These Words Are My Own
It’s been another fabulous day on the front pages for Nicola Sturgeon.
The stories were triggered by a speech in the House Of Commons from Tory MP Sir David Davis, which you can watch below.
(It was meant to be a much longer speech, but Davis had to truncate it on the hoof from 10 minutes to four after his speaking time was cut.)
Sturgeon’s response – issued through her yappy little Scrappy-Doo lapdog Aamer Anwar but written in the first person – was to lash out in blind fury.
Readers can only admire the sheer jawdropping audacity of Nicola Sturgeon calling someone else – someone with more decency and integrity in his pinkie nail than she has in her entire bloated body – a “coward”, just a couple of days after she’d hastily U-turned on her professed willingness to publish the written statement she made to police on Operation Branchform.
Below are the words Davis said, as recorded in Hansard, but let us be clear: this is now me saying them. My views are entirely in keeping with those of Sir David. What he thinks about the matter is also what I think. His views are my views. Our opinions are entirely as one. What he said is what both of us honestly and sincerely believe to be true. So I’m saying the exact same words here for myself, outside of Parliament’s protection, with no quotemarks.
Last month’s sentencing of Nicola Sturgeon’s husband exposed the real reasons behind the Scottish Government’s persecution of Alex Salmond. From 2010 to 2022, Peter Murrell abused his position to embezzle almost £500,000 from the SNP to buy luxury items. He used SNP money to buy a £33,000 Volkswagen Golf.
Then he stole £57,000 to buy a Jaguar car. Further luxuries included handbags, an £850 gold pendant, four separate coffee machines costing £9,000, luxury kitchenware, at least 26 fountain pens costing nearly £21,000, and two £350 Dyson hairdryers – for a man with no hair. Really?
Then, of course, there is the infamous £124,000 motorhome. Did Sturgeon not wonder where he got the money for all the vehicles, the kitchenware, the handbags, the pens, the pendant she loved? After all, who used the Dyson hairdryers in that household?
My view on Sturgeon’s denial is clear: she is lying. She knew full well what her husband was doing and how those luxury purchases were funded. That Murrell was a thief was obvious in the 1980s, when he stole from Alex Salmond. Salmond told Sturgeon it was deeply unwise to keep her husband on as chief executive, but she kept him in place, enabling his crimes for years.
Eventually, in March 2021, three members of the SNP’s finance committee withdrew and resigned, blaming “chaotic” and “incompetent” financial management. In their own words, they were on the receiving end of a “hostile” backlash, driven by Sturgeon’s “toxic culture”. They resigned in protest and were later followed by the treasurer of the organisation. Sturgeon told colleagues at the meeting where those first resignations happened:
“There are no reasons for people to be concerned about the party’s finances”
No reasons. And when the treasurer resigned, she ignored it.
Sturgeon was part of a cover-up, using her position to suppress justice. She behaved dishonourably and dishonestly, but her most evil act was stitching up Alex Salmond to hide the truth. When he was considering going on the National Executive himself, the risk to the conspirators was clear: here is a numerate man who could not be silenced.
So what did they do? In Salmond’s own words, there was “a malicious and concerted” attempt to remove him from public life in Scotland by “a range of individuals within the Scottish Government”.
Senior Scottish Government figures created a procedure for dealing with sexual harassment allegations that deliberately targeted Salmond. The procedure was so biased that a judge ruled it “unlawful” and “tainted by apparent bias”.
Having lost that, senior figures brought prosecutions against him, but Salmond was acquitted on all charges by a majority female jury, before a female judge. It now appears clear that those actions, to destroy a man’s reputation and life, were motivated by a desire to hide their own crimes.
There are many unresolved questions. What happened with the £60,000-worth of items that were dropped from the indictment: the hairstylers, the lingerie and the books by Sturgeon’s favourite authors? Murrell was clearly protecting Sturgeon by removing items that incriminated her.
In the investigation, the police had further questions for Sturgeon, but prosecutors stopped them from putting them. Those prosecutors worked for the Lord Advocate, the principal legal adviser to the Scottish Government – a clear conflict of interest.
There is a clear pattern of secrecy, obstruction and power used to protect power – a pattern started by Sturgeon. Scotland needs a fresh start. That starts with a judicial inquiry into this entire sordid scandal, because it is a scandal that cost Alex Salmond his life.
So there we go. I have no Parliamentary privilege. If Nicola Sturgeon wants to sue me for defamation, nothing prevents her. She can stand up in a court and be cross-examined on the matter and a judge can decide if I’m allowed an opinion. See you in the witness box, Nicola? Come and make my heart fly.
Absolutely spot on.
If there is a requirement for a fundraiser for legal fees, you can rely on a donation from this direction.
I suspect there will be no such requirement, because – as another Tommy can tell you – a libel court is often not the final destination when the worms get the tin-opener out.
Q to AI – Sturgeons head bobs around when she seems under pressure or maybe lying. She also blinks a lot under the same circumstances. What does that body language suggest.
AI – The specific physical tics you are observing—rapid blinking and erratic head movement under pressure—are recognized in behavioral psychology as classic indicators of cognitive overload and acute stress.While body language alone cannot scientifically prove a lie, behavioral and interrogation experts view these non-verbal micro-expressions as a sign that a person’s brain is working intensely to manage a threat. When applied to a highly polished, media-trained politician like Nicola Sturgeon, these specific tics reveal a hidden psychological battle.
1. Rapid Blinking (The “Flutter” Response)A normal resting blink rate is roughly 15 to 20 blinks per minute. When a person is challenged or lying and their blink rate dramatically spikes, it signals several physiological shifts:The Cognitive Burden: Lying or withholding complex information requires immense mental processing power. The brain must simultaneously recall the true facts, suppress them, construct a plausible alternative narrative, and monitor the interviewer’s reaction. This massive spike in “cognitive load” frequently manifests as rapid, uncontrollable blinking.
Under interrogation or intense questioning, the sympathetic nervous system triggers a fight-or-flight response. The accompanying rush of adrenaline causes physiological changes, including dry eyes and increased heart rate, forcing the eyelids to blink rapidly to lubricate the eye. Psychologically, rapid blinking can act as a subconscious barrier gesture. The mind is momentarily trying to “shut out” the stressful environment or the person asking the threatening question.
2. Head Bobbing and Jerky Neck Movements. When a person’s head tilts, bobs, or moves erratically while they are speaking defensively, it indicates a struggle between internal emotion and external control. Highly trained speakers are adept at keeping their voices steady and their words measured. However, true stress almost always leaks out through the extremities and the neck. If the words coming out of her mouth are calm, but her head is bobbing or jerking, it shows a lack of alignment—the body is physically resisting the narrative the mouth is delivering.
When a person is forced to sit still under a camera’s glare, the immense fight-or-flight energy generated by stress has nowhere to go. Because they cannot walk away or fight, the body channels that physical tension into micro-movements, resulting in head nodding, bobbing, or rapid neck adjustments to release muscular tightness. Aggressive head movements or sharp bobs during a denial often function as a physical punctuation mark. The individual is subconsciously trying to “shake off” the accusation or forcefully project authority to make the audience accept their version of events, even when their internal confidence is fractured.The reason these tics are so noticeable in Sturgeon is because they directly contradict her established baseline behavior.The Polished Mask: Throughout her career, Sturgeon was praised by communications experts for her exceptional non-verbal discipline, steady eye contact, and relaxed, open hand gestures. When an observer sees a sharp departure from that calm baseline—such as the sudden onset of rapid blinking or erratic head movements during interviews about Operation Branchform or the Salmond inquiry—it proves that the external pressure has breached her media training. Her brain is fighting a losing battle to maintain the public “mask” of calm indifference while dealing with profound internal panic.
Well said all round.
The dogs in the street know who did what to whom and when and why.
Agent Sturgeon has been weighed and measured and found wanting.
But being as dumb as a rock and surrounded by sycophants she simply doesn’t realise it.
Excellent ? Stu. Truly excellent.
Excellent ? Stu. Truly excellent.
Sturgeon is unlikely to ever want to face cross examination in court on any of the issues you raise.
And when she shirks the challenge…
Well done, smart and brave.
Oh dear, Rev. You will never get on in public life. Far too principled and brave.
I do admire the tenacity and antennae.
It was years ago that you identified here what had happened and what the inevitable consequences would be. It is at once electrifying and depressing that it is all coming true like a slow motion car crash – a noble cause has been perverted by perverts.
If you need a crowd fund – I am in.
“What happened with the £60,000-worth of items that were dropped from the indictment: the hairstylers, the lingerie and the books by Sturgeon’s favourite authors?”
This is what I don’t understand. Why hasn’t this been followed up on? If it was removed from the charges against Murrell, then what is the explanation for these items? If it was Murrell, why were they removed? If it wasn’t, why haven’t the police followed up (or, more pertinently, bee *allowed* to follow up)?
What is the explanation for £60,000 worth of items that are of no obvious use to the SNP?
The COPFS apparently justify that the dropping of £58.3k of stolen goods from the indictment on the grounds that it would have no impact on the sentence that Murrell was going to receive.
There’s clearly big questions about the probity of the COPFS as well as Police Scotland – and indeed the suggestion of COPFS and Police Scotland malfeasance looms large.
AH
But, but..
“She loved that necklace, so why should she” surrender any of the items??!?
Honestly, who speaks like that except gangsters molls?
