Wings Over Scotland

“A 50%+1 vote in a plebiscitary election … would be an unmistakeable, undeniable, unspinnable assertion of the Scottish people’s will”

Precisely.

Which is why it remains unfathomably mystifying just why no group of concerned, committed pro-Indy Scots is organising to stand for election on that plebiscitary platform.

That’s all they need to do. Get together, start a party (The Plebiscite Party), get the word out, stand for election. WM, HR, both if they wish.

What exactly, in the name of all that’s holy, is the fucking problem?

Thanks for taking that bullet. Colour me shocked. Again.

I agree 100% with this article Stu and your conclusion.
Words, more words is what this is. No mention on how to action this idea nor any mention on who would recognise and support this vague idea.
We have had years of words from the SNP and little action unless you wish to highlight a draft referendum bill that was put to the UK courts from comment. A court whose purpose is to support the Union. Why was that not an approved bill sanctioned by the Court of Session.
I have no faith at all that any political party with members in Holyrood or Westminster has the nouse, the assertiveness and ability to get us independence. They do not have a clue about our own laws and constitution. They abide by Englands laws only. Disgraceful.

A second independence referendum will never be granted by the British state. Westminster is not in fact a democracy, it’s a Spookocracy.

Keir Starmer has been described by that levelheaded, one nation Tory, Peter Oborne as the “MI5 candidate”.

Starmer’s Chief of Staff, Sue Gray comes from solidly working class, Irish diaspora stock, having grown up in London. Financial restraints prevented her going to university, and she joined the Civil Service straight from school.

How did she end up joined at the hip to Keir Starmer? Well, she resigned from the Civil Service in 2023 to take up the position as his Chief of Staff while he was leader of the opposition. By exercising this highly unusual move, she was found to have broken the Civil Service code.

One curious note from Gray’s Wiki page; “Gray took a career break in the 1980s, a step described … as “strikingly unorthodox”.During this time, she ran the Cove Bar, a pub in Newry … during The Troubles, … Peter Caldwell, a former special adviser to several ministers, said it had been speculated Gray was a spy at this time, though Gray denied it.”.

The Cove Bar was a known Irish Republican haunt.

Clearly, Gray is Starmer’s Handler, not his “Chief of Staff”. All terribly redolent of Sturgeon’s visceral attachment to Liz Lloyd.

“…recognised, legal and fair process to test,
where appropriate…”

Where appropriate are the key words there I think. And the Westminster Viceroy gets to decide.

“The international community is not especially exercised by the issue, particularly as Scotland did have a vote on the matter in fairly recent history”.

Yeah, even though that particular exercise would fail all tests of being a free and fair one; two (or was it 3) world record beating postal vote returns in one day. A foreign media 99.9% hostile to Scotland (proven fact by prof. Robertson), with the State Broadcaster even running a 5 minute ‘No’ propaganda piece nationally, every hour on the hour, all day long, no independent observers etc…
Oh and mustn’t forget a local government franchise used where everybody and his/her dog got a say; second home owners, students here temporarily, anyone from anywhere basically.

Just saying, like.

If Scots are to receive the equivalent treatment of the Belfast Agreement implied by this report that should mean the franchise is similarly open only to ‘all persons born” in Scotland. But I don’t see this ‘condition’ in the Noon & Dugdale report. Which means the Scots are not being treated equally vis-a-vis N Ireland. We are not equal also re Brexit with people born in N Ireland able to hold EU citizenship via an Irish passport. Scots treated as second class again, and as the Rev implies, held captive. Scotland’s resources are clearly worth a great deal more to Westminster, a factor also ignored by Noon & Dugdale .

link to assets.publishing.service.gov.uk

But Scotland is not Northern Ireland. Scotland is one of the founder signatories of the Treaty of Union between the Kingdoms of Scotland and England.

Nothern Ireland was never a state. Scotland was an independent state until May 1707.

Nothern Ireland is a province that emerged as an entity after the rest of Ireland declared independence. Scotland is a country in itself and has been a country in itself for over many many centuries before the union. It has maintained its borders since May 1707 despite this union. The union was political, and did not include the transfer of territorial ownership between Scotland and England.

Because of this, Scotland is not seeking “to secede” from anything, as that document purports, to become independent. It does not need to.

Scotland can and should simply unilaterally terminate that treaty of union so the Kingdoms of Scotland and England can continue their separate paths. Legally, the only thing it needs to do so is a majority of Scotland’s MPs agreeing to end the union. That was what was required to start the union, therefore that is what is required to terminate it.

It is not a matter for “the UK”, for England’s representatives, for foreign-led “think tanks” or for anybody else’s security services to stick their nose in how the people of Scotland can organise its exit way. That is for Scotland, and Scotland only, to decide and choose.

Scotland does not need to negotiate with the “UK”. Scotland is as much the Uk as England is, therefore the idea that Scotland has to negotiate with itself is silly in itself. Without Scotland, there is no “UK”.

The partner Scotland has to negotiate the termination of the union, separation and division of assets is the Kingdom of England. And by negotiating termination of the union, I mean precisely that: how the termination is effected – ie dates, not IF termination can be done or how the people of Scotland should communicate their desire to effect that termination, or how valid it is considered by entities that are outwith Scotland and therefore have no business interfering. It is for nobody else, other than the people of Scotland, to decide.

Ireland never needed “a referendum” to communicate its desire to be independent and to become independent. The only thing they needed and used was a UK general election and then a bunch of MPs with a backbone to reconvene Ireland’s parliament.

Scotland is not the property of the Kingdom of England or “the UK”. Scotland is in a political union with the Kingdom of England, therefore the way out of this union is clear: to revoke the Treaty of Union ending that union.

The only thing we need is a mechanism to ditch the Scotland Act and restore the powers of Scotland’s parliament.

That mechanism could be through a political party that stands on a manifesto to revoke the Scotland Act, restore the powers of the Scotland’s old parliament and revoke the Treaty of Union. For this, it is required that the representatives of that political party do not swear allegiance to any monarch. At the moment, it seems that the only party that resembles that mechanism is ISP.

The alternative is through a popular convention, like the Convention of the States was. Given Scotland’s popular sovereignty, such convention could, independently from UK structures, organise its own consultation with the purpose of overruling Holyrood as it stands, tied in the Scotland Act straight jacket and behaving like a puppet of Westminster and the crown, and Scotland’s MPs, who become useless to Scotland the minute they swear allegiance to a foreign monarch.

Holyrood and the parasites currently sitting there may feel they have to abide by the Scotland Act to preserve their own salaries and perks. But such convention will not have that problem.

It seems to me there is a massive and concerted effort from all elements of the establishment across the UK, to present Scotland’s independence as impossible. The British establishment, including that think tank outfit, seem determined in their minds to, somehow, demote Scotland to the status of a province like Northern Ireland or to a region like Catalonia is.

Scotland is none.

And why can this possibly be? It is obvious. It is because the establishment may fear the prospect that, because it is perfectly legitimate for Scotland to do and because it has every right to end “the united kingdom of great Britain” unilaterally, fed up of waiting for a fair referendum that never arrived, it may just choose to do so. And about time.

Forcing us to wait for a stupid referendum for 10 bloody years after we sent 3 absolute majorities of anti-union MPs to Westminster was abuse and a violation of Scotland’s right to self-determination.

But the abuse was not Westmintser’s. It was from the very Scotland MPs themselves who, elected to deliver independence and to stand up for Scotland, chose instead to stand against Scotland and to collude with elements of the British state to forcefully deny Scotland’s right to self-determination, so they could keep lining their pockets with salaries, secure pensions, access to subsidised bars and perks at the expense of the yes supporters they were supposed to represent.

It seems to me that the controllers of the British state, wherever those are, cannot possibly cope with the idea of losing all that perceived power and influence that the UN seat, Nato seat, embassies, treaties, trade deals, etc, etc, etc, give them.

But the reality is that none of those goodies belong just to England. They are common assets to both partners and therefore they should be treated as such and used for the negotiation of separation. So shame of those who call themselves “Scotland’s representatives” and have, for the last 10 years, pathetically surrendered any attempt to properly represent Scotland’s interests and instead happily capitulated to the pressure of the English establishment by helping them to portray Scotland as a province or region of the kingdom of England instead of what it is: its equal partner in a political union.

If a referendum is accepted by the majority of Scotland’s natives as the route to follow, then the franchise for that referendum will have to be tighten up in line with constitutional referendums across the other European states, including the UK’s franchise for the EU referendum.

Otherwise it will never be a referendum on self-determination. It will be just another joke at the Scots’ expense like 2014 was. It will be another assault on the Scotland’s natives’ right to self determination and yet another sly mechanism to purposely suppress their will by using migrants form everywhere else with no allegiance to Scotland and who, just like it happened in 2014, may just leave Scotland within a year after the referendum.

Scotland does not need “to secede” from anything. That is misinformation. It simply needs to terminate the union with England reverting both, the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland to their former status of independent states.

It will be then for NI to decide if it wants to continue shackled to England and form the “United Kingdom of England and Northern Ireland”, if it wishes to go solo, or if it wishes to unite with the rest of Ireland.

From the John Smith Centre!

Hmmm..

Maybe with the SNP in a self imposed death spiral Westminster will suddenly say now is The Time and graciously grant another referendum now the odds would appear (to them) as being heavily stacked in their favour.

It would also mean keeping Branchform going even longer to maintain the nasty smell in everyone’s nostrils; final nail in the coffin and all that..

