Things happen slowly
When times are quiet in Scottish politics, as they currently are, our favourite genre of story is “mainstream press belatedly catches up with Wings Over Scotland”. And so to this morning’s front page splash in the Sunday Mail.
The rumour mill has been grinding about Operation Branchform developments again in the last few days, although we’ve seen too many false dawns now to get overly excited about that. But the Mail’s story sounded awfully familiar.
The key passages concern some questionable figures from the SNP’s 2020 accounts.
And those numbers might ring a bell with Wings readers. Because it was more than three years ago – in August 2021, to be specific – that we drew your attention to them.
We found the astronomical sums the SNP claimed to have spent on kitting out its Edinburgh HQ so unbelievable that we offered a Wings gold coin (notional value £500) to anyone who could construct a credible way for the listed costs to be achieved. And we never gave that coin away, because nobody managed to get anywhere close.
Unfortunately, there was nothing much else we could do to follow up the story. The SNP is a private organisation so FOI laws don’t apply to it, and nobody outside the party has any power to force it to explain its accounts (well, except for HMRC and the police, of course). All we could do was highlight it in the hope that party members – to whom the party is at least theoretically answerable – could seek an explanation.
But that didn’t happen, so it took another three years for the police to dig into it during the investigation – also triggered by Wings – into the missing fundraiser money.
(The Mail does acknowledge that the office story is a development of Branchform, but curiously forgets to credit who it was who “raised” the “concerns” that started it, and indeed who it was who “revealed the accounts were under scrutiny”, claiming the role for itself although it was in fact Wings who broke the story two days earlier.)
There are growing complaints from all sides at the amount of time Branchform is taking to resolve. But perhaps things would have moved a little faster if Scotland’s media had done more to pick up the stories this site has been breaking for years and try to get some answers.
It wasn’t as if it would have required much in the way of journalism. We’d already done the work for them. Our August 2021 piece bent over backwards to find a way to spend that much money kitting out a small 20-person office, and we just couldn’t do it. But Scotland’s mighty press sat on its hands and said nothing.
We all want to see the mystery of the SNP’s finances settled once and for all. But as we keep reminding you, the wheels of justice do turn, even when they take their time. Wings Over Scotland set them in motion way back in late January 2020, and however agonising the pace and however badly the media failed to lend a hand with pushing (indeed, helped Scottish Government mandarins’ attempts at sabotage and stalling), almost five years later they’re still inching closer to their ultimate destination.
(You can buy a lot of compliance for £3 million.)
Patience is a virtue, folks. But it shouldn’t take much more now. As Ernest Hemingway famously said of financial catastrophe, things happen slowly, then all at once.
There must be a right muddle up of strings at the top of the puppet show, who’s pulling which strings? Which puppets are being dropped from the stage show? which ones are being destroyed never to return to the main act? Will Punch and Judy stay popular or will the crocodile make a snap decision?. Who is the crocodile? Whatever, it’s going to be worth having a front row seat when the curtains open…… And as to your journalistic skills, well, that’s the way to do it…… 🙂
Let’s hope the all at once happenings are soon.
Snp with Swinney at the helm is incredibly close to falling over a cliff into oblivion. With Alba rising in local elections a big conclusion on SNP corruption would be a step forwards.
I can’t think of any police enquiry which have generated so many ‘leaks’ It makes one wonder
This is looking very bad for Murrell. I said a while ago this will be part of long running pattern as you don’t go from zero to 110k motorhome overnight.
Reading the Mail article it looks like he was using every trick known to man to tunnel money out of the SNP and into his pockets somehow.
The fake company selling imaginary services and goods, buying high value items in cash and selling them some time later to ‘launder’ the cash… these are all your classic ways to do it and obviously well known and understood by the police.
Murrell really is not the brightest if he was doing all this. It looks really bad for him. So many different things now that appear ultra fishy… I think he is going down. I really do.
Which Murrell, though? Dafty Pete, or Crafty Nik, or both?
Electoral law is clear that ALL signatories to party accounts are jointly and severally liable to what happens with them. Both Sturgeon and the other fall guy who both got interviewed are bang to rights on this.