“I’m in the clear” More gangster talk.
I’ve seen it suggested – can’t remember where – that these items were removed because he “bought them with his own money”.
I’m not convinced by that, because
a) “his own money” has a rather fluid definition, and
b) why was he so scrupulous in separating out these particular items for legitimate purchase? He presumably didn’t expect ever to be caught.
Puzzled me as well. Private Eye points out that the answer might be that as he wasn’t convicted of the £60,000 it cannot be part of a proceeds of crime recovery. So someone gets to keep the loot.
Perhaps the £58,735 worth of items were dropped from the indictment as part of a deal where he agreed not to reclaim the remaining £60,000 of the loan the SNP still owes him.
« The Shadow of that hyddeous strength,
Sax myle and more it is of length. »
– ‘Ane Dialog betuix Experience and ane Courteour of the Miserabyll Estait of the World’
(Sir David Lyndsay of the Mount, c. 1486-1555)
We are all Stuart Campbell. A couple of quid from each of us and She’s toast. Unlike the sycophants that back her up, we’ll put our money where our mouths are. Hopefully learned from Alex’s case though.
The dam is ready to absolutely burst.
Sturgeon is being exposed for the foul individual that she is. Her lying and perjurious behaviour is now becoming exposed for all to see. And it will not just be Sturgeon who will go down alone for her criminality.
Perjury, false witness, criminal conspiracy, the covering up of crime will be causing many to contemplate their future. As one particular funder of legal support to the Salmond fight said recently, his principal lawyers have accumulated devastating evidence, and that certain elites should be enjoying their freedom, whilst they can.
The day of reckoning for Sturgeon and those who aided and abetted her in an utterly shocking criminal enterprise is drawing nigh.
This is going to be the allegorical bloodbath for the guilty and they know it.
Well, things are bubbling along nicely…
Just to keep everything tidy, matters requiring attention:
1. The “ring-fenced” fund. I’d still be shouting “Fraud!” I know it’s a harder charge to make stick, but the fact that the SNP never set up any ring-fenced account in the first place clearly indicates that they never had any intention of ring-fencing the money from the outset.
2. The risibly implausible expenditures on “IT”, “office refurbishment”, and “audio-visual equipment”. I don’t have the exact sums at hand, but by memory they far exceed either the ring-fenced fund or the sums Murrell was charged with. Were these ever properly investigated and what was the outcome?
3. The claims by “a businessman” that he gave tens of thousands in cash donations to the SNP. Did that money ever even find its way into the SNP accounts in the first place? Was this ever properly investigated and what was the outcome?
3. The ludicrous decision not to charge Beattie, which has flown under the radar with so much attention being given to Sturgeon. How could you possibly not have enough evidence to charge Beattie? If he wasn’t actively complicit with Murrell’s larceny then he was the most criminally negligent treasurer in the history of treasury. Which is a crime. Other than “Er… because if we charge Beattie then we have to charge Sturgeon too”, what possible rationale could there be for not charging him?
4. The “YES” accounts…
5. Plus the substance of the ring-fenced fund, plus the stitch-up, plus the billions handed out by ScotGov to assorted perverts, fetishists, cross-dressers, publishers, publicists, and other assorted pals and hangers-on…
6. Those CalMac ferry contracts. Just incompetence, or worse?
The ferries scandal has all the hallmarks of a corrupt, money laundering scam. Obscene and unjustifiable cost increases throughout the “contract(s)” signed off by public officials without any serious scrutiny, Has anyone checked for offshore accounts?
MI5 is working on a plan to save her.
Apparently they are not averse to lying in court if it involves a cover-up.
It is regrettable that the House of Commons at Westminster had to be the channel through which Sturgeon/Murrell might be forced to account for her actions. The ‘architects’ of devolution to Holyrood can be recognised as saboteurs of Independence in part through withholding Privilege, as recently exercised by David Davis.
There is plentiful laughter, here, at the humiliation and shaming of Mrs. Murrell and the impotent rage of her Solicitor, (solicitor in an older profession?). On the balance of probabilities, they will not proceed at Law but I really hope they do.
I will draw inferrences if they do not act, including that they need to conceal far worse offences than embezzlement and fraud.
Calling out the Alphabetties would be an excellent concommittant.
Not wanting to rain on your parade, Jay (well maybe just a wee shower), but you’ve already noted one of the elements of this story that will have hundreds of thousands of Scots on Nicola’s side.
Hint: The WM HoC
Then there’s another element seen on the screen grab at top.
Hint: Tory
Far from being a blindly furious lashing out response, Nicola’s solicitor’s statement will engage positively with hundreds of thousands more Scots:
Hint: Old Boy’s Club
But you know all this. You know how Scottish Tribalism works.
And that’s before we get to Nicola’s secret weapon. The one that gets near half the entire Scottish population on her side.
Hint: She’s a wee wifie in a big, bad man’s world.
I wish Rev Stu well, but I think she’ll ignore him and move on.
As for the court of Wings BTL public opinion, that, whilst noisy and entitled, has never influenced anything yet.
I doubt it will this time either.
If Scots really want change in Scotland, they are gonna have to stop sitting about waiting for somebody else to do it for them (such as an English, titled, Tory) and do it themselves. It really is that simple.
Hatey, that’s one of your worst efforts ever.
We’ll see, but Sturgeon can’t keep running from this one. She’s already squirming obviously.
Nobody cares that it is WM (with hardly anyone in the chamber), or that it’s a “Tory” (a Tory who the Tories hate).
The alphabettys will inevitably be called out when the malfeasance case funded by millionaire businessman and rock god drummer Paul McManus proceeds.
She will flee justice by going abroad. Where? That could be revealing.
The alphabetty accusers will be checking their passports too no doubt.
Dubai? America? I’m sure m15 will pave the way.
I am still of the hope that at least one of the alphabetties will realise the error of their ways, and come clean. The grave injustice they were persuaded to persecute on an innocent man to keep him out of Scots politics and the fact it led to his untimely death should hang heavy on their conscience. What were they promised to make them corrupt themselves. Their statements allowed Nicola and Peter to continue with the destruction of the independence minded SNP. I hope they repent!
“What happened with the £60,000-worth of items that were dropped from the indictment: the hairstylers, the lingerie and the books by Sturgeon’s favourite authors? Murrell was clearly protecting Sturgeon by removing items that incriminated her.”
How could Murrell remove the charges?
The utterly corrupt and rotten to the core Crown Office removed the charges to protect Sturgeon and the conspirators.
I will not be satisfied with only Sturgeon and the conspirators going to jail.
Those at Police Scotland and the Crown Office who abused their powers to protect Sturgeon and the conspirators must also go to jail, with longer sentences.
Utmost thanks to David Davis for exposing the utter corruption of the Scottish state.
Can he not also name the conspirators?
I cannot wait to see Sturgeon and “her yappy little Scrappy-Doo lapdog Aamer Anwar” in court against the Rev. Stuart Campbell.
“exposing the utter corruption of the Scottish state”
There is no such entity as a ‘Scottish state’, yet, unless I have missed the full recovery of our national sovereignty.
All I see is a UK colonial administration comprising a co-opted national party elite, Whitehall’s finest, and the dubious values of the colonizer.
Well said, Alf.
You, of course, must be withholding the additional taxes levied on Scottish residents by the non-existent Scottish state.
And should you be taken to task over that, or any other matter, you must be insisting on your right for English law to apply to your case.
Do let us know how it all works out for you.
BTW. What did you make of that football team in the US? The one with a name superficially identical to “Scotland”?
“Prick”.
[If the helmet fits etc….]
Oh well, England firing six (yes, you heard it right folks SIX) goals against the French – widely fancied as the best football team in the world.
Six goals! Better than a single deflected effort for their entre campaign for sure. Enough to get Confused’s knickers in a twist. 😀
“Rosbif” eh? Hah! Make mine a roast bone-in rib joint, washed down with an ES Primitivo with all the trimmings. 😀
Honestly? I think we had a shot, we only lacked belief. But, a decent effort notwithstanding. 🙂
Perhaps you could clarify, CC.
Does that make England First Loser, or Second Loser? 🙂
Bronze medal in theory, but in reality, yes, “first loser”.
Ach. Great game of footy tho, and awesome to see English and French players sharing a “huddle” and great sportsmanship after the battle royale.
Sadly I drank far too much “Cheshire Cat” ale at the pub.
CC says: “SIX goals!” & “Sadly I drank far too much “Cheshire Cat” ale at the pub.”
Such a lacklustre supporter, I’m a wee bit disappointed you didn’t get all Bjørge Lillelien and go off on a proper passionate rant…
Something like: “Charles de Gaulle, Renault, Yves Saint Laurent, EDF, Vanessa Paradis, PSA Group, La Vache Qui Rit, Gérard Depardieu, your boys took a hell of a beating!”
😀
Fair do’s Dan. I’ll try and do better next time!
Masterstroke by Stuart to challenge the biggest coward, the biggest tractor and the biggest liar in Scottish history who has the audacity to call others cowards.
What a brass neck she has.
Always the victim, always.
Her time in court will come, Salmond will get justice.
A very ugly person, inside and out.
The SNP rot started when she took the wheel.
It’s the crap they spent the money on that gets people. A national scandal that involves the very highest of Scotland’s Civil service, Police Scotland and the Judiciary and now Westminster has pulled it’s privilege to speak on the matter.
