This select gathering is all the Scottish Conservative conference delegates who were interested in discussing the party’s approach to devolving more powers to the Scottish Parliament in the event of a No vote in the independence referendum of 2014.
Readers far more cynical than ourselves may find the picture a useful gauge by which to measure the true degree of interest the Tories have in more powers.
It’s taken 306 years for the people of Scotland to be allowed a democratic voice on the constitution of their country. It’s a thing that was never supposed to happen. The Scottish Parliament’s electoral system was constructed deliberately and explicitly to prevent any party achieving a majority – in theory ensuring that the SNP could never pass a referendum bill – even though the two main UK parties still resolutely defend the First Past The Post system that produces them at Westminster.
This morning’s Daily Record carries a story about Ed Balls’ policy speech on welfare yesterday. Commendably, the Labour-supporting paper isn’t shy of pointing out the implications of Balls’ comments:
“Scots could get welfare benefits at lower rates than people in wealthy parts of England under plans being worked on by Labour. Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls yesterday raised the idea of a regional cap on welfare, opening the door to variations in a range of social security benefits.
Balls said the welfare cap of £25,000 a year per household should be higher in London but could be lower in parts of the UK where housing is cheaper.”
We’d have been even more impressed, though, if Wings Over Scotland hadn’t revealed the reality of what Labour’s future plans meant for Scotland almost three weeks ago.
The Scottish media is full today of Gordon Brown’s latest attempted intervention in the independence debate. Scotland on Sunday and the Sunday Herald both report that the former Prime Minister will urge Scots to “ditch the Tories, not the Union” (as the original SoS headline put it before being changed online to the rather more sober “Brown urges Scots not to give up on UK”, presumably out of respect for the gentle sensibilities of the paper’s Conservative-leaning readership).
(We’d like to take a brief moment here to appreciate a couple of beautifully acidic, deadpan lines from the Herald’s piece, written by Paul Hutcheon. Our emphasis.)
“Brown, who led his party to defeat at the last General Election, will be the special guest at an event in Glasgow. Although Labour has a dominant role in the cross-party Better Together campaign, senior party sources last year pushed for a separation to convey Labour’s distinctive message.”
The substance of Brown’s argument, in so far as it can be said to have any, is founded on a lie that was comprehensively disproved on this very website well over a year ago – namely that “if Scottish Labour supporters vote to leave the UK it would mean abandoning colleagues in England to years of Tory rule”.
That proposition is demonstrably untrue (not to mention a remarkably defeatist assertion that Labour can’t now defeat the Tories in England, despite having done so in 1997, 2001 and 2005). But even if it wasn’t, what then?
Extracts from a piece last year on the highly influential Conservative Home:
“Drawn up more than three decades ago by now Lord Barnett the [Barnett] formula distributes taxpayers’ money across the UK. Even Lord Barnett now describes the formula as “unfair”. On both the Left (IPPR) and Right (TaxPayers’ Alliance) there is agreement that the formula is well past its sell-by date. Scotland and Northern Ireland receive a much greater share of UK taxpayers’ money than need in either country would require. The biggest losers are the poorer English regions and Wales.
This seems one of the great no-brainers of British politics. England is losing up to £4.5 billion every year because a Conservative-led government is sending that money to parts of the UK that stubbornly refuse to vote Conservative. So let a [2015] Conservative Prime Minister call for the phased ending of the Barnett formula.”
“Vote No, Get Nothing” is starting to look a little optimistic.
In this site’s view, there are just two things the Yes campaign needs to get across to the Scottish people in order to win the independence referendum. All the quibbling over this detail and that detail, as seen in the No camp’s ridiculous (and so far mythical) “500 questions”, will ultimately come down to two simple facts at the ballot box:
1. There will be NO significant new powers for the Scottish Parliament in the event of a No vote. If anything, the opposite will be true.
2. The Scottish people already want independence. They simply haven’t yet realised that the thing they want is called independence.