If they didn’t know they’re liable for not taking the time. If they did ken & did nowt they’re liable.
Might take Murrell being found guilty or pleading guilty to get them charged but they’re band to rights.
I have been a branch Treasurer. I know the relevant law as I made myself very familiar with my responsibilities. Party leader is also a signatory.
It was kinda rhetorical Muscle Guy. I have a close relative who is a practicing criminal lawyer with 40 years experience. They are dumbfounded by the idea that only one Murrell (so far) has been charged. Even precluding their close working and (ahem) marital relationship – their ex officio positions within the SNP – including their ‘joint and several’ liability renders it (in their opinion ‘incomprehensible’ that only daft Pete would be charged.
Unless…….
Who might be ‘protecting’ someone – and why?
My understanding is the other two will also be arrested and charged. However, the arrest of St Nic needs to be done perfectly (see; Rangers FC malicious prosecution et al) and there was a commentary in the Times last week about how hollowed-out COPFS is now.
That makes sense, Harry. And reassuring – if that’s what happens!
Seems like things are (finally?!) accelerating towards something happening in the next few weeks. Bring it on!
Hopefully the house of cards is about to collapse. Interesting as the fall out will be, another fascinating aspect will be finding out in the future just why this has taken so long.
This whole sorry farrago serves as a great “how not to do it” example for the establishment of open and accountable governance in the early days of our better nation.
We can’t afford for Scotland to be governed by the likes of yon folk.
Now is the time too. GE is over, HR is 2026 so now is the window of their discontent as the political risks are manageable. SNP will have time to be contrite, expel the miscreants, create blue water with that time and those practices.
Ah hae ma doots that the SNP is salvageable or worth the effort to do so even if it were. Do we really think the candy floss haired twitler youth and supine Nicophant winnets who appear to make up most of the current activist base are a suitable engine for the independence vehicle?
One day, somewhere in Scotland, there will be a lifesize statue of Rev Stu.
On the plinth will be his honourable epitaph:
“Notorious Crank”
I’m thinking myself we could melt down that one of Donald Dewar to get a head start on the materials, but maybe that’s taking it too far.
There must be a competition to decide the epitaph.
It should be decided by the greatest number of pluses in the comment BTL on WoS.
“Vile cybernat” perhaps?
There are lots of Queen Victorias about. The one in Albert Sq here in Dundee is a twin of one in Queen’s Gardens Dunedin NZ. The Rab Burns one near is the same as the one in the Octagon centre of Dunedin.
And it just takes the first one to burst looking for a deal for the whole house of cards to fall down.
One surely hopes that a few wee bums are twittering.
Classic Prisoner’s Dilemma. At the moment keeping stum is the best policy. If they are arrested to be charged one has to sing loudly to anyone within earshot.
I am sooooo looking forward to seeing who gets thrown under a bus first, and who turns king’s evidence to save their worthless skin.
Questions remain about why it took so long, but I’m certain the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service will be able to provide answers to everyone’s questions. Eventually, when forced.
I do hope everyone will soon understand our imperial masters only protect you as long as it’s in their interests.
On a completely different matter, how is Liz Lloyd doing ? And has a Lord Advocate ever been imprisoned ?
Eventually…when forced , is spot on….. Also correct about the imperial masters protection, now that our country is almost milked dry, they’ll do what they did in India, i.e. leave.. and let the people clean up the sorry wrung out excuse for a country which they raped and plundered. Worse is the fact that we have had this happen in an age when we had all the facts at our fingertips , such as the Whisky exports not being attributed to Scotland’s GDP, they export from England – just a small example of the financial manipulation done to make Scotland look too wee, too poor etc etc…
WoS appears to be the only source of information which proves accurate, and EVENTUALLY (average 18 months on from the events) the MSM have no option but to print the truth. Sorry to rant on the back of your post 🙂
It’s a binary and you’ve covered both: stay and it’s bad, leave and that’s bad too.
Given the enthusiastic, home-grown slaughtering of a million or so that occurred when we left India, maybe leaving will be worse.
Nah, just kidding.
But, please, when you write of Scotland being “raped”, you come across as a touch OTT, so don’t do that.
