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The impenetrable skulls

Posted on May 28, 2016 by

We’ll be honest, readers, we’re actually quite happy that the Tories are now the lead Unionist party in Scotland. Because after four and a half years, we’ve pretty much run out of things to say about the epic, unquenchable stupidity of Scottish Labour.

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The above tweets from the branch office’s former leader come from an exchange about a long-standing Glasgow charity that’s been forced out of its premises after the Labour-run city council hiked its rent by 400,000%. (No, that’s not a typo – we really mean FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND PERCENT.)

Of course, that Lamont should choose to blame the SNP for cuts coming down the line from the Tory government at Westminster (that only controls Scotland’s budget at all because Lamont and her colleagues campaigned for Scotland to remain in the UK) is no surprise.

But it’s the sheer jaw-dropping lack of self-awareness in that last line which lays bare the incredible inability of her pseudo-party to learn a single lesson from the revolution in Scottish politics that’s been going on for most of the last decade.

Because it takes quite some effort of blind-eye-turning to accuse Nicola Sturgeon of being the person who doesn’t “get” Glasgow in the face of the evidence. It’s not like the voters haven’t handed out some pretty big clues.

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In 2015 Labour crashed from 100% of Glasgow seats to 0% in the space of a single election. A year later it was wiped out at Holyrood too. Nicola Sturgeon won her own Glasgow seat with over 61% of the vote, more than 38 points ahead of the runner-up, while Johann Lamont was thrashed by nearly 6500 votes in hers, losing it to the SNP on a 12.5% swing. Glasgow voted Yes in the independence referendum.

We’re almost out of adjectives to describe the delusion of a party that can go through all that and STILL not take the hint about who isn’t “getting” Glasgow. With the council elections coming next year, Labour’s running out of time to hear the message.

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  1. 28 05 16 12:56

    The impenetrable skulls | speymouth
    Ignored

118 to “The impenetrable skulls”

  1. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    Pretty silly use of percentages in that article. A symbolic peppercorn rent of £1 has been replaced by a rent of £4,000 a year. Why obfuscate that into a meaningless percentage?

  2. Grouse Beater
    Ignored
    says:

    Lamont – yet another Labour ‘politishun’ wholly unable to express intelligence, or capable of a fig leaf of insight.

    Lamont wipes from her miniscule memory it was her party that returned £1.3 billion to the UK Treasury unallocated because Union Jack McConnell and his crew couldn’t think of anything to spend it on – not even poverty in Glasgow.

    But his ‘gift’ got McConnell his earldom!

  3. Paul D
    Ignored
    says:

    Morag – That was my thought too.

  4. MrMac1040
    Ignored
    says:

    Labour proved their utter inability to take responsibility for their own demise right after the Scottish Election – Sawar and Dugdale both made comments to the effect that Labour had tried to move on from the independence issue but the people of Scotland (SNP and Tory voters) has “chosen” not to. In other words, Labour’s problems are due to the stupid pig-headed people of Scotland (Nationalist and Unionist)who are just too dumb to see the wisdom of Labour. That party are just NEVER going to “get it”. They are so blinded by hatred of the SNP that they are beyond reason. They’ve actually gone mad. Like, REALLY crazy. Psychotic. Deluded. In need to treatment – or in need of being put out of their own and everyone else’s misery like a sick dog.

  5. ScottishPsyche
    Ignored
    says:

    O/T slightly – on ‘not getting it’-

    Iain Martin has written his last CapX weekly editorial.

    Could he be the new Herald editor? If so, has the Herald finally signed its own death warrant?

  6. Dan Huil
    Ignored
    says:

    Lamont is not programmed to accept reality; she is programmed to say and do anything which increases her chances of being rewarded by the britnat establishment. The bbc loves her of course.

  7. Fred
    Ignored
    says:

    @ Morag & Paul, don’t bother about the article, nothing like a good nit-pick on a Saturday morning.

    An excellent illustration of Slab’s demise in Glasgow, never thought I’d see the day. Time now to cleanse the Augean Stables in George Square & bid farewell to fat-cat McAveety that fingerer of pies & general balloon.

  8. Rev. Stuart Campbell
    Ignored
    says:

    “Why obfuscate that into a meaningless percentage?”

    Man, you really do love to nitpick. It’s a perfectly accurate percentage. Accuracy is never meaningless.

  9. G H Graham
    Ignored
    says:

    “Hey yooz SNP lot & yer smart Alec Campbell bloke! Me ‘n ma pal Magrit urnae havin’ any mare o’ yer shite. We’re aff tae Largs tae huv a fish supper & a debate. So watch it Mac!”

    – Johann Lamont

  10. CmonIndy
    Ignored
    says:

    I really don’t mind that they are not learning. They can become a dessicated corpse of a party, the quicker the better.

  11. Quarmby
    Ignored
    says:

    @Morag – The justification of the piece’s use of those percentages is in the context of Lamont’s risible claim that the rise is down to the SNP cuts and the SNP ‘not getting’ Glasgow’, rather than the reality of Westminster cuts and London’s Labour branch in Scotland ‘not getting’ Glasgow. BTW if you think a rent hike from £1 to £4,000 isn’t a bit of a hit for a charity, then you must be doing all right for yourself under the glorious Union. Another I’m-all-right-Jack carping from the sidelines.

  12. Greannach
    Ignored
    says:

    Just when Kezia Dugdale makes you think that maybe Johann Lamont wasn’t actually that bad a manager, good old Ms Lamont gets tweeting.

  13. Marcia
    Ignored
    says:

    If you ask any voter who isn’t a Labour party member what Labour stands for these days you won’t get a quick reply. I doubt if some Labour party member know either. A descent from dominance in the 1960’s/1970’s to irrelevance now. My late grandmother who was a Labour party stalwart from the 1920’s will be birling in her grave.

  14. Betty Boop
    Ignored
    says:

    @Quamby

    I’ve just opened my popcorn. Yeeha!
    Hope you’ve got a tin hat.

  15. ScottishPsyche
    Ignored
    says:

    Johann Lamont must be worried she will be the sole breadwinner come 2017. Her husband is Archie Graham, Langside Councillor and holder of numerous positions of ‘power’ on Glasgow CC over the years.

    https://www.glasgow.gov.uk/councillorsandcommittees/member.asp?id=43&t=Councillor+Archie+Graham+OBE

  16. Fred
    Ignored
    says:

    Wee Ginger Dug excellent in todays National plus a good letter from Wings own Donald Anderson.

    Jim Sillars joining a nice bowling club would be good news.

  17. The Tree of Liberty
    Ignored
    says:

    Quamby, I think you must be a new poster on here, but nobody works harder for the Independence cause than Morag.

  18. handclapping
    Ignored
    says:

    I doubt its JoLa anyway. More like some sparky SPAD the same way as Kez used to do Cumnock’s posts when he was too pished.

    Slab should set up a commission to look into whether they consider that their social media engagement is helping or hindering the development of the Labour message in Scotland.

    There you are Kez, just personalise that wording and you’ll be seen to be doing something and the BBC can trumpet your ‘fightback’

  19. ScottishPsyche
    Ignored
    says:

    The Lamont-Graham household must take more responsibility than most for the state of Glasgow over the years.

    Maybe that is what she is worried about.

  20. HandandShrimp
    Ignored
    says:

    A symbolic peppercorn rent of £1 has been replaced by a rent of £4,000 a year.

    It probably doesn’t feel like a meaningless percentage to the charity that had to give up the premises though.

  21. Capella
    Ignored
    says:

    SNP don’t seem to get Aberdeen, Dundee or Inverness either. Edinburgh, on the other hand, is 610 votes short of not being got by the SNP.

    Glasgow gets Labour though.

  22. Wulls
    Ignored
    says:

    @Paul D & Morag.
    If you only read this to nitpick and whinge I seriously recommend you find a nice comic to read.
    To clarify for you, the article is about the collapse of Scottish labour.
    Complaining about the way the figures are presented means either
    1/ you don’t get it
    2/ you don’t care
    3/ both.
    If it’s 1/ there is a strong possibility you are a labour voter.
    If so the comic might be an intilectual stretch.

  23. Betty Boop
    Ignored
    says:

    @ Quarmby

    Apologies, I spelled your name incorrectly – wouldn’t want folk having difficulty finding your comment.

  24. Graeme Borthwick
    Ignored
    says:

    But the Opposition have the media behind them; Lamont, Dugdale, Rennie, Davidson etc can say anything and it will be reported positively. Anything the SNP say is BAAD.

  25. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    I don’t care what Johann Lamont says. Sorry about that! I’m busy reading this

    http://www.parliament.uk/documents/lords-committees/constitution/union-and-devolution/FINAL-Evidence-volume-UDE.pdf

    If you want to read what Adam Tomkins or Lord Sainsbury has to say then just scroll down, down,down the index list to find their names it will highlight in yellow and you just click.

    I haven’t figured out what sort of order they are listed in or why on earth the evidence from a Holocaust Denier is top of the list.

