The Gathering Storm
After months of phony war, we’re actually about to find out something concrete about the current state of Scottish politics.
The omens aren’t massively auspicious.
The conditions for today’s by-election in Rutherglen & Hamilton West could have been deliberately designed to depress turnout. It’s going to be bucketing with rain from the moment the polls opened until teatime, when it’ll ease off slightly just in time for the 5.45pm Europa League kickoff in Cyprus when “Rangers” take on Aris Limassol, after which it’ll be dark.
(And goodness knows the Ibrox side’s unhappy fans could use seeing what on paper ought to be an easy win after a miserable few weeks that culminated in the sacking of their manager after a humiliating pumping at home from the mighty Aberdeen FC that leaves them already trailing Celtic in the league by seven points.)
Meanwhile photo ID is now required at all polling stations and the SNP have been tweeting poorly-designed graphics likely to confuse people into thinking they need a whole raft of paperwork to vote.
The party has struggled to put boots on the ground in the seat. Reliable SNP insiders tell us that almost all of its veteran activists have quit for Alba, and the party’s blue-haired Twitler Youth have conspicuously failed to show up to fill the gaps, evidently not fancying the hard work of chapping doors in Hamilton and trying to persuade folk to vote for Paedophile Rapist Story Time in local primary schools and locking women in changing rooms with drag queens or whatever the latest policy initiatives are.
Astonishingly, local SNP councillors actually picketed hustings on the grounds that women’s rights were being discussed at them, and in which the female SNP candidate refused to appear. (We’re not aware of a single hustings open to the public that either Labour or the SNP took part in, which is absolutely extraordinary.)
MPs and MSPs and payroll staff have been browbeaten into making appearances, but the former groups mostly just do a photoshoot at the trans-flag-bedecked campaign HQ, give each other a round of applause for God knows what, and scurry back home.
It’s so grim even the CEO has had to do a shift.
Labour sources, on the other hand, say that they’re fighting off volunteers who “want to come up and get the buzz”, and that the vibe in the party is “like how the SNP used to be. Fresh and enthusiastic and contagious”.
According to a very senior Labour figure speaking to an undercover Wings operative while campaigning in the constituency, “the numbers are looking good and [we] might not even need the SNP voters to stay home”, but despite that we know of dedicated, tireless independence campaigners and former SNP staffers who are voting Labour today just to make absolutely sure there’s no chance of a surprise SNP win.
And yet there’s the potential for the by-election to be calamitous for both of the main contenders. Nobody seriously thinks Labour will fail to win, but the size of the victory will be key. There have been – surprisingly – no polls of the constituency, but Labour still isn’t ahead in national polling in Scotland despite the utterly shambolic state of both the SNP and the Tories, and few people detect any great groundswell of public enthusiasm for Anas Sarwar’s branch office on the ground.
(Everyone else with the possible exception of the Tories is likely to lose their deposit.)
If Labour wins narrowly – by a few hundred votes or a couple of thousand – it’ll put on a brave face but be severely deflated, as Sir John Curtice notes with his customary astuteness in today’s Scottish Sun.
Sarwar will be hoping that the constituency’s enormous historic volatility works in his favour. Rutherglen & Hamilton West has changed hands three times in the last eight years, and we can’t think of many seats anywhere in the UK that have been won with over 50% of the vote by different parties in consecutive elections.
As recently as 2010 Labour’s vote share in the seat was a breathtaking 61%, an astonishing figure even for the era of Labour’s vote being weighed in Scotland rather than counted. But just five years later it saw a record-shattering 31% swing to the SNP’s Margaret Ferrier. When the people of R&HW lose faith in a party, they don’t mess about.
We have no idea what the result is going to be. Like everyone else we’re expecting a low turnout, but it’s not guaranteed. All the Unionist parties are salivating at the prospect of giving the SNP a real kicking, with a significant number of Tory voters expected to defect for the night. Labour has barely been able to conceal its triumphalist glee before a single ballot has been cast.
Meanwhile canvassers tell us that the SNP’s support is thoroughly scunnered with the party and likely to stay at home out of the rain. But it’s at least possible that their tribal hatred of Labour coupled with their residual support for independence could overcome it. (If anyone still believes the SNP are interested in independence, of course.)
For the sake of argument, Wings predicts a mid-30s turnout and a thumping Labour win by 5,000 votes or more, although we wouldn’t put a lot of money on either. In truth, anything substantially less would be a shockingly poor performance for them, indicating that 16 years in wretched and ineffectual opposition under a succession of comically hopeless leaders had destroyed the Scottish party beyond salvation as a meaningful force.
(The Kezia Dugdale era, when Labour regularly trailed in 3rd place behind the Tories or even worse, must have been especially traumatising for a party that once owned Scotland. We find ourselves, to our own considerable disbelief, forced to look back on Johann Lamont’s reign as a relative highpoint of political competence and vision, although it really is impossible to overstate just what a low bar that is.)
Whatever happens, though, we’ll finally have some solid data on the state of play in Scottish politics and the likely shape of the future. And for that at least, we can’t wait.
The protest against the 39 community facility closures which North Lanarkshire Council Policy & Strategy Committee voted for on 28th September takes place today. Due to pressure from the public North Lanarkshire Council have, for now, u-turned on these closures until at least 2027.
Our protest goes ahead today to remind them that they work for us, on our behalf, to protect our community, not destroy it, and these facilities must remain open forever, not just unil election day.
The protest takes place from 3pm outside the Civic Chambers, Windmillhill Street, Motherwell.
Come and join us and make your voice heard.
https://fb.me/e/1C20bf6am
“And goodness knows the Ibrox side’s unhappy fans could do with what on paper should be an easy win after a miserable few weeks that culminated in the sacking of their manager..”
I expected you to have a good, well deserved, gloat long before now. LOL! The sacking of ‘Ian’ Beale did, however, get me wondering if it was going to be Sharon, Bianca or Ricky replacing him. The bookies have got Pauline at 8/1 and ‘Dirty Den’ to make a surprise comeback at 10/1. 😉
Roll on 10pm..
