Slicing the shrinking pie
In the last few days we’ve been talking a lot about the bizarre perversion of arithmetic that now seems to dominate political campaigning in the UK, and which has the media so tied in knots that the poor Telegraph now thinks nothing of saying the SNP gained council seats, lost them and gained them again in the space of four paragraphs.
But numbers are confusing and we’re very hungry at the moment after some major dental surgery made eating difficult, so we weren’t really paying attention until Ruth Davidson started talking about pies.
So let’s just recap here. Davidson backs “Theresa May’s desire to cut immigration to the tens of thousands”. It’s currently in the hundreds of thousands, so that means reducing it by a factor of 10.
Davidson said she wanted Scotland’s proportion of migrants doubled to match our population share. But if you double the size of a pie that you’ve just divided by 10, that means overall you’re only getting a fifth as much actual pie as you were before.
So when Davidson says she wants “more migrants” coming to Scotland, what she actually means is 80% fewer migrants. You see what we mean about arithmetic?
All the while supporting her Government as it deports a positive family from Canada. She could’ve helped stop that but chose to do nothing.
Yeah, lies with smoke and mirrors, are all they have.
There is no positive case for this Union. So they do what all crooks do, try and lie their way out of the hole, the trouble is we see them clearly, there are no hiding places left.
But she is absolutely absolute about this so she must be right and you must be absolutely wrong
I think we just have to switch it off. Kudos to Stu for listening to it on our behalf.
Heard the World at One today where they extended endless goodwill to puff up the Tories, warmly reviewing Theresa May’s One Show appearance with lots of clips and appreciative vox pop.
But as for that Jeremy Corbyn, well nobody likes him do we. Boo. Not even Labour voters in vox pop. Boo. Booooooo.
So finding Ruth Davidson being presented with an open goal on Radio 5 is no surprise. Finding she spouts unchallenged rubbish is also no surprise. I don’t suppose the interviewer pointed out that immigration is a reserved matter. The Tories are busy developing the theme that nobody wants to come to Scotland because it’s so horrible with that nasty SNP in charge.
We have another 4 weeks of this rubbish to endure.
The total net immigration to UK is now 333,000 and Ruth Davidson says Scotland gets 4% of that, i.e. 13,320.
Ruth wants us to get 8.4% of a maximum 100,000 UK immigrants.
So she wants Scotland to receive 8,400 immigrants, down from the present total of 13,320.
But in her head this decrease is an increase.
Schrödinger must be having a field day with this Scottish Tory ‘numberiness’!
Mmmm… I think RD may also have to re-think her “I think the big question in Scotland is why, when we have got a third of the land mass off the UK, we’ve got 8.4% of the population of the UK, …” line. I may be wrong, but is it not the case that Scotland has a proportionally low population to its land mass as a result of poor governance of the last 300 years. I believe that, if left to its own devices, Scotland would now have a population of at least 10m rather than 5m, but that a series of clearances, deindustrialisation and poor investment has caused the decline.
What Davidson is saying is that England should have fewer immigrants but that Scotland should have more.
Whatever you think about immigration, this is a position which simply doesn’t make much sense.
Sounds like normal TORY logic, say something, but actually mean the opposite.
Maybe instead of another runway at Heathrow Ruthie could talk with her masters in Westminster and get the Heathrow money spent improving airports up here instead. Encourage immigrants to fly direct to Scotland (where you want them to settle) instead of forcing them via airports in SE England and they finish up staying down there!
A better question for Ruth Davidson to occupy herself with would be why Scotland has a third of Britain’s land mass and only 8.4% of its population.
Was there a plague?
So Ruth wants more immigration to Scotland at the same time as her party is deporting families from Scotland.
Just the other day she was telling us how the elected MPs that Scotland chooses to send to London have no influence over the UK Government. The 56 SNP MPs had been unable to “do anything to benefit Scots despite their pledge to be stronger for Scotland,” she said.
Before that she was demanding Nicola Sturgeon mitigate the rape clause. Before that she was voting for Scotland to stay in the EU and wanted access to the single market.
Poor confused Ruth, doesn’t she know that the only solution to her demands is independence?
The more she tries to put a distinct Scottish slant on things the more ridiculous she sounds. This type of dissembling by the Tory party up here has to be called out at every opportunity. Easily done, as Stu has shown here.
There are three types of politicians…those that can count and those that cannot! It really should be called out for what it is – lying to secure electoral advantage. Not a strange thing for politicians admittedly but quite disturbing for a national broadcaster who is notionally committed to being impartial…
Like all Yoon politicians, Ruthie’s only core political belief is British Nationalism.
All else is just ‘SNP bad’ expendable soundites.
Selfish shallow creatures like her can go a long way in Scotland with the dependable backing of the ‘Scottish’media.
A migrant is described as someone moving location for a better standard of living. Isn’t that what expats do when moving to the sunnier climes?
What’s the difference? is expat just posher sounding or maybe the Butchers rag gives them special status.
Now then! What was it that Phil Robinson was saying on the previous thread?
Oh! Aye!
“Most of the papers today are full of stories … about a … decline in Scottish educational standards.”
Which might suggest it would be a valid topic for a discussion. But no, off you go on a rambling distraction about a couple of subjects that, to most of the electorate, have nothing to do with the price of mince.”
Perhaps it has passed Phil by that the price of mince has gone sky high of recent times, as has everything else and the cause of that increaser in the price of mince is in direct relationship to the poor standards of education of the people elected to run the United Kingdom.
Does Phil imagine that only the Scots have been badly educated? Is Phil and his Westminster unionist pals somehow escaped a bad education and only the Scottish electorate are the United Kingdom’s dunces?
A massive UK national debt informs me that the real UK dunces are running the UK.
But what do they mean as immigrants?
Eu citizens?
Students on courses?
Workers brought to fill jobs?
Rich Arabs and Russians?
Asylum seekers?
Illegal immigrants?
All totally different. Why lump them together? It’s like adding apples to oranges yo bananas. Unless you are a xenaphobe then they are all just ‘others’.
Question. Are we Scots now among the ‘others’?
Maybe Ruth does want migrants into Scotland to be doubled, but at the same time wants migrants into the UK cut massively. We’d just need to find our migrants closer to home.
To answer Ruthie’s non-question. The reason most immigrants go to England is because that’s where the power is, and therefore the jobs. Investment and jobs follow power. The answer to Scotland’s relative lack of immigrants is Independence, Ruthie. It’s not really a difficult concept to grasp.
Maybe those with discalculia are differentially drawn to Unionists politics (cf Jackie Baillie) or it could be that there is a virus, passed between party members of the unionists which causes discalculia.
As there is an election campaign happening can I suggest to everyone that they have a surgical facemask by the front door in case a Unionist chaps the door. You can don it in a trice and save yourself from being infected and spending a lifetime unable to calculate to save your political life.
Anyone asked for MiniRuth Annies Wells opinion on this, cannae beat some more “hmm”, “errr” and “Haud oan a minute I know this wan, ah dae ah dae!!” rants
A simple observation regarding immigration ” port of entry ” London and the south has always been first in the Queue for tourists , it dosent take a two job professor to link the both .
Tory policy north and south of the border like the tory party confusing and contradictory, ruthie its ether more or its less , or it this never ending circle your two job prof got himself tied up in the other day on the radio , when he managed to confuse himself and the presenter by arguing for both .
Roofy-babes should be asking herself “How is it that Scotland has 96% of oil in its territorial waters but gets 0% benefit from it.”
Depopulation (absolute or relative) is always a good indicator of how well a country is managing itself.
No doubt we are all happy that Scotland’s population is now at an all time high of 5.4 million.
However, it will come as no surprise that when we compare the population growth in Norway (much of it pre-oil, though they have taken full advantage of the oil as we all know)we find this:
Norway population at the beginning of the 19th Century 2.2 million and now 5.2 million.
Scotland over the same time period rose from 4.4 million to 5.4 million.
Still, a lot of unionist MPs had a great careers and made themselves wealthy in that time, many of them still ensconced in the financially rewarding House of Lords.
I am sure we are all happy for those better together liars
If Scotland has a third of Britain’s land mass, Why does it look so wee on the BBC’s weather maps ???
Oh, and when did the Tories become known as “Theresa May’s Party”? Has Treeza been getting lesson’s from Ruth-the-non-consensual-sex-clause-party?
O/T: Sorry to cut in so soon but there has already been a resignation of a newly elected councillor in the Elgin City ward of Moray.
Sandy Cooper has tendered his resignation so we are already seeing the election results changing with a by-election now due to be called.
You couldn’t make this stuff up.
Wait now… never mind.
Basically it boils down to she likes pie. Am I right?
blackhack says:
All part of the too wee, too poor, too stupid ubiquitous assault.
We ain’t too wee nor poor. The jury is still out on too stupid!
@galamcennalath says: 10 May, 2017 at 3:18 pm:
“We ain’t too wee nor poor. The jury is still out on too stupid.”
Yer right, galamcennalath, but the strange part is the. “Too bloody stupid”, ones are, without exception, all unionists.
Okay, not everyone knows the difference between “to affect” and “to effect,” but you would think that, to be a journalist with the Telegraph, you really should.
I’ve just copied and pasted the following directly from the Telegraph article to which Stu refers in this post.
“These local elections were in part a test of just how Brexit will effect Labour.”
I think she must have be on a diet of pies given the verbal diarrhea she produces
Our local bigshot lives in Australia, has a virtual office in Aberdeen, and must have been hovering up EU farming subsidies since he bought his 3,000 acres. I think I’ll write to him to ask if I can build some housing on the slopes of the hill outside, perhaps even on top at c.2700 feet. I suspect I won’t get a reply but it’s outrageous!
There’s clearly room on Ben Nevis and the Cairngorm plateau for social housing, a prison or a Trump golf course…
That Telegraph article is concrete evidence of a failure in the education system south of the border. The tories should be ashamed.
When a child in the distant past I was one of those who sat a school test called the ’11 plus’ just before you went to secondary school. For me this was 1960. Even then we understood maths better than these idiots in the press. And that was under Scottish Education.
Mr Sandy Cooper resigns.
link to moray.gov.uk
I have no idea why so much of the electorate actually respects Davidson, though in fairness I did before they became 2nd party and totally dishonest.
