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The principles of opposition

Posted on September 22, 2018 by
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jdman

Wot?
no Leonard?

Ian

Perfect. Throw thier deceitfulness in their faces for all to see. Great start to the day.

jimnarlene

A short, but accurate, summation of those political ‘heavyweights’.

Capella

Let’s all forget about Leonard – in fact, all of them. It’s the early days of a better nation after all.

Effijy

Two faced Westminster parties just doesn’t seem enough but 6 is much closer to summing up the immorality of UK Politics.

Radio shortbread has a Tory Councillor from the Red and Blue Tory
alliance in Aberdeen threatening to break the law if SNP continue to promote testing of P1 children.

Yes the asked for it previously but now the Unions have explained how they are against it.

Yes a Tory taking notice of the Red Tories fund raisers?

The two are so preoccupied in fighting anything and everything that SNP try to do for Scotland they have become a blend of each other.

Wonderful how Aberdeen Council claim to have been squeezed by SNP when their previous Labour leader and property magnet spent £Millions they didn’t have on projects that nobody wanted and stranger that 8 years of Tory Austerity and swinging cuts has no relation to Westminster.

How on earth could anyone vote in this angry bubbling idiot to
office beats the hell out of me.

sassenach

Who is this ‘Leonard’ who’s name keeps popping up?

Spot on , once again, Chris.

Sharny Dubs

Great start to the day. Lay it out bare!!
Could have sworn I saw our Nicola’s mum in a hotel restaurant this morning in Dubai, older spitting double.
Onwards and upwards, indy2!!

Marie Clak

Well done Chris, that sums it up perfectly. What an absolutely unprincipled, useless crew. Yuk.

mumsyhugs

Two faced with double standards.

Morgatron

Hehehe, Delightfully true. Their pathetic each and everyone of them. My Saturday has now commenced . Thanks CC .

Collie

What got me angry the other day was when I read that if Corbyn became Prime Minister he “might” grant Scotland a second Independence Referendum.

In the eyes of our political Westminster masters, Scotland is nothing more than a ply thing, who in the long distant future may or may not be granted “things”.

Marie Clark

Well done Chris, shows this lot for exactly what they are. Totally unprincipled and useless. Yuk.

Robert Louis

The main reason England is falling down the plughole with each passing day (and forcibly dragging Scotland with it, against its wishes), is because Labour have an absolute joke of a ‘leader’ right now.

Imagine if Labour right now, had a positive, progressive, outgoing, personable non marxist leader right now, opposed to this brexit lunacy. They would be surging in the polls. Literally.

Yet right now, they have the most miserable, argumentative, miserable, unprincipled, wishy washy pro brexit leader you could imagine. He even uses the whip to make Labour MP’s to vote with the Tories, FFS.

The Tories are terrible, but they are doing EXACTLY what Tories have always done – making society work for the enrichment of the wealthy, and f*** the poor and disabled. But Labour, are ten time worse. They are falling over themselves, offering congratulations to Theresa May for ‘standing up to Europe’. What a shoddy party Labour have become.

An election is Labour’s for the taking, if they opposed brexit. Anybody with half a brain can see Brexit as utter economic madness. The EU might not be exactly what some people want, but being outside it, is just f*****g stupid. But no, Labour’s miserable, argumentative marxist leader hates the EU as much as Tories do, so they will still lose the next election.

Gary45%

Brilliant Chris.
Nice One.
As said many times before, the SNP could find the cure for all the worlds ills, and this sorry lot would still vote against them, and I mean VOTE AGAINST THEM, they are and always will be that pathetic, self interests over the country/people who vote for them, its that plain to see.

Les Wilson

Shows them up for what they are Chris, you did not miss!

Actually, this would be a great idea to expand, we could show the deceit of all of them or at least the worst ones. A good campaigning idea.

Alex Coull

“Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them…well I have others.”

? Groucho Marx

defo

Fab toon CC. You’ve really captured their characteristics.
Esp. WRs glaikitness.

starlaw

Medieval minded England still imagine that they are world leaders and anything other is Johnny Foreigner the enemy. Theresa’s rant yesterday is exactly the mindset of most Englishmen who still believe that they are welcomed and loved the world over.

Colin Alexander

Collie said: ” What got me angry the other day was when I read that if Corbyn became Prime Minister he “might” grant Scotland a second Independence Referendum.”

My view is that the sovereign people of Scotland voted for SNP and Green MSPs who had an indyref in their manifesto pledges. Those SNP and Green MSPs were then democratically elected by the sovereign people.

Those MSPs then voted for another indyref.

Whatever the expectation of success, there MUST be an indyref because that is the democratic decision of the sovereign people and their MSP representatives in the Scottish Parliament.

So, it’s not for Nicola Sturgeon or Theresa May or the UK Govt or Mr Corbyn or Labour or the LibDems to decide if there should be another indyref.

We, the sovereign people of Scotland have decided by democratic votes, that another indyref should be held.

It should be held and we should vote for independence.

Then get rid of SNP, UK Labour and UK Conservative and UK LibDem parties.

Wipe the slate clean and build an independent country without the political dross who have managed to make a name for themselves because they are on one of the sides in the Union v independence power struggle.

Bob Mack

England is on the road to becoming a fascist state. UKIP will rise again if the Tories falter. Already we can see Mr Javid doing a UTurn on the Windrush children,whilst May has been funnelled down a track by DUP and hard line Tories, which will inevitably leave us isolated in the world, because we lose our European status.

Please do not even try to tell me that immigration is not behind all of this mess.

The UK hates foreigners, especially those we have conquered in the past who have dark skin. They are meant to be servile rather than part of Society. They carry the blame for every Ill in society. The scapegoat.

Chris, your toon is fabulous. Every one of them a hypocrite and accomplished liar and deceiver without a shred of embarrassment..

Scotland has the chance of a different path and I hope we take it, because I do not wish to live in a Country the like of which we will inevitably become should we fail to gain independence.

Iain

Yesterday’s speech by Theresa was like listening to king Canute address the tide.
She must have another agenda, nobody is that out of touch with reality.

Valerie

Excellent, Chris.

What an absolute state these idiots are.

That’s McDonnell in The Guardian, this morning, saying there would be Brexit under Labour, but they would secure better terms from EU.

Sick of telling the blinded Corbynistas, Labour support Brexit.

It’s important Labour supporting Scots start to face that reality. Labour are anti EU.

Robert Peffers

@sassenach says: 22 September, 2018 at 7:40 am:

” … Who is this ‘Leonard’ who’s name keeps popping up?
Spot on , once again, Chris.”

The reason there is nothing from Leonard in the cartoon is because his claims were all related to reserved to Westminster matters and tricky dickie thus tries to blame the SG for the faults of Westminster.

William Habib Steele

Chris, you’ve hit the bulls-eye!

Giving Goose

Mother Treeza is painted into a Dunkirk fetish dream. That speach was her Churchill moment without the Sunlit uplands.
The 3 jokers in the Chris toon are willing pawns of the BritNat queen, trapped in their subservient wet dreams of power and self importance.

Jimmy The Pict

In my opinion if the British Labour party swapped to being pro-EU (that is what anti-brexit really is) they would be slaughter in an election as the media and British Conservatives would go full on ‘Rule Britania’, ‘How we won the war’, ‘Dunkirk’,’Battle of Britain MkII’. The voters in England would lap it up.

In Scotland British Labour would gain no ground as we already have a pro-EU party in the SNP.

The support for stopping Brexit in England may be vocal but I think there has been too much anti-EU stuff and guff that is now embedded in a lot of the electorate’s minds to allow a pro-EU party there to win.

As with every opinion I have had, I could be proved wrong.

galamcennalath

Good toon. Leonard’s omission make a point in itself.

UK politics. Policies and principles change with the wind. It’s all opportunistic populism.

Then in Scotland the Onion has other layers. Firstly SNPBaaad where BritNats cast aside their own policies just to be able to oppose the Scottish Government on every issue. And secondly gross hypocrisy where one set of rules apply to the UK and its voters, while the opposite applies to Scotland and Scots.

No political system like this can’t last. A massive reconfiguration is unavoidable now.

manandboy

Illogical and contradictory. The two basic characteristics of British Nationalism.

For Scotland, the biggest example of this is the way Westminster has virtually the same list of reasons for the UK leaving the EU as Scotland has for leaving the Union, but are then treated oppositely. OK for England’s independence, not OK for Scotland’s independence.

But England’s reasons for leaving the EU is VALIDATION of Scotland’s reasons for leaving the Union since they are the same.
England is therefore caught in the trap of reason from which there is no escape.
And so the BritNats resort to propaganda and the now familiar sequence of lies, distortion, blame and deliberate confusion.

Illogical and contradic-tory.

Well done, Chris. You are a gem.

Macart

The disappointment. The serial photo op and the rentaquote.

Opposition for the sake of opposition. It’s all they know really. And no, I don’t think it’s a principled stance either.

Fred

TM aint no MT.

Collie

The English think the World owes them a favour,,,boy are they in for a shock.

Socrates MacSporran

Anent the absence of small Dick Leonard from Chris’s excellent cartoon.

You do not attack the poor, helpless monkey – you go for the organ grinder who is making all the grinding, pointless, noises off.

Fergus Green

Leonard who?
Cohen?
Rossiter?
The lion?

robert alexander harrison

Leonards nothing but a puppet and torys and lib dems leaderless smegheads right now vince is stepping down if he’s not done so already and mays just basically walking to her own political execution so no wonder it shows Corbyn Davidson and rennie they the only ones who still stick to being the hypocrites they really are.

HYUFD

Fred May will likely be gone in a month if she persists with Chequers at the risk of No Deal. Davis will likely become PM by coronation, agree a transition period in which the UK stays in the single market and customs union and tries to agree a Canada style FTA in the transition. Davis planned doing that originally before Chequers which he resigned over as he knew the EU would refuse it

Hamish100

ot/
so shereen announces on the BBC that the well known commentator Martin Geissler is to lead on the new bbc news channel for Scotland.
Ok another No to self determination place man. No change there. If he is working for the BBC and we have Alison Rowat pro uk unionist and ? Hannah McGill.

As an aside – since the tories and liebour work together over the class testing and want to remove it from P1’s. Speaking to folk who like the idea that their child is assessed earlier than later please John Swinney give parental choice. Let the individual parents opt in or opt out. Most will ask I think to opt in. let the tories say that’s not allowed.

HYUFD

Manandboy Where was the EU’s ‘vow’ to the UK in 2014 and its Scotland Act 2016? It could have at least offered a fudge on free movement eg similar to the yransition controls Blair did not take in 2004 and a few more powers for Westminster. That may have been the difference between Yes getting 45% in 2014 but Leave getting 52% in 2016

Calum McKay

In a normal country these clowns would not get a free ride, Scots live in a country trying to become a normal country, deafeating these clowns is on the road map to Scotland becoming a normal country.

Hamish100

Shereen bbc scotchland – Northern Ireland, trade, British public tories. British – we.
Did our attendees mention or engage over Scotland issues to any degree? what about the court judgement?

oops snp could delay re Article 50 -sighing in the background.

That’s it guys. Free impartial news.

manandboy

THERESA MAY- BREXIT – LEAVE – THE DUP – DARK Money – £435,000

A REMINDER

link to opendemocracy.net

“Of course, in the middle of all this was the snap general election which nearly broke Theresa May, leaving her dependent on votes of DUP MPs. It led hundreds of people to contribute cash to our investigation, without which we’d not have been able to do this. And it left the UK government in a tortured position: reliant for its majority on a potent mix of a Northern Irish party that’s been crippled by a string of financial scandals and on the radical right of its own party, desperately pushing their own vision of Brexit.

But here’s the thing. In the middle of all of this, there are people who know where the DUP’s £435,000 came from, and why someone worked so hard to keep it secret. And some of those people might very well understand why transparency matters in politics, why citizens have a right to know who is trying to influence us. If you are one of those people, you can slip us whatever information you have here.

We’ve been running this investigation for a year now, with a growing team of colleagues and helpful contacts. And what we’ve discovered is perhaps not surprising. While the Brexit vote was fuelled by legitimate rage, it was steered by rich and powerful men (and yes, mostly men) who work very hard to keep their interests hidden.

Which means we have to keep working hard to expose them. Starting with the cash which paid for that placard I happened upon in Edinburgh.

Donate to our investigation here, and we’ll keep digging.”

Collie

We couldn’t have planned a better Brezit fuck up, even if we had tried.

Treeza is blindly leading us to Independence.

manandboy

The memory of Michael Portillo, former Tory Cabinet Minister, on The Daily Politics came to mind this morning for no apparent reason. He said that the Government knows how to fix the result of a referendum. But no one paid much attention.

Clydebuilt

Brilliant effort Chris. Should be getting pushed through letterboxes all over Scotland!

Talking about opposition. . . . Kevin Mckenna mole or grabber? . .. . . .

link to thoughtcontrolscotland.com

PRJ

I suspect that this is a tactic to cause confusion and division. Keeping there own supporters ignorant and giving ammunition to the yes movement makes it appear that it is Yes that is being pugnacious.

Hamish100

what Alison Rowat supports the p1 testing on Radio Scotland. Attacks the tories flip flopping and politicisation of the children’s testing. John Swinney give the parents to opt in or opt out.

Parental Power – you know the tories will hate it. You know labour will say it is their idea and they are not against such tests !! a few EIS labourites should not determine Government policy.

The unionists own goal

manandboy

HYUFD – an interesting train of thought, even though it entails the EU interfering directly in UK ‘democracy’ which is beyond even thinking about.

What would have countered ‘The VOW’ in September 2014, would have been the promise of an increase in State Pension by the SNP to, say, parity with Ireland (50% increase). Some would say that alone would have lifted the 45% Yes vote. It certainly looked like the SNP missed an open goal with Pensions in IndyRef14.