The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland loves a precedent, and the Edinburgh Agreement (2012) is the precedent which has become a rod for our own backs.

The Edinburgh Agreement came about via an Oliver Twist-like approach to the Government at Westminster by the Government at Holyrood, with the former only agreeing to the process because…

*Yes was trailing in the polls
*The MSM were rabidly pro-Union
*HMQ could be called upon if needed (and was)
*West central Scotland Yoons could be emboldened by social club paramilitaries posing as marching bands being imported from Ulster to make the point that hard core Yoons didn’t intend going anywhere, let alone peacefully.
*Postal ballot returns could be ‘enhanced’ and pro-Union local authorities could be less than rigorous in their control of counts
*The pillar of democracy and Mother of Parliaments would be excused any external scrutiny as to the process being fair and meeting internationally recognised standards
*Spain would ensure any talk of future EU membership would be quashed
*NATO allies could be relied upon to pour cold water as/when required
*Westminster could pour scorn upon any hypothetical post-Yes negotiation, for example regarding Sterling, by simply refusing to engage

It’s a miracle that 52% of Scots voted Yes and only a 6% swing would’ve been sufficient to see those non-Scots who won the day for No being defeated.

Any talk of an alternative to the Edinburgh Agreement/IndyRef1 will be portrayed as being an attempt by the losing side to try to change the rules of the game, and in doing so acquire a means more favourable to their preferred outcome.

We shouldn’t be fretting over IndyRef2 – after IndyRef1 we should be running in the opposite direction!

It ought to be fairly simple thing to bring evidence that Scotland joined the Union as a con seating partner to an equal endeavour, not as a supplicant. Nothing whatsoever gives English prior authority to become top dog, nothing whatsoever.

It is not enough to say that the Treaty is ancient history because it is, legally, underpins the UK constitution. If it doesn’t, then there can be no Union. If there is no Union, there can be no UK. The implications are so massive that it is not difficult to understand why lies are told about the Treaty and the Union.

Treaties are, by their very nature, international legal entities, which means that no domestic legislation pertaining to the Union can supersede that Treaty or cause any of its Articles to be thrust aside or to fall into desuetude. The Acts of Union are not primary legislation, but secondary legislation, domestic legislation, and, as such, could never have overturned international law. They still cannot do so. If you are lied to and told that they can – and people have believed that, the Scots and the English people, it is not hard to comprehend why so many English people believe we were conquered. It is all lies and we are fools to believe them.

This is a matter in international law for Scotland to take to the ICJ, as a matter of urgency. The political sphere should be a united front for independence. It is not that England and the British State cannot be overcome, it is that too many Scots are collaborators and fearties, and the top of the SNP, the supposed party of independence, has been compromised and is acting in the interests of the British State and not in Scotland’s interests. That is the truth of it. So much of history, here and elsewhere, is simply a tissue of lies.

Mia, you are correct. They are not Scotland’s representatives, they are England’s representatives in Scotland. Useful colonised idiots. England never gets mentioned in the debate, it is as you say, not Scotland vs the UK, but Scotland vs England, and how long before they mention racism. England needs to find its own identity, its own resources and stop depending on colonising others, including Scotland. Grow a pair England, be a good neighbour and pay for what you take. Ultimately you will grow and learn and have a great potential to be a nation again, standing on your own two feet. You can do it. We can for sure, and will.

No real nationalist could or should accept that self determination is in any way in the gift of Westminster, or subject to consent.

Constitutional fetters however ingeniously and loosely applied remain fetters.

The attempt by anti independence actors to “Ulsterise” the process of Scottish self determination should be rejected out of hand.

As you rightly say, 50% + 1 in a plebiscitary election might not be seen as authoritative and wouldn’t necessarily guarantee recognition of the result either by Westminster or the UN, but it would be very persuasive. It would also beg the question of whether the pro independence majority has the balls not to take “No” for an answer, and – as any self respecting nationalist movement ultimately must – takes rather than asks for its independence.

There are actually few precedents for a pro independence majority being stonewalled, but there are also relatively few examples.

The Faroese people voted for independence from Denmark in 1946, with 50.7% voting in favour. The Speaker of their Logting declared independence on 18th September 1946 whereupon the Danes dissolved the Logting and called fresh elections which were won by unionist parties. Negotiations after the new elections granted wide ranging home rule to the islands in 1948.

I suspect that the overwhelming majority Scottish unionists and British nationalists – particularly those like Dugdale – don’t really even want or expect to be able to deliver the same level of home rule for Scotland as the Faroese enjoy from Denmark.

Another great post by Mia followed by one of Xaracens,it appears that the John smith centre and their resident very highly paid MORON have been instructed to cobble together some pish to placate and quieten the current displeasure of independence supporters at the ongoing and forthcoming destruction of our social services by Labour eagerly supported by the Scum Nonce Party and their deviants

WM has been trying for decades to rewrite the COR and to get Scots to sign away their birthright, they are continuously working to undermine and destroy Scots SOVEREIGNTY , THIS is just another plan to chip away at our sovereignty by inferring that we NEED WM as england graceful permission to hold a referendum with ALL CONDITIONS being set by our colonisers, there are indeed many even on here who would gladly sign away their birthright because they are brit scots not Scot brits and unfortunately our political parties are staffed entirely by them apart from ISP

IF WM as engerland was SO POWERFUL why has EVERY PM since 2014 stated that “Now is not the time” instead of we will NEVER grant another independence referendum because by law we can do so , they CANNOT destroy or rip up the COR because THAT would destroy the TOU, THAT is why they want to AMEND it and to do so they NEED Scots to accept the amendments

As Stu has pointed out the MORON and her sidekick have NO AUTHORITY to propose ANYTHING and even if they did the conditions would be untenable, has Gordy Broon the tr@it or been seen in Glasgow Uni The Vow version 2

The ONLY thing stopping independence is political COWARDS and LIARS

“Legally, the only thing it needs to do so is a majority of Scotland’s MPs agreeing to end the union”

That will never happen the majority of MP’s from Scotland are careerist unionist troughers – who don’t give a toss about dissolving this illegal union – the same can be said for the MSPs at Holyrood.

So me n ma mate Tam are gonnae set up oor ain quango and publish oor ain dross.
I see that as no different to this. How much did that cost?

Because of course, the Union as it stands is NOT voluntary. Scotland is a prisoner – or as John Smith, the Speaker of the Commons, put it at the time of the Act Of Union: “We have catch’d Scotland and we will bind her fast”.

Are you saying:

Scotland is not just a colony it’s a penal colony!

Mia

Great post.

The UK government has no authority over Scotland. Eejits from the ‘The University Of Glasgow’s Centre For Public Policy’ are trying to imply Scotland is subordinate to England & no higher in the pecking order than a provence ffs. What planet are these morons on? Dugdale still proving she has no brains.

We’re the other half of the UK. A sovereign nation & it gave hee-haw authority to the English. Studies like these should be treated with the contempt they deserve. A parasitic nation trying desperately to cling onto territory, vast waters & wealth that doesn’t belong to them.

If the English wanted to leave does anyone think Kezia & Co would come out with the pish that they couldn’t? They’d need a section 30 or permission from Scots? No, me neither.

This bullshit only tries to legitimise fake news. Made up bullshit that they shouldn’t have wasted their time on.

@Sven says: 26 September, 2024 at 2:15 pm

Get 3 of them in 1 room and you’ll get 4 “united” opinions on how to get the Party going

Hard to believe it could be worse than that, Sven, but actually, it’s worse than that.

Because all the time the 3 in the room are arguing, they’ll be watching the door, in the hope that somebody will come in and announce that they are actually going to do something.

But no, when that fourth person comes in, she’s watching the door too, in the same state of helpless paralysis as the first three.

And so it goes on.

129 good and true Scots, one from each constituency in the land, are all that are required from our 5.5 million to stand on that plebiscitary platform at HR. Heck, just counting the usual suspects on here, we’ve probably already got 10.

And for those regular posters who are absolutely emphatically adamant of the unimpeachable rightness and righteousness of their opinions and the overwhelming support for their cause among ordinary Scots, being elected just has to be a stone cold certainty.

Right?

So as I wrote before:

What exactly, in the name of all that’s holy, is the fucking problem?

I encourage everyone who’s interested in the Indy movement to read the comments at WoS by the likes of “Mia”, “Geri,” “James Che”, the aptly-named “Confused,” and more.

They’ll soon realize that the cutting edge of the Indy movement is populated by a dozen tin-foil-hat conspiracy theorists (Humza is an MI5 agent?), historical illiterates, constitutional illiterates, actual illiterates, and Salvo moonh*wlers.

No wonder their actual support is so few that they dare not publish the number of people that voted for their self-styled “Liberation” committee. No wonder the Monster Raving Loony Party outpolls their ISP at elections.

There should be only one way that Scotland gets a referendum. By returning a majority of MSPS in favour of independence.

This is the only definite way of determining what Scottish people want. Opinion polls are not elections. They are snapshots of opinion at a given time. Opinions are not valid in a legal sense. So I entirely refute any movve towards opinion poll democracy.

This is a very dangerous path to go down. An opinion poll may suggest yes would lose, despite electing a nationalist government. And that’s because it is a small sample, not quantifiable, not binding or democratic.

The SNPs failure to use their mandates, is a matter of regret. But that does not mean we then revert to opinion poll democracy.