SNP will be gubbed.
It’ll give us an indication of how many Unionists are sticking with GRR nonsense.
I wouldn’t read to much into it tho cause if I could vote I’d stay at home & wait until the GA next yr.
If it was a football match, I’d say “I hope they both get beat”.
I hope the scunnered indy supporters vote for Colette Walker. It would be great if the ISP got more votes than the Greens, a party I now wholeheartedly despise.
SNP shelling out for paid advertising in the local newspaper this week. I don’t remember that being necessary or acceptable normally.
Rules around this election appear to have been made up ad-hoc. The letters from the council are not in the same format as you’d normally see. One might think that council officers can get away with making up their own rules.
The only “non payroll” local SNP people seen around are 3 teenage boys. A constant stream of “payroll” SNP people from out of the area, but no idea how long they hang around after the photo shoots. I wonder if they ever ask themselves WHY they are required? Do they ever ask themselves what happened to the hundred or so local activists that Margaret Ferrier could command?
What an utter waste of time, of loyalties, of money that’s in very short supply. Proof if need be that there was no strategic thinking in SNP HQ whatsoever. A textbook lesson in how to gift everything to your opponents.
Best wishes to Collette Walker, the Independence candidate today.
get roof davison in for a prediction
– she knows where the postal votes are buried
Nae doubt the SNP will wow the electorate wi a last minute promise o skooshie cream for all schoolbairns, under the age o 11. A vote winning manoeuvre ( albeit a wee bit late) ??
Those pictures of Humza and the nuSNP look like a surprise birthday party organised by Capability Scotland. They don’t look like serious people you’d trust to get you a pint of milk from the shops.
Did they get Beth Douglas to jump out of a giant novelty cake?
The Rangers game might divert a few Unionists to the pub or keep them at home. Giving the SNP a glimmer of hope that they don’t deserve.
A real stormy gathering.
https://archive.ph/F36ry
What’s needed is some drama.
Voting superannuated old Labour on a dreich thursday somehow lacks panache.
I hope SNP and Greens get gubbed.
I don’t want Lab to win but the SNP/Greens need shocked out of their bubble.
Good luck to Colette Walker but it seems Scotlands voters are very conservative with their choices.
“Meanwhile canvassers tell us that the SNP’s support is thoroughly scunnered with the party and likely to stay at home out of the rain.”
They should get out the vote for Colette Walker of the ISP. They should but they won’t. If they did though, now that would be truly seismic!
Possibly the deciding factor will be the postal votes.
We know that the big parties have been heavily promoting signing up for posting voting for years now. I understand it’s a high percentage now of the electoral register which has postal votes.
Then the vast majority of those people will send in those postal votes in the first 24 hours or so after they come through the letterbox. It’s a mindless tribalism in place.
Postal votes should only be available to those people who cannot physically get to the polling stations.
Regarding ID to vote, I have been working at my local polling station for several years and what boggles my mind is that we still use pencil to mark our ballots. All anyone needs is a simple rubber to alter the vote of thousands of people and leave no trace.
And as for ALBA running protection for Sturgeon and snitching Sunak to the cops, this is even more fishy than Salmond never once questioning the integrity of the Indy referendum back in 2014.
A win for SNP/Labour/Conservatives/Liberal Democrats would be a loss for Scotland and its people. What a time to be alive.
Covidhoax at 1:14pm – pencils are on offer but voters aren’t obliged to use them… anyone can bring their own pen if they wish.
I also thought Chris McEleny’s grandstanding yesterday was not his finest hour. First, Sunak didn’t cross any line – all he said was that she “may go down” and so might anyone who has been arrested and questioned in an investigation: she might or she might not, that’s what “may” means. Second, Sunak was speaking outside Scotland, so good luck getting a passing Quality Polis to arrest him. Plus they’re all too busy demeaning the office of constable by getting doctors to write them sick notes about how they can’t live without a beard.
Good luck to Colette Walker ISP.
As for Labour and SNP, I don’t care about these pro-devolution Unionist, Anti-women parties.
British Red Tory and British Tartan Tory scum.
Knight of the Realm, John Curtice, is a pretty astute commentator alright, if only because he knows very well what will or won’t be permitted to pass the editing-process intact. To that extent, as his media-longevity shows, he is very astute.
(Credit to Tom Harris, the ex-MP for Glasgow Cathcart)
NHS Lothian have decided that the best use of £40 million of taxpayer money is to pay it out in reparations for slavery to Jamaica and Africa, to atone for slavery. It seems that their predecessor organisation in the 19th century had been left a bequest by a Scottish surgeon in the Caribbean who also owned an estate which had some slaves on it, so they decided that it should be updated by inflation and paid out.
I thought that the NHS was for public healthcare, not paying reparations for something that nobody alive today was responsible for. And that’s £40 million of Scottish money that’s not going to be spent on Scottish healthcare.
The Royal Navy largely ended the slave trade, and it had about 15% of the sailors who came from Scotland. Isn’t that service reparation enough?
Turnout 12% so far
The Britnat branch office parties at Holyrood are bad for Scots health and wealth as are the SNP, which has become the major roadblock to ditching this rancid union, the once good indy party is no longer a party for Scottish independence, its time to stop voting for it, for sadly the quicker the SNP goes into demise the sooner we can replace it with a party THAT DOES support Scotland dissolving this prison of union.
Shed no tears for the party, it is now a party of lying, deceitful, grifting careerists who’ll tow the party line whatever no matter what bizarre (and unwanted by the public) policies that its hierarchy are pushing.
Only vote for the Alba party or the ISP the rest of the mainstream parties including the SNP are unionist.
I don’t want BLiS to win in the Rutherglen West Hamilton by-election, I also don’t want any other unionist party to win either including the SNP, I want the ISP’s Collette Walker to win but that’s unlikely.
@red sunset who said :
“Turnout 12% so far”
For a by-election is that good? bad? normal at this time of day?
@Republicofscotland who said
“I want the ISP’s Collette Walker to win ”
So do I!
Wonder how many Rutherglen voters agree with us?
