scottish Senior Citizens’ Unity Party MSP said that “a Yes vote offers our older people the best prospect of a better and fairer pensions system”.
(Not to mention a senior former Labour defence minister also backing a Yes, and polls finding a record high number of Labour voters also backing independence.)
All the same, it’s a bit of an odd one. Which newly-laid corpse will the No campaign exhume next, so desperately short are they of living volunteers that they’re bussing gullible teenagers up from bits of Liverpool to do their lying for them?
Our money’s on Margaret Thatcher. Literally nothing would surprise us any more.
The only thing about the Blessed Margaret would be to Naw’s advantage was that she was for independence?
I feel a sudden coldness all over.
Maggie’s dead ! for fuck sake, why didn’t anyone tell me…………
It’s on a par with in other news, Pope Catholic. The pension piece is a cracker though have shared it
Yes, strange one that. You’ve taught us to always look at what they don’t say, but I can’t figure this one at all!
As for busing up supporters I supposed it worked in Quebec, but then they commanded most of Air Canada’s fleet, although who paid that one has never been satisfactorily explained. At that time Air Canada was nationalised so, I suppose, it was the Quebeckers partly.
Buses and a visit to a food bank would be cheaper though.
@Steve – one of her finer moments…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWbiWLcAbQY
Nye Bevan?
“William Wallace would have voted No says descendent”
What do the CLP’s in England espouse?
bussing up people … Can’t we use those Border controls they keep going on about…
Is it really Liverpool and Derby?
“Liverpool West Derby” is a constituency, and I think that is where the tweet originates – the town of Derby is divided into 2 constituencies, Derby North and Derby South.
Derby is in fact a city, not a town. I suspected as much and should have checked before my last post. Better late than never.
Check this one out – Tony Benn is at 3.00 mins.
Are we expected to believe that Benn wasn’t aware of the McCrone report? If he did know about it, then his comments here take on a totally different hue, and he (and ‘comrades’ like Healey) become at least partly to blame for the rise of Thatcher.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QcqIpOOpMg
Just shows the narrow mindedness of all of the MSM and those that work in it. They are deliberately undermining our referendum and will have to find other employment after a Yes vote.
Desperate stuff from the Labour party and its supporters to try and bring back to life about the only socialist Labour had in the last few years.
Says a lot about the latest red Tories who’ve had to resurrect a dead socialist to try and make their party look left wing.
My money’s on Queen Anne’s dead. I mean it was her wot done it AND its history which is all the Union has left.
As I posted some days ago. While out walking the wee dog through a newish housing development I passed a couple of young guys delivering leaflets and had spoken to one of them several times before as he delivered all sorts of leaflets at my address. Things like Takeaway Shop menus, Factory Shop bargains and so on.
Wanting to be pleasant I asked, “What are you delivering today then”. His reply was, “Better Together stuff”. I said, “Didn’t have you down as a NO voter”. He said, “I’m not but I’m paid to deliver these”.
Now this is a Fife former Coal Mining village. A former strong Labour heartland and if they cannot get a grass roots delivery of stuff around here where else could they? If things are that bad here the NO campaign is there for defeating
Edward 1, against Scottish, well, anything really.
Only a matter of time before they bring up this spirit of John Smith stuff again. People just don’t know or care who these guys are. The only Benn I know was from the kids show he changed into different party outfits.
The Benn thing is truly bizarre.
Just one thing: “bussing gullible teenagers up from Liverpool and Derby”. The West Derby constituency, despite its confusing name, is in Liverpool.
I just hope the teenagers of Liverpool understand better than Tony Benn that the concepts of self-determination and socialism are compatible. And that nothing even remotely like socialism is going to be advanced within the British state.
Desperate and macabre liars now, a new low for bettetogether no thanks. Must be the weirdest anti democracy campaign in history.
“convinced it wouldn’t advance socialisim”
A bit like the Labour party then?
@Doug Daniel, 10:00pm
That one has already been done.
Too wee, too poor, too stupid. Now too tory.
Thatcher’s poisonous legacy continues unabated. The truth of Hillsborough has emerged. In addition, there are strong hints that she condoned child abuse among her ministers and closest supporters. Her campaign manager in 1990, Peter Morrison, was a paedophile, and there are strong indicators that others were in the same mould. That is all on top of her wilful failure to support devolution, the Poll Tax, the destruction of industry and manufacturing in Scotland. Given all this, surely not even the MSM in the UK would bring Thatcher into the independence referendum campaign?
On Tony Benn, everyone knew he opposed independence. I fail to see why they are writing articles on it. What a complete waste of paper and time. I know the No campaign/MSM have talked out how John Smith was against independence a little while ago, but that seemed to fade away.
‘m hearing on the grapevine that RAIN is wet, SNOW is cold, WIND is blowy,SUNSHINE is hot. Apparently this is due to something called WEATHER. All this and other breaking news will of course be covered ad nauseum by tomorrow’s papers alongside the voices from beyond the grave concerning their *ahem* opposition to Scottish independence. 😛
Its all down to the Benn factor, there aren’t many (If any at all)Labour personnel whom command respect, and Benn did command some respect from all parties and people,whilst alive. I guess the desperate no camp are hoping Benn still commands enough respect, to sway us all to a no vote.
Letters released late tonight show Edward Longshanks was against Scottish independence.. more on Reporting Scotland tomorrow, with analysis of this blow for Salmond from Brian Taylor and Glenn Campbell..
@Steve Bowers says: 20 July, 2014 at 9:52 pm
“Maggie’s dead ! for fuck sake, why didn’t anyone tell me…………”..
Aye! Steve Bowers, Weel awa but her ghost is still hanging over Scotland like a bad smell hangs over a farmers dung heap.
Tony Benn – was he in the labour party, socialism stuff?
@Ian Brotherhood
Tony Benn almost certainly knew about the McCrone Report alright. Pretty sure he was an energy minister at the time.
MSM is running out of ideas. They have tried everything possible, using every smear and lie imaginable, and it hasn’t worked.
Project Fear has nothing left in the tank and will snatch at anything they think might give them any sort of advantage.
And the gap narrows every single day.
Steve Bowers says:
Maggie’s dead ! for fuck sake, why didn’t anyone tell me…………
Oh aye she’s deid all right Steve cause the TAXPAYER paid for her STATE funeral. Not only that but she is creating hell in … erm … hell! The devil himself is said to be furious because she has closed down 5 of his furnaces already. 😛
@Training Day
They would try it if they thought it would work! Probably not even BBC Scotland would bring up King Edward I of England though… 😀 😀
I opposed the Second World War but wasn’t born then and so unable to voice my opinion.
I also disliked the way the White Man treated them injuns but I had to read about the injustices in history books a hundred years later.
@Andy B
The irony is though that the MSM hated Benn when he was in his prime. They made sure he was defeated in the early 1980s. It was only when Benn was no longer a threat to the establishment, that he was portrayed as a cuddly old guy by the MSM.