    I’ve just been reading the evidence from ‘United against Separation’ they have some ‘interesting ideas on how to make us more British.

    Ban the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government from interfering in reserved matters The Scottish Government should not be allowed to express an official position on any reserved matter, to do so undermines the UK Government.

    UK Government rebrands the May Day Bank holiday as a UK national day. This would allow national events to be held to mark the occasion each year without the cost of having to introduce a new bank holiday.

    marks the anniversary of the Acts of Union coming into force, it is the birth of our United Kingdom day of celebration would be very popular.

    Change the Flag Flying protocols to require the Union Flag to be flown every day

    More events to mark other occasions are also needed, like better honouring Trafalgar Day and celebrating other days of historic national importance

  26. Betty Boop
    Ignored
    says:

    @ Wulls

    Same comment to you as I made to Quarmby!!!

    Stu has already answered Morag’s point in his own inimitable way. Fair do’s.

    As for your conclusions, like Quarmby’s, either you don’t have a clue about Morag or you simply want to stir.

  27. desimond
    Ignored
    says:

    Labour remind me of “The Old Gods” in Neil Gaimans wonderful novel ‘American Gods’

    The less people follow them or talk about them, then the more they diminish until eventually…theyre just…gone

  28. Marko
    Ignored
    says:

    I hardly think Morag was “nitpicking”. She never suggested for a second that a jump in rent from £1 to £4000 was insignificant or devastating for a charity, just that it was a disingenuous use of numbers; which it clearly is. This very blog has been quick to point out such headline grabbing abuse of statistics many times, Morag’s point is perfectly valid and reasonable.

  29. Capella
    Ignored
    says:

    I don’t think Labour will be gone. They’re the only hope for millions of people in England. Jeremy Corbyn is getting the neo-liberal media treatment in spades. Tony Blair adding his malevolent tuppence worth in a BBC interview today.
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36401105

    SLab may disappear though.

  30. Chic McGregor
    Ignored
    says:

    “Pretty silly use of percentages in that article”

    If the message was aimed at SLAB, best to use the language they themselves would use.

  31. Turnip_ghost
    Ignored
    says:

    Would I be being too kind if I gave her the benefit of the doubt that what she meant was “If only the First Minister had won Glasgow….” ?

  32. Chic McGregor
    Ignored
    says:

    @Turnip-Ghost
    That wouldn’t make sense either – she DID.

    To make any kind of sense to it you would need to add words like:

    “If only the First Minister had got Glasgow more, think what state SLAB would be in then.”

  33. Cath
    Ignored
    says:

    “A symbolic peppercorn rent of £1 has been replaced by a rent of £4,000 a year.”

    Just be thankful it wasn’t free for a trial period or the increase would be infinity.

  34. DerekM
    Ignored
    says:

    Ah its the old virus hows your back jola got all them daggers out yet hen hmmmm?

    Stupid is an understatement a walking talking disaster of a woman who could not see she was being played as a total chump by her better together blue tory pals.

    And how ever you paint this charity thing its despicable,i dont have the info on them but i would guess they dont have any Lords sneaking about in the shadows.

    And well said Betty Boop,Morag was a winger before i was so to accuse her of being a yoon is not only stupid its down right rude so an apology is in order imo.

  35. HandandShrimp
    Ignored
    says:

    Marko

    Aye, as ever the Evening Times headline is a tad tabloid but the point that Stu makes in response to Lamont’s reaction (with an altogether more relevant headline) is the pertinent issue. While Stu doesn’t rely on the Evening Times to do that he is right to note that it is a fair old hike in their rent….which it is.

    That said Lamont has been “listening” and in “discussion” with the electorate for as fair while now…and she “doesn’t agree with them” 🙂

  36. Peter McCulloch
    Ignored
    says:

    Labour will never change, it needs scapegoats for it to avoid responsibility for anything bad that happens here in Scotland as a result of Westminster.

    Kezia Dugdale had no problems campaigning for Scotland to remain as part of the UK and continue to be Governed from Westminster.

    Now she and some union officials are demanding the Scottish Government stop passing on Westminster cuts and end austerity.

    Either she doesn’t understand (which is highly unlikely)or is she hoping that people in Scotland don’t understand that level of the Scottish Government’s budget is decided by Westminster.

    And as such she has yet to explain how the Scottish Government could possibly refuse to pass on the consequences of Westminster’s cuts.

  37. Mick DIAMOND
    Ignored
    says:

    Capella, only problem is, england is a right wing country so i cant see anyone replacing the tories.

  38. Roger Mexico
    Ignored
    says:

    It’s a perfectly accurate percentage. Accuracy is never meaningless.

    Well a perfectly accurate percentage would be 399,999%. But rather than quibbling from either side, a more interesting approach might be looking at City Properties (Glasgow) LLP who are the instigators of these large increases which seem to have been given at very little notice to their tenants. How much control does the Council have over it? – something that might become important if Labour loses control next year and policy changes. And who are the people running it?

  39. AhuraMazda
    Ignored
    says:

    Good post, Ruby. Hilarious. We thought it couldn’t get much funnier than the proposed Union Line with all our kids being abducted to England on a red, white, and blue train…

    Alistair McConnachie is the biggest zoomer Scotland has ever produced.

    I urge everyone to watch this video.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJOUlJcIJJc

    It’s actually the best advert for independence I have ever seen.

  40. Mick DIAMOND
    Ignored
    says:

    Peter mculloch i agree, they vote tory or liebor in scotland, then demand that the snp do more to protect them from austerity cuts???. You couldnt make this s***e up.

  41. Xaracen
    Ignored
    says:

    What “above” tweets?

  42. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    Man, you really do love to nitpick. It’s a perfectly accurate percentage. Accuracy is never meaningless.

    I’m not nitpicking you, I’m criticising the original article, and in a more general sense this ridiculous newspaper thing where they say “has increased by 200%” instead of “has trebled” (or whatever). Once you’re significantly over a doubling (that is, over an increase of 100%), expressing the increase as a percentage rather than as doubling, trebling, gone up tenfold or whatever, is much harder to comprehend. But it sounds gee-whiz and I suppose that’s why they do it. It’s about sounding sensational rather than being easily comprehended.

    Yes, accuracy can be meaningless if it’s expressed in such a way that the meaning is opaque to the normal reader. You know that.

  43. heedtracker
    Ignored
    says:

    Usual vicious end of era SLab stuff. Austerity UKOK style still failing after 7 years, they hit the worst off hardest, blame Nicola Sturgeon.

    The really nasty hard UKOK politics of it all is SLab stood BetterTogether with the tories and the BBC 2014, started losing, farted out The Vow devo-max federal UK shyst and all of its turned into nothing but a big stick to beat the SNP.

  44. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    To clarify for you, the article is about the collapse of Scottish labour.
    Complaining about the way the figures are presented means either
    1/ you don’t get it
    2/ you don’t care
    3/ both.

    I’m complaining about the way the newspaper article presented the figures, because it’s a common journalistic ploy either to big up figures or obscure them completely from normal understanding.

    Stuart has merely repeated the presentational method chosen by the newspaper, which is perfectly reasonable.

  45. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    BTW if you think a rent hike from £1 to £4,000 isn’t a bit of a hit for a charity, then you must be doing all right for yourself under the glorious Union. Another I’m-all-right-Jack carping from the sidelines.

    If I think what??? Where did I say that? The cost increase for the charity is obviously devastating. Going from a nominal rent of £1 to having to find £4,000 per annum is clearly a fatal blow, as the article makes clear.

    Why does complaining about a badly-written newspaper article choosing an obfuscatory and opaque way to present a perfectly straightforward set of figures get interpreted as meaning I don’t think the rent increase is a serious blow?

  46. AhuraMazda
    Ignored
    says:

    Just to clarify then, The Constitutional Committee which has been looking at ways of strengthening the British Union (or, putting the Scottish people back in their box) took evidence from Alistair McConnachie who is on the record as saying this;

    “I don’t accept that gas chambers were used to execute Jews for the simple fact there is no direct physical evidence to show that such gas chambers ever existed,” McConnachie wrote in an email to party members.

    “There are no photographs or films of execution gas chambers … Alleged eyewitness accounts are revealed as false or highly exaggerated.”

    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish/news/1.592699

  47. Capella
    Ignored
    says:

    @ Mike DIAMOND
    In the 2015 election Labour got 9m (30.4%) votes and Tories got 11m (36.9%). That’s not such an enormous difference in a 66% turnout and could easily be reversed. Look at the amazing popularity of Bernie Sanders in ultra right wing USA. The majority of ordinary people do not support neo-liberal policies.

    Labour lost 48 seats, almost all of them in Scotland where the SNP gained 50. Kezia Dugdale has dropped Neil Findlay, a Corbyn supporter, from her team. Labour have abandoned the left of centre with their scathing comments about the poor living in a “something for nothing” culture.

    What Slab fail to learn is that ordinary people just want a fair and caring society and are prepared to pay a fair share to sustain it. The SNP now occupy the left of centre and aren’t in a hurry to move out!