And, please, don’t anybody post a claim that our Scottish ancestors had no part in the colonialist exploitation and plunder of India. Because we did.
yeah, you are right it was OTT I was, to be fair, on a rant…
I’m still reading a book which has opened my eyes to a lot of stuff in India which I had ZERO idea happened, i.e. the fact that the Brits, (note I’m being inclusive now) destroyed the textile and the SHIP Building (i had no idea) industries in India, then imported inferior textiles from UK to India by force… that’s the kind of thing which I’m finding out and makes me sad, although perhaps not raped in Scotland, how about just plundered then?
Wait until you get a load of what they did to China..
PS, ignore the village idiot. He posts OTT 24/7
Of course that isn’t a “fact” re; Whisky, it’s a load of contrived nonsense.
Erm, what Scottish international container port does all the whisky depart from then, Aidan?
Re ‘the crocodile’; special ‘branch’ has ‘form’.
yes…. i know 🙂
This stuff is enormously frustrating for me (and I suspect the rank-and-file Polis at Gartcosh). The corrupt COPFS have clearly obstructed the ends of justice and slowed any progress to that analogous of tectonic plates.
The lavender Ceausescus were never Keyser Söze. What is being implied here is good ol’ fashioned dummy invoice fraud, the primary investigation of which should have taken a few hours. This is comprehensively covered in chapter one of White Collar Crime for Dummies.
Another basic scam favoured by the Mafia is “no show jobs”. At its peak, the SNP received £1.3m pa in Short Money from the British state. Short money was initiated in 1974 to enable “research and policy development”. Exactly how many policy papers did the SNP generate? A more pertinent question would be how many imbecile, illiterate and innumerate relatives of SNP MPs, MSPs and Cooncilors were being paid to sit at home and play video games?
Does anyone believe that the Ferguson Marine/ferries fiasco is not a classic money laundering exercise? Ever increasing costs (to obscene levels) resulting in kickbacks to those who authorised the overpayments. Investigation is imperative.
Kinlochleven Smelter Fiasco ???
Breaking news.
Keir Starmer’s
Handler“Chief of Staff” has quit. Seemingly, Sue Gray couldn’t stand the scrutiny. Why would a British Civil Servant take a sabbatical in the 1980’s to manage a Republican / IRA pub (the Cove Bar) in Newry. Very spooky.To be known, it seems, as the PM’s “Envoy to the Regions”.
An envoy being, I vaguely recall, some type of government representative to another country, perhaps Sir Keir is already recognising Scotland’s independence.
It points to her being a spy for the British.
Sue Gray – Wikispooks
She’s heard he won’t be around much longer or maybe she’s in the same camp as Nuland, plan backfired – exit stage left.
How dare that wee nyaff think he can play with weapons.
Set storm shadows tae Starmer..
Please God – don’t tell us BoJo is about to make a comeback?!
Are you saying she’s like the female Robert Nairac ?
That would be a very grey area. If she was 100% covert, it would be an insanely dangerous thing to do. Newry was just about the worst posting to get as a squaddie outside of Crossmaglen. It has been suggested that she was “declared” at least to McGuinness. The local active service unit appeared to believe she was a legitimate civilian. Perhaps she was protected by McGuinness and Scappaticci.
Nairac is a very, very grey area. All is not as it appears with regard to the standard narrative.
If that was the fiddle theere is no way it should take 3 years to investigate. It can only be the crown office delaying charges or no charges and they are hamstrung either way. If the charge the salmond case will win. If they dont charge the are seen to using the law to stymie the SNP.
It surely can’t be the case that the Crown Office’s tardiness has something to do with its (or those close to its) own involvement in the matter under investigation?
That would surely be unthinkable?
In a fraud you not only have to find that monies have been exfiltrated, you have find where they went and prove those purposes were invalid/illegal.
None of that is simple and it has to be done forensically for EVERY transaction.
I suppose it must give you a wee bit of satisfaction to know that this latest ‘scoop’ is a rehash of everything you were saying way back but it will still never be acknowledged by Leasky and pals. Wings rules ya bass!
Notorious crank say Leasky Boy – if we had more Scots with the guts and conviction of Sean Clerkin – we wouldn’t be trapped in this illegal union.