It remains to be seen if the SNP make the same massive mistake again in the next independence Referendum. To repeat the error would be unforgiveable should NextIndy be lost.

galamcennalath

John McDonnell, Labour’s shadow chancellor, says they would push ahead with Brexit. Also, he’s dismissive of an EURef2.

Perhaps their conference will have other ideas on another ref.

However the point is, England is almost certainly intent upon massive self harm no matter what.

call me dave

Driving back from the shops there and puts car radio on and Shereen Nanjiani’s shortbread programme bursts into life on P1 testing.

(not a fan of stale news and raking over the coals & SNP bad but)

Anyhoo! I was about to put on the CD but low and behold all the pundits were basically in approval and thought politicising the issue was not good (they never outwardly said Tories bad but, you know) and further more gave Mr Swinnie a nod of approval not to back down.

FGS! Had to pinch myself…Jings!

TheBuchanLoony

What the Britnats don’t realise is that the wolves are beginning to circle us and the vultures are close behind. The UK is a wounded animal and they can take advantage of this chaos to their benefit. Past actions of the misuse of power going all the way back to the ‘Empire’ still bear grudges and have long memories. It is not only the EU 27 that can see benefit in a weakened UK but also many countries around the world. The recent Chagos Islands dispute is one example… ‘Last year, the UK suffered a humiliating defeat at the United Nations general assembly when members voted overwhelmingly to send the matter to the ICJ in The Hague. It was in the run-up to that vote – at which the UK’s traditional European allies, including France and Germany, chose to abstain – that Mr Johnson is alleged to have threatened the Mauritian prime minister. “After the Brexit vote, support for the UK collapsed,” said Philippe Sands, the British lawyer who is representing Mauritius. “Britain has fallen off its pedestal. I think we’re seeing a story here about the end of empire and the end of colonialism in a small part of Africa in the Indian Ocean, coinciding with a moment when Britain seems to be turning inward.” Long memories of empire may not be good for future trade agreements.

Artyhetty

Excellent Chris.

To these jumped up self congratulating, over paid, jobsworths, the people, including children in Scotland, are collateral.

Their aim is to demonise the SNP, our democratically elected party in government, and to ensure they do their masters’ job in orchestrating as much damage as possible. Their London masters give the orders, these lickspittles do the donkey work.

They are an insult to Scotland, they work against Scotland and actively damage Scotland. It’s a disgrace.

I don’t know how they sleep at night, they must have to check their fat bank balances before bed, to deal with it all.

Daisy Walker

Another very apt cartoon from Chris.

o/t Corbyn should be doing so much more to ‘take back’ Scotland, and yet he isn’t, and the powers that be, don’t appear that worried. Why is that do you think.

A Theory.

In terms of historical money stash in off shore tax havens, here is a time line.

The Spice Trade – nutmeg sold at more than the price of gold at the time. For a common sailor on a spice ship, they would hope to return with a small bag of spices (no room for bigger on a ship) for which they would get a return of about £50,000.

Scale that up big time for the owners of the ships and the mind boggles at the amounts.

Empire and colonies – the asset stripping of entire continents. India estimate if Britain was to repay what it stole, they would be looking at somewhere in the region of £600 Trillion.

It makes the estimated £2 trillion of oil and gas from Scottish waters seem a bit piffling, doesn’t it.

And that doesn’t include the assets stripped from Africa, Asia, etc.

And in that mix, the Slave Trade.

The Chinese Opium Trade. The largest narcotics trade ever, to one of the biggest countries ever.

War. The 1% made money out of War, financed both sides, contemplated doing a deal with Hitler, didn’t see him a such a threat really – remember our Royal Family with their Nazi Salutes.

Ultimately once the bodies are buried, its the tax payer who pays over generations for war, not the people in power.

So, when you look at it from that point of view, and the EU Tax Haven laws that threaten them, from the Royal Family down, to its appointed ultra rich carpet baggers, as long as the Labour Party delivers a No Deal Brexit as the number one priority, the loss of one nations wealth, is small potatoes to the loss of the accumulated wealth stolen over generations from entire continents.

Which is not to say they won’t do something about the ‘Scottish Problem’, it just explains why Corbyn isn’t an issue for them just now.

The labour party serves westminster, it just provides a soothing tune for the electorate compared to the tories. Scotland at least knows this now. Poor old England is still clueless.

For anyone who hasn’t seen The Spiders Web – Munguin has put it up on his site. Really worth watching.

Kind regards to all.

HandandShrimp

Love the Corbyn one. It nails how I feel about the guy. I just don’t know what he really thinks.

Ruth on the other hand only has one thought … SNPbad.

Willie? Willie may have had a thought once … it is difficult to tell.

prahažiji

…one of the best ‘toons’ I have seen, explains so much, so simply and so elegantly.

jfngw

When you boil it down, Labour, Conservatives and LibDems have no real interest in Holyrood, presumably that’s why their MSP’s are so woeful and see it merely as a staging post to jump to the big smoke of parliaments. It irritates them they don’t have Holyrood, but it’s not the big prize for them.

They SNP have upset their apple cart, it threatens their little club of joining in with the big boys (just a saying as some are women) in London. Any unionist politician would throw Scotland to the wind to increase their own profile at Westminster, we just need to look at Brexit to confirm this.

If they were acting in Scotland’s interest, those so called Scottish politicians would be backing Scotland’s place in the EU we voted for. Unless deep down they believe that Scotland is the only country in the world that could not run its own affairs, not sure which of these makes me despise them most.

Of course some of them don’t actually believe Scotland is a country but a region, at least I suppose their position is consistent. They are not pretending to be Scotland’s champion but Westminster’s representatives in Scotland (basically the colonial type).

Dr Jim

With just a few lines that’s a brilliant depiction of Willie Rennie, I love that one, anyway back to President elect Boris and Chancellor Reese Mogg who are defintitely NOT plotting the current Fuhrer’s downfall, NOT no way ever, they’re only at Jacobs house examining old war footage because they have a shared interest in transportation systems old and new

The red lines are now drawn…again…but further back than the last ones ….again….which will be held to resolutely….again…..and *Britain* stands ready….again…. to just move them further back and further back so far back in fact you’ll have to pump air into a long tunnel to the *British* people who are standing ready to be resolute

On re-examination of Mrs Mays speech I’m not sure whether she was more angry by everybody laughing at her rather than the EU rejecting her as a person because this is a problem of Mrs May’s creation she attempted to go behind the EUs back and recruit support individually from each Nation and that showed the EU and everybody else what a shower of duplicitous ingrates the *British* are, so she brought it on herself and now she has to own the low character of the British as was displayed for the world to view once again, see and that’s another reason why Scotland needs to have sod all to do with *Britain* because it’s so embarrassingly cringingly crawlingly a reflection upon us in Scotland

Like it or not if the UK government had agreed to involve the other nations and governments of the constituent parts of the UK this would have all come out better and better because in any negotiation personality is just as important as policy and that’s where the *British* fell down, they just don’t have any personality plus being dead from the neck up

So now we’re going to be stuck in the mud for God knows how long the *British* will keep kicking the can down the road for as long as they hope it’ll take for the populations memory banks to goldfish out and then they’ll announce victory over the nasty furriners by doing something they could’ve done at least two years earlier by which time we’ll all have been made even more worse off so the extra pound in our pockets on fixing the problem will feel like a Brexy Bonus but Hey we’ll still be in line for Kaintucky breadcrumbed chlorination day so that’ll be a hoot hell yeah

Sure it’ll defo be like that we’ll remember nothing remember nothing remember nothing remember nothing… except …I can’t remember?….they’ve got me Aaarrgh!

You getting it yet

Orri

Here’s the thing.

The only, apocryphal (?), reason I’ve heard for dropping assessments of P1 is children being upset by it. Not being a father I’ve no direct experience of being a parent but giving in to them every time they throw a tantrum seems a great way of making a rod for your own back.

Thisisnt

Jockanese Wind Talker

As for Radio Shortbrieds Shereen Nanjiani’s and guests being favourable to P1 testing and advocating that J Swinney hauds gaun.

Call me cynical but:

This gives BritNats and their MSM to go all what’s the point of Hollyrood the SNP don’t respect the will of Parliament when they lose, be as well shutting it down.

And you know it will be front page, top of the hour news for days and days.

Tell me I’m wrong.

Artyhetty

re;Daisy Walker@12.03

O/T
Great comment there Daisy. Labour are there to give the illusion of a democratic system in their so called UK.

There’s a very good book, ‘Living off the state, a critical guide to royal finance’, by Jon Temple, Progress books, 2008.
Tip of the iceberg, you won’t find the book anywhere though.

The demonisation of Corbyn has all been a front, a very convenient distraction from the British Nationalists catastrophic and impending Brexit.

People who are Labour supporters won’t hear a word against Corbyn, they have no hope otherwise.

Just to mention, my family were just over from Australia, have toured around most of England this time, and said everyone they spoke to said they voted remain. They are wondering, ‘ who the heck voted leave, or are people too scared to admit it?’

Andy-B

Another belter Chris, bang on the money.

HYUFD

TheBichanLagos You are forgetting the main dispute with Mauritius is over the Chagos Islands as the US has an airbase it wants to keep there which the UK backs and Mauritius opposes. Of course the most powerful superpower in the world since the end of the British Empire has been the USA and Trump of course backed Brexit too

Orri

Here’s the thing.

The only, apocryphal (?), reason I’ve heard for dropping assessments of P1 is children being upset by it. Not being a father I’ve no direct experience of being a parent but giving in to them every time they throw a tantrum seems a great way of making a rod for your own back.

This isn’t the guardianship thing where the SNP completely dropped the ball as far as data protection went. This is an issue meant to improve the education of children and there’s already been a pilot otherwise there’d be no reports of upset children.

The vote to halt and assess the results implied this is like the introduction of ATOS where the failure as far as removing benefits from those genuinely qualified was seen as a positive and they were kept on.

If I was Swiney I’d respect Holyrood’s wishes. Halt the rollout whilst a report is written up, a week maximum, and then go ahead.

As far as I’m concerned the attitude of the opposition in Holyrood is that not only are the electorate expendable but their children are too including Baby Boxes in the mix.

The same kind of cynicism was seen when Thatcher miss spent oil revenues to sustain the destruction of industry and the failure of Monetarism. The unions also share some of the blame. For the many not the few sounds great until you find yourself unexpectedly in the later category. For everyone seems a far better and led divisive slogan.

Welcome relief that the sheer hypocrisy of the opposition mentality is laid bare. It might only be a radio show but if it’s a reflection of public feeling in general then it’s bad news for those trying to prevent the SNP doing the day job.

HYUFD

Manandboy Possibly but do not forget The Republic of Ireland overall now spends less as a percentage of GDP than the UK and had to impose heavy austerity after the 2008 crash to get its finances back in order

Dan Huil

Good stuff, Chris. You’ve caught the ugly faces of britnat hypocrisy perfectly.

Meanwhile English nationalism, under the pathetic guise of British nationalism, is on the rise. Time is fast approaching for Scotland to ditch this disgusting union with England.

Glamaig

Artyhetty says:
22 September, 2018 at 12:40 pm

thanks, looks interesting

link to amazon.co.uk

jfngw

Is that a new OO BT song I spot:

It is old and it is beautiful
Its colours they are fine
It was moved to a bank account
For services we defined
My party told me as a youth
In the grand old days of yore
We are here to feather our own nest
That’s the cash we partners (to be completed)

frogesque

Manandboy:

Much as I would personally like a 50% pension increase, any promises on such a scale would have been laughed out of court in 2014 as unaffordable. Whether true or not MSM and Bittertogether would have had a field day.

I am desperate for Indy, at 71 I can’t promise to be around in 20 odd years or so. Please though, no uncosted unaffordable promises about pensions or anything else. I would take Indy even if it meant a small decrease. At least I wouldn’t need to keep fighting the wallet moths for fundraisers!

Robert Peffers

This whole episode is comedy gold.

In the first place the claimed primary one , “TESTS”, are not testing anyone. They are standardised assessments and thus not just assessing the actual pupils being assessed but also assessing those doing the assessing.

In the second place they will undoubtable assist in identifying those pupils with disability that need assistance. I can think of quite a few. Pupils needing hearing and eye tests, pupils with dyslexia or dyscalculia.

However People with dyscalculia are often wrongly diagnosed with ADD,(attention deficiency disorder), or ADHD, (Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) and these assessments will lead to such pupils getting the help they need as early as primary one.

This is most likely the real reason at least one teachers union are against them – the results will show up poor quality teachers if whole classes, or indeed whole schools, have below average results.

In either case early discovery of problems is in everyone’s best interests it seems. Other than unionist politicians and teachers in need of retraining it would seem.

manandboy

For the record, Norway is one of the richest countries on earth, in spite of the fact that Norway, unlike Scotland, has none or little of the following :-
* Oil & gas in the Atlantic Margins
* Extensive wind, wave and tidal green energy assets.
* Major agriculture and fishing industries
* Whisky & Gin industry
* English speaking
* Trading neighbour of 50 million (albeit from hell)
* Banking and Finance
* Computing
* Electronics and construction
* Tourism, textiles & transport
* And more..

An independent Scotland will be far, far wealthier than any part of the continent of Europe with the possible exception of Switzerland.
To deny this is to engage in May-speak ie. lies, distortion, blame and a stubborn denial of obvious factual truth.

Hail Alba

Legerwood

Orri @ 12.52pm

The very worst thing you could do would be to halt the P1 assessments for all sorts of reasons.

If you want to find out how the assessments are performing then a fully funded and properly designed research project should be set up to study in a coherent and systematic way to recognised international standards the assessments over a period of time. You can only do that if the assessments are still in operation.

To date any evidence is anecdotal and collected in a haphazard manner by those with an axe to grind.