We cannot bind our people to opinion poll democracy.

If England decided it wanted to leave the Union and rUK said no do we really believe it would take a blind bit of notice.
If Scots are prisoners England is the jailer.

I encourage people who are undecided about Indy to read the comments of “Geri.”

Whose scintillating intellectual responses to criticism are best summed up as “shut up!”

If sensible people read Geri’s long, rambling, repetitive, weird screeds (danger–they may be bored to death in the process, or break a rib bone laughing) they’ll never vote for Indy.

“Eejits from the ‘The University Of Glasgow’s Centre For Public Policy’ are trying to imply Scotland is subordinate to England & no higher in the pecking order than a provence ffs”

Of course they do. The British establishment they work for is desperate to ensure England remains as the “united kingdom” state after Scotland’s independence.

Right now, if Scotland unilaterally ends the treaty of union, England can only become the successor state with Scotland’s consent. Scotland has the exact same right as England to demand being the successor state.

Presenting Scotland as a region/portion that simply exits the UK, so the UK remains as the main entity, would avoid having to terminate the treaty, which is, in my view, what they are desperate to preserve at all costs.

In my view, this is the reason why they have been busy devising alternatives to revoking the treaty using some kind of fudge around their beloved “parliamentary sovereignty”. And here it is one of the attempts:

“Act of Union Bill [HL]
Private Members’ Bill (Starting in the House of Lords)
Originated in the House of Lords, Session 2017-19
Last updated: 9 October 2019 at 10:28

Long title
A Bill to provide a renewed constitutional form for the peoples of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, to continue to join together to form the United Kingdom, to affirm that the peoples of those nations and parts have chosen, subject to and in accordance with the provisions of this Act, to continue to pool their sovereignty for specified purposes, and to protect social and economic rights for citizens”

This bill is in its second reading, but it has not progressed since 2019. Thank goodness.

First of all, it is not a proper treaty, but rather an “Act of Union”, therefore domestic law. In my opinion it does not substitute the real treaty, it simply adds a domestic layer over it to hide it a bit more.

It seems to me that this “Act of Union” would aim to completely demote Scotland to the status of a province of England.

In this new “Act of Union”, the “union” is not between Scotland and England, but rather between, England, Scotland, NI and Wales. But England remains, of course, in full control of the UK parliament. So, if Scotland leaves, the “united kingdom” remains intact.

It actually purports to offer a mechanism to that effect. It offers a mechanism for Scotland to exit the UK through a referendum via domestic law (fully controlled by England as the UK and its crown, of course) without having to even touch the original treaty, because all negotiation of independence and who grants independence is this new “UK Parliament” through an Act of this Parliament. In other words, Scotland becomes a part of and subordinated to this new parliament.

Because the original treaty remains intact, I am not quite sure what happens with “Great Britain”. I guess is that the idea behind this is that the English crown continues to control the Scottish one. They will probably fudge all that too.

This Act of Union also purports to legitimise the Supreme Court, whose legitimacy under the Treaty of Union is quite dubious. This new Act gives this English court full supremacy over all other courts on Scotland, Wales and NI. I am of the opinion this remains to be a direct breach of the treaty of union.

When you look deeper, you realise that everything continues to be exactly as it is now, with England being given priority and control over everything, over every decision and over every other nation.

The only differences with now are that it provides:
a mechanism to demote Scotland to the status of a region of England, just like Wales and NI
a mechanism to devolve power to England but without losing control over the whole UK
a mechanism to reform/abolish the HoL
a mechanism to reduce the number of total MPs to a meagre 146, making the representation of NI, Wales and Scotland pretty much insignificant.
a mechanism to change the name of the Bank of England to the “Bank of the UK”.
and critically, a mechanism to change the name of the state. By the look of it, it may pass to be simply called “United Kingdom”.

It is interesting that this new “Act of Union” proposes that to start there must be an initiation referendum:

“53 Commencement principle
(1) The preceding Parts of this Act shall not come into force unless their commencement is approved in a referendum held in accordance with this Part (“the commencement referendum”) by all of the following—
(a) a majority consisting of at least 65% of the votes cast in the United
Kingdom as a whole; and
(b) a majority of the votes cast in England; and
(c) a majority of the votes cast in Scotland; and
(d) a majority of the votes cast in Wales; and
(e) a majority of the votes cast in Northern Ireland.
(2) In this section “votes” means valid votes. a referendum that is in domestic law, seeking to avoid having to resource to international law and ending that treaty”

Either the person who wrote this paragraph cannot count, does not have a clue about the populations of England, Scotland, NI and Wales, or thinks we are all thick and would not notice.

According to Google, for 2020 the population of the UK was
67,081,234. The population of England was 56,550,138

65% of 67,081,234 was 43,602,802.1

The population of Scotland+Wales+NI combined was 10,531,096

Even in the impossible event that the entire population of Scotland+Wales+NI voted for this thing, it would still be required that 33,071,706.1 of England also voted for it. That figure represents around 58.5% of England’s population.

In other words, England is given a veto over everybody else, just as it has now. Unless a 60% of England votes for it, it does not happen.

Is also interesting the content of section (2) above which says: “In this section “votes” means valid votes”.

Clearly, they are just ensuring that the inconvenient spoiled ballots do not get counted at all. Probably they do not get even counted as “turnout”.

There is another interesting thing for this “initiation” referendum: the franchise

Here it is, loud and clear:

“58 Franchise
(1) A person who would be entitled to vote in a general election held on the day of the referendum is entitled to vote in the referendum.
(2) No other person is entitled to vote in the referendum”

There you go, a restrictive franchise and not an open one like the indyref was where everybody who was for 5 min in Scotland was able to vote. What a bunch of “ethno-nativists” these Brits are, huh? Yet, I don’t see any of those pro-wide open franchise criticising them.

And what happens if a majority of the people in Scotland, Wales, NI or England vote against this Act? Nothing. Business continues as usual, because this Act was never designed to offer an exit for the present union where the treaty is exposed to be revoked. It only offers an exit to Scotland from this fake new “UK” that they appear to be planning.

The fact that it requires a referendum to start may explain why it has stalled since 2019. They still cannot guarantee at this point that Scotland would vote yes to this crap, even after Sturgeon took a chainsaw to the principles, reputation, competence and integrity of the SNP, even after she forcefed us all with the self-id gender woowoo crap an put rapists in female prisons, even after Yousaf enacted the hate crime bill and send the stone of destiny down south, even after the threat of the freeports and the plans of this new GB entity to devour our electricity while we are charged over the odds for it, etc.

However, this bill, or something similar to this but more elaborate, could explain why the political fraud Sturgeon, yousaf, Swinney or Forbes never were in any hurry to call a referendum, and forced us to wait and wait and wait despite knowing a S30 would never arrive.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Dugdale’s paper is based on this bill. Let’s remember this, published by the BBC on December 2016:
“Kezia Dugdale calls for ‘new Act of Union’
“Kezia Dugdale has called for a “new Act of Union” in a bid to “save the UK for generations to come”.

If ANY of our elected parasites from ALL parties had any principles or integrity they would be shouting outrage that engerland doesn’t have a devolved parliament or a Barnett formula like the other parts of the fake uk

That they are ALL silent indicates to me that they are all collaborators working to oppress and subsume Scotland on behalf of their colonisers

I speculated at the time that Bojo was removed for not being compliant enough. His removal at the time made no other sense to me.

The only way you could get something as vile as Starmer ‘elected’ was to make the alternatives so bad that people really had no choice.

Even then the turnout tells the real story. No one voted ‘for’ Starmer it was voting anti-tory, anti-snp as they were so fucking bad we had no alternative.

Starmer is 100% the ‘covert operations’ candidate. (Calling them the intelligence services is a bit of a misnomer these days.)

The death of John Smith paving the way for Tony scumbag Blair is another very dubious event. I don’t think most people comprehend how involved these wankers are.

Honest decent people in politics are the exception not the rule. And they all become targets of them if they get anywhere near real power.

They are the secret police, the Stasi, for the people who really hold power in the UK. And Starmer is their man make no mistake. That is why he is such a dislikeable cunt. People can instinctively sense what a creepy fake he is as soon as he steps out of the shadows. Starmer means war. He always did. That is why he was placed into the slot.

Judging by the way the UK is acting my guess is there are real structural economic problems there that are being covered up. They are panicking. And they see war (with Ru$$ia) as their ‘way out’, So you know it is fucked up.

Personally I think the UK has been totally engulfed by this evil. Blair was pivotal in this regard. Same as the US. It is very sad to witness as the people in these countries are not bad. They are more victims. I feel like a complete stranger in my own country, in the west. None of this has anything to do with me or anyone I know. We are unwilling passengers.

Independence would not have protected us from it. Look at all the independent countries in Europe in its grip irrespective.

Mac @ 7:20 am

“We are unwilling passengers”

Yes, the colonized are merely ‘bystanders’ in their own land; a colonized people are ‘out of the game’ (Memmi).

The main task of the colonizer is ‘to make any prospect of liberation for the colonized seem impossible’.

@BLMac says: 27 September, 2024 at 1:35 am

The oppressor always makes it illegal for the oppressed to have legal methods of removing the oppression

Well, you look to be a Scot, from your name.

It’s not illegal for you, or any other Scot, to stand for office – either at WM or HR, or both.

It’s not illegal for you, or any other Scot, to campaign on a Plebiscitary Election platform – a majority vote for you will be treated by you as a mandate to end the Union.