Meanwhile the liar Humza Yousaf had to apologise at FMQ’s for calling the liar Douglas Ross a liar, it says a lot about our lying deceitful politicians, and our parliamentary rules that you can’t call a spade a spade without being rebuked.
In my opinion the chamber is full to the gunnels with dirty lying b*stards, who’ll say anything knowing they are safe until election time comes around.
In fairness to Katy regarding not turning up to hustings, it seems she hasn’t been allowed to talk for herself throughout the campaign so Humza would have to be the one there to answer questions.
What if most of Scotland did not vote ever,
Whilst we have a rigged system and enforced ID whereby security from hackers is not guaranteed.
Perhaps no Scot voting under this system sends a better message,
Especially if only the own party branches and members are the only ones to show up to vote.
A large VETO vote by not voting, might be stronger and similar option, when you study what a veto did the bud beer company corporation loads os finances.
Perhaps Scotland for the first time should stop repeating the same old mistake. We should not do what the wolf political pack expect us to do,
Sometimes not doing what the establishment want is harder but wiser long term,
We never get who we vote for anyway,
Asa,
You explained your family backgound to us all once before, you don’t need to keep trying to justify your family, we get it.
“Gathering storm, gathering storm”…I’m thinking, where do I know those words in a specific poem?
Well, youse lot whae ken yer Scots poyums know it’s from Tam O’Shanter.
An updated version might tell of a “sulky sullen dame…”
Gathering her brows like gathering storm,
Cursing Clerkin for Operation Branchform.
Yes, I am easily amused…
I am not voting in a rigged system, until that bias system collapses, and it would if many followed suit,
Imagine hardly any votes for all Scottish political parties in Holyrood.
Three quaters of Scotland voters absent from all elections.
That would be news in every country,
That is a legal principle and protest that no one can charge you with,
A Scottish independence veto on the devolved Scottish parliament parties,
@ ben madigan 2.27pm
I’m not sure about past turnouts.
Would be good to hear from anyone who has records like this.
A couple of years ago, almost a quarter of the electorate had registered for postal voting, according to National Records of Scotland. This was an increase of around a third in just a year so it could be more now.
With today’s rain, football etc, the comments by Confused at 12.26pm and Red Sunset at 1.01 and 2.10pm point to postal voting playing a significant part in the result. Interesting that it’s the big parties that have been promoting postal voting.
For anyone with a vote who cares about independence, there’s still time to hunt out the wellies, put on a raincoat and go and vote for Colette Walker, ISP.
Megs 2.29pm
If that’s the case, why is she standing?
@AScot Abroad
“The Royal Navy largely ended the slave trade, and it had about 15% of the sailors who came from Scotland. Isn’t that service reparation enough?”
This seems largely meaningless since legislation is what ended slavery.
Also, reparations for ending the slavery were made as a condition of ending slavery.
The payments were not to those who suffered the enormous crimes against humanity. They were made to slave owners.
Payment of £20 million was made to compensate slave owners -around 40% of the budget and worth about £17 billion today.
The debt incurred to make these reparations was not fully paid until 2015.The families of PMs David Cameron and William Gladstone were compensated.
A descendant of the slave owner, Robert Porteous, was Frances Smith. She married Claude Bowes-Lyon and their grand-daughter was the mother of Elizabeth II.
The Royal Navy was only involved in seizing ships after slave trading was made illegal in 1807. The RN was hardly providing a “service”.
The 1807 Act that abolished the trading of slaves did nothing to liberate those already enslaved.It took until 1833 for that to happen and slavery continued for some time after in the form of unpaid “apprenticeships”.
The length of time between now and the period of these savage atrocities does not matter according to international law coming out of the Nuremberg Trials. UN principles say that reparation for crimes against humanity should be made.
Poster Boy.
https://archive.ph/TcfhW
@ red sunset 3:13pm
Rutherglen & Hamilton is a fairly new constituency and as such has never had a by-election before. General election turnouts have been a little lower than the national average.
UK wide, by-election turnouts in recent years have averaged around 40%, but vary quite widely, so between 30% and 50% mostly.
All being equal, if this was a run-of-the-mill by-election, I’d expect turnout to be around 35%, but it could vary considerably from that.
https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-8060/CBP-8060.pdf
Mermaids leaving X(Twitter) for Tik Tok, a far better target rich environment. The SNP will be signing up for the training courses and the Weekends away. I expect our schools will be funding Mermaids under official promotion
https://x.com/StandingforXX/status/1709929705087148111?s=20
NOT grooming, Definitely NOT grooming
I contested a by election in 1990 in dPaisley South. It was in November and the turnout was 55% if that helps.
A House of Commons Library report shows that the average voter turnout at 16 by-elections over the last four years was just under 40%.
(from page 47, UK Election Statistics: 1918-2023, A Long Century of Elections)
Sam,
the large majority of ships stopped by the Royal Navy after 1807 were Portuguese and Spanish, running slaves to Latin America. Some were Barbary corsairs.
But my point is more narrow. It’s really Tom Harris’ point, but I agree with it. Why is an NHS trust using public money, given as part of a budget approved by Holyrood, for the purpose of healthcare in Scotland, and funded by Scottish taxpayers, to give money for reparations? Who approved that, and on whose authority?
It’s very quiet BTL here on Wings.
The SNP are doomed tonight. And I care not one joy, it really is time to rip it up and start again
I’d put a tenner on the turnout being historically low. I mean, from a punter’s perspective, the choices are either a party that ran Scotland like it’s personal property while lying about fighting for… oh wait.
Did anyone watch this:
https://twitter.com/TuckerCarlson
One thing Tucker Carlson asked was if there had ever been a study of transexuals sex lives.
I understand what it means to be gay. It’s simple gay people are same sex attracted. Trans people I have no idea.
Are transexual people asexual? Does all the drugs & castration just turn them into eunuchs?
Yes I think a study of transgender sex lives would be very interesting.
Sorry I am off topic but QFMDs I can’t get exciting about the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election.