The only attempt to gather information in any sort of systematic way was a Snap Survey carried out by Connect, a parent’s group. The survey was carried out via their social media channels and received 364 responses. Hardly a well designed and executed piece of research but interestingly it did throw up this interesting little nugget:

“”96% of children did not talk to their parents about the SNSA in advance
75% of children did not talk about the SNSA after they took it””

Limited as it was in scope it does suggest that children were not too bothered by the assessments and saw them as just another part of what they did at school.

Link to the survey results:
link to connect.scot

ALANM

What about “Scottish” Labour; don’t they have an opinion on these important issues? (rhetorical question)

HandandShrimp

The only, apocryphal (?), reason I’ve heard for dropping assessments of P1 is children being upset by it.

This was, as I recall, Leonard’s complaint … that and not knowing that bill and beak are interchangeable terms for a bird’s gub. I don’t get this at all. The opposition are forever citing international assessments and saying we should do better. Are they now saying that we should withdraw from such assessments because it upsets the kids? I mean why should it be OK to upset say 12 year old kids and not 5/6 year old kids?

When I was in P1 we had spelling tests every week. Every now and then, if these tests were not going well, the teacher used put the belt where we could see it … just to encourage us to practice more. Call me a snowflake but even though I was good at spelling and never on her radar I found that a wee bit stressful and those that incurred her wrath did shed tears. Yet the same gimps that are moaning about P1 assessments, particularly the Tories, are the first to say our educational attainment 50 years ago was better. What exactly are they advocating? It is this lack of consistency of thought and intellectual rigour that brings politics into disrepute.

Capella

More nails in the coffin of the money myths we’ve been spun.

link to whatifitoldyouthis.blogspot.com

Found it in a comment under a Chris Hedges talk in August 2018, which is excellent as usual and, although describing US policy is equally applicable to our own sorry oligarch devastated culture.

His advice is to take to the streets. Edinburgh October 6th?

link to youtube.com

Hamish100

May will just go for a General Election and say to the english electorate — vote for tory chequer brexit or vote for a corbyn brexit.

Scotland – tough.

Northern Ireland- DUP will be weakened by a GE.

jfngw

The last thing the DUP would want is a GE, unless it can once again produce a number that gives there 10 MP’s the same power. If not then there is probably going to be a border in the Irish Sea, it would be sort of fitting. I expect Stormont would suddenly become a necessity to be back up and running with such a scenario.

If there is a snap election Scots need to send a clear message to Westminster, anything else will be used as weakness. It would look like an election is possibly going to happen before an indyref, unless May clings on, she is currently playing up to her right wing to retain the job. We need to get the Indy vote out at the next GE, this time it must be top of the agenda, along with retaining SM & CU access.

Saw some claiming online to feel sorry for her, not me, she is a myopic autocrat to my mind. All the signs were there since she was home secretary, power crazed and will sacrifice anyone to maintain her position.

Chick McGregor

Bravo, Yoonspeak exemplified.

Democracy, shamocracy,
Expose their vile hypocrisy.

Nana

Terrific cartoon Mr Cairns. If I had to choose one of them to receive a custard pie in the face, it would have to be Wee Wullie.

The so called democrat who says if it was up to him the SNP would not be allowed to take part in debates

link to youtube.com

Morning links on the previous thread for anyone interested.

gus1940

According to today’s metropolitan blats May’s trip to Salzburg was not a disaster but a triumph.

Go to the BBC News site UK Section and click on Today’s Papers and you will see the incredible front pages.

If ever there was an example of the people being brainwashed these front pages are a classic example of today’s propaganda led media.

Meg merrilees

Great cartoon Chris – could be called Hypocrisy rules!

I heard Nigel can’t remember 2nd name MP from the DUP who leads the party at WM talking on the radio last night.

He was supporting T May – of course, but I wish he could have heard himself

”so long as she doesn’t let the EU bully her and dictate where the border should be between North and South Ireland …..’ We of course, would never support a border in the North Sea and we must no remain in the Single market or Customs union and we have told her that’… In other words, we have bullied her and we are dictating where the border is to be.

The DUP is running the UK and Brexit just now.

I noticed Farage is worried that UKIP is moving too far to the right – must be bad then!

T May can’t call a GE just now because her Tank Commander in North Britainland is about to go into labour any week now and won’t be able to fight her corner with a baby on her hip – and Treeza needs those 13 Scottish tractors to keep her majority…

She’s definitely backed herself into a corner on this one.

Scottish Steve

The cartoonist certainly got Ruth’s ugly mug down to a T. She’s like a pitbull chewing a wasp when she gets all angry and shouty.

galamcennalath

gus1940 says:

front pages are a classic example of today’s propaganda

Indeed. Saw the display at the supermarket today and it’s like there is a parallel universe out there.

May had a chance to allow a fudged version of Chequers to be the basis of the non binding statement accompanying the Withdrawal Agreement. The EU threw her a lifeline. All she had to do was accept the backstop arrangements for Northern Ireland.

She screwed up by telling them she hadn’t done anything constructive about Ireland. So the lifeline was yanked away tout de suite.

Then she makes a defiant fight-them-on-the-beaches speech when she returned home. And the media focus on that and run with the fallacy that May is acting rationally.

Sharny Dubs

Daisy Walker!!

Couldn’t have put it better myself. Except for maybe one proviso, the lucrative on going criminal business has to be protected.
The old school tie brigade has to look after their futures.

galamcennalath

Talk of a general election. It could come about in various ways, but just imagine it’s been called.

What manifesto are Tories and Labour going to run on regarding Brexit? Both seem clear they will continue with the madness.

The sensible answer would be a Brexit which appeals to their core voters and then attracts some others. However, with polls suggesting most people now want Remain, making a proposal to Leave isn’t going to attract these folks!

The Tories cannot possibly continue May’s line of Chequers or No Deal, can they? That now amounts to saying NoDeal!

Surely no one could stand on a ticket of NoDeal?

Labour. They could offer an EURef2, but with what options? They would first need to get agreement with the EU on Canada+backstop or Norway, then present that as a choice against Remain.

FPTP means either only needs over about 40% to form a government. Either could manage that. The problem would be one winning without improved clarity on what happens next. Which could happen.

Dr Jim

DUP MP Sammy Wilson on national television put it plainly when he said
“Quite simply the government depends on the DUP to keep it in office and for votes in the HOC”

This smirky little red faced scroat and his party now run everything and from Scotlands position we now have a party (Tories) we DON’T vote for run by a party (DUP) from another country who we CAN’T vote for….or indeed AGAINST

No self respecting Scottish voter no matter which party you support should have to tolerate this behaviour from 1 England a country who Scotland subsidises and 2 NI a province that everybody subsidises

In other news English oil in Scottish waters is up to $80 a barrel now so good news for Englands UK treasury …..for the moment
Plus of course Englands oil in the stolen part of Scottish waters doing the same thing for Englands pretendy GDP figures

Oh and people in Orkney will you just shut up about Ferries that I pay for but don’t use when you chose to move to that location from God knows where then complain about how I don’t subsidise you lot enough then have the temerity to vote against the SNP government who’s building more of them with my money to accommodate you, and if it wasn’t for the SNP you’d have barely any tourists to fleece at all to then not declare for taxes the amount of sticky buns you sold them when they got there
See you’re entitled to the same as everybody else and that’s fine but not more, more is a bonus be a bit bloody greatful there is a Scottish government, remember when you had Labour or the Tories before a Scottish government because that’s why you all live there now, it’s better

frogesque

@Nana 3.32 thank for all the great work you do.

So Willie Winkie thinks half of Scots should have no democratic input into debates.

How very wholesome of him, and to think his merry band have a whole 5 out of 159 MSPs

Donald Urquhart

OT

Historic day.
Sad news that Chas Hodges has died, and with his death, the end of that highlight of English culture, Chas n’ Dave.

In my opinion, Scottish access to Chas n’ Dave was the last remaining rational argument for the Union.

HYUFD

Dr Jim Most Protestants in Ulster and DUP voters have Scottish Presbyterian ancestry

schrodingers cat

@gala
Surely no one could stand on a ticket of NoDeal?

that is exactly the policy the tories will stand for. and they will win.

the real question will be what corbyn will stand for? he has already stated the labour position of being out of the sm and cu.
unless he accepts that NI stays in the cu/sm, the eu wont give the uk a transitional deal.
in truth, no matter what position corbyn takes, it will damage his support and the tories will win

Proud Cybernat

“Eeny, meeny, miny, moe….”

comment image

K1

That’ll be ‘Ceremonial’ ‘Scottish Presbyterian ancestry…to you lot’

HYUFD

Polls show even in England Remain would win a second EU referendum if there was No Deal and No Deal would also not get through Parliament most likely without a second referendum.

Therefore most likely it will be a stay in the SM and CU transition but Chequers will be dumped with a Canada style deal the basis for FTA talks in the transition period

Alastair

Tell me about Irish Backstops when between 1845 and 1852 only 3 generations ago over 1 Million Citizens of Great Brittian an Ireland were allowed, allowed, to die of starvation, desease and migration. All under Westmister 1945 Backstop.

manandboy

link to theguardian.com

When you read this, you’ll realise that you’re not what you think you are – a voter, an observer, law-abiding, a consumer, an informed intelligent citizen.
You’re not even a spectator, or at least not at where the real game is being played. No, the truth is, you’re not even in the stadium, where the game of Dark Money is underway.

If you want to understand what Theresa May and her associates, both inside the Conservative and DUP Unionist Party, as well as elsewhere, are trying to achieve with Brexit, then you have to consider what is happening here and elsewhere, under cover of darkness, meaning in total secrecy.

Like the £435,000 given to the DUP to promote leaving the EU, of which, amazingly, not a penny was spent in Northern Ireland and which, when ‘investigated’ by the Electoral Commission, was deemed to be outside the scope of their authority.
But this is small beer.

And if you think that Scottish Independence is our business as the people of Scotland, then you may have to think again. During the years before we started to wake up politically here in Scotland, and learned about the dirty tricks played on us by successive Tory and Labour Governments, others, both here and abroad, had already been busy making plans for Scotlands emerging riches.

And still are.

Brian Doonthetoon

Hi Donald Urquhart at 4:46 pm.

You typed,
“Chas Hodges has died, and with his death, the end of that highlight of English culture, Chas n’ Dave.
In my opinion, Scottish access to Chas n’ Dave was the last remaining rational argument for the Union.”

See:
link to wingsoverscotland.com

manandboy

frogesque says:
“Much as I would personally like a 50% pension increase, any promises on such a scale would have been laughed out of court in 2014 as unaffordable. Whether true or not MSM and Bitter together would have had a field day.”

While I see where you’re coming from, Frogesque, I take the view that for the oil economy of an Independent Scotland to be unable to afford to pay pensions at the level of Ireland, currently, 243 Euros/£218 a week, is laughable.
UK pension is £125.95 as of 11 April 2018

Just by off-loading Scotland’s share of Trident, by itself, would be more than sufficient. The idea that a country which is as rich as Norway couldn’t match the pensions of Ireland is a joke.

Better Together 2 would have to think very carefully indeed before labelling Irish-level pensions in Scotland as unaffordable. How would that make the mighty Empire of England with the lowest pensions in Europe look? Ha!

Abulhaq

An independent Scotland would rediscover its neglected cultures but at the same time look forward, be modern.
England, sadly, seems stuck with its fantasy imperial and class ridden past. If ever a country needed ‘a cultural revolution’ England is the one.
Wish them luck as we bid them, and their North Brit hangers on, goodbye: The end o ain auld Inglis sang.
Just bring it on please Nicola!

Dawn in NL

If anyone is interested in a Dutch newspaper’s (Volkskrant) view of the Salzburg meeting,I translated an article.

The most amazing quote was:
“Did those present know what it feels like to have your country divided up, she asked her table companions. The Irish Prime Minister, the Cypriot, the Czech, the Slovakian and Chancellor Merkel all bit their tongues to avoid bursting into laughter. They all have personal experience with it, Merkel was born in the East Germany GDR.”

link to m.facebook.com

mogabee

They have ‘Principals’???

Who knew?

mogabee

LOL apologies…’Principles’ 😀 😀

HYUFD

ManandBoy The British state pension was higher than the Irish state pension even when that report was published, despite being lower than the European average it was also higher than state pensions in Latvia, the Netherlands, Denmark, Poland and Estonia.

Since the report was published in 2014 the UK state pension has risen to £155 a week from £113 a week then. Though the fact that the highest state pension is provided by Greece with 20% unemployment and still a significant deficit despite all the austerity there confirms it has to be affordable

link to telegraph.co.uk

HYUFD

Abulhaq Is England proposing to reestablish the British Empire? No. If it was really proposing to be imperialist it would try and challenge Germany for leadership of the EU superstate

Petra

Great cartoon Chris. Got them all down to a Tee. A bunch of lying hypocrites.

…………..

@ Gus at 3:41pm …… “Front page propaganda.”

I see that Gus. Seemingly as per some newspapers big, brave, strong and stable Theresa Churchill May has now “frozen the Brexit talks until the EU makes her a fresh offer.”

Twenty seven months since the EU referendum was held, eighteen months since dafty submitted Article 50, six months to go and she’s telling the EU to make HER an offer, FGS.

link to bbc.co.uk

Thepnr

How things change, a soft Brexit now would be described as Chequers or essentailly any deal at all, whereas hard Brexit has come to mean No Deal. This wasn’t always the case and it’s easy to forget that things were very different even just two weeks after the EU referendum.

This was how soft and hard were being defined by one presenter on the BBC in July 2016.

The “hard Brexiters” are those want to act quickly and be gone. They want to curb European migration as quickly as possible, using a points system. They don’t much value being part of the single market, and point out that just about every nation in the world has “access” to it, without being a member.

You can call this the “Canada lite” model if you like.

“Soft Brexiters” want to take their time, and retain as close a relationship with the rest of the European Union as possible. They want access to the single market, and some sort of minor concession on free movement.