It’s not illegal for you, or any other Scots, to band together to stand in every Scottish constituency on the same Plebiscitary Election platform – to get a majority of the seats in either WM or HR, or both.

It is entirely legal for you, and every other usual suspect, to come on here day after day, giving it the “poor us”, and “we’re victims” and “it’s not fair” and “we’re oppressed slaves of the colonialist regime”.

So yes, it’s entirely legal for you to spout utter shite.

Why you believe that hopeless, hand-wringing and wailing and gnashing of teeth over non-existent laws is going to inspire the majority of Scots to support Indy remains an ever enduring mystery.

The sooner Scots realise and act on this the better

Sure, what you really mean is, as soon as somebody else has done all the heavy lifting, you’ll clamber on the bandwagon.

If the support for Indy is there, the mechanism to demonstrate that support and get a majority vote in favour of Indy is there.

And it’s all legal, all day, every day.

Off topic but I’ve got to comment on the disaster that Labour are proving to be.
Anything should be better that the most corrupt U.K. government the Tories ever cobbled together but maybe not by much.

After seeing the gap between the U.K. rich and poor widen every year for 60 years Labours first move is to take money from our OAPs.
Money that would help stop many from becoming ill or dying with hypothermia.
Next they say they will end the nondom status for the rich based here but keeping their tax free money abroad. I like the sound of this but now Labour are having doubts and are now likely to let them keep their ill gotten gains or they might leave.
I say not paying your way go away and have restricted access to visiting the country.

Labour Foreign office Minister David Lammy, who called Trump many bad names including racist is meeting Mr Trump along with Sir Keir later today to improve trade relations should the US be dumb enough to put a sex predator and compulsive liar back in power.

Will they be wearing free £4,000 specs and £500 suits that they forgot to declare?

As Labour wishes to contribute to a Middle-East peace deal they continue to provide the planes and parts to Israel so that they can continue to kill and maim 100’s of thousands of innocents in Palestine and the Lebanon.

Just can’t wait for their budget to continue the 14 years of Tory cuts, increasing numbers living in poverty and deprivation.

As Labour takes over Holyrood we can see the new levelling up where our NHS can become equal with the worst NHS in the U.K. Labour controlled NHS Wales, and end to Seniors free bus travel, reintroduction of bridge tolls, the removal of free prescriptions and hospital travel
and no more free personal care. The Bedroom tax will be reintroduced to Scotland so that can further cripple the disabled as it does in England.

Go Jump off a pier Keir.

“If the support for Indy is there, the mechanism to demonstrate that support and get a majority vote in favour of Indy is there”

Support for indy in 2015 was over 50%, as judged by the over 50% who voted for pro-independence parties on the GE2015.

We demonstrated that support with our vote, we got a majority of the vote on the May election 2015 and we got an absolute majority of anti-union MPs.

The expectation was that those anti-union MPs would get up their fat arses, reconvene the old Scotland’s parliament and revoke the treaty of union, rather than getting comfortable on the seats and proceeding to line their pockets and guts in the subsidised bars.

When we voted in 2016 and 2021 for a majority of pro-independence MSPs, we also expected them to get their arses in gear and progress independence. We expected them TO DELIVER our mandate for an independence referendum within that parliament, not to piss all over it and hand a veto to England MPs for free as they did.

When we voted in the EU referendum by 62% against Brexit, we expected that the parasites who claimed to represent us would actually represent us and issue an ultimatum to our Kingdom of England partner in this union: either the UK remains in the EU, or the union disbands and the kingdoms of England and Scotland go their separate ways.

Once again we were ignored.

So yes, the mechanism TO SHOW support for independence is there and we have used it successfully several times already. We should have only need to use it once. Yet, in the context of this union, we are expected to continue expressing that support over and over and over and over and over and over again and still nothing is done about it.

For as long as those who claim to represent us swear allegiance to a foreign crown and put the interests of that foreign crown ahead of the interests of Scotland, what we do not have and will never have, if we continue playing by the crooked rules of this game which is deliberately rigged against us, is a mechanism TO EFFECT and implement that desire for independence. In other words, we have been deliberately placed in a hamster’s wheel where we are expected to keep running but never get anywhere.

For the last 10 years we have been in a loop, demanding to show support for independence over and over and over again, but never allowed to progress it because we have been relying on parasites who have no interest whatsoever in progressing it: aka the gatekeepers of the union.

That is what each and every single political party in both Holyrood and Westminster have been to Scotland.

“And it’s all legal, all day, every day”

It is also considered “legal” in this UK context to continue to piss all over the people of Scotland’s democratic mandates, to piss all over our Claim of Right, despite being a fundamental condition of the ToU, and to breach, as many times as they wish, every single fundamental condition included in the ToU.

It is also “legal” in the UK context, to usurp our constitutional popular sovereignty and force on us the English only convention of “parliamentary sovereignty”. It is also “legal” in the UK context to completely ignore the ToU and force on us an English court “so called UK Supreme Court” which, somewhat, is allowed to tramp the rulings of our Supreme court in Scotland and even given England judges applying English law the power to put our own effing legislative body into a straight jacket.

It is also “legal” under this context of the UK and, despite pretending it is a democracy, to have an unelected representative of the crown sitting in the middle of what should have been a democratically elected government cabinet, policing our legislation, and then, against every principle of democracy, having that representative of a foreign crown stealing from the people of Scotland control over the legislative and executive powers and handing them to that crown as a way to stop legislation the crown does not like entering our own parliament.

The minute the people of Scotland sent 56 anti-union MPs to Westminster, when we issued a mandate for an independence referendum in 2016, and when we voted against brexit which put us on a collusion course with the path England chose, the UK union was put on notice, each and every time. That is the reality. Yet, those who claimed to represent us, decided to betray us, ignore it and allow the British state to continue business as usual.

If the people of Scotland demands an independence referendum, as we did in 2016 and every election until, and including 2021, then it means the UK union does no longer have the consent from Scotland to continue and Westminster does no longer have Scotland’s consent to operate on its behalf until that time that referendum takes place and the people of Scotland decide.

To ignore that and force Scotland to continue in this union and worse, abuse that time to force on us toxic legislation to rob our resources and control our territory, legislation we never asked for, actually point blank reject and is completely against our interests is, at all effects, imposing absolute rule on Scotland, a direct violation of the Claim of Right and an indirect violation of the ToU.

That should have been sufficient for those parasites claiming to represent Scotland both in Holyrood and Westminster to get up the seats and terminate the union on the basis that a fundamental condition was breached, therefore the ToU is null and void in line with the fundamental principle of pacta sunt servanda in international law.

Something being “legal” in the Uk in the constitutional context does not necessarily mean that it is legal under Scotland’s constitution or international law. Something being deemed “illegal” in the UK in that constitutional context does not necessarily mean it is illegal under Scotland’s own constitution or international law.

Scotland is not the property of the Kingdom of England or its crown. Scotland is a co-signatory of the Treaty of Union and has every legal right to unilaterally terminate it at any point of its choosing.

If that has not happened yet it is only because we have parasites pretending to represent us in both Holyrood and Westminster who, in reality, only are there to line their pockets and act as the useful idiots of the crown at the expense of the needs and wants of the people. Their only job appears to be the putting the interests of everybody else ahead of Scotland’s.

So, in the constitutional context, saying something is “legal” or “illegal” when applying the English-only convention of “parliamentary sovereignty”, is completely meaningless.

The union between the kingdoms of Scotland and England cannot be controlled by domestic law, which is what Westminster issues. It has to be controlled by international law, because both kingdoms were independent states when that treaty was signed, and Westminster is just a byproduct of that treaty and therefore it is not above Scotland or England. It can only rule on their behalf for as long as they give consent.

Scotland revoked that consent in 2015, 2016, 2016 again, 2017, 2019 and 2021. Yet, here we are. Stuck in the same hamster’s wheel.

Historically where countries have separated/broken up there has been a huge support for the break up by the population.

In such cases it makes the referendum (or whatever mechanism) almost inconsequential because the outcome is a forgone conclusion (usually 70/30 or at the least in the high 60’s).

This is the key to any change – making the public so in favour of it that it becomes an irresistible action.

Scottish Nationalism has never reached those levels – so moaning that you can’t have you way when the country doesn’t want it isn’t going to cut the mustard.

Incidentally, few countries in the world have a mechanism for breaking themselves up – its not in their interests to do so.

Shitface

Its you that spouts shit & plenty of it.

“It’s not illegal for you, or any other Scot, to stand for office – either at WM or HR, or both.”

The SNP had a triple mandate to exit the union. Scotland has already demonstrated its intention numerous times at the ballot box. The UK even conducted its own polling on the shit state of the union & didn’t like the results so locked it away. They refuse to play ball. What bit are you struggling with?

It wouldn’t matter if Holyrood had a full pro Indy majority. It wouldn’t matter if we had a full house of MPs at Westminster. It wouldn’t matter if polling was 100%, consecutively, over decades.

They will refuse & that’s why it’s utterly futile playing their democracy denying game any longer on a domestic footing. They’re especially going to get hostile too because they own fuck all but what they’re stealing from Scotland. Its time we started looking outside our borders.

“Historically where countries have separated/broken up there has been a huge support for the break up by the population”

The UK is not a country. It is just a political union based on an international treaty subjected to international law, just like the EU is. Ending the treaty of union will not “break” the UK. It will terminate it because the treaty is bilateral, aka between only 2 partners.

