Wings Over Scotland

I would also urge everyone to obtain and keep Ivan McKee’s article in todays Herald (page 24).
Ivan takes the political NO campaigns fiscal arguments (scaremongering) apart as well as promoting Scotlands strengths in an accurate and thoughtful manner.  He doesn’t miss Darling.
Agree with your comments regarding John Swinney. When he’s debating  in his comfort zone he’s superb and entirely genuine. That honesty comes through to the public. 

Just a couple of minutes in…….
but for some reason I really really want to know more about the Cupar Business Network……
 
Is there a blazer badge & tie combo available at these excellent networking opportunities ?

I would much prefer to have John Swinney handle an independent Scotlands affairs than a failed journalist handling the UK’s!

@ronald alexander mcdonald
 
Got an Archive link?

John Swinney is indeed seen at his best when responding to an audience in a setting like this: it’s something we need to see more of. As for Murdo Fraser, I actually quite like him and look forward to his playing a key role in (possibly even leading) a new, fit-for-purpose centre-right party in an independent Scotland. Still won’t vote for him, mind you!
 

@ Breastplate
 
You mean like this?  link to archive.is
 
🙂

I watched the whole thing through. 
A very good debate,  without all the shouty nonsense.   We need more like this out there.
There were lots of points John did not pick up on that he could have.  Part of his skill was to focus in on his key points and tell his own story, not jumping about rebutting every single item.  
There were some open shots at goal not taken in this debate.  Plenty time though.

That woman who “works in tourism” was amazing. It sounds like a BritNat had specifically tailor made a worst possible scenario for her. Of course we’ll never know because she didn’t read it and deleted it. Perhaps it never really happened and either she made it up or she dreampt it.

Good video though, I likes the one about England not wanting to buy its energy in. What they need to realise is that England currently takes energy from Wales and Scotland and buys from France. You don’t do that if you can generate your own. It also is looking to import energy from Irish wind farms because it has signed up for green targets but has neither the want nor the tolerance amongst its people to make that happen.

I am with Buckie Brays. the Murdo Fraser was better than his brief allowed him to be.
 
Just imagine what he and some Lab (certain tossers removed,  and all the f’n LibDums (cannot think of any of them worthy) could contribute in the chamber in anew balanced Scotland. Sad that Aunty took the Ermine so, for my money she is now beyond the pale.
 
Looking good, with JS doing very weel.
 
I can but imagine what JS and NS could do in a progressive round table negotiation for the benefit of all?
 
What I would want, post Indie.

Glad you found that, Stu.  It’s what the debate should be like…Whnce came all the fear and loathing?

Thank you Major, you show-off. 🙂

I see the latest ICM poll for the Guardian reports 5% for the SNP. Presumably a small sample size but that must have Scottish Skier in calculator overdrive. That is a ridiculously high figure.

If only the rest of the debate could be like this we might be in the position of the Scottish people making an informed decision. Both men appeared to respect each other and that is what will be needed in the months and years ahead. I am afraid that the tactics of Better together will create a split in the country that will take a long time to heal no matter the result of the referendum.

@Jingly Jangly
 
Use a new private window gives unlimited access.
 
 

About 10 or 11 years ago I had invited Jack McConnell to talk at our annual conference. We had been invited by one of McConnell’s aides to ask him to speak. Anyway many emails and phone calls later no response from McConnell or his team (who had asked us to invite him in the first place). 
 
I then contacted Mr Swinney and he replied straight away; turned up on his own at the conference venue in St Andrews, wrote his own speech and didn’t alert the media. He was a perfect gentleman and spoke well and intelligently on a subject I am sure he had limited knowledge on. 
 

I do think Murdo really struggled here to answer questions coherently. I particularly thought his, ‘we don’t know’ stance was an excuse and not only that, the better together lot are consistently telling us how horrendous it will definitely be if we vote for Independence, not quite the unknown scenario, it seems. J Swinney did miss some points, and focused on the oil, which so many even in Scotland are sceptical about, but he couldn’t cover everything like the issue of massive revenues going to Westminster from production and spending here in Scotland. That alone, as far as I have read from the knowledgable folk here, is much more than the pocket money we are handed, which at the moment is being managed very well by the Scottish government,  against the odds. Be interesting to see what is reported of the white paper in the msm.

Here’s the archive link to Ivan McKee’s article in to-day’s Herald:
The numbers do not add up for Darling and No campaign

There was two things that struck me about this debate;

1)js actually answered the questions put forward where as Murdo just said “we don’t know, can they guarantee (which I note got a derisory laugh from the audience)

2) Murdo is ok with foreigners. As long as they aren’t his friend or in his family. Wonder if that word “foreigner” was to be replaced with another one…or am I stepping over a line there?