  48. K1
    Ignored
    says:

    Yes he has just ‘literally’ taken the use of the ‘percentage’ figure from the headline, Morag’s point is fair enough in this context.

    Did no one read Morag’s first sentence:

    ‘Pretty silly use of percentages in that article.’

    They ‘dramatise’ to pull in punters.

  49. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    I just noticed that Humza Yousaf has himself been bamboozled by that ludicrous “percentage” presentation.

    https://twitter.com/HumzaYousaf/status/736320264762470404

    He has tweeted it as a 4000% increase, when in fact a 4000% increase on a £1 rent would only see the charity paying £40 a year which I think they might have coped with.

    It may be accurate to say it’s a 400,000% increase, but it’s anything but clear or understandable.

  50. Papko
    Ignored
    says:

    4k a year rent ?, about £80 a week for one bedroom council flat off the council in Fife.

    Presumably this “charity” , has “volunteers” (more than one ) and these “volunteers”, “raise cash”.

    And £80 week itself a subsidised rent, undermines there efforts.

    I would advise them to pack up, there not raising much.

  51. Dr Jim
    Ignored
    says:

    Ian Murray abstained positively on the question of deciding anything until a commission has been formally established and then a study of those conclusions should be examined and debated before they’re abstained on again, And he’s absolutely positive on the issue

    However there is no doubt the SNP are talking left and looking good while they’re leaning right and being disingenuous over the whole matter and the people of Scotland are coming to realise that more and more by voting for them in ever greater numbers

    But this hides the greater truth about the SNPs real aims and people in his constituency of Morningside Torylandburgh have placed their faith in Scottish Labour to deliver them from evil, for mine is the kingdom and the glory, Mr Murray said in a statement today from College Green in Westminster

    Has Johann Lamont spat Ian Murrays dummy, will it ever be returned to the Abstainer in chief, will Magrit Curran ever find her way out of the vote counting room without assistance, do we care?

    It’s now the turn of Ruthless Davidson to come under fire from the evil Cybernat Hordes led and driven blindly and obediently on by the Commander in Chief of Sarcasm, the Master of Disaster of one the liners, the great seeker of Sweeties Rev Stuart Campbell or the Rev as his followers call him in whispered respectful tones

    The destruction of La (El) Ruthie is imminent

    Does any of this make sense in Scotlands new politics, NO but in a way YES

  52. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    And yes, I do realise that the point of this blog post is the sidespliting tweet “If only the First Minister got Glasgow.” Which kind of left me a bit speechless too when I read it.

    She did “get” Glasgow, as the post points out. Every single seat, by a pretty stonking percentage (in a context where percentages make perfect sense).

    As someone said, though, it’s quite likely JoLa didn’t write that herself. It was probably written by the next spad nonentity set to be parachuted in on the list in 2021, to become SLab leader by 2023 for lack of any other talent.

  53. MacRocker
    Ignored
    says:

    MrMac1040 @ 28 May, 2016 at 11:14 am

    “Labour proved their utter inability to take responsibility for their own demise right after the Scottish Election – Sawar and Dugdale both made comments to the effect that Labour had tried to move on from the independence issue but the people of Scotland (SNP and Tory voters) has “chosen” not to. In other words, Labour’s problems are due to the stupid pig-headed people of Scotland (Nationalist and Unionist)who are just too dumb to see the wisdom of Labour. “

    There is unfinished business for all Yes voters. Labour needs to be wiped out in next years council elections.

  54. K1
    Ignored
    says:

    ‘However there is no doubt the SNP are talking left and looking good while they’re leaning right and being disingenuous over the whole matter and the people of Scotland are coming to realise that more and more by voting for them in ever greater numbers’

    Love this greatly 😉

    *wanders off whistling… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04854XqcfCY for no good reason*

  55. Wull
    Ignored
    says:

    Hello and thank you, Ruby at 11.59 a.m.

    I haven’t got time to explore the link you give us, but wonderful to read five of the daftest ideas ever produced for saving the Union. Every one of them guaranteed to stick in the craw of any self-respecting Scot.

    If the UK Defence League Lordies who wasted tax-payers’ money on the consultation do any of the things above, as listed on Ruby’s post, they are absolutely certain to turn many who voted ‘No’ in 2014 into independence-supporters overnight. And not just the waverers – even many a hitherto convinced ‘No’ voter will not be able to stomach that kind of thing.

    I suppose they will want to celebrate all the phoney ‘events’ proposed in their list by having the OO march down all our streets, just to make sure that everyone gets the unmissable message. That is, to ensure that true Unionism gets up every self-respecting person’s nose once and for all.

    Will Adam Tomkins and Lord Sainsbury be leading the charge on white horses? And will they still be doing so when Britannia finally sinks under the waves?

    Even the pretence that it was ever a Union, and not a colonisation, seems to have been wiped clean from the empty slate that their dismal minds have become. Empty because without historical or even common sense, without a modicum of statesmanship, without common cause or commonweal, or the slightest reasonable ideal with which to make appeal to the common man or woman of Scotland … without everything.

    The modern Emperors – whether egghead ex-Professors or egg-seller grocers clad in ermine – stand there before us … Empty, naked, and unadorned, in all their vain glory.

    You can’t run a country – or even an artifice like the UK -on empty, for ever.

  56. Chic McGregor
    Ignored
    says:

    K1
    Classic case of projection.

  57. K1
    Ignored
    says:

    Yeah Chic, totally subconscious on ma part.

  58. David
    Ignored
    says:

    So the Labour council isn’t to blame for it’s policies as it’s the SNP governments fault due to the ‘reduction’ in budget. However it isn’t the Tory UK governments fault for reducing the budget available to the Scottish government.

    Labour, the true party of grievance.

  59. TD
    Ignored
    says:

    If the Daily Record or the Herald had talked about a 400,000% increase to describe a £1 to £4,000 change in rent imposed by an SNP Council, (no doubt as part of the usual SNP BAD narrative), would we be howling in protest at the headline? I don’t think so, because in this (hypothetical) case, the report would be accurate and not misleading. We might be embarrassed at the action of the SNP Council, but we could not really complain about the reporting,

    A headline can be true, but misleading. Think of the Herald and their recent story about Nicola Sturgeon being dragged into the Hosie/Robson private grief – it was true only because the Herald had asked Sturgeon about it. But the reference to a 400,000% increase in this article is not misleading in any way. It is accurate and intended to illustrate the scale of the problem for the charity – they are having to quit the premises. Why should expressing it in percentage terms be unreasonable or misleading?

  60. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    Wull says:
    28 May, 2016 at 1:23 pm

    Hello and thank you, Ruby at 11.59 a.m.

    I haven’t got time to explore the link you give us, but wonderful to read five of the daftest ideas ever produced for saving the Union

    Ruby replies

    That’s a shame! I’ll keep reading and highlighting the ‘interesting’ parts for you.

    I’m just wondering how a day of celebration of the ‘1707 Act of Union’ aka The Birth of the UK would pan out.

  61. galamcennalath
    Ignored
    says:

    What this is really all about is SLab’s unwillingness to die is a peaceful dignified manner.

    SLab have contributed nothing positive to Scottish politics for a decade. They have whinged and moaned in response to their voters abandoning them. And worst of all they campaigned for London Tory rule while those who should have been their natural followers voted to reject this.

    Their niche on the political spectrum has been filled. They have nothing left to offer, no role to fulfil.

    They just refuse to RIP as they are kept on life support by the likes of the Daily Record and BBC SLab.

    Those who are still involved with SLab need to let it go, let it pass and enter the history books.

  62. Wull
    Ignored
    says:

    Thanks Ruby. Have to go now. Will come back and have another look later. I am sure plenty of others will also be interested in what you post.

    Just a word, afore I go, concerning celebrating the Birth of the UK / 1707 Union and all that …

    Just imagine what that would be, or who would take it over! An attempt to recreate George Square 19.09.2014 OO ‘celebrations’ all over the country … What an idea!

    Most decent people, including I am sure all the many decent Scots who nevertheless voted ‘No’ in 2014, would avoid it like the plague.

    Just the ‘turn-off’ (away from ‘Unionism’) they need, perhaps.

    If they are decent people, they are potential independence-supporters, and we should be having reasonable conversations with them. Such an irrational and odious ‘celebration’ of the Union would make them all the more open to us.

    The more ‘unreasonable’ Unionism becomes, the quicker the reasonable will turn to independence – which, very clearly, is and always has been the rational, reasonable, well-thought-out position. It is reason that will finally win the day, not emotion, as such.

    Even if reasonable people are also emotionally committed, in the best possible way, in decisions like this the heart pulls and tugs but in the end it only advises – the head rules and decides. And the only union that counts is the union of head and heart, rejoicing in that most reasonable of decisions – Yes, Scotland should and will one day be an independent country. Hopefully, rather soon …

    Cheerio … back later, hopefully.

  63. heedtracker
    Ignored
    says:

    Just remembered Niclas Reddish used go sweary UKOK mental, on rancid The Graun’s vote NO or else 2014 stuff. He wasn’t exactly a WoS fan but he certainly got WoS out there with his bad WoS rage.

