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The Surge

Posted on October 06, 2023 by

Labour won far more handsomely in last night’s by-election than anyone – and we very strongly suspect that includes themselves – expected. If the swing of over 20% was to be repeated nationwide next year (which it won’t be, but we’ll get to that in a minute), the SNP would be reduced to six or seven seats, as Wings has predicted for a while.

From the abject pit of despair of 2015, when Labour lost 40 of its 41 MPs in Scotland, let’s look at how the party has powered back to recapture the hearts of voters.

Wait, what?

Because something very unusual happened last night. Out of the 14 candidates who ran in the by-election, only four represented parties who also stood last time round. Here’s how their votes went:

SNP: DOWN 65%
Labour: DOWN 4%
Tories: DOWN 85%
Lib Dems: DOWN 68%

But that’s just normal for a by-election, right? By-elections pretty much always get significantly lower turnouts than general elections, so it’s normal for everyone’s vote to go down, even the winner’s.

Except it isn’t.

Since the SNP’s 2015 tsunami, there have been 11 UK by-elections in which the seat changed hands. Last night was only the third in which the party that took the seat failed to increase its vote in absolute numbers as well as in share.

2015 Richmond Park: UP 9,121
2017 Copeland: DOWN 438
2019 Brecon & Radnorshire: UP 1,783
2021 Hartlepool: UP 3,660
2021 Chesham & Amersham: UP 6,890
2021 North Shropshire: UP 12,134
2022 Wakefield: DOWN 4,759
2022 Tiverton & Honiton: UP 13,730
2023 Selby & Ainsty: UP 2,598
2023 Somerton & Frome: UP 4,170
2023 Rutherglen & Hamilton West: DOWN 700

Last night was a hugely favourable contest for the challenger. It’s clear that voters of the other Unionist parties lent their votes to Labour in significant numbers in order to deliver a humiliating defeat to the SNP, judging by the spectacular decline in the Tory and Lib Dem votes.

(This is also a common feature in by-elections. In Somerton & Frome, for example, just down the road from Wings HQ, the Labour vote plunged from over 8,300 to just 1,009 in order to help the Lib Dems displace a Tory.)

But even that wasn’t enough to get Labour’s vote up. As with 2017, the party gained the seat not by generating a groundswell of public enthusiasm for itself, but simply by standing more or less still and watching the hapless SNP fall past it.

Even by by-election standards the 37% turnout in R&HW was abysmal. In the by-elections listed above turnouts were 53%, 51%, 60%, 43%, 52%, 46%, 39%, 52%, 45% and 44%. Voters weren’t excited at the prospect of electing Michael Shanks – a massively cynical and opportunist drone – but they hated him less than the others, in large part because his party hasn’t been in power at either Westminster or Holyrood for the last 13 years so it hasn’t recently done anything to annoy them very much.

Idiotically, SNP MP David Linden went on telly last night to blithely assert that the SNP would take the seat back next year because Scots didn’t want a UK government they didn’t vote for. But the way things are going, neither of those claims is going to be true in 2024, because it looks very much like a Labour UK government will also have won the election in Scotland.

In a general election Tory voters won’t tactically vote en masse to help elect a Labour government. But the SNP can take no comfort from that, because their own party is very unlikely to merely stand still over the next 12 months. In fact it’s fallen out of an aeroplane without a parachute and it’s not going to start going back up no matter how much it gets Kirsten Oswald to flap her arms.

The SNP recovered from 2017, but this isn’t 2017. A third of their vote stayed home that year because they’d voted Leave and didn’t want an SNP vote interpreted as one to fight Brexit, but Brexit is no longer a meaningful political issue. It’s done and dusted.

They came back because the UK elected a series of bumbling idiot Prime Ministers who Scots despised, and because Nicola Sturgeon kept promising them an indyref was just over the horizon if they gave her just one more mandate.

But just like The National, nobody’s buying that any more. All that’s between the SNP now and the general election is a series of jagged rocky outcrops, of which the outcome of Operation Branchform and the Section 35 court case are just the spikiest.

Labour are entitled to their moment of crowing. A majority of well over 9,000 on such a dire turnout is an achievement, and a victory margin of more than 2:1 is a sweet one even in a seat highly prone to extreme swings and which has now changed hands at four elections in a row.

But the real story of last night is that Scotland is sick to death of ALL its politicians, and we can’t blame it. The only surge last night was the one you get from vomit rising in your throat, and what’s coming up is pretty similar in both cases.

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0 to “The Surge”

  1. Saorsacat
    Ignored
    says:

    Was listening to the radio earlier, an SNP “representative” – didn’t catch their name – said they had lost the seat due to the bad behaviour of Margaret Ferrier, that people were disgusted that she didn’t voluntarily resign and they’re punishing the SNP because of this.

    There are no limits to their excuses and no limits to the gullibility of (some of) their followers.

  2. David
    Ignored
    says:

    What is HY going to do? He can’t carry on regardless unless he wants to destroy the party. The conference is next week. That will be very interesting.

  3. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    “Politics has fundamentally changed.”

    Anas Sarwar. Naw it husney you big rectum and blue arse.

    Nationalists stayed at home. Scotland’s not going back to the old ways!

  4. Ian Brotherhood
    Ignored
    says:

    ‘The only surge last night was the one you get from vomit rising in your throat, and what’s coming up is pretty similar in both cases.’

    Aye, with plenty of wee bits of undigested carrot.

  5. Andrew Morton
    Ignored
    says:

    ‘Delendo est SNP’

  6. Alastair
    Ignored
    says:

    I’m keeping my powder dry.
    At times like this parties can rely on an experienced
    respected grandee to seize the tiller and guide the party to calmer waters.
    So I’ll wait for Pete Wishart’s intervention.

  7. Kenneth Jamieson
    Ignored
    says:

    The only people who never saw this coming was the snp, head in sand doesn’t even begin to describe that party.

  8. Cuphook
    Ignored
    says:

    SNP in “Why didn’t the transphobic bigots vote for us?” conundrum.

  9. Politically Homeless
    Ignored
    says:

    There is a silver lining: failing upwards specialist Humza Yousaf has seen his opportunity – to quit politics.

  10. Liz
    Ignored
    says:

    The wee troughers on twitter are getting telt re trying to blame Mgt Ferrier.
    Some wee child was criticising those criticising her for trying to blame Mgt, responded, she’d been campaigning for 9 whole years for indy and oh my, what had we done.

    They are beyond thick.
    I’ve never known so many useless, braindead eejits in power.

    As for Ruth Wishart, apparently we are all pretending to support indy.
    She has the goddam nerve to call herself a journalist.

  11. Luigi
    Ignored
    says:

    “But just like The National, nobody’s buying that any more.”

    Ouch!

  12. Confused
    Ignored
    says:

    Maybe the SNP failed, not because of its radicalism, but because it wasn’t radical enough – if only they had pushed the tranny hatecrime antiracism and “all white people are evil and deserve to die” agenda, then the votes would have flooded in.

    TIME is a CIA rag
    Foreign Affairs is the CFR house journal
    Chatham House represents establishment opinion

    Yousuf on the front cover says a lot, and he is one of their young leader graduates.

    A lot of asians in positions of power right now – the reason seems to be this (its cunning) – when the next load of really evil shit comes down (could be anything, another pandemic, another war, world recession) – the people fronting it up will be BAME and thus complaining about it all makes you a “racist”. There is a meme of a black man tapping his forehead with his finger which is appropriate here.

  13. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    With the nationalists all staying at home and souring the SNP vote.

    We are country over party.

    We want Scotland United for Independence.

  14. Mike Fenwick
    Ignored
    says:

    “But the real story of last night is that Scotland is sick to death of ALL its politicians, and we can’t blame it”

    I hope this might be of interest:

    The Declaration of a Sovereign Scot – Since this initiative started it was based on this one perspective – that regaining the independence of Scotland was dependent on the ending of the Treaty of Union, and that could and would only be achieved by individually signed Declarations of Sovereign Scots that the Treaty was no longer to be continued, Why?

    It is the people of Scotland who are Sovereign!

    The decision to finally end the Treaty will happen when it is declared in writing for the world to witness and acknowledge.

    Declarations of the sovereign people, by the sovereign people, for the sovereign people.

    I will detail the next step in this initiative in about a month’s time.

  15. desimond
    Ignored
    says:

    Will we see Petted Lip Humzah rise to meet his detractors?

    Latest Private Eye also running a piece of the rise and expansion of Arden Strategies…Jim Murphy’s Lobby group and now it seems The leading way for Business minded folk to get in front of high heid-yin Labour officials for a cosy fireside chat. Up to over 20 employees now…seems failure doesnt mean despair for some.

  16. Merganser
    Ignored
    says:

    David @ 11.22.

    The SNP is already dead. Neither Humza nor anyone else can revive it.

    It poisoned itself by drinking from Sturgeon’s chalice.

  17. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    This is our voting choice in Scotland,

    Vote for a labour party,
    that does not know what a women is and is as far from supporting workers or unions as be,

    Or A vote for

    A green trans party into grooming, where fancy dress for men, who are abusive and want to be in females spaces

    Or a vote for

    A party that runs of with you money, and tried imprisioning your last first minster, and introduce communist hate speech laws to Scotland.