Scotland’s Labour group are all sitting around a Ouija board in the gloom, eyes closed in rapture, Lamont asking:
‘Is there anybody there – and if so wull yous vote No?’
The whole report is madasfcuk. “Benn’s brother wrote “In a letter published by Labour, David Benn called on Scots to consider his brother’s views when deciding Scotland’s future.”
Its such a great idea too.
Dear Bank Manager,
Please consider my dead brother’s views when deciding whether or not to extend my overdraft to £500k with no interest.
Best wishes, from the great beyond.
David Benn
I can see it now.
Great big black Headline : –
BLOW FOR FIRST MINISTER
very very smallprint: –
First Minister accidentally swiches on desk fan.
Strange that they’re bringing up Tony Benn – just provides us with a great opportunity to go over the McCrone Report and Tony’s role in government at the time.
I clearly recall Tony Benn expressing his opposition to Scottish independence on a Channel 4 programme at least 25 years ago.
I’ve a feeling Margo MacDonald was on the same programme. She was in favour of independence, you know.
Benn was a government minister at Westminster. How many ministers, past and present, dead or alive, of any political party, have supported Scottish Independence?
ZERO!
Stupid question, really.
I heard Rory Stewart is arranging a MASS seance to communicate with every single soul of a deceased Scotsman and woman, in an attempt to alert the living that all of them are against independence. It’s called Hands across the veil of death. Tony Benn and other important dead politicians will also be dropping by including Nelson Mandela and Ghandi, to remind us all why a yes vote is a no no.
Wasn’t it Tony Benn who famously said that North Sea oil had “saved England”?
Strange? I’ve had 2 comments go missing.
First time that’s happened.
It has to be Lulu?
It’s been a good week for the YES campaign.
So, Better Together will lash out with the these desperate stories.
They will range from the talking dead, to mentally deranged halfwits playing with bricks down at the border.
Essentially, they are seeing old labour supporters getting it and slipping away from them, There’s nobody in new labour who those people have that kind of regard for and they know it.
Tony Benn knew about the McCrone report. He kept silent for (labour) party advantage as an entire country was lied to for 40 years. Hope he’s rotting in atheists Hell!
He could cope with marrying a foreigner but not with his poor old Mum being born in a foreign country. The man was an arsehole his entire life.
And he had his own title revoked so as to remain an MP but allowed his eldest son to inherit instead. A man of no principles just lust for power and slavish loyalty to the party.
Benn was Tory plant. So was Healey but Benn was just horrendous on the 80’s campaign trail to Labours oblivion. I think he was Labour Transport minister and he pumped money into Concorde jets, super fast trans Atlantic air travel for teamGB elite.
He also bought the Route Master bus for London, freezing in winter, roasting in summer, dangerous to get on and off and very very polluting but ideal for the plebs of London. A complete Labour weirdo til the day he died and joined the ukok bettertogether campaign to shut down Scottish democracy, in this life and the next.
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/17/theairlineindustry.g21
PS a hatchet job on Benn would be counter productive for the reasons above, that may well be what they are hoping to provoke.
@galamcennalath
Benn was a government minister at Westminster. How many ministers, past and present, dead or alive, of any political party, have supported Scottish Independence?
ZERO!
Stupid question, really.
Peter Kilfoyle supports independence, and he was junior minister in Blair’s first term.
We will be getting a lot more of this type of stuff.
They are all worried at a huge chunk of the labour vote in Scotland moving to a YES.
Personally, I would hope to see the ‘Labour for Independence’ group become a lot more prominent, with their own billboard campaigns etc.
They can’t just be dismissed any more – there seems to be a constant stream of Labour figures endorsing a YES vote now.
If farts are the ghosts of what we eat, what is Maggies ghost?
@Bugger
A poltergeist? A blood sucking vampire?
@Muttley
A wet fart, apparently in a space suit.
O/T
Just when you thought they couldn’t denigrate Scotland any more up pops one of the most excreable bits of ‘tv humour’ I’ve seen. Susan Calmans ‘Don’t drop the Baton’ in which Ms Calman thinks a joke about foodbanks is appropriate.
Absolutely garbage.
Been off grid most of yesterday and today (wet, in field near Dunecht).
Possibly a lo argentino, exhuming a dead and embalmed Churchill?
@muttley79
True. One, out of how many? 🙂
Yeah I know it was only 1, and he was only a junior minister. Your point is still valid.
@Bob Sinclair
Susan Calmans ‘Don’t drop the Baton’ in which Ms Calman thinks a joke about foodbanks is appropriate.
Absolutely garbage.
Really? What did she say?
@ Grouse Beater,huv you still goat that weedgie board fae this mornin, you need tae consult the deeded.
crisiscult says:
Unknown until now, Rory is clairvoyant, during this interview in Scottish Politics today, he said “it is not about the last 300 years, it’s about the next 300 years!
He can see 300 years into the future, wow what a guy!
tae see if they,re registered tae vote
This the funniest thread yet Stu.
And the comments are brilliant.
Canny see the screen cos my eyes are streaming.
Wiz Tony a Scot ??
Rentaghost are coming out as YESSERS
My aunty Maggie says . “She sees deid people “.
@ Steve Bowers 9.52pm
She’s Gone Where The Goblin’s Go.
Below ,Below ,Below ,Below
We will just have to call up our own guys I guess –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikQXY4qnFNs
Didn’t the “gullible teenager” turn out to be the secretary of the constituency Labour party or something?
Nice words from a former QC .
//youtu.be/Zp2pv4cxan4
Tory labour toffs bullying Scotland
You mean this Margaret Thatcher?
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/qp890a45xn2bebb/AACDyw_UEtu7SSOPGXN1iaMTa#lh:null-766152036.jpg
I agree with bob Sinclair. “Don”t drop the Baton” was one of the worst “comedy shows ” ever.
I can imagine the BBC suits in conference telling each other that it is good enough for the Jocks, best not make it too sophisticated, they’re too stupid and genetically not programmed to appreciate anything anything that requires a bit of intelligence.
They do this all the time.
Muttley79
I’ll leave it to those who have the stomach for comed which sounds like it was recycled from rejected 1980s scripts to check it out on iplayer, full cringe quota applied.
Suffice to say the whole thing seemed to be an exercise in telling us we’re incompetent to run a sporting event. Just awful.
Oh I’m waiting for the resurrection of Enoch Powell (every right-wing nutjob’s favourite) with a letter from the grave that was magically kept quiet until producued at the right time. A new ‘rivers of blood’ tirade, this time rallying against Scottish independence, to be read out by a sincere George Robertson (chortle) at the altar of the United Nations three days before voting day.
Waking the dead to keep their skeletal hands on an empire long since vanished but kept alive in the heads of those robber barons and their minions who still feed off it.
Perhaps he was using a weegie board like this one?
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/qp890a45xn2bebb/AACDyw_UEtu7SSOPGXN1iaMTa#lh:null-2007-09-05%2022.10.10.jpeg
@ the Man In the Jar, noo ah never knew there was such a thing.lol nice one.