    Niclas kept telling the btl Graun crowd he’d go back to Wales, if we voted YES, which was quite funny. Wonder what his SLab activist title is? John Ruddy SLabour Montrose from Plymouth’s another regular Graun CiFer but focused much more on Plymouth and south coast trains to London btl. He’d pop into to Graun’s scotland region section to slap down uppity vile seps like me but much of his brilliant mind’s all about the south of England and its trains, or is it

    http://www.johnruddy.org.uk/about/
    From

    John Ruddy ?@jruddy99 May 26
    “The problem is when voters twig that an SNP MP equals a Tory government.”

    to

    John Ruddy ?@jruddy99 May 23
    And what do you call year on year cuts to Glasgow’s budget? SNP have already “let Glasgow down

    Then there’s Dr NO, unionist of the year

    Scott Arthur ?@DrScottThinks May 25 Edinburgh, Scotland
    Nicola Sturgeon is still pushing the myth that SNP MPs are better than the rest.

  64. Proud Cybernat
    Ignored
    says:

    There’s lies, damned lies, percentages and Tomkins.

    Hey Tomkins–why not have every new born in Scotland tatooed with the Union Jack on its forehead so that when the see their pals and theselves in the mirror they’ll become all cosy, misty-eyed yoons? It’s about as sensible and reasonable as any of the utter pish you have proposed, you fecking rocket.

  65. Iain More
    Ignored
    says:

    It begs the question as to how individuals with such impenetrable skulls managed to get University Degrees at all. Clearly a University education is wasted on a great many Yoons though. It might be that they aren’t genetically programmed to take the hint? Oh well here is hoping they never take the hint!

  66. Iain More
    Ignored
    says:

    OT

    I couldn’t let it pass without saying something about the latest Yoon Home Office Farce. I guess if having worked for the Red Cross makes somebody a “bad character” then lord knows what they would make of me having done two stints with the VSO. I am guessing that makes me thoroughly evil in Yoon eyes. Thank god my mother decided to give birth in Scotland.

  67. Proud Cybernat
    Ignored
    says:

    O/T

    What muppets like Tomkins just don’t get is that there is no such thing as a ‘British’ nationality. Sure there will be the OO zoomers who will dispute this but it’s a fact. Indeed, most English people, in my experience, do not consider themselves as ‘British’. They are English first and last. ‘Britishness’ is just an imperialist fob, a smokescreen to mask the dominance of England over the smaller countries of the UKOGB&NI. England IS Britain and Britain IS England. Just ask most Americans.

    I used to work in London. Spent many a night in London pubs along with Welsh, Irish and English pub goers. When the Celtic fringers explained to our English cousins that “We’re all British” they would just laugh at us because the simple truth is that it is the wee countries that are ‘British’ and England is English. This supposed ‘shared’ identity only works one way. “We’re ALL British” is a total lie. And idiots like Tomkins have been taken in by that lie.

    But I am Scottish. And my Scottish culture is distinctly different to any other in these islands. I will NOT be labelled with a manufactured cultural identity such as ‘British’. Not even if England agrees to being British too.

    As R.L. Stevenson said:

    “There is nothing perhaps more puzzling (if one thing in sociology can ever really be more unaccountable than another) than the great gulf that is set between England and Scotland – a gulf so easy in appearance, in reality so difficult to traverse. Here are two people almost identical in blood: pent up together on one small island, so that their intercourse (one would have thought) must be as close as that of prisoners who shared one cell of the Bastille [. . .] and yet a few years of quarrelsome isolation [. . .] has so separated their thoughts and ways that not unions, nor mutual dangers, nor steamers, nor railways, nor all the king’s horses and all the king’s men, seem able to obliterate the broad distinction.”

    Over 300 years of this defunct Union and they still try to force it upon us. Never going to happen, Tomkins, old chap. Not in a quad-zillion years. I’m NOT bRitish and won’t be forced into being so.

  68. Greannach
    Ignored
    says:

    I thought the red white and blue Union Express was a malicious spoof. Until I discovered Tomkins. Oh dear.

  69. Truth
    Ignored
    says:

    Labour don’t get Scotland.

  70. Lanarkist
    Ignored
    says:

    Roger Mexico 12.44pm

    City Property (Glasgow) LLP is wholly owned by Glasgow City Council but is a separate legal entity. City Property is governed by a Strategic Board, which is appointed by the Council and operates in its own name, directly enters into contracts, directly employs staff and keeps separate accounts.

    City Property Glasgow (Investments) LLP is owned by both the Council and City Property (Glasgow) LLP and is also a separate legal entity. It too is governed by a Strategic Board, made up of the same board members as City Property (Glasgow) LLP.

    The board consists of senior officers of City Property (Glasgow) LLP, a senior officer of Glasgow City Council and four elected members.

    Councillor Martin Neill; Board Chair
    Tom Turley; Assistant Director of Development and Regeneration Services
    Pauline Barclay; Managing Director of City Property (Glasgow) LLP
    Bailie Phil Greene; Audit Committee Chair
    Councillor Helen Stephen
    Bailie Gerald Leonard
    Councillor Frank Docherty

  71. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    John Curtice’s contribution to the ‘New Act of Union’ committee seems reasonable no mad ideas about more Last Night at the Proms, more Rule Britannia, more BBC, more Union Jacks, more Royal Family.

    There’s a lot of reading in this ‘New Act of Union’ report. It would be good if everyone could read & review a separate section. It’s a lot of fun honest there are a good few laughs to be had!

    Professor Curtice: Support in Scotland for the maintenance of the Union has probably never been lower. To date, there has never been a period when polls and surveys have consistently pointed to majority support north of the border for leaving the UK. Yet polls conducted since the referendum have on average found that Scotland is now almost evenly divided on the question of its constitutional status. On average four polls conducted in September and October have found that 48% would now vote in favour of independence, while 52% would vote against. These figures are in line with most polling that has been conducted since last year’s referendum.

    The Chairman: One rather senses from your answers that those who wanted independence voted on philosophical reasons, the big question, whereas those who voted to stay in the union were not motivated by the union itself, but by either fear or other small points that accumulated. Is that correct? We are trying to identify the union, what its pulling power is and what needs to be done to clarify its advantages.

    Professor Curtice: My answer to you, Chairman, is that ultimately the debate, and for most people the consideration in their minds, is what course of action is in Scotland’s best interests and best represents their feelings. One needs to understand that politics in Scotland now is primarily about Scotland, and not about the interests of the UK as a whole. The truth is that the Prime Minister is rather good at being able to articulate the view as to why the United Kingdom as a whole should stay together, but I am not sure that it cuts a great deal of mustard with voters north of the border, because that is not the question that most voters in Scotland are asking themselves. The question most voters in Scotland are asking themselves is what is in Scotland’s interest, not necessarily what is in the interests of the UK as a whole.

    Sorry I’m totally off topic but TBH I find anything Johann Lamont says to be totally boring. Anytime I watched FMQ when she was Branch Office leader I always had my finger on the fast forward button as soon as she opened her mouth.

  72. Ealasaid
    Ignored
    says:

    @Ruby
    You are doing a great job there Ruby and thank you for bringing it to our attention. I have not had time to read much of it yet but wondered as you have read more than most of us, have you found any point where they have even suggested doing anything that would actually help Scotland and Scots?

  73. galamcennalath
    Ignored
    says:

    Proud Cybernat says:

    ” the simple truth is that it is the wee countries that are ‘British’ and England is English. This supposed ‘shared’ identity only works one way. “We’re ALL British” is a total lie.”

    Exactly!

    Anglicised Scots were North British, the English were never South British.

    Unionism is an Scottish (and NI) creation. From a London perspective, there is no Union. There is no partnership. There was a series of take overs long long ago.

    We Scots get pissed off when foreigners call the UK England and think everyone from this isle is English. Truth is, that’s the way most English think too, when they bother to think on such trivial matters.

    They have a Queen of England, ask anyone outside the Celtic fringes!

    English sports teams are the ‘real’ national teams, just look at the arrogance displayed at the Commonwealth Games.

    Like it or not, it is the reality of a Greater England we are up against.

    The sad thing in all of this is that the pathetic Scots who aspire to be pseudo English are never completely accepted by the ‘real thing’.

    England is a great place. I have many fond memories of visits and friends there. However I am not English and have no wish to be English, Polish or Kurd. I have my own nation and culture.

  74. Croompenstein
    Ignored
    says:

    Professor Curtice: Support in Scotland for the maintenance of the Union has probably never been lower. To date, there has never been a period when polls and surveys have consistently pointed to majority support north of the border for leaving the UK

    Poultice won’t Scotland be dissolving the UK

  75. chasanderson200
    Ignored
    says:

    I have now got round to a preliminary scan of the mickey mouse lords committee to put Scotland back in its box.
    In my quick scan I looked at pages 113-130 evidence (both oral and written) from the Campaign For An English Parliament.
    In short, the misguided nationalistic, little Englander arrogance is enough to boil your pish to such an extent that I am going to stop for the moment to regain my fucking composure before I need another triple bypass.