    Or vote for vote for the Colonial masters whom refuse to let Sottish people be free from captured controlled resource theft of your land

    Thats our choice to go vote for,

    Perverts that grrom children
    Corrupted Thieves whom shut up free speech,
    Scientology party hard workers or whom do not recognise females, young or old.
    Or a old enslavement empire party acting in modern day Colonialism over Scotlands freedom.

    Sorry I am not voting for any of that , four parties that are working together behind the scenes sectionally for my demise for that of my families or for the demise of the country of Scotland,

    I refuse to vote myself into woke controlled world that restricts freedom and free speech.
    That is not a choice even if it is dressed up and rigged as opposition parties.

  18. Ebenezer Scroggie
    Ignored
    says:

    SNP is a spent force. It has been run into the ground by Salmond’s once cherished appointees such as Swinney the Poo and Sturgeon.

    There won’t be a referendum Version 2 until at least 2032 and subversion of the UK by anti-democratic revolutionaries is most unlikely to succeed.

    Sadly, Salmond who is one of the greatest politicians of his generation, is history. Some of the mud that was thrown at him by the fraudulent and perjurous malicious prosecution seems to have stuck to him and his employment by RT has stained his reputation. He’s also saddled with the fact that he fucked up the Referendum with his lies. He’s toast.

    Sure, there are some powerful pro-separatism voices, such as in BBC Scotland and elsewhere such as Craig Murray, but they’re outside government. Within government and the parliaments there really aren’t any heavy hitters anymore, just nincompoops and self-serving troughers.

  19. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    All the parties are regulated by the same establishment system,
    All under the same boss,

    That ofcom system has no-over seer regulating body other than members of the policical parties your voting for in Westminster in law,

    Captured and all regulated together by catch 22.

    The only way out of that system enmass is a refusal to participate in a rigged system, to vote for ourselves into our own demise.
    We never get whom we vote for in Scotland anyway especially if your party selection choice is wrapped up between a rock and a hard place.the devil or the deep blue sea.

    I am not voting,
    spouse has come to same conclusion.

  20. Red
    Ignored
    says:

    Is it true that Murray Foote’s real name is R. Sole?

  21. desimond
    Ignored
    says:

    Laughed out loud there…

    I was thinking if now we might start to see a split between SNP and Greens. Would both parties starting to distance themselves from the harm of the other, and that thought then prompted me to ask Google “When is next holyrood election”

    It replied with :

    Next Scottish Parliament election/Start date
    7 May 2026

    And a picture of a grinning Alex Cole-Hamilton!

  22. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    Scotland needs to break the mold,
    We need to have a democratic system of voting, one vote for one party, not lent or rolled over to other parties.
    Minimal postal votes, counted on site at voting station, , not transported miles away unseen from the public view,

    And the only way to start that fairer system in Scotland is by vetoing the old Colonial system of voting.

  23. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    Individually the choice is yours wether you want to make a change, a difference in who runs Scotland.
    I personally will never anyone advise who to vote for,
    Only to stop a corrupted unfair old system in Scotland by the people choosing to make a change for the better.

    Westminster Changing and reducing the voting Burgh’s in Scotland breached the treaty of union and reduced voter seats for Scotland.

  24. Johnlm
    Ignored
    says:

    Politics is quite simple.
    Survive politically for long enough and eventually you will be given power as the rest fk up their turns.
    63% stay at home is quite encouraging.

  25. Stoker
    Ignored
    says:

    Every bit of this is down to Sturgeon’s destruction of the indy movement momentum. It’s her doing and no amount of Ruth Wishart pish or SNP-lickspittles trying to control the narrative of defeat will change that fact. Sturgeon is the turncoat responsible for all of this, not Margaret Ferrier, not us indy supporters and certainly not any lie being promoted by the SNP. If they think last night was bad, just wait and see how many of you we dispose of in 2024. Will Yous blame Margaret Ferrier for that too?

    YOUS HAVE LIED TO US ONCE TOO OFTEN.

    PS: Those that do social media should be making sure Sturgeon is left in no doubt this was all her doing. And that this is just the appetiser, the main course will be delivered in 2024.

  26. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    Scotland could change politically if it wished to.

    It is up to the “people to act upon their Sovereignty”,

    It is not illegal to with-hold your vote/s if you are not happy with the selection of political parties offered.

  27. Mia
    Ignored
    says:

    How many minutes until the first devolutionist SNP apparatchik/UK establishment asset starts using the hammering of the SNP in yesterday’s election as their fabricated excuse to avoid using the GE as a de-facto election on independence?

    Everybody and their dog knows Sturgeon and Yousaf have made the SNP unelectable with the gender nonsense, wasting taxpayers’ funds pursuing lost causes, jury-less trials, the corruption, the incompetence, etc.

    Everybody expected a hammering for the SNP at yesterday’s election. Curtice has been informing us of this even before we knew officially there was going to be a by-election. The hammering of the SNP was expected.

    So, how should we interpret Yousaf’s very recent announcement of using the number of seats rather than votes as a mandate to negotiate independence?

    Are we to interpret it as yet another last minute exercise in carrot dangling to boost the SNP votes, or was it the direct application of the problem/reaction/solution strategy?

    In other words, did he make that announcement knowing very well the SNP would be hammered for all the other things, but with the expectation of using that defeat as the excuse to stop using the election as a de facto election on independence?

    I think I choose the latter.

    So, was stopping the de-facto election on independence the real objective behind Sturgeon and Yousaf deliberate sinking of the SNP at the polls by making it unelectable?

    I am inclined to think it was. That would tally with Sturgeon’s infamous “vote SNP 1 and 2” to stop the anti-union supermajority.

    Over 60% of the electorate chose not to vote for any of the candidates. The unionist parties combined decreased their absolute vote by more than a 30%. Under which kind of delusion can such result be interpreted as the electorate supporting the union and not supporting the next GE being a vote on independence?

    Is Yousaf prepared to listen to the over 60% of the electorate who could no longer be bothered in casting a vote to continue the farce of the UK parliament, or is he going to just focus on the proportion of tories and libdems who lended their vote to labour to stop it looking like it was also haemorrhaging votes so he can use them as an excuse to not hold the vote on independence?

    For goodness sake, Mr Yousaf, stop taking us for fools already. Isn’t it time you and Flynn ditched the yellow rosette, ditched the party name and constitution and rebranded it as what it is: a pro-devolution copy cat of labour which, since Mr Salmond left, has developed an irreversible allergy to Scotland’s independence?

  28. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    Sovereignty is no use if you do not use it.

    In voting or vetoing your vote Scots have control of Sovereignty. And is legal.

  29. Gordon Keane
    Ignored
    says:

    These figures showing Labour vote down, even with almost full tory and Lib Dem votes, tell us there hasn’t been any “seismic” shift towards Labour, and Sarwar & Co. celebrate overmuch in my view.
    In effect, going by 2019 votes, almost 7000 tory voters, with almost 2000 Libs, voted Labour.
    So Labour got near 9000 non Labour votes, and we can assume, that then got Labour around 9000 actual Labour voters.
    Hearing Labour dudes on the wireless makes it sound this was all
    Labour, with a mere snippets of others.
    It hasn’t been that way at all.

    However, SNP has failed in the most abysmal way here. They brought this entirely upon themselves, and hearing SNP politicians talking, it its clear, they still don’t want to accept the reality of the present awful position with Humza, and they need not just a change of direction, like going real for Independence, but a new leader.

  30. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    Unionists consistently tell Scots, that it is a myth that Scots have Sovereignty,

    Everyone of those Scots can use that Sovereignty by legally vetoing the possibly corrupted voting system.

    It would be a unique way to display the Sovereignty of Scotland, to enforce it politically, and to make change happen.

    Scots Sovereignty has unexpected ways of being enforced as a action,

  31. David Lindsay
    Ignored
    says:

    Labour has just won Rutherglen and Hamilton West with fewer votes than it lost with in 2019, and with fewer votes than the SNP lost it with in 2017. Three quarters of the SNP voters from 2019 stayed at home, so Labour easily gained the seat with 17,845 votes. In 2017, also from the SNP, Labour narrowly gained the same seat with 19,101 votes. On both sides of the Border, an abysmal ruling party is collapsing, to the benefit by default of a politically identical Opposition (the SNP has not seriously pursued independence in nine years), with more and more people simply finding better things to do. Their votes are up for grabs.

  32. Jacob1972
    Ignored
    says:

    Good analysis comparing last night’s figures with the previous by-elections.

    I’m having a chuckle that you and Darren “Loki” McGarvey have come to the same conclusion about the SNP and Labour parties.

    His Unherd piece is worth a read.

    I’ve seen nothing that makes me want to vote for any of them, and I feel quite despairing about it as I’ve voted in each election available to me for the last 32y.