Anyway well done to you Rev – I recall the story, and you asked us of ways to spend the dough; for me the so called Scottish MSM are a bunch of spineless unionist b*stards – too afraid to rock their masters boats – as with many House Jocks – paying their mortgage comes before truthful reporting; in anycase, if what passes for Scottish journalists did print the truth – they’d be out of a job in a jiffy – so its mainly puff pieces, or dragging their feet on certain stories.
We must get the SNP out come 2026 – vote ISP or Alba where you find them.
A snippet from the Record story
“A major high street bank flagged suspicious transactions on accounts connected with the SNP last year and;
– Crown prosecutors have stepped up their investigation with movement on the case expected in the coming weeks.
A source said: “A bank flagged up large transactions on SNP related accounts to the police in 2023 which they wanted to query.”
Police probing claims fake company received payments for SNP office refurbishment – Daily Record (archive.is)
Let’s not forget that Leasky Boy (according to Craig Murray)
link to craigmurray.org.uk
Leask himself (through the so-called ‘Integrity Initiative) is very close to the organs of the Brit secret state that has spied on /infiltrated the independence, movement – and indeed that the SNP was long ago infiltrated and compromised.
Most on here have a good idea who these SNP agents are. And we have a really good idea who Nik’s handler was/is!
It’ll never amount to anything.
The reason they’ve turned an hours work into one that’s lasting years is because PC Doughnut has hit the security services brick wall.
Only in Scotland could we produce fcking dummies that didn’t fleece them for billions but chose a camper van instead lolz
Didn’t I tell you not to fucking buy anything? What are you, stupid? Yer going to get us all pinched! Fucking moron!
What? Its a present for my wife, it’s in my mother in laws name. Me & Imelda are going to try van life..Its okay – I’ve woven it intae a desk.Stop getting excited.
It’s another one that will never get off the ground! 🙂
punk
The camper-van wasn’t ‘instead of’ it was ‘as well as’!
As it was 2020 a year where there were many fixings and fitups more that the usual and as there didnt appear to be any budget spent on the private investigator firm employed by the SNP either for the Mark Macdonald case where they got the practice run then the real deal with Alex Salmond I have pondered many times whether many of the fixtures and fittings were indeed fixings and fitups. Apparently the former detective in charge of the firm was also the one who blew the Emma Caldwell investigation 20 years ago . Just a thought .
“Fixings and Fitups” is as good a title as any for a book about the SNP’s descent from the days of the adoration of the Tartan Stilettos by the masses at the SECC.
It seems almost like a fever dream now….or a nightmare perhaps. 🙁
Fingers crossed we get the result we and Scotland deserve.
On the subject of the missing £600K plus, how many Yessers asked for and got their donations refunded from “THE COMPANY” ?
I was lucky I was refunded by “THE COMPANY”, this fact is in the public domain !
Police Scotland said they were interviewing victims ? As I had been a victim, strangely enough I have NEVER been contacted by the Scottish Police. So the question of who is “THE COMPANY” has never been probed !
The SNP have data on payments/dates/times/bank accounts from Yesser who donated ! Have Scottish Police obtained this from SNP HQ ?
After the Tom Gordon of the Herald published my story one week later Humza Yousaf stated that there would be no more refunds ? On what authority did he have to impose this rule ? What is his connection with “THE COMPANY” ?
Who are the Directors of “THE COMPANY” ?
Once again Many Thanks to Crazy Cat and Rev Stu Campbell, Wings of Scotland Onwards and Upwards.
Lastly on a sad note how many of those who donated are no longer with us today, their hopes and aspirations for an Independent Scotland betrayed by the very people who are supposed to protect them.
Scottish born journalist John Swinton speaking at a media celebration of the independent press in New York in 1883.