Ronnie Anderson
Going by the size of the base on that Cairn at Gretna, I think Rory the Tory is trying to replicate the Great Pyramid of Giza, and that took about 30 years to build.
Tony Benn opposed people who make assertions on their behalf but died before he could say so in public.
@Duncanmore, kin we no hiv By The Rivers Of Babylon, ah faint at the sight of blood.
Better Together now reduced to astroturfing the afterlife.
Tony Benn opposed politicians making political capital when dead but died before he could say so in public.
“Is he really 83?”
Nelson Mandela confusing Tony Blair for Tony Benn.
Bob Sinclair
What have BBC Scotland done with OUR Saltire, it’s disappeared from our TV screens.
BBC Scotland, please return OUR Saltire.
@Ronnie Anderson at 11:28
Thanks Ronnie. I got the weegie board of this guy!
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/qp890a45xn2bebb/AACDyw_UEtu7SSOPGXN1iaMTa#lh:null-2013-02-27%2023.59.59.jpg
Damn! James Garner has gone to the Great Green Room in the sky.
‘Rockford Files’ gave us the voice mail cliche: “Leave a message and I’ll get back to you.”
Incidentally, Tony Benn opposed messages from the dead but died before he could say so in public.
@ caz_m, ah wish Rory wuld giza peace,mibbee,s he,s goat a Tut tut tae bring Tooton Kharmon tae cut the Ribbon.
I am not wholly convinced that Tony Benn would oppose scottish independence at this stage.
I think it is certainly true that people like him (and me) were not in favour in time past. A socialist background included a commitment to internationalism for me, and for many like me. It was not easy or quick to move to support for independence with that history. But many of us have done it.
It seems to me that those who have not made any move in that direction are very often people who do not live and work in Scotland any more: they have not been party to the debate and they do not understand the journey some of us have made. For them Scotland got stuck the day they left. I do not mean to criticise them for that: it is very natural.
For those who were never scottish in the first place, many have had no opportunity to do the hard thinking which changed my mind. The notion that nationalism = fascism and socialism = internationalism is largely unquestioned if you have that kind of political background: it is quite hard to give it up
But Tony Benn did leave the house of commons and he said he did that so he could participate in politics again. That is what we are all doing. Given his location he might not have shifted his view: but one thing I do believe of him -if he got involved he would at least have talked to the people who have a vote. And I think he would have listened, too.
Perhaps his brother is right: but I think he is as likely to be wrong, really.
Point is, we will never know
Cuddly grandad socialist Tony Benn, you know a government minister of Wilson’s cosy swinging 60s Labour cabinet. That very cabinet that signed off the forced removal of the Chagossian people (over 2000 of them) from their homes on Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, transported them hundreds of miles away from their coconut plantations and livelihood to unemployment and social housing on Mauritius, all to make way for their land to be stripped and turned into a bomber base so the Americans have somewhere to park their B52s in the Indian Ocean.
I’m sure Tony’s heart bled for these people, there must be a letter, maybe his brother has it, that proves that Tony was in solidarity of the Chagossians. Did he even fight for the Chagossians to receive compensation? He must have, it would be in a letter somewhere.
And the name of this base … Camp Justice! oh the irony.
Yeah, Tony Benn, internationalist and man of the people (just selected people preferably nearer home with votes) god rest his socialist soul.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chagossians
Ronnie
@ caz_m, “ah wish Rory wuld giza peace,mibbee,s he,s goat a Tut tut tae bring Tooton Kharmon tae cut the Ribbon”
LOL
“The Great Pyramid O’ Gretna”
Turns out that David Cameron is now for independence in order to make himself more popular with the Scots than Danny Alexander and Johann Lamont. A spokesperson for the Prime Minister said it was this or offer Scots a free pint at the pub to vote No. It is thought that a Tory Prime Minister coming out for independence, will cause a majority of Scots to vote No simply because all Tory policies are bad. Furthermore this was cheaper than buying everyone a pint given current budget constraints.
Not to be outdone in the popularity stakes, Jim Murphy, Blair MacDougall and Lord Foulkes immediately agreed independence was the only way forward and said that the most important thing is to support the Tories in their Better Together battle and present a united front. Gordon Brown said this new approach reflected a very clever political construct but said No Thanks to working with Better Together but his United Together campaign will also campaign for independence in order to maintain a No Borders Better No United Together No Thanks united Yes campaign. Willie Rennie is still thinking things over and is consulting Ming the Merciless for a decision before Christmas.
A spokesperson for the Yes campaign said the grassroots campaign was growing apace and wondered if these convertees would now be able to physically join the debate in the many town halls and villages througout Scotland.
BBC Scotland said it would remain impartial and was considering convening a forum with the Daily Mail, The Scotsman, The Herald and the Telegraph on how best to achieve this.
@Dcanmore
That was a shocking episode, certainly: but that same Wilson government did good things as well. Not least they provided opportunities for many to go to university who were the first in their families to do that. I will always be grateful for that and I will never forget that they did increase equality in this divided land
“The good is oft interred with their bones”
Don’t really wish to speak ill of the dead, and I’m sure Tony Benn had good intentions, but it was partly due to his “socialist” posturing, middle-class fantasy view of the working-classes and sheer refusal to address the problems of the time that caused so much trouble for the Labour governments of the 70s and helped Maggie get in.
How far are we gonna dredge back? What would Attlee/Gladstone/Keir Hardie/Bonnie Prince Charlie/Robert the Bruce have thought? Who cares.
Tony Benn?
Clearly a desperate reaction to Labour voters opting for YES!
Tony Benn for all his faults, is a Left Wing Hero for a lot of Labour voters so they are trying to use his good name to stop the Genuine socialist Labour voters opting for Yes.
I’ve been looking everywhere for that picture. It’s a huge vote-winner towards the end of the campaign. I hope the people in Labour areas go to town with it. (I have a few letterboxes I’m planning to put it in myself now I’ve located it.)
Tony Benn – A friend of Ireland
Tony Ben was a supporter of Sinn Féin and spoke out publicly of his support for them and the reunification of Ireland.
Here is what Sinn Féin said of Tony Ben.
So he believed in self-determination of a united Ireland and its freedom from Colonialism but was not prepared to extend those same freedoms to Scotland. What a warped mind he had or was it the wealth that Scotland possessed the contributing factor in his decision regarding Scotland.
Whilst were on the topic about quoting the dead, maybe the Scots Labour voters need reminding what Thatcher said was her greatest achievement.. “Tony Bliar, & New Labour”.
After all that’s been said about negative campaigning not working, I know this wont be popular, but I feel that if we get the message across that even if New Labour wins the 2015 GE, there’s no hope of a remotely left leaning westmidden government, for decades to come, then we can scare enough of the ‘red rosette on a donkey’ brigade over to Yes.
Ends justify the means ect…
Has Cliff Richard come out yet ?
It gives a whole new perspective on ‘a grassroots movement’.
Mind, I thought that it was daisies that the dead were supposed to push up.