  33. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    Time to sort the wheat from the chaff,
    Those that want to legally use their Sovereignty in Scotland and those whom are here to stop us, using it by deflecting argument and conversations on to small talk,

    There is nothing that the establishment or Westminster can do to prevent you in using your Sovereignty by choice for the first time,

    It is not legally compulsory by enforcement, legislation, statue or bills in law to vote or veto your vote,
    Scotland could be the first Country to change the political landscape. By actually using the Sovereignty of their votes or not using them.

  34. A Scot Abroad
    Ignored
    says:

    Not much appetite for Indy representation in Rutherglen and Hamilton West.

    The SNP got shafted by the electorate, Alba didn’t stand, and the ISP got a pitiful 207 votes.

  35. Dave Llewellyn
    Ignored
    says:

    “James Che says:
    6 October, 2023 at 1:22 pm
    Sovereignty is no use if you do not use it.

    In voting or vetoing your vote Scots have control of Sovereignty. And is legal”

    But that’s the same in England where parliament is sovereign .
    In Scotland the people are sovereign all the time not just the 15 hours every voting cycle .

  36. Andy Storrie
    Ignored
    says:

    The London Uni-party won that election. Whether red or blue, the result will be just the same: more metropolitan, globalist diktats being forced down the throats of our people. More wage-comoressing migration policies. More identity politics schemes hurled into the public arena to keep the proles busy squabbling among themselves while London louse bags disappear out the back door with the money.

    Many working-class people will be in no mood to kiss and make up with Labour after the treacherous, globalist orgy they embarked upon with their Tory sidekicks over the past 30 years, or so.

    At no point whatsoever did anyone in the Labour party raise any concerns about working people having their living standards decimated due to blanket uni-party policies. Policies which have benefited a select few since they were rolled out in 1997.

    As a newbie to the movement, It still feels a bit weird and unnatural to be rooting for the SNP over the old London parties. They are undoubtedly a shower of largely useless and weird odd bodies. But the abuses from the London parties went on for way too long to be forgiven, quite frankly.

    Choosing between the SNP and the vile London uni-party feels like being given a choice between going for a late night walk with either Freddy Krueger, or the guy from the Scream movie.

    This is a truly shambolic state for the home of the Enlightenment to be in! London has failed us dramatically, and the SNP just aren’t up to the job of freeing this Nation from the grip of London. It’s a sad state of affairs.

    We’ve just been dragged through the most shameful, rapacious, debauched and anti-family period in our nation’s history, and the instinctive reaction from people in Rutherglen has been to back one of the main culprits who spearheaded that shameful era. Sad.

    They would have been better off staying at home on the couch instead of handing those red Uni-party arseholes a boost like this.

  37. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    SNP coming out and saying that Scotland doesn’t want Independence because of last night’s result.

    Someone get Alex Salmond on the phone to rebutt this absolute nonsense.

    This wet wipe. Marcus Carslaw you glass half empty, not very intellectual pygmy. Can we say that?

    https://nitter.net/WingsScotland/status/1710261240444981346#m

    It’s clear to me that Scotland United is the answer to moving forward. And the polls have Scotland 50:50 for Independence. We just can’t vote for Humza Yousless and the cabal any longer. And all your failing polices and doubling down.

    Let’s hope Fergus Ewing take out Humza.

    Get big Eck on the phone. We need some leadership in times like this.

  38. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    Get Alex Salmond on the phone.

    Scotland and the nationalist cause needs leadership in the time of defeat.

    Especially when the SNP are sending out members to say Scotland doesn’t want Independence.

    Get a fucking lid on it!

  39. John.H
    Ignored
    says:

    Mia 1.19pm.

    Sturgeon must be delighted with the result. She loves it when a plan comes together.

  40. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    Get Fergus Ewing on the phone. His mother Winnie made the people of Hamilton proud.

    Humza Yousaf has disgraced her legacy.

    Fergus. Hold your head up high. Speak out and restore pride in the nationalist cause. We need new leadership in the SNP.

    Ash Regan. Feminist freedom fighter and commonweal. Where is she?

  41. Gordon Keane
    Ignored
    says:

    Just one other thing, there is an Independence march in Edinburgh tomorrow, (October 7th) by AUOB.
    We wonder how many will turn out for that.
    The weather is set to be poor, which will not be too helpful.
    There is another due for Glasgow the next Saturday, October 14th by the Yes2Independence group.
    Back in January 2020 in Glasgow, about 100,000 turned out and it poured with rain, yet we had all those folks take part even thru that heavy rain.
    But SNP leadership bitterly betrayed all their efforts and hopes.
    Don’t know how many they hope at Edinburgh tomorrow.
    I note for the upcoming Glasgow October 14th march, the City Council is expecting about 500!
    But if enough did take part, either in full or for some of these marches, it could send a message to our colonial rulers and their wretched supporting minions, including SNP, Independence is still very much around.

  42. Mark Beggan
    Ignored
    says:

    Dear Scotland,

    Thanks for giving me the ability to insult every goddam one of you. Thanks for the ticket to ride.

    See ya Suckers!

    Next stop U.S.A.

    Yours Humza

  43. Red
    Ignored
    says:

    Mhairi Black threatened to quit the SNP

    To do what? Go back to her important work as a Wee Hairy?

  44. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    Dave Llewellyn,

    But that 15 hours would change the political landscape in Scotland, if they chose not to vote for the estblishment.

    Your correct in Stating that in England the Sovereignty of people has been transferred to the parliament of westminster and therefore promotes self belief that parliament can over rule the peoples choices.

    But in Scotland that English law of parliament Sovereignty over Scotland is contestable on many levels,,
    Claim of right, treaty of union, monarchy, and that Scots were “not” asked to join the treaty of union.

    This is the Westminster/uk parliament that admits it left the “Sovereign Scots” outside the treaty of union,
    As is their very own statement that there is NO Scottish parliament in the treaty of union since 1707,

    It would be Akin to Westminster shitting on a hornets nest,

    It has left Scotlands people, Scotlands monarchy and old parliament of Scotland Sovereign by default of Westminsters England parliament eons of errors,

    It is time that Scotland veto’d the Colonial imposed vote system by using their Sovereignty in Scotland to veto it,

    There is not a english or Scots law that has been passed that says you are enforced or have to vote for a political party under the Westminster system,

    Without stirring up the question of sovereignty over anyones choice to vote freely or not as the case maybe.

  45. Mike d
    Ignored
    says:

    Although it pains me to say it,
    R,sole abroad at 2.08pm got it right, Seems a lot of Scots dont have the balls for independence. Scotland the brave my arse.

  46. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    It is surely time to veto voting for phedopillia policies, corruption, racist invented hate speech against Scotland, to veto sexually grooming our children through the education system, and veto a vote for dismissing women and females rights as non entities.

    Surely it is time to veto a vote that would continue colonialism of Scotland,

    Think what you are voting for, if you continue voting in and for this system of governance.

  47. Den
    Ignored
    says:

    We need a couple more bi elections forced to create sheer panic in the Scottish political establishment. Branchform might just be the vehicle that allows that to happen.

  48. TURABDIN
    Ignored
    says:

    In a country less buttoned up in obedience to political norms and respectable behaviour the future would be very uncomfortable for all political parties touting for business in Scotland.
    There is a significant disconnect between the people and those who rule them. In Scotland it may always have been so.
    The direct «feed» from the increasingly dysfunctional, paranoid?, «other half» augurs ill in its consequences for any return to the historic Unionist status which the system devoutly wishes.
    This is a sickness normally associated with the sham democracy characteristic of my ancestral world.
    Astaghfirallah!* Oh the irony.
    However, despair is so much worse.
    *HY will know the expression.

  49. James Che
    Ignored
    says:

    The would be little need for marches in the streets,
    Little need for begging for referendums,
    Little need for seeking recognition of the UN .
    Little need for recognition from other countries.

    Because you can legally veto the system within the laws of Scotland or British laws for that matter,
    You can an will through your veto change the authority of a colonial management office in Scotland,

    Change Scotlands Sovereignty to become a active Sovereignty.

  50. Geri
    Ignored
    says:

    Black – back to the chippy, hen. Tho I’m sure you’ll even struggle there now. The SNP wasn’t for mates. That’s what’s helped fck it in the 1st place. Mates, aunts, cousins FFS! A well worn tactic of Labours too polluting every council with a job for life rather than on brains & ability.

    Also disagree with Stu re 2017 GE. I know plenty SNP family & friends who threw the towel in by then. Declaring Sturgeon was a complete fraud who’d never call indy.
    While she distanced herself from Indy in 2017 the yoons were shouting about it from the rooftops. ‘Tell Nicola naw’ & the classic ‘A vote for us is a vote to save the Union’ Another strategic fcking FAIL by Sturgeon to read the room while having a triple mandate on her desk gathering fck all but dust.

    Brexit was her mandate trigger. Everyone knew an iScot would need an EU ref of its own for applying so I doubt it was leave voters. Imo. It was inaction to act on the mandates she already had.

    A typical psychopath gathering tokens from their victims for their own sick pleasure.