Regards this Rutherglen By Election, one thing SNP “Leadership” has to answer for, is their absolute refusal to have anything to do with ALBA, with no cooperation whatever thus far, even when ALBA tries to be constructive, but here, we have the Greens putting up a candidate, even tho Greens are now part of the Scottish Government, and yet SNP still insist on keeping in with the Greens!
Even tho Greens know full well this a must win vote for SNP, could actually cost SNP this election (the way they helped put Ruth Davidson into Holyrood for Edinburgh Central) and thus hinder the cause for Independence.
Yes, we know SNP has been hopeless these past years under Sturgeon, but we note too how a loss would be treated by the pro London mobs, and the Media.
So what if SNP do lose, what is Greens gonna say? Because they certainly wont be winning tonight!!
Had they not manufactured the Humza “win” and say, put Kate Forbes in charge, I’m sure SNP would be in a much better position today.
Perhaps even, we might not be having this By Election at all, then.
Alas, it didn’t work out that way, and we have to just wait and see how it pans out.
Trouble of course being, the Scotland no longer has time to wait.
Hence the anger at SNP, but voting for anyone pro London, I don’t think will help the country either,
Unless however, it were to have a change on SNP leadership, and I know that’s the definite hope for some, but I wonder, would it?
Slightly on topic.
If the people in Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election are opposed to Gender reform has Rushi Sunak helped the Tory candidate by what he said about men being men and woman being woman. Will the Tory candidate get the vote of those opposed to sex changes?
I was going to admit to being a bit of a one trick pony and only interested in transgender issues but I realised that is not true I’m a two trick pony.
1. The transgender madness
2. Is Scotland a colony
Ruby 3.53pm:
It could be “…an area of sinking air called the eye of the storm or inner core. Weather in the eye is normally calm and cloud-free.”
Well, the first part matches.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/the-gathering-storm/comment-page-1/#comment-2793774
Maybe I should have used the term gender recognition in my earlier post.
The impression you would get from what Rushi said is that he is opposed to all sex changes.
I am opposed to all sex changes Rushi however is the Prime Minister of the UK where the Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows for sex changes.
Gender Recognition Act 2004 is an act of UK Parliament.
If there wasn’t this act then there couldn’t be any GRRB Scotland bill.
GRRB = Gender Recognition Reform Bill.
Holyrood would have to start from scratch.
Prime Minister Rushi Sunak said
“Patients should know when hospitals are talking about men or women. We shouldn’t get bullied into believing that people can be any sex they want to be. They can’t.
“A man is a man and a woman is a woman, that’s just common sense.”
Yes I agree it’s common sense but the Gender Recognition Act 2004 says something different.
James Che 2.49pm, i’ll tell you what would be news in every country James,
Colette Walker of the Scottish Independent Party getting elected. But my own opinion is that the people of Scotland are fearties. Sad really by voting liebor no lessons have ever been learned.
@
A Scot Abroad
“Why is an NHS trust using public money, given as part of a budget approved by Holyrood, for the purpose of healthcare in Scotland, and funded by Scottish taxpayers, to give money for reparations? Who approved that, and on whose authority?”
I can think of two possible reasons. One is this – copied and pasted from Yagoo news.
“Damning new research has revealed that the health board profited by almost £40 million from slavery, including through ownership of a slave plantation in Jamaica, left to it in a surgeon’s will in 1750. A report found that, in today’s money, an estimated £39.1m was provided to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh from its ownership of the Red Hill pen estate and the enslaved people of African descent who worked there – for longer than the NHS has existed. Cash was also raised through donations from people with connections to slavery.
Health chiefs have now said they will launch a reparations programme to atone for it’s links to slavery, based on eight recommendations provided by an independent advisory group following a two-year research project.
Calum Campbell, Chief Executive of NHS Lothian, said: “This important work was carried out to help give us a greater understanding of the history that has shaped our society and institutions. Tackling racism helps us reduce health inequalities and improve outcomes for our diverse population and ensures a better experience for everyone who works with and for us. This work is vital to delivering this ambition. We have a duty to use this understanding to take action that will create meaningful change.””
From the NHS careers site.
“The NHS is the largest employer in Scotland, and international recruitment plays an important role in our workforce strategy, to grow and enhance our skills, expertise and talent with overseas candidates coming to live and work in Scotland.”
To be consistent you may need to question Charles III and members of his family when he gets around to atoning for human rights atrocities and makes reparations – taxpayers money?
‘Twitler Youth’ – ha ha.
These nauseous Gen Z gits are reprehensible psychopaths that the Murrels (still plural till the inevitable divorce) encouraged to kill off indy – can’t be doing with all that bothersome fighting for indy clap trap, eh, what ?
Voted earlier for Colette Walker and the Independence for Scotland party. Last on a very long list. I’m not sure what she’d consider a success, 500 votes maybe?
Rain, the Rangers match, revulsion at what the SNP have become, revulsion at what the Labour and the Tories still are, and the requirement to produce photographic ID will altogether deliver a real picture of what folks think of their crap political system.
Only the rigged postal votes will I suspect stop the turn out from being in the teens. Our political system is that bad.
Aye Rain, Rangers, Revulsion, Requirement and Rigging will deliver the Rubbish that this by election is.
Anyway, aside of all that, a good Rip Roaring Roasting, whatever the turnout, is exactly what the SNP need – but wouldn’t it be good if Collette Walker did well. Real Regime change is what we need.
Anyway, not long now till we find out.
@ Ruby 3.53pm
“It’s very quiet BTL here on Wings.”
All the usual commenters are out on the streets Getting The Vote Out in Rutherglen
🙂 🙂 🙂
My prediction is there will be no storm, no earth will move.
It will all be a big anti-climax like the incident with the blow up doll who was given a love bite then farted and blew out the window. 🙂
I’m sticking with my research into the sex lives of the ‘Castrati’ and ‘Scotland the Colony.’
@ Megs 2.29pm
Rutherglen is not the southside of Glasgow.
I don’t think Humza Yousaf attracts many voters here, other than the party faithful.
To be consistent you may need to question Charles III and members of his family when he gets around to atoning for human rights atrocities and makes reparations – taxpayers money?