Great graphic, which would make great billboards, when I hit the lotto. “Marginally fewer,” certainly shows us the level of hard core tory cunning going in Pacific Quay.
We have another 4 weeks of this rubbish to endure.
We do Capella. But its not new is it, BBC got Thatch in, kept her there, they destroyed Scargill and NUM completely, they only tolerated Tony and Gordo because they’re tories too, they destroyed indy ref1, they’re mercilessly trying to destroy fledgling Scottish democracy in its entirety, and they will destroy indy ref2.
Aint no brass neck like a toryboy brass neck though, have to hand it to them, you don’t rule a whole country on 30 odd % of the vote, by being decent honest characters.
Sir Eric Pickles ? @EricPickles
CPS has come to a sensible decision on Conservative Candidate’s expenses from the last election. The complaint was overblown and over spun
11:41 AM – 10 May 2017
I suppose the favourite phrase of the Tory party , Greece without the sun , and so poor we have to rely on england to feed us , piss poor government , crap this, crap that , crap health service , you name it we are rubbish at it , This Marketing strategy needs looking at , i am sure you could do better .
Thats possibly why the immigration policy set by YOUR government , and not your favourite SNP people requires attention .
David says:
10 May, 2017 at 2:17 pm
The total net immigration to UK is now 333,000 and Ruth Davidson says Scotland gets 4% of that, i.e. 13,320.
Ruth wants us to get 8.4% of a maximum 100,000 UK immigrants.
So she wants Scotland to receive 8,400 immigrants, down from the present total of 13,320.
But in her head this decrease is an increase.
Schrödinger must be having a field day with this Scottish Tory ‘numberiness’!
Methinks you forgeteth from whenceth she came from David.
Before making her *cough* “meteoric” rise through teh Tory party tobecome its branch office manager on North Britain she “worked” at Pacific Quay.
NUFF SAID!
@Macart says: 10 May, 2017 at 3:16 pm:
“Basically it boils down to she likes pie. Am I right?”
A sort of latter day – Pi*R squared where the R is Ruthie.
Or even a latter day Pythagoras where the square on the Hippopotamus is equal to the sum of the square on the other two sides.
Mrs May…
link to imgur.com
link to twitter.com
Telegraph: “This re-alignment has created a bizarre situation where no Scottish council is controlled outright by any major party.”
Pity they’re so confused, since that is precisely the effect that PR electoral systems are intended to achieve.
Which just goes to prove that English journalism has no effing clue about how electoral systems operate outside their 18th-century autocratic little world.
test
What you forget is that Davidson thinks every pie is a Desperate Dan pie that she can ride.
The horns are perfect for holding onto.
link to inews.co.uk
link to inews.co.uk
link to twitter.com
Graeme McCormick says:
10 May, 2017 at 3:40 pm
I think she must have be on a diet of pies given the verbal diarrhea she produces
I do believe we all know someone who has a liking for pies … don’t we readers!
link to wingsoverscotland.com
@heedtracker
Aint no brass neck like a toryboy brass neck though, have to hand it to them, you don’t rule a whole country on 30 odd % of the vote, by being decent honest characters.
Sir Eric Pickles ? @EricPickles
CPS has come to a sensible decision on Conservative Candidate’s expenses from the last election. The complaint was overblown and over spun
As many folks know I have a tendency to be a bit on the cynical side of life some days more so than others. Today is one of those “other” days peeps.
With the announcement that the CPS was wimping out of charging a Tory MP, any Tory MP, with election fraud it came as no surprise to come across this on Twitter earlier today.
In my role as “cynic for a day” I give you the excellent case of “you scratch my back I’ll scratch yours also known as the corrupt judging the corrupt!” Remember folks this head of CPS is the SAME head of CPS who “interestingly” enough dropped ALL charges against Tory MP’s over allegations of Pedophilia at Westminster!
link to archive.is
I noticed on the recent photos we’ve had of Ruth Davidson she has the same puffed up gesturing, arm and head positions as Mussolini used in his speeches.
I know that GE17 has been ticked as being the right answer, but I still can’t get it to add up to a credible solution to a real problem.
And as for Scotland, we need a General election like we need a June Christmas.
Regardless, Stu continues to be Man of the Match every time he plays.
You might also want to note that the Telegraph refers to “Theresa May’s Party”. The others mentioned are Labour and the SNP.
A reflection of the posters at her closed campaign rallies – “Theresa’s Team” – with the word “conservative” in small print. This Crosby guy always gets it right. Unfortunately.
Ruth Davidson is trying to minimise damage control on rape clause policy over on inews, can’t get the links to post.
And Alastair Majury has stepped down as councillor for Dunblane and Bridge of Allan after his extreme remarks.
Not only has Sandy Cooper resigned from Moray but a certain Mr. A. Majury, no I’ve not heard of him either
, has resigned from Stirling Council apparently! 
If Ruth Davidson wants more immigrants, simply campaign for independence. The 10% of Scotland’s population from rUK will then be added to the pot and suddenly, with nothing else changing, Scotland will have more % of immigrants than rUK.
Remember folks this head of CPS is the SAME head of CPS who “interestingly” enough dropped ALL charges against Tory MP’s over allegations of Pedophilia at Westminster!
Arbroath1320, yes but its so horrific, its almost unimaginable. From tories like Ted Heath to Leon Brittan, Liberal’s and Cyril Smith and so on. But then they went after guys like Grenvil Janner who promptly died before it all went to court. Its terrify but who really know what goes on.
Anyhoo, The Guardian’s realised there is an election Scotland too next month.
Hammer of the Scots Severin says,
SNP accused of twisting Andrea Leadsom’s fishing industry remarks
Nicola Sturgeon’s party criticised by Tories and industry leaders over leaked excerpts of letter about integrating EU fisheries law
Robert Graham says:
A few years from now, post crash and burn Brexit, iEngland might be envious of Greece!
They could end up wishing they WERE Greece without the sun!
I’m not saying this trying to be funny, but deadly seriously. No oil, no whisky exports, devastated financial sector, car manufacturing migrated, massive debts, contracted economy … their future, if the WM government fcks up, does not look good.
There should be questions asked about just how those figures are compiled. Certainly if there’s a large portion of retirees doing so in Scotland then that’s inwards migration. As would be Scots leaving for jobs in other parts of the UK.
However given Scotland’s figure is might be worth asking if perhaps the level of illegal immigration is better than the rUK isn’t as good at catching them as we are. Assuming that the figures include all immigration.
Oh just in case I missed posting this earlier our *cough* “friends” at the CPS may have troubles of their own to deal with outwith the catastrophe they have made of the pedophile and election fraud cases.
*Drum Roll*
I give you the husband of the head of the CPS who appears to have been doing some “naughty” things with money!
link to archive.is
Still everything’s hunky dory folks. He’s rich … she’s rich … both obviously Tories … so it’s over to you BBC … “Nothing to see here folks move along now … oh look squirrels!”
Craig P @ 16:22,
That’s a wonderful notion. Scotland has bled many of its brightest and best over the last 300+ years, both to rUK and rWorld. To get some of that diaspora back, together with some of the brightest and best of those English who can see a far more congenial future for themselves and their families here, would be one of the most welcome blessings of independence.
Bring it on!
Comparing Greece and Scotland is hard to do rationally but hard core yoon tory culture like this, shows how the Scottish economy is used to beat the life out of independence.
Or, how come these ITV liggers don’t actually say what the Scottish GDP is, just that its shrinking? They either do not know or they just do not want 5.4 million Scots to know,
link to stv.tv
Arbroath1320 said at 4:28 pm
Oh just in case I missed posting this earlier our *cough* “friends” at the CPS may have troubles of their own to deal with outwith the catastrophe they have made of the pedophile and election fraud cases.
*Drum Roll*
I give you the husband of the head of the CPS who appears to have been doing some “naughty” things with money!……
link to archive.is ……”
For Newbies to Wings– CPS is The Crown Prosecution Service for England and Wales:
link to cps.gov.uk
Further to my previous post about a certain Mr. A. Majury it looks like Tory branch office are denying all knowledge of him resigning. ?
link to twitter.com
Looks like we are heading for a medium to thick time of yes he has no he hasn’t! ?
Talking about Education. I travelled on the Train from and to Fife up till we won the election in 2007. I used to travel with two other women one whose husband was a Primary School Headmaster. On our homeward train there was bunch of girls, well maybe women, they were younger than we were. The Headmasters wife was scathing about them who were apparently in training as Primary School Teachers. Now remember who was in power up to 2007 and who went on a recruiting drive for teachers. I will not traduce Johann Lamont but I imagine these were similar. When the SNP won the election in 2007 they were left with these people as Primary School Teachers. I should say that this woman the Headmasters Wife was a rabid Labour supporter. I often wonder what she says today.
Back to the SSLN survey. Most media outlets are using these as exact numbers when it clearly states they are estimates based on a sample of pupils. The graphs give a margin of error and looking at these there could in fact be no change or a larger variation apart from the writing which does appear to be lower.
They are not really meant to be a league table but a guide to what is happening and highlight where action is needed, it’s a shame that education is such a political football.
“Scotland – Greece without the sunshine.”
Bollox – we’d be more like Norway with the whisky.
Oh dearie me … all that shines may not actually be silver, so to speak, in shiny Tory land after all.
link to tompride.wordpress.com
It would also appear that the leetle tankette commander might be getting a wee bit rattled over a certain clause created by Feartie McFeartie and co.
link to archive.is
I take it that the 96% of migrants “attracted” to the rest of the UK includes London, so does anyone have the relative percentages for other parts of the UK EXCLUSIVE of London? Clearly, given this statement by Ruth Davidson combined with Annie Wells’s? car-crash interview the other day, this is the Tories new line to deflect attention from Tory policy and flip the blame onto the SNP: You haven’t done enough with the powers you have to make Scotland attractive and less rubbish, so it’s your fault no-one wants to come here. As usual, by rolling what is effectively the City State of London in with the figures for England the Tories (and other unionist parties) are skewing the picture, not comparing like with like.
@joannie says: 10 May, 2017 at 2:47 pm:
“Was there a plague?”
Matter of fact – yes there was. The Highland region in particular was hit hard by the potato famine that hit Ireland so hard.
But that was nothing compared to the plague of unionists that has plagued Scotland from long before the Treaty of Union. Our entire history since Roman times has been fighting to prevent union with invaders from the south.