  51. Captain Yossarian
    Ignored
    says:

    Sunak’s wisecrack about Sturgeon going down in the history books for all the wrong reasons was delivered with some style and confidence. Maybe he knows something we don’t? A respected poster on here has said it’s 50:50 whether Branchform charges will be brought, but maybe the Police are just saying that in the meantime? Last night’s result shows the SNP really aren’t popular any more and so what do you think the chances are of these odds improving. When I say improving, I mean getting the chances of a charge up to much higher than 50:50. I speak as an old Labour man but I take no pleasure in seeing them win comfortable as they are total mince nowadays.

  52. Captain Yossarian
    Ignored
    says:

    Speaking of respected posters, I’m still on the look-out for Corporal Dan. I’m missing his rants on heat pumps, overgrown trees, solar panels, electricity exports down south, brake callipers on Volkswagens and all the rest of it. It’s time he was back at his post. Our politics are different, but he is remarkably sensible nonetheless.

  53. Anton Decadent
    Ignored
    says:

    Things are bad but we have not hit bottom yet. During the week the globalist overseas owned Herald was pushing Graham Campbell, Kenny McCaskill having recently validated chancing grifters like him. The absolute detachment of the political classes from the people is so bad that they no longer believe that we even deserve the opportunity to represent ourselves and groom and mentor people from marginalised minorities who are so oppressed that they are given opportunities which the average young person in Scotland will never see in their wildest dreams.

    This ship can still be turned around but it means putting some kind of a ceiling on outside interference in our affairs. I know that sounds extreme but literally everything is at stake.

  54. Shug
    Ignored
    says:

    SNP aren’t fighting for indy now they are fighting for their jobs and they are onto plumbs.

    Humza had a chance to come in and clear out the dregs instead he gave them positions and continues on Sturgeons downhill trajectory

    At least when the tories get into trouble the drop the leader quickly and maje a change.

    If inly there were some real grown ups in charge and not this bunch of identifying troughers

  55. Antoine Roquentin
    Ignored
    says:

    @A Scot Abroad

    Nuanced analysis of the Scottish body-politic isn’t really an area that you excel in, is it? But don’t let me stop you: the whole world loves a trier.

  56. Andy
    Ignored
    says:

    Well well, first of all, those Indy supporters who made claims MI5 or 6 had infiltrated the Indy movement…….you were correct, it’s name was Sturgeon but you couldn’t spot your own personal Kim Philby at the top, don’t get me wrong folks, I’m all for an Indy Scotland, I also voted Brexit, why give up our Indy to hand it to the greater Communist party of the EU??…..those that did made me cringe…..Stonewall, pushing the gayification of our children funded by our own money courtesy of lesbian Nikki nacky noo..(we all know she likes it French)….blaming Westminster for the state of our NHS when we clearly had full control of it…..”judge me on my record of ……..”, well take your pick, it was forever changing, so glad to see the demise of the SNP, my old man back in the 70’s used to say the SNP were just a bunch of Commie bas…..s, he was correct, hate speech, named person, lockdowns…..all part of the communist manifesto to those that could see, but who were the communists?…..what tied all the Bolshevik revolutionaries together, what tribal bond did they have?

  57. Tommo
    Ignored
    says:

    Shrug @ 4.30 pm; correct save that he WAS the dregs; put in place by Wee Jeannie’s closest as the chap who wouldn’t raise any awkward questions about what had gone on before in exchange for getting a gig WAY above his pay grade
    Seems to have worked so far for both sides

  58. Joe Graham
    Ignored
    says:

    Spot the difference…

    Former SNP MP Margaret Ferrier, whose seat was won by Labour in last night’s by-election, admitted making a mistake, she informed Test & Protect about testing positive, she reported her ill-judged train journey to the proper authorities, and she made no attempt to deceive anyone.

    Former chief medical officer Catherine Calderwood, who lectured us all on the importance of the rules, was caught wandering around Fife when she was legally obliged to be in Edinburgh. This was no mistake. She didn’t “panic” and get it wrong, as Ferrier had apparently done. Calderwood deliberately took her entire family on holiday at the height of the pandemic. Later, Calderwood was caught again when it was discovered that that was actually her second holiday of the pandemic.

    Ferrier was lambasted by her own party, the now politicised Scottish Police charged her, not with a covid-related offence (nor by way of a fixed penalty notice, like Boris and Rishi), but with a criminal offence carrying a maximum sentence of life imprisonment, she received 270 hours of community service, and is now unemployed.

    Calderwood was not lambasted by the SNP, she was supported by Nicola Sturgeon and only resigned when the media made a fuss, she was not prosecuted, she received no community service, her salary did reduce from £120k to £80k, and she was invited to Bute House for Sturgeon’s leaving do.

    The difference is one was in Nicola’s clique and one was not. The rest of the clique are still at large, but it’s against the law to name them.

  59. John Burns
    Ignored
    says:

    I see Starmer’s been rowing about this. He says it shows Scottish voters have turned their backs on Tory rule in Westminster. The poor deluded fool canny see that Scots voters have actually turned their backs on the SNP.

  60. John Burns
    Ignored
    says:

    @james che 12:48, Winna be much o a general election if naebody gauns tae vote , will it ?

  61. Republicofscotland
    Ignored
    says:

    Listening to the Britnat media on BLiS winning in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election, one could be forgiven for thinking that London’s branch office of Labour in Scotland had taken every GE seat in Scotland.

    I read today that BLiS MSP Jackie Baillie lived in the R&HW for an entire six months to try and garner votes for this foreign party’s candidate.

    I say to Collette Walker (ISP) thanks for trying, we won’t forget you’re hard work.

  62. Red
    Ignored
    says:

    We know Humza doesn’t like “white people”, because he told us so. But did you know he thinks all “white people” look the same? Even men and women* *(well, to be fair, Nicola Sturgeon)

    He gazed up at a series of six portraits hanging in the stairwell and took in the enormity of his achievement. The first was of Donald Dewar, who became the nation’s inaugural First Minister in 1999 when the Scottish Parliament was created; the fifth showed Yousaf’s predecessor, Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s longest serving leader. The final portrait, of a grinning young man wearing a tartan tie, was his own.

    “I really stand out because I look different,” Yousaf, 38, recalls

    Jail this mad racist.

  63. Chas
    Ignored
    says:

    The only rational reaction to be taken from last nights result is that, for the foreseeable future, Independence is dead. You can moan about it all you want but it is fairly obvious if you have the ability to think for yourself.

    However, look on the bright side, according to the individual who previously treated us to ancient history, the way forward is simply not to vote at all in any future elections. What a masterstroke of inventive thinking! That will undoubtedly work!

  64. Corrado Mella
    Ignored
    says:

    First one of many, but there’s nothing to celebrate.

    We allowed this to happen allowing narcissistic sociopaths to steal a perfectly well organised party from under our nose.

    Now the thing is poisoned beyond survival and the humane thing to do is to suppress it.

    We all know that this is the most read Scottish political blog in Westminster (and I suspect in Holyrood), so let’s make it clear to the sitting Saint Nicola’s Party MPs and MSPs that their career is over.

    In absence of short money from MPs and MSPs, and with falling membership, the SNP is bankrupt.

    They need to resign and trigger by-elections to accelerate the process, free themselves and join the Independence Movement, in a move that will expose the rotting flesh that the cabal of narcissistic sociopaths are still feasting on.

    Hey, you: yes, you with that clootie on the lapel and a Westminster sized fattened arse: if you don’t distance yourself from that putrid cadaber RIGHT NOW while the news of the debacle are fresh, you will be forever seen as one of the zombies that are still lingering for one last morsel of the corpse, tainted forever.

    Folks, it’s your money that these parasites are taking home.
    Your dignity that they’re trashing.
    Your freedom that they’re selling out.

    Take back what’s yours.

  65. Red
    Ignored
    says:

    Liz says: As for Ruth Wishart, apparently we are all pretending to support indy.
    She has the goddam nerve to call herself a journalist.

    For as long as I can remember, Ruth Wishart has been a horrible old lady with a strange fetish for immigration. But journos usually aren’t good people, which is why it isn’t a respected profession.

  66. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    https://nitter.net/GillianKeel2/status/1710226173236482057#m

    Amber Roberts. SNP. Biological male on all female shortlist. In Fetish gear. Why are they always male sex freaks?

    They plan to break the law to put him illegally forward on the all female shortlist.

    Humza out.

  67. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    “Good girls get gagged.” Says Amber Roberts.

    Absolutely disgusting male. How dare the SNP put him forward to run illegally on the all female shortlist.

    I’m really hoping there is an article done on his selection. Because that is a threat.

    Good girls get gagged. You wouldn’t want to bump into him in the changing room.

    They don’t want you to know this though. They don’t want you to ruin the gender self ID bill.

    YouTube etc. Try their best to delete you comments. No freedom of speech on this issue.

    Except on Wings over Scotland where the truth is always told.

  68. James Jones
    Ignored
    says:

    Stu wrote:
    “But the real story of last night is that Scotland is sick to death of ALL its politicians, and we can’t blame it.”