For Hairdryers and Salt and Pepper grinders! WTF! Scotland got ripped off for pish and Ma Baker gives everyone the finger.
I,m in for the fund raiser. No rings and definitely no fences.
This is all fascinating Rev
Gaun yersel..
However one wee thing that whispers in my ear, amongst others you have confidential sources within the SNP.
You stridently want the SNP done and gone.
So what are your SNP sources motivations and to them what comes next?
Asking for a pal 🙂 ?!
“So what are your SNP sources motivations and to them what comes next?”
Postcolonial theory tells us that the colonizer’s political process and laws fail the people and delays independence, aided by a national party elite that is ‘co-opted by colonialism’.
The people then desert the party and the national party ‘disintegrates’.
The independence movement, thanks to a better understanding of the colonial reality of the people, then becomes a liberation movement and takes a different path toward independence.
Which is what we see: link to liberation.scot
Question.
Can the full 10min speech be entered into the record in the HOC or is it only content that had been actually spoken out loud?
Also, can the text of the full 10min speech be made available under Parliamentary Privalege, or is it, again, only verbalised content?
The other question that I’m scratching my head about is why.
Sturgeon is First Minister of her country.
The job comes with a very good salary, expense account, wonderful pension and power in her party to place her useless husband in a very well paid job where he appeared to do nothing worthwhile.
Why on earth would you risk everything by stealing party funds to buy idiotic luxury items such as £21,000 worth of pens.
How many pens each worth thousands would you carry around with you?
4 expensive coffee machines, what one for each room?
There must have been a complete mental breakdown by Sturgeon who lost all connection with reality.
It may well be within a mental institution but Sturgeon must be punished and locked up for a long time for her attempt at destroying Alex Salmond no matter the cost to Alex or the public purse.
She has no right to the stolen goods still in her possession nor that very lucrative pension.
If you need Anwar as your lawyer, you’re guilty as hell.
They used to say that about Beltrami.
“ Get me Beltrami” was the fabled injunction to the polis on arresting a crook of VERY high standing.
He reputedly saved several killers from the hangman’s noose.
In living memory of some graybeards here, the notorious Glasgow gangster, Arthur Thompson, was one of his clients.
I think he would have defended even Nicola Sturgeon.
I find it interesting that someone who claims to be ‘a feminist to her fingertips’ apparently left the financial management of the household entirely to her husband (‘I’m the man with the money’). That’s something that someone from my mother’s or grandmother’s generation would have done, and I’m no spring chicken.
Standing by for the fund raiser!
Does anyone know how and why the time allowed to David Davis MP was reduced to 4 minutes? It was a restriction most convenient for Mrs Murrell and any State Officials whose purposes she may have served.
David Davis’s thesis appeared to be that action against Alex Salmond was a scheme to protect the Murrells againt consequences of financial crime but could there, none-the-less, have been higher level political purpose involved? Occam’s Razor is not necessarily the correct tool for finding the truth.
You’re onto something there, Jay.
Keep going until you’ve uncovered evidence for extra-terrestrial interference and then wind back a little.
As you say, the more outlandish, the more likely it is to be true, but always bear in mind that wise, old Scots saying:
“You’ve taken that one too far”
“Once a Tory Prick, always a Tory Prick” ?
Ah Wally, is there a sight so delightful, a sound so musical to the ear, or a scent so alluring, as that of a winking walrus flailing away with his flippers below his waist, bellowing childish, sweary words through a stinking mist of flying spittle, food fragments and halitosis as he frantically beats at his eternally bruised blubber.
The dawn of Scottish Independence and the integration of your beauty, strength, wit, wisdom and yes, glamour, into the new government of our great country can’t come soon enough.
Meantime, hae a haddie. There’s anither if ye can catch this ane richt oot the air.
“could there, none-the-less, have been higher level political purpose involved? ”
Yes there could. Alex Salmond could have been too likely to produce an independent Scotland for the liking of MI5 and their friends.
in 2017 Alex Salmond was putting a bid in to purchase the Scotsman Newspaper it was at this time the accusation against AS started. Is there a link here in also stopping AS purchasing the newspaper by both NS and WM(security forces)?
Now that really is interesting.
Getting control of The Scotsman would have given a nationalist slant to a major paper as opposed to a pretendy paper like The National.
Just think what could have been done with that! Just think of the red flags raised in MI5 HQ.
Oh what a tangled web. Straight out a John Le Carre novel.
Dubai? America? I’m sure m15 will pave the way.
Whatever somebody’s politics, this is both shameful and a disgrace beyond words. For this to occur in a developed country, supposedly a democratic country is beyond comprehension……. how? Why? As for that snivelling wretch Swinney – he’s in it up to his neck too of that there is no doubt. Idi Amin looks a saint next to this shower of corrupt, lying, self serving trough feeders.
I read here occasionally but never comment, however I doff my cap to you Mr Campbell. More power to you and all who are pushing hard to get to the truth. The SNP is bankrupt – morally and financially – and the sooner they are gone, dead and buried the better. Their passing should not be mourned. Those at the helm over the last 14 years should be the first to sign in to the new jail.
Whatever ones political stance, everyone who believes in truth and democracy should be 100% behind you here. Please keep it up, and turn the screw harder where you can.
Thank you
Scotland is not a country, it is a colony.
It cannot develop outside its colonialists’ interest.
The deeds to its land are held abroad (apart from the cairngorm national quango, an incubator for the likes of daniel alexander)
An oil and gas production unit with no refining facility.
Not a country.
…and its cherished legal system is viewed as an opt in option by the colonialists
Taking on a brit state asset. All da best
You, Sir, are the champion that Scotland needs right now.
Thank you for your valiant and tenacious pusuit of the TRUTH.
Thank you for everything you’ve done here Rev. I know who I believe…and it ain’t Nick-ola.
Blaming MI5 for sturgeons crimes against the Scottish people is as ridiculous and wishful thinking as the money spent on the pens and kitchen nic naks.
Since everyone is getting the boot into Cranky I would like to say in my very own words that Sturgeon has penis envy and hates her own femininity. She is also a psychotic, back stabbing little bastard. Just call my lawyers Burke and Hare if you want to sue me you ugly little Dyke.
“Since everyone is getting the boot into Cranky”
Let me just correct you there, Mark.
“Since everyone here is getting the boot into Cranky”
I feel all this is a little unfair.
In a fair world, nobody, who only a few years ago believed absolutely that Sturgeon was all that stood between them and a hideous, untimely death from Covid, would be allowed to stone her now.
What short memories people have, eh? And how quickly eternal gratitude withers.
Do remember that Sturgeon is one of the two “Shipman Sisters” with the now departed Freeman. And never forget that these two were responsible for the Covid deaths of many thousands of elderly people who were abruptly transferred from hospitals into care homes, allegedly on the basis that these elderly were mostly pro UK, and their deaths would aid an Indyref2 success.
Perhaps above all, it’s her sheer hypocrisy and sanctimonious nature that makes her so loathsome. Waxing about being kind, progressive and on the right side of history while behaving like a demon behind the scenes. I’ve never detested a politician more than Sturgeon. She must be jailed along with others in order for Scotland to move on. If Scotland is ever to be independent, we need to at least have the basics in place of a moral legal, police and political system.
” If Scotland is ever to be independent, we need to at least have the basics in place of a moral legal, police and political system.”
Surely wishful thinking, since we will be unlikely to find any such ‘moral system’ within a colonial society.
As Cesaire explained, on imperial ‘morality’:
“… that a nation which colonizes… is already a sick civilization, a civilization which is morally diseased..”
Aye, Alf.
Folk often propose in this place that us Scots should fix what we can’t possibly fix until we are an independent nation again … before we are an independent nation again.
Aye, Alf.
We have no choice. We have to be back-stabbing thieves, crims, degenerates and embezzlers. Epic fuckups too. Some big, English cants make us do it and then refuse to run away.
The AI site Prick’s mission is to divert, distract and divide. All day, every day; in the hope that the Scotch will give up hope.
Endless bollocks and round-in-circles “it’s all your own fault” unionist bullshit.
That’s why they call ‘him’ the “Site Prick”.
Lang time yet, arsehole.
THE GENIUS OF THE CROWD
By Charles Bukowski
There is enough treachery, hatred, violence, absurdity in the average
human being to supply any given army on any given day.
And the best at murder are those who preach against it,
and the best at hate are those who preach love,
and the best at war finally are those who preach peace.
Those who preach god, need god.
Those who preach peace do not have peace,
those who preach peace do not have love.
Beware the preachers,
beware the knowers,
beware those who are always reading books,
beware those who either detest poverty
or are proud of it,
beware those quick to praise,
for they need praise in return,
beware those who are quick to censor,
they are afraid of what they do not know.
Beware those who seek constant crowds,
for they are nothing alone,
beware the average man, the average woman,
beware their love, their love is average,
seeks average,
but there is genius in their hatred,
there is enough genius in their hatred to kill you,
to kill anybody,
not wanting solitude,
not understanding solitude,
they will attempt to destroy anything
that differs from their own.
Not being able to create art,
they will not understand art,
they will consider their failure as creators
only as a failure of the world.
Not being able to love fully,
they will believe your love incomplete,
and then they will hate you,
and their hatred will be perfect,
like a shining diamond,
like a knife,
like a mountain,
like a tiger,
like hemlock,
their finest art.