That’s why we have the Gask Ridge and Road, The Antoine Wall and Hadrian’s Wall. There has been more blood spilled on the borders regions of Scotland & England than in any other area of Britain.
BTW: How many Wingers has ever heard of the Battle of Roslin. It was 8,000 Scots Vs 30,000 English and the Scots not only won but the battle was the bloodiest ever on British Soil:-
link to scotsman.com
Only around 10% of the English army made it home to England. So why do Scots children not get taught about that battle in 1303 in their history lessons? Yet I bet there isn’t a Scot that couldn’t tell you all about 1066 and what that was all about.
Just thinking about the spat between Nicola and TMay over the slur that the SNP has also been fined for electoral malpractice.
There is a wider issue here, the comparison between us and them.
They, the Unionists, seem to think that we are are no better than they are. And therein lies the essence of the matter which many/most Unionists can’t/won’t see …. the standards of the UK, its Union, its government, its behaviour, are just not good enough for us any more and we want something much better.
We don’t want to be like them, so we strive to conduct ourselves as best we can, not as worst as we can.
Having just spoken to EU expats who are leaving because of Brexit, all I can say is that – wonky maths or not – Ruth Davidson’s words are a slap in the face to all those who have come here to make a home in Scotland. The level of anxiety amongst my fellow EU citizens is palpable and not helped by the recent introduction of a law that makes many of us illegal immigrants. That’s quite a deliberate policy decision by Ruth Davidson’s party, so when she says she wants more immigrants to come here, I don’t believe it for a second.
The UK government’s habit of counting the 168,000 international students who started their studies that year as economic migrants is another farce. Take them out and net migration is halved. (I’ve looked at quite a few recent years, and it’s always around half of net migration that is made up of incoming students). As these numbers make the government look incompetent after promising to bring net migration below 100K, you have to ask why is the government insisting on counting students if not to keep stirring up resentment against immigrants.
Arbroath1320 says:
10 May, 2017 at 4:59 pm
Majury. Has he or hasn’t he resigned?
Personally, I hope he hasn’t – yet. I might even travel through to Stirling’s first Council meeting to see him run the gauntlet of the inevitable protestors and have to listen to the endless puns from his political opponents.
If he survives that, then he will have no credibility at any meeting he attends. He will be ridiculed at every turn.
If he offered to resign and it was turned down what does that say about the Tory party. They must know the guy is on a hiding to nothing, but don’t want to risk losing a by election
I’d hate to be the Tory Westminster candidate trying to win Stirling. How does he/she explain it on the doorstep.
The gift that keeps giving.
Poor Ruth and she forgot to even mention Turdo Fraser’s ‘unattractive nation theory’
WOS archive links for December 2013 now over on O/T.
Another example of Brexit….
My daughter wants to flatshare with a Lithuanian woman. The Lithuanian woman is an honours graduate (of Leicester Uni) and had a job offer with Leicester University. That offer is now on hold as the uni “cannot in good faith make an offer to an EU national at this time”. The offer is delayed until August apparently, although I suspect that date is more to do with academic timetables/funding rather than overtly political.
Result for me is great as I have both my daughters back home for probably the last summer but that’s an indication of what’s going on in E&W academia.
Ruth Davidson is just the monkey, the BBC is the organ, and the UK Establishment is the organ grinder.
I find it increasingly tiresome that here in Scotland we continue to engage in political discourse at “monkey” level, never any greater level, but forever with the organ grinder deciding the tune and organ playing on perpetual retreat.
At what point are the merits of Scotland staying in the EU going to receive due and appropriate coverage? On the BBC??? That’s a joke right???
I wish the “right” people, and by that I mean the strategists at the SNP HQ and YES movement, would take a step back to see the bigger perspective of media dialogue, or rather the extremely narrow and uninformative media narrative.
Or have we already conceded the principle that the BBC is going to be allowed to manipulate the agenda and narrative of the pro EU arguments and EU membership issues during our ScotRef campaign?
Why, why, why, doesn’t the SNP make a GE manifesto commitment to secure a mandate to demand either full or partial devolution of broadcasting?
A few years ago (maybe 2014?), a substantial number of UKIP candidates were elected in the English local elections, and then almost immediately had to resign when their backgrounds were uncovered.
In many cases, they had not expected to win and were really just paper candidates, suddenly thrust into the limelight.
Maybe the same thing is about to happen here with the Tories, with the important difference that many of them had been outed well before the election, but were allowed to carry on.
The man in Elgin is an independent, in a ward where the Tory was elected in round 1 – a by-election win would make them equal-largest party. Another candidate had complained about him after he promised to give £1,000 a year to each of 5 schools, which could constitute bribery.
The report I found giving those details is “not secure” according to my computer, so I won’t link to it; it can be found by googling “Sandy Cooper resignation Elgin”. The BBC report only says he’d decided it “just isn’t for me”. It will cost the council about £25,000 to hold the by-election.
Totally agree with Maren above. My wife is from another EU country, and we’re still none the wiser as to whether she’ll be allowed to live in my country. The utter gall of these people continues to astonish me – these Tories? Blaming others for creating a negative environment for foreigners? It’s difficult to satirize Ruth and her ilk because they shuffle between one position and its opposite pretty much daily.
Just watched the “Scottish” unionist and Conservative party broadcast and not one of the folk who said how much they thought May would be the best PM had a Scottish accent. Or Welsh, or Irish. So much for the Scottish and unionist adjectives!
@Proud Cybernat says: 10 May, 2017 at 5:13 pm:
“Scotland – Greece without the sunshine.”
Bollox – we’d be more like Norway with the whisky.
Correction : – Bollox – we’d be more like Norway with the whisky, and the oil & the gas.
I despise Ruth Davidson even more than I did Thatcher. She is a straw in the wind bending this way and that way as long as it is Westminster’s way.
She grovels at the feet of Saint Theresa and worships her every utterance, she is the ultimate hypocrite and I’ve never known worse.
Remain remain, no Brexit brexit. The SNP should use it’s new powers to mitigate the effects of MY parties abhorrent welfare policies in Scotland. Why won’t they use them?
She cares for no one other than herself, she has zero principles except what advantage can I gain. She’s also the biggest liar among all UK politicians. A liars crown she probably wears with pride. If her head continues to swell she’ll need a bigger thorny crown placed on her head.
I am hopeful though that the day of reckoning is approaching and she will get her comeuppance along with the rest of the Scottish Tory scumbags that rob the poorest to reward the richest.
She jokes about Scots thieving in England while in England to please her masters, she supports the rape clause and laughs at Scots as being too wee, too poor and too stupid. Forever talking Scotland and the Scottish people down.
Her day job is to represent the people not just who voted for her but all in her constituency and as the leader of the opposition she also has a duty to all of Scotland’s voters. A duty she fails miserably at.
Well I’ll be having the last laugh and we will be shot of her and the rest of them that talk Scotland down as she continually does.
C4 teatime news explaining how to cheat your election expenses, spend as much as you like, tell your agents in each constituents its all fine.
Cops will check you out but courts won’t do anything.
Oh Stu you horrid man exaggerating Ruthie’s figures.
By “Tens of thousands” they mean not hundreds – so 99,000 is enough to make the claim. A population share (8%) of that would be 7,920.
At the moment there 333,000 and we get 4% of that which is 13,320.
So *increasing* the number of migrants to Scotland is actually halving it which is pretty close compared to what Kezia would do. By the time we allow for the notional migrants everything will be fine I’m sure
I despise Ruth Davidson even more than I did Thatcher. She is a straw in the wind bending this way and that way as long as it is Westminster’s way.
She grovels at the feet of Saint Theresa and worships her every utterance, she is the ultimate hypocrite and I’ve never known worse.
Remain remain, no Brexit brexit. The SNP should use it’s new powers to mitigate the effects of MY parties abhorrent welfare policies in Scotland. Why won’t they use them?
She cares for no one other than herself, she has zero principles except what advantage can I gain. She’s also the biggest liar among all UK politicians. A liars crown she probably wears with pride. If her head continues to swell she’ll need a bigger thorny crown placed on her head.
I am hopeful though that the day of reckoning is approaching and she will get her comeuppance along with the rest of the Scottish Tory scumbags that rob the poorest to reward the richest.
She jokes about Scots thieving in England while in England to please her masters, she supports the r@pe clause and laughs at Scots as being too wee, too poor and too stupid. Forever talking Scotland and the Scottish people down.
Her day job is to represent the people not just who voted for her but all in her constituency and as the leader of the opposition she also has a duty to all of Scotland’s voters. A duty she fails miserably at.
Well I’ll be having the last laugh and we will be shot of her and the rest of them that talk Scotland down as she continually does.
Davidson, I have a message for you. Your days are numbered and I’m just one of many that will make sure of that you scumbag.
@Arbroath1320
“you forgeteth”? Thou forgetest, surely?
You do Ruth Kim Jung In a disservice!
She wants immigrants coming to Scotland Doubled up with Laughter at how the Tories and their UK Media minions can’t count on their fingers.
I heard that Harrison had to take her gloves and socks of to check that she got a Dozen eggs in her basket.
It was a trick question though.
She only does SNP Bad as an answer that she can rely on.
If she can keep Scotland in the Dark for much longer, she might become the Count-less Of Embra!
A small point but indicative of continued poor reporting. The graph in the BBC article above concerning net migration has been marked to show the ‘Previous peak’.
The headline figure of 333000 is the ‘second highest on record’. I wonder then how 336000 became the ‘previous peak’ if it has not been exceeded?!!
Old Edinburgh proverb:-
“A pie in the sky is worth two in the Ruth.
I believe they will try to attract more English immigrants to Scotland.
Which means an increase in the No vote.
Saint Theresa of England and Wales will then give permission to Scotland to hold an independence referendum, after Brexit has been completed.
The Tories are not fools and idiots as some extremely naive posters believe.
Ruth on a tank, Ruth on a buffalo.
Photo-shoots and soundbites does not a politician make. That’s why her days in the political limelight will be numbered as this time Scotland will take back her Independence at the next referendum.
Hope she stands in England as an MP and aims for that ermine robe and we never need to hear from her again.
The Tories are not fools and idiots as some extremely naive posters believe.
One of your dafter comments Rock. Tories are fcukng spectacular idiots, sometime lethaly so.