    I keep seeing Scotland referenced in these terms but the fact is the UK feels the same way. Brexit was an expression of the same, though for some reason Scots didn’t get it (-your enemy’s enemy is your friend, perhaps?); first get rid of the failed national politicians and their unelected bureaucrats in Brussels/Strasbourg, then purge the UK Parliament of the inadequates who have been relying on the EU for decision-making. We haven’t managed the last step yet but there’s a chance.

  69. David Hannah
    Ignored
    says:

    https://nitter.net/pic/orig/media%2FF7wYCsfW8AAkC4p.jpg

    Jeesus Christ all mighty. It looks like Amber Roberts is a paedophile as well into adult baby Fetish.

    Why am I not surprised? The nappy Fetish gang in the Scottish Greens. That sick bastard I can’t remember his name. The trans mob in Scotland really are sick Perverts.

    What an insult to women all over the country. This man needs locked away. How DARE They!

  70. ScottieDog
    Ignored
    says:

    Career politicians are a great gift to neoliberalism. Completely dependent on an income from the party machine which takes its lead from the elites. The political, journalistic, and economic landscape is now a monoculture.

  71. McDuff
    Ignored
    says:

    Ever since the sturgeon came to power there has been a deliberate move to destroy the SNP. Firstly she brings the judiciary into the government and there is the rapid prosecutions of prominent independence activists including Alex Salmond, Manny Singh, Mark Hirst, and of course Craig Murray, yet no Unionist`s are similarly harassed. Then there is the list of unpopular bills Hate Crime, trans madness sending men to women`s prisons and motor homes parked outside murrell`s mother`s house, police investigations into finances etc etc, the list goes on. All great for winning votes.
    The point is nothing like this happened when SA was in charge, the SNP worked like a competent and dignified government.
    So is this the work of a woman who claims to want independence? I`m no conspiracy theorist but on the other hand something is very very wrong.

  72. Peter Wilson
    Ignored
    says:

    It’s pretty simple for the SNP to boost its vote percentage. Dump the deal with the Greens and disavow all their toxic policies. They can be a useful scapegoat for most things that have gone wrong. Then call a truce with other independence parties. Go for a grand coalition where 50% +1 equals a mandate to negotiate independence. Problem solved?

  73. pipinghot
    Ignored
    says:

    Mike d, we fucked our chance in 2014. Every time I hear a pipe band playing scotland the brave it makes me want to puke. Shameful. There was a wee video of two guys in Glasgow after the referendum saying just that. It was like the scene in Trainspotting.

  74. 100%Yes
    Ignored
    says:

    If the Tories weren’t so spinless they’d call a general election so we could get rid of all the SNP Unionist MPs at Westminster.

    Yesterday result was Scots saying to the SNP we’ve had enough of your lies and your weird policy’s.

    If the SNP was to take notice, the first thing they should do is reinstate Fergus Ewing and then end the partnership with the greens, but they won’t nothing will change.

  75. Red
    Ignored
    says:


    ScottieDog says:
    6 October, 2023 at 7:24 pm
    Career politicians are a great gift to neoliberalism. Completely dependent on an income from the party machine which takes its lead from the elites. The political, journalistic, and economic landscape is now a monoculture.

    Aye, it’s how we end up with this situation.

    If we ever get our country back, we need to stop paying our elected representatives to have political careers. None of their political careers have done us any good for S long as I can remember. Make it a part time gig for responsible people who already have jobs and lived in the constituency for at least 10 years – and government doesn’t need to be a remote ivory tower anyway. It should be by the people, for the people.

    Professional politicians can be retrained for useful work picking up jobbies. Oxford PPE graduates get to be the first British people to explore the surface of the Sun.

  76. robertkknight
    Ignored
    says:

    The Yoons, Brit-Nats and assorted House Jocks have spent the last 9 years crowing about a Once-In-A-Generation vote

    Who’d have guessed that it’d be Sturgeon who’d gift it to them.

    Perhaps the British Government will buy her and hubby a camper van as a big thank you for f***ing Scotland over in a style not seen since Thatcher’s days.

  77. Ian Brotherhood
    Ignored
    says:

    It seems that Nicola Sturgeon has been paid the first of four instalments from her publisher. £75k. Don’t know if the instalments are all the same but that would be £300,000 total.

    Nice work if you can get it.

    She claims that she’ll be working for 10-15 hours per week.

    A toty wee teensy drawback may well be that she isn’t a writer. There’s no evidence that she’s ever written anything herself. Naturally, she’s always had someone to do that (well, as a minister, then FM, of course she has).

    Hobnobbing with the likes of Val McDermid won’t necessarily be any help. After all, at some point you have to sit down, just you and the keyboard, and actually write.

    If I was her I’d discretely hire the services of a cash-strapped post-grad lit student, pay her £25 per hour cash so long as she signs a NDA, then set her a word-count target and never clap eyes on her again. The student will then use AI to find out everything palatable about NS and belt out 5,000 words every day. (Don’t want to get greedy and do it all at once.)

    The result will be unreadable boring shite destined for The Works.

  78. Sven
    Ignored
    says:

    Ian Brotherhood @ 20.55

    Spookily enough I was just thinking that Ms Sturgeon’s collaboration with Ms McDermid may be the only way the former FM could manage to present her version of the 2014-2023 years as her outstanding statespersonlike guidance of the SNP from the party Mr Salmond brought to the very brink of independence to the party which can’t even build a couple of ferries or be sure what a woman is.
    Going to take a writer who is great at fiction to make a good read of that …

  79. Casper1066
    Ignored
    says:

    But your all ready for the big vote on 19th… right.

    ?

  80. John Main
    Ignored
    says:

    37% turn out.

    By my arithmetic, thats 63% supporting the “meh” party.

    There’s a wee idea I just can’t get oot o ma heid. Imagine a party selling Independence to an apathetic bunch of Sovereign and New Scots on the simple premise that Indy will make them better off.

    Imagine that party chapping on doors with easy-to-understand, worked out, independently verified financials explaining where the money will come from for better pensions, health care, public services, education, and lower taxes, lower utility bills, etc. Facts not faith.

    Imagine a groundswell of Indy supporting voters, excited and incentivised by a party that shows us the money.

    Oh well, back to reality. I guess it’s to be another 10 years of Culloden, 1707, “English bastards” and “MI5 infiltration”.

    Sure, play those records to the “meh” stay at homes if that’s the comfort zone, but they ain’t listening any more.

    Show us the money is the game changer waiting in the wings. Everything else has been tried. It’s time to get real.

  81. Stoker
    Ignored
    says:

    The BBC’s ‘The Context’ presenter spouting the “great result” shite. Some “Lord” and a former American Democrat Strategist on as guests spouting shite about Tories, and their lack of knowledge on Scottish politics showed as brightly as the Ailsa Craig Lighthouse.

    A piece from Labour in Scotland’s millionaire leader. Footage of their millionaire London master, Sir Starmer, spouting all sorts of shite with Bailey & that scruffy c@nt with the Edinburgh seat watching sycophantically by Starmers side.

    And through all of that not one single fact out of all those facts printed here on WOS in this one article from Stuart. And these lickspittles at the BBC call themselves “Journalists”? The BBC are nothing more than what we know them to be, London’s propaganda platform.

    Mind you, they did include a piece from Hoozat Useless who blamed the “wreckless actions” of Ferrier and then, almost whispered, admitted the police investigation may have played a part. But then bounced back into full volume serial failure mode with: We’ve come back from bad defeats before. We will regroup blah blah blah (I couldn’t take anymore, turned it over).

    A programme from the BBC called ‘The Context’ gave absolutely no context whatsoever. Go figure!

  82. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    David Hannah says:
    6 October, 2023 at 7:19 pm

    https://nitter.net/pic/orig/media%2FF7wYCsfW8AAkC4p.jpg

    Jeesus Christ all mighty. It looks like Amber Roberts is a paedophile as well into adult baby Fetish.

    Transgenderism seems to be all about fetishes.
    I notice Amber was a masochist and a rubber doll.

    I had to google rubber doll.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkhkVtkJ27Y

  83. Shug
    Ignored
    says:

    I will only accept the SNP is going for indy when I see a policy statement written by grown ups.

    Even then they have to instruct the courts to prosecute woman H. This would be an act of good faith showing they are serious.

    Anything less is insufficient

  84. Breastplate
    Ignored
    says:

    John Main,
    The only people playing ripping the pish out of the English are the Unionists here who want to continue to sponge off our very good neighbours to prevent themselves being accountable for any decisions they might have to make.

    I think Unionists shouldn’t be so eager to be marked out as good for nothing scroungers but unfortunately we seem to be burdened with too many people in this country with no self respect.

  85. Derek
    Ignored
    says:

    “John Main says:
    6 October, 2023 at 10:09 pm

    37% turn out.”

    That would suggest that a “None Of The Above” option on the ballot might be a good idea.

  86. A Scot Abroad
    Ignored
    says:

    Antoine Roquentin, at 4:51pm

    I don’t need to do “nuanced analysis”. The SNP got shafted, Alba failed to turn up, and the ISP got a pitiful 207 votes. All of this two weeks before the SNP we’re planning to hold a vote on it.