I agree with you Sam, we should sack King Fannybaws and his dysfunctional family of benefits claimants.
No King But Christ.
On the other hand, this:
Calum Campbell, Chief Executive of NHS Lothian, said: “This important work was carried out to help give us a greater understanding of the history that has shaped our society and institutions. Tackling racism helps us reduce health inequalities and improve outcomes for our diverse population and ensures a better experience for everyone who works with and for us. This work is vital to delivering this ambition. We have a duty to use this understanding to take action that will create meaningful change.””
Is a load of shite and Calum Campbell should be sacked for extreme uselessness and stupidity.
Stevie @ 16.51
Didn’t half give me a giggle when I misread your post as “nauseous Gen zits” initially.
Guess that’s how I’ll think of them from this moment on.
\Sam.
Where do you draw the line in regards to responsibility?
Romans? Greeks? Mongols? Egypt ? Arabs? African tribes? They all profited immensely from slavery since 700 BC
Just to let you know that a recent UN report states that over 50 million people are still modern slaves predominantly in Asia and Arab countries.
Perhaps the National Trust should sell a fifth of the Lake District gifted by Bestrix Potter of Peter Rabbit fame since her family made a fortune from cotton grown in slave owning plantations.
@ Steep Brae 3.31pm
“why is she standing?”
Some people have alleged that she always wanted Margaret Ferrier’s job.
It’s understood there was no love lost.
Margaret Ferrier was promoted by very many people in the constituency after the referendum, to be the MP. Today’s candidate was almost non existent during the referendum campaign. The clique that formed around Sturgeon was and still is very strong in Rutherglen. The recognised that Margaret Ferrier was first and foremost a very good and conscientious constituency MP, and importantly a real supporter of independence. The knives were out for Margaret from very early on.
It has to be said that today’s candidate, same as the other councillors locally, have not gained anywhere near the personal support that Margaret Ferrier had.
A wee story. There is a huge union jack flies above the town hall here. When these SNP councillors were elected in 2017, there were questions at SNP branch meetings about getting a Scottish flag flying there. The councillors said they didn’t want to fall out with the Labour councillors so they would not do anything about it. That scunnered a good number of independence supporters. Today’s candidate was one of those councillors who preferred being pals with Labour.
Let’s not forget that the SNP were at least as vocal as Labour in screaming against Margaret Ferrier. They are massively to blame for any Labour victory today.
“The NHS is the largest employer in Scotland, and international recruitment plays an important role in our workforce strategy, to grow and enhance our skills, expertise and talent with overseas candidates coming to live and work in Scotland.”
How many people in NHS Lothian might be better employed in their home countries where plundering of medical staff by the colonial powers has left many health services short of staff?
I wonder what the bill for the opportunity cost of those affected would be. Probably a lot, lot higher than £40 million.
With regard to slavery if you look up major slavers such as the one known as Cha Cha you will see him described as a Catholic but if you look at his portrait he looks stereotypically Jewish. Further research will show that a number of jews converted to catholicism in their public life to make it easier to work in developing markets such as America whilst maintaining their jewish faith and culture in private. When slavery was abolished a new market opened for the trafficking of women into prostitution and later pornography. If we are going for reparations perhaps a look at fortunes made in the sex industry should also be considered. I believe that a sum of five million pounds should be paid to any woman anywhere in the world who has been affected in any way by the objectification of women via pornography, prostitution, publishing, advertising, the entertainment industry etc. This should include generational trauma if they believe that one of their female ancestors may have been affected by this.
Never mind, the Scottish Government is doing its best to bring even more Unionist voters to Scotland – as lamented below by Tory MP Greg Hands:
Greg Hands
@GregHands
·
“The Scottish Government spending a fortune on Tube ads trying to lure my constituents away – what the ads don’t mention is they would be clobbered by higher tax rates north of the border.”
Alf Baird will not be surprised!
CHILD ABUSE.
https://jobs.army.mod.uk/how-to-join/can-i-apply/age/
https://www.bmj.com/company/newsroom/stop-recruiting-children-uk-armed-forces-urged/
British exceptionalism.
Hope Collette gets a great vote and hope she wins.
Dear Humza,
as a former SNP member, voter and independence supporter, I sincerely hope the SNP get totally humped. They 100% deserve it.
Dump the ‘greens’ and get focused on independence, instead of drag story hour, or whatever the latest virtue signalling gender nonsense is this week.
@Bob Mack
If you know any descendants of Romans, Greeks etc who profited from the slaving activities of their ancestors, please let me have their names and addresses.
Beatrix Potter is far from the only slavery connection with the National Trust. As the Trust says:
“The research presented here indicates that 29 properties now in the care of the National Trust have links to successful compensation claims for slave-ownership and somewhere in the region of one-third of properties can be directly connected to colonial histories (see criteria listed in the Gazetteer on page 62). This conclusion is perhaps not that surprising, as the practice of enslaving African people was a fundamental part of the British economy in the late seventeenth, eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.”
Love or loathe Sturgeon she has been arrested and questioned on serious criminal matters and a current live police investigation is ongoing.
Against this background the Prime Minister of the UK has just been reported saying the following at his Tory Party Conference.
“Nicola Sturgeon wanted to go down in the history books as the woman who broke up our country but it now looks like she may go down for very different reasons.”
It’s utter contempt for the law. Ot more than suggests that Sunak is party to confidential information. It more than suggests that he knows Sturgeon is guilty and that she is heading for jail. And it more than suggests that Sunak is trying to interfere in an election being held today in Scotland by proclaiming the criminal guilt of the SNP’s ex leader.
Welcome to the Wild West of the legal whore house that is the UK. The law couldn’t have been more flagrantly broken than this.
@Red Sunset 5.28: spot on re Margaret Ferrier, an old-fashioned MP who thought she was elected to work for her constituents, not to get her pronouns in order or to kiss La Madrina’s ring.
The SNP’s only remote hope is that the rain and the coincidence of a Rangers match and the Citrus Fruit tendencies in the likes of Burnbank and Blantyre keep the Labour victory down to a 2,000 majority or so.