What tory idiots do have, is the luxury of a giant bent UK media industry and the BBC, all working flat out to keep them in power.
yesindyref2,
“I have no idea why so much of the electorate actually respects Davidson, though in fairness I did before they became 2nd party and totally dishonest.”
In contrast, this is what I have been saying of her since before the first independence referendum:
Rock,
(Good faith and bad practice – 22nd June 2014)
“I could perhaps agree with you about Scottish Tories but Ruth “line in the sand” Davidson IS NOT TO BE TRUSTED ONE BIT, to say the least.
She is a total bully on TV debates and her tone at FM Questions is disgraceful.
She came 4th in her constituency with less than 10% of the vote yet she gets the privilege of abusing and insulting the democratically elected First Minister.”
10 May, 2017 at 7:52 pm
The Tories are not fools and idiots as some extremely naive posters believe.
Dear lovely old Rock,
link to northern-scot.co.uk
Well, we live in Germany because my sife of 17 years STILL can’t get a visa for the UK, despite me being British.
One reason I’m rooting for Indy is that I want to come to Scotland but the WM Policy is to make it impossibly hard, despite being well qualified in areas the UK needs.
So, Ruth: we want to come, but we’re waiting for Scotland to be able to let us in…
Depopulation of Scotland would have nothing to do with union rule for 300 years and the tory/labour obsession with the south east of England – another reason for independence and then the small matter of the weather maps 1/3 land mass but a very small Scotland on the bbc weather map.
Migration and more arithmetical tomfoolery and sheer dishonesty from Ruth the no truth and the bbc. Every time Ruth opens her mouth she gives us another reason to be independent.
link to caltonjock.com
OT/
Moray Councillor resigns.
Sandy Cooper, an ‘independent’, newly elected onto the Moray Council has just announced his resignation. (STV on-line news)
No reason given.
He had promised to give £5000 of his salary to 5 Moray schools.
Apparently the by-election to replace him will cost Moray £25,000.
SNP will contest the place. Yahoo = )
I put a post on earlier asking what is the difference between a migrant looking to better their life and an Ex-Pat looking to better their life in the sun?
Seriously what is the difference ?
Wait what? Aren’t the UKToryGov chucking people out of Scotand because they are migrants?
No time to read comments, so probs been discussed, but er Ruthie needs to have a look at what her masters in London are actually doing to positively discourage people from coming to Scotland.
Of course they don’t want people coming to Scotland, or else they would not be throwing whole families out who have been here for years, built up businesses and employ people.
Just exactly what is it she does want? Immigration is reserved to UK country of London government, I am sure she is at least aware of that. They are now playing the race card, the expenses card (saw that Treeza not-green May, lying about SNP re that on twitter) etc. It’s all fake tory rhetoric! They are really, really desperate these yoons.
Migrants, foreigners, immigrants, ex-pats and people. We are talking about people. Folk with families. Folk who are so desperate to get their children out of Syria, Yemen, Iraq and others that they try to get them a better life in Europe by putting them on dinghies to cross the Med. please let’s not be part of the dehumanising language used by the Tories, labour and most of the media.
@ BJ
Some languages (Korean, for instance) have different ways of saying goodbye, depending on whether the speaker is the person leaving or the one left behind.
Similarly, an “ex-pat” is living abroad among all them furriners, but secretly, deep down, really remains part of the UK, rather like the army bases in Cyprus.
In contrast, a “migrant” is someone who has moved to the UK but will never truly belong and can probably be persuaded to “migrate” back to where they came from.
I’m being flippant, but there is some truth in it – perspective makes someone who has departed an “ex” and someone who has arrived a “mover(-in)”.
@Artyhetty
Exactly, last year we had the Brain family saga who escaped deportation at the last minute and just days ago we had the Zielsdorfs who were unsuccessful in stopping their deportation.
Then we have the liar Ruth Davidson appearing on the media saying she supports more immigration for Scotland. What a hypocritical liar.
These two families invested everything they had in Scotland and built up small successful businesses that brought benefit to their local communities and the Tories chuck them out.
This is an absolute disgrace in a modern society, the Tories though don’t believe in society. We need to fight these obnoxious policies every step of the way. It’s absolutely infuriating to me that not enough publicity is given to such matters.
Immigration matters are reserved and the Scottish Government is powerless, this is so wrong. The bastards are trying to wear us down and this is just the precursor to the main event.
We really are fighting for our lives as well as any semblance of decency. It’s a fight Scotland will win when faced with only Tory scum as our enemy. Be up for that fight, it starts now.
Ruth..’we want to marginally increase our share.. of massively less immigration’
The Tories will only cause Scotland’s brain-drain to increase, forcing many of our brightest to leave.
The Tories will replace them with ‘low quality society with temporary jobs’ as the Tories now call the working class and the immigrant population.
The Tories, i.e.the current establishment,
after ruling in the name of progress, for over two centuries of war, (or is it the other way around) have finally taken us up the creek, and Westminster’s greedy hands STILL hold onto both ancient paddles.
The depopulation of Scotland by Westminster centrist policies.
The Clearances. 1WW, migration, 1933 The Great Depression, 11WW, 1960’s £10 passage to Australia, Thatcher illegally and secretly took the Oil revenues and spent them in London S/E.Cut Scotland’s budget. Kept it secret. Shut every manufacturing facility in Scotland. ‘Sermon on the Mound’. Until Devolution 2000. Scotland’s population has only increased since 2000. If Scotland was Independent the population would increase. There would be more administration jobs. A navy based in Scotland. The Tory/Unionist policies are throwing people out of Scotland. It is disgraceful. They came to the UK on visas. The Tories have changed the visa conditions, Hard working families in the Highlands are having to leave.
The Tories have stopped 33,000 vulnerable, migrant children from coming to the UK. The Tories are killing off the elderly in England. Their voters.
The Westminster criminals have caused the worst migrant crisis since 11WW by illegal wars and bombing the Middle East to bits for years. 10,000 refugees have come from Iraq. 1000 have settled in London. 9,000 have been resettled in the NE of England. 4 million have been displaced in Syria.
Tory policies would ensure there were no one left in Scotland. The North/South divide. The unfair, high Tory tax in Oil sector has cost Scotland £Billions and 120,000 jobs, Scotland could have had full employment. The UK Union costs Scotland £20Billion a year, which could be saved or better spent. Westminster borrows and spends £Billions in the rest of the UK. Scotland has to balance the books and spend £Billions on what the majority do not want because of Westminster policies. Prof Murphy says QE benefits the rest of the UK but not Scotland on a fixed budget. Westminster has £Trns of debt.
Westminster Illegal wars, financial fraud and tax evasion. Costs Scotland £Billions.
WeeAlex @6.44
Re Alsadair majury’s resignation
I’m reading that he was talked out of resigning at the last moment. You could say he flip-flopped – (no pun intended on his much bragged about masculinity, only on Nicola’s use to the term to describe tRuthless).
It appears that Stirling Labour may want him on the Council but Stirling SNP do not. We shall have to wait to find out. Maybe Nicola can bring it to a head at FMQ’s tomorrow.
Another Tory councillor in Stirling has locked down ‘his’ twitter account and possibly even deleted it following accusations of racism..
That’s 2 out of 9 in Stirling – how does that multiply up across Scotland?
@heedtracker says: 10 May, 2017 at 8:03 pm:
Aye! Heedtracker. Your link:-
link to northern-scot.co.uk
contains this little gem:-
“Mr Cooper said he had never been a member of a political party, although he stood for the Conservatives twice in the mid 1990s”
Am I wrong in thinking he must have been a member of the Tory Party to stand for them twice in elections?
So just another Tory disguised as an independent Tory.
Heard Tomkins on the Beeb spouting the 4% story and it seemed wrong. Looked up the Census & 2015 stats. 2015 seems to be the latest. 4% is the number of foreign-born living in Scotland (Census). Net migration is 6.8% and if you look at UK outside London 8.8%.(Population of Scotland is 8.9% of UK minus London).
So, well done Ruth, wrong logic, wrong figures and a divide by 10 which would spell disaster for tourism, farming and fishing.
At least now with Mr Majury exposed we now have an explanation as to why male Tory MSP’s seem to be a bit thick. It would seem that they suffer from a sudden loss of blood to the brain. Now I understand the tank commander nomenclature
The above theory of course cannot explain the Annie Wells phenomenon.
OT
Just want to say thanks to all the folk making comments, on this thread, and others, in support of migrants who have come to Scotland and made this country such a great place to live and work in.
My father was the son of migrants and sadly passed away last year. In the last few days i’ve been on a downer seeing bigots, racists and xenophobes voted into positions of responsibilty as councillors.
My frustration is compounded when i have to tolerate seemingly intelligent work colleagues opine that their are too many immigrants in Scotland even though our entire economy and public sector would be in meltdown without them.
When I read through the posts here though it reminds me that their are more good people than bad and it makes me proud (not in a proud Scot but way…) that the vast majority of the yes movement recognise the the positive contribution migrants have made to Scotland.
Completely OT I know but thanks to all the WoS regulars for keeping my spirits up.
Ken500 says:
10 May, 2017 at 9:07 pm
The depopulation of Scotland by Westminster centrist policies.
Up to the beginning of the 20th century, the Cabrach – a rural area in the midst of Aberdeenshire was a vibrant populous community, numerous crofts, schools, churches, post-office and inn. However, the outbreak of WW1 resulted in 800 men and teenage boys from the area to be drafted under influence of politicians and the press that “…the more men who joined up, and the quicker they did it, the sooner the enemy would be defeated and the earlier they could be home.” Of course this was to never happen, and many died on the battlefield or from disease. It was not long until the women and children left to tend the land waiting for the return of their men folk had to give to give up after a couple of harsh winters and leave to find work and accommodation elsewhere. To travel through the area today is to witness an empty barren space which is filled with sadness that is hard to bear and has described by a Dutch academic historian as “the biggest war memorial in Europe. Much of the area was given over to forestry in the 70’s with the lure of tax relief to landowners which adds even further insult.
I see that Tory Moray Councillor Donald Gatt, also responsible for extreme tweets, has his account in lockdown too.
Some frantic deleting going on I think.
I suppose it should be observed, “What’s it got to do with Ruth Davidson?’. Any of it on any subject.
Again it is about trying to set the agenda. That get away with it, partly because the propaganda outlets broadcast it and partly because Slab is paralysed by gross stupidity.