Interesting that ITV gave about 80% airtime to this report of the HandsAcrossBorders ‘friendship cairn’.
http://www.itv.com/news/border/update/2014-07-20/foundation-stone-for-friendship-cairn-is-laid/
Found via Rory Stewart MP
https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/490969428314845184
‘Crowds 3 deep’ or around 100 in total. Nothing on the official site.
I must get the ouija board out and have a séance with Tony to discuss the referendum. Also put him in touch with the late Dr Mac – Robert McIntyre. They should have a good discussion. Maybe Tony will canvass the Spiritualist Churches but I think he was an atheist.
The voices, the voices! They’re back again –
Me – Who’s that?
I AM THE SPIRIT OF THE LABOUR PARTY’S LAST SOCIALIST AND FORMER VISCOUNT STANSGATE, LATELY TONY BENN.
Me – It says here that you opposed Scottish Independence and would vote No in the referendum (if you had a vote) (if you were alive).
THAT IS TRUE – IF I WERE ALIVE. BUT HAVING SEEN THE ELYSIAN FIELDS (just for a few minutes as they packed me off elsewhere) I HAVE ALSO SEEN THAT ALLOWING ORDINARY PEOPLE THE FREEDOM TO MAKE DECISIONS FOR THEMSELVES WITHOUT THE INTERFERENCE OF THE SELF-INTERESTED, ELITIST AND PROUD IS THE TRUE SOCIALISM THAT I SHOULD HAVE BELIEVED IN. AN INDEPENDENT SCOTLAND CAN GIVE PEOPLE THIS POWER AND ALTHOUGH I HAVE BEEN A “NO” I AM NOW A “YES”.
Me – Better late than never, Tone. Well, maybe not.
As was pointed out to me recently Tony Benn indulged himself in uttering left wing cliches and adopting traditional left wing positions but never won a case of any sort nor ever resigned on any matter of principle
Doug Daniel says:
“William Wallace would have voted No says descendent”
He didn’t shout FREEDOM when he was being hacked to death by being hung, drawn and quartered. He said, ‘You know what I am better together’.
Don’t sweat it about the Labour vote when the day comes. So far 1/3 will definitely vote Yes. This will grow as that 1/3 persuade the rest of the merits of a Yes vote.
I truly believe more than 50% of Labour voters will eventually vote Yes on the day. That will win the referendum for the Yes side.
Think about it, Labour voters hate Tory welfare cuts and foodbanks as much as you do, many may also hate Alex Salmond and the SNP. Their vote on the day though will be made on their view of foodbanks in their communities rather than on their view of the SNP.
Footsoldier, send that to BBC Scotlandshire!
I’d forgotten that the Labour Govt’s decision to ignore the Yes to devolution in 1978 led to the Labour govt falling and Thatcher getting in. Forty years later and the Labour Party would still rather the the Tories be in power than the Scottish people decide things for themselves. And quite possibly the English people as well. Trust them people, the Labour Party know what’s good for you and more importantly what’s good for their careers 😉
@thepnr
I believe that nobody who is voting no actually hates Alex Salmond or believes he is a dictator etc.
They are simply voting no and can think of no rational reason to back up why they are voting no.
Hating Alex Salmond is an easy fallback position to “justify” why they will vote no.
This is why the media continues to vilify Salmond for his 5 star hotel stays, his “praising” of Putin, and countless other nonsense stories. This allows these people to point fingers while attempting to save face with their yes voting contemporaries.
Ah !!!
Picture of Tony Benn In todays Daily Record, in a pro independence article!
That’s your answer Rev.
Alert. Possible game changer
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/open-letter-signed-seven-famous-3889002
This comment might sound frivolous, but I make it in all sincerity. Readers of Wings Over Scotland are a pretty clued up bunch with generally long political memories. I recently had a conversation with a researcher with a journalism degree who, it emerged, thought that Margaret Thatcher was a pre WW2 politician. She genuinely had no concept of society before she was born. She was frighteningly young, or maybe I am frighteningly old. The thought crossed my mind, despite the fact that it hasn’t been that long since he died, maybe the journalists who ran hard with this story are like the young woman I met, and simply hadn’t heard of Tony Benn. A horrifying notion, I know, but…?
You mean this Patrick.
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/open-letter-signed-seven-famous-3889002
Wedgewood getting in his photo op, with real socialists.
Co-incidence, Benn speaking from beyond the grave today ?
Damage limitation more like.
This really is a good start to the week.
http://www.scotsman.com/news/uk/hammond-i-would-still-vote-to-quit-the-eu-1-3482777
Marcia: well played.
James Gillies: nah, it’s far simpler than that. Labour know their supporters are increasingly turning to Yes, so they have to find a way of getting the “Tony Benn says No” story back in the papers. So they issue a press release this pish, and the compliant media go along with it, because it’s what they do.
Quite liked Benn & have read most of his diaries. But I’ve never sentimentalised his politics.
Most points about him already well made by Stu & other posters : principally, he was a leftist, anti-EU British nationalist who believed passionately in the sovereignty of the Westminster parliament. That the people of Scotland should have national self-determination (in the same way, for example, he believed the people of Ireland should) simply never entered his thought-process.
2 other observations about him:-
1. An early volume of his diaries reveal he was “a great admirer of Mao…he made mistakes, because everyone does”. Estimated number of innocent people who died as a result of Mao’s Great Leap Forward : 40-65 million.
2. In Stephen Haseler’s “The Great Delusion : Britain After Sixty Years of Elizabeth II”, reference is made to Benn initiating a plan in 1978 to create a sovereign wealth fund from North Sea Oil revenues (described in the book as a “bonanza”). This was axed after ’79 when the Tories gained power. An economist from Price Waterhouse Coopers has estimated that, had the fund been put into effect, it would have been worth around £450 billion by 2008.
The suggestion that “socialism” can be advanced by voting No & relying upon Milliband’s modern day Labour Party is ludicrous. For Labour voters, No means further Tory governments you didn’t vote for & Westminster continuing to piss away decades more of North Sea oil wealth.
Had Sandra Osborne MP for Ayr Carrick and Cumnock going round Dalmellington yesterday afternoon hand delivering leaflets. If they have got to have their MP tramping the streets, then they must be desperate for volunteers.
Stephen.
bugsbunny,
Losing a Westminster salary, expenses and perks is a pretty strong motivation. Especially when you discover that you no longer have many foot soldiers willing to go out and protect your lifestyle.
Jimmy Reid just came to me in a dream and told me John McLean had stuck the heid on Tony Benn in Heaven, right in front of Gandhi! He said John Lennon was appalled and Martin Luthor King didn’t know where to look. You can read about it in the Record tomorrow.
I remember the 1979 referendum vote, they sent multiple ballot papers to the deceased, to children and to empty houses.
Then there was the 1,000s of missing postal votes for Yes and the suppressed McCrone report.