Perhaps, they muse, the EU would give us an emergency brake and annual quotas on both sides. Their priority is to avoid trade tariffs and secure a good deal for services, particularly financial services. That’s “Norway plus”.

link to archive.fo

The UK public have been led up the garden path over Brexit, totally manipulated into giving the corrupt leaders, those that you never see, exactly what they want.

Breeks

I think the situation is being misread.

Theresa May having her delusional Chequers plan thrown in the dustbin leaves her with the only viable Brexit closure being a no-deal. Just suppose for a minute that, that is wholly deliberate.

When Brexit looks at it’s very grimmest, and a bleak cliff edge No Deal beckons, – those are the circumstances when she throws Brexit back to the people and gives the UK a second referendum with the starkest possible choice between a bleak and miserable Brexit, and a last gasp chance to make Brexit go away.

We’ve been fed the narrative that the big choice has been a reluctant Hard Brexit and a monumentally delusional Soft Brexit that has never stood any chance of success from day 1. It could be that this has all been stage managed, so the hard Brexiteers are goaded into revealing themselves as pseudo-fascists with an unhinged toxic morality, while the Soft Brexit fantasy dissolves precisely as intended, so the UK has a last minute reprieve via a second EuroRef touted as a battle between the frothing BritNat eccentrics who will wreck the country, and the steady voice of traditional British unflappability which will make the right choice despite whatever flak it encounters for making it.

I think the “British Establishment” wants a Get Out of Jail Free card for Brexit. That is very problematic when the issue is between a dangerous hard and an impractical soft Brexit, but once the trajectory is set for a hard and ugly Brexit, all of a sudden, the erstwhile electorally unpopular No-Brexit Remain argument takes on a whole new dynamism. The choice is a lot more binary.

Think about it. Since a soft Brexit is now dead in the water, (yes, we all know it always has been), the only sensible referendum question if there is to be a second EuroRef is a choice between the catastrophic hard Brexit under the Lunatic Far right freakshow of Rees-Mogg and Boris, or the moderate “corduroy brown trouser” option of No Brexit at all.

The past few months have been making Brexit look so scary that many Brexiteers are beginning to waken up to what they have done. I think Remain would win a second Referendum, and kill off Brexit.

Here in Scotland, if there is a second EuroRef, it won’t matter a damn what we vote. It didn’t matter the first time, especially after we pissed all over our own Constitutional Sovereignty back in 2016. Brexit 2 will be defeated and the UK will secure a last minute reprieve and stay in the EU and avoid economic catastrophe, and Scotland will have blown the clearest, definitive, Constitutional open goal for a chance of Independence based upon the unconstitutional subjugation of our Sovereignty which our Nation has seen for over 300 years.

We had it all! An unprecedented and unambiguous democratic expression of will from the Constitutionally Sovereign people of Scotland, which was irreconcilable with, and diametrically opposed to the similarly expressed will of the English. The two signatories to the Treaties of Union were at loggerheads, and had a definitive clash over Sovereignty which the Union could not reconcile. The Union HAD to fail. But we blew it. We set our own Sovereignty to one side, and surrendered all the initiative to Westminster.

Still, let’s all just sit on our arse for a few months and see what happens eh?

Robert J. Sutherland

Meg merrilees @ 15:58,
Dr Jim @ 16:36,

Remember in the last-but-one UKGE where the Tories (and their willing little helpers in the media) were monstering Ed Miliband with the “tail wagging the dog” jibe over the SNP (then as now the third-largest party in WM)?

After May’s “strong and stable” =cough= gamble, the Tories are now being pushed around by that tiny band of NI antediluvians (nth largest party in WM) and the only thing that May can say about that is that we must humbly respect and satisfy their every whim.

They and their media pals have no shame.

Abulhaq

@HYUFD
The anglosphere, now trending and currently touted by the likes of the Scottish Unionist Fox among others, is simply the British/American anglocentric politico-cultural hegemony remorphed. Your reference to Germany is suggestive. Some still seem engaged in the conflicts of the 20th century. Trump, half German, appears to be fuelling this ‘dont trust the Krauts’ anti EU ie anti-European stuff. Old empires just can’t give up the habit of having their own way.
Scots do have an alternative to this retro ‘madness’. We can be ourselves. Let the scales soon fall……

Bill Hume

I was a union representative for more than 25 years (on and off, because it’s not something you can do properly without it burning you out).
One thing I learned in all those years was this.
The arseholes who run things don’t know what they are doing.
They react…..they take orders….they have never had an original thought in their lives.
Order takers….and May is just another one.

K1

Thank you Dawn @ 6.19pm. Unbelievably thick and quite honestly astonishing remarks from May around ‘that’ dinner table. UK is being run by utterly delusional and quite frankly embarrassing imbeciles.

K1

Just going to keep posting this for anyone who hasn’t watched yet:

The Spider’s Web: Britain’s Second Empire

link to youtube.com

Lenny Hartley

Breeks, your forgetting why we are having brexit, which by all the available evidence is the EU’s making tax avoidance illegal.
And btw, i trust Nicola, She knows a shitload more than you, just saying.

Dave McEwan Hill

HYUFD AT 6.36

The UK basic state pension now is £125.95 per week. The basic Irish state pension to anyone 66 or over is E243.30 ie £219.04. Fact.

CameronB Brodie

In order to engage with principles, one must first posses knowledge, understanding and reason.

British ‘exceptionalism’ drove Brexit, but EU media aren’t buying it

A survey of EU media coverage since the referendum has reflected a lack of concern about the impact of Brexit on the Continent.
link to politico.eu

#DissolvetheUnion

Iain

The price of Brent crude, or Scottish oil has reached $80 dollars a barrel.
Something to gladden the hearts of unionists.

Macart

@K1

Yep. Delusional, lacking diplomacy and given the company, empathy. A totally mistimed and inappropriate speech, preceded by a totally mistimed and inappropriate press release.

link to archive.fo

You’d almost think that Ms May had been very poorly advised. That mibbies the outcome of such statements was to intentionally provoke a response from EU members.

UKgov has known since it was first made public that the Chequers proposals were a non starter. They’ve been in constant contact with the EU for weeks. It’s frankly unbelievable that they didn’t know rejection was the order of the day.

I’m not saying Ms May’s clear shock and anger were in any way feigned. No. I reckon she was clearly shaken and taken aback. But someone advised these moves. Someone reckoned that forging ahead with a dud and rejected proposal and preceding it with a catastrophic press release and utterly thoughtless dinner speech would be a good idea. Do we believe that everyone in Whitehall is a thoughtless cretin? Empathy free, arrogant and utter wossinames yes, but all cretins?

The EU have done nothing wrong. All they’ve ever done is to stand by the statements they’ve been making for over two years. Zero shock really for anyone with two neurons to rub together who’s been paying attention.

However this humiliation does seem awfy convenient for at least some in her party. It also provides yer meeja with a handy scapegoat on at least two fronts.

Worth a thought.

jfngw

The day after the PM is told her plan doesn’t work, and is still the same as the one they previously told her didn’t work, because it would compromise the single market. The UK government and press respond with, to paraphrase, ‘You foreign bastards better start showing us some respect’.

Exposed, the so called superiority of British diplomacy. It’s about as sophisticated as a Neighbours script, also a Neighbours script is probably less transparent than the direction the government, but the gullible seem to be lapping it up.

Farage is back, with sidekicks Davis & Hoey. It’s a spewghetti western, A fistful of dollars remake.

Liz g

Breeks @ 7.14
Well …… and I have no real way of knowing of course…
But what if all that bing boning around Europe that Nicola did has resulted in, some kind of assurance from Politicians there that…
Once the UK is no longer a member state.
A) We will get no negative interference.

B) We will receive the report that only Cameron could ask for in 2014 about our re entry into the EU.
That report would have cleared things up re the EU and allowed us an informed choice.
Mibbi that’s why it’s better to wait…

C) Also a clear route to the ECJ or ECHR for self determination.
Any all all of this could be a factor!!

Dr Jim

@K1
Notice how the Scroatfud got his sectarianism in, it’s Murdo Fraser it’s defo Murdo Fraser lookin up his wee SIU book for things tae say

North chiel

What a con “ Better together” perpetrated on Scottish pensioners during the referendum campaign . Telling our pensioners that their state pension would only “ be safe” with a no vote and that an independent Scotland “couldnt afford “ or guarantee a state pension for our citizens . Since then the Tories have increased the contribution years for a full state pension from 30 to 35 . Increased the state pension age from 65 to 67 and rising . “ Stolen “ up to 5 years state pension from “ waspi” women ( around £35,000 from women in their late fifties who should have got their state pension at 60). There is more to come from these Tory shysters ,as they plan to regularly “up “the pension age ,and thereafter means test the state pension ( this is why they have introduced “ employee works pensions ) . Eventually , they will “ abolish” the state pension and once these worker pensions kick in ,they will only “ top up” to the state pension level in the interim. ).
For Indyref 2 our FM should give a categorical assurance that a “ Scottish citizens pension” will be introduced and that they intend to attain a state pension based on the European average. A commitment to look at a compensation scheme for our “ Waspi women” should also be assured. Also our Independent government should look at resetting our state pension age to 65 in view of lower life expectancy in Scotland.
Perhaps, mandating some of the above pension “ reforms” in an Independent Scotland might just might make some of our previously NO voting middle aged to senior citizens reconsider when casting their vote next time??

CameronB Brodie

Macart
You don’t appear to be an English cultural chauvinist, so you’ll always struggle to get your head around this. It’s largely a colonial legacy thing. As a Scots, you have to be a hard-core yoon to view the world from the imperialist’s perspective.

New British exceptionalism – no longer in competition for the best and the brightest?
link to blogs.lse.ac.uk

Elite discourse and popular opinion on European union. british exceptionalism revisited
link to cairn.info

‘Brexit’ in transnational perspective: an analysis of newspapers in France, Germany and the Netherlands
link to link.springer.com

chick mcgregor

Dawn,

It is the self-blindness of the English elite which is the most scary of a lot of scary things about Brexit.

Dave McEwan Hill

Today’s Daily Express headline is a classic – even by the hilarious standards of that joke publication.

“May’s greatest hour”

Iain

Before indy ref 2, the Scottish Government needs to state that the Scottish pension will be at least the European average and not the current brittish pension that is the lowest in the European Union.

Fred

Is Murdo one of the “Boll o Meal Frasers?” I wonder. A past Lord Lovat doled out meal to anybody taking the Fraser name to boost his rent-roll. It’s in the genes, a grasping sod!

Chick McGregor

Without assessment, how is a teacher to know whether a particular pupil is performing below expectation and therefore in need of a gee-up or not?

Especially in the more fluid turnover teacher environment of today.

The presence of or lack of standardised assessment could mean the difference between some child achieving their full potential or not.

Macart

@CameronB Brodie

Heh! Safe to say I’m not an English cultural chauvinist right enough.

Three good choices there Cameron and I’d recommend No.2 as well worth a read.

Dr Jim

Scotland just woke up again:

Latest sub sampling of polling has the SNP on 51 seats in a GE
That’s quite interesting given we’re told constantly there’s no support for Independence intit

Robert J. Sutherland

Prompted by another great cartoon from Chris, here’s another wee thought for the mix. If a UKGE does indeed come along in the next few months, and Corby somehow (how?) manages to scrape enough MPs to claim first dibs at power, but not enough to win a majority even with the help of the ever-eager LibDems, so he has to depend on SNP support to get anything through the HoC, how likely would he be willing to offer us an IR2 any time soon? Given that a likely indy win would deprive him of his own lifeline in the HoC…

The SNP may be his insurance policy for another indecisive UK result, but his only likely payout for a claim would be stringing the SNP along on false promises that never amount to anything, like back in 1978-79, I reckon.

Daisy Walker

Another wee thought on Brexit – its all about the tax havens…

In the Spiders Webb, they mention that Britain initially signed up to the early tax laws because they primarily affected the banks in places like Switzerland and Lichtenstein, and they were enthusiastic because it meant they could grab their customer base, and at that time the off shore British tax havens were not included in the legislation.

If there is any desire on the part of EU to smack Britain down, it will come from the EU’s version of the 1%, and it will be because of that previous British manoeuvre.

Which must be mighty annoying for the British 1% now, since that is who they need to convince to alter the EU’s tax laws now. And why would they, when they can sit back and see all the UK’s industry relocate to mainland Europe, and once the UK is out, change the tax legislation at their leisure.

Oh dear. Once your bluff is called and you don’t have the cards, it really is game over.

And for us in Scotland, it means they will cling on for dear life. Scotland is the cash cow.

I do hope the Scottish Government will be hosting some neutral, but thoroughly important international advisory types in the country from now until Indy 2. It really wouldn’t do for Westminster to behave any which way it liked and write it up in the same vein now would it.

We live in interesting times. Best wishes to all.

Robert J. Sutherland

Liz g @ 20:45,

The EU’s attitude to the UK state is not conditioned by the latter being a member. As a matter of diplomatic niceties, it will continue to treat the UK post-Brexit as a unitary whole. It cannot be seen to interfere in internal UK affairs, as the whole world will still see it.

The only time we’ll be recognised as sovereign and thus can be formally approached in our own right is after a duly-recognised democratic vote.

About a minute after such a vote, actually. The time it takes to dial-up Edinburgh and say “congrats, let’s meet”.

(Which is something that the legalistic nit-pickers still don’t seem to understand. Sovereign power is everything. All else is mere detail.)

Petra

O/T

An interesting wee link from Craig Murray’s site.

link to sparaszczukster.wordpress.com

K1

Aye Dr Jim, noted. Stirring little shitbag.

Robert Peffers

@HYUFD says: 22 September, 2018 at 6:38 pm:

” … Is England proposing to reestablish the British Empire? No. If it was really proposing to be imperialist it would try and challenge Germany for leadership of the EU superstate”

You have as much awareness as my wee Papillon bitch and she’s been dead for some time now. There isn’t any EU state that leads the EU and there never can be. The presidency of the EU changes every six months and it is not voted upon it is by, “Buggin’s Turn”. Now the presidency is not a personal thing but is held by the EU member state whose turn it is. Now I quote:-

“The presidency of the Council of the European Union is responsible for the functioning of the Council of the European Union, (the upper house of the EU legislature).