    There’s not that much to analyse. Indy ain’t a factor at the moment. It ain’t happening.

  87. President Xiden
    Ignored
    says:

    So Humza, you said the buck stops with you. What are the consequences of that then?

  88. Confused
    Ignored
    says:

    Humsa being a CIA bumboy would surprise no one, but sarwar probably is too, and … the lot of them; back all the horses, it’s how you win

    the left ain’t the left anymore …

    https://thephilosophicalsalon.com/the-cia-reads-french-theory-on-the-intellectual-labor-of-dismantling-the-cultural-left/

    – a deep dive into where all this shit came from, and who stirred it to begin with

    TL;DR identity politics was used to destroy the old left and this nonsense is hard to deal with because it has deep roots

    foucault->derrida->butler->trannies trying to nonce your kids

    and all the govt people in the bureaucracy who went to uni in the past 30 years have been steeped in this, whether from these prime toilets themselves, or their students or students students – you can’t get your arts degree and hence a job without some critical race theory, antiracism and gender/queer theory

    it is hard to fight all this because it comes from a deep place, worked out by subtle people – and they are very good at shutting people down on the basis of their invented categories of offence and outrage, you racist transphobic bigots …

    These young leadership programs are not happenstance and peripheral – it is poisoning the well, early in the game, grooming and selecting the worst, sellout shits. The reach of the CIA to poison the well, any well, is breathtaking, e.g. operation mockingbird, or promoting jazz and abstract expressionism.

  89. Time Please
    Ignored
    says:

    Anybody actually read the Yousaf Time story (linked below)? Utter shit from start to finish. “Scotland can be global leaders…Fergus Ewing is a prick…my portrait looks different among my white predecessors whom I hate…I want to inspire others into politics…” Drivel.

    And I still want to know why the slimy fuck looks like he’s about to burst out laughing all the time, like he has some nasty surprise to spring on us. What does the arrogant cunt know we don’t?

    https://time.com/collection/next-generation-leaders/

  90. Captain Yossarian
    Ignored
    says:

    Confused – “and they are very good at shutting people down on the basis of their invented categories of offence…” – Another great post.

  91. JockMcT
    Ignored
    says:

    President Xiden says:
    6 October, 2023 at 11:58 pm
    So Humza, you said the buck stops with you. What are the consequences of that then?

    The buck stops in Humza’s bank account..!

  92. socratesmacsporran
    Ignored
    says:

    The more I see of the Labour Party’s current UK leader, the more convinced I am that he is an old-style “one nation” Conservative; and the more I realise, the “centre ground” in politics is somewhere further to the right than it used to be.

    Truly we live in interesting times, which are not good times for Scotland.

  93. Paul Davis
    Ignored
    says:

    James Che says:
    6 October, 2023 at 12:48 pm

    We never get whom we vote for in Scotland anyway

    Nonsense. You voted in your droves over and over again for the SNP and got the SNP. All this sorrowful naval gazing now is a combination of buyers remorse and a way of hiding away from the unpalatable truth, namely that the one chance of independence came in 2014 and the SNP blew it. Everything since then has been smoke and mirrors and the blind faithful kept falling for it. All that’s happened since is that the well has been thoroughly poisoned.

  94. TURABDIN
    Ignored
    says:

    A surge of «extremism» in the pursuit of freedom is no crime.
    Letting freedom die by inaction is.
    Scotland has been at the X roads for too long, the view is more than tiresome.
    A new style of «leadership» capable of intelligent, strategic decision making is necessary. By pursed lipped UK standards that might well be labelled «extremist».
    SNP management, You’re FIRED! and take your Green dress up box with you.

    To put a certain cat among certain pigeons, Scotland has a Muslim FM, no probs with that if only he had the «cojones», when might a Catholic get the job?
    Too radical?

  95. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    A Scot Abroad says:
    6 October, 2023 at 11:46 pm

    There’s not that much to analyse. Indy ain’t a factor at the moment. It ain’t happening.

    Yet another flame-bait from The Unionist Abroad.

    I think we all know there will be no independence referendum at the moment.

    As far as I know there are still 50% of the electorate who support Independence so your statement that Indy ain’t a factor at the moment. is incorrect.

    Indy is always a factor in Scottish politics. Unionists like yourself seem happy to accept the fact that 50% are not happy
    being part of the Union. It as if you don’t care.

    It’s a if the thinking is ‘We don’t have to do anything about these independence supporters we’ve got them well and truly trapped in their little colony.

    We’ve watched them being robbed and cheated by the SNP and we’re happy about that. We do nothing to help. We don’t care about these people. Why should we they are lesser beings.

    You come on here everyday with your childish taunts
    Na Na Na Na Na Indy ain’t happening!

    Losers! Losers! Losers!

  96. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    Paul Davis says:
    7 October, 2023 at 8:35 am

    We never get whom we vote for in Scotland anyway

    Nonsense. You voted in your droves over and over again for the SNP and got the SNP.

    When were the SNP in power at Westminster?

    Come to that when were

    Scottish Labour, Scottish Tories, Scottish Lib-Dems in power at Westminster?

  97. sam
    Ignored
    says:

    In 2019 opinion polls were saying that 30% of Labour members were in Favour of Scottish independence. 66% were in favour of Irish re-unification.

    If that is still the position, Scottish independence will be more of an issue than now.

    Any move away from austerity and a better economic position and lessening of a Covid threat will be likely to increase interest in independence

  98. Mac
    Ignored
    says:

    “The prosperity of the West has been achieved by robbing colonies for several centuries. This is a fact. Essentially, this level of development has been achieved by robbing the entire planet.

    The history of the West is essentially the chronicle of endless expansion. Western influence in the world is an immense military and financial pyramid scheme that constantly needs more “fuel” to support itself, with natural, technological and human resources that belong to others.

    This is why the West simply cannot and is not going to stop. Our arguments, reasoning, calls for common sense or proposals have simply been ignored.”

    I’d be interested in the thoughts of Alf on the above… my view is that it is completely accurate.

    In fact I would recommend reading this entire speech as it is a master class in modern day Nationalism versus Globalism from the world’s leading nationalist. He uses a different word, civilizations, and it is a much better word, but it amounts to the same thing.

    Very interesting indeed.

    The independence movement should pivot towards Ru$$ia as the world’s leading proponent of nationalist ideology. That would certainly set the cat amongst the pigeons. I am joking of course but also I am not joking.

    Read it. It is a fascinating speech.

    https://archive.ph/pxYLM

  99. sam
    Ignored
    says:

    Countries want independence for different reasons.

    One is to have greater political control. We can govern our own affairs in the interests of all our people.

    At present, we do not control employment law so we can’t do away with zero hours contracts.

    In 2015, Professor Carol Tannahill told the Holyrood Health Committee that there was evidence that zero hours contracts were more harmful to health than long term unemployment.

    Figures at the early part of this year show 105,000 Scots employed on zero hours contracts – about 3.9% of the workforce. England’s % is 3.5.

    Sectors most affected are hospitality and social care.

    Although nominally in full control of our health service, in practice we are not. We get a block “grant” (colony) not based on need. Based on need we should be receiving a larger block grant for health.

    UK initiatives affect our health service. PFI is a malign influence without any public service advantage.

    It causes hospital mergers and ward and service closures in England.In Scotland, too? Professor Allysson Pollock says it closes 30% of hospital beds when a hospital becomes PFI because the meeting of PFI debt has prriority over all else.

    Increasingly, there is a privatisation of hospital services. The start of this practice under Thatcher saw a sudden increase in hospital acquired infections.

  100. Mia
    Ignored
    says:

    “You voted in your droves over and over again for the SNP and got the SNP”

    No, we did not, actually. Not even close. The SNP was terminated on the 14 November 2014, the day an undemocratic political fraud took over as “leader” and proceeded to use the next 9 years of our time to destroy from within the party as a vehicle for independence and to ensure the UK survived as a political union.

    Nothing could be further from the original raison d’etre of the political party we thought we were voting for.

    Every since the day the political fraud took over, what we have been presented with as “SNP” is nothing but an empty shell driven by pro-devolution labourites who have been exploiting the remnants of the brand’s credibility, developed by the hard work of the political fraud’s predecessors, to keep yes voters on a leash and to ensure the momentum of yes came to a hault and recede.

    A political party that actively and relentlessly works against Scotland’s independence, that actively hands powers and assets to Westminster and chums, and that shows, for 9 effing years, the uttermost contempt for democracy and the sovereign rights of the people of Scotland, is not the SNP. It is a pathetic cheating labour hiding under a fake rosette which has become well aware that cheating and deception are the only ways labour can be resurrected in Scotland.

    A name does not make a political party. It is the actions of those who control it what do.

    The political party that calls itself “SNP” today and has been doing so since 14 Nov 2014 is not the SNP. It is new labour. And sure as hell we did not vote for labour to take control of Scotland neither in 2015, nor in 2016, nor in 2017, nor in 2019, nor in 2021.