They will try even more sophisticated dirty tricks this time, starting soon.
most bile peice yet on Scottish Nationalism,that it got thru editor is jaw dropping
http://www.scotsman.com/news/brian-monteith-division-will-come-back-to-bite-1-3482712
The Scotsman’s headline and article:
‘Blow for Salmond as Tony Benn backs No from beyond the grave’
‘Although Benn became a ‘foreigner’ by dying even before Scotland separated from the union, that has not stopped him from making a desperate plea from beyond the grave to the 90% or so Scottish Labour voters now planning to vote Yes.’
‘He urged them to have a thought for the feeble Scottish Labour MPs and Lords who would have to turn to foodbanks in the event of a Yes vote as they have had no experience at all of doing a hard day’s work.’
‘Better Together’ leader Alistair Darling welcomed the dead Benn’s support. We are unable to find living persons in Scotland to fight for our cause and therefore all support from the dead is highly welcome said Darling.’
‘A spokesman for Yes Scotland could not stop laughing when told about this latest game changing news and was therefore unable to give us a comment.’
Thepnr,
“I truly believe more than 50% of Labour voters will eventually vote Yes on the day. That will win the referendum for the Yes side.”
I would very much hope so.
I would also like to see Scotland’s most deprived people to be the very first ones to taste the fruits of independence.
Dave McEwan Hill,
“As was pointed out to me recently Tony Benn indulged himself in uttering left wing cliches and adopting traditional left wing positions but never won a case of any sort nor ever resigned on any matter of principle”
I have a strong suspicion that he was bribed by Blair not to speak out against New Labour at the post Iraq war general election in return for a cabinet post for his son Hilary.
STOP PRESS…
Just in Vote No Borders to hold seance in Scotland to prove historical support. But wee lassie from travel agent took 10 hours to get through to them ‘they don’t have to be in Geoege Sq to get full potential of “WEEGIE” board.
West Derby is a Liverpool constituency. I don’t think they’re recruiting from Derby itself.
I’m reminded again of Lord Foulkes saying how Scottish services were demonstrably better than those over the border and when asked if that was such a bad thing he said “but they’re doing it deliberately!”. This is all they had, all they have and all there’ll ever be from them. Good news for Scottish airports was turned on its head; ‘warning’ us Newcastle Airport would be hit hard. There’s no content, just bluster, all they can do is jump out and say boo!
Picture of Tony Benn In todays Daily Record, in a pro independence article!
That’s your answer Rev.
That’s exactly what my 2 missing comments were about.
Good news, Jasper the friendly ghost says YES, with Tom & Jerry swiftly agreeing with him, Donald duck says quack (undecided)and the crew of ‘catch that pigeon’ are not saying until after the race.
All other ghost and cartoon figures have declined to comment due to the fact it’s Scotlands business, not the undead’s.
Johann Lamont, Iain Grey, Jackie Ballie are exceptions.
bugsbunny says:
Had Sandra Osborne MP for Ayr Carrick and Cumnock going round Dalmellington yesterday afternoon hand delivering leaflets.
Some SNP MSPs and Councillors should read this and get off their rear ends
Dave McEwan Hill
Re-posting your link to the Daily Record letter from seven of the Upper Clyde Shipbuilders who fought to save the yards in the 1970s and who think a YES vote will be the best outcome for the future of shipbuilding on the Clyde and throughout Scotland.
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/open-letter-signed-seven-famous-3889002
I sincerely hope that present day shipbuilders in Scotland have a read at this letter.
Nepotism beats democracy every time in the heart of the union,in the mother of parliaments.
The deid Benn had his son Hilary ( elevated to ministerial office) and Tony Benn`s grandaughter will join Hilary.
Multiple Churchill Off-spring.
Multiple Kinnocks will send “Son of Kinnock”
The Kinnock Kluck Klan.
AND they are not alone as families.
The tv and radio news industry is infested with the Dimbleby`s, the Suchet`s, Dan and John Snow…and the list runs on.
These people are being foisted upon electorates, viewers and radio listeners, not because they have more talent or ability – but because their family rules the roost and can/will ensure work and very high rewards are made available to their kids.
Democracy is becoming a hand me down third-rate adjunct that enables the few – to screw the rest of us.
Laughably, let`s vote NO – for MORE of the same?
Gimme a friggin` brek.
Rite laddys n lasses theres mair people deed than living,
we need to get on top of this thing, so,s here’s a proposal. We devide Scotland from Stirling to the Northern Isles thats Grouse Beaters constiuancy wie his OUIJA board, South from Stirling to the Borders, thats The Man In the Jars constituancy wie WEEDGIE board between the two of then they should cover a lot of Graveyards ( miss out the Crematoriams guys ) all in aggreement raise yer hands.
For pure hypocrisy, look no further than BBC Scotland’s Gary Robertson this morning on GMS.
During an interview with a Russian expert regarding the shooting down of the passenger jet over Ukraine, Robertson had the cheek to ask the expert,
“and are the Russian people being told the truth about what was happening in their country”.
You’ve got to be havin a laugh Gary.
I think you better look a bit closer to home before you start criticising how the media and governments operate in other countries.
@ronnie anderson
My hand is in the air Ronnie. You have made me laugh this morning so thank you for that.
Actually now that the ‘big yin’ is retiring perhaps you should apply to take over….
As a former resident of Dalmellington the village was devastated after the Thatcher years. I hear there is a food bank set up in Dalmellington and apathy hangs heavy in the air! Please do not neglect Dalmellington, Patna and other former mining villages, they need help and a vision that independence can give them a better future. The people in towns like Dalmellington should be at the heart of the YES campaign.
Oh how I loathe this bloody rag….
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/record-view-late-great-tony-3889607
Ronnie
I hope you have your YES Saltire flag flying above the House.
I made up a flag pole yesterday, so my YES flag goes up today.
Get those Saltires flying ladies and gentlemen, along with those YES posters on your windows.
It’s a great way of giving those undecided voters that boost of confidence that they have been looking for.
bugsbunny says:
If they have got to have their MP tramping the streets, then they must be desperate for volunteers.
cearc says:
Especially when you discover that you no longer have many foot soldiers willing to go out and protect your lifestyle.
For me, this is one of the biggest indicators we are winning, no matter what polls say.
SNP and Green voters will mostly vote YES. Tory voters will mostly vote NO. To win we need a lot of Labour voters to vote YES.
The fact that Labour foots soldiers seem almost completely absent from the streets as NO canvassers is a very good sign. If anything, some Labour activists appear to be out with Radical Independence etc..
@ Good Morning Nana. Ah good chuckle sets you up fur the days Trials n Tribulations, as to the Big yin the answers NAW an no followin in his footsteps, his Big Bannana Feet wuldna fit me, furby that he needs them he,s mair slipups tae dey on behalf of Better Together.
caz_m, Im making a couple plastic washers fur the pole, so,s the flag dizzna get rapped roon the pole, its gonna get put down through the roof of the shed & fixed to the batton inside.Am layin a trap fur anybody tryin tae steal it, the roof of the sheds rotten ha ha,me maw, me maw.