@Juan P
Commiserations on the death of your father, I know how that feels and it hurts bad.
Your post though also lifted my spirits, unlike what Cameron stated we on Wings really are all in it together and I believe we can all help make Scotland Independent.
Pretty soon we will need a presence on the streets and many of them will be Wingers and the more the merrier. Your average Wings reader probably knows more about Scottish politics than any Government Minister. We need to share that knowledge.
Especially the lies of the media and the failure to keep promises.
So anyone building up their strength to watch BBCQT tomorrow night here is the starting line-up.
Merryn Somerset Webb … Editor in chief of UK personal finance magazine MoneyWeek
Ben Wallace …Tory candidate for Wyre and Preston North
Emily Thornberry … Labour candidate for Islington South and Finsbury
David Hayman … actor and director
Joanna Cherry QC … SNP candidate for Edinburgh South West.
Now I may be a wee bit cynical here but I would have thought as the programme is coming from Edinburgh there might be a few SCOTTISH unionists available to appear like say … erm … Kezia Dugdale … or Willie Rennie … or even *sharp intake of breath* … Unlawful sexual attack Ruth Davidson! Apparently they were all washing their hair tomorrow night.
Populating Scotland will only lead to a loss of valuable land, that can be better used for fox hunting
It’s been a complete and utter disgrace how the media have conducted themselves in this last week – The Telegraph especially!
The ramping up of attacks on the SNP while promoting the Scottish Conservatives is now so blatantly obvious, that many of the Scottish electorate are both angry and dismayed. However, this coverage appears to have gone beyond hyping up Ruth Davidson and Co; if anything, I believe we are seeing a very early form in the resurrection of good old 1930’s Scottish Presbyterianism. Simply put …how on earth did members of the public that have OO affiliations manage to get promoted to positions that they eventually become Labour and Tory Councillors? What vetting procedures were carried out by both parties that allowed such candidates to be passed? …Seriously!!
And by not condemning it, we could say that both the Tories and the media seem to be publicly endorsing what they consider in their eyes …good-old-fashioned Scottish Protestant values.
As someone raised in a Presbyterian household and who has studied Scottish History deeply, I’m finding this ‘celebration’ of ‘Tory revival’ in Scotland rather alarming. If not checked, then it will fulfil what the London Tories really want – having …and then leaving Scotland badly divided and bitter. Overall, they couldn’t give two figs for what they perceive to be parochial backward social disputes over religious values. All that matters is that the Scots must not slowly unite to eventually clamour for independence.
It’s gutter politics, but it is also effective politics. The London Tories, who themselves, would never in a million years embrace Presbyterianism over their own Episcopalianism, are happily promoting the darker side of the national religion of Scotland. And yet, they need to beware, such religious politics from the 1930’s only attracted the disillusioned and the extremist. Worst of all, some members of the Church of Scotland promoted it too. Most Scots who were Church of Scotland actually steered clear of the more fundamentalist elements and groups that surrounded the worst aspects of Presbyterianism. Even members of the General Assembly at the time questioned the extreme path that some clergy were taking and even endorsing anti-Catholic and anti-Irish rhetoric. This haunted the Church of Scotland so much, that it apologised in 2002 for its past behaviour.
I’m hoping and praying that come next month, the vast majority of Scots turn out and vote SNP (or Green), and thus send a resounding message to Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Tories, the London Tories and those in Scotland who hold such extremist ideology, that Scotland will not endorse such politics. Hopefully, the SNP will pick up 50 seats at least next month
…for if they don’t and Ruth picks up 15 to 20 seats, then I believe this nation will not only have allowed the Tories to divide this nation …but it will also impress on us that we have gone backwards as a people.
Be great if Majury has resigned and a by-election was on the cards but appears he has been talked out of it.
Union before Party, before electorate.
I think that BCUPS in some parts of the country are now like BLiS.
The closet Tories won’t come out publicly so they are left with this bunch of repellent dregs to put on the ballot.
Left with a pool of prospective candidates with no talent and no scruples.
I’ve said on previous posts it is now everyone’s duty to keep the light focused on the right wing creatures that came out of the sewers at the Local Elections.
Let people see what their tribalism really elected to represent them.
If Donald Gatt has deleted his tweets then surely he is another who need fully exposed (pardon the term).
Resignations = By-Elections.
By-Elections = a chance to get an Indy Supporting Councillor elected and negative publicity for the tRuthless No Surrender to Referendums Party.
@Juan P says: 10 May, 2017 at 9:43 pm:
” … When I read through the posts here though it reminds me that their are more good people than bad and it makes me proud (not in a proud Scot but way…) that the vast majority of the yes movement recognise the the positive contribution migrants have made to Scotland.”
I’ll cheer you up a little more, Juan. Scotland’s history is totally different from that of the rest of the United Kingdom and it has always been a country, one of the oldest in Europe, that was formed entirely by an always open door to others.
In fact that tradition pre-dates Scotland as a unified country. In England, Wales and Ireland there was a Norman Conquest but not in Scotland. Under conquest the Normans were a ruling elite and enslaved the native population. That was what serfdom was and they had another class of slaves the called, “Villeins”, who were also virtually just slaves.
Certainly we had Normans in Scotland, both Bruce and Wallace were Norman Knights, but the Normans in Scotland did not come as invaders. They came, assimilated and married into the existing Scottish nobility. The fact is both Scottish heros fought as Scots against the English Norman aristocracy.
Robert the Bruce was born on 11 July 1274 into an aristocratic Scottish family. Through his father he was distantly related to the Scottish royal family. His mother had Gaelic antecedents.
That is Scotland, people come here and the are not ghettoised. They assimilate and become Scots. Think on this, there can hardly be a hamlet, village, town or city in Scotland that doesn’t have at least one family of Italian descent. They brought us Ice-Cream Parlours, Restaurants, Fish & Chips and garage business’.
When the English expelled the Jews the Scots welcomed them in and there have been Jewish families in Scottish cities ever since. We had the Irish even before the potato blight famine. There is hardly a Scot that doesn’t have at least one Irish grandparent.
I went to school in Leith and we had children of all sorts in the class. Every last one of them was as Scottish as I was.
Laughably my late wife and I were walking in the Royal Mile during the Festival and came across a Sikhs Businessman standing outside his shop, He was wearing full Sikhs regalia but his sash and turban were tartan. I spoke to him remarking on his colourful dress and he laughed and called me by my first name. He had been in my class at school. He was Scots born but his parents were both immigrants. He and I used to go and watch the old Hibs Famous Five together.
@ Juan P There are Idiots in every walk of life , just ignore they’re comments . You can further bolster your spirits up by pouring ah wee Dram ( malt recommended ) Slainte.
Here is a great story about a Scot who was one of the many kids kidnapped in Aberdeen
link to en.wikipedia.org
Arbroath1320..
BBC better get their best undercover hecklers into QT tomorrow..
Hayman and Cherry will take those three Tories to the cleaners.. And the elitist Dimbleby..
Think I’ll just leave this here. It’s just a wee Common Space piece about the extremism now circulating through our councils via the Tory party.
link to commonspace.scot
I would go so far as to say that your last paragraph JLT is what they have wanted to happen all along, ‘to divide this nation’.
We must be very close to uniting else this level of dangerous rhetoric would not be getting employed across the board from all the Tories, whether London or Edinburgh based. They are terrified, there’s nothing less than a full frontal attack on the SNP and half of Scotland going on, they’re lying right to our faces too…it’s actually ‘stunning’. Ahm surprised and deeply heartened that their rhetoric is having so ‘little’ effect in real terms. I mean in our communities and on the SNP’s remarkable voters who are increasingly backing them all the way in the face of one of the most toxic onslaughts of relentless provocation that Scotland has ever faced in recent times from our political adversaries.
We’re doing well…considering defcon batshit crazy has been deployed :
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Take heart, they won’t win.
The sums have never added up as far as being attached to Westminster is concerned and these articles and interviews prove it.
Macron in France, having being elected has already said he’s going after London’s banking sector. Independence could almost certainly give them somewhere to go and keep relations open on all sides and bring massive amounts of money to our economy. So with all these stupid sums … how would Rooth, Flipper and others square away any loss for Scotland if the economy of Westminster took a massive hit like that?
Arbroath 1320 and louis.b.argyll
Somerset Webb is a member of Scotland in Union. Emily Thornwood comes across as a decent politician, don’t know anything about the Ben guy.
David Hayman is a passionate Yesser who has made many great programmes on Scottish industry, etc for the BBC.
At the end of the SNP conference in March I went oot fur a fag and Joanna Cherry was standing on her own waiting for her lift. I went over, wished her happy birthday for which she thanked me. I also congratulated her on her performance on QT 2 days earlier.
In reply, she said she “quite enjoyed it, but wouldn’t want to do it every week.” We spoke about the situation in England and she told me that there is a dark undercurrent of unrest – presumably gleaned from fellow MPs in England.
Tomorrow Joanna Cherry is on home turf.
JLT @ 22:34,
Sorry, but what has Scottish Presbyterianism to do with the independence movement, one way or the other? I vehemently disagree with any attempt to elide any religous denomination with any other organised grouping, quasi-religous or not, including any political party.
Attempting to introduce any kind of sectarian argument into the independence issue is to further the Tories’ (real) divisive (ie. divide-and-conquer) agenda.
I find that not only repugnant, but damaging to the cause, which has to be as inclusive as possible. The last thing we need now are “splitters”. Besides, there has to be space in a new Scotland for everyone, including those people like the OO that you or I might find laughable, anachronistic and/or unpleasant. They will still need to live here too.
LOL
I see Jeremy has came into the fold lmao
link to commonspace.scot
BBC Newsnight there, CPS cant prosecute tories because CPS cannot prove tories broke the law on purpose or by accident. That’s the beeb ligger explaining it all.
If you ever get nicked by the cops, for anything, see how far arguing you broke the law by accident gets you, and tell them you’re a tory too. That’s seems to be the clincher, m’lud.
Beeb gimps have really displayed how corrupt they are today.
Ruth Davidson didn’t sack the councilor immediately, as Sturgeon would have done. Quite the opposite someone talked him out of it.
So extreme views are valued in the Tory party. Ruth is condoning them in other words. Just don’t get caught you silly boy.
So we are dealing with an enemy of democracy, decency and with no moral compass. This is a very sad state of affairs.