(There’s yer answer)
What did a tiger ever do to him?
There’s no hatred in a tiger, nor in any predator that ever lived.
Apart from man.
[“Apart from person” is more progressive, but far more lame]
What a stupid fucking meaningless interjection from Mr Answer Everything All Day Every Day (I Am Halfwit, Hear Me Roar!), the king of logorrhea. The more things change.
It is a bit of a stupid fucking meaningless poem, Onlooker, so just what did you expect?
And it doesn’t even rhyme.
“beware those quick to praise”
Didn’t you even read that bit?
“beware those who are quick to censor,
they are afraid of what they do not know”
Whoops! You must have skipped that bit too.
Stupid fucking meaningless interjections is what the Site Prick is programmed to do.
All day, every day. Rinse and repeat.
She won’t challenge you in the courts she’d have to use her own money.
…which doesn’t go that far these days in that london.
The portugese property looks like one of her husband’s more astute purchases.
I would be delighted to see the documentation of this transaction.
If you’re spending that much money on pens, hairdryers and ladies underwear, how could you be a legitimate purchaser?
At the time of his sentencing, when there was discussion about how he managed to qualify for legal aid despite seemingly having enough assets to pay the SNP back, it was asserted that he didn’t own the Portuguese property – he had inherited a part share in it, along with some of his relatives.
fair enough
Why this, why now – were my immediate thoughts on hearing Davis’s speech.
The speech looked like it was about Sturgeon, and sounded like it was about Salmond, but structurally, rhetorically, and politically, it was about Davis himself.
I think it was a personal positioning move… a visibility play, a brand reinforcement, and possibly a promotional manoeuvre (does he have a book deal in mind, I wonder).
The “dear old friend” framing around Salmond is rhetorical sugar to make the self-interest look noble.
Davis’s speech mainly served Davis himself… it was a personal visibility and relevance manoeuvre.
My feeling is that Davis’s timing fits a desire for renewed relevance, a desire to reinforce his ‘brand’, a desire to be seen as a moral authority, and a desire to be quoted.
If he does have a book, memoir, or political project coming, this behaviour is textbook.
Even if he doesn’t, the pattern is the same… he wants attention.
The speech’s structure reveals its purpose: it was crafted for media resonance, not political consequence.
Westminster privilege gave him a safe stage to perform on… high visibility, zero personal risk, and entirely in keeping with his past parliamentary theatrics.
In short, I believe Sturgeon and Salmond were props.
The performance was for Davis himself.
What a wily old parliamentary fox Davis is.
Davis’s speech was embarrassing for Sturgeon, but not dangerous.
It was theatre aimed at visibility – Davis’s, not a mechanism capable of harming her.
A minor obstacle, if even that, in Sturgeon’s journey, not a meaningful threat.
Indeed, it does all seem like a bit of theatre with certain scenes being scheduled and performed for the masses.
Eg. Murrell’s trial being held just after the election so lessening the influence on voters and impact on the result.
Plus the powers that be know full well what was going on and will undoubtably have all the communications like whatsapp messages used in the conspiracy to take Salmond out.
I jist commented a few days ago reminding folk again that Scotland had supposedly “pro self-governance elected individuals in Westminster that chose to remain silent, instead leaving David Davis to on occasions raise the matters.
(Readers note that there are hotlinks in blue in the article that will take you to previous articles re. David Davis which are definitely worth a read / re-read)
Has David Davis been particularly exercised and used parliamentary time and his privileged position to call out the massive fiscal corruption carried out by his own governing Party in relation to billions of taxpayer’s dosh going to certain individuals for dodgy covid contracts.
Putting to one side all of Northy’s “look at me” bloviating …
Both protagonists (Salmond and Sturgeon) are out of Scottish politics for good. Whilst we can all understand the desire for vengeance, serious pursuit of Indy should have other priorities.
I have to agree with the WGD mob. It ultimately doesn’t matter who is stoking the Indy civil war. The true winner of the Indy civil war won’t be anybody in favour of Indy.
Scotland already has everything it needs to finish its tribal support for the SNP for good. We should spend the next 3 years building the alternative to the SNP.
There can be no meaningful progress on independence until the SNP is at least rendered helpless and preferably utterly destroyed. I’d prefer the latter. The party will go down in history as a huge disappointment, effectively suicided by a small cabal of grifting mediocrities, spivs and woke extremists who were always far more motivated by retaining power for power’s sake than making progress on self determination.
Enough and more than enough of such people. We must do to them what Irish voters did to the IPP in 1918. Nothing less will do. If it takes the efforts of Stu and others to bankrupt them for malfeasance, then all right thinking Scots should be willing to support such efforts.
Even a rump SNP can’t be trusted to co-operate with other pro-independence parties or an umbrella movement, nor should we trust those to retain their sad attachment to the SNP: they are either irredeemably compromised by association or just terminally stupid.
I doubt 3 years is enough. The non-SNP parts of movement has signally failed so far to come up with any plausible alternative and certainly lacks any charismatic or capable leadership as far as I can see.
“The non-SNP parts of movement has signally failed so far to come up with any plausible alternative… as far as I can see.”
Andy, you appear not to have noticed the rupture in the movement caused by the SNP’s ‘neutral’ stance on independence and which over the last few years led thousands of former SNP members, myself included, to create Salvo and Liberate Scotland.
These individuals have since elected a LS committee to petition the United Nations on our right to self-determination on behalf of all Scots. LS are therefore following the established decolonization process that the UN set out and which has facilitated the independence and liberation of numerous former colonized peoples, now UN member states.
The ‘alternative’ approach that you (and the fast diminishing SNP rump) still maintain is that Scottish self-determination and decolonization somehow depends only on the goodness of our oppressor/colonizer and their mankit political and legal system. Do you not see the inevitable failure in such an approach and the direct link to the SNP’s subsequent ‘disintegration’ and rejection by the people?
I’m genuinely curious, Alf.
Of your “numerous former colonized peoples, now UN member states”, how many of these were split 50-50 on their support for Independence when the UN stepped in?
If the inhabitants of the Northern Isles choose to petition the UN to support their Independence from Scotland, on the pretext that they were illegally absorbed by Scotland against the wishes of their inhabitants, will the UN take their side?
@Alf 3.20pm
On the contrary Alf I’m quite aware of the rupture in the movement and of the creation of Salvo, Liberate Scotland and the petition to the UN.
I don’t maintain that our self determination “depends only on the goodness of our oppressor/colonizer and their mankit political and legal system” at all.
Indeed I’ve gone out of my way to point out the opposite. That in itself should tell us everything we need to know about your confused mindset. Or perhaps you’re just arguing in bad faith?
Scottish independence, or that of any people, is solely a matter for that people to decide. Making that principle a reality however is not a trivial pursuit.
The Scottish people, or at least the majority who we are now assured by polls support independence, have in their wisdom driven themselves up a cul-de-sac whereby it is at least in the short term unlikely that they can leverage that majority in to a coherent, workable plan to deliver independence in the short to medium term.
You and others may be right that the UN will be persuaded and become the deus ex machina that drops independence in to our laps. If it works, I’ll raise my glass to you all and admit I was wrong. The trouble is, I’m not buying it and from the levels of support, membership figures and (presumably?) financing behind it, neither are most pro-independence Scots.
I don’t see LSs self appointed committee and petitions to the UN achieving our aim in any reasonable timescale. Could it work? Possibly. But the fact remains that the two most plausible routes to independence remain either an agreed referendum on the pattern of 2014, or a plebiscitary general election fought on a platform that won’t take “No” for an answer.
I strongly suspect the former is a non-starter. I beleive even more strongly however that the latter is much more likely to produce the result we want in a shorter timescale than the extra parliamentary routes you and your supporters advocate.
Time will tell which is correct of course. How long do you think the UN will take to decide if Scotland qualifies as a non self governing territory Alf? And, more importantly, what are you going to do if they say Scotland isn’t in fact colonised.
Presumably you have some Plan B? Let’s hear it…..
Great post, Andy.
“a plebiscitary general election fought on a platform that won’t take “No” for an answer”
is, of course, the surest and fastest route to Indy.
Surest because it will avoid the UN throwing Professor Baird out, telling him to come back when he can demonstrate within a democratic context that Indy support exceeds 50%. Something he has yet to even attempt to do.
Fastest because a plebiscitary policy could be adopted, publicised and be in position for the next WM election in around 3 years time. With the HR election following in under 5 years time.
And unlike the UN route, the formation of a plebiscitary party movement gets Indy unlimited chances. Every 5 years, at both WM and HR, it gets a chance to win and hence an unarguable mandate for Indy.
Andy, Hatey, You are ignoring the greatest fraud against the Scots, which is neither Murrell or Sturgeon, it is the so-called UK ‘union’.
Such a fraud cannot be remedied by colonial elections, colonial referendum, or colonial laws, all of which seek only to maintain the charade in one form or another.
It can and should be remedied via the laws of decolonization, which is why such laws exist, ‘to end the scourge of colonialism’ (UN).
“Such a fraud cannot be remedied by colonial elections”
Havers, Alf.
God only knows what you think the “laws of decolonization” are, but the UN isn’t going to apply these “laws” to any part of a country where a clear majority in favour of them being applied hasn’t been demonstrated.
Hence we come back to the required democratic mandate for Indy, and the best way to get that – a plebiscitary election policy.