It rotates among the member states of the EU every six months. The presidency is not an individual, but rather the position is held by a national government.

It is sometimes incorrectly referred to as the “president of the European Union”. The presidency’s function is to chair meetings of the Council, determine its agendas, set a work programme and facilitate dialogue both at Council meetings and with other EU institutions. The presidency is currently (as of July 2018) held by Austria.”

If memory serves Austria took over from little Malta and the UK has had its turns as the presidency when it was.

Now bear in mind that every EU member state has a veto and no EU regulations can be passed if any member state uses its veto.

The EU must therefore not only be a true democracy but must work by consensus.

In other words your above claims are utter pish and no state can dominate the EU when even the smallest state must agree or nothing is passed.

If you are typical of the British/English Nationalist is it any wonder Theresa and her cabinet are flapping around like headless chickens. The EU will never agree to allow the UK to leave with a better deal than existing EU member states who would each demand at least as good a deal on each of the four EU freedoms.

Long standing Wingers with good memories will recall I posted that on the day May put in her formal request for the UK Exit from the EU I’ve also pointed out since then that Britain will not be exiting the EU because Britain isn’t the EU member state is the member state is the United Kingdom and that is not all of Britain.

Now ask yourself this question – can you envisage any circumstance where the Republic of Ireland would NOT veto a plan that did not keep all free movements between both parts of the country of Ireland? It only takes one member state to veto any EU rule and the EU has said since day one – no cherry picking of the freedoms.

Liz g

Robert J Sutherland @ 10.33
Yes Robert J,I do understand and agree with you,about the EU having a protocol around not interfering.
But they will have their ways too.
What I am floating is the idea that all those trips to Europe were not for nothing,and I’m mindful of Nicola’s welcome in Ireland where she was asked directly “what can we do to help”!
In short we don’t have the information that Nicola has and she seems to have very much taken the temperature in Europe.
While she was doing it the British Nationalists were just a tad unhappy about it too!!
So if we are to wait till after Brexit day to actually hold the referendum,I would be presuming that Nicola would have judged it ( for whatever reasons) to be the best thing in the round.
And I’m just, as I said, exploring what those reasons “might possibly ” be!
Absent an obvious tipping point that would justify calling on Nicola going ahead full tilt,we have no other choice?
All we can really do at the moment is work on that tipping point.

yesindyref2

@Hamish100
Martin Geissler’s a good guy, I met him years ago and had a blether with him, so kept an eye on his reporting of Iraq or something like that. Very even-handed and factual. Not your Sun or DM type reporter at all. No idea what he’s like now but when I saw his appointment it gave me some hope it would improve things. So I’ll give him air to breath.

Dr Jim

All accross England today there have been rallies and meetings attended by Brexiters such as David Davis Nigel Farage (he’s got another bus) and others riling up the English folk to get behind a Leave means Leave campaign

So I say once again England is deciding the fate of Scotland Wales and Northern Ireland without giving one jot of thought to the way anybody elses voted because those people in that country believe that they and they alone are the United Kingdom or Britain and England and the rest of us don’t even exist, because democracy to them is majority RULE by them and them alone

Remember Scotland is paid 43% short of it’s own money that’s around 20 billion quid per year, deficit? what deficit? the English deficit that’s what, and they still have to borrow money and assign a percentage of that debt to us that England spends on ?????

K1

Agree wi everything you’ve outlined Macart, but this is a wee bit of a baffling enigma:

‘I’m not saying Ms May’s clear shock and anger were in any way feigned. No. I reckon she was clearly shaken and taken aback.’

In light of yer other points about the fact we’ve known from the start that Chequers was a dud, and so has May and that of course the EU27 were never going to go along wi that cobbled together cobblers…why would she be in any kind shock after Salzburg?

She wrote that OpEd in Die Welt (or whoever wrote it for her) and was in fact the confrontational one in Salzburg. The reaction from EU27 is on the back of this, they just got very direct very quickly and that’s what she seems angry about in reality? May was the ‘aggressor’ in all of this, not the victim.

It’s like it was a ‘set up’ so she could come back and basically ‘make up a story about how badly ‘respected’ I was in Salzburg’…dae they no know aboot the internet yet?

link to twitter.com

It’s all a bit weird. It could be some sort of ‘passive aggressive’ manoeuvre for English audience? But damned if ah have any idea what any of this serves in terms of ‘negotiations’ et al?

A great big huff and a great big puff and they blow the whole house down?

If anyone believes any of the guff printed in ‘our’ media about any of the Brexit shite, then they seriously are out the loop on what is actually going down.

Here’s the full Newsnight from player, the whole segment with Stefanie Bolzen speaking starts at 19:05:

link to bbc.co.uk

Collie

Anybody heard on the National News bulletins what the people of Scotland Wales or N Ireland think of Brexit?

No,,,me neither.

HYUFD

Dr Jim Wales voted 52.5% Leave in the EU referendum, it was not just England of the UK Home Nations that voted Leave

Meg merrilees

Latest news says Corbyn will call a vote of No Confidence in the Tory Gov next week if T May is getting a rough time and this will be an attempt to force a GE.

Get the popcorn in – things may be about to take off.

Mind you. I widnae put it past the Tories to whip everyone to support Treeza through this vote and then stab her in the back, figuratively speaking.

And in the middle of this (t)Ruthless is about to give birth and widnae be able to campaign…

HYUFD

Dave McEwan Hill RoI has a higher average gdp per capita than the UK as a whole but spends less as a percentage of gdp, the Irish state pension is slightly less than 30% of the average salary compared to slightly more than 30% of the average salary in the UK

HYUFD

Abulhaq Australia, New Zealand, Canada, India and South Africa too on some measures are part of the Anglosphere too but while the Commonwealth is a useful forum to bring them together even Brexiteers acknowledge the British Empire is history.

Germany of course runs the EU and the Eurozone in all but name, as Greece and Italy have discovered

HYUFD

Collie Yes, the BBC news was in Dundee and Swansea discussing Brexit last week

K1

I wish we had real journalists in Scotland and the wider UK that actually contextualise and analyse what actually is going on, but we don’t, but in Ireland they do. I’m posting the whole article because it’s simply so refreshing to read a piece of journalism that reads like a proper piece of well written journalism, ‘reporting’ of events and circumstances that took place and isn’t full of opinions ‘about’ what took place:

‘Tony Connelly
Europe Editor RTE

In the game of Jenga, competitors build a tower of identical wooden bricks, creating a new layer each time by deftly removing one block from below and placing it delicately on top.

The higher the tower rises, the more unstable it becomes, and the more skill is required to extract each new brick without bringing the whole structure down.

This aptly describes Theresa May’s Brexit strategy. Salzburg may well prove to be the clumsily extricated brick.

Since the Chequers paper was published in July, both London and Brussels have engaged in a dubious pretence. Theresa May pretended Chequers would allow the UK to maintain frictionless trade with Europe, avoid a hard border in Ireland, and permit free trade deals around the world.

The EU pretended that Chequers might work – or at least, officials and leaders were careful not to slap it down immediately or completely.

It’s important to remember the context of the Chequers publication. In July, Theresa May was barely surviving week-to-week; Tory hardliners were circling; her foreign secretary and Brexit secretary resigned along with a handful of junior ministers; the government was forced into voting for a slew of amendments which contradicted its own strategy.

One of those amendments rendered the Irish backstop virtually illegal.

The EU looked on helplessly. Member states even decided to suppress a set of European Commission Task Force slides that spelled out in stark detail the cost to the EU over time of allowing the UK to go its own way on services, yet stay aligned to the single market for goods and agriculture – one of the planks of Chequers.

This was done expressly to give Mrs May a helping hand. She barely clung on till the summer recess, but there was a hope that after the summer break, fresher minds might prevail as we headed to the autumn showdown.

But summer came and went and the Tory dynamic was back with a vengeance. Local conservative associations were up in arms over Chequers. Boris Johnson was throwing down weekly gauntlets as his stock among the grassroots rose.

By late August, the British press was convinced that Salzburg would be a pivotal moment. Theresa May would appeal to EU leaders over the head of the doctrinaire Michel Barnier and they would change the chief negotiator’s mandate to give her a deal on the backstop and Chequers.

British diplomats worked the capitals, attempting to peel member states away from the Task Force. Briefing against Ireland’s position on the backstop continued.

All this was viewed with bafflement in Brussels. Downing Street was also worried that that expectations were being unduly raised.

Salzburg was the first time the EU27 would meet Theresa May since Chequers was published. Officials close to the negotiations predicted leaders would carefully calibrate their position. They didn’t want to kill Chequers, but they wanted also to deliver unambiguous support for Ireland.

By Thursday afternoon, the entire charade appeared to have been blown to smithereens.

At a news conference Donald Tusk, the European Council president, seemed to tire of the pretence. He said: “We should not hide the obvious truth. [The Chequers plan] will not work… There are positive elements in the Chequers proposal but the suggested framework for economic co-operation will not work, not least because it risks undermining the single market.”

The French President Emmanuel Macron also dismissed the economic parts of the Chequers proposal, and then sharpened the knife with an ad hominem attack on Brexiteers. “Brexit is the choice of the British people… pushed by those who predicted easy solutions… Those people are liars,” he said.

In London there was a cascade of negative headlines: “humiliation”, “catastrophe”, “ambush”, “fury”. The Sun newspaper, which has denounced Chequers relentlessly from the start, decided that any criticism from EU leaders made them mobsters, under the banner headline “EU Dirty Rats”.

Downing Street officials were stunned at Mr Tusk’s intervention. London wondered if this was a deliberate, if high-risk, “Darkest Hour” strategy by which, in a nod to the recent Churchill film, Britain would have to be forced into a crucible of torment in order to finally do a deal.

Some sources wondered was it a miscalculation, or an accidental ramping up of rhetoric. But President Tusk had also tightened the deadline for a deal on the backstop. Unless there was significant progress by the October summit then he would not call a summit in mid-November.

That seemed a harbinger to no deal.

In contrast to the fear and loathing in London, there was thinly disguised amazement in Brussels at the British reaction.

“We never said Salzburg would be a game changer,” says one EU diplomat. “That we would dump our line on the backstop, or that we would suddenly think the economic part of Chequers was workable.

“We never hinted at that at any moment.”

So what happened in Salzburg? Who tugged at the wrong wooden brick?

Sources suggest that Theresa May got off to a bad start. The Prime Minister was to make her pitch on Chequers and the backstop at a dinner in the Felsenreitschule Amphitheatre the night before the summit.

However, EU leaders were dismayed at what they saw as an aggressive tone, presaged in her article in the German newspaper Die Welt.

Her message was: ‘we’ve moved, now you have to move too’. And she flatly rejected Michel Barnier’s efforts to “de-dramatise” any checks along the Irish Sea by reducing physical checks at GB ports to just one category of goods, with technology and pre-clearance handling the remainder.

“It’s not that she was turning up as a leader,” observes one source, “saying to her colleagues, ‘look, I have a major political hurdle here. We all want a deal, but I have a couple of difficulties, can we find common ground on certain issues that are of high concern?’

“That was not the message. The message was, I moved, that was Chequers, that’s it. And I cannot accept a border on the Irish Sea.”

“That is not very conducive to getting people to say: ‘perhaps we should reflect on how we could get further here’.”

Yet, the following morning the Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker described her presentation to reporters at the Mozart University: “It was interesting, it was polite, it was not aggressive. She is doing her job.”

As Mr Juncker was speaking Theresa May and Leo Varadkar were holding a bilateral meeting with teams of officials and diplomats at the Sheraton Grand Hotel five minutes walk away.

An Irish source described it as a “useful” meeting, involving an “open exchange of views”. Another source present described the encounter as “warm”.

Dublin felt that London had to get deeper into the detail of how the backstop would work – how it would be legally operable and all-weather.

Mrs May told Mr Varadkar that she didn’t think she could reach agreement on the backstop before the October European Council meeting. She said she would bring forward new proposals shortly to try to break the deadlock.

In Dublin, Simon Coveney was meeting David Lidington, the deputy prime minister. It was, according to London, a “sensible” meeting. There was no inkling of what was about to happen in Salzburg.

Meanwhile, other leaders were arriving at the summit.

Most said the UK needed to move on the backstop, but acknowledged that Chequers had some merit. During the Article 50 gathering, when leaders met without Theresa May, Michel Barnier outlined in detail his reworked plans for the backstop, but he also praised Chequers.

“On Chequers he was extremely nuanced,” says one EU source. “He said there are many areas of convergence on which we can work and where we can find common ground. But, he said, the hard [economic] core of it is not workable.

“It was very comprehensible. People had no reason to think we should depart from this approach.”

But does that explain the yawning chasm in perception, with “catastrophe” at the British end of the spectrum, and “what-did-she-expect” at the other end?

Diplomats from more than one EU member state insist there was no pre-meditated ambush.

EU officials had clearly indicated in advance of Salzburg that Mr Tusk would work up three themes: a declaration of unity, support for Ireland, and a look ahead to work on the political declaration on the future relationship that will accompany the Withdrawal Agreement.

The issue of timing also came up. While there had been rampant speculation that the deadline for a deal was shifting to mid-November, France in particular was pushing for October.

“There was a view, certainly among the French,” says one EU diplomat, “that we should big up October, because if we big up November, then you just make a rod for your own back down the road, because suddenly the EU gets put under pressure.”

That, of course, would mean Ireland also coming under pressure.

According to another source, this was the main point of discussion between Donald Tusk and Theresa May when they held a short meeting after the Article 50 lunch.