Aye Ronnie you are right about banana feet…I slipped up myself there. Still want to think that deep down Billy is a secret Yesser or am I being naïve?
He does rub shoulders with the rich nowadays, such a big step away from the Clyde. Strange how money makes some folk forget their past and where they came from.
Ian Brotherhood says: 20 July, 2014 at 10:06 pm
“Are we expected to believe that Benn wasn’t aware of the McCrone report?”
Oh! Aye! Tony Benn, the socialis who inherited a peerage when his daddy died, 2nd Viscount Stansgate. In those days that prevented him continuing as an MP. Benn fought to remain an MP and campaigned to renounce the title and succeeded. Thus began, “The Peerage Act 1963”.
Tony certainly believed in, “The best of both Worlds”.
Ronnie
Don’t you go dabblin in the super natural and going to the “other side”.
We need you on this side.
I noticed a few runners in the Dundee half-marathon yesterday were wearing Yes t-shirts. 🙂
WantonWampum
I agree, Emma Benn for South Croydon.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/tobyyoung/100280755/labours-love-of-inherited-privilege-shows-a-lack-of-class/
Enjoy folks.
@Caz_m nae worries about me am firm in ma stance its jist the walking that ah wobble.
R5 live phone in with Danny Alexander and Stewart Hosie. So far it’s naws phoning.
Authority figures, authority figures, we must authority figures, it is like ‘crystal meth’ for journalists, they just can’t get by without them.
Although Together politicians having been pedalling the same product too.;”We have some Gordo Brown, how about a pipe of Tony, blow your mind, dude. There’s nuthin in reality that comes close to the high with this, at least we go strato over little dougie alexander”.
“All this street stuff, grass roots is nothing compared to what we have, yo bro.”
Ok, I’ve been watching Breaking Bad, but the similarities are uncanny.
Where are these ‘volunteers’ from Liverpool being bussed TO? I would so like to meet some of them. By the time I’ve finished with them they’ll be BEGGING to go back to wherever-it-is! How can anyone meet up with a Liverpool student, who probably has no knowledge of Scotland (other than the rubbish pedalled in the MSM) even BEGIN to persuade people to vote no. What a pointless exercise!
Dalmellington Community Centre would be a great venue for a Radical Independence Campaign or YES Scotland public meeting. Come on you local Yessers time is not on our side now go out there and engage with the folk!
@Walking on Sunshine says: 20 July, 2014 at 10:21 pm:
“MSM is running out of ideas. They have tried everything possible, using every smear and lie imaginable, and it hasn’t worked”.
You think so? This morning we find Crash Gordon back on the already discredited claims that, “Patients north of the border would be at risk in the event of a Yes vote with co-operation over blood transfusions and organ donations”.
Saint Tony Benn did oppose Scottish Independence. He was also Labour Friends of Israel. He also supported Troops IN to Ireland in 1964 and vote for the Prevention of Terrorism Act in 1974n which created a record in Breaking European Human Rights Laws. This included trial without jury status, imprisonment without trial and lots of other infringement. He also sup[ported a Labour Zero per cent Pay Freeze, that led to Troops IN to Glasgow, driving Ambulances, Fire Engines and Bin Lorries.
As Min of Tech he was directly responsible for closing down most of the Scottish pits, by supporting Nuclear power. He opened Hunterston and Torness power stations. I could recite more of his record but I do not wish to upset the very British left.
@NanaSmith yes you are naive, but nae worries he,ll find his voice during his tour, & normal service will be resumed,sad to say he,s no far fae a WEEDGIE board consultation.
“Our money’s on Margaret Thatcher. Literally nothing would surprise us any more.”
What? Margaret Thatcher was against independence?
In this very first episode, Mr Benn has been invited to a funeral. He dislikes funerals but it’s his own funeral so he has to go. He enjoys dressing up, so he looks round the shops for a costume to wear, but everywhere he finds only ordinary everyday clothes.
Turning into a small lane on his way home, Mr Benn comes across a costume shop where he chooses an outfit of the Scottish Heilander. Changing into the outfit, Mr Benn passes through another door in the shop’s changing room and finds himself in another world. He stumbles upon a Scotsman, and at first thinks it is someone else in fancy dress. He soon realises his mistake.
He learns that the Scotsman used to be independent, until some evil persons sold off his lands and started a union that disenfranchised his counrty for over 300 years. Mr. Benn decides he’ll help the Scotsman regain his independence but alas too little too late. Scotland had long since managed to do this all by itself and Mr Benns’ socialist ideal of saving it from itself had long come to pass.
“How’s Maggie by the way?” quips the plucky, confident Scotsman.
“Shpinning” replies Benn. “She’sh been keeping ush up at nightsh you know”.
On returning to his own everyday world, Mr Benn decides he has had enough of politics outside the planet and won’t be going to the funeral after all.
He tells the shopkeeper that he won’t be coming back to the shop again to try any other costumes nor go on any more and adventures as he does not agree with being misrepresented from beyond the grave.
Many thanks to David McKee for the words and inspiration.
Maggie wasn’t against independence, it was a concept she couldn’t grasp. Maggie was against anybody doing anything that Maggie hadn’t told them to, a sort of personification of the spirit of Westminster.
Just imagine her as the naked lady on the bunnet of a roller.
I was sad when Margaret Thatcher and Tony Benn passed away.
Two people that I really wanted to witness a YES vote in September.
@ handclapping, Maggie wie Wings, never in ma wildest imagination an ah hiv some imagination.
One of the nastier aspects of the ’79 referendum was that not only were deceased voters regarded as legitimate in that their non-votes counted against the Yes result, but that students in Scottish Universities were registered twice: one registration at home and the other where they were living whilst at Uni.
They could only vote once of course as to vote twice would be illegal.
The result of this meant that even if every single student voted Yes their vote would be cancelled out by the vote that they weren’t allowed to use.
Don’t ya just love the U.K.?
Anyone who names their son Hilary should be done for child abuse. Susan is a great boys name too, if you’re just one more English upper class twit that thinks his high titled birth made him fit for high office and thereby deterring who knows how many ordinary sane people who don’t call their boys Hilary.
@handclapping, ah hope you didna mean Maggie as the new Spirit of Extecy the wan that pops up.
Coffee time and its one more rancid slice of ukpk hypocrisy from progressive liberal Graun, “Scotland running Scotland means I wont be British any more and that makes really weally sad, pouting lip, stamp foot, gets whole page to try and make Scotland vote no”
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/21/british-identity-scotland-independence-english-scottish-no#start-of-comments
handclapping
Just imagine her as the naked lady on the bunnet of a roller.
Can’t agree mate. The sculpture is art, so a product of culture. Thatcher denied the existence of society, so rejected that which produces culture.
I see her more as a fungus feeding off decay.
Prime minister Margaret Thatcher, talking to
Women’s Own magazine, October 31 1987
“I think we’ve been through a period where too many people have been given to understand that if they have a problem, it’s the government’s job to cope with it. ‘I have a problem, I’ll get a grant.’ ‘I’m homeless, the government must house me.’ They’re casting their problem on society. And, you know, there is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first. It’s our duty to look after ourselves and then, also to look after our neighbour. People have got the entitlements too much in mind, without the obligations. There’s no such thing as entitlement, unless someone has first met an obligation.”