It’s a thread running through all these cunning plans for Indy that they attempt to ignore the democratic process. To me, that smacks of weakness and an underlying fear that no such democratic majority exists.
Nobody could reasonably deny Indy if a clear majority in favour was demonstrated at the ballot box.
No international institution is going to believe the unsubstantiated claim of a few zealots that a clear majority in favour of Indy exists. That will have to to be demonstrated.
Oh, wow. You can tell when something ‘gets’ to them eh?
They’re not even hiding it now, reams of unionist ‘we know best’ shite. away back to your Daily Torygraphs.
(not you, ‘SP’ obviously lol).
“God only knows what you think the “laws of decolonization” are, but the UN isn’t going to apply these “laws” to any part of a country where a clear majority in favour of them being applied hasn’t been demonstrated…”
That treats decolonisation as if it were just another branch of the electoral process, but that’s not what it is at all, and not how it functions.
The UN’s decolonisation frameworks don’t begin with a majority vote; they begin with an assessment of conditions: historical incorporation (the ‘union’ for example), demographic engineering, coercive constitutional arrangements, and whether a people’s right to self-determination is constrained by the constitutional structure they live within.
I think the point Alf is making (he’ll correct me if I’m wrong, I’m sure) is that decolonisation law doesn’t ask, “Has a majority voted for this yet?” It asks, “Is this a relationship (Scotland/England, for instance) that can be fairly resolved through majority voting at all?”
If the constitutional architecture itself is part of the problem, and we know that it is in the UK, then relying solely on normal internal electoral mechanisms to remedy it cannot resolve the issue: the system is being asked to validate its own legitimacy.
None of this denies the value of democratic expression… it simply recognises that decolonisation frameworks exist precisely because some constitutional relationships (Scotland as a subordinate part of the UK, for example) cannot be fairly adjudicated through the very mechanisms that sustain them.
So, the issue isn’t “cunning plans” or “fear of the ballot box.”
It’s the recognition that international law treats self-determination as a matter of conditions, not just votes.
“then relying solely on normal internal electoral mechanisms to remedy it cannot resolve the issue”
Naw?
You cannot say that if you have never tried (and no party has tried the plebiscite route).
If you insist on saying that, then logically, voting Yes in 2014 wouldn’t have delivered Indy. And that’s just more havers.
Seems clear enough to me, Northy, that Professor Baird and his crew have hit on a wheeze that they imagine will deliver Indy without first having to put in the hard graft of persuading a clear majority of Scots that it’s a worthwhile endeavour.
No amount of obfuscation can hide the fact that any “decolonisation” attempt becomes a slam dunk if the people behind it have a democratic mandate.
If they haven’t, then their claims to speak for a majority of “Sovereign Scots” are just so much hot air.
“The UN’s decolonisation frameworks don’t begin with a majority vote; they begin with an assessment of conditions: historical incorporation (the ‘union’ for example), demographic engineering, coercive constitutional arrangements, and whether a people’s right to self-determination is constrained by the constitutional structure they live within.”
That is absolutely untrue, NSGT status does not rely on any of those things. The process for determining whether a territory should be classified as an NSGT starts by applying the most important and restrictive criteria: geographic separation. An NSGT cannot be geographically contiguous to its administering state, like Scotland is.
Beyond that, it’s also worth mentioning the point that no new territory has been added (although some have been re-added) to the list of NSGT’s since 1963, so it’s stretching the term to describe there as being a “process” in place at all.
I notice Alf that you still don’t deign to answer the questions I posed. One might almost think that’s because you don’t have a sccoby what you’re talking about, or what will happen when – as is most likely – the UN tells LS and Salvo to sling their hooks.
You’ve bet your ramshackle intellectual “farm” (such as it is) on the UN being the deus ex machina that delivers independence to Scotland. You’re so convinced by your own post colonialist mantra that you can’t bring yourself to face the almost inevitable consequences of your cunning plan failing, or admitting either that a Plan B is necessary and probably more likely to succedd in any reasonable timescale.
If you, Northcode and other deluded believers in cunning plans are going to put your faith in international law (such as it is) you’re all in for a long wait and probable disappointment.
There is no route to indy that doesn’t demonstrate a clear majority in favour of it, in response to a clear question and clear mandate from the Scottish people. LSs petition and Craig Murray rocking up at Geneva sure as hell aren’t going to cut it.
It’s a total cop out to whinge about the cards being stacked against us, or us being “robbed” of our rights by the nasty colonialists in Westminster. No self respecting people in the end could or should tolerate being told “No”. If a majority of Scots – ALL Scots – don’t have the political and moral cojones to actually vote for self determination and to refuse to accept any purported unionist veto, then they don’t want independence enough and they certainly can’t expect outside forces to impose it on Westminster on their behalf.
Anyone believing that’s going to happen is as intellectually dishonest and politically bankrupt as Sturgeon and the slavishly loyal devolusionist sheep still in the SNP, and represent a similar level of threat to actually achieving the desired result.
That is why for example, Palestine, Tibet, the Sioux/Navajo regions, North Cyprus etc. have never been NSGT’s.
“No amount of obfuscation can hide the fact that any “decolonisation” attempt becomes a slam dunk if the people behind it have a democratic mandate.”
You’re treating this as if the issue were, “Has Scotland tried every possible voting method yet?”
But that isn’t the question.
The question is whether the constitutional structure Scotland sits inside is capable of producing a fair outcome through internal majoritarian mechanisms at all.
2014 didn’t prove that it can.
It proved that Westminster was willing to permit a vote once.
A plebiscite is still an internal mechanism.
It still depends on Westminster recognising the result.
It still operates inside the same constitutional architecture.
Decolonisation frameworks exist precisely because some constitutional relationships cannot be resolved by internal votes, no matter how many times they’re attempted.
A democratic mandate helps, of course, but it isn’t the mechanism… it’s the evidence.
You’re also asserting that a democratic mandate makes decolonisation a “slam dunk”.
It doesn’t.
We have multiple real-world examples: Catalonia, Quebec, Puerto Rico, New Caledonia, and French Polynesia all had clear democratic mandates.
None achieved independence.
Why?
Because majoritarianism inside a coercive constitutional structure doesn’t create a legal right to secede.
You’re treating democracy as magic.
International law doesn’t.
And finally, 2014 wasn’t Scotland exercising unilateral self-determination.
It was Westminster permitting a referendum, defining the franchise, setting the terms, and deciding whether to honour the result.
That’s not sovereignty.
It’s permission.
“That is absolutely untrue, NSGT status does not rely on any of those things”
You’re reducing the UN’s criteria to a single test, but Resolution 1541 doesn’t work that way.
Geographic separation is one principle, not the only one.
The UN also assesses historical incorporation, constitutional arrangements, degree of self-government, distinct identity, and whether the people have been able to exercise free choice.
That’s why the UN talks about “separate and distinct territories”… not just physical distance.
On the “no new territories since 1963” point: that’s a political reality, not a legal one.
Powerful states block additions.
The list is frozen because the C-24 cannot override a sovereign state, not because the criteria disappeared.
The criteria still exist, and they’re still used to assess petitions, even if they don’t lead to listing.
So yes, Scotland can’t be added to the NSGT list unless the UK nominates it… that’s the political barrier.
But the structural criteria you’re dismissing are still part of the UN’s decolonisation framework.
They’re why petitions are assessed, recorded, and archived even when listing isn’t possible.
Those examples don’t support your point, AI Dan.
Palestine, Tibet, Indigenous nations in the US, and North Cyprus aren’t NSGTs for reasons that have nothing to do with geographic contiguity.
They fall under completely different UN frameworks… occupation law, self-determination of peoples, or internal Indigenous sovereignty.
NSGT status applies to territories, not to every political dispute or every people with a claim.
So listing them doesn’t show that geographic separation is the only criterion.
It just shows that you’re mixing categories.
Resolution 1541 sets out multiple principles: separation, distinct identity, degree of self-government, constitutional arrangements, and free choice.
Geography is one element, not the whole test.
The fact that those cases aren’t NSGTs doesn’t tell us anything about Scotland.
It just tells us they belong to different parts of international law.
Andy Ellis.
You’re arguing as if the only question is whether a majority exists.
But the issue isn’t whether Scots can express a majority view… the issue is whether the constitutional structure Scotland sits inside allows that majority to have legal effect.
A majority is necessary, of course, but it isn’t sufficient.
Catalonia had a majority.
Quebec had a majority.
Puerto Rico has had several.
New Caledonia had multiple.
French Polynesia has had repeated pro-independence majorities.
None achieved independence.
Not because they lacked “cojones”, but because majoritarianism inside a constitutional framework controlled by another state does not create a legal right to secede.
That’s why decolonisation frameworks exist: to deal with constitutional relationships where internal votes cannot resolve the issue, no matter how many times they’re attempted.
International law doesn’t replace a democratic mandate… it contextualises it.
A majority is the evidence… it isn’t the mechanism.
I repeat: 2014 didn’t demonstrate that majoritarianism works. It demonstrated that Westminster was willing to permit a vote once, define the franchise, set the terms, and decide whether to honour the result. That’s not sovereignty. It’s permission.
If the structure itself is part of the problem, then relying solely on internal mechanisms cannot resolve it.