Michael Laing et. al will be looking on in horror at what Ruth has created. She is a rabble rouser not a politician. She probably goes into any Rangers pub on match day and says:” Right who wants to be a councillor”.
They are the most Base elements of society. Worse than any drunk on a Friday night spewing unchallenged hatred.
I think we have reached peak Tory and it stinks.
We now only have one enemy and that’s the Tories. Now we are not going to steal many of their Loyal votes but we can stop the leak from the Labour party to them.
My mind boggles at how any former Labour party supporter could find it OK to give the Tories a vote even if in their mind it was to “save the Union”. Those that have are from the poorest areas just as in England those that lived in the poorest areas voted to cut their own throats by voting leave.
When the pain starts to bite they will realise their mistake and it won’t be too late for them to change their mind and back a Yes in Indyref.
Same goes for those still supporting Labour, you need to make a choice Scotland or the Toxic Tories. That’s the blunt fact of the matter. I would plead with you if any are reading to come over to our side now and keep the filthy Tories out. They are your enemy.
The Blue Tory Scum will continue to decimate our welfare state, our NHS and our education system for the sake of a profit. Everything else has already been sold off so they can’t make any money that way.
Health and education are already partly privatised, think £9000/year for Uni when it used to be “free”. Of course it wasn’t really free our taxes paid for it. But taxes have been slashed so much for the rich and that is why they get richer while the majority get poorer.
Labour voters, do the right thing or we go over the cliff with Brexit.
@ Robert Peffers 6:20 pm
BTW: How many Wingers has ever heard of the Battle of Roslin.
Me Sir, I had an excellent history teacher and later read about it in relationship to Bruce, Roslin and the Templars
Robert there is no space in any country in the world for a sectarian hate mob called the Orange Order. You are out on your own there. They are scum and nothing else. I don’t want them in Scotland ever, because they exist to preach bigotry, they have no other purpose. That’s not intolerance,it’s intolerance of bigotry.
I said it the instant that Westminster claimed the United Kingdom should leave Europe and I say the same still.
There is no way that Europe is about to accommodate any special deal for a UK outside of Europe. Not only that but there is every chance England could end up with Scotland, all Ireland, The Channel Islands and Isle of Man surrounding them as EU members and perhaps even Wales.
There is no way that the EU are going to have open borders with non-Schengen Area countries. Today, the Schengen Area encompasses most EU States, except for Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Ireland, Romania. However, Bulgaria and Romania are currently in the process of joining the Schengen Area. Of non-EU States, Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein have joined the Schengen Area.
It’s going to be hard borders and no free-market or freedom of movement. The Little Englanders will finally get a real Little England and their once Colonies and Dominions would be mad to even contemplate free trade deals with their erstwhile oppressors and some have even said as much.
O/T I’ve had a close look at the Tory Councillor problem in Stirling.
2 of them now in trouble in a hung council. It should be bye bye but Ruth needs them to remain.
The current state of affairs is 9 SNP, 9 Tories, 4 Labour, 1 Green.
It was a Tory/Labour coalition last time so you’d suppose it would be the same. But would you want to enter a coalition with the toxic Tories?
Enter stage left the new Labour Councillor, Kris Kane. He is standing in the GE. A bit of a dilemma. He has no chance of winning but does he risk losing even more votes by supporting a tainted Tory group or does he work with the SNP.
I like a wee flutter and I’m backing the red Tory to join with the Toxic Tories just to keep the SNP out.
A win win for the SNP politically but a disaster for the taxpayers of Stirling.
Robert Peffers at 10.46
Wiliam Wallace (William Le Walys in Norman French) was not Norman. He was a Briton and his cumbric name loosely translated means William the Welshman. A large area of west central Scotland was of Strathclyde Britons with the same background of the people of North Wales up to Cumbria (and the Cumbraes in the Clyde). It is the same name as Walsh or Welsh in Ireland.
Robert J. Sutherland says:
10 May, 2017 at 11:15 pm
JLT @ 22:34,
Sorry, but what has Scottish Presbyterianism to do with the independence movement, one way or the other?
Quite a lot actually, considering it was Presbyterianism on the Scottish side that were responsible for signing the ‘Act of Union’ they were in most the ‘parcel of rogues who sold us for gold’.If you want your independence so much as the rest of us-the AOU needs to be repealed in all it’s bigotry! So yes it has a hellava lot to do with it. Many many of THESE DECENDANTS OF THEM they sit within the Tory party as you should know.So by default the don’t and never will want independence.
I maybe wrong but that’s my take on it. Maybe some of the historians on here will put me right or wrong?
@Big Jock says: 10 May, 2017 at 11:24 pm:
“Robert there is no space in any country in the world for a sectarian hate mob called the Orange Order. You are out on your own there. They are scum and nothing else. I don’t want them in Scotland ever, because they exist to preach bigotry, they have no other purpose. That’s not intolerance,it’s intolerance of bigotry”
Which Robert are you aiming that barb at Big Jock?
I have never in my life advocated any support for the Orange Order.
stonefree says:
10 May, 2017 at 11:23 pm
@ Robert Peffers 6:20 pm
BTW: How many Wingers has ever heard of the Battle of Roslin.
Me Sir, I had an excellent history teacher and later read about it in relationship to Bruce, Roslin and the Templars
Scots have been deliberately robbed of their extraordinary history. Keep saying this but ask any Scot who was on the throne of Scotland during the reign of one of England’s most horrific serial killer monarch’s, Henry V111.
Look at how the French venerate their Celtic mythic past. Scotland’s Celtic heroes actually won too. Its all around us, our country’s past, but our current imperial master baiters do not want it mentioned.
link to en.wikipedia.org
Young Scots are doing something about it though. Is it a coincidence, the establishment of link to uhi.ac.uk
link to thebrochproject.co.uk
There’s yet another Tory councillor that might merit some investigation.
Robert Connelly was elected in Glasgow’s Calton ward and looked totally shell-shocked at the count after he was told he had won a seat. Speculation at the time was that he got in on the back of the Orange vote in the Bridgeton area and his Facebook campaign pages show him as a protege of Annie Wells, a known Orange supporter. His Twitter description reads “The latest Tweets from Robert Connelly (@RobertHConnelly). Proud to be @GlasgowTories candidate for Calton. Offering Glasweigans (sic) a #FreshStart from the failed lefty establishment. Glasgow, Scotland.” but his Twitter account is now deleted. Someting smelly there!
So Sandy Cooper, RABID “Yoon” Independent has resigned. I wonder if he will cease his anti SNP tirades in The Northern Scot as well.
I wonder what bounced him into resigning so soon?
Well whatever it cheered me up to see that proverbial gone from Moray Council.
Still Positive says:
10 May, 2017 at 11:08 pm
Arbroath 1320 and louis.b.argyll
Somerset Webb is a member of Scotland in Union. Emily Thornwood comes across as a decent politician, don’t know anything about the Ben guy.
David Hayman is a passionate Yesser who has made many great programmes on Scottish industry, etc for the BBC.
AH she is THAT somerset what not. I seem to recall the last time she was on the Conservative Broadcasting Corporation (formerly known as BBC
) “forgot” to mention anything about her being a member of Scotland in Union.
Only thing I can remember about Emily Thornberry is her faux pas over the White van man and England flags in 2015 General Election.
There is only one thing that needs saying about Ben Wallace SP … he’s a Tory candidate end of!
I have to admit to hanging my head in shame regarding David Hyman I didn’t recognise his name until I saw his picture. You are right though I too seen to recall him being big YES supporter.
From what I recall from Twitter the last time Joanna was on I garnered she did, like all SNP MP’s have done, extremely well in an overtly hostile situation.
I don’t actually watch BBCQT these days, mainly through the outright racism and the regular anti Scotland angle from audiences darn surf. I just wonder how many bus loads of folks from darn surf will roll up tomorrow night.
@stonefree says: 10 May, 2017 at 11:23 pm:
” … Me Sir, I had an excellent history teacher and later read about it in relationship to Bruce, Roslin and the Templars.”
Oh! I didn’t say there weren’t any Scots that hadn’t heard of such great victories, stoonefree – just that there were very few Scots, and even fewer non-Scots, who really have a clue as to Scottish history – and I mean the good bits and the bad bits.
For example one of the good bits – I knew an old Rabi when I went to school in Leith and he told me that he loved Scotland because Scotland was the only European country that had never, throughout its entire history, had an official pogrom against the Jews.
Robbo @ 23:45,
I’m sorry, but you obviously know not whereof you speak. The vast majority of common people were Presbyterians and they opposed the Union. Riots and all. The vast majority of the nobility were Episcopalians (semi-converted Roman Catholics) and it was from their ranks that support was bought for the Union. So phut goes that argument.
That’s history, since you bring it up, but it has nothing whatever to do with today anyway.
If you or anyone else introduces any kind of irrelevant division (religion, monarchy, EU, etc., etc) into the independence movement, and thereby scuppers the inevitable coming referendum, for your useless self-serving you will deserve to be branded by future history as another parcel of rogues.
As for the Orange Order, I don’t agree with them either. So what? Is anyone seriously contemplating some kind of population cleansing after indy? I mean, seriously. Are we only pretendy inclusive, then?
@Robert Pfeffers – Ireland never had an official pogrom against the Jews either. There was the so called “Limerick pogrom” of 1897, but that a) wasn’t official and b) wasn’t much of a pogrom, given that nobody was killed or injured and as an attempt to drive Jews out of Limerick it was an abject failure.
I’ll probably watch Question Time tomorrow.
Hayman has a deep understanding of the power of language and the language of power, he’ll be seeking out difficult questions. He is some dry powder for us.
Cherry is excellent, confident that the truth we seek is hidden behind a tapestry of lies..which must be challenged at every turn.
@ Dave McEwan Hill at 11.43
The Irish surname of which Walsh/Welsh is the anglicization is Breathnach, which is cognate with Briton, underlining the connection.
(You probably know that, but I thought it was worth pointing out for those who don’t, to back up your point.)
Ian More
My understanding is that Sandy Cooper offered to donate, from his £16,500 Councillor’s salary, £1,000 to each of the 5 local schools for each of the 5 years he would be a Councillor.
This has been deemed a bribe.
Hence his departure, altho he is saying that he just went off the idea!.