    So no, we did not get what we voted for. But that is what happens in a colony, is it not? There is no democracy, just the illusion of it. Elections are meaningless. They are not a way for the people to express their democratic will. The are a tool to overrule the democratic will of the people of Scotland and to implement a pre-determined result chosen by the establishment under a faux and rather thin veneer of democracy.

  101. And spouse
    Ignored
    says:

    So do we have to hope that at next weeks “bonding meeting” actually becomes a shambles! Should members walk out? It’s the only chance of getting rid of the virus that has infiltrated the party. It needs revolution because it’s certainly not evolving.
    Instead of letting this drag on, we should agree to abandon the SNP totally unless the party chooses a real leader. One we can trust.

  102. Stoker
    Ignored
    says:

    @ Paul Davis on 7 October 2023 at 8:35 am:

    Fairly accurate comment and not much anyone can take issue with. That is, other than this line of utter shite: “namely that the one chance of independence came in 2014 and the SNP blew it.”

    A complete distortion of the reality. On the run up to the actual vote, against the might of a Unionist media that lied and deceived relentlessly, the ‘YES’ side was taking the lead in the polls. Then the Unionists played their final dirty trick of the campaign and introduced ‘The Vow’. A grand deception on a scale to trump anything the Unionists had previously done.

    What the Unionists did was a blatant breach of ‘The Edinburgh Agreement’, and if you don’t know what that means i suggest you go educate yourself because i’m not about to do it for you. They introduced a third option/offer into proceedings, with that ‘Vow’, which The Edinburgh Agreement (signed by both sides) was meant to prevent. That, as they say these days, was a game changer.

    Your comment tells me you are either clueless to the facts of 2014 or your guilty of the very thing you are accusing others of? Your guilty of “hiding away from the unpalatable truth”. So to say that the “SNP blew it” is not only simplicity in the extreme, it’s another blatant Unionist deception. Just like all the convenient air-brushing out of history the lies and deceptions peddled by the BritNat Unionists and their media machine.

    Yes, Salmond got 2 or 3 things wrong. But he brought the indy movement from a meagre 27%(?) right up to almost snatching victory from the jaws of defeat. Then the BritNats did what they have a well-earned reputation for doing, played dirty and introduced their trump card, ‘The Vow’. *THAT* is the reality.

  103. Mac
    Ignored
    says:

    It was always a curiosity to me that the people who actively participated in the attempted stitch-up of Alex Salmond will repeatedly mention him joining RT to host his own show.

    I never understood at the time why that was a such a big deal to them. But it is mentioned over and over again…

    Now I realize that RT move by Salmond touched a massive raw nerve and I suspect it points directly at the ultimate source of the stitch-up. That was a potential convergence that they really did not like. Alex and Vl@d discussing nationalism over a beer or two… can you imagine.

    I think joining RT may have played a far more significant role in triggering (them and) the stitch-up than any of us may fully realize.

  104. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    TURABDIN says:

    To put a certain cat among certain pigeons, Scotland has a Muslim FM, no probs with that if only he had the «cojones», when might a Catholic get the job?
    Too radical?

    I didn’t think Scotland would be happy to have any ‘Holy Willie’ in the job.

    Maybe there is confusion as to what ‘Muslim’ means. Maybe Muslim/Asian is interchangeable.

    It’s quite weird!

    Frankly it gets up my nose hearing Humza say I am Muslim, proud Muslim, first Muslim not because he’s Muslim but because he’s a Holy Willie or pretending to be.

    It would be equally jarring to hear his equivalent say I am a Free Presbyterian, Proud Free Presbyterian, First Free Presbyterian Christian or Roman Catholic, Proud Roman Catholic,

    When you make these announcements people make a judgement as to what your beliefs are.
    I know very little about all these religions but I don’t think Free Presbyterians believe in same sex marriage, abortion etc so you would expect a Free Presbyterian to vote for these things.

    I understand Muslims don’t believe in same sex marriage, abortion, homosexuality & sex changes.

    Humza the Muslim believes in all those things which is really weird.

    What’s his game is he a Muslim and pretending not to be or isn’t he a Muslim?

    How can you be a proud Muslim and not believe in the teachings of Islam?

  105. stuart mctavish
    Ignored
    says:

    On bright side, if rumours of 17,000 postal votes have merit, the old stereotype of rugby being a game for only conservative supporters will have been properly debunked.

    Indeed, given what it would infer about the percentage of the constituency’s voters that must currently be abroad, it also suggests English efforts to trick Scots into hating success (presumably in hope of keeping posh totty closer to home) might be at its end – particularly once the beneficiaries of the holidaymaker vote are factored in and it becomes clear that limiting efforts to fostering hatred of toaries will no longer be enough!

  106. Breeks
    Ignored
    says:

    Comparisons between Labour and the SNP simply remind me of Orwell’s Animal Farm, specifically where man became pig and pig became man, and you could no longer tell them apart.

    I very much agree Confused has a great comment at 12:27am… I would go further… Perhaps the fact Western Governments are easier for the CIA to manipulate is the reason why these “friendly” governments are not bombed into submission and made to suffer Maidan style regime change / insurgencies, or shock and awe bombed into the stone age.

    It also begs questions about whether Scotland’s Independence aspirations are held in check by much deeper factors than our politicians attending inductions in the USA.

    It’s not that I believe it to be so, but for arguments sake, let’s suppose Colette Walker did spectacularly well in Rutherglen, and let’s suppose ALBA was running at 45% support… is it credible / possible that the hoax played upon Scotland is a whole different order of mass indoctrination and coordinated disinformation… How would we know? We have no super-user access to the system. How do we know the whole paradigm isn’t a complete illusion/ fabrication? Who do we trust to tell us the truth?

    If the USA can reach out to depose an elected government perched right on the Border of Mother Ruskia in weapons range of Moscow and the Black Sea Fleet, it hardly seems much of a challenge to disrupt and oppress a burgeoning Independence Movement in Bonnie Scotchland.

    Indeed, with the army of wretched Proud-Scot-Buts already determined to sell out Scotland’s rights and interests before anybody is even asking them to, then Scotland has a standing army of 5th Columnists in a literal sense of the word.

    The expression comes from the Spanish Civil war .. look it up. It’s a fitting description.

  107. Stoker
    Ignored
    says:

    Further to my post @ 9:49 am:

    And the fact that Salmond took the indy movement from a meagre 27% to the verge of victory, against a relentless filthy corrupt BritNat media, scared the utter life out of the Unionists. So much so that we, not in my lifetime anyway, will *NEVER* see London agreeing to another referendum. And this time we would be starting from somewhere around the 50% mark if recent polling is to be believed. Either way we would be starting from a much stronger position as well as being older and wiser to the BritNat tactics.

    There will *NEVER* be another referendum agreement from London, no matter what colour of rosette occupies Downing Street. Anyone thinking a Labour government will grant an S30 is living a lie in a land of delusion. They are playing the Unionist game of leading the indy movement down a darkened alley for another mugging. It is imperative we come up with an entirely different way of taking back our right to self-determination because it is *NEVER* going to happen via a referendum with London’s participation.

  108. Mia
    Ignored
    says:

    “I think joining RT may have played a far more significant role in triggering (them and) the stitch-up than any of us may fully realize”

    Of course it did. It showed he was the real pro-independence leader deal and therefore not prepared to tow the line and behave as another of USA’s puppets. The UK tory party is flooded with rich Russian donors, so I very much doubt they would be as alarmed by his intervention in RT as USA would have been.

    Having so many elements of Scotland’s politics going to USA in “training” programmes and watching in real time how the approach to foreign policy and attitude towards Israel has changed since the political fraud took over, shows quite clearly, in my personal view, who is really controlling Scotland’s politics, and it ain’t just “Westminster”.

    The Rev’s article “All the jolly boys and girls” paints a picture of its own. How many of those in the picture would go then to attempt to bring down the most popular pro-indy blog site and to destroy the reputation of the man who represented the biggest political threat to the continuity of the union?

    Was it a coincidence? Do coincidences exist in politics?

    Keeping the “deterrent” in Scotland’s territorial waters, control over Scotland’s vast oil reserves and keeping Scotland geopolitical position under the control of NATO must be a far, far bigger deal than many of us ever recognised.

  109. Breastplate
    Ignored
    says:

    Mac @ 9:25am,
    Shashi Tharoor chronicles exactly this in his book Inglorious Empire.

    How Britain turned one of the richest nations on the planet to one of the poorest.

  110. Mac
    Ignored
    says:

    Hmmm I am starting to really warm to this whole idea now…

    So instead of saying ‘we want to become Independent (to regain our sovereignty) and join the EU (to give most of it away again), let’s say instead we want to become Independent and join BRICS (instead of the EU).

    Oh yes… I can the hear the dummies getting spat into low earth orbit already.

    Plus we’d get a great deal on high speed trains, ferries that work, and just about any large scale infrastructure project you can think of.

  111. Captain Yossarian
    Ignored
    says:

    Stoker – “Then the BritNats did what they have a well-earned reputation for doing, played dirty and introduced their trump card, ‘The Vow’.”

    The most sordid, putrid fandango ever to occur in UK politics was the Fabiani Inquiry. The “BritNats” looked-on and asked themselves: “How could this be happening here in the UK.”