“There is no such a thing in America as an independent press, unless it is out in country towns. You are all slaves. You know it, and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to express an honest opinion. If you expressed it, you would know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid $150 for keeping honest opinions out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for doing similar things. If I should allow honest opinions to be printed in one issue of my paper, I would be like Othello before twenty-four hours: my occupation would be gone. The man who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the street hunting for another job. The business of a New York journalist is to distort the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of Mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread, or for what is about the same — his salary. You know this, and I know it; and what foolery to be toasting an “Independent Press”! We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are jumping-jacks. They pull the string and we dance. Our time, our talents, our lives, our possibilities, are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes”
Financial crime is notoriously difficult to investigate and prosecute. Each thread of finances can burst exponentially into different paths, each of which has to be pursued to conclusion.
For me the 3 years has been a lot, but given the subject matter and those under investigation its fairly clear to anyone but an imbecile the police will want its investigation to be as thorough and scrupulous as its ever possible to be.
Then we have potential prosecution… I read some years ago a very compelling suggestion for juryless trials in complex financial cases. Given what is written BTL in nearly all newspaper, and even Wings comments its nearly inconceivable that you could select a Scottish jury who will all understand what has actually happened.
It would be a good thing to finally get it all over the line, but whatever the result of the investigation and potential prosecutions, it appears many on both sides have already written their conspiracies to reflect the outcome… which coincidentally already read remarkably similar…
From Sky
“A Police Scotland spokeswoman said: “On 9 August 2024, we presented the findings of the investigation so far to COPFS and we await their direction on what further action should be taken.”…
…A COPFS spokesperson said: “A standard prosecution report has been received by the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service from Police Scotland in relation to a 59-year-old man and incidents said to have occurred between 2016 and 2023.
“Connected investigations of two other individuals, a man aged 72 and a 53-year-old woman, remain ongoing.””
and?
And,… if they’ve already presented their findings then that would suggest their investigation is complete for one of them at least.
Aberdeen council employee embezzled over £1 million pounds which were refunds to council householders over a period of 17 years,
His criminality was exposed in the Spring of 2023 and he was jailed in the Summer of 2024 !
So obviously no interference in that case !
Therefore proof positive that cases in regard to relatively small sums of money purloined over many years involving many victims can be investigated and the perpetrator incarcerated in just over one year can be achieved !
Is it time for Murrell to transition, in order to share a cell with St Nic?
“But Scotland’s mighty press sat on its hands and said nothing.” Needs to carved in 20 ft letters on the side of Ben Lomond.
Looks like classic Churnalism.
You should accuse them of plagiarism.
Remember when (not so long ago) the Rev did a piece where he accidentally put ‘Branchfoot’ instead of ‘Branchform’, and a load of outlets brazenly nicked it without so much as a nod? Or, when it was then obvious what they had done, even a word of apology?
As for Leask, I still reckon Greg Moodie must have used him as a model for his press corp hack characters..
Thomas Ross KC has pointed out that if no prosecution takes place “within a reasonable time” the Lord Advocate will be barred from seeking to have the currently charged individual brought to trial. What a remarkable oversight that would be..
OK Stu, we get it, the SNP are shit. Couldn’t you give some airtime to people trying to do good in the Scottish community for a change, instead of just spitting on a dead party? Seriously. If you want good to happen in Scotland, help it happen.
“OK Stu, we get it, the SNP are shit. Couldn’t you give some airtime to people trying to do good in the Scottish community for a change”
You appear to have mistaken me for Esther Rantzen.
Esther Rantzen is a vocal advocate for assisted dying.
I’m sure there are plenty on here who would crowdfund sending the SNP to Dignitas.
So an easy mistake to make.
Class! Gladly Stu has kept wings just positive enough to accommodate the negative!
So scrolling to the end here it seems like no comments since 2 hours plus… Not sure the new comments system is working. Is there some filter I am missing? If not this is very hard to read new comments.
So people are replying to comments up and down the thread but there is no easy / quick way to view them.
You could do it by clicking on Recent Comments, one by one, but that is horrifically clunky and now I see that Recent Comments has been also reformatted so it is almost unusable for that purpose (of finding new comments).
Oh my. I hate change. lol.
Hmm..
when I go to the main article & scroll down, as I would the old fashioned way, ppls comments are already expanded.
I’m using a tablet, not a PC. Dunno if that makes a difference.
I have no idea what you mean by this. All that’s changed in Recent Comments is that there are more of them displayed (30 rather than 10) and you get a preview of the actual comment in the sidebar rather than just being told that someone has commented. In every other sense it’s the same.