There never was support in Scotland for joining the union in the first place, yet, because of a political decision, the people of Scotland were forced into it. Nationalism was never any part of it. It was the crown who pushed and pushed for it because it satisfied its own interests at the time rather than those of England or Scotland.

Where was the majority support for brexit in Scotland and NI?

Nowhere to be seen. Yet, the UK was dragged out of the EU without Scotland’s consent and therefore in direct violation of the claim of right and therefore the ToU.

How on earth was that ever considered legal? and Why was it done? Because it was a political decision which had been already taken even before the 2014 referendum took place.

The bombardment with pro-brexit propaganda we all experienced during the campaign in 2016, and the unlawful tricks which were deployed by the pro-brexit side, were simply the mechanism put in place to ensure that a majority pro-brexit in England was seen by the English people. Because that is the only thing they care about: what England thinks and England sees. And to hell with everybody else.

It was acknowledged in the English courts that some of the tactics used by the pro-brexit side were unlawful, but the courts did not demand a re-run of the referendum because of, guess what? parliamentary sovereignty and because the referendum was advisory, not legally binding, therefore they considered it a political decision to proceed with brexit and not one based on the will of the people.

“Scottish Nationalism has never reached those levels”
And, for as long as we have a continuous stream of people from the rUK and elsewhere entering Scotland and given the vote to the point where the proportion of people living in Scotland born outwith Scotland voting in Scotland’s constitutional matters is well over ten times the proportion of people voting in England’s constitutional matters who were born elsewhere, those levels will never be reached and are designed to be never reached and to be forcibly reduced as the time goes by.

For several years now, the number of deaths in Scotland is surpassing the number of births, meaning that the exchange of native population for migrants is accelerating and the voice of the natives of their own country is being silenced even more as every year goes by.

The natives of Scotland voted for independence in 2014. THAT should have been sufficient, and it would have been sufficient in every other country of the world, for yes to independence to have won. It is evident that the vote of migrants was used as a tool to frustrated the right to self determination of Scotland’s natives.

Kind of insignificant – Russell Findlay, has been announced as the new branch manager of the London Tories in Scotland – the Fifth Columnist leader replaces – nope it gone – that’s how much I thought of the treacherous b*stard – that was Findlay’s predecessor.

That’s another joke. London Tories who Scotland has rejected for over seventy years but still here scrounging a free seat on the list to meddle & disrupt every single thing going on at the branch office & they’re absolute shit even at that.

Aww jeezo, the ‘names’ are out in force today, the Site prick John Main and Franchise Fanny, and some newbies too, or doppelgangers mebbies…..

We really must tell those ‘cabals of zealots’ in France, Spain, the Netherlands etc etc who deny residents the vote on constitutional matters until x years residency, or in some cases permanently that they are baaaad… Moonhowlers even!

Roll up, roll up, come on in to Scotchland. Day bus trip? Here; here’s your ballot paper….

The spanner in the works was that if it was solely for the residents of Scotland to decide our future, then what the fuck was the cuckoo in the nest UK MSM (which is predominantly based in England and aligned and supportive of its and UK needs) doing broadcasting its clearly biased influential shite in Scotland during the campaign…

“what the fuck was the cuckoo in the nest UK MSM (which is predominantly based in England and aligned and supportive of its and UK needs) doing broadcasting its clearly biased influential shite in Scotland during the campaign”

Absolutely. And I would go even further: what were the three English leaders of England’s three main political parties, each and every one of them representing a constituency in England, sticking their nose in the campaign?

And how much money donated by members of those parties in England or from donors based outside Scotland was used to campaign against a yes vote?

How much “UK” money was directed by the UK government (a byproduct of the treaty of union and therefore subordinated to the union, not above it) to the no campaign?

Why was the “UK” civil service involved in the process at all and even being allowed to breach the civil service code by “working all together to save the union”?

How on earth was that not ever seen as direct unlawful interference from external interests attempting to derail a yes vote?

The whole thing was a complete joke, riddled with unlawful external interference and rigged against a yes vote from the very start.

Andy Ellis said;

“Voting franchises for constitutional votes or elections in already independent states ARE NOT THE SAME as the franchise used in self determination referendums.”

Don’t be silly, Andy, it’s you who is making a false distinction on the matter! Both of these kinds of plebiscites are specifically constitutional in nature, and thus constitutionally valid franchises are entirely relevant to both. Neither are simple elections, so an ordinary electoral franchise is not appropriate.

It is actually even more important for a self determination referendum in a colonial situation for the franchise to actively prioritise the native population of the relevant territory explicitly to block the colonisers’ votes or ‘conditions’ from muddying the outcome, and that is unequivocally stated by the UN’s own decolonisation committee. There’s a reason it’s called self-determination.

And even if you are right on some examples, it does not mean your stance is right for Scotland’s situation, for the simple reason that Scotland is an actual sovereign nation of centuries-long standing with its own Treaty-guaranteed constitution, its own distinct monarchy, and its own distinct legal system, and its ‘legal’ subjugation by England’s establishment in Westminster is NOT formally supported by anything agreed in the Treaty or Acts of Union. England’s authority is bogus, and it cannot be allowed to interfere with Scotland’s right to self determination in any way at all.

“Applying restrictions based on citizenship and length of residence requires an independent state which sets what the citizenship and/or residence criteria are.”

And thus the essence of self-determination soars far over your rubber head!

Remember the foreign leaders too invited to stick their nebb in.
The fake ‘no borders’ pish on the BBC 24/7
The fake ‘You’ll be stranded abroad’ ads in the cinema.
The fake ‘vote naw’ to save yer job.
The fake “You’ll not get a transplant/A pension” etc
The foreign interference traced back to Isr with the warm cup of coco pish. Currently lording it up in the Lords..
Who can forget Barosso on the BBC 24/7 telling us we’ll not get into the EU.

It was just wall to wall English & foreign interference & not a single thing they said was true.

Has Swinney lifted the phone to Salmond yet???

Anyone know about the discussions.

Brexit vote excluded all EU citizens resident in the UK except for citizens of Ireland which were permitted under the 1922 Common Travel Area arrangements.

No reason why those not eligible for Scottish Citizenship in a future Indy Scotland be similarly excluded.

Much, much more here.

link to cadmus.eui.eu

John @ 3:27pm, the part-time judge was not let off. he just didn’t go to jail. link to standard.co.uk

First off a correction to Frank Gillougley’s post.

Bluenose is the name of a sailing ship, and fro memory”ahem” a US navy ship.

Regards the subject of rev’s article. A nation’s politics sitting on a 50:50 split over independence is not a sustainable situation.The “plight” of England – be it the recent riots, non-caucassion immigration, water resource concerns, waterway pollution, and the receipt from Scotland of power transmission and nasty oil and gas – etc. I reckon means that an amicable departure from the “Union ” is unlikely – and a terse departure simply is not in Swinney’s armoury.

That’s what they tried to say for indyref. That it was only consultative which is why I don’t believe for one minute that they’d have honoured a YES result.

The Edinburgh agreement wasn’t in legal form either. Nothing legal & binding. Just that they’d respect the result. ‘Aye, ok Scotland, I get that yer unhappy. Tough. There you go, we’ve acknowledged the result like we said we would – we’ll try be nicer now get back in yer box, losers.’

I dunno what Salmond was thinking tbh. He knows what slippery double crossing shits they are.

@LogorrheaMia 4.13pm

You were wrong before and remain wrong now. Both the Falklands and Gibraltar are – unlike Scotland – non self governing territories. Like East Timor and New Caledonia they can’t meaningfully be compared with the many more numerous examples in Europe, particularly those attendant on the collapse of the USSR and Yugoslavia which account for the largest number, but also including Catalonia and Quebec which are more readily comparable with our case.

Your prolixity is only exceeded by your intellectual dishonesty and bigoted nativism.

For the record:

1. Quebec 1980: All Canadian citizens residing in Quebec.

2. Quebec 1995: All Canadian citizens residing in Quebec.

3. Slovenia 1990: All Slovenian citizens (deemed to be all holders of Yugoslav internal citizenship cards resident in Slovenia, irrespective of birthplace or nationality).

4. Lithuania 1991: Nationals of Lithuania, including those resident before the USSR invasion of 1940 & their descendants, plus any Soviet citizens resident in Lithuania who renounced Soviet nationality. Soviet soldiers in Lithuania were excluded.

5. Estonia 1991: All residents with a permanent Soviet resident card in Estonia in 1991. (i.e. including all USSR citizens planted there since 1945).

6. Latvia 1991: All residents with a permanent Soviet resident card in Estonia in 1991. (i.e. including all USSR citizens planted there since 1945).

7. Macedonia 1991: All Macedonian citizens (deemed to be all holders of Yugoslav internal citizenship cards resident in Macedonia, irrespective of birthplace or nationality). Qualifying citizens abroad could vote.

8.Ucraine 1991: All residents of Ucraine. Soviet soldiers stationed in Ucraine were allowed to vote.

9. Bosnia & Hercegovina 1992: Yugoslav citizens who had established permanent residency in B&H.

10. East Timor 1999: those born in East Timor. Anyone not born there but with a parent who was born there. Individuals whose spouse was born in East Timor or whose parent-in-law was born in East Timor.

11. Montenegro 2006: Individuals with a minimum 24-month residency and nationality of the Serb-Montenegrin state.

12. South Sudan 2011: All permanent residents of South Sudan or those whose parents or grandparents were permanent residents since 1956.