    Tomorrow I shall print the whole document and in a calm and restrained manner study it in fine detail and will further post my views here.

    As someone mentions in an earlier post it would be good if we could have a number of us looking at the detail of this even if only to be ready to pull it to bits if they try to spring any of its moronic suggestions upon us.

  76. galamcennalath
    Ignored
    says:

    Ruby says:

    “John Curtice”

    Thanks for highlighting that. I think the points he makes are spot on. Few in Scotland give a hoot about the UK as an entity. We are motivated by what’s the best course for Scotland and for our individual families. I reckon most NOs were never pro UK, they were simply scared of change or motivated completely by self interest. Very few are actually BritNats motivated by perverse patriotism.

  77. papko
    Ignored
    says:

    From a London perspective, there is no Union. There is no partnership. There was a series of take overs long long ago.

    From my perspective as well , there is no “union” and I dislike the term “yoon”,

    Scotland and England got merged into Britain in 1707, in much the same way as every country in Europe and world History came to be , by bloodshed,machinations,threats .

    That’s how all countries get formed , the new country meant a large market and increased prosperity.

    Any Scot with ambition welcomed it, save a few hundred rioters or so , (they soon buckled down as well.)

    All those wars we fought with other nations as we jostled for power, the Wars with France,Holland and Spain. more recently enforcing the pax Britannica, and preventing German hegemony over Europe.

    Finally giving up the Empire after the great Wars.
    I can’t understand anyone not thrilling to such wonderful history.

  78. Paula Rose
    Ignored
    says:

    I love a bit of parody and papko certainly delivers.

  79. galamcennalath
    Ignored
    says:

    Aye, the ‘butcher’s apron’ is certainly an appropriate nickname.

  80. louis.b.argyll
    Ignored
    says:

    LOOK OUT FOLKS!..

    Bitter Unionist councillors are conspiring to trash councils further and privatise whats left.
    Blaming cuts, while choosing where to let the axe fall, unnecessarily.
    There are anti-cuts groups in various
    communities, these people are in there, checking no shenanigans are taking place, support them.
    Too many councillors dont actually like the people of their own wards.
    They dont give a monkeys about social-cohesion etc.

  81. heedtracker
    Ignored
    says:

    Finally giving up the Empire after the great Wars.
    I can’t understand anyone not thrilling to such wonderful history.”

    Empire’s are never given up. The UK was stripped of its empire. Also, you’re living through British history right the noo. Look at how hard BBC led yoon Britannia destroyed Scottish independence 2014, they hope:D

    Welcome to WoS papko

  82. Effijy
    Ignored
    says:

    You can see were Lamont is coming from, and going to,
    Nowhere in both instances!

    A friend advised me that she attends a local pub quiz?
    From what I’ve seen of her, I hope someone Knocks on the door so that she can answer something.

    What is she doing still in the Labour party?

    It stabbed her in the back. It forced her to wait one full year to advise her if she was against the horrific Bedroom Tax, it forced her to lie about the North British Branch having any form of autonomy, it use Gordon Brown to Lie about pensioners receiving no payments in an independent Scotland.

    The woman and her husband have made a very nice living pretending to be Socialist, but their game is now up.

    Go away woman, you have been a blight on Scotland’s wellbeing.

  83. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    Ealasaid says:
    28 May, 2016 at 3:55 pm

    @Ruby
    You are doing a great job there Ruby and thank you for bringing it to our attention. I have not had time to read much of it yet but wondered as you have read more than most of us, have you found any point where they have even suggested doing anything that would actually help Scotland and Scots?

    Ruby replies

    Not so far unless you think more Union Jacks, more Last Night at the Proms, more Rule Britiania, more BBC & more Royal Family would help Scotland & Scots.

    I think they are more interested in England aka the United Kingdom than Scotland.

    ‘Lord Norton of Louth: You are saying that it would be the unit itself, England, that would determine the distribution of powers.

    Lord Salisbury: That is our feeling, but we recognise that if England is unhappy, the union as a whole will be unhappy. The two are intimately connected.

  84. Robert Peffers
    Ignored
    says:

    @Croompenstein says: 28 May, 2016 at 4:13 pm:

    ” … won’t Scotland be dissolving the UK”

    That is the truth I’ve been harping about since around 1946 but generally found no one listening to the truth, (and I’m including a great many YES voters in that not listening group and certainly all Unionist).

    The truth is clearly contained in the exact text of The Treaty of Union and is almost word for word mirrored in both the English and Scottish parliamentary Acts of Union.

    That truth is that the Treaty Of Union is a bi-partite agreement signed by two equally sovereign Kingdoms to form a single United Kingdom. Not, “A Country”, as is so often claimed by both unionists and non-unionists alike.

    The respective parliaments then ratified the Treaty and yet there is not a single mention of the words, “country or countries”, in the entire set of documents.

    That means several legal things that any reasonably honest court would have to rule :-

    The Union is between only two Kingdoms.

    It is not a country but could, perhaps, be termed a state.

    The actual Kingdom is thus a unified, “Royal Realm”, and the parliament is the unified parliament of the Monarchy, (thus common to each former kingdom).

    In fact the formal name of that common parliament is, “Her Majesty’s Government of her United Kingdom”. To put that into context the Treaty of Union joined the two realms and The Monarchy is legally the Head of State of a Parliament legislating for two equally sovereign Kingdoms.

    One Kingdom contains three countries and the other is a single country and thus it is illegal to treat any of the countries in a different manner to any other.

    Devolving powers in an unequal basis is wrong and particularly treating England as the UK by the Parliament at Westminster legislating for England as the UK, funding England as the UK and now treating English MPs as UK MPs with all others relegated to inferior beings is unacceptable – except to the English and sycophants.

    The fact is that now there really is no United Kingdom, (if there ever was one in the first place).

    Nothing in the Treaty or Acts of Union can legally justify the way Westminster treats the people it rules over. Not even in the regions of England itself.

    The stark truth is that the Treaty of Union has always been treated by Westminster as a take over of both Kingdoms by the country of England and thus the treaty has been broken from 1 May 1707 when it first came into power.

  85. Effijy
    Ignored
    says:

    Lamont reminds me of nasty Mags Curran attacking the people of Shettleston a few years ago when they voted SNP.

    She told them that they should never forget what Labour had
    done for them!

    I agree with that sentiment as at that point Shettleston had The worst health record in Europe with the shortest life expectancy, and the highest City Unemployment rate in the UK.

    Yep where would you be without Labour? Somewhere Better!
    But at least Mags has a big house and plenty in the bank.

  86. Ealasaid
    Ignored
    says:

    @Ruby
    Thanks for that. You do not surprise me. Going down the list giving ‘evidence’ there do not seem to be many that are instantly recognisable as being of a YES persuasion, who would be speaking for half the population of Scotland. Quite a few from universities and such-like but as we know most of the high-heid yins are English placements as we Scots are not to be trusted.

    I did notice Maggie Chapman of the Greens (p.131) who spoke quite well about the Scottish people. But she seemed to be there under false pretences as the first question the Chairman asked was to confirm that they were all of the Better Together persuasion to which she answered that she was not. She was subsequently snarled at by the red blue and orange Tory representatives throughout.

    Not much representation of the opinion of YES voting Scotland or indeed the Scottish Government in there at all. So maybe they should not be surprised if the Scottish Government told them where to stick their conclusions at the end of the day. They do not seem that interested in the opinions of us Scots just what they need to do to us to changes our rebellious ways.

    I shall continue reading when time allows.

  87. Rock
    Ignored
    says:

    Morag,

    Do you agree with me that the outgoing Lord Advocate is deliberately lying?

    call me dave,

    “Second trial over Lockerbie a ‘realistic possibility’ says outgoing Lord Advocate”

    A knowingly deliberate lie by the “Lord Advocate”, in my view.

    The Scottish justice system is rotten to the core.

    A second trial will never be allowed, not before independence anyway.

    I am sure Lockerbie expert Dr Morag Kerr agrees with me.

  88. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    Ealasaid says:

    They do not seem that interested in the opinions of us Scots just what they need to do to us to changes our rebellious ways.

    Ruby replies

    I don’t think they are interested in us Scots infact it sounds as if they would like to exclude us from their plans!

    ‘Q48 Lord Judge: Why should those who seek independence participate in the creation of a charter? Why should they, if a charter were to be created, accept it?

    Professor Alan Trench: The latter question is a very difficult one, understandably. The former question, however, has a very straightforward answer, which is that they represent a very substantial slice of Scottish public opinion. As we know, 45% supported independence last year in the referendum and the SNP still commands very broad support in Scotland, a little short of 50%. One cannot simply ignore the will of 50% of the population of Scotland. Apart from the political—

    Lord Judge: I am sorry to interrupt you, but who would represent that at this great meeting or convention, or however it is dressed up?