I’m sure it will be twisted round to SNP Baad…
In Stirling, the dodgy Tory has decided to stay – for the time being- but I’m sure it will become increasingly uncomfortable for him there and there is another on in Trossach’s and Teith who it seems might be even worse. Watch this space.
GrahamB @ 23:48:
Ah, didn’t know that. But it figures.
Surely the Ben Wallace scheduled for tomorrow’s QT is the same Ben Wallace who was the extreme right wing smug and nasty Tory MP for one of the NE seats until the great clear out of Scottish Tory MPs.
He was subsequently rewarded with a safe Tory seat in the S. of England.
@Dave McEwan Hill says: 10 May, 2017 at 11:43 pm:
“Wiliam Wallace (William Le Walys in Norman French) was not Norman. He was a Briton and his cumbric name loosely translated means William the Welshman.”
Perhaps so but there is a fundamental difference between what is now Wales, what is now Scotland or at least that bit of Scotland and what was Strathclyde.
In effect the ancient kingdom was all Celtic and the real result was not that it became Wales but that it divided up with the Celts being driven back into, Wales, the English West Country and areas of Scotland.
There are Gaelic Place names that prove that to be true.
Allowing an abuser (even of cultural history) freedom to ‘act’, is not equality..it’s irresponsable.
The 1690 lovers can believe in stuff blown out of all proportion, but not practice it’s hatred in public.
Sorry, but they have been ill-informed for centuries, while we have been distracted.
OT
It appears peace has broken out between US and Russia after the snap meeting between Trump and Lavrov,and the sacking of FBI Chief Comey.
Anti Russian Boris Johnston and flabby pansy Sir Mickie Fallon will need to change their rhetoric tout suite.
Watch the proud Great British crawl at their American and Russian masters feet now
O/T
Listened to a ConservativeBBC broadcast from Wales tonight.
They were asking folk how they were likely to vote in June.
Still quite a few diehard ‘Can’t possibly vote for Tories, ex-miner’s daughter, lifelong Labour supporters etc.’ which was reassuring.
But they found a few who would, for the 1st time, vote Tory –
‘Because TM seems to be a nice woman!’
‘Because TM is a strong leader’
that strategy seems to be working then!
and the saddest one of all ;-
‘I’m a Labour supporter but I’ll probably just vote Tory because the only ideas I’ve heard from Jeremy Corbyn are to make hospital parking free and give us four extra bank holidays.’
Shows you just how effective the impartial BBC is at getting out a balanced representation of the choice on offer.
Or could it be that they are deliberately broadcasting a biased slant on these elections?
From the little i’ve seen Corbyn seems to be having a good campaign with loads of people turning out for his visits.
@ gus1940
Ben Wallace was a list MSP for the north east, not an MP:
link to en.wikipedia.org
According to that article, he was once an “Austrian ski instructor”, despite not being Austrian, and despite “Austrian ski-ing” not being a thing, as far as I can tell. I suppose it means he was a ski-instructor, in Austria.
He’s also a member of the unintentionally hilarious Royal Company of Archers.
Eilidh at 8:47 pm
Eilidh there is nothing derogatory about any of the words, Migrants, foreigners, immigrants, ex-pats. My question was about Migrants and Ex-Pats. No mention of refugees or immigrants. You are answering a question that I didn’t ask.
I know the meaning of the words I used but I have always wondered why, migrants who move around for work or a way of life are different from the Ex-pats who also move around other countries for work and lifestyle. When abroad and you hear someone say they are an ex-pat living and working abroad you wonder why they don’t say they are migrants.
It really is just a simple question.
If Labour go into a coalition in Stirling with Majury and Davies then any pretence about being anything other than an anti-SNP party is out of the window. It will show that they stand for nothing.
crazycat says:
11 May, 2017 at 12:34 am
@ gus1940
Ben Wallace was a list MSP for the north east, not an MP:
link to en.wikipedia.org
According to the BBCQT page this is how they describe the panelists.
Panellists include Labour’s shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry, Conservative home office minister Ben Wallace, the SNP’s Joanna Cherry, actor David Hayman and Financial Times columnist Merryn Somerset Webb.
@BJ says: 11 May, 2017 at 12:37 am:
“I know the meaning of the words I used but I have always wondered why, migrants who move around for work or a way of life are different from the Ex-pats who also move around other countries for work and lifestyle. “
Well, BJ, I wasn’t going to get involved but here’s my tuppenceworth.
There isn’t any difference – it is just Yoon poor education, Little Englishness, bigotry and derogation..
Like Expatriate = GOOD: Migrant = BAAD.
and,
Patriot = GOOD: Nationalist = BAAD.
Like England = United Kingdom = Britain and Britain = Great.
Stick it on the BBC and demonize the BAAD and glorify the GOOD so often that you create a hate fest in Yoon culture.
Robert Peffers @ 00:25,
As I understand it, modern DNA evidence doesn’t support the longstanding “driven into the west” hypothesis, even though invasions from the east are indeed historically well-founded.
Apparently most locals (eg. “Picts” etc.) stayed right where they were, and where (allowing for relatively-recent greater mobility) they are still to be found today. They just changed culture, sometimes including language.
@ Arbroath1320
Yes, he’s an MP now; as gus1940 said he was given a safe seat in England.
But he was not one of the MPs who lost their seats in the great 1997 clear-out; he was an MSP from 1999 to 2003.
me @ 00:57,
Of course it is a truism (reputed originator, one J. Tamson) that we all got here at one time or another, it’s just that some of us made it a little earlier than others! =laugh=
And we have continued to rub along together ever since (sometimes with rather more friction than both wise or necessary)…
I’m guessing having Wallace on is the CBC way of having a “balanced” Scottish panel.
Still you’d have thought after last week’s “stupendous victory” byr the unlawful sex Ruth Davidson’s party she’d have been gagging to be front and centre again for some obscure reason she is M.I.A.
Slightly off topic, but I’m a bit worried about Moray, (and I live here).
I’ve been told from a usually reliable source that ‘the tories are throwing everything they’ve got at this seat’, presumably because taking out the leader of the SNP’s Westminster group would achieve more than just a tory gain.
Every ward in Moray returned a tory on first preference votes. I know you guys keep saying that local elections are no way to judge GE voting intention, but I’m still anxious.
I tried talking to people at work last week and heard ‘anyone but the SNP’ quite a lot, along with ‘all she does is bang on about Independence’. I tried to say that actually Nicola Sturgeon isn’t the one talking about indy, that would be Ruth and Kezia; that actually Nicola talks about policy and the SNP are doing a great job of managing public services. But no-one was listening – even self-styled SNP voters.
I think perhaps we’ve underestimated how much the wider public still believes what the media feeds them, and how hard the propaganda machine is fighting here. After all, without Scotland, and, more importantly, Scotland’s oil, little England is in deep doo-doo. It’s already about to lose a huge chunk of the financial services industry, losing us too would be the last straw.
Unless we can combat the MSM, I don’t quite see how we’re going to win scotref. I’d love to be persuaded otherwise but right now, I’m just scared.
The idea that so many of my colleagues and neighbours would vote for abhorrent tory policy rather than listen to the truth and see the possibilities has shaken me.
Jenni from Moray,
I am sorry that you are feeling shaken that some folk seem to be taken in by the MSM. This is not new.
That is one reason why our grassroots movement is so important. And why YOU have the power to make the difference.
Folk talking to folk.
We truly ARE on our road to Independence.
THAT is why the unionists are so scared = )
Robert Peffers@12:52
Thanks Robert! To be honest I always thought it a daft way of someone saying that they lived abroad and wondered why they didn’t call themselves migrants.
If they all come back to Britain after Brexit they’ll all be Ex-ExPats
The BBC is rotten and Sky is no better
I don’t for one minute believe any pish about SNP voters changing votes to Tory.
Get a grip! It was a cooncil election. A lot of people could not give a toss about them.
If there are really people who are swallowing the Tory ceech then sod them. Very soon they’re going to feel the hurt of Brexit and they will soon change their tune.
Keep the yoke!
Links
link to davesworld2017.wordpress.com
link to sbnn.co.uk
link to holyrood.com
link to commonspace.scot
link to thoughtcontrolscotland.com
link to autonomyscotland.org
link to thesecretbarrister.com
link to skwawkbox.org
link to uk.businessinsider.com
link to taxresearch.org.uk
link to irishtimes.com
link to tompride.wordpress.com
Nana, Good Morning, Sun is shining. Thank you for your links.
Kettle’s on! Peace Always.
Good morning Smallaxe. Looks like it’s going to be a nice day.
Checks on prime ministerial power are weak in Britain
link to cer.org.uk
A family not eating for days, a child collapsed at school, a dad working 3 jobs and still going hungry…
link to twitter.com
Brexit will leave ‘a business support black hole,’ says report
link to archive.is
Right-wing parties are working together globally and this international network is linked to Russia.
link to byline.com
Jenni,
I too live in Moray. Its an odd place. Lots of landed “toffs” and retired senior military types. Generals and Wing Commandrs. Indeed, one of them is on the board of Scotland in Union.
They have a network in their society that includes landowners like “Sir” Edward Mountain (Tory MSP and Baronet of somewhere in England) and Guy MacPherson Grant (Ballindalloch Estate), right down to the Ghillies and Gamekeepers they employ.
A big wedge of the population are elderly from south of the border (retired ex RAF) and lots of comfortably off pensioners.
Someone close to me works in property and cites that there is a steady influx of wealthy folks coming here from England. Most property enquiries are from there.
Indeed, I can walk down Elgin High Street, or go into Tesco in Elgin and not hear a local voice.
Im not saying that all are anti SNP and anti Scottish self-detetmination, but I would say most are.
I too despair, when despite a social media campaign outing Tory council candidates as holding extremist views,they still vote for them and now it seems, they want to vote for another, who has shown his disregard for our Parliament by missing debates and votes in order to referee football games and who has stated he would continue to do so if made an MP!
I must confess, that in dark moments, I would like to see these folk reap what they sow in their election choices, removal of free travel and prescriptions, dwindling state pensions, poor NHS health provision, imposition of tuition fees for their children etc.
Keep fighting on Jenni. Hopefully Angus will win, but if not, its only one battle and a majority of battles won elsewhere in Scotland will win this “war”.