British sources described the encounter as “frank”. There were reports Mrs May left angry and unsettled. An EU source described the meeting as “sociable”.

“It was a short meeting,” said the source. “They were extremely surprised by the emphasis that was now being placed on October, but that was the dynamic in the room. That was not an ambush.”

It is hard not to avoid the conclusion, therefore, that Salzburg was another example, of which there have been many, of a florid mismatch in expectation and perception on either side of the Channel.

This was exacerbated by familiar pattern: an exaggerated expectation within the British system and media about the importance of Salzburg, Theresa May’s posture ahead of it, and the attempts to bypass the Task Force and go direct to heads of government.

“The elements coming together are disparate,” says one EU diplomat, “but to a large extent the British brought this on themselves. To the extent that Salzburg was being presented as a great liberation of the process from the clammy cold hands of the ideologues of the Commission bureaucrats – that was never going to happen.”

It is undeniable that Donald Tusk’s language in his news conference was blunt. But in the post-Chequers period, neither he, nor other EU leaders, or countless officials, have made any secret of the fact that the economic and customs elements of Chequers were deeply problematic.

The problem is that, whether deliberate or not, Mr Tusk’s intervention threw the notoriously short-termist Downing Street machine into defence mode.

With the party conference imminent, there were few options available to Mrs May other than to present herself in her Downing Street statement as tough and angry, doubling down on the ambush narrative, and casting Salzburg in existential and emotive terms.

She accused the EU of showing her a lack of respect. The EU wanted to “break up our country”. She seemed to imply the EU wanted her to overturn the referendum result (the EU has never taken that position). She accused President Tusk of not explaining why the Chequers plan would undermine the single market (in fact, Michel Barnier has spoken non-stop about how Chequers would undermine the single market).

The EU was only offering two alternatives: that of a rule-taker under a Norway plus model, or a Canada-style free trade agreement which would necessitate a backstop.

Neither, she said, were acceptable. Yet, the EU has said Britain’s own red lines are the very things that predetermine those outcomes.

But the uncompromising language on the backstop must be a concern. Theresa May has reinforced the constitutional threat idea, and getting down from that position will be difficult. One Dublin source hopes the speech is merely a “play-within-a-play”, scripted for purely domestic consumption.

Ironically, the Salzburg “catastrophe” was not primarily about the backstop, and the chemistry with Leo Varadkar was better than it had been.

Dublin now awaits the new proposals on the backstop, which I understand will cover not just regulatory checks – as some have suggested – but the whole gamut of checks that the backstop will give rise to.

Irish officials are, however, suspicious that the new proposals will be a repackaging of the demand for the backstop to be UK-wide.

But the backstop and Chequers are, of course, intimately linked.

One key reason why EU leaders had been careful not to trash Chequers during the summer is that the White Paper posited the UK more closely to the EU’s regulatory and customs orbit than the visions outlined in Theresa May’s Lancaster House speech.

Even if the economic and customs ideas within Chequers were never going to fly, they altered the trajectory of Brexit from Lancaster House, through the Mansion House speech, and on to a landing zone which could be worked towards, not in October or November, but two years down the line.

Eurosceptics realised this, of course, and that is why they hated it so much.

That landing zone was not fully defined, but a closer customs and regulatory symbiosis between the UK and EU beckoned. Time could have allowed it to materialise.

For Theresa May it was to provide her with cover in order to reassure unionists that the backstop would not ever be needed, because Chequers would inform the future trade relationship in such a way as to remove the need for customs or regulatory checks either on the land border, or down the Irish Sea.

It would also allow her to reassure the business community that highly valuable supply chains would be protected.

While both sides tacitly understood this formulation, there was a critical difference: the EU regarded Chequers as a pseudo-option, a virtual solution that might help close off the Withdrawal Agreement and then guide everyone into the trade negotiations where, over time, the UK would settle for a softer Brexit.

Theresa May saw it as a literal solution.

In Salzburg the virtual met the literal, and the Jenga tower collapsed.’

link to rte.ie

Macart

@K1

Oh I’d say it was definitely playing to an audience. The theme from the EU was a softly softly toward Treeza meme for some weeks. Chequers was mooted as a starting point and not a red line. I’d say Barnier would have been only too happy to offer crumbs to help the PM out with her party problems. I reckon they thought they could reach some kind of agreement using Chequers as a starting point.

link to twitter.com

I don’t think the EU leaders or Barnier saw the confrontational statement or speech coming or could understand the vehemence of it, but clearly were left with no choice but to answer them rapidly and in kind.

Absolutely agree, the EU were the victims and UKgov through the PM, the aggressor. Don’t think they’re in much doubt now that there is no plan b from UKgov and yes I’d also reckon the shock/horror headlines were written before she even left No.10.

There’s some bad folk out there K1 and they’re no too fussy about how many bods they throw under a bus.

Right now they’re looking for scapegoats to hang the shitstorm on and they’ll cast their net of blame wide. Johnny Furriner, the PM’s office, Ireland, the Scottish government. Anyone and everyone. Lots of look anywhere but here whilst they set up a sales pitch for misery which a majority of the population will buy into.

Gary45%

Painting the outside of my house, so I went into my local plant hire company and asked for a cherry picker, got handed a picture of Treeeza.

HYFUD what’s your point?

Collie

Lol,,,so the BBC was in Dundee one day last week.

How patronising is that?

Brexit is taking up the majority of news bulletins on every station and the BBC managed to get the opinion of someone in Dundee one day last week.

I think I made my point,,,the English/National media couldn’t care less what the people of Scotland Wales or N Ireland think.

Chick McGregor

While not engaging, I correct Hi Ya Fud’s factual errors.

On Pensions.

Ireland’s male pension as a percentage of average earnings, while lower than the OECD’s average is 42% (OECD 2016).
The UK’s male percentage of average earnings is 29%, the second lowest, to South Africa, among OECD countries.

Also note that GDP per capita for Ireland is significantly higher for Ireland than the UK. So that has to be factored in as well.

Germany is 51% and France is 75%.

Hamish100

Hifud.
RoI pension has just got better as £ value falls again € and US$.
The settlers abroad from the uk are niw struggling. Scotland needs independence from RUK.

Hamish100

Yesindyref2
Martin geisler has consistently ran down Scottish Independence as he us a regular attendee on bbc shereen show. The fact you met him hasnt changed that. Middle class person living comfortably.im alright Jack.

K1

Aye Macart, bad lot, the lot of them. The article ah posted just prior to your comment seems to confirm exactly that this may well have been a set up for an English (home) audience.

The whole corrupt cabal will destroy millions of people’s life’s and yes, ‘most’ will fall for it…sigh.

HYUFD

Collie No you did not make your points at all as I have comprehensively refuted them both.

Of course your main point, that England alone is dragging all the other Home Nations out of the EU against their will, falls at the first hurdle as Wales also voted Leave. So your attempt to play the anti English card there is completely illogical

Thepnr

@HYUFD

Simple Simon met a pie man going to the fair
Said Simple Simon to the pie man “what have you got there!”
He said “Pies yah daft bastard”

Grouse Beater

Very nice, Chris, very nice. I see three split personalities, and none of the characters depicted friends to Scotland.

Your essential weekend reading:

A Letter from the Clearances: link to wp.me
A review of ‘Black Klansman’: link to wp.me

HYUFD

Chick McGregor The UK pension for all workers as the link below shows is higher as a percentage of salary than that in Latvia, the Netherlands, Denmark, Poland and Estonia and Ireland.

link to telegraph.co.uk

HYUFD

Hamish100 Currency values fluctuate, that is not a real measure of pension value which is more percentage of average salary. Plus of course a low £ is good for UK exporters and the UK tourism industry, it is not solely a negative

ScottieDog

@HYUFD
“Manandboy Possibly but do not forget The Republic of Ireland overall now spends less as a percentage of GDP than the UK and had to impose heavy austerity after the 2008 crash to get its finances back in order”

And there you go brazenly misunderstanding the basis of macroeconomics.
Which finances are back on order? The ones which receivesd the greatest investment perhaps?
I.e the city?

K1

Lol Thpnr.

*Went intae a shop
Boy said, all cakes a £1
Ah said, can a get that one?
He said, that’s £2
Ah said, £2?
He said, aye that’s Madiera cake

*this wee joke has fuck all to do with anything 🙂

(jammies oan…aff tae ma kip)

ScottieDog

@HYUFD
Truth be told Ireland is benefitting from a brass plate economy. Many American big companies registering to aviod tax.that certainly boosts GDP but doesn’t benefit individuals per se.

Iceland is probably a better example of a govt that rejected austerity, pumped its own currency into the economy, and funnily enough generated a govt surplus a few years after the crisis. Could it be that the aggregate economy doesn’t work like a household?

Chick McGregor

comment image?dl=0

HYUFD

ScottieDog A number of UK based banks e.g. HSBC and Barclays would have survived without a bailout

HYUFD

ScottieDog I agree Irish GDP per capita is inflated by Apple, Amazon, Facebook etc basing themselves there due to very low corporation tax for instance in the Republic of Ireland.

Iceland introduced more austerity than the UK, Spain or Portugal or Ireland did, Iceland is also outside the EU and is still prosperous now

HYUFD
Liz g

Thepnr & K1
As aye was going to St Ive’s
Aye met a man with 7 wives
Each wife had 7 sacks
Each sack had 7 cats
Each cat had 7 kits
Kits, cats, sacks and wife’s
Thank fuck there no aw going to St Ive’s

manandboy

http://www.thenational.scot

The Tory government is found guilty of the neglect of Britain’s nuclear submarines mothballed at Rosyth, near Edinburgh, creating a nuclear hazard with no means to fix it.
But not to worry, the elite members of the British Establishment will have a whip round to buy a tarpaulin to cover the subs up – at least the glowing parts anyway.

Yep, so much Better Together under Westminster’s dump Britain’s nuclear sub waste in the Forth estuary scheme.
But it matters not a jot to Scotland’s British Nationalist No voters.

Nice bungalows going cheap in the Rosyth area.

Chick McGregor

Hi Ya Fud
Barclay’s clandestinely had a bigger bail out than HBOS and RBS(the then biggest world bank) combined. Fact.

Robert J. Sutherland

K1 @ 00:16,

A complete mismatch of understanding and expectation. Seems to me that May really did think that having sweated blood to get her herd of fractious cats to (more-or-less) rally behind Chequers, that the EU would recognise her great effort and give her some leeway in return.

Whereas the EU regarded it as merely another ratchet point on the inevitable push towards either Norway-style or Canada-style exit.

Maybe the EU saw time rapidly running out, had had enough of pussyfooting around May’s fantasies, and decided to deliver her a cold dose of reality. The velvet glove was deliberately slipped a little off the iron fist.

Her shock, which I believe was genuine, was in finally realising exactly what the EU were thinking and where they were inexorably heading. And that she had no room for manoevre. Not even a millimetre.

The UK will have to either humiliatingly knuckle under the mounting EU pressure (by whatever regime change necessary, if May can’t deliver) or duck out in a huff with no deal (likewise).

Wounded pride may overtake cold reason. Almost any further miscalculation on either side could push UKGov over the edge, in more ways than one.

For those who are still not paying attention yet, or still think that Brexshit will be a jolly wheeze, a traipse along the yellow brick road to sunny uplands, effing wake up!

There is no good Brexit. Period.

Dr Jim

Hey Murdo explain the Laffer curve to us
then I’ll explain another curve to you and how the Internet works both ways

Dr Jim

I see on twitter some English tourists turned up in Dublin shouting abuse and throwing a pigeons head at some Irish people calling them scroungers

There’s yer colonialism as per usual butting into other country’s business

Thing is though they took the dead pigeons head of of their pocket, what kind of people carry a pigeons head in their pocket

Try that in George Square ye’d get handed yer own head back

K1

Aye Robert, what’s really ‘shocking’ is the utter naiveté that May is capable of if as everyone surmises she was genuinely shocked and surprised, I mean one could at least ‘imagine’ different scenarios from the ‘others’ perspective? And given she is the PM surrounded by hunners of haunners, and not one of them…could see the utter futility of ‘Chequers’ fudge?

That’s what’s really gobsmacking imv. These are supposed to be ‘adults’…but ah suppose ‘adults’ and Tories could be viewed as mutually exclusive terms. Beggars belief all of this nonsense on such life changing circumstances for the entire UK.

I just want us out of this catastrophe, I mean the SNP have done a whole lotta mitigation…but this is off the charts…what’s coming down the line, especially if off the cliff happens…there is no mitigating against that prospect for Scotland.

Ah actually cried with anger on the morning of the EU result, it was clear as day then as it is now that this was disastrous for everyone but those bastards who gain everything from this while the rest of the population will suffer under Tory rule for at least the next 10 to 15 years…it just doesn’t bear thinking about…and yet we must think about it, we must fight it with everything we have.

We must gain our independence, it is the only way, now, to avoid Scotland being economically devastated.

Dr Jim

News in this evening

There’s been a meeting and the rumour is a snap GE so the Tories can rid themselves of the DUP and try once again to keep Mrs May in power while the polls are showing Corbyn can’t win
The one drawback for the Tories is sub sample polls show the SNP would bounce back to 51 seats that’s why Corbyn is sooking in with Scotland with his fake offer of mibbees we’ll ALLOW you a vote on Independence

Robert J. Sutherland

Dr Jim @ 03:13,

Aye, the SNP is Corby’s insurance policy in case he’s ahead after a UKGE but needs support that the ever-ready FibDems can’t provide.

But suppose he has to claim on the policy? If he graciously =ahem= grants us our rightful IR2, and the result is a win for indy – plausible – he loses his support as all the Scottish MPs head back home.

You could call it cutting-off the branch on which he sits. (Unless he’s a considerably bigger chancer than Cameron.)

So we might expect lots of warm words and earnest promises of wonders to come, but a badly-conflicted Labour will surely lead the SNP down the garden path, just like it did back in 1978-79.