Murdo still basically peddled the same fear uncertainty and doubt mantra, and on many subjects that he knew fine well already to be disproven. That is lying.
 
I also thought the sneaky RBS and HBOS dog whistle during his summing up was intentional and cheap, as he knew full well mentioning it in open debate would have seen the argument demolished (again). By waiting until his summing up, the proposition that the ‘UK treasury bailed out our biggest companies, something that may not have happened in an Independent Scotland’ was simply allowed to hang there in the air, having succeeded in repeating it one more time.
 
All in all I have to disagree with what seems to be the positive vibe being expressed about Murdo Fraser’s performance and integrity so far on this thread. The fact that he can happily speak weasel words while appearing personable, simply makes him a more dangerous politician, not a better one.

I see the latest ICM poll for the Guardian reports 5% for the SNP.
 
Again?
 
Yes, 60%, but on average they have 4% which is 48% in Scotland. Even yougov which gives the lowest SNP share is consistent on 3% (36%).
 
I have the SNP on at least 44% for UKGE VI.

One and half hours well spent. Aided and abetted to be fair by Murdo Fraser, made a pleasant change from the tactics of Labour at these events. This sort of debate with questions needs wider exposure, not sure how you achieve that.

That was a very good debate.John Swinney is the right man in the right job.And Murdo?He conducted himself very well.A stark contrast to anything the Labour party have to offer.As to Murdos future in an independent Scotland,wouldnt he be forever taunted with the accusation of……”well,you didn’t believe in Scotland,why should anyone believe in you”.

A good, courteous debate.
 
It is though sad to see the fear in some of the questions put by the audience. The old guy who asked the energy questions. I mean for goodness sake, and I don’t mean to be rude, but how many years have you left? Do you not want something better for your fellow Scots?
 
As the other guy put it, things may fall back initially, though I doubt that, but we’ll build more and stronger replacements.
 
Have some bloody belief in our abilities!

We do have to nail the “Scottish banks” myth and it’s fairly easy to do in very simple language
The conversation starts with the comment “The last time I looked Halifax was in Yorkshire” and Halifax basically tookover BOS and then proceeds with the information that much of RBS was actually Natwest and that it was the London behaviour of speculators in two banks with about 5% of their activity in Scotland and about 5% of their ownwership Scottish. That they were actually large multi national banks which had retained a Scottish name (like Scottish Widows for instance) is explained. And then the protocol of how banking failure is paid for where the banks operate is flung in. All this can be put into simple words.
I’ve never met anybody yet who knows that NatWest and Ulster bank were RBS.

It was the UK regulatory authorities headed by Alistair Darling that had the powers to investigate the RBS / AMRO take over  but ignored fact that no  proper due diligence was done by RBS on a deal worth £49 billion before they gave its approval for world’s biggest bank take over  deal that brought about the collapse of the Royal Bank.
The UK  FSA did briefly consider a rethink, but chief executive Hector Sants and chairman Sir Callum McCarthy concluded that they did not have sufficient grounds to intervene. RBS was a big bank, and surely it knew what it was doing. Incredibly, Sants then overlooked the rules on capital. He allowed Goodwin and RBS to dip below 4%, below the minimum regulatory requirement on capital, to do the ABN Amro deal.   So much for relying on the UK regulatory body.
 
 
In a BBC Today Programme Lecture on 2nd May 2012, the Governor of the Bank of England, Sir Mervyn King criticised the lack of action by Alistair Darling and the last Labour government in the earliest days of the banking crisis when the first UK Bank, sorry English bank, Northern Rock, failed, which King said could have cost up to one million people their jobs.   Decisive action would have at least mitigated the problems encountered by other Banks including HBOS and RBS some 10 months later. 

@Ivan Mckee, just wanted to say how much I’ve appreciated your report and how your clear explanations helped me understand a little more about complex economics and quite how the Better Together campaign have managed to spin the arguement and the figures whenever the economy is mentioned.
 
Also thought you were excellent on AQ, I said this elsewhere on Wings, but just wanted to reiterate here
 
Thank you
 
 

One of the worst mistakes the Tories have ever made was in electing Ruth Davidson as their leader instead of Murdo Fraser.

And you must never interrupt your enemy when he is in the process of making a mistake.