13. Scotland 2014: Residents in Scotland with British nationality, or Commonwealth or EU nationality.

14. Catalonia 2014: Residents in Catalonia with Spanish nationality, EU nationality, EEA nationality or Swiss nationality.

So in fact LOTS of other countries both entertain and do exactly what you insist no countries do. Hard fail on your part again.

“Both the Falklands and Gibraltar are – unlike Scotland – non self governing territories”

When exactly, since May 1707, did Scotland become a “self-governing territory”?

Scotland is controlled by England as the UK government and parliament and its colonial administrative branch in Scotland.

It can quickly become a self-governing territory if Scotland’s MPs ever grow a backbone, dare to stand upright and reconvene the old Scottish parliament. But until that point, Scotland is not a self-governing territory.

If two tiny colonies like the Falklands and Gibraltar, both under BRitish control, can, AND HAVE successfully created citizenship registries with well defined criteria to specifically limit the franchise, and to specifically deny the vote to individuals coming from the neighbour countries, which are far bigger in population than they are, so can Scotland.

What exactly is stopping it, other than the supine attitude of Scotland’s MSPs and MPs?

Nothing.

Why hasn’t a citizenship register been done in the last 10 years, despite Scotland having an, allegedly, nationalist government?

Because what we have was not a “nationalist” government, but rather a devolutionist one that was more interested in stopping independence than facilitating it, never mind delivering it.

If the Falklands and Gibraltar can have a “Falklands Islands status” or “Gibraltar status” and a closed franchise, so can Scotland.

Who should decide on what franchise to use anyway? The Scots?
The UN (suits me), and why would anyone be so opposed to a, say (let’s be generous, why not, we have been for 317 years) 5 year residency rule,and no restriction if you moved here in less than that but were born here? What’s so difficult to accept there? Methinks AskAndy is Yoon moonhowler mebbies?

Who does AskAndy think should decide what franchise would be used…..? Hmmmmm. Oh, I know – Westminster!

For those unionists who like to pretend all other countries voted 70% in favour of independence. Therefore they throw around these statistics, as a reason to de-legitimise Scottish support.

A constitutional referendum was held in Malta between 2 and 4 May 1964. The new constitution was approved by 54.5% of voters, and came into effect on 21 September 1964. It was effectively a referendum on independence, as the new constitution gave the country self-government.

You see, that’s called democracy. Only 55% of Scots voted to stay in the UK. Hardly a ringing endorsement, and the same numbers as Malta’s vote to leave.

Once we start claiming that 50% plus 1 is not enough. Then we may as well suspend belief in democracy and mental arithmetic. A majority is a majority no matter what they try and claim.

Most of the very reasonable arguments put forward on both sides regarding international recognition of potential independence ignore the geostrategic significance of Faslane and a strong military presence in this country. NATO will not want us to separate from the UK and that probably overrides and economic, cultural, or moral arguments. We are not Catalo ua or Kosovo.

@James 8.53pm

The franchise should be decided by Scots, as it was in 2012 via their government negotiating the Edinburgh Agreement in 2012.

There would be little point in their representatives in Holyrood (or indeed any castles in Spain “cunning plans for indy” body dreamt up by the Brigadoon nationalists in the unlikely event they ever manage to do anything concrete) deciding on a franchise that resulted in a refusal by the UN or significant numbers of other states to recognise any result based on a franchise that is regarded as suspect or non standard.

Some people might accept a residence qualification. Many won’t. As I’ve pointed out before however, hardly any self determination referendums impose ANY residence qualification. So why should Scotland be the outlier? We can hardly claim to be more oppressed than most of the other states which have managed to achieve their independence using the same or even more liberal franchises.

You have neither logic nor historical / constitutional precedent on your side. Unlike you, I’m not a snivelling anonymous nativist bigot spouting their bile BTL on Rev Stu’s site, even though he publicly rubbishes your moonhowling plans.

The franchise used is already established. Nobody sane wants to change it. If change is agreed by the majority of the movement, it still has to be accepted by the other side and the international community because there is zero point in a contested referendum. Since we won’t be having a referendum anytime soon, it doesn’t really matter. Plebiscitary elections are the way forward: they won’t exclude those the moonhowlers regard as mischlings or ethnically undesirable either. Suck it up bigots.

@Vicount Ennui 9.23pm

There’s very little evidence that a post independence Scotland would be anything other than Atlanticist in outlook though, so why would NATO set its face against the democratic will of the majority of Scots if they voted for independence?

Given recent events and the extraordinarily rapid accession of Sweden and Finland in to the alliance, it’s even less likely Scotland post independence would opt for splendid isolation, however fondly the sophomoric marxists in here wish it weren’t so.

NATO is in fact much more likely to be keen to ensure a rapid entry in to the alliance for Scotland given its strategic position, particularly as its highly likely we’d provide a better and more coherent security environment when shorn of the UK’s delusions of post imperial world influence.

We can spend less than we currently contribute to the UK defence budget and be better defended, with defence forces and a defence industrial base tailored to our needs and spending / investing more in Scottish industries like shipbuilding.

There’s no reason we can’t do it when neighbours like Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden can.

The Britnats can pay us rent for use of Faslane until they can move operations elsewhere: it’s a great bargaining chip for leverage in the negotiations post declaration of independence.

Viscount Ennui

That’s what you call hard lines. Faslane is Scotlands territory. Not the UKs & Not Americas paper tiger. The Nukes aren’t ours either & neither is the codes.

As for yoons & the franchise & % criteria they like to invent – shall we all cancel Brexshit? That was only 52% & huge numbers of citizens were denied a vote. Jeez, the can’t even vote on a General election. A fact that Franchise Fanny conveniently forgets right here at home..we don’t need to go trotting round Google Earth looking for shit to fit his argument. Look at the UK franchise. Even NI for that matter .

Mia, agreed regards Salmond. I just wish things hadn’t been agreed without them being nailed down legally in writing. We were stiffed with the Smith commission too. The fact there was nothing to prevent a ref in the future should’ve been written into the Scotland Act at the time. Same with Dewars *gentleman’s agreement* that died with him. I know Smith wasn’t him, he’d handed over to Gold Standard Sturgeon by then who only managed a Gold standard in a catalogue of failures. Agreed too on the nyaff who advised him to step down. He should’ve dealt with Smith first imo…

I believe we were robbed too. The very fact the SNP membership soared within days of the no vote & the landslide GE only a few months later.

The ink was hardly dry on the no vote when the UK government started selling oil licenses & I now discover, through following geopolitical channels, the Americans begged Saudi to crash the oil prices to harm R in 2014 cause that’s when they carried out their coup in U. It’d have been a godsend for Cameron at the time cause it fit neatly with our indyref at the same time when the Better Together mob could craw the price of oil had fallen. Aye, cause it had been manipulated to harm R.

@Geri

What you say about the oil is really interesting.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Cameron actively colluded with the Americans to crash the oil prices so Scotland’s oil could be portrayed as worthless during the ref campaign. The move would have been mutually beneficial.

Didn’t Obama and Hillary Clinton also stick their uninvited nose in our referendum, “advising” us that we were better in the UK and that (Clinton) would “hate for the UK to lose Scotland”?

And isn’t Hillary Clinton one of the people Sturgeon admires and praises the most?

I’m wondering if French farmers give two fucks what La Communauté Internationale thinks with their Gold Standard Rules Based Order pish when said farmers protest and get shit done.

I’m not seeing much outrage from the International Community and all those WEF COP wazzocks when it comes to vehicle manufacturers making and offloading endless shite products on to an unsuspecting public.
Got to laugh when folk are so fucking gullible to think the same bunch of corporate vehicle manufacturing twats that have deviated so far from sound and proven engineering protocols to produce massively flawed products, are somehow going to make perfect planet saving leccy vehicles.

As an aside, diz anybody ken if yon Dr Oetker is a big proponent of the genderwoowoo?
Found an old pizza in the freezer and a little concerned the meat on it might be sourced from the residual waste of gender reassignment operations.
#PizzaMeatFightClubStyle

Dan

Aren’t they all made by robots on a production line now?

Quantity over quality.

Robert

‘The whole ” recognition ” thing is just another imaginary bogeyman , like all the other Better Together fearmongering pish’

Exactly. We could have all the permission slips in the world. It won’t make someone recognise us if they simply don’t want to. Nowhere does it say it’s a requirement. Some countries will, some other countries may not – no one steps in to say it’s void cause they don’t all agree. We’re not at school.

This ‘international community’ are currently breaking all international laws at the moment, from outright theft to arming one unhinged nutter with messages from God to conduct geno*cide – Despite a court ruling to cease & desist – to another that’s not even elected, sold all the land & is erecting Nazi statues. Sheesh!

Franchise Fanny treats them like they’re his God. A fictional Oz more like. 146 UN member states recognise a Palestinian state. Three perpetually veto. There’s yer international community for you. It denies democracy if it’s not in their interests. Same for a ceasefire. Denied.

They now also want to scrap international law & invent a new rules based order. Wouldn’t that be convenient, international treaties rendered meaningless everywhere & a US one instead. I hardly think they’re any moral authority to give an opinion to anyone or advice on independence.

@Robert Hughes 10.48pm

You may think international recognition is trivial, but most sane people don’t. Ask the Catalans, Northern Cypriots, Abkhazians, Transnistrians and folk of Somaliland how things are going. Try travelling anywhere on the passport of an unrecognised state, or doing business anywhere, or acceding to any international organisation.