Not sure why I though that at the time looking at it now.
It was very easy before, all new comments appeared at the end and people had no problem at all replying to each other without this new chronological destroying reply feature.
My prediction is the frequency of comments will go down after this change.
It’s clunky and if it isn’t broke don’t fix it.
Nothing to do with being resistant to change. (Last time I make that remark in humour. jeez)
Excellent work by Wings Over Scotland. In a non-corrupt country you’d be an award winning journalist.
Lock up lavender Pete! And throw away the key!
And I’m as shocked as you Nicola. Colour me shocked!
The Indy Swindlers. And partners in crime. A bed of Lavender. And embezzled cash from the two highest profile criminals in Scotland.
Liz Lloyd – Leaky Liz – will know all the details.
She’s as guilty as sin. Sturgeon’s attack dog and hench woman.
She knows everything.
Unless you are willing to crawl through every reply looking for the most recent reply date for every BTL comment there is no way to be sure you have read the latest posts.
Am I missing something?
No, it’s currently a total inefficient time-wasting difficult to follow crock of shit nested comment system like Arsebook uses, with the extra addition of like or dislike pish too, which just uses up even more of folk’s time and brain space and within a couple of days has merely highlighted the obvious factionalism we already knew was here.
Folk now expend their time getting drawn into playing a game of find all the comments and / or clicking hunners of likes or dislikes, fuck that for a laugh, never feel like you’re simply being distracted away from focusing on and addressing the important stuff no?
Rather than just sorting the long running issue of it taking up to 15 mins for submitted comments to show, and those comments standing on their own merits, and retain a simple easy one click to refresh page and scroll to pick up where you left off, you’ve now got to attempt all manner of moves to try to find all comments.
I know some Wingers and btl lurkers that live busy lives and some with eyesight and RSI issues so this “upgrade” will be an utter pain for them to use.
I wonder why your comments are taking ‘up to 15 minutes’ to appear? Perhaps that’s not related to the site at all. Mine came through instantly.
Edited to add that there *is* an issue with low res image clips distorting.
The old system had a delay. You never knew if it would be posted or if Gremlins would just run off with it.
This is a caching issue and nothing to do with the comments plugin.
You could subscribe to ‘new follow up comments’ (link is at the top of the Comments section). That way, you’d receive email notifications & only need to re-visit the site if you wanted to reply or give a thumbs up/down to a comment.
Would that help?
I want to see Lavender Pete prosecuted. But Dorothy Bain, and the rest don’t seem to want to.
Blow the lid off the Scottish corruption of the Crown Office.
And send them down!
The decision to charge three indiviuals was without doubt made some time back.
Timing of launch is what’s being played out now to coincide with the Hollyrood election.
Interesting – eh?
In the longer term, that can only benefit alternatives such as Alba & ISP.
Are the Mail’s sub-editors running a competition amongst themselves for the most double-entendre headline? “Fake firm probe”. ??? 🙂
Well Spotted sarah.
They are plainly telling us the ‘probe’ into ‘the firm’ is a fake!
😉
Perhaps the competition is “How many different interpretations can be made?”. I like your take i.e. that the police probe is fake.
ooh-err missus, colour me lavender.
I’m seeing a lot of criticism of the new comment set-up, and I don’t agree with the critics at all. The new system with discrete threads in response to individual comments makes it far easier to follow the conversation. It’s the same system as has been used on LiveJournal since as long ago as 1999. It’s clearly a much better arrangement, but people are blindly resistant to any change, even when it’s an obvious improvement.
Oh dear.
It’ll be AI generated gobbledegook comments next..
Lazy is, lazy does.
In the case of quite a few, how will we be able to tell?
How ironic.
How do i make an account ?
“How do i make an account ?”
To comment? You don’t need an account.
Just a thought regarding the stushie over the new format …
Should we suspect that those posting how they “hate change” or “wish things had stayed the same” are closet Yoons?
Haha, just my wee joke.
It is a simple fact though, that we Scots are a small ‘c’ conservative lot. It’s wired into our national and racial psyche. The wider Indy movement frequently loses sight of that, and so we are where we are.