Win on those two, and the Yes side will win everything.
We gather a few refreshments are usually taken at party conferences, so given that Eddie Barnes of the Scotsman is in Inverness covering the Scottish Labour gathering, perhaps a hangover explains his rather confused piece for Scotland on Sunday today.
There are three particularly notable passages, which we’ll take you through quickly here so you don’t have to go and read them on the paper’s website.
Scottish Labour’s record time for a policy U-turn was already pretty low. It took less than 24 hours from Johann Lamont’s infamous “something for nothing” speech before her MSPs were hastily popping up in the papers to insist that various universal services were in fact NOT under threat at all. (Despite the fact that the head of the commission investigating them had explicitly said that nothing was off the table.)
But yesterday saw the hapless party set a new personal best.
We hate to harp on. But it may be that there are still some people stuck in a cave somewhere in the Hebrides who think Johann Lamont is the “leader” of a political party called “Scottish Labour” rather than a regional branch manager of one based in London, and who imagine that the findings of her commission on devolution – should there actually be any before the referendum – will become official Labour policy.
The media is in full-on spin mode today, reporting Ruth Davidson’s miraculous Damascene conversion to the principle of “more powers” for the Scottish Parliament, just 18 short months after her Churchill-esque declaration of devolutionary defiance to the effect that the petty tinkering of the Scotland Act was a “line in the sand”.
Most of the papers, of course, feign critical analysis by highlighting Davidson’s U-turn. But what we haven’t seen in a single one is any sort of actual examination of the content of Ms Davidson’s speech to a micro-audience of literally several people in what appeared to be the corridor of an Edinburgh hotel yesterday.
We suspect that’s because anyone who did would be very hard-pressed indeed to credibly describe the measures she proposes as representing “more powers” for anything. In fact, they’re the opposite.
A lot of independence supporters are getting excited today about this clip of Labour shadow-cabinet MP Helen Goodman telling the BBC that Labour would keep the bedroom tax. They’re right to highlight it, but most are doing so for the wrong reasons.
Goodman’s position is that Labour WOULD still implement the hated tax, but would only penalise people for over-occupying their housing if they’d been offered smaller accommodation and refused to move. Opponents of Labour are observing the hypocrisy of the party raging against the tax in public while admitting they’d retain it, which is fair enough, but also misses the real point.
willie on When the law breaks the law: “Ultimately if you live with a shortage of money, food, heating and lighting life becomes hard and stressful. Factor in…” Feb 25, 21:33
robertkknight on When the law breaks the law: “And what’s your point caller? Scottish and European me… Not British! (Only thing ‘British’ about yours truly concerns either geography,…” Feb 25, 21:28
sam on When the law breaks the law: “Scotland’s mental health problems are somewhat worse overall than in E&W. One in 4 Scots has a mental health problem-…” Feb 25, 21:22
sam on When the law breaks the law: “Mental health issues. England and Wales. “One in five adults (20.2%) in England are living with a common mental health…” Feb 25, 21:06
GM on When the law breaks the law: “Debatable, given the turnouts in EU elections. I voted remain because I thought England might vote to leave. Political ammunition,…” Feb 25, 19:54
sam on When the law breaks the law: “The first food bank in the UK opened in 2000. In 2026 there are about 2600 food banks. The main…” Feb 25, 17:25
Cynicus on When the law breaks the law: “Young Lochinvar 25 February, 2026 at 2:10 am CY…… ….You can take your choice but Unless you have an axe…” Feb 25, 17:24