Vote No to support the above.
R.A. @ 10 08am.
”He who has imagination without erudition has wings while he lacks legs”.
Joseph Joubert. 1754-1824
Does Broon speak for the blood transfusion service and the organ donation folk, or just plain old project fear.
I wonder what these organisation think of Broon terrorising and misleading folks.
P.S. Plus I’m no masochist. 🙂
https://id.theguardian.com/profile/abiesalba/public
Prof Tomkins also says Madeline is spot on but eases off on his you’re all Scottish fascists ranting and the “in my country Slovenia we like to walk in nice Slovene beauty spots that I can find online” here in my study at work, in Glasgow, which is nice of him.
Aliebadas may well be a WoS reader as her mood swings pretty much match getting a mention on here.
Dance Adam, dance for the cybernats:D
“Robert Burns would have supported a No vote” claims Anas Sarwar as he recites ‘My love for money is funded under a red red rose’
“Jesus would have been against Independence – didn’t he claim separate not lest ye be separated” asks Mags Curran.
“Herod would have been A YES voter” claims Nursery campaigner Wee Wullie Rennie.
Oh, the old rinse and repeat cycle again.
We heard it the first time. We’re not deaf.
There was a lot to admire about Mr Benn, but frankly I believe he was wrong in his belief about Scottish independence. His system of governance, the one he worked with and within is the true enemy of social cohesion and interest. It has been given more than a fair crack at the whip, been given more chances to change and reform than it deserved and on every challenge offered has favoured the few over the many.
If the system won’t change, you change the system.
Bunter says:
Does Broon speak for the blood transfusion service and the organ donation folk, or just plain old project fear.
I wonder what these organisation think of Broon terrorising and misleading folks.
Indeed. It’s not just that BT spread lies and deceit, it’s the way they are so callous about ‘collateral damage’ to non political organisations and ordinary folk.
“Aneurin Bevan would have voted No to help me get rid of the Scottish NHS” claims Andy Burnham
@ The Rough Bounds, am from the community of the great unwashed & unedumacated Ah Numpty in a class of my own,erudite I,ll let you know ma Tribes Amalekite.
Not to change the subject and someone may have commented I have yet to read all of them but I see the Benn dynasty continues. We have the Granddaughter of Tony being selected, what a shock, for Parliament. What is it with these so called socialists and their dynasties, worse than the Tories.
Crash Gordon tries to frighten very ill people into No but comedy from Bettertogether Guardian/Slovene style and Slovenia’s really worried now over civil service being too busy after the ref. Who knew Slovenes cared so much about civil servants work load here in the yewkay!
eg
“While only ONE side (Scotland) gets to vote, a Yes vote would greatly affect BOTH separated states, iScotland and the rUK.
Among other things, the people of the rUK would have to PAY for the separation of states, and their politicians and civil servants (which THEY pay) would be busy sorting out the messy and complex issues related to separation of states for many years, most likely even decades.”
@ Robert Peffers
This morning we find Crash Gordon back on the already discredited claims that, “Patients north of the border would be at risk in the event of a Yes vote with co-operation over blood transfusions and organ donations”.
Orly? that would be the blood transfusion service which the government has decided to privatise, would it?
http://thosebigwords.forumcommunity.net/?t=47582789&p=359910922
http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2013/07/19/privatised-nhs-blood-services-sold-to-mitt-romney-s-company
Ah, Jack Cunnningham! I was there, I voted Yes, I remember it well. Cunningham was a Scottish Labour MP who sat for an English consituency, in the SE, if I remember correctly. In a chamber that was virtually deserted at the time, he snuck in, and got voted in his famous ‘Cunningham amendment’ to the Scottish bill which I have always called the ‘Scunner-them amendement’ whereby, unique amongst all votes (no such requirement was ever needed, before or since, in any general election or the EU referendum held some years before) that 50% of the entire electorate must vote Yes, or the result wouldn’t carry.
On the EU citizens for an Independent Scotland site, Brown is getting a right bollocking from everyone! He’s not well thought of HA,HA! They see right through him. Another TROUGHING, ERMINE seeking politician and an embarrassment to Scotland!
The Scotsman must have had a premonition, this was TWO years ago!
http://www.scotsman.com/news/scottish-independence-tony-benn-uk-split-would-divide-me-with-a-knife-1-2475596
Sorry for going O/T here, oh wait a minute maybe I’m not actually going O/T after all. Newsnet have this article up on their site this morning about a certain Gordon Brown, see what I mean about not necessarily being O/T 😉 , apparently he has raised the pathetic scaremongering story about the ill not being able to get cross border transplants or blood transfusions.
This disgusting excuse of a human being makes me sick to my core.
http://tinyurl.com/ptucl3z
Newsnet have covered Gordon Browns wild claims in an article to set the record straight:
http://www.newsnetscotland.com/index.php/scottish-news/9484-gordon-brown-targets-chronically-ill-in-latest-attack-on-independence
Devorgilla, it wasn’t 50% of the electorate that had to vote Yes, it was 40%. Even so, an insurmountable hurdle at that time. I was a student then, but thankfully was living at home so only registered in one place. I well remember a friend swearing about how her Yes vote in Glasgow would be cancelled out by her automatic No vote in Wishaw. I said I would have got on the train and used both votes and made a big fuss about it if anyone had challenged it.
The 40% hurdle was actually cleared in 1997 if anyone’s interested.
Edward “Longshanks” I of England, would have opposed Scottish independence, if he had a vote today.
Or would have subverted the process using violence whichever was more satisfying.
In a week day Herald no less.
http://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/referendum-news/yes-campaign-gets-boost-as-future-position-in-eu-made-clear.24803804
The old chestnut about currency union is being run again and again today….canna have it no siree is the message.
Have you all got that now????
Forget 79! All that really matters is that socialist workers like Crash Gordon and Flipper Darling did the most important thing in their very lucrative political careers, in 2008 they saved teamGB noble and honest City bankers and made them even richer too.
The last great City crash of 2008 came completely out of nowhere apparently but the City knew they could count on oor socialist son of a Kirkaldy manse and Crash didn’t fail any of them. Also Crash and the Flipper blame AlicSamin for all if it because he wrote a goodwill letter to Fred the shred in 2007, so vote no.
@Macart
Thanks for that, fine reading and the comments are hilarious!
@desimond
Damn near needed the oxygen cart on seeing that this morning. 😀
Hang on guys, we’re missing the most obvious name: has anybody contacted Idi Amin?
Various (re G Brown and the NHS)
I write this as a GP. He is talking pish – shock!
Cross-border care is common – in mainland Europe, between UK/Ireland, between UK/Malta etc. Be it accidents near a border, blood/transplant, complicated paediatric surgery.