Dave McEwan Hill says:
 

We do have to nail the “Scottish banks” myth and it’s fairly easy to do in very simple language
 
Dave,
I make it even simpler when I hear this line.
 
If Better Together and Alistair Darling applied the same logic to the UK then the whole UK would have been sunk if the USA hadn’t bailed out Barclays et al to the tune of £600 billion. They like to keep that one quiet.

Swinney is no orator but he has as they say “gravitas” and in a nutural unaffected way he communicates authority and common sense. He is a real treasure in a setting like that.
Superb performance, unruffled calm, clear and detailed. Fraser, give him his due, was civil and gave the usual Project Fear boilerplate without rancour or spite. He offered the Unionist view in a polite and detailed way which would have been impossible for a SLAB cretin like Sarwar, or Grey.
Both SLAB offerings are thick – I mean a Dentist and a Physics teacher. They would have tried to cover their lack of understanding of the detail through slogans, abuse, evasion and lies.

I’ll join in the chorus of approval for Murdo. I don’t agree with his arguments at all, but the fact is he treated John Swinney with respect, and vice versa.
 
Imagine the same debate taking place with Anas Sarwar. It would have been a rammy, with people in the crowd shouting, John having to try and be heard over Anas’ immature antics, and essentially all heat and no light.
 
I think there are two reasons for that. The first is the simple fact that Murdo (and this was true of Annabel in the Inverness debate that John Swinney referred to) has nothing to lose in terms of his career. Not only is independence not a direct threat to his current livelihood since he’s an MSP, but as a Scottish Tory, he’s already climbed the greasy pole as high as he can. Anas, on the other hand, has his job on the line here, and when it comes to the likes of Lamont or Baillie, although their immediate job may not be at risk, they’re seeing their chances of promotion – to the “proper” parliament – being wiped out.
 
The second reason is because people like Murdo feel completely confident with their position. When he speaks about the UK, you can see he completely believes in it, and when it comes to defending Westminster policies, he’s more than happy to do so. He’s also, I notice, completely comfortable with using the “I” word, rather than having to go on about “sepurashun”. But despite the digs we all give Labourites for being British Nationalists, I think a lot of them are uncomfortable with what they’re having to defend. Deep down, they realise they’re defending the indefensible, so there’s a battle going on in their heads as their brain struggles to come to terms with being asked to rationalise these conflicting ideologies. The result is anger; anger at being forced to face up to this hypocrisy. They’re angry that they’re effectively being given an ultimatum, being forced to decide who’s side they’re truly on, and more annoyingly still, to declare it.
 
Well, they could do us all a favour and just not take part. No one would care if Anas Sarwar, Magz Curran or Jim Murphy never took part in an independence debate ever again.

Thank you for publishing this.  Resisted the opportunity to watch the first 18 minutes – you’ve never lead us astray yet Rev. Stu…
I think that, when Alex Salmond retires from his position as First Minister of an Independent Scotland, it will be difficult for SNP members, and I’m one, to choose between Nicola Sturgeon and John Swinney.
My feeling at present is that John is the best person to keep our books balanced & Nicola is the natural replacement for Alex.  There are no other contenders on the horizon (at the moment)

@Tartanfever
“We’ll be supplying energy for Scotland, our 5.2m population, less than 10% of the UK population,”
 
But that’s where you’re wrong. It’s been made pretty clear that we all see Scotland as an energy EXPORTER and that’s to play a crucial role in Scotland’s economic future. You can’t think that we can just say we’ll meet our own needs and screw everyone else. 
 
John Swinney’s style is to be reasonable, collaborative, concensual and based on common-sense – he is arguing to maintain the current integrated grid, makes the point that we are already interconnecting with “foreign” countries, therefore continuing connections with an independent Scotland shouldn’t change much, or be anything out of the ordinary.
 
However, energy policy is at a delicate juncture at the moment – whether rUK goes full-scale nuclear or commits to renewables to the extent Scotland wants to – or a bit of both. Swinney realises that nuclear long-term is the costlier option for govt. (despite the strike price agreed recently for the new Hinckley plant, which is double the existing price). There’s a strong nuclear lobby down south, and there is more scepticism with renewables, and if the SG is seen too much to be dictating the terms to the rUK, they may react against it.
 
Most of the businessmen probably appreciate the costs of nuclear decommissioning and waste storage, so he didn’t have to labour the point. It would have been very helpful if proven tidal power generation  was up and running already, but we are where we are.
 
Swinney’s restrained style in a potentially divisive and currently controversial area where two divergent strategies are possible, is the right one for business audiences. If mass nuclear does happen down south, the tone will change.