The only reason Kosovo managed to achieve independence after declaring UDI – even in the face of Serbian aggression and ethnic cleansing – was that the majority of the international community supported it, including most of those you need: the USA, EU and their allies. The few remaining countries who don’t support it have ideological axes to grind in favour of Serbia’s regressive regime, or are doing so because they have secessionist movements of their own they don’t want to be seen to encourage.

You and your fringe nutter mates may see the appeal of being a tartan Hoxha style Albania existing in splendid isolation from the international community, alliances or even the UN….the rest of us…? Not so much.

The UN may be dysfunctional, but if you want to tear it down what’s going to replace it?

twathater said;

“Geri you and Mia are on fire, Gollum is getting angry he’s started quoting Stu again, he must think Stu is the messiah”

Seconded!

#AskAndy

Should you not be spending more of your time interacting and convincing the wider electorate of the merits of your Alba Party, rather than engaging with a handful of fringe nutter bigots and nativists?
It’s just that Alba are still polling rather shitly and just lost a couple of their MPs.
Kenny M fae your Party got less votes than the I4I candidate so I’ll take anything you say on genius political tactical moves with a fair bit of skepticism.

Some folk seem far too easily distracted yet again going over old ground of franchises and referendums.
What’s actually wrong with focusing on and working towards a plebiscite general election whereupon we try to elect a majority of candidates who will not take up their seats in Westminster and instead instruct an end to the Union.
That seems to be the most straightforward, applicable, and legitimate way to proceed with a reasonable time frame and voting system.
Endless repetitive bickering going over what’s been done to death numerous times already is pointless and a distraction.

Geri

Your entire tottering house of cards ignominiously collapses if it’s not “genocide-cide”.

And of course it’s not.

It’s what you do isn’t it? Erecting houses of cards on foundations of sand. All in pursuit of objectives a million miles removed from Indy, but far closer to what deep down YOU really want.

You should listen to Dan.

Oh dear. I only opined re a 5 (or 10) tear residency rule to counter our current uncontrolled open borders. My bad.

AskAndy says that makes me an “anonymous insane, snivelling nativist bigot, spouting bile from brigadoon.”

I’m hurt to the quick, so I am. AskAndy obviously knows everything about absolutely everything; he’s the messiah. I’ll spend the rest of the weekend lying down and pondering where on earth did I go wrong? Should I start reading the foreign Scottish mainstream media? Should I get a tv licence and watch the BBC? Is that where I’ve gone wrong?

Wise up, folks and AskAndy! He will set us free! No more involvement in illegal wars, NATO membership or nukes next to Glasgow when he’s in charge, no siree! Now, where’s that Daily Heil?

@Geri

I’m all for dismantling the UN for all the use it is. A body which is incapable of doing what it was established to do, and which unapologetically allows Iran and Saudi Arabia to sit on its Human Rights Commission is just trolling the general public at this stage.

Your facile slightly unhinged Wolfie Smith worldview is interesting, but only in the sense of that old Chinese curse: “May you live in interesting times”.

So will these countries who uphold international law impose sanctions on China for it’s suppression of democracy in Hong Kong and of the Uighurs? If some bad actor attacks a neighbour, or begins exterminating some minority it disapproves of, do we just let them? If not, who is going to stop it?

Are you going to advocate for the formation of some new body with its own armed forces able to impose it’s will, or simply let might prevail?

I’d be all for them going for the mad mullahs in Tehran and hanging a few from lamp-posts to make an example after what they’ve done to the Iranian people over decades for example. Similarly with those responsible for Tiananmen Square.

I imagine quite a few of those in power would be feeling a bit nervous if there was some over arching authority capable of investigating and punishing all wrong doers.

You seem to have the hots for imposing some kind of New World Order without any actual clue of how it might be constructed, let alone paid for or enforced. Or maybe it’s just that you’re full of it….I reckon that’s probably it. No huge surprise there.

@Dan 9.34am

Why am I obliged to do anything you think is right? Being a member of Alba doesn’t oblige me to do anything in particular. If folk have loads of spare time to campaign and want to do so they should have at it. Seems Alba has more members than the Tories in Scotland, so perhaps we can only expect some upturn in their fortunes down the line.

Countering the barking mad vomitus of nativists bigots polluting BTL discourse in here is performing a public service. We can’t have undecided wavering voters who might be attracted to independence thinking the intellectual dross spouted by the usual suspects in here is representative after all.

If you and the other moonhowlers want to do something more useful, then go do! Perhaps then we’ll attract some normal folk back to BTL here.

Dan says:
27 September, 2024 at 9:37 pm

After the week I’ve had dealing with vehicle issues, no Swede or German living in Scotland gets a vote again till they give me the names or heads on spikes of their countryman that signed off the fitting of a piece of shit sealed for life autobox in a Volvo, and a pissy wee wet belt driving the oil pump in a VW engine.

Well, if my experience as a circuit-monger is anything to go by then I would put such automotive arsery down to cost-cutting. I know that my experience with mass-market (or “cost-sensitive” as they call it) designs where the production runs were gonna be in excess of ~250,000 has been…well, not good. There is major pressure to keep the BOM cost and the assembly time (since time==money) down, so you end up having to eliminate “unnecessary” components while using inferior (i.e. cheap) parts which are sometimes driven hard at (or sometimes beyond) their limits and therefore liable to fail. Still, never mind – who cares if those crappy Chinese electrolytic caps are gonna dry out, dome up and then burst within a couple of years eh? Who cares if those LEDs are gonna cook themselves due to inadequate heatsinking? Who cares if the enclosure has been ultrasonically welded shut so yer punter can’t even get in to repair the bloody thing? =IdiotsOverrulingEngineers 😥

James says

prick

I have a grudging respect for anybody willing to broadcast their monomania on a site like this one.

Well done to you, James, you’re out and defiantly proud of it too.

Keep it up for as long as you can.

There’s an educational article on Chinese Expansionism on Wiki.

But nobody who has ever heard of Tibet needs to bother reading it.

As for Iran, it’s their proxy’s colonisation of Lebanon that’s the root cause of today’s current stushie. They covet Moses’ Promised Land too. Time was when every Scot would have known this, but educational achievement has slipped in recent decades. How else can anybody explain the enthusiasm for the medieval misogynistic clerics that seems to have Wings BTL so under its thumb.

Venezuela? Good luck finding some of the indigenous Arawaks & Caribs who once regarded that land as their own.

As for India. They’ve been fighting China on and off for over half a century over the contested lands straddling their shared border. It doesn’t matter which country is in the right here; the country in the wrong automatically disproves Geri’s assertions.

It’s never a good idea to just make stuff up, Geri. Your conviction that the road to Indy lies through making stuff up will always be debunked by the sane, rational and educated.

@Hatey McHateface

It is. And it is about time the terrorist state which has been getting away with it for decades is brought to heel.

But for that, it is required that the higher echelons of USA and UK take for a moment their eyes away from the backhanders and bribes they are getting for looking the other way, and start looking instead at the emaciated, mutilated and disemboweled dead bodies of tens of thousands of innocent children that their disgusting inaction, total lack of humanity and morally corrupt complicity with this out of control, rogue, apartheid and murderous state has caused.

“According to UNICEF, 1000 kids die every day from dirty drinking water. Why’s that not geno-cide?”

Sorry, but your whataboutery and pathetic attempts at deflection are not fooling anyone.

@Mia says: 28 September, 2024 at 3:05 pm

it is about time the terrorist state which has been getting away with it for decades is brought to heel

Sure, you and whose army, eh Mia?

I don’t care that you’ve decided to hitch your wagon to a people whose primary characteristic has been to ensure that not even their allies and co-religionists want them anywhere near.

What I object to is your attempts to tie my country, Scotland, to that medieval, nihilistic, lassie torturing, baby burning, shithole.

Here’s a quote for you:

“One of the most remarkable Nobel statistics is that 22 per cent of winners have been Dewish, despite them comprising less than 0.2 per cent of the world’s population”

I’m very happy indeed to support a people who have benefitted the world, and Scotland, and me, far beyond their numbers.

No doubt “your side” has given us a hundred words for sand, and maybe two hundred for hatred, persecution, and oppression of women.

emaciated, mutilated and disemboweled dead bodies of tens of thousands of innocent children

The Humous boys need more, much, much more. Their one policy is to pile the bodies of their own women and kids as high as they can to protect their yellow hides, while they cower in their tunnels behind their emaciated, mutilated, innocent hostages.

Those of them they haven’t already killed, that is.

No decent, honourable Scot would offer up his women folk and kids for slaughter while skulking deep underground. We’re better than that. So why aren’t you?

They’re occupied by a foreign force you fcking moron.

They shouldn’t need to hide anywhere & according to international law they have every right in the world to defend themselves against their oppressors.

Take yer ill educated propaganda pish elsewhere. Even figures recorded by I themselves show they haven’t suffered anywhere near the deaths they claim at the hands of Palestinians. The whole reason they took hostages was to negotiate the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians detailed for no good reason languishing in torture jails.

So their response was to just mow down innocent, unarmed civilians indiscriminately or throw them live off buildings, or publicly humiliate & break them with R*people, you sick fck. Over 200 official UN killed too. Don’t tell me, we’re they terrorists too? Hiding a tank in their backpack?