And that union flag is a constant irritant to real Scots passing by on the M74. No coincidence the so-called Traitors’ Tower is so close to Rutherglen town hall.
Gendel – North Lanarkshire Council are bankrupt due to a small number of PFI schools which were commissioned years ago by the Labour Party.
Willie @ 6.07 says ” The law couldn’t have been more flagrantly broken than this”.
It could, and it was, when Sturgeon commented to the press “I have done nothing wrong”, regardless of the effect that would have on other people who had been arrested and interviewed and who had remained silent.
“It more than suggests that he knows Sturgeon is guilty and that she is heading for jail”. I hope you are right, Willie.
Willie – that’s a shame.
Poor Nicola a victim of injustice?
You’d need a heart of granite not to laugh 😀
I voted today and the only people outside my polling station was a chap in his wheel chair and a lady handing his leaflets out for the Scottish Labour Party, not the English one.
At the last election no one was outside representing any party.
People are sick to death of politicians lies, deceit and incompetence.
The 5 minutes that I was there, 5.45pm I saw 2 individuals and a couple go in.
A vote per minute after working days suggests a poor turn out.
It’s a wet night and looks like street lights will be on by 7pm.
Rangers are facing defeat again so maybe the Unionist voters will leave the Orange Order Club at half time in favour of getting wet and voting Red or Blue Tory for some light relief.
Flagrant breaches of the law ? Hypothetically speaking (I have no wish to become a flagrant breach of the law myself) I may have thought that the entire trial of Mr Salmond and the trial and jailing of Mr Murray were far more flagrant breaches of both the law and natural justice.
A mildly humourous crack in the context of a political speech somehow doesn’t seem to be in the same league to me.
Sam, at 4:49 pm,
that is utter mince. Total nonsense. The sole purpose of NHS money is to deliver healthcare.
That Chief Executive is going to be out on his ear within a week, and no money will be paid.
The evidence and history of new parties breaking through in electoral terms is not good. Even Alba has struggled to move the dial. And Alba are financially on a more sound footing compared to others. I expect a 7000 Labour majority tonight with minor parties losing their deposit. But the SNP can console themselves that Humza has made it onto the Time magazine front page. Just like his predecessor making it onto the Vogue magazine twice. I am thinking who is really running Scotland?. A significant portrait of an FM that leads a country with 96% white population and he can’t answer FMQs with material questions of interest to the Scottish people.
The problem with getting rid if charles is you could end up with a president Blair or Broon. In scotland you could get a president Sturgeon. Suck that one up.
I have no isse with a king but I would like to see him taking a position when corrupt incompetence like the tories get into power. When they tried to pirogue parliament they did nothing. Off to the tower would have been a good result
As voting draws to a close in Rutherglen it seems clear nobody expects a big turnout (it’s a by-election; it’s a bad day; there’s a match on TV etc).
Let’s send out a final call to voters – vote Colette Walker, ISP. Make a good show, Independence supporters!
Let’s see you’re there!
I wanted to mention that as a former SNP member I had a pair of leaflets thru my door twice
an enveloped leaflet and a car thru the door tonight arriving after I voted.
The SNP campaign office was a Bookmakers office a few months ago.
You had more chance of winning in there when Ladbrooks had it.
I voted for the only real independence candidate.
There no way she can win tonight but it says I will never give up on independence to the English Parties and to SNP it says enough of broken promises wasted mandates.
0-2 against Rangers now.
Saint Mirren 3 points in front of Rangers well I never.
One in the eye for the nay-sayers.
https://dailysceptic.org/2023/10/05/irony-is-dead-time-puts-humza-yousaf-on-cover-as-next-generation-leader-despite-leading-party-towards-disaster/
@Sam,
Try more recent history. Were not Jewish people enslaved by the Third Reich and worked to death? Quite a few if I remember. I think many families of those involved are still contactable if that helps.
@sam says:5 October, 2023 at 3:31 pm
reparation for crimes against humanity should be made
On you fecking go then Sam.
Lead from the front, why don’t you?
@ Bob Mack
” Just to let you know that a recent UN report states that over 50 million people are still modern slaves predominantly in Asia and Arab countries.”
This is the very thing none of the bleeding hearts that go on about reparations ever want to talk about . Possibly because – in Arab countries anyway – the obscenity of modern day slavery is a direct or indirect result of * Western * interference . This doesn’t justify the obscenity , individuals are still choosing to do this – purely for profit .
And while we’re on the subject …..I’ll take the whole Racism Industry seriously -maybe – when the ridiculous idea that only Caucasians can be guilty of racism is seen for the denial of reality it clearly is .
Ditto * Climate * and all the other subjects that have been taken-over by the motley assortment of crooks ,clowns & socio/psychopaths that pass as Governments , NGOs , Charities n – god ‘elp us – * Philanthropists * .
@Anton Decadent says:5 October, 2023 at 5:35 pm
Your usual posts are in the better class of sanity, so what happened with this one?
If the entire post is supposed to be irony, then you missed the target IMHO.
But, on the subject of SNHS health boards giving away money to sharp elbowed grifters.
I posted on the previous thread about how Sunak, with nothing to lose and everything to gain, was starting to slaughter the sacred cows. The biggest, fattest, most sacred cow of all is the NHS.
Farcical, value signalling like this story, while ordinary citizens are in the grip of epidemics of preventable disease, is just playing into the Tories hands.
Where’s Dan?
Well its taken ten years but for the first time since I started reading Wos, you got a prediction wrong rev ?
Well done the Cypriots lol
I’ll bet that NHS Lothian, and fundamentally the Scottish taxpayer, have given far more than £40 million in the cost of “free” medical treatment to descendants of Caribbean or African treatment since the NHS was founded. So another £40 million as reparations is warranted.
~ unwarranted
@Bob Mack
I’m not quite sure I get your drift.
The legal principle of crimes against humanity came out of the Nuremberg trials.
Following that the Jewish Agency put to the governments of US, USSR, France and UK a memorandum seeking reparations for the Jewish people from Germany for the Holocaust.