    Professor Alan Trench: That is one of the many problems with a constitutional convention. There clearly has to be a role within it not only for the Scottish Government but much more so for representatives of the Scottish Parliament. Equally, they are not necessarily the only people who would speak for Scotland. In the same way, it would be wrong for MPs to be the only people who were to speak for England. A variety of interests from England would need to be engaged’

    There are videos of most of these oral sessions if you prefer watching rather than reading.

  89. Tam Jardine
    Ignored
    says:

    Ruby

    I finally got round to reading the Scotland in Traction’s head antiscot Alastair Cameron’s submission.

    http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/constitution-committee/the-union-and-devolution/written/21857.html

    I will summarise his 15 recommendations “To Stabilise and Reinforce Unity in the United Kingdom” (which sounds like something Darth Vader would write before annexing a solar system:

    1. Westminster should be able to overrule and interfere with the actions of the SNP led Scottish Government

    2. If a devolved funtion is not used it should revert to Westminster (NOT the other way round of course!)

    3. Lets make everyone use the term United Kingdom at every opportunity.

    4. Make students study in different parts of the UK to make YooKay more of a melting pot and reduce that awkwardly high demographic of native “Scots” in “Scotland”.

    5. Gradually abolish Scots law

    6. Merge national arts bodies, charities, sporting bodies, public bodies so that in 50 years there will barely be anything distinctive (except the Scottish parliament which we really want to abolish but we’ll keep quiet about that aim for the moment). As for further devolution of the BBC- over my dead body.

    7. End distinctive Scottish banknotes (I say end Bank of England notes but see what I did there…) Basically the “S” word is verboten.

    8. Team GB all the way- end all Scottish sporting teams and organisations.

    9. Promote the armed forces at every given opportunity

    10. The SNP’s stranglehold on education has to end. Westminster should prescribe a set curriculum including lessons to reinforce their status as UK subjects.

    11. The Union Jack should be everywhere. The saltire should be erased from public life.

    12. Westminster should have a far more visible presence in Scotland.

    13. The nationalist administration is deceiving everyone in areas where they appear to be succeeding. This must end- statistics should be controlled by Westminster and performance judged by Westminster alone.

    14. Civil servants in Scotland must be subservient to Westminster and not the Scottish administration.

    15. Newborn UK subjects should receive a token of unionism such as a set of British coins from the Royal Mint.

    And that, my friends is it- Scotland in Traction’s proposal to erase Scotland from the map and ensure the Yoonited Kingdom survives for thousands of years.

    If a fraction of his proposals comes to pass I’ll see youse at the GPO

  90. David Jardine
    Ignored
    says:

    Tam Jardine @ 8.42pm

    My favourite :

    15. The UK Government should consider marking of birth of every child in the UK, celebrating the birth of every new British citizen.

    For my son, a new British Citizen born outside of the U.K., his birth was marked by my payment of £184.50 to cover birth registration and reception of a birth certificate. We are eagerly looking forward to receiving his coin from the Royal Mint.

  91. galamcennalath
    Ignored
    says:

    @Tam Jardine

    I would say, a number of those actions have been underway for a few years now…

    3, 8, 9, 11, & 12 with others just beginning to surface.

    Like the Unionist Jack on our licences. That serves no other purpose than to promote UKOK where it isn’t considered OK.

  92. John from Fife
    Ignored
    says:

    Surely all these suggestions to the HOL on Yoonism are racist against us Scots. How on earth can they get away with this.

  93. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    Tam Jardine

    Brilliant summary! 🙂 Who would have thought that reading a Government document could be so entertaining!

  94. galamcennalath
    Ignored
    says:

    John from Fife says:

    “Surely all these suggestions to the HOL on Yoonism are racist against us Scots. How on earth can they get away with this.”

    Their sense of entitlement knows no boundaries.

    It certainly clarifies how they perceive the status of the ‘home colonies’ within their Greater England.

    Perhaps less clear is exactly why they believe the last vestiges of their Empire are worth saving.

  95. K1
    Ignored
    says:

    4. Make students study in different parts of the UK to make YooKay more of a melting pot and reduce that awkwardly high demographic of native “Scots” in “Scotland”.

    ‘The trouble with Scotland is that it is full of Scots.’

    It’d make ye weep if is wisnae so utterly blatant in it’s re strengthening of our colonisation. They really are crapping themselves.

    Which means, we’re winning. (or we’re gonnae die trying)

  96. Tam Jardine
    Ignored
    says:

    David Jardine

    As with many costs associated to these official interactions with government I often wonder how they reach their figures. Registering the birth could hardly have taken any more than 15 minutes and postage is buttons so how do they get to £184.50? Why not £30? Why not £584.50? Why not £1084.50?

    The only answer I have been able to come up with is that HM government looks at what other countries can get away with charging and makes it a bit more- it certainly seems that way with the cost of passports.

    The crazy thing is for a new British citizen who happens to be born outwith the UK, until said citizen successfully applies for a UK passport Her Britannic Majesty’s Secretary of State does not Request and does not require in the Name of Her Majesty all those whom it may concern to allow the bearer to pass freely without let or hindrance, and to afford the bearer neither such assistance nor protection as may be necessary.

    For that you’ll have to stump up another arbitrary amount. You should have just gone for the passport- it has more practical applications 😉

  97. ronnie anderson
    Ignored
    says:

    @ Morag hivnae heard from you for months then you popup & bring your fan club wie you. Please Morag dont tangle wie our resident Troll ma heid couldnae stand it.

    Nice tae see you back xx.

  98. Robert J. Sutherland
    Ignored
    says:

    Tam Jardine @ 20:42 said:

    I finally got round to reading the Scotland in Traction’s head antiscot Alastair Cameron’s submission.

    5. Gradually abolish Scots law

    10. The SNP’s stranglehold on education has to end. Westminster should prescribe a set curriculum including lessons to reinforce their status as UK subjects.

    Well, those two right there are both direct violations of the Treaty of Union.

    Is this person actually Scottish? (And presumably suffering from a terminal case of cringe.) Or some kind of crazed imperialist defending the last vestige of the Empire in North Britain? Does he even exist, and is actually some kind of Chris Morris-type parody?

    We need more like him. Indy is a serious business but I’m convinced that the best way to win is not by fine-print nitpicking but through satire and laughter. It’s not as though we’re short of raw material, is it?

  99. Greannach
    Ignored
    says:

    Shouldn’t we all just enjoy the Morris dancing and cricket on the village green as the vicar greets us to evensong?

    Now, there’s a few possibilities for a new British curriculum. The “youngsters” (as ever so humble Michael Gove would call them) would love it.

  100. Tam Jardine
    Ignored
    says:

    galamcennalath

    Indeed- they have been pushing a number of these for years but it is instructive to see someone who wants Scotland erased as a distinctive political, social and cultural entity lay it down in black and white.

    The irony is that to proceed with Scotland in Traction’s proposals formally (which is surely what he is advocating otherwise why else make the submission to the lords?) would be the equivalent of the union taking potassium cyanide.

    Here’s a wee hint Mr Cameron- that’s why you’re no at the controls, dummy! Nicola and big John would be giving each other high fives. They’d be pishing themselves laughing.

    But of course as is the way in politics now- when Westminster wants to push through something unpopular they start by bringing forward suggestions and proposals that are way over the top so that the eventual much softer policy put forward seems moderate and acceptable. There must be a name for this but I know it not.

  101. Tam Jardine
    Ignored
    says:

    Greannach

    16. “Youngsters” are now to be referred to as “Yoonsters” to reinforce their unionist heritage and all benefits therein and thereof

  102. K1
    Ignored
    says:

    Tam,

    ‘There must be a name for this but I know it not.’

    Manipulation?

  103. Tam Jardine
    Ignored
    says:

    John from Fife

    “Surely all these suggestions to the HOL on Yoonism are racist against us Scots. How on earth can they get away with this.”

    They are beyond simple racism- it is imperialism, colonialism from a section of society who have at every turn dishonestly portrayed their position. I don’t recall Better Togetherists telling us that voting no would result in a concerted attempt to erase Scotland’s cultural and political identity.

    Gordon Brown (I am laughing while I type this) had a vision that Scotland could lead the UK, not leave it. And now he thinks the UK can lead the EU instead of leave it. Thats one of they towering intellects right there. What the beeb call a big beast.

    His hombres now want to dip us and strip us like they do with doors. Get rid of all those layers of that awful Scottishness.

  104. Ken500
    Ignored
    says:

    Fifty years of Labour. Most of them should be in jail. Rejected at the Ballot box time and time again. It is a disgrace.

    The House of Lords have absolutely no powers. Only limited powers of delay. Most of them are known liars. Most of them should be in jail. The House of Lords should gave been abolished long ago. Instead of being packed with ex a Commons politicians. They get a pension in any case.

    If Scotland keeps voting SNP for Independence there is nothing they can do about it.

    The Scottish justice system did not organise the Lockerbie Trial. It was Blair and Labour/Unionists. A kangaroo Court in The Hague. With no jury. Westminster found Megrahi guilty, although he didn’t do it. The evidence was fabricated. The shirt was a boy’s shirt. The witnesses were paid liars. There were notes added to the evidence. The UK Gov will not release documents relating to the decision, They are keeping them secret. He was sent for trial as a Patsy because the authorities thought he would not be found guilty because he did not do it.