(Unless NorthBritLab slump again so badly in the election that Corby finally decides to give them up as a lost cause, I suppose, and rolls his own Engexit.)

yesindyref2

@K1 / @Macart
Despite us saying such as the Tories are a complete mess, incomptetent, totally lacking statesmanship and not having a clue, I’m not sure I really believed it. Always the possibility that it was one of Baldrick’s cunning plans, and it’d all work out. Then that stupid interview, you wonder for a few seconds if even that can fit the plan, the EU-27 allowing it, just a few words and shakes of the head, let her have a bit of dignity, save face, then slap some palm as though it’d never happened.

Then you wake up and it wasn’t a dream.

yesindyref2

@Hamish100
I wouldn’t know I guess, I don’t listen to it (is it a radio show?).

He must have changed for the worse. Sad.

Liz g

Dr Jim @ 3.13
Where are you getting this from…. Meg Merrilees @ 12.03 said the same thing?
……………………….
Robert J Sutherland @ 4.05
I think the proposal to Scotland will be… the most immediate problem is Brexit, we ALL need to get Labour in charge to fix it first.
We need Labour MPs from Scotland to get the Tories out….. and then you can have your Indy ref, Labour won’t stand in the way…
They are probably planning to go for the younger vote and will try to O germ’ay Corbin them!!!
Same shit different day

Liz g

Sorry if I’ve missed it on here but I’m just reading that Derek Bateman has been ill??
And that his partner has donated an organ to him..
If true…
My best wishes to him for a speedy recovery and a very well done to his partner…
( read it on Scot go,s Pop)

Gizunder

Politicians change their minds about things. This is not a failing.

Rev. Stuart Campbell

“Politicians change their minds about things. This is not a failing.”

LOLZ.

sassenach

Oh dear, I see it’s been a ‘fud’ night and the usual bunch feeding it/he/she.

Will we never learn? “Scroll on by”.

Robert Louis

Sassenach at 747am,

Aye, all the usual folk merrily feeding the tolls.

Meanwhile, an interesting wee story in The National

link to thenational.scot

Remember to buy your Sunday National today – let’s support a sunday newspaper which supports us. If your local shop doesn’t sell it, take ALL your business to a retailer where they do stock it.

Nana

Links

link to news.gov.scot

link to thoughtcontrolscotland.com

A reminder- Scotland’s contributions have not been published since 1920/21. No wonder Eh?
link to twitter.com

link to autonomyscotland.org

Nana

Crashing out of EU may hasten breakup of UK, ministers warn
link to archive.is

link to zelo-street.blogspot.com

link to thecanary.co

link to welfareweekly.com

Nana

link to skwawkbox.org

So far there have been 280 submissions to the UN human rights commission ahead of visit to the UK November 5-16
link to ohchr.org
link to politico.eu

England region
link to voxpoliticalonline.com

link to rt.com

Nana

link to chrisgreybrexitblog.blogspot.com

link to politico.eu

Brexit: bartering in a souk
link to eureferendum.com

Senior staffers in the city tell me the mood in the financial district is that they have lost all faith in Theresa May, that no-deal would be a total disaster and they are desperately searching for a “party of business” because “the Tories are just not it”.
link to twitter.com

Nana

link to thenational.scot

Fantastic initiative by the @ScotParl (though worth a wee look through the comments to read some of the extraordinary, incomprehensible, rage bilingualism provokes amongst a tiny minority of Scottish monoglots.) #Gaidhlig
link to twitter.com

link to voxpoliticalonline.com

Comcast triumphs in auction for Sky with £29.7bn bid

Some info about them here
link to forward.com

Nana

link to skwawkbox.org

So far there have been 280 submissions to the UN human rights commission ahead of visit to the UK November 5-16
link to ohchr.org

link to rt.com

link to politico.eu

Robert Peffers

@HYUFD says: 22 September, 2018 at 11:58 pm@

” … Dr Jim Wales voted 52.5% Leave in the EU referendum, it was not just England of the UK Home Nations that voted Leave”</i?

Why Oh! Why? Do you persist in posting this pish here, HYUFD?

It only serves to expose you and the British/English Nationalists to the people of Scotland as the totally ignorant numpties that you are. Everything you post shows your ignorance, or more likely senseless, thoughtless and totally wrong, and illegal, Britnat attitudes to both the EU and what is legally a united KINGDOM, which for some strange reason, actually is called, “The United KINGDOM of Great Britain & Northern Ireland”.

It is not called, “Britain”, It is Not called, “The United COUNTRY of Britain”. Got it yet, HYUFD?

The United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland is so called because that is what it is, “A UNITED KINGDOM”, and it came into existence on 1 May 1707 when ONLY TWO formerly equally sovereign independent KINGDOMS signed a legally binding, and still extant, Treaty of Union.

Now I know it is hard for the hard of thinking Britnat brain to be able to understand what all those English words mean but you and your British/English Nationalist friends really do need to attempt to understand the English language that you don’t speak, read or write like the rest of the people of Britain and the World.

So I’ll explain it again so you really have no excuse to continue with your pig headed, (Oops! No connotations of certain English Public Schools dubious porcine practices intended), pig ignorance.

The United Kingdom is legally a two partner union of kingdoms. It is a monarchy and not a democracy. The Monarch of each of the two respective kingdoms has a different legal standing in each respective kingdom of the union.

In the three country Kingdom of England the monarch of the three country Kingdom of England is a legally Sovereign monarch but in the Kingdom of Scotland the Monarch is Queen of Scots and is not legally sovereign.

So here’s the lies you are attempting to convince yourself are truths. – ” … Wales voted 52.5% Leave in the EU referendum, it was not just England of the UK Home Nations that voted Leave”

The truth being there are only two Kingdoms in the United Kingdom and Wales, Northern Ireland and England are all parts of the one Kingdom – the fact that these are also, “Home Nations”, is totally irrelevant. In the context of, “The United Kingdom”, the component parts are kingdoms and there are only two of them.

It legally doesn’t matter in Pimlico is indeed part of Burgundy and Pimlico voted to remain for in the context of the United Kingdom the component parts are two Kingdoms and both Wales and England are parts of the same kingdom of England.

So there you go, HYUFD, “a’body is oot o step but oor Britnats”. (Though I expect that last wee quote flies right over your wee pointy English/British Nationalist head like everything else.

To Britnats/English Nationalists the whole World is out of Step with them but they, (the Whole World), don’t count because, as every English Nationalist knows, they are all Johnny Foreigners anyway and if you shout it loud enough and often enough they will just have to accept that England, and there’ll always be an England, are always right.

Or as we say in Scotland –

Aye!
Richt!

Nana

On the Full Scottish this week, Carol McNamara is joined by guests Sandra White, MSP for Glasgow Kelvin and by Ellen Hofer from EU Citizens for an independent Scotland.
link to broadcastingscotland.scot

link to politico.eu

BREAKING: Bosses at UK’s NCA ordered most senior money laundering investigator in the country NOT to investigate $30m of Russian money laundering in UK banks from Magnitsky case. This reeks of a full scale cover-up
link to twitter.com

manandboy

Since the art of storytelling is experiencing something of a revival under Theresa May, here’s a short story that could become popular – in places like India, but also elsewhere around the Commonwealth and even beyond.

Like a really poor third-world country after a really bad hurricane, sorting out the mess after Brexit eventually hits, is probably going to take a long time, during which an awful lot of people are going to suffer badly, many of them children.

Due to crippling debt, the government at Westminster will be unable to offer much by way of meaningful assistance, and will be reduced instead to broadcasting empty platitudes and messages of sympathy, but of the type that can only be delivered by rich people, to the poor, whom they couldn’t care less about. Nothing new there then.

Then, both Brexiteers and Remainers will discover the hard way, that Brexit doesn’t mean Brexit after all, but rather powerless impoverishment, as England and Wales begin their very own version of the Great Depression of the 1930’s in the US.

Many will apply, in desperation, to emigrate to the newly independent and flourishing Scotland, but will, of necessity, due to National Security, be unable to gain entry, although they will get a coffee in Gretna Green. Others will seek respite by fleeing to Europe, but will find immigration a problem there too, due to widespread antipathy and even hostility toward the impoverished but still arrogant refugees from England.

Life as we have observed it in class-ridden Colonial England, is about to change as English superiority undergoes a much overdue realignment through extended national humiliation.

But frankly, as Donald Tusk would say, they’ve had it coming for a long time – centuries in fact. Worldwide, I suspect, many who have been trodden on by Britain’s colonial boot, will enjoy the spectacle, until, after a while, they lose interest and switch off.

All things must come to an end, so they say, but at this time, the demise of the English, now that was a surprise.

Insomnia – there’s a lot of it about these days. I blame it on social media and afternoon naps.

auld highlander

Dr Jim at 3.13

Plotting for a snap November election.

link to uk.reuters.com

Essexexile

Too true….although political opposition can take many forms in the gnarly world of UK politics.
It’s quite likely we’ll soon have a GE in which vast swathes of remain support side with the previously untouchable Corbyn as he’s promising another vote on Brexit.
Would SNP support then get behind the Tories in an effort to keep Corbyn out, protect Brexit and strengthen the case for iref2!?
Just when you thought things couldn’t get any stranger!!

Collie

You do get the feeling that Scotland is reaching that “wait a minute” moment.

America, India, Canada, Australia all must have reached their own “wait a minute” moment. And then it clicked with them..

They suddenly realised that they could stand on their own two feet and one by one told England that it would no longer be sending all their hard earned money to London.

And as I said, Scotland is reaching that moment and will vote to tell England thanks but no thanks.

Robert Peffers

@HYUFD says: 23 September, 2018 at 12:04 am:

” … Dave McEwan Hill RoI has a higher average gdp per capita than the UK as a whole but spends less as a percentage of gdp, the Irish state pension is slightly less than 30% of the average salary compared to slightly more than 30% of the average salary in the UK.”

More pointless idiocy, HYUFD. Why do you persist with your meaningless claptrap.

NI. Wales and England are all component parts of the Kingdom of England and The Kingdom of England is one of the only two Kingdoms that comprise, “The United Kingdom”.

It doesn’t matter a damn what internal differences there are within the three country component parts of the Kingdom of England are in the context of, “The United Kingdom”.

In which context there are only two kingdoms in the United Kingdom and it matters not how many countries are parts of the Kingdom of England they all remain as parts only of the Kingdom of England.

There are only two kingdom partners in the United Kingdom and no amount of Little Englander loud shouting at Johnny Foreigner, (including shouting at Scots and EU member states), is going to change that salient fact.

You can shout it loudly till you are blue Red in the face but no matter how loud or how often you shout it there will be no change in the salient fact that the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland only has two Kingdoms as signatories on the Treaty of Union.

So, when the Kingdom of Scotland decides the Union is over the legal Status Quo Ante will always be the same – Scotland, (the Kingdom), will legally end the United Kingdom and what remains will not be a still extant rUnited Kingdom and an independent Kingdom of Scotland. It will be the Status Quo Ante of a return to being the two independent kingdoms as on 30 April 1707. – of course the Republic of Ireland will then presumably request a return of Northern Ireland as per the status Quo Ante before the partition of Ireland by the UK creation of the Irish Free State, which in fact was never a free state but officially a United Kingdom Dominion.

You really must brush up upon the real history of the United Kingdom, HYUFD. Bear in mind that Westminster did not contest the recent Scottish claim of right in the Westminster Supreme Court. That failure to contest means that Westminster agrees that the People of Scotland are indeed legally sovereign and, when we choose to exercise our legal sovereignty the Treaty of Union is ended and the United Kingdom will thus only remain the Monarch’s personal Union of the Crowns as of 1603.

Dave McEwan Hill

jfngw at 1.15pm

Good stuff. But that’s the second rework of that little song. It started off as “The hat my father wore” and was written by an Irish American entertainer for the the St Patrick’s Day parade in new York.
“It was green and it was beautiful”

The OO came along in 1907 and stole it.

Proud Cybernat

It seems pretty certain now that if May can’t get agreement with the EU in October (unlikely in the extreme) then she will have to change her offer in order to avoid a cliff-edge Brexit. And in order to change her offer she will need to accept the backstop which means an Irish sea border (despite all her protestations of not wanting her country split – she couldn’t give a flying fig about NI). And to agree to that she needs to get rid of the DUP and have her own majority. Which means another snap GE very soon (November being tipped & she’s been putting the pieces in place for a while for that scenario, hedging her bets). It’s really become her only way out of the DUP stranglehold over her.

But odds are that she’ll lose a good few (if not ALL) of the Scots Tories in another snap GE making her position potentially worse. She will go to the people that make up the UK of GB and NI that only a vote for the Tories can avoid a disastrous, cliff-edge Brexit. Labour will go to the people with “Em, uhm, Customs Union, Single Market, em, mibbees….”

The worst Tory Gov in living memory and the worst PM ever may even cling on. But even if she doesn’t, I think Treeza-doll will be mightily glad that she has passed on the poisoned chalice.

And the Tories, of course, in ensuring that NI can remain in the SM+CU, they will, at the same time, point blank refuse Scotland’s demands for the same. And among all that confusion and uncertainty and Tory dismissal of Scotland’s demands, THAT is the moment for the SNP to strike, to call IndyRef2 for Thursday 27 March, 2019 – 2 days before the UK jumps into a dark, dark tunnel:

comment image

frogesque

Brexit related? Mebees aye, mebees naw.

Two relatives both in Surrey received redundancy notices on Friday, one in 20s with no commitments and will be ok. Other 54, mortgage, messy divorce in the offing and totally bricking it.

Not going to give more details but both in civil engineering.

And so it begins, or not.

Cuilean

Brilliant

Nana

link to thoughtcontrolscotland.com

I remember posting this in 2014, worth sharing again
Scottish independence: read about the McCrone Report

link to youtube.com

A couple more for any new readers

TRUTH LIES OIL AND SCOTLAND

link to youtube.com

The Stolen Seas

link to youtube.com

galamcennalath

The detail in language often gives away the propaganda nature of stories.