I never said that geographic separation is the ONLY criteria, but that it is the most restrictive and most important criteria and should therefore be applied first. It is only when that criteria is met that other criteria such as cultural and ethnic distinction, and the measure of self government can be assessed. Because Scotland fails this first test, there is no need to go further with the analysis.
You are also flat out wrong about the territories I listed. For example, the saltwater rule was agreed after Belgium sought to support the addition of Native American nations to the list of NSGT’s. Whilst other territories are also considered occupied (e.g. the West Bank) under international law, designation as an NSGT would provide a framework for the political independence and self-government of those territories, were it not for the saltwater rule. Are you also going to claim, with a straight face, that the conditions are worse in Scotland than in the places I have listed and that the UN would consequently consider NSGT status for Scotland but not those places?
AI Dan.
You’re now saying geographic separation is the “most important” criterion, but Resolution 1541 doesn’t describe any hierarchy of criteria.
It sets out multiple principles – separation, distinct identity, degree of self?government, constitutional arrangements, and free choice – none of which are described as primary or as a “first test”.
You’re imposing a structure that the UN itself doesn’t use.
The “saltwater rule” isn’t a formal UN rule either.
It’s a political convention colonial powers used in the 1960s to limit decolonisation, not a binding legal principle.
It doesn’t appear in Resolution 1541, and the UN has repeatedly treated “separate and distinct territories” as a broader concept than simple physical distance.
As for the examples you listed: Palestine, Tibet, Indigenous nations in the US, and North Cyprus aren’t NSGTs for reasons that have nothing to do with geography, as I have already explained in a previous comment.
They fall under occupation law, Indigenous sovereignty, or internal self?determination.
NSGT status applies to territories, not to every political dispute or every people with a claim.
So the fact that those cases aren’t NSGTs doesn’t tell us anything at all about Scotland.
As I have also said previously… it just tells us they belong to different parts of international law.
The criteria you’re dismissing – constitutional arrangements, degree of self?government, historical incorporation, and free choice – are still part of the UN’s decolonisation framework, even if the list is politically frozen.
And, they’re off.
Sun’s shining outside. That won’t last forever.
This pointless argument will.
Andy already has the win on points, goal difference and a knock out.
Simply by observing that there is no power stopping a few dozen honourable, committed, savvy, grafting Scots from standing for office in either or both of the parliaments available to them, and telling us, the Sovereign Scots, that if elected, they will form an Independent Scottish government in waiting, engage with international forums, and commence dissolution of the Treaty Of Union.
All backed by a clear, unarguable and permanent democratic mandate.
Whether or not that ToU actually exists.
This isn’t Ukr@ine. London isn’t going to launch a ballistic missile at them. Nobody’s gonna assassinate them with nerve agents smeared on door handles.
As for that few dozen honourable, committed, savvy, grafting Scots, we, the Sovereign Scots, will freely and democratically choose to back them or sack them when we get to see them, hear them, discover if they understand human reproductive biology, listen to their plans to divvy up the £150+ billion per year, etc. etc.
There’s no Stazi stopping us. There’s no gulags of solitary confinement cells lying in wait.
We just need to stop gurning, stop eternally finding excuses for inaction, and get doing.
“Hence we come back to the required democratic mandate for Indy, and the best way to get that – a plebiscitary election policy.”
Where is this “plebiscitary election policy”, Andy? You sound like Believe in Scotland who in 2024 promised such an event in the May 2026 election. Didnae happen, did it? Where is it? You are promising something in 2028 or 2029 that you canna deliver.
You also forget that self-determination is not merely about ‘democracy’, which means different things to different people, its about human rights, ‘inalienable’ rights.
@Northcode – I am not NOW saying that, I’ve pointed that out from the beginning. There is no formal hierarchy of criteria in the sense that all three main criteria need to be fulfilled for a territory to be designed as an NSGT. However, the “geographic separation” criteria is the most important as it is the most restrictive and determinative, and provides the most instinct into what an NSGT is.
It’s also nonsense to describe the saltwater rule as political rather than legal. The saltwater rule describes how the “geographic separation” principle applies in this context, and it also describes how the delicate balance between the right to self determination in Articles 1 and 55 and the principle of the respect for territorial integrity in Article 2(4). It has also, as I have pointed out now for the third time, been used to halt efforts to designate certain territories as NSGT’s including some of those on the list of examples I set out earlier.
It’s easy to see why. If the criteria for an NSGT were to be relaxed to exclude the saltwater rule, there are many thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of territories containing a distinct ethnic/cultural group where that group does not self-govern. Far from being a stabilising concept designed to bring an end to colonialism and exploitation, it could become a serious risk to the stability of almost all nation states. Designating Scotland as an NSGT would mean an end to the saltwater rule and the abandonment of Article 2 of the UN charter, and would therefore be the most significant development in intentional law in the post-war period.
For those reasons, and many others, it won’t happen.
@Alf
Where is this “plebiscitary election policy”, Andy? You sound like Believe in Scotland who in 2024 promised such an event in the May 2026 election. Didnae happen, did it? Where is it? You are promising something in 2028 or 2029 that you canna deliver.
Unlike you Alf, I’ll actually engage and attempt to answer your queries. That’s the difference between people arguing in good faith, and ideological zealots like you. To you and your compadres, when all you have is a hammer, every issue is a nail.
The reason there was no plebiscitary election policy in 2024 is that there was no party or movement enjoying majority (or even broad) support within the pro-independence movement, still less the Scottish electorate as a whole, which endorsed such a platform.
The most obvious stumbling block to that is of course the SNP, which is why many of us feel that the only way to make progress on independence is to destroy the SNP as a political force. Until they are either totally removed from the scene, or rendered so powerless that they exert no influence, then it’s hard to see any progress being made.
It’s not impossible that *something* could be done by 2028/29, but it rather depends on what happens inside the SNP. A week is a long time in politics etc.
The problem for you Alf is convincing the rest of us that your cunning plan is more likley to produce a better outcome, and/or that it promises to deliver the result more quickly. I’m not a betting man, but I’ll wager you a bottle of malt your scheme will fail to produce a positive result.
You also forget that self-determination is not merely about ‘democracy’, which means different things to different people, its about human rights, ‘inalienable’ rights.
I quite a agree self-determination is a many splendoured thing. If it was easy the Scots, Catalans and Quebecois (amongst others) would doubtless already be free. There’s many a slip between cup and lip however.
The UN charter recognises the right of every people to self determination: and yet……everywhere we see peoples subject to oppression and unable to achieve their aim.
The problem for Scots and other self defining people who want to change their existing status, is that international law is an imperfect thing. The right to self determination may be a jus cogens, but it is neither unlimited or automatic.
Where barriers are placed in their way (whether spurious constitutional prohibitions à la Madrid versus Catalonia, or as you and your supporters see it colonial oppression and/or institutional bias resulting in an effective unionist veto), any self respecting people worth its salt faces a stark choice. It either gives up and accepts the veto, or it plows on regardless.
The latter is of course entirely possible and permissible, but it rests on the assumption that enough people in Scotland are prepared to force the issue, whether via non-violent protests, civil disobedience or ultimately declaring UDI. That’s a much more difficult prospect and not one I see a majority supporting, though it would rather depend on the circumstances and how the British nationalist elites, state and Scottish unionists reacted to any repression – and particularly use of violence – by Westminster.
You seem to be getting closer to the realisation (always delayed for the native intellectuals and bourgeoisie, according to Fanon) that us Scots are in an oppressive colonial situation, which is progress.
Franchise Fanny jist loves taking the divisive cheap shots, and knocking Scots for not having the moral and political cojones*, rather than actually helping raise awareness as to why quite so many Scots think and behave the way they do.
*Think you meant baws.
Aye, best not talk about influential factors such as broadcasting being a reserved power and the BBC punting so much biased propaganda to preserve London Rule, and a UK Civil Service that won a fucking award for preserving the Union, and there being no real pro-Scotland self-governance “newspapers”.
So the paradigm so many Scots exist in is really jist a mushrooms kept in the dark and fed shit / Plato’s Cave scenario, carefully controlled by external interests.
Example being it takes about 5 years for this Murrell / Sturgeon / NuSNP shite to hit the MSM headlines, instead of it being breaking news a couple of electoral cycles ago.
And that’s also a reason there isn’t majority support for the use of plebiscitary elections gaining traction, because the idea also just hasn’t had enough promotion and explanations being punted into the psyche of more Scots to grow the concept into something viable and deliverable.
Quite a few folk have actually attempted to grow that seed, but then Franchise Fanny and other supposedly pro-Indy influencers jist take the cheap shots and knock them for being fringe nutter cranks with no support.
The pathetic twats have both angles covered to slate Scots.
“helping raise awareness as to why quite so many Scots think and behave the way they do.”
Excellent point Dan, and here we should add the ‘colonial mindset’ which makes a colonized people “think and behave the way they do”, even to the extent where many reject their own liberation plus suffering a range of other adverse psychological impacts.
But the ‘colonized minds’ of Scots after centuries of colonialism is not something Hatey or Andy wish to discuss in their inevitably failed quest searching for ‘democracy’ in the oppressive colonial framework:
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
If she does take the bait and opts for a court case I’ll be happy to contribute to any crowdfunding you find necessary.
The WoMAN is a liar and a coward, she won’t. Your money safe better invest in NS&I.
Thank god for obstinate men like you Stu. Decency lives.
The long days in prison will fly by for Nicola as she won’t recall them.
You have the heart of a lion, Rev Stu.