    That is why Megrahi was released under on compassionate grounds as he had a predicted short time to live. An appeal would have taken years and the UK gov would not release the relevant documentation for an appeal. They still will not release relevant documents and (US) letters. Keeping them secret under the Official Secrets Act.

  105. Ken500
    Ignored
    says:

    If the total numbers of mature Uni students are added in the number of student figures would be higher. Mature students are over 25. 20% of students are mature student. If 25 to 30 years added to the number is 5%? There is still 15% to be added on. 55% going into FE. Another 15% of mature students = 70%+ in Scotland accessing FE. With higher numbers from more recent figures? Plus 100,000 aprenticeships. 92% of pupils in Scotland go into FE or an apprenticeship. A high number. More is spent per pupil (pro rata) in Scotland than in the rest of the UK. Buildings need refurbishment,

    20% of students in Scotland are wealthy students from elsewhere, getting a subsidised education. A clique. More (part-time) colleges places are needed to support the vulnerable. Money should be invested in the early years. Keep class sizes down. Additional needs training for teachers. It helps all pupils achieve and develop.

    Willy Young -Labour intends to illegally try to shut the bases in schools. To cut the education budget and try to get money from the Health budget. After getting the City into £Millions of debt building unwanted, obscene carbuncles. Ruining the city centre and wasting £Million of taxpayers money. May 2017.

    The Scottish Gov should introduce minimum pricing urgently. As soon as possible,

    Keeping the people healthy and well educated is a priority for any Gov.

    Scotland would be better off, without the illegal wars, banking fraud, tax evasion and mismanagement of the economy from Westminster. £10Billion+ a year could be better spent.

    Cut Trident/illegal wars £1Billion, a tax on ‘loss leading’ drink £1Billion. £3Billion? lost on tax evasion, £4Billion lost on Oil & Gas mismanagement by Westminster. £4Billion on debt repayments not borrowed or spent in Scotland. = £10Billion+ People are being sanctioned by Westminster and starved.

    Westminster are cutting Education (£6Billion a year ), cutting Health budget (£4Billion a year) cutting Welfare Budget (£4Billion year). Spending £20Billion a year on Hinkley Point and HS2. A disaster waiting to happen with absolutely no business case. The business case is flawed. The Tory fund to transfer £Billions of public money into their associates pockets. A disgraceful waste of public money. There are credible alternatives. They should get their priorities right.

  106. Born Optimist
    Ignored
    says:

    After reading through the list of contributors to the House of Lords Select Committee on the Constitution I was left to ponder a quote I came across recently: Not my circus. Not my monkeys.

    Seemed appropriate somehow.

  107. Macbeda
    Ignored
    says:

    Why not just say they increased the rent by 4000 times which Is the correct way of describing the increase or so I was taught.

    The maximum percentage you can ever get is 100 % which is the whole lot.

    Will this start a debate on percentages I wonder?

  108. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    Born Optimist says:

    Not my circus. Not my monkeys.

    Ruby replies

    I think these monkeys are definitely worth watching! Think back to the EU debate it was one of those HOL committees who got Barosso involved. Remeber Lord Tugendhat’s letter to Barosso?

  109. Christine
    Ignored
    says:

    A wee bitty hyperbole never did any harm to highlight a valid point Morag. Especially if its accurate.

  110. defo
    Ignored
    says:

    Macbeda

    No. 🙂

    A summer of bringing the Trident ‘successor’ issue up to the boil, ahead of the ‘decision’ “gateway” in the Autumn, is needed to wring maximum benefit for the cause on what we all know is a done deal.

  111. wull
    Ignored
    says:

    Many thanks, Ruby especially, as well as others who are taking the time to read this report. The information you are providing, and your illuminating comment, is much appreciated. Especially by all of us who can’t find the time or energy to study the document.

    I did, all the same, grab a moment to read a few lines of the contribution of Professor Tomkins, that Tory Republican Constituionalist. Only a few lines, mind – so the comment that follows is out of context, and may be miles off the mark.

    Tomkins seemed to say that the so-called ‘Union’ we are all supposed to be so involved in is, basically, like no other. So it doesn’t fit most of the standard definitions of what a Union might be. In the end, it isn’t really anything definite (or definable) at all. I think he admitted that.

    This means that the Union is pretty much whatever anyone wants it to be (Prof. Tomkins included). And, obviously, different people want it to be different things. So you can basically define the UK Union any old way you like.

    That sounds to me like Alice in Wonderland. Especially when one of the characters in Alice (is it the Mad Hatter?) declares that ‘words mean what I say they mean!’

    Maybe that’s what happened when the UK came into existence in the first place. Maybe it was declared to the world that there was now this new thing called the UK, and the world had better believe it – but don’t ask us to define it!

    What does this UK thing mean? It means whatever we – the UK establishment – say it means.

    And that meaning can change according to needs and circumstances.

    No wonder there is no written UK constitution for a UK Professor of Constitutional Law to study. The UK means whatever ‘we’ want it to mean; it means whatever suits ‘us’ at any particular given moment in time.

    Who ‘we’ and ‘us’ are in the above statement cannot be defined either. But, be sure of this: it’s not ‘youze’!

    I suppose, in the context we are presently discussing, ‘we and ‘us’ are the Lordies and their Commisssion-to-Save-the-Union, and the advisers they are consulting.

    God save our gracious Union …

    So there we have it: a (self-appointed?) committee of the Lordies in Wonderland (how else to describe the fantasy-world, fairy-tale existence of the HoL?) discussing an undefinable entity, in order to save it from dissolving into its own inherent Non-Existence.

    Or … a bunch of over-paid nonentities discussing – well – a Non-Entity! The UK!

    Now, in my extremely brief reading of the wisdom of our Mr. Tomkinss (which I have to admit was not unintelligent) I noticed his declared need of a ‘benchmark’ (his word) on which to base his contribution.

    Why does he need such a thing? I suppose as a substitute for that elusive ‘definition’ of what the UK actually is (elusive because, in fact, it isn’t really anything).

    And, if I remember rightly, the ‘benchmark’ had to be something that had been at the heart of the Union from its inception, and had remained of its essence ever since. Not a definition, therefore (for there isn’t one), but a defining characteristic.

    And so, what did Professor Tomkins’ benchmark turn out to be? Well, if I read him rightly (though maybe I did not) he summed up his benchmark in two simple words: ‘trade’ and ‘security’.

    According to Professor Tomkins, that is what the Union is all about: trade and security. That is what it consists of. And what it exists for.

    Now, if I understand Robert Peffers aright (though maybe I don’t) that is precisely what it is, and always has been. Prof. Tomkins is right: the Union, ultimately, is merely a Treaty between two entities concerning trade and security.

    Prof. Tomkins may not be the flavour of the month (or of the year, or the century, or indeed the entire millenium) for many of us, but he is not necessarily always wrong.

    The constitutional reality is that there is a treaty (or treaties) about trade and security between Scotland and England (into which entity was incorporated Wales long beforehand and Ireland some time afterwards). And that treaty / these treaties constitute ‘the Union’.

    These two concerns, trade and security, are the only ‘benchmark’ the Professor of Constitutional Law can find to ‘quasi-define’ the Union, and he is the expert.

    The basic slogan, the underlying reality, the cement that holds us ‘together’, making life ‘better’ for all of us, is this: the UK Union is good for trade and security.

    I find that very interesting.

    To be honest, I even find it an extremely helpful contribution to the cause of Scottish independence.

    If the Union was / is basically a ‘trade and security agreement’, why can’t there still be a modern-day ‘trade and security’ agreement between the two entities after they become independent from each other?

    It would obviously be in the best interests of both parties for such an agreement to exist. It is not beyond the wit of man, surely, to maintain or expand trade and security agreements that have proved beneficial to both, and can continue to be so after independence. Neighbouring nations frequently have all kinds of friendly agreements with each other.

    And this is precisely what the SNP’s White Paper set out during the independence campaign. It was the intention that if Scotland had voted ‘Yes’, her trade and security arrangements with her southern neighbour would have remained pretty much as before. Nothing much would have changed, especially ‘in conventional terms’. Trident was the only major ‘security’ issue on which there was real disagreement, and trade would have continued freely as before!

    This is undoubtedly what the Yes campaign aimed at. It was only lunatics on the No side – unfortunately not a lunatic fringe, but mainline loonies comprising prominent UK-supporting politicians and some of their fellow campaigners – who refused such a clear and common-sensical vision of the future.

    These were the scare-mongerers who went about screaming things like: ‘If you horrible Scots become independent, we won’t trade with you any more (we’ll stick up tarrifs to keep your goods out of our England, and prevent ours from reaching you); and there won’t be any mutually helpful security agreements (we’ll erect a military frontier with checkpoints all along the border, and we won’t help you – or allow you to help us – in any way).