One of @Nana’s linked pointed out that Chequers is a proposal, not a deal. To be a deal the other side needs to accept it. ‘Plan’ would be another appropriate description.

Since reading that I keep seeing references to ‘Chequers deal’ in the media. Sometimes ‘plan’ and rarely ‘proposal’, but often ‘deal’. What is that all about? Such a significant and widespread mistake can’t be coincidence.

The only conclusion is there is a coordinated attempt to bolster the credibility of May and her plan. Presumably, that is in the face of another faction which actually wants ‘no deal’.

There has never been ‘government’ like this current shower.

Still, it should all be a gift to the cause of Scottish self determination.

ronnie anderson

link to youtube.com

To Tereza with lots of love from us Independenista Scots ( nae kisses )

Boudicca

On radio Scotland this morning just after 8.00 the journalist talking about Labour members wanting a People’s Vote, threw in that Jeremy Corbyn said that if elected he would not allow a second indyref. So at least we know where we stand there.

Collie

Richard Leonard (Englishman) tells Scots, “You will not have a second Independence Referendum”.

Best of luck with that one Dick.

Undeadshuan

Car crash interview by richard leonard on bbc politics scotland.

cearc

The current NL state pension for a single person is 1,181.36 eu/mth
plus holiday money of 70.40/mth paid annually in May.

A tad more than UK?

HandandShrimp

Labour slamming the door in the face of all their voters who left to vote for independence? Fair enough .. not sure it is the sort of home most of us would want to re-occupy anyway. Divisive, racist and leaderless on the key issues of the day.

HandandShrimp

I see that Katie Hopkins is about to share a stage with racists, islamaphobes and holocaust deniers in something called For Britain.

Surprised they would risk their credibility really /\(Oo)/\

ScottishPsyche

Richard Leonard there saying he will push for a veto on a 2nd IndyRef in the UK Labour manifesto.

If Labour forms a UK government and Scotland continues to vote for a majority SNP representation who advocate a 2nd Indyref, then voters in England are subverting the will of Scotland? Wow! Good Luck with that, ‘Dick’.

Les Wilson

Thinking about social media and how all the groups use them for keeping in touch with members of groups, yet we know everything that is said is monitored.

I came across these social media alternatives. I found it interesting, see if anyone else can see a use that would benefit our movement in some way.

link to windowsreport.com

HYUFD

Chick McGregor Barclays did not take UK government funding, even if it shored up its funds from elsewhere

HYUFD

Dr Jim Not quite true.

Latest UK General election average poll prediction gives Tories 290 Labour 278 SNP 44 LD 16 PC 3 Green 1 NI 18

link to electoralcalculus.co.uk

So likely Tories largest party and with a majority in England but Corbyn becomes PM reliant on SNP, PC and LD votes

Hamish100

Leonard and Corbyn two Englishmen decide the fate of Scotland (So they think). May and Rabb decide the fate of Ireland (So they think).

What is it with the English Establishment who also believe in English votes for English laws?

HYUFD

RobertPeffers Being a British Nationalist and an English Nationalist is logically impossible, you cannot want England to stay in the UK and be an English Nationalist.

The Queen is Queen of both England and Scotland, the Act of Union simply confirmed the highest Parliament for both nations was Westminster. That remains the case even if Scotland now has its own Parliament at Holyrood too for much of its domestic policy

Dr Jim

@Liz

I scour the information highway you’ll see a link kindly put up by @ Auld Highlander 9.17 am

Although I saw this plan on the telly at about 2am in the morning, I think it was Sky

Macart

Just got in to this so am I reading this right?

Leonard is proposing that UK Labour would stand against the population of a nation partner having the right of self determination?

Or to put it another way. He reckons UK Labour should have a veto on a population’s voting rights? Really?

He might want to rethink that.

HYUFD

RobertPeffers Scotland of course voted to stay in the UK in 2014, in reality a Claim of Right or no Claim of Right Westminster is unlikely to send troops up to Scotland and arrest Sturgeon and abolish Holyrood if she held an indyref Westminster opposed as the previous Spanish government did in Catalonia when it arrested the Catalan nationalist leader and abolished the Catalan Parliament, though of course if it did it would be a matter of a clash of will and force. In reality Westminster would also have to recognise such a vote as would the international community for it to have any force

HYUFD

Collie Australia, Canada, New Zealand, India, the USA, were all colonised by the BRITISH Empire (ie in which Scotland troops, merchants, administrators etc played a key part in the colonising) NOT the ENGLISH Empire.

Plus of course Australia, Canada, New Zealand etc all still share the same monarch as the USA

HYUFD

Manandboy Yet again, Wales voted Leave too, it was not just England. Norway, Iceland, Switzerland are all prosperous outside the EU. There is no majority even in England for No Deal, all the polling is clear if No Deal was in prospect there would be a second referendum and Remain would win it. If you really want rightwing populism see the likes of Italy where the anti immigration Lega Nord leads the polls or Poland where Law and Justice is in charge or indeed the US with President Trump

So your anti English hysteria has little basis in fact

HandandShrimp

Looks like the Dick and Ruth show are going to run out the same gags as the last election and make it a face off as to which of the Unionist Parties gets to march sashes and all with the DUP.

It also indicates that they both think there may be yet another imminent election which will determine nothing because on current showing Corbyn will not get the keys to No 1 outright and with a no independence for Scotland clause in their manifesto he is very unlikely to get SNP/PC backing either. A serious problem if those two parties do have 45 to 50 seats.

If there is one thing that is certain Labour seem to have a triangulation device that only works in ever decreasing circles.

ScottieDog

@HYUFD
“ScottieDog I agree Irish GDP per capita is inflated by Apple, Amazon, Facebook etc basing themselves there due to very low corporation tax for instance in the Republic of Ireland.

Iceland introduced more austerity than the UK, Spain or Portugal or Ireland did, Iceland is also outside the EU and is still prosperous now”

No it didn’t, you’re talking rubbish.
Also Iceland is in EFTA..

link to bilbo.economicoutlook.net

“While the Icelandic government certainly didn’t go on a fiscal spree and allowed net exports to reap the advantages of the massive depreciation, the government also didn’t scorch the economy with austerity. They have allowed growth to build its tax revenue rather than exacting harsh tolls on its citizens.”

The U.K. is still imposing austerity which is why there is little growth. Where have you been?

Yes also say some banks haven’t benefited from bailouts. Have you heard of QE? The U.K. government asset purchase facility? Of course they have.

Cubby

Hey You FUing Diddy

You spout the biggest load of crap ever seen on Wings.

Petra

Oh well more of the same from the BBC today.

Sunday Politics with Gordon Brewer and not one SNP politician in sight other than a short clip of Angus Robertson (who was looking great).

Dickie Leonard spouting the same old, “We’ll say no to Indyref2. The Scots had their say in 2014.” Severin Carrel (Guardian) and Anne McGuire (ex-Labour politician) up next followed by two young Labour activists (or whatever).

P1 tests covered, Corbyn saying he might consider Indyref2 with Leonard basically saying he’ll not and the Humza Yousef / Demster racist case (delay).

Not one mention of the A50 Court ruling, no one from the SNP on to counter the P1 “tests” guff, no one asked how Corbyn could form a Government with Labour politicians alone, no mention of the impact of Brexit on Scotland…. and so it went on. BBC bias at its best. Doing its utmost to keep the Scots in the dark as usual.

………………

Thanks for the links Nana, especially some of the “oldies” that some of the “newbies” on here may not have seen previously.

And what a list, eh? What an absolutely damning catalogue of evidence of the misery that’s being inflicted on millions across this country by the Tories. I wonder how many of the Tory victims are drinking too much (if they can get their hands on money to buy alcohol), self-harming, punching walls and are on anti-depressants? That’s the people of course who haven’t committed suicide already or died of cold and hunger due to Tory policies. No mention of this (or any of the other issues you’ve covered today) on the BBC. No sign of Dark money Ruth being questioned by the BBC about anything at this critical juncture in our history, hence the focus on SLab now, other than her pregnancy, book or sponge puddings.

link to ohchr.org

dakk

Barclays is still under police investigation for the illicit dark Qatari money bail out it solicited with the blessing of the sneaky English government.

HSBC too caught money laundering for Mexican drug cartels.

But they are good English banks because they’re English is the britnat narrative.

One of the worst state pensions in Europe, and food banks in britin are also to be normalised defended by Britnats.

We have heard all the well honed contortions of britnat propaganda by disingenuous state funded parasites like hyfud many times before.

Anyone who still believes in and supports the british/UK state has no moral compass.Fact.

Contrary

O/T but inspired by wings Twitter feed on the subject of the defamation case against Kezia being reported in the papers and her tragic loss of Labour funding. Labour appear to be taking sides on something that wouldn’t have needed funding if she’d just written an apology – but I guess ‘principles’ abound.

The strange thing is, they are reporting that only Wings followers – the extremist elements (yeah yeah) – funded Rev Stu – well, I put in my tuppence worth on principle – on the principle that politicians appear to think they can get away with telling unrelenting lies (believing the rules of parliaments where you can’t use the word ‘lie’ apply in the real world?) with no come-back, and that applying the same rules that seem to be acceptable – even required – in the political word (slagging off your opponents) are acceptable in the real world to be used against private citizens. Well, no, you cannot just say anything you want publicly against private citizens, and certainly not something that causes harm and is only an opinion (not real). They are in an alternate universe bubble, and they need to get real. I’m hoping that Rev Stu ‘s bravery on taking on this case will help them along that path.

I am, of course, an extremist fan of John (prof, leading academic). And he, bizarrely, has been saying nice things about Wings and its author. This: “outspoken, spirited, lively and sweet-toothed, pro-independence blogger, the Reverend Stuart Campbell ” sent me into shock, how often do you hear pleasantries (can’t remember which article this was in, it was recent, you’ll have to search to find it) said about Rev Stu? Refreshing, and uplifting to hear, and no ‘but’ at the end of it.

Then John has just awarded wings a professorship:
“Wings has actually researched the story properly. I award him a full-visiting-honorary professorship in ‘21st Century Investigative Journalism’ at the Chomsky University of Propaganda Studies in Ayr.”
link to thoughtcontrolscotland.com

Anyway, got me thinking; the negative spin from unionists decrying this site and Rev Stu himself as some kind of objectionable extremist trough, does need to be countered – This blog is an extremely useful resource, well written, and articles well researched (mostly 😉 ) – no one is going to agree with every single opinion of another person so that is irrelevant – and no one should be concerned about accessing it. I believed the Nomedia (see John’s blog) hype re this blog before 2014, and I’m sure others still do. The perpetuating myth that somehow Rev Stu is brainwashing thousands might put people off reading this blog, and then allowing their brain to start functioning again.

So words we use do matter, and ‘spirited’ and ‘outspoken’ are good words. I’m not really aiming this at the commenters here, but maybe more to SNP politicians and other independence supporting institutions – I have been gratified to see some articles here by SNP (members) and Alex Salmond support for the YouTube incident – but we, all of us, need to stop buying into the Nomedia brainwash-idea that this blog and its author are somehow ‘controversial’ – it isn’t true (unless you subscribe to the opinion that Scottish independence is a controversial idea,,, hmm). It is a platform, and one that could be used to benefit the SNP, they should use it instead of believing they’ll get a break from any of the mainstream ones one day. Why should the Herald (for example) be any less controversial – just because they have been spewing out the same opinion for more years? Just because,,,? Is it okay to twist a story and lie about it, to miss context, just to fit in with your own opinion, affecting millions of lives (‘controversial P1 assessments’ – when did that become controversial? When the BBC told us it was?) – that is what should be controversial. All authors should be declaring which stance they are writing from. Why are there not more quotes from this blog on the BBC? What makes a labour politician’s tweet of more value? Etc. If the BBC version of balance was applied (‘here are two extremist views’) surely we should be hearing about wings all the time?

So if you are ever describing this blog, or Rev Stu, and find yourself needing to use the word ‘but’, try again. There are no buts. Re-word it. Positively. The message can be the same, just framed differently. In this way it is this blog (and others that are doing proper investigative journalism) that becomes mainstream. Small steps.

(Yeah yeah I should have stopped seven paragraphs back)

ronnie anderson

link to crowdfunder.co.uk

The Big Push, a Publishing Crowdfunding Project in …
We need your support to be able to create and broadcast a series of 20 second iScot videos over October November and December – Crowdfunder.co.uk
http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk

Please Share Widely ..

HYUFD

ScottieDog Even that article says Iceland has made fiscal cutbacks but of course in 2008 as it also says it rejected EU imposed bailout terms which only reinforces the argument against EU diktat as Iceland is in EFTA but NOT in the EU

HYUFD

Dakk Unemployment UK 4%, EU average unemployment 7%, French unemployment 9%, Italian unemployment 11%, Spanish unemployment 15%, Greek unemployment 20%

link to statista.com

schrodingers cat

the banks were bailed out by the country where their debts were, eg the us bailed out barckleys banks debts in the us

he Federal Reserve has released details of more than 21,000 transactions after being forced by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act to disclose which institutions it had bailed out in the financial turmoil since December 2007.

The data reveals that British-based banks accounted for $1 trillion (£640bn) of the money the Fed issued to prop up the financial sector.

Barclays took the biggest chunk of bailout money, borrowing $863bn from the Fed. Almost half of the money came in overnight loans thought the Primary Dealer Credit Facility, a programme intended to help banks dealing in US Treasuries.

Barclays has since paid all of its loans, which came about because of Barclay’s $1.75 purchase of Lehman Brothers.

Royal Bank of Scotland borrowed $446bn, Bank of Scotland $181bn, Abbey National $19bn and HSBC less than $10bn. The figures show each institution’s total borrowing, not the amount they had outstanding at any one point.

link to newstatesman.com

Cubby