By 2020, Germany had paid about $20 billion to people who had suffered from the Holocaust.
I’m sure you don’t oppose that.
@ A Scot Abroad
Are you entirely against the making of reparations for crimes against humanity by any body or group?
@A Scot Abroad 7:39pm
I will ask you the same question I posed above. Who is running Scotland? Humza has had 3 ministerial posts. I can comment on his time as Health Secretary. His recovery plan for the SNHS last August was derisable. A few weeks in the job with huge questions over his competence to lead and he is on the front page of Time magazine. Reserved usually for people who have made significant contributions to their Country. It’s more than passing strange. So as you are a Unionist I could find common ground with you as an Independence supporter. Is Humzas elevation to Time magazine justified if so on what basis? I can’t see it.
@Sam.
Your figures are way off the mark. Something like 1.5 billion US dollars was paid throughout the fifties and laterly firms who benefited from forced Labour like Opal and various Banks in Germany and Switzerland were made to contribute.
Most of this money went to the State of Israel rather than individuals. That makes everything all right then does it not?
Captain Yossarian says:
5 October, 2023 at 7:40 pm
Where’s Dan?
Dan said Good-bye on the 25th September
Just a couple of days before you announced that you were going to take your leave of Wings for a few years.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/birth-of-a-politician/comment-page-1/#comment-2792916
I was wondering who that message was for.
I turns out it was for me. 🙂
If you include a banned word in your post it could eventually be manually approved and appear many hours later.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/birth-of-a-politician/comment-page-1/#comment-2792199
Four banned words in that post which eventually got approved.
Dan if you are reading this perhaps you should check your lost post maybe it did eventually get approved
@George Ferguson says:5 October, 2023 at 8:27 pm
A few weeks in the job with huge questions over his competence to lead and he is on the front page of Time magazine. Reserved usually for people who have made significant contributions to their Country
It’s hardly any time since Yousaf was in New York scattering Scotland’s hard-earned taxpayers dosh to left and right.
I don’t know how Time magazine leans politically, but if they are a mouthpiece for the sharp-elbowed grifters of the world who seem to be so much in the ascendant these days, Yousaf’s largesse will have been sufficient to get him a front page slot.
Maybes you’ve heard what they say about international aid? It’s a scheme by which money is taken from poor people in rich countries and given to rich people in poor countries.
As somebody who likes to call for us Scots to be “shown the money”, it’s disheartening to discover where some of it actually goes.
exit poll anagram result
lot pixel
close result ?
@John Main 9:33pm
I am suspicious of the American influence on our Scottish Parliament and also on our so called Establishment. Stu posted an article about our young political guns being groomed in America which possibly resulted in the Alphabettie situation. Mediocre politicians that took their party from second to third place and now have an undeserved Professorship. Humza follows suit apparently by saying he is the first Muslim leader in the West. We remember his prayers to Mecca in Bute House the minute he got in. Compare that to his treatment of Kate Forbes in the early exchanges of the SNP leadership contest. Something is amiss. So my question to Unionists is why are you tolerating foreign intervention in our affairs?. And why are you so behind imported ideologies that the Scottish Public have not consented to.
Time Magazine has our current leader classed as one of the next generation’s leaders.
Problem is Time Magazine we’re stuck with him as this generation’s leader.
Maybe he should come back in around 20 years.
These are the others
https://time.com/collection/next-generation-leaders/#2023
If turnout was 12% at midday then the overall turnout should be in the mid-40%’s if we assume that 80% of the postals will be returned. In a low turnout election it’s the postals that count. All the activity in the last 2 weeks is for very few votes.
Sam, at 8:25pm,
In principle, no. But in practice the vast majority of those now living in the USA or the Caribbean have vastly better lives than they would have endured if their predecessors had not been enslaved 250 years ago.
I’m not making any excuses for slavery: it was and is a disgraceful and inhumane practice, and should never have happened. But why be paying reparations to people in developed countries who are 10 generations away from what happened to their ancestor, and who now lead vastly better lives than some cousin ten times removed still in West Africa whose ancestor didn’t get sold into slavery?
On a wider note, about 27% of the UK’s international development budget goes to west Africa. That’s quite a lot of money.
any news of exit polls at Rutherglen? Final turnout? Anything? Anybody?
I think the SNP will finish this one in 4rth position.
Behind the family party.
They are going to be humiliated.
Just mentally contrast the dank sodden streets of Rutherglen today with Humza’s coiffeured mug under the Time 2023 “greasy pole climbers of the year” award with the masthead, “in partnership with Rolex.”
The perfect epitaph for this woke affinity cult.
Rutherglen isn’t interested in the EU flag. Zelensky. The false green agenda. The Pride flag that’s been eaten up by the transgender ideology. The picketing of the women’s event. The congestion charges. The council tax rises. The 2 closures of the police stations. The cancelling of Hamilton’s beloved Winnie Ewing’s son Fergus. And many more horrors. The caravan. Patrick Grady being approved by Katy Louden to campaign with her.
I’ll eat my hat if I’m wrong. Katy Louden couldn’t answer a straight question on STV news with Colin mackay. Their party is a shambles.
I watched Humza Yousaf calling Douglas Ross a liar. It was like 2 children fighting. Humza and his party have poisoned the well in police Scotland in my opinion. But I hope to be proved wrong.
@Our Man in Norfolk
You may say that you’re ‘no apologist for slavery’ but a lot of people would read an argument like the one you’ve made and conclude you are the very thing you say you’re not.
The structure of your argument is also incredibly silly. You could retrospectively justify, or at least diminish the horror, of any atrocity by referencing the ‘success’ of refugees who fled that very atrocity.
I would stick to what you’re good at i.e. constantly referencing your work history and baiting Alf Baird, because rational argument is not your strong suit.
Ruby says:
5 October, 2023 at 10:08 pm
Time Magazine has our current leader classed as one of the next generation’s leaders.
I think they meant Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Humza is from that daft eejit planet that tricked the crew of the Enterprise into fixing their warp drive by being aggressively thick.