Cap doffed. Again.
Long gone are there days when Scotland’s MSM ignored or even ridiculed the Rev.
Now, they cannot get enough of him:
YESTERDAY
link to bbc.co.uk
TODAY
Nicola Sturgeon challenged to ‘sue’ Nat blogger as he re-publishes Murrell claim
link to scottishdailyexpress.co.uk
What will TOMORROW bring?
“…If Nicola Sturgeon wants to sue me for defamation, nothing prevents her…”
Well, sure… nothing legally stops her.
But practically?
She’s got nothing to gain and plenty to lose, which tends to kill the appetite for a courtroom showdown pretty quickly.
Davis has already said what he said under parliamentary privilege, and that’s a sealed box.
She can’t touch it, challenge it, or drag it into court. It’s out there, and it’s untouchable.
Given that, staying silent is the smartest move available to her.
And she’s shown more than once that she knows when silence serves her better than engagement.
The idea that she’d sue anyone repeating Davis’s remarks – even if they’ve dressed them up in their own wording – is hard to take seriously.
There’s simply no strategic upside for her.
So yes, I think we can safely assume she’ll decline the challenge.
It’s the only move that actually makes sense.
I believe, as others, have so rightly said, the amount of evidence of duplicity, deceit and dishonesty that has pervaded the Scottish Government, is stacking up at an alarming pace! And I can see that it will involve A GREAT MANY people, who have shielded the culprits for far too long. And given that mountain of evidence, and the way cracks are appearing in the walls of silence, I would think someone will be wishing to save his or her own skin! All it needs is ONE person to start the ball rolling and I foresee a LOT of people giving statements to COPFS or Police Scotland. Or at least, I HOPE some will be reviewing what they know, when they knew it and why they kept it secret. And I hope they will be reviewing their part in keeping the silence.
A message to all those who know what happened, and who know who was involved:
Is this person, her co-conspirators and her position, worth YOU going to jail for? Is the House of Murrell worth YOU being forced to lie in court and protect people you wouldn’t want at or to share your table? Seriously, are these people worth what you sacrificed to keep silent?? I’d say ‘no’. But… maybe that’s just me…
Perhaps it is time to re-evaluate what you gave up, what you took, what you sacrificed in the way of morals and ethics, to protect someone or someones, who don’t deserve the right to be where they are, or to hold the power they do, and to behave in dishonourable and dishonest ways that you never foresaw you would ever have to protect. Perhaps its time to re-evaluate how going to jail will mean total chaos, extreme hurt and humiliation to your own family.
Also, does it not hurt you to the core that there are people who forced you to allow your country to become what it has – and be seen as a parochial, one horse town with a corrupt sheriff riding thought the streets, his gun on his hip, shooting those he deems wrong-doers without so much as the benefit of due process of law? And who has made that town look what it has become – a lawless, dangerous province where you can be thrown in jail for thinking what the powerful see as wrong thoughts and for steering the country to be what it has become – a laughing stock on the world stage? It sure hurts me that dishonest people did this to my country, my home – to my children. But… I can sleep at night. Can you? You know how to fix that. The sounds of silence are very expensive… you willing to pay the ultimate price? *shrug*
I believe we are dealing with no ordinary people, if anyone was to come forward it would be for money and not justice.
Now is the time and now is the hour
Ian Foulds says:
18 July, 2026 at 2:57 pm
Now is the time and now is the hour
Nope!
Memmi reckons it’s next Tuesday at 10:21 am !
Ask Alf !
The worry for Sturgeon is, what secrets does wings have hidden away in that large safe.
And the place is nearly empty
The lion the witch and the audacity of that bitch
Thank you, Reverend.
From a grateful and weary Scotland.
Nice one, Stuart. Let her try to prove her innocence in court.
Surely the fact that all the items implicating her involvement were removed from the indictment is proof in itself that she was complicit? Can COPFS be charged with aiding and abetting crime?
And should she not be subject to the proceeds of crime act? After all, the stolen items were hidden in plain sight.
I think you are quite safe , she won’t be issuing a libel claim ……..
Like another renowned liar she will stay silent on certain matter.
I love the comments desiring a “plebiscitary election.”
We HAD a “plebiscitary election” last May. The sorta-Indy party (the SNP) got 30+% of the vote. The openly Indy party (the Alliance) couldn’t even reach 1%. The anti-Indy parties received a great majority of the votes.
We’ve now had a referendum (in 2014), and an election as recently as 2 months ago. Both times, the Scottish people voted for the anti-Indy side, by large margins. I could add several other election results, if needed.
The Indy proponents here simply reject any election results that don’t go their way.
Nicola Sturgeon. John Swinney. Humza Yousaf. Jamie Hepburn.
Alex Salmond gave all these people political careers, despite their horrible inadequacies and personal failures. And look how they repaid him.
Look how they repaid Scotland.
When we get our country back, we need to build a nice big beautiful jail on St Kilda.
Nah…save the expense of construction and staffing and just dump the bastards there and let them fend for themselves. I’m sure the NTS could be persuaded…
Wee Done Red!
All these inadequates. We need our old Scotland back.
Nah! Gruinard not St Kilda – leave it to its lovely natural inhabitants!
Holy Crap !!! … it just could be that she is the architect of her own doom !! … she might have just lit the fuse of the powder keg under her own arse …. Karma could indeed be a bitch !!
Can’t wait until tomorrow, to get some hope in my postcode.
I give it a week before normal service will be resumed.
Anybody else clocked the real name of Mrs Burn (ham) – Marie-France Van Heel? What’s that all about, eh? Has the King of the North been forced into a dynastic marriage with the daughter of a foreign monarch?
Unionists (colonialists if preferred… same thing) frequently tell us in this place that:
“There is no route to independence that doesn’t demonstrate a clear majority.”
But they never address the core point:
What if the constitutional structure itself prevents a majority from being actionable?
They always refuse to engage with that question… I wonder why.
Does anyone really believe that even if the YES vote had won the 2014 referendum – or opinion poll as I call it – by an overwhelming majority that Westminster would have simply shrugged its shoulders and handed the Scots the ‘deeds to Scotland’?
“Westminster would have simply shrugged its shoulders and handed the Scots the ‘deeds to Scotland’?”
Why would it? It’s not as if Brussels did the same after Brexit. In fact, the hard-nosed division of liabilities negotiated by Brussels will see the UK paying until the middle of the century, after many of us will be dead.
Even if we take only the dosh owed by Scotland to the EU as an example, do you believe we should just walk away and say to England, “Your problem”? When an Independent Scotland wants to negotiate entry to the EU?
No rational person on either side of the border believes the break up of the UK can be achieved without difficult choices over shared liabilities, shared assets, common defense postures, trade, migration, etc. Not to mention the large populations from either country, happily resident on the “wrong” side of the border. Are they to stay, or be driven out at gunpoint?
Every rational person, looking at an aspirational Indy movement that hasn’t a scooby about how to negotiate and compromise on solutions to these issues, will say No to Indy.
And rightly so.
There is nothing as sad as a stupid Scot who refuses to accept defeat. They turn on their own, blaming everyone and everything in sight. They even blame people who died hundreds of years ago.
The madness culminates with MI5 dirty tricks and a strange belief in the power of the United Nations. Whilst getting royally rode by a stupid dyke and her grubby wee husband.
It wasn’t just the referendum some Scots lost over ten years ago.
Some Scots got confused when asked if Scotland should leave a non-existent union.
What if the constitutional structure itself prevents a majority from being actionable?
They always refuse to engage with that question… I wonder why.
I’m not a unionist or a colonialist Northcode. Plenty of people who are on the same side you purport to be on just absolutely disagree with your analysis. Saying there is a (bare?) majority for independence according to polling does not equate to making it so. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride as they say.
The only plausible way to achieve independence in any reasonable timescale is by mobilising a clear majority of Scots to vote for parties or a movement which makes self determination the central part of their platform. That can be done either via referendum or plebiscitary elections. Or in extremis it can be done via UDI and the use of violence.
Perhaps you and others don’t accept or believe it, but I do actually think if the Scots people had voted Yes in 2014 that Westminster would have accepted the result. There’s no serious indication otherwise. You can of course now make the argument that having been given a fright then, they won’t make the same mistake now and that since 2014 they have effectively “moved the goalposts” to make holding a mutually agreed referendum functionally impossible.
I have some sympathy for that view, but in the end again that unionist veto (i.e. the concept that they have to graciously PERMIT us to have a vote) is only tenable if Scots lack the political courage to face such a veto down. If we are not as a people prepared to make it quite clear that we don’t accept a unionist veto, then we aren’t actually fit to be an independent nation.
It isn’t the British nationalists refusing to grant us permission, or the UN failing to deliver independence from on high we have to worry about, it’s the worrying lack of passion and resolution on behalf of enough Scots to not take “No” from Westminster as an answer. Insist that the power to hold referendums be vested only in Holyrood. Begin the process of nation building by insisting that the sovereignty of the Scottish people is recognised.
Of course the recent bùrach of SNP misgovernment has not helped our case: the earlier argument that Holyrood presented a better example of governance, competence and stability has not fared well in the hands of the Murrells.
“If wishes were horses, beggars would ride”
wise words my Granny used to say.
The issue here isn’t sentiment, passion or the level of frustration people feel.
It’s the constitutional architecture.