    Such petulance would quiackly have died the death if we Scots had been brave enough in sufficient numbers to call the bluff of thee hysterical screamers. England would have had too much to lose by acting in such a moronic fashion after a ‘Yes’ vote, in terms of its own trade and security. So common sense – that old Scots’ virtue – would have prevailed in the end.

    Unfortunately, the hysterical loonies had just enough voice to influence enough waverers to scrape home the result they wanted. So they (some of them, anyway) lived to fight – or gush forth – again in the current EU referendum, transforming themselves into the European-hating BritNat UK Unionists of 2016.

    As if to prove Prof. Tomkins right, thee Unionist Anti-European-Union-ists are still onsessed with ‘trade and security’. They want to be ‘secure’ from Europe, which they see as a menace to their England (‘their’ UK); yet, laughably, they still hope to be able to trade with it.

    Let’s come back to Tomkins – who may not be entirely loony, and may well be pro-European, and to his ‘trade and security’ ‘benchmark’ for what the Union actually is.

    What happens if we join that Tomkins view of the Union to some of the things another politically well-known Glasgow (but hardly Glaswegian) Professor has been confiding to the Lordies and their consultattion? Professor Curtice says the Scots, even most of the No voters among them, are no longer centred on the UK but on what is best for Scotland. Surprise, surprise!

    So, vis-a-vis independence, the basic question for most Scots – according to our two Professors – is simply this: whether the Union is or is not good for Scotland. Is it more advantageous to Scottish ‘trade and security’ for Scotland to be in the Union, or out of it? That, according to them, is the main question most Scots are continuing to ponder.

    Funny – isn’t it? – that they actually begin to sound, in a roundabout kind of way, like Alex Salmond. Who has been arguing for years that Scotland would be better-off outside the UK Union, while remaining inside the EU Union.
    I agree with both these points. Yet neither of them is the main reason why I want Scotland to be independent.

    For me, the crix of the matter is the colonial, imperial mentality, and everything that goes with it, none of which I can abide. I regard that mentality as having no place whatsoever in the modern world, and no future. It is a mind-set which puts ‘my security’ above everyone else’s, and my ‘trading’ or economic advantage likewise.

    This justifies me treating other people – and other nations – in an appalling fashion, without regard for their peace and security,and rights, in order to guarantee my supposed safety. The same with trade: my own material well-being is what counts, and it more important than anyone else’s. Portrait of the nation as a collective egotist.

    Oh the number of wars that have been fought to gain trading advantage … and the number of further wars that are then required, and multiplied, to guarantee ‘our security’ … That is, wars waged to keep the (unfair) advantages I have managed to acquire, by fair means or foul. As in love, and above all war, of which they are an extension, all’s fair in ‘trade and security’.

    Scottish independence. for me, is about opposing and overthrowing these old mentalities. I can understand those with a nostalgia for a time when they genuinely believed the UK Union was a force for good in the world … Maybe, in some regards, it was, at least sometimes … But, in my view, it isn’t any longer.

    And it’s up to us Scots to put it to bed once and for all, by taking responsibility for ourselves. And ceasing to be complicit in our own decline, and final demise. For that, it seems to me, is the alternative. A stark choice, indeed.

    From what Ruby and the others have posted it is crystal clear that the Wonderland Lordies and their UK-supporting advisers are aiming at only one thing: the ultimate and total extinction of Scotland.

    Despite all our modern sophistication, and quite incredibly,it is as if we are back in the 14th Century. As if nothing has changed since then. For those who are aware of them, the similarities are astounding.

    As the French say, ‘the more a thing changes, the more it stays the same’.

    And isn’t it strange how some of the Scottish-based people whom the Lordies have been consulting actually seem to regard ‘the Scots’, among whom they live and about whom they are talking, as ‘them’? Maybe they feel as if they are living amongst aliens. Because these peope – the Scots – are not ‘us’; they do not belong to that ‘we’ to which we belong … .

    Some things have happened since the 14th Century; one of them is that Machiavelli wrote ‘the Prince’. In which he says some astoundingly awful things about the means ‘the Prince’ should employ in order to establish or maintain colonies.

    Instead of simply lampooning them, we should give the Lordies and their advisers some credit: at least some of them have read Machiavelli. So should we. Having bragged so long about never having been conquered, it’s about time we Scots woke up to just how hugely colonised we have been, and for how long … And still are, maybe now more than ever before.

    We could have been and should have been – and were at one time (think again of the 14th Century) – the ‘anti-imperial nation’ par excellence. We defined ourselves, and in some ways came to be, against England’s First Empire. We were not just its nemesis, but – spiritually speaking (if you will allow me such a term) – its antithesis.

    We then failed miserably in our anti-imperial vocation for centuries. We even became the antithesis not of England but of ourselves; instead of being its opponents, we became colonial imperialism’s greatest facilitators and, on English coat-tails, perpetrators.

    Now’s surely the time to make amends, freeing ourselves from our own aberrations. Could Scotland become ‘the anti-imperial nation’ once again? To me, despite loads of evidence to the contrary, that is her defining spirit. Even her raison d’etre.

    And if we don’t stand up and become what we were meant to be? The alternative – alas! – is for Scotland and the Scottish nation to disappear altogether. The forces ranged against us – and make no mistake, they are imperial forces – will make sure of that. The essence of Scottish independence has always been to refuse the spirit and forces of imperialism that surround, attack, and seek to obliterate us.

    Have we got the guts to do it again?

    We had better have.

    Small, weak and insignificant though we may seem to be, and actually are, the world has very much need of us. This is the anti-imperial age, and Scotland is the anti-imperial nation.

  112. Bryan Weir
    Ignored
    says:

    Christine says:
    29 May, 2016 at 7:15 pm”

    “A wee bitty hyperbole never did any harm to highlight a valid point Morag. Especially if its accurate.

    Ah, you mean just like the Sun, the Daily Mail and the Daily Record?

  113. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    hivnae heard from you for months then you popup & bring your fan club wie you. Please Morag dont tangle wie our resident Troll ma heid couldnae stand it.

    Nice tae see you back xx.

    Och, I happened to see the original article in the Evening Times with that ludicrous “400,000%” thing, and thought it was the most ridiculous example of the misuse of percentage presentions I’d yet seen – in a very strong field. So I commented on it here and now everyone seems to be down on me for it, including Stu.

    I should probably go away again.

  114. Fred
    Ignored
    says:

    Naw Morag, you should just have made this stuff clearer in your initial post instead of appearing to have got oot the wrang side of the bed on Saturday morning! 🙂

  115. Rock
    Ignored
    says:

    Ken500,

    “The Scottish justice system did not organise the Lockerbie Trial. It was Blair and Labour/Unionists. A kangaroo Court in The Hague.”

    It was a SCOTTISH kangaroo court in The Hague.

    The Scottish justice system is rotten to the core and the vast majority of lawyers, especially judges, are the lowest of the low.

  116. Rock
    Ignored
    says:

    The outgoing Lord Advocate is deliberately lying when saying that a “Second trial over Lockerbie a ‘realistic possibility’”.

    Lockerbie expert Dr Morag Kerr, where are you when you are wanted?

  117. Morag
    Ignored
    says:

    Look, I have no more idea than anyone else what’s going to happen now over Lockerbie.

    Kenny MacAskill went spectacularly off piste in his book and stated something that fatally undermines the conviction. In fact he agreed with something we’ve been saying for years, but while he was in office he gave us the brush-off. And Alex Salmond is agreeing with him. Why they are doing this is anybody’s guess.

    It may make it more likely that some sort of inquiry could be set up, but the Crown Office is still issuing its boilerplate stone-wall denials. The bizarre thing is that while MacAskill has fatally undermined the conviction, at the same time he says, “but I know he did it anyway because I have special knowledge of other evidence that only came out after the trial.”

    Two points about that. First, the law doesn’t work like that. You can’t just admit that the most basic fact underpinning a conviction wasn’t so, but declare that it’s all OK because of other stuff the court didn’t know about. Second, they’re all basing this “he did it anyway” on the assumption that “it” was placing the bomb on board flight KM180 at Malta. Anyone who has been paying attention knows that the bomb was never on flight KM180 s the first place. They’re still in denial about that, but when they finally have to face up to it, the whole thing goes up in smoke.

    Of course, if there’s any evidence that Megrahi was involved in the actual plot to put the bomb suitcase on board the transatlantic flight at Heathrow itself, that’s a different matter. But since the authorities haven’t yet caught up with the fact that that’s how the crime was committed, I seriously doubt they have anything like that.

  118. Rock
    Ignored
    says:

    Morag,

    Basically, the Scottish justice system is rotten to the core and the vast majority of lawyers, especially judges, are the lowest of the low.

    It seems to be very clear that Megrahi was innocent.

    If there was any justice, the Scottish judges who wrongly convicted him should be jailed for as long as he was.

    Of course the system will never admit to any wrongdoing.

    Any enquiry if it ever happens will be a whitewash.

    Kenny MacAskill and Alex Salmond must have very good reasons for their stand on the issue.



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