    That was the first domino to fall and what has happened since then for the SNP, was always going to happen. I have Nationalists in the family and independence is dead for 20-years.

    A great many people that voted “Yes” in 2014 are looking-on and will never vote “Yes” again. That is now “baked-in” as they say and Branchform is hanging over your heads like an axe.

    Are Labour any better than the SNP? No, Labour are exactly the same, with only (a few) with more talented people.

    You should have elected Kate Forbes.

  112. Mac
    Ignored
    says:

    Wow… why has this never occurred to me before.

    We go for independence and join BRICS!

    That is the future folks not some woke nightmare run by total sell outs.

    I don’t even know if I am joking here anymore. It is a very appealing idea.

  113. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    What are we voting for in a General Election?

    We are voting for who should be in power at Westminster.

    How can the votes of a country 1/8th of a size of the
    neighbouring country determine anything?

    I think may have been said many times before maybe it needs to be put in simpler terms.

    Lets have a Tug of war.

    One side has 80 people pulling the other side has 800 people pulling.

    Who will win?
    Is it a fair game?

    The 80 people say this isn’t a fair game we don’t want to play anymore
    The leader of the 800 side team says you can’t stop playing there is no way out.

    The 800 side team leader says we love this game! It’s a winner.

    The 80 side team are playing a losing game but they continue.

    It’s a game with English rules for English games.

  114. Tinto Chiel
    Ignored
    says:

    Mac @9.54: “Now I realize that RT move by Salmond touched a massive raw nerve and I suspect it points directly at the ultimate source of the stitch-up. That was a potential convergence that they really did not like. Alex and Vl@d discussing nationalism over a beer or two… can you imagine.

    I think joining RT may have played a far more significant role in triggering (them and) the stitch-up than any of us may fully realize.”

    Yes, and remember also his remark that the 1993 NATO bombing of Belgrade was “an act of unpardonable folly”. Our modern-day Bourbons forget nothing about those who step dangerously out of line, as Craig Murray can confirm.

  115. Ruby
    Ignored
    says:

    Captain Yossarian says:
    https://wingsoverscotland.com/the-surge/comment-page-1/#comment-2794151

    You said last week that you were leaving Wings for two years. What happened did you get ordered back to work?

    The most sordid, putrid fandango ever to occur in UK politics was the Fabiani Inquiry. The “BritNats” looked-on and asked themselves: “How could this be happening here in the UK.”

    Did you all cheer and say it’s great that this is happening?
    Nothing like this could ever happen outside Scotland in our our precious United Kingdom?

    I have Nationalists in the family and independence is dead for 20-years.

    I don’t get that!
    Is it because you have Nationalists in your family that independence is dead for 20-years.
    Sounds like just another meaningless Unionist flame-bait

    A great many people that voted “Yes” in 2014 are looking-on and will never vote “Yes” again. That is now “baked-in” as they say and Branchform is hanging over your heads like an axe.

    Did you just make that up?

    You should have elected Kate Forbes.

    Who are you talking to?
    Who should have elected Kate Forbes

  116. cirsium
    Ignored
    says:

    @Mac, 9.25
    I would recommend reading this entire speech as it is a master class in modern day Nationalism versus Globalism from the world’s leading nationalist. He uses a different word, civilizations, and it is a much better word, but it amounts to the same thing.

    It’s a superb speech and worth studying. What should a nation offer its people? This is an extract from a speech made in 2021 which put the cat among the pigeons of the WEF crowd

    “First, everyone must have comfortable living conditions, including housing and affordable transport, energy and public utility infrastructure. Plus environmental welfare, something that must not be overlooked.

    “Second, everyone must be sure that they will have a job that can ensure sustainable growth of income and, hence, decent standards of living. Everyone must have access to an effective system of lifelong education, which is absolutely indispensable now and which will allow people to develop, make a career and receive a decent pension and social benefits upon retirement.

    “Third, people must be confident that they will receive high-quality and effective medical care whenever necessary, and that the national healthcare system will guarantee access to modern medical services.

    “Fourth, regardless of the family income, children must be able to receive a decent education and realise their potential. Every child has potential.
    This is the only way to guarantee the cost-effective development of the modern economy, in which people are perceived as the end, rather than the means.

    Only those countries capable of attaining progress in at least these four areas will facilitate their own sustainable and all-inclusive development. These areas are not exhaustive, and I have just mentioned the main aspects.”

    your comment at 10.26
    let’s say instead we want to become Independent and join BRICS (instead of the EU)…. Plus we’d get a great deal on high speed trains, ferries that work, and just about any large scale infrastructure project you can think of.

    I like the sound of that.

  117. Viscount Ennui
    Ignored
    says:

    Re MI5

    Trying to think through the new MI5 strategy for Scotland.
    Obviously, and it goes without saying, that MI5 are charged with keeping Faslane within UK territorial control and so independence must be suppressed at all costs.
    But the second consideration during the Corbyn years was to stifle Scottish Labour so that a Tory majority could be gained and then sustained. That mean covert support for a foot-dragging SNP and the neutralisation of Salmond.
    Job done.
    Very effective too.
    But something changed.
    2 possibilities:
    1. Starmer. A very conservative Labour leader who looks like he will inherit the Tory mantle due to the sheer cock-uppery of the Conservative Party. He poses no threat and the Corbynistas are powerless.
    2. An external disruption. Perhaps an international fraud investigation into Gupta which has intruded on the normal whheeler-dealing that kept Sturgeon safe and which cannot be dismissed. Branchform is the smokescreen for much bigger issues and it would not surprise me if “insufficient evidence” emerged to prosecute the key protagonists – for the simple reason that they know where the bigger bodies are buried.
    So, if I were directing MI5 at the moment, I would want Labour in power both north and south of the border.
    A rump nationalist movement can be dealt with quite easily by simply releasing periodically evidence of the scandals that occurred during NS’s reign. The trump card being Salmondgate which can be kept up the sleeve to keep her and Swinney quiet.
    The only way to escape this is for the indepence movement to kill-off the SNP and re-group around a credible alterntaive.
    Whatever happens next, NS has done her job and will be rewarded heavily.

  118. Ebenezer Scroggie
    Ignored
    says:

    “Perhaps the British Government will buy her and hubby a camper van as a big thank you for f***ing Scotland over in a style not seen since Thatcher’s days.”

    He/they have already got one. Very profitably bought with SNP funds.

    The profit comes from the fact that the purchase price of £170,620 was paid in the doldrums of Covid. The going rate for the same vehicle is now £140k.

    Quite legitimately, the accountants declared the depreciation policy and have marked down the current valuation by the normal declared percentage for such items as office equipment and vehicles, so he can pay back something like £60k for a vehicle which is actually worth £140k.

    Kerching!

    The SNumPtie membership are such suckers!

  119. John Main
    Ignored
    says:

    @Breeks says:7 October, 2023 at 10:11 am

    If the USA can reach out to depose an elected government perched right on the Border of Mother Ruskia

    But they didn’t and they can’t. We can all sleep easy tonight, folks.

    Still, it’s the only explanation available to a narrow strand of so-called Scottish nationalists who just can’t accept that any other sovereign nation might be prepared to fight for their very own land, freedom, culture and language.

    Rather than accept the very poor example us Scots show in comparison with true freedom fighters, poor old Breeks has to invent some pretzel conspiracy instead.

    Sad.

  120. John Main
    Ignored
    says:

    @Mac says:7 October, 2023 at 10:26 am

    Plus we’d get a great deal on high speed trains, ferries that work, and just about any large scale infrastructure project you can think of

    Sure, and we’d also get to sample real colonisation and colonialism, just like every other third-world dump who’s rulers have sold out their countries for “belt & road” type “development”.

    But don’t worry, your dummy is safe. Quite frankly, nobody cares.

  121. Edward McPhee
    Ignored
    says:

    Has anyone ever listened to Lewis Capaldi song “How This Ends” give it a listen and just think of Useless

  122. Cameron Lochiel
    Ignored
    says:

    The Sturge

  123. Castlerockson
    Ignored
    says:

    Watching Starmer and Baillie on the stage celebrating Labour`s win in Rutherglen reminded exactly why, despite my distate of the current state of the NuSNP, I could never vote Labour in any election. I have no issue with Sarwar, yes he is loud and aggresive at times, but at least there is passion there, something that neither of the forst two will ever posess.

    Yet a vote for the NuSNP is giving them a vote that says, more of the same please, when it is their mismangement of key issues in Scotland, their awful deal with the odious Greens, the continuos lies that an independence vote is just an election away, only for reasons to then be given that now is not the time. The frankly awful election campaign to replace Sturgeon that ended up with damaged goods being replaced by defective
    goods was yet another nail in the NuSNP`s coffin. Sadly the NuSNP needs to go into opposition, not just in the number of Scottish seats at Westminster, but also at Holyrood. This is a party that needs to go back and have an intensive look at itself and wonder where it lost the support of the Scottish electorate becuase a lot of that electorate will never vote Unionist, but will simply abstain from elections.



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