We already do it WITHIN the UK, with the four separate health services paying for care of their own residents in other parts of the UK. The infrastructure is already there – it’s just another example of “we really, REALLY love you, but if you dare leave us then you’ll suffer” without any logical basis.
Best comment of the week by Marcia ref.
WilliamWallace : ” he didn’t cry freedom when
He was being hacked to death, hung, drawn and
Quartered. He said, you know what, ‘I’m better together ”
Footnote on Actor James Garner’s passing:
I seem to recall an era of U S series on TV during
The 70’s and 80’s suck as Dallas,Starsky and Hutch,
Frank Cannon’ Hill st.blues, Charlie’s’ Angels etc and
American films ,all which provided for people
Living in Scotland an insight into life ,society and
Technological progress in the US .i note now
That these programs and films have now been
Discarded by our state broadcasters to be
Replaced with never ending (propaganda) drivel
Such as “The great British anything they can
Think of” ‘ Victorian/Edwardian period dramas,
Reality TV shows and “British talent shows”
Anything to propagate ” the black hole of Britain”
And to keep the masses blindfolded without
Aspirations beyond the end of their noses.
Thank goodness for the World Wide Web, however
If the Westminster government can find a way
Of controlling “British access” then this new media
Will also come under state control.
tony benn was nothing but a conman and useful idiot for the tories.
Hiz King Richard 11 been reburied under the Taramac yet, we could make a exception on him he could use his thumb print on the ballot paper ,sorry bone print.
@G H Graham
Anent Edward Longshanks and other Royals.
Compare and contrast. “The divine Right of Kings” v “Democracy”
Oh the English did that and had Civil Wars.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Civil_War
Indeed Mr. Kerr,
Even Schama admitted in his Anglocentric “HIstory of Britain” that the declaration of sovereignty resting with the people of Scotland, rather than a divine monarch, was centuries ahead of its time.
Yet, here we are in the 21st century, spectating a state broadcaster & much of its brain washed audience, still propagating the idea that the Royal family is divinely special, superior & a despite centuries of evidence to the contrary, a pillar of stability.
Longshanks was against Independence.
The SLAB,new labour,tory and fibdems should all worry when they gaze into the deep-end of their unionist Gene Pool.
Nepotism is rife and is beginning to reflect – the contents of their gene pools are being rapidly thinned-out.
Look at those SLAB politicians, scots tories and dimplebs?
Brown,Darling,Ian Davidson,Lamont-Roof Davidson,wee willie rennie- Curran etc.
These are not Shiny Happy people.
As Scots, we can rid ourselves of the commons,the Lords and Trident with one cross in Sept.
The sorely depleted scottish tory gene pool has already produced dementia – when they voted in 2010 – for a tory MANDATE that excuded all scots tories from ever getting representation in the commons.?
BamCam pledges he will enact Boundary Change Legislation in his 2015 Tory Manifesto.!!
Freedom`s just another word for nothing left – to lose.
Independence (and bleach) can thin-out THEIR gene pool.
What a shock, the Scottish Affairs Committee of Westminster no less, has came out with a report saying that we will not be allowed a currency union according to what all the unionist parties say.
Well hit me on the erse wee a kipper and call me one of the big girls, who would have thought it.
I believe our government has in a polite way told them they are speaking shite as normal.
Is this the best they can do ? probably.
I would not rule broons prediction too quickly…
Anyone recall the case recently of McKenzie furness?
Sorry…
McKenzie has fought cancer for years now and needed £300,000 ish for last chance treatment in germany.
Time was running out and despite brilliant efforts from a whole swathe of big hearted people, it looked grim.
Her family sent letters out for help,and for this i will stick to politics.
She got a nice letter back from David Cameron’s office wishing her well and sent her a westminster PEN !!!!
The Scottish Government stepped in and handed the balance of her treatment in Britain before heading to germany (around £160,000 if i recall rightly).
Although not wishing to be crass here, her family are English, settled in Scotland, yet when the crunch came, it was the Scottish Government who came through for her and her family.
Do you think her parents used Cameron’s donation of a PEN to write the thank you note to the SG and all the brilliant army of family, friends, and fundraisers who helped a child and her family in their most dark of days ?.
Broon’s blurb may be more believable than seems logical in some respects.
Some sarcasm has been added to this post…reader aware!
Tony Benn brokered the deal for Shetland County Council to get a % share of every barrel of oil landed back in early ’70s. Hence they now have an oil fund of £200 million plus. Scotland, the country that Shetland is part of, has none.
Two reasons:(1) Practical: they i.e. Brits needed a handy landing site near to the oil fields;(2)Political: and thereby ensured possible divide and conquer mechanism for undermining Scottish Independence at later date.
Benn was an exceedingly rich man, British nationalist, and sham socialist (shurely sham shocialist?). Unfortunately, like many iconic ‘left’ politicos, history has shown him to be a bourgeois fraud only good for soundbites.
The 1979 referendum is famous for the dead voting No. Any referendum set up with similar provisos starts off with the No camp getting 100% of the vote, while Yes votes simply reduce the total down from 100%, not up from 0.
Mugabe-esque in the extreme.
The last gasp that the UK government has is to fix the vote.
There is no form of ID required and it only takes a small amount of homework to identify people who will not be voting at all. The recently deceased and the recently jailed can be gleaned from local newspapers and access to council computer records. Postal voting is another one ripe for misuse. Then there’s the ballot itself. Missing papers and friendly staff recruited from within a Labour friendly council structure.
Don’t expect to even get a sniff of any polling booth posts at the referendum. That’s in all likelihood been hoovered up already, by council workers given paid leave to take up paid work. The gravy train has many carriages.
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/council_staff_working_at_the_may#incoming-185667
I remeber seeing Tony Benn being interviewed on the telly.
He did say he was opposed to Scottish Independence.
He also said he wanted Britain to get out of the European Union.
Quite a lot in common with certain fundamental beliefs of the Tory right and UKIP.
David says: I remember seeing Tony Benn being interviewed on the telly.
Fascinating how little English-born ‘rebel’ politicians allow democracy to progress. The colonial mindset is set hard in concrete. You wonder what it is about social progress that motivates them to deny it.
In the days when John MacLean broke away from the Social Democratic Federation to form a Scottish Workers Republican Party the aristocratic SDF Leader, Hyndman was not only a Unionist, who supported WWI, but also a larger Imperial navy. He did not support John MacLean or James Connolly.
Tony Benn was a true socialist who recognised the basic incompatibility of socialism and the selfish, divisive, hate driven agenda of the second biggest cause of war in the history of mankind
,vile nationalism!
The old Viscount, Tony Benn, in office, was an Imperialist, British Nationalist, Unionist and Labour Friends of Israel. He supported Lords, Wilson Callaghan’s further Occupation and Invasion of Ireland and Labour’s antediluvian oppressive laws. He also supported Labour’s zero per cent pay freeze and sending Troops IN to Glasgow to scab on striking workers.
He also supported Nuclear energy, in office. What’s not to like? Do you want me to complete the list