The reason their neighbours don’t help is because they bought apples from the US cart before – flee, we won’t hurt you, you can come back later – only to be told they’ve no right to return at all.

“Your side” the side of common decency & the right of a ppl to live in peace in the State they’ve been promised for over 70 yrs & countless votes at the UN.

The Americans have given jack shit to the world but mayhem. But that’s not surprising. They’ve no culture or history but theft. Its all they know. A ppl who have earned nothing see the value in nothing.

“According to UNICEF, 1000 kids die every day from dirty drinking water. Why’s that not geno-cide?”

Tell America there’s oil, gas, precious metals & minerals & they’ll be there in a shot. Or maybe they & their colonial buddies are already there looting the country dry as the indigenous ppl look on.

The whole reason I, along with its colonising buddies, wants to clear the whole region is Oil, Gas & Water. The UN ruled they’d need to share & it infuriated them onto a killing spree.

They’re war criminals & their crimes will catch up with them. Those mass graves of children with missing organs just gives a tiny glimpse of the horrors happening there.

You can see why Nazi Germany happened with racist sick feckers like you around spouting yer blatant ill educated lies that doesn’t have a shred of evidence but the foreign media told you so it must be true. Ya sap.

No wonder the Nazis

*yawns*

Do we have anything current?

Taiwan belongs to China. That’s official UN ruling in international law.
What started those wars? Was it the The US with absolutely no business being there noising up the region for a spot of trouble?

I noticed they’re disputes with neighbours. Not setting up 800 military bases all over the world. Try reading what I said.

@Campbell 7.43pm

It’s not altogether impossible that Geri is in fact a paid asset of Uncle Vlad sat in their kecks in a basement in Omsk.

Sadly I fear such delusional dregs do actually exist in Scotland: there has always been a leavening of tankies on the extremes of Scottish politics, in the unions and far left of the Labour party. They really do believe this stuff.

They’re the type who used to make excuses for the old USSR and go on fraternal visits to the GDR.

Doubtless Geri’s hard drive will already have been examined by those who want to check on the activities of hostile state actors and their useful idiots amongst us. I doubt their anonymity in here is much of a barrier.

I doubt the mainstream movement takes any of these dingbats seriously as they represent such a miniscule proportion of the public. Their bile and disinformation still needs to be called out however. 🙂

As Maya Angelou notes: “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time”. It never takes long for the usual suspects to out themselves of course, but surely even by their sickeningly low standards BTL in here, labelling those you disagree with as subhuman is a new low.

It is of course the classic red flag of zealots through history. If one can dehumanise the opposition, they are already firmly on the path from burning books to burning people.

I can’t say I’m really surprised to see it, although I’d perhaps have expected it from one of the more potty mouthed moonhowlers rather than from Mia, our very own resident sufferer from terminal logorrhea.

As our French friends say: “Quand on parle du loup, on en voit la queue.”

#AskAndy

“If Scotland is entitled to self determination, then so is Taiwan, or Tibet, or the bits of Kasmir the Chinese annexed might prefer to be part of an independent Kasmiri state or even India rather than China. Who are you to deny them?”

I’m not denying them anything. The difference is I don’t think it’s my business to go storming that country with military, weapons, security services, with paid plants to fck up & overthrow elected governments & fund terrorist organisations to cause civil unrest unlike YOU & yer Uncle Sam pals colonising most of the world & have the audacity & arrogance to think you’re in the right.

Every country has its problems. Its for those countries populations to bring change, not some foreign fuckwits. But we can drop the act they’re only looking out for ppl. They’re not. Taiwan makes world class chips that no one else can & your mob wants their mitts on them. So drop yer pish those poor ppl need saving.

Unlike Scotland, Taiwan is autonomous & has fck all desire or inclination to be independent bar a few of Uncle Sam’s roasters sent in to noise up a faction for separation.

‘South China sea’s the clue is in the name. What is aircraft carriers from the US & UK doing there crashing into everything or running a ground? Taking in the scenery?

I notice you have fck all to add to the convo but petulant insults with a Scottish slant. An alleged founding member of Alba too. You’re in no position to lecture anyone about the Yes movement. The bile you spout on here doesn’t gather much support except from yer yoon pals. & Do fuck off with yer threats. I bet you have already done yer civic duty ya curtain twitching fuckwit.

“I doubt the mainstream movement takes any of these dingbats seriously as they represent such a miniscule proportion of the public.”

Touche pal. We know, officially, that the mainstream YES movement doesn’t take you seriously either. You are as Toxic to Alba as Sturgeon is to the SNP. Its almost like yer a Brit nat spoiler. It wouldn’t surprise me. We seem infested by your sort.

@Geri 9.19pm

Unlike Scotland, Taiwan is autonomous & has fck all desire or inclination to be independent bar a few of Uncle Sam’s roasters sent in to noise up a faction for separation.

“A poll released by the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation yesterday showed 48.9 percent of Taiwanese support obtaining formal national independence, while 26.9 percent support maintaining the “status quo” and 11.8 percent support unification with China.

Support for Taiwanese independence topped support for maintaining the “status quo” by 22 percentage points and Chinese annexation by 37 percentage points, foundation chairman Michael You (???) said.

An overwhelming majority of respondents aged 20 to 44 voiced hope that Taiwan can declare independence in the future, he added.”

link to taipeitimes.com

Facts, eh?

What’s yer point caller?

Taiwan can be independent if the choose. They don’t need colonisers storming in like the SAS to cause a war
That is the business of China & Taiwan to discuss. Not colonisers. Taiwan belongs to China. The US & UK have zero business there.

They should ask Obama & Clinton to interfere. Tell them they’re “Better Together” eh? No, thought not.

All these fake actors wishing other countries their independence & spreading democracy but aren’t two minutes denying it to everyone else they’ve already colonised.

Taiwan wouldn’t be independent because Uncle Sam would do what it always does. It’d set up home permanently & rob it blind. The Chinese have first hand experience of exactly how that ends.

& You think this fake concern flies with anyone? Well, maybe it does with you cause yer a Brit nat conditioned to zip up the back.

What is this Western utopia that needs spreading? Their own countries are in dire need & pish poor. Start helping them. But that’s not what they’re interested in is it? Its other countries resources. Good news tho. The world isn’t taking it any longer.

“It’s not altogether impossible that Geri is in fact a paid asset of Uncle Vlad sat in their kecks in a basement in Omsk.”

I’m not but I’ll take that as a compliment. The only adult on the world stage with patience to deal with fantasist fckwits on a daily basis. Remember when everyone from the West proclaimed he was unhinged & psychotic? Turns out they were talking about themselves. Lots of projection as per usual.

Nope, I follow the UN live & news outside of Britnat bullshit hour TV. You should try it sometime before your sort get it shut down. Lavrov absolutely nailed it at the UN as always reciting a whole litany of Uncle Sam’s destabilisation of the ME that’s still not recovered & the EU. Blowing up Nordstream gets a mention too. Various countries endeavors to work together in peace & harmony sabotaged by the Yanks & the Britnats get a mention too, where they make promises cause they think it sounds better in English LMAO!

looks like they may have intel the Skrpals were the unfortunate victims of them too cause he wouldn’t make that accusation lightly.

Oh dear, nothing is going to plan for the colonisers back at the UN. 70 yrs Palestine has waited for its state that never comes.

How sick is the US & I?

They’re not only funding Nazis in U they’ve added another two belters, al -qaida & Isis are being funded now too.

The Haz leader they’ve just assassinated, beloved by Christians & Muslims alike, defeated these US factions in Lebanon & now they’re back. Those wounded are being treated in I hospitals.

Yet according to I & US, everyone is a fcking terrorist but them.

Glad to see over half the UN walk out when Yahoo appeared on stage. Why isn’t he arrested? There is a warrant out.
The UN isn’t buying his pish God gave him Lebanon too.

P told the West yrs ago exactly who was funding Isis but he was dismissed as an eejit. (Press conference still available on YouTube) Now they’ve been deployed to Lebanon with American weapons.

Its clear Cackling Clinton is in charge of Biden. Those terrorist groups were her favourite go-to for a bit of mayhem.

I’ll bet our resident roasters will no doubt have a good attempt at an excuse. I can’t wait to read it..

Aw, Johnny, dinna fash, you’ll always be my favourite prick.

@ Geri

A whole slew of arse-kicking posts ,above , sista – likewise @ Mia

Personally , I don’t engage directly with ghouls like Main who exult in the pain, suffering & death of other humans & know-(fuck)-all presumptive ” voice of the majority ” bores like Ellis , who , like the Party he supports , is not only incapable of thinking outside the box but is not even aware he/they are in a box . A box labelled ” For Dreary Thoughts Only ” : and has the gall to feign moral outrage at the term ” subhuman ” being applied ( correctly ) to the monstrous actions of the ” most moral army in history ” whilst he and his creepy wee sidekick have been calling people they don’t like ” Orcs ” , ie subhuman , for the last 2+ years

I imagine in their warped moral universe that’s acceptable ’cause , that pair , like the disgusting regimes they support , are superior beings whose judgement/position on all matters is infallible .

The torrents of blood inundating the M.E & E.Europe are not sufficient to slake the death-thirst of such people* ; they would rather see those torrents become oceans , than admit the breathtaking hypocrisy/lunacy of the horrors whose flags they wave and every death-dealing action they applaud .

* as long as they , themselves are nowhere near the carnage they cheer from their comfy sofas . natch .