It took some quick thinking from Cmdr. Geordi La Forge to stop their dastardly, if still somewhat low IQ Humzerian schemes. Needless to say, Captain Picard had the last laugh. But not before Humza enchanted TV audiences young and old with his insightful catchphrases: “That’s Spacist!” and “There is no place for [X] in Planet Spacemong Delta IV!!!!! (Formerly Space Scotland)”
I think we have to, like Mr T., pity the poor fool.
Humza couldn’t lead a slug to lettuce, and a’body knows him as a famous workshy bawbag. A comic figure, known for his scooter pratfalls and funny racial theories. He is Mr Bean with a bad attitude.
When Caligula anointed a horse to the Senate, demanding respect for the horse proved impossible, and deliberately insulting as the “Time” puff pastry piece of Broughty Ferry’s answer to Simple Jack is.
But at least that horse probably did an honest day’s work in his life before being thrust into a situation he couldn’t understand. That is something Oor Humzy, who huznae earned or achieved anything in his life, never did. Should we try a horse for First Minister next time? Or, if a suitable horse is unavailable for the job, a cat with a fluffy tail.
I’m no apologiser for slavery, I just don’t give one nanoscopic quantum of a scintillating fluck (I wanted to say the bad word there but they telt us in primary school it makes Baby Jesus cry. Fr fr no cap.) about slavery.
Slavery is not even in the first ten encyclopedia volumes of things that are of importance or concern to me, or any normal truthful person as far as I know. I do not care at all. Slavery has as much to do with me as the Mongol invasions or Napoleon Bonaparte or climate change. I don’t give a monkey’s about them either.
That’s a wee bit negative, so I will tell you something I do care about. And that’s wee babies. A lot of Scottish couples I know have just had or are expecting weans, which is always good news. Weans are brilliant! Mon the wee yins.
I also think we’re in for a nice day tomorrow. Scotland, twinned with Hope. We are betting our bottom dollar on tomorrow. Let it be filled with the laughter of our bairns.
Labour is celebrating victory. I listened to the prism show this week.
The guy, Phil Boswell says the new oil fields will be going to Norway. The oil wi be getting pumped to the company formally called Stat Oil to refine Rosebank.
That’s absolutely shambolic. Unfortunately the regular punter doesn’t get fed that information.
Sir Kier Starmers fangs are to come. He’s coming to suck away our natural resources.
The only option left, is Scotland United for Independence.
Time for the revolution in the SNP.
@7:02pm I said a Labour majority of 7000. Unfortunately I have missed out on the alert reader award again! Even if I say Aberdeen wuz robbed of a clear cut red card where the referee should have gone to Specsavers and the Var referee has a guide dog. Drat and double drat one day I will get the alert reader award.
So Labour in Scotland, (Scottish Labour doesn’t exist) wins Rutherglen.
We wonder how Humza will react to that!
Wonder too, how the SNP faithful will.
The whole thing’s the pits!
Well Sturgeon’s done a job on the SNP hasn’t she. If I were Alex Salmond I don’t think I could ever forgive her for destroying all that he built. The only hope is that the low turn-out means that lots of people are waiting for a set of people who will build a bridge of freedom for them to move away from the abyss
Humza Yousaf addressing the next gathering of the SNP faithful…
“Go back to your constituencies and prepare for opposition!”
I’m calling it again…this SNP will NEVER win another election. They had one USP, one political mission, but however it has gone wrong in those dark corridors of power, it has gone really badly wrong.
A few are responsible. Sturgeotti. Swindley. The SNP’s very own Third Man, Angus ‘Viennetta’ Robertson. These are the main culprits with walk-on parts for sundry water-carriers.
Utter disgrace to Scotland, never mind the party they helped to destroy…
@Gordon Keane 1:54am
“Wonder too, how the SNP faithful will [react]”
Easy! It will be Alex Salmond’s fault, Alba’s fault, WoS’s fault, WoS followers fault. In fact, the fault will lie with anyone/anything bar the SNP, its utterly ridiculous policies, and the behaviour of some of its vile supporters.
I was very disappointed in only 207 votes for Collette Walker the independent Scottish Party.
9th place with parties like Reform gaining more votes.
Even 1200 votes for the Tories.
I don’t think Rutherglen has many millionaires but I’m left what the electorate use for brains.
I really need to research the possibility of applying for an Irish Passport.
Totally ashamed to to be identified as living in an English Colony called Britain.
@ Bob Mack
“Your figures are way off the mark. Something like 1.5 billion US dollars was paid throughout the fifties and laterly firms who benefited from forced Labour like Opal and various Banks in Germany and Switzerland were made to contribute.”
Off the mark?
When you write of “1.5 billion dollars throughout the fifties..” you are talking of annual payment amounts.
The payment to be made to Holocaust survivors in 2023 was 1.2 billion euros.
“BERLIN (AP) — The organization that handles claims on behalf of Jews who suffered under the Nazis said Thursday that Germany agreed to pay approximately $1.2 billion (euros) to Holocaust survivors living around the world in 2023, bringing its total compensation to more than 80 billion euros.
The announcement came as Germany marked the 70th anniversary of the signing of the so-called Luxembourg Agreements, a reparations pact that made it possible for Holocaust survivors to receive a measure of justice for the Nazi persecution of Jews during World War II.”
The compensation is based on a number of things including individual need. So your claim about it going to the “state” is wrong also.
Here are some recent remarks on the subject taken from the AP article i reference.
““The Luxembourg Agreements were fundamental and led to financial compensation in the amount of more than 80 billion euros Germany has paid by the end of 2021,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said.
“At the same time, it was clear to all concerned that this agreement could not pay off the heavy guilt that Germans had brought upon themselves,” Scholz added. “The Luxembourg Agreements were rather an attempt to assume moral responsibility for the failure of morality – the attempt to ensure that it was not inhumanity that had the last word, but humanity.”
The reparation agreements, signed in 1952, created the basis for all subsequent compensation for Nazi persecution.
The negotiations were very contentious at the time and even led to violent protests in Israel, where some argued that accepting payments — critics called the compensation blood money — would be like forgiving the Nazis for their crimes.”