sam on When the law breaks the law: “Child poverty in England is at 31 %. In Scotland it is 22%. Still too high but the difference is…” Feb 25, 17:14
sam on When the law breaks the law: “People in Scotland, a rich country with many resources, do not have healthy lives. The average period of good health…” Feb 25, 17:01
agentx on When the law breaks the law: ““The Scottish government has announced it will establish a Scotland-wide grooming gangs inquiry chaired by Prof Alexis Jay, who led…” Feb 25, 16:54
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on When the law breaks the law: “MP URGES LESSONS TO BE LEARNT FROM DETRANSITIONER HARMED BY ‘AFFIRMING CARE’ A girl ushered into social and medical treatments…” Feb 25, 16:22
Alf Baird on When the law breaks the law: “There is neither dignity nor morality in colonialism, whose very aim is ‘to widen inequality’ (Memmi) based on ‘hateful racism’…” Feb 25, 15:44
lothianlad on When the law breaks the law: “100% correct. I tried several times to get the SNP run council and the MP, MSP to have this recognised.…” Feb 25, 15:32
Hatey McHateface on When the law breaks the law: ““The responses showed an alarming amount of ignorance and a lack of concern” One interpretation, certainly. Other interpretations are possible,…” Feb 25, 14:12
sam on When the law breaks the law: “The neoliberal policies that Scotland in the UK has experienced since 1979 seem like a kind of colonialism, A rentier…” Feb 25, 13:47
Ian Smith on When the law breaks the law: “If 80% of people are Scottish or Scottish and British only, why is joining the EU so popular?” Feb 25, 13:22
Hatey McHateface on When the law breaks the law: “Nae fear o hoarse joabbies, TFIOD. Unicorn joabbies smell, taste and look indistinguishable frae Pick’n’Mix, richt doon tae the individual…” Feb 25, 12:55
The Flying Iron of Doom on When the law breaks the law: “Hatey McHateface says: 24 February, 2026 at 8:29 pm Unicorn Land. You know, I quite like that idea. My only…” Feb 25, 09:04
Hatey McHateface on When the law breaks the law: “I would expect a lot of support for an amended proposal, especially among those Scottish patriots who extol the virtues…” Feb 25, 08:41
Hatey McHateface on When the law breaks the law: “@Cynicus That’s an empty slogan that doesn’t stand up to thoughtful assessment, parroted by the dense. History is written by…” Feb 25, 08:01
Young Lochinvar on When the law breaks the law: “CY Yes. But Fraser was better, Comyn effed up at Fa’kirk, did the dirty at Dumfries while Bruce won the…” Feb 25, 02:10
Cynicus on When the law breaks the law: “Here you go https://archive.is/AkJ3C History, remember, is written by the winners. The winner here was NOT The Bruce but his…” Feb 25, 00:50
Hatey McHateface on When the law breaks the law: “Good one, Confused. No messing about. Straight to what’s on your mind. Ach, maybe immediately is better. Straight doesn’t quite…” Feb 24, 23:08
Confused on When the law breaks the law: “I am deeply annoyed at the rejection of my planning proposal for TOP HAT BUGGERY LAND at trinity college quadrangle,…” Feb 24, 22:57
Confused on When the law breaks the law: “I think Main has tourettes and his tics make him post all day – time for a wee film “John…” Feb 24, 22:56
Young Lochinvar on When the law breaks the law: “AX Very droll 🙂 Try original sources? Very educational: “learns you things”..” Feb 24, 22:34
Hatey McHateface on When the law breaks the law: “Unicorn Land. Immensely popular with the youngsters, whilst staying true to our rich, cultural heritage. Maybes a nod to our…” Feb 24, 20:29
agentx on When the law breaks the law: “FGS – no-one wants fun and enjoyment and jobs in Scotland. Misery rules OK?” Feb 24, 19:51
Scot Finlayson on When the law breaks the law: “They should never have kept with the name `Flamingo Land`, Loch Lomond Leisure or Eagles View Holidays. we need to…” Feb 24, 19:39
Hatey McHateface on When the law breaks the law: “Behold! The other pole of the Baird/Northy axis appears. As if from nowhere. Alert readers will be verifying Northy’s claims.…” Feb 24, 19:34