A majority can’t enact independence without a lawful mechanism recognised by both domestic and international frameworks.
That’s the central constraint, regardless of how strongly people feel about the matter.
Mobilisation, political will, or hypothetical scenarios involving UDI don’t alter the fact that the UK constitution currently provides no actionable route for a majority to express sovereignty in a binding way.
That’s the structural problem under discussion.
Everything else – party dynamics, historical hypotheticals, or assessments of national ‘courage’ – sits downstream of that constitutional reality.
Andy, “to face such a veto down”.
How do you envisage doing that?.
Scotland is of strategic importance to England. Like any colonialist it has taken oil and gas and relies on Scotland’s renewable energy supply (having relied on “the market” to provide security of supply.
There are two obstacles. One is that many Scots think the status quo is the norm and the other is the sense of inferiority.
The “Scottish Independence Tracker” (BritPolls) since Jan 2024 finds 50% Yes and 50% No to Scottish independence, MoE 2+- %.
@ Northcode 1.27pm
Constitutional architecture can be changed. The default position is certainly that it is better if that change takes place via a lawful mechanism, but you’re dead wrong if you think that’s the only mechanism.
UDI, passive resistance and ultimately the use of force are legitimate if a people’s self determination is being denied or they are themselves subject to repression, violence or where they have exhausted other means and the “metropolitan” power refuses to compromise or allow self determination to take place when a majority is clearly in favour.
If you’re convinced that the current British nationalist establishment is not acting in good faith, and will never provide a practical or actionable route to independence on the pattern of 2014 in the future, then you have a number of choices:
1) Accept that unionists have a veto (à la Spain/Catalonia position as seen from Madrid);
2) Campaign to have the current devolutionary settlement changed to repatriate more power to Holyrood, including a specific ability for Holyrood to hold referendums when and an on what conditions it has majority support for;
3) Adopt a position whereby pro-independence Scots representatives make it plain that they don’t accept Westminster has a veto, that they will regard any future combined majority for avowedly pro-independence parties as an automatic mandate for independence, withdraw from Westminster and begin negotiations for independence.
Number 3 seems eminently achievable to me, and much more likely to produce results in any reasonable timescale than relying on the UN to deliver independence for us in the face of potential vetos in the Security Council.
Whether it’ll happen any time soon is open to doubt however, particularly given the lack of progress in the last 12 years and the implosion of the SNP and its baleful record in government.
Again, if we don’t have the political will, electoral power and popular support to change the constitutional architecture, then we’re all wasting our time.
“it’s the worrying lack of passion and resolution on behalf of enough Scots to not take “No” from Westminster as an answer”
Its only worrying if you don’t understand the fundamental reasons why, in a colonial society, the assimilated native “craves dependence” (Cesaire) on the colonizing culture and “hates” their own culture (i.e. “self-hatred”; Scottish cultural cringe).
And, in this sense that the assimilated colonized person is “a manufactured being” (Memmi), with a mindset created by colonialism itself.
Which tells us that the peoples “understanding remains rudimentary” (Fanon) when it comes to their colonial reality.
Which means that in order to become liberated the nature of their “oppression has to be unveiled to them” (Freire).
link to salvo.scot
See Nicola managed to attend the Glasgow Gay March yesterday.
Wonder what stopped her attending any Independence marches when she was FM ?
I think Sturgeon may have escaped from London back to Scotland for more than a gay pride march.Put very simply she is in the doo dah.
In relation to tbe Alex Salmond court case Paul McManus has announced that his legal team have amassed ” devastating evidence ” and that certain London elites should ” enjoy tbeir freedom ” whilst they can.
With Sturgeon and others at tbe heart of this case it will be very much the case that engagement with legal defence counsel will very much be happening.
But it doesnt end tbere. Pressure to pursue the £660k of money solicited specifically for ring fence referendum funding is building and no lesser an individual tban tbe Dean of tbe Faculty of Advocates has provided an opinion on the matter saying that the perpetration of a crime is irresistable and tbat prosecution should proceed. Again Surgeon is at the heart of that.
And then tbe complaint now being investigated by police about a missing £1.5m of Yes money. Was Sturgeon involved in this or did she see and know nothing or did a big boy do it and ran away.
Or like tbe campervan in the mother in laws driveway. Did she not see it because it was at the side of the house or was it she did see it but thought it was the house next door. Bit like the pendant, the very expensive fountain pens, thousand pound plus coffee machines, lingerie, perfume and much else of stolen goods that she didn’t see.
Well if I was a betting man i’d guess Sturgeon came to Scotland for other reasons. She’s up here for more than a couple of hours at a gay pride march.
The noose tightens and she and other know it.
“…certain London elites should ” enjoy their freedom ” whilst they can…”
Aye, but you are only allowed so far. Then ye shoot yersel in the heid and throw the gun awa….
Ah, c’moan noo, Wally.
Stick aroond.
Nae cant wants tae be oan the hook fer cleaning up the mess.
@AndyEllis
If the political will were truly manifest nothing could seriously prevent the restoration of national sovereignty & independence.
The spirit is evident but the resolve & will (to succeed come hell or highwater) is not so.
The Scottish worldview in the particular is perversely constrained by the seeming overweening presence of England; a geographic & historic T-Rex filling the vision of some to the point of obsession.
That is a native Scottish perceptual matter which Scots alone might rectify, «the world» will not give a damn either way.
A new perspective/vision might beget a new political breed and with that a new politics without a whinge and cringe option.
“If the political will were truly manifest”
“native Scottish perceptual matter”
“worldview in the particular is perversely constrained”
“Turn on, tune in and drop out”
Scottish independence and the doors of perception.
Timothy Leary’s dead but Turabdin is on the outside looking in.
Does anyone remember her pleading for sympathy saying that she had recently become pregnant but had suffered a miscarriage.
I didn’t believe it at the time and I don’t now, and I suspect it was all a devious ruse to say look I am in a normal marriage and please don’t have a go at me.
I suspect there is no evidence of a pregnancy in her medical records.
One interesting thing – Davis was able to say this because the House of Commons is not answerable to the judiciary as it is sovereign parliament. This goes back to the old struggles between monarchy and parliament, with the courts being seen as agents of the king, whose power parliament eventually resisted: the king loses sovereign power to parliament, the courts lose sovereign power over parliament.
Such parliamentary privilege is not available at Holyrood as it is not sovereign as it gets its powers via a statute, the scope of which is decided by the judiciary.
It would take independence for Holyrood to have the same privilege, but that is actually unlikely to happen even then as there would likely be a written constitution which would give the last word, as upholders of the constitution, to the judiciary.
It’s true that Holyrood wouldn’t simply inherit Westminster-style parliamentary privilege after independence.
But independence also wouldn’t force Scotland into a model where the judiciary has the ‘last word’.
That assumption only holds if Scotland chooses a constitution built on judicial supremacy.
Scotland has another option — one rooted in its own constitutional tradition.
In an independent Scotland:
Historically, Scotland’s constitutional tradition is very distinct from Westminster’s doctrine of parliamentary absolutism.
And after 300 years and more of operating within a system based on Westminster sovereignty, an independent Scotland is far more likely to adopt a constitutional model grounded in popular sovereignty rather than recreate the Westminster arrangement.
“ In an independent Scotland:
– sovereignty would lie with the people, not with Parliament
– the Claim of Right could be constitutionalised
– Parliament would legislate within a constitution rather than above it
– courts would uphold the constitution, but ultimately derive their authority from the people
– all institutions would be accountable to the people, not supreme in their own right”
How do you know any of those things? And in particular, what does the people being sovereign as opposed to parliament being sovereign mean in practice?
@Aidan
It means that an Independent Scotland would do as I say.
What you say too, of course. And what every other Scot says.
Heck, perhaps even what Northy says, if enough Scots want to acknowledge that Picts have equal rights.
I see no problems with any of that (apart from the Pict thing), so what’s your beef?
Aye well this is the problem Hatey, an independent Scotland can’t be everything to everyone even when people have conflicting interests and values. Nor do I think it’s going back to some myopic, mystified interpretation of the conditional arrangements that were in place in Scotland pre-1707.
Yes this is all possible and the sentiment is sound, though as others have asked what does deriving sovereignty from the people actually mean in practice? Assuming it is seen as desirable, how would they grant MPs the right to say what they liked in a parliament, over and above the judiciary?
Alternatively, the old Scottish monarchy could be revived: King Swinney I? But more likely, Nicola I, Queen of the New Picts!
Southernbystander.
You’re right, that the practical side matters more than the abstract principle.
When I talk about “sovereignty of the people”, I’m not imagining daily plebiscites or direct instruction of MPs.
In most modern democracies the people demonstrate sovereignty through defined constitutional mechanisms rather than constant intervention.
For example, a people-sovereign system could include things like:
None of these place MPs ‘above’ the judiciary or vice-versa… they simply ensure that both operate within a framework whose ultimate source of legitimacy is the electorate, not the institutions themselves.
It’s not about micromanaging government; it’s about making sure the constitutional architecture points upwards rather than sideways.
Also, if we’re imagining a people-sovereign constitution, I’d like one of the first instructions from the electorate to be renaming the country Pictland or Pictavia (my preference) — and making it a republic rather than retaining a monarchy.
No King Swinney or Queen Nicola for me, thanks.
Missing a trick there, Northy.
Demand billions in compensation from the Scots for the genocide of the Picts.