(For anyone minded to criticise me for highlighting “incomers” as responsible for the developing political scene in Moray, yes, there are many locals – wealthy business people and folks from dying former fishing communities – who vote Tory, but Id say they are in a minority)
@Jenni
Yes I am anxious as well. The Tories made 5 gains and many of the “Tory” and “Kipper” Independents are back even considering that Moray Councils past ruling Tory- Independent Coalition was one of the most corrupt and incompetent in Scotland.
Actually I am more than anxious I am angry. I am seething mad at the c!!!s that voted to make sure we would have to suffer another 4 to 5 years of them. I am equally seething at that apathetic bastards who couldn’t get off their arses to vote to change things for the better in Moray.
I will be going to visit a family member who is in a care home today. It is a care home where the staff have to work 12 hour shifts and they are in my opinion understaffed. The Tories an “Tory” Independents and those that voted for them are cunts!
Nana, reading the Irish Times link I thought maybe we should just give the the dogs and cats a vote on Brexit
for heavens sake people of moray you have plenty of ammo to hit the torys with foreign tourists wiil go to ireland ie hotels and b and b empty malt whisky sales to europe france 2nd biggest export market,ruth says take back control of our fishing grounds but she didnt say no forein boats in scottish waters no italian shoting partys spending moeney or fishing on the spey
its shooting fish in a barrel time
Anent the Edinburgh rabbi, he was the father of Prof’ David Daiches who wrote an excellent biog of the man. It was Daiches himself who claimed that Scotland was the only country where the Jews were not persecuted & as Ireland was English then the quote wasn’t far wrong.
@ The Cabrath. Some eventually emigrated around the world. Others in the Army. India etc. Not a very good aspect. British colonism. One reason for the Asian extended conflict in 11WW. Terrible war. The locals acted as a fifth column. Now all are Independent. Most thriving. The UK Gov stopped Indian student visas. The Indian Gov imposed visas for travelling in Indian waters.
Labour policy to set up a central Bank in Scotland? A prelude to Independence?
GE FPTP. More people as a % vote. SNP has a better chance of a majority.
The fishing industry were throwing back dead fish for years. Destroying their own industry. There was a need for conservation or there would have been no fish left to catch. Any Gov would have to bring in conservation measures. If the NE has 80% of the UK fishing sector. There are no foreign boats there. All EU home ports have a priority 12 mile radius for landing fish. The rest of the UK has 20%. The West coast 10%? If there are Spanish boats there – 5%. UK fisherman can fish in the Mediterranean and the coast of Africa. Reciprocal agreements. Peterhead market is being extended with EU investment. In the NE there has been low unemployment for years. Alternative employment in the Oil & Gas sector, renewables etc.
The NE has supported the SNP for years. Alex Salmond has been representative for years. Extremely popular. The AWPR is finally being built. EU investment in wind energy. Labour has lost seats in ACC. The SNP/LibDems have worked together before. To improve the City. The Willy Young catastrophe getting the City into £1.2Billion of debt. Building the grotesque monstrosity. The best thing to do would to pull it down. Maybe the UTG project, predestrianising the City Centre can go forward. Supported by the majority.
In Spain some fish comes from Scotland, exported, but most of the varities are Mediterranean fish. Not eaten in the UK.
The UK fishermen should have been using bigger nets and protecting their own industry. Just like the Norwegians. The Tory fishing spokesman does not represent the whole industry, which needs migrant workers and the EU market for exports. For the best prices. Quotas are increasing because of agreements on larger net sizes. Negotiated by the SNP Richard Lockhead. Not a Home Counties Tory.
From a coldly political point of view this is excellent. Many of the Tory supporters have a negative view on immigrants. This won’t please them
@Jenni
Aberdeenshire the same as Moray, Tories first preference on Every ward.
So Ruth Davidson states Scotland needs more immigrants and that they are put off by high taxes and nothing whatsoever to do with immigrants who have lived worked and married here being deported from Scotland by the home office.
Also I may have missed it, but I don’t recall Davidson ever campaigning against the deportation of the Australian Brain or the Canadian Zielsdorf families.
It is possible we may be learning a very important lesson.
The only sustainable reason for support for the SNP is support for independence.
No matter what else the SNP does it should campaign for independence on a continuous basis.
No matter how well the SNP government runs this or that it will not be given credit for that. The media will make sure of that.
The reason for the huge surge of SNP support was the Independence referendum.
I do suspect they got peak Tory last Thursday, however, but the sooner we get onto the independence battleground and off battlegrounds on which we have no natural advantage the better.
The Tories mostly fielded just one candidate in most Wards.
The Vote Management Strategy used by the SNP had two candidates trying for parity of first vote in the hope of getting two across the line.
It got close to working in many Wards.
This situation will, I hope work in our favour during a GE by motivating our vote in a FPTP situation against the perceived increase in the Tory vote.
Apparently WH Smiths in Elgin have stopped stocking ‘The National’ just 4 weeks before GE17. Funny that.
Dave McEwan Hill says:
Agree completely, now. The SNP’s success has in part been down to good governance, but now the only game in town is the constitutional one.
I also agree the Tories won’t increase. They got their vote out last week, many postal. They would get all that many more in numbers at the GE, IMO.
To get the SNP numbers up we need to get our voters out and I believe Indy in the light of an impending dreadful Brexit is the key.
Scottish fishing is run by tory fcukwits. Biggest and richest market for Scottish fish produce is the EU. Now tories and some fish folk have flounced out of this vital EU market, for their quality produce.
So EU will tell tory fish fcukwits, give our EU fisherman access to your fish, or EU tariffs on your produce will destroy you.
Its all tying in to the great Empire 2.0 tory fraud but it may be the only way out. You can buy very high quality frozen Icelandic cod steaks across the USA.
Get negotiating tory fcukwits.
Happy to see indy posts and posts about fishing industry better off in the EU from an old fishing pal on Facebook He’s been on the boats since the age of sixteen. The BBC always like to portray fishermen as pro brexit and anti indy but the reality is different
The comments above on what is effectively the colonisation of the Moray area are particularly poignant as people from that area and as far as Aberdeenshire came to join the Highland army at Culloden.
If you read H J Paton’s Claim of Scotland, there was talk in the 1960s among the Brit establishment to colonise the most productive areas of Scotland with English settlers to stop the growth of Independence.
Sadly, the people of those areas seem to be letting it happen all by themselves. Subservient and deferentially seems to be in the genes of some Scots.
@Robert J. Sutherland says: 11 May, 2017 at 12:13 am:
“That’s history, since you bring it up, but it has nothing whatever to do with today anyway.”
Matter of fact it has everything to do with today and, hopefully, Scotland’s future.
In the first place what Scotland wants to end is the Treaty of Union. Here is Article 2 of that Treaty:-
(Bold emphasis is mine).
That is openly and explicitly not only stamping religious bigotry upon the United KIngdom but is actively anti-Scottish, (and that is the Scottish Parliaments version of the treaty).
Secondly the bribery part of the forced union was only a small part of the forced deal. Other things forcing the Scottish parliamentarians were coercion, (blackmail in English), and a military force massed on the border and an English fleet lying of the Firth of Forth. Not to mention a seat in the HOL.
” … If you or anyone else introduces any kind of irrelevant division (religion, monarchy, EU, etc., etc) into the independence movement, and thereby scuppers the inevitable coming referendum, for your useless self-serving you will deserve to be branded by future history as another parcel of rogues.” Pish!
“As for the Orange Order, I don’t agree with them either. So what? Is anyone seriously contemplating some kind of population cleansing after indy? I mean, seriously. Are we only pretendy inclusive, then?”
Don’t be bloody stupid. The point is that the basic UK law is now anti-RC and needs changed. Under the Scottish legal system religious freedom is guaranteed which is why there is NO established church in Scotland and the monarch is explicitly barred from being head of the church.
In truth the whole bloody deal that is the Treaty of Union is nothing more than the Westminster Establishment in 1707 using divide and conquer as a big hammer to take over Scotland. So Scottish independence is sweeping away religious intolerance and xenophobia, not introducing it.
One last thought on “notional” results or at least the methods behind them. In modelling other phenomena it’s common to backcast so what might be possible is to take the results of this election and apply the same methods used to guesstimate the 2012 result based on the new boundaries to get notional results for 2017 if the old boundaries had been in place. Perhaps, shockeroonie, it’ll turn out that there’s a bias towards giving more seats to parties with a larger of percentage of first preferences.
@ Robert Peffers
Was there actually an English force massed at the border?
I’ve read that the general in question was actively fighting in Spain at the time.
Apparently it might have been just a rumour/ruse spread by the English.
RP,
You’ve really missed the sodding point. By stigmatising Presbeterians in the way you do you go a long way towards entrenching a myth beneficial to those in the OO and others.
Besides which one of the founding principles of Scotland as a nation is that our King should not be beholden to a foreign prince.
Obviously in a modern setting where the church of Scotland is not headed by the monarch it’s far easier to simply ignore attempts at imposing contrary doctrines.
Indeed, according to Wiki, Holyrood have already passed a motion to remove any discrimination.
Remember though that the whole act of succession was a reaction to attempts by a monarch to impose his “Divine Right” on both his kingdoms. Something Scotland was willing to put up with due to him being an old fart with an heir who was Protestant so it was unlikely to be a problem for too high.
This would all be far easier if Scotland was independent though.
@joannie says: 11 May, 2017 at 12:14 am:
@Robert Pfeffers – Ireland never had an official pogrom against the Jews either.
Sorry to burst that wee bubble, Joanne, but the 1290 expulsion of the Jews from England applied to Ireland as Ireland came under the Lordship of the King of England, (by appointment of the Holy Roman Se). A large part of Ireland, mainly Leinster and Munster was under English rule from the twelfth century for three centuries. So there was a legal pogrom against the Jews in Ireland under the English Kings Lordship of Ireland.
ALERT ALERT ALERT
There is a huge lie – and I mean a huge lie – on the front page of the Daily Record today. It says that dwindling oil revenues has cost SCOTLAND £388 million.
Scotland does not get and never has had any oil revenues (which are all tax anyway)which all goes to London.
They should be called out
Robert Peffers @ 10:26,
It’s one (necessary) thing to be aware of one’s history, quite another to be chained by it. That’s the problem the likes of the OO suffer from. Alas it sometimes seems that you share that tendency too.
(And no need to be so gratuitously rude with it either.)
The Pale was a small part of Ireland. The English were confined there until Tudor times.