Aye,
Small c conservative.
Not ultra right-wing warmongering racists.
So what’s your excuse? You must’ve been switched at birth to end up in the wrong country.
Just my wee joke..
I feel your pain. I want you to have these
xxx
I once costed up and procured an image grabbing and processing system with software, cameras and computers. Two setups and a wizz bang for then image handling computer with a really high res big screen. I had to install the eyes as when the cursor was the PS crosshairs it would be hard to find.
All that for a Biology lab would not have touched 1/20th of the IT equipment spend and we were talking Mac Computers.
Starmer’s ex-chief of Staff, Sue Gray has a new role as Minister for the Nations and Regions of the UK – its another layer of colonialism – as we in Scotland already have the staging post of Queen Elizabeth House in Edinburgh.
More on Gray – maybe she’s more suited to the COPFS in Scotland, its teeming with David Harvie’s.
Sue Gray – Wikispooks
Regards those with a spooky background being on manoeuvres, at the end of August, Catherine Smith was elevated to the post of Advocate General (and life Peer to be confirmed). This being the position tasked with advising the UK Government on the Scots law.
In truth, this has always been a political appointment and the office holders have not necessarily been top tier legal authorities to the same degree as is required to become Lord Advocate.
Catherine Smith dabbled in the covert intelligence world in her younger days, being involved with political influencing operations in the countries of the former Soviet Union. In this, she was very much following in her mother’s footsteps.
The position of Advocate General may be substantially an honorific one, but the danger here is that Keir Starmer asks for advice on Scots law (say to to with the devolution settlement) and gets a bespoke answer from Smith. There would be little concern regarding this given that the opinion of the Lord Advocate would naturally blow any adverse advice from Smith out of the water, but could we trust John Swinney to seek such an opinion?
Vivian, how much of this sort of thing is attributable to “Deep State” machinations, and how much is this simply “he/she seems like a reliable sort of chap” type thinking.
Sure, these are essentially the same as it preserves the current power structures, and which direction things are heading in, but the latter is way more mundane, and probably closer to the truth, though it makes for much less dramatic headlines.
Case in point, in my home town, two of the respectable shop owners were a) a Justice of the Peace and b) a Special Constable. Both, middle-aged, upper middle-class, white males – first class material for preserving things the way they currently are (or were, this was a while ago). Dastardly villains, or trustworthy souls with some skin in the game (shops), if there was ever an incident which required their civic services.
Back to Gray and Smith. It’s a bit more upmarket but does these appointments simply show that Labour is still running Scotland – after all the the work they put in to get these people in position – and we’re just see the results of a cabal shuffling positions within their membership.
No surprise that a fake company was set up to launder money Stu. It is not Peter Murrell’s first time as per Independence Merchandising Ltd where the SNP was laundering £hundreds of thousands into the party funds via the MPs and MSPs expenses for fake “information” from a cheap fake database called Broadsword. This company did not last long due to infighting and funny how the police and Crown Office were NOT interested in investigating this back then citing a lack of evidence even though I presented the evidence from FOI expenses. The Metropolitan Police were NOT interested in the fact that the Labour party were doing the same only they laundered over £20 million into their party funds via their fake cheap database called Excalibur. Notice the link between the SNP and Labour database scams being named after swords and betting every party was doing the same.
You can see that a certain musician MP in the SNP was also a director of this scam company as shown here :
link to companieslist.co.uk
“Things happen slowly, then all at once”. I hope so. But I have little faith left in the Crown Office & Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS). There is little separation between it and the Scottish Government, as Salmond warned in 2014. It could be argued that COPFS is marking its own homework in some ways. It’s a stark ‘conflict of interest’ which is one founding legal principle the COPFS is meant to uphold and defend. It’s a shocking state of conflicting affairs for any country to find itself enmeshed in. For that reason if no other, it is in the public interest that this case proceeds, though the heavens may fall.
For the first time we seem to have a reference to a second account… I wonder if that’s the same place that the 107k came from.
Maybe it was a trusted friend’s online bank account… Robbing Peter to PayPal.
Okay I’ll leave.