Tossing your chips
Over and over again in the years leading up to the independence referendum, Scots were warned of the many dire consequences of voting Yes. Among the No campaign’s prime targets for scare tactics were subsidies for renewable energy.
UK government subsidies drying up certainly sounded like a scary prospect.
On a number of occasions, shameless nationalist propaganda sites like this one and others claimed that a No vote would leave Scotland helpless at the mercy of the UK government. With the threat of leaving finally removed, Scotland would have no bargaining power and would simply have to rely on goodwill to ensure that it wasn’t badly treated by Westminster.
Fortunately nobody listened to our hysterical scaremongering, Scotland voted No, and investment in the crucial renewables sector will be safe for decades to come.
Phew, that was close, eh readers?
This is all very well, but why didn’t you warn them at the time?
Oh wait…
The way so many scare stories about voting Yes have come to pass by voting No, I’m starting to think we’d better get prepared for our airports to get bombed…
Keep it up Rev. By the time the Final Indy ref comes along none of the scare stories will be believed by anyone.
My Wee Blue Book arrived today, thanks to the support team too. Quality product!
It turns out Better Together wasn’t scaremongering, it was Tories Advance Policy Unit.
That does it for me!
Due to Westminster breaking their Vow an removing the promised wind energy investments.
We have a major conflict that must end with a 2nd referendum.
I’m free next month!
I literally have steam coming out my ears, and a headache starting!
Anti frackers will know why. This is a potential loss of £3Billion of investment, meaning jobs too. Scottish Renewables say they will seek legal advice about their losses, building business plans etc. Not to mention the climate issue.
This has got to be to redirect this money into fracking down south, to line the elites pockets. Shares in fracking companies increased when the Tories were elected.
It’s no doubt designed to squeeze the Scots, in addition, on the fracking front, for having the temerity to introduce a moratorium, because this is going to bring this to the fore again in the shape of Ratcliffe saying we are ready to step in.
So so sick at this latest.
Is there anything else they said would happen in event of a Yes vote, that they haven’t covered yet & dismantled in the last few weeks?
Just thought a bit of forward planning in your articles might make your job a bit easier Stuart 🙂
Their plan is to keep saying this is all the fault of SNP but we’ve seen for ourselves via the Commons debates & know that this couldn’t be further from the truth. The antagonism in Westminster is palpable & in that place MP’s can say anything they like & will not be censured for it. Well almost-they can’t call another MP a liar.
Thanks for this Rev.
I work in renewables and will be sending this link to a no-voting colleague of mine who said No was ‘best for business’.
Aӣ$%^&*
Of course the “subsidies” didn’t cost anything because they made it all back on the charges for “pooling and sharing” the National Grid. But hey, if you scrap the subsidy then the Jocks have to pay for the National Grid and that really is win win
Is it Time for a we book on broken promises lies vows
To be used at the next referendum / election
To be fair, latest news tells us that £7.1b needed to repair the Palace of Westminster has to be found from somewhere!
[…] Over and over again last year, Scots were warned of the dire consequences of voting Yes in the independence referendum. Among the prime targets for scare tactics were subsidies for renewable energy. […]
The difference between dishonesty/deception and a mistake is that if they had made mistakes during the referendum campaign on things like the green subsidies and other matters then these same newspapers would at least have the decency to mention every time that these things were reversals of the promises or claims during the referendum. Their constant failure to do so only proves that they are knowingly misleading us to suit their own personal desires and profit or ideology.
I have said this on many fora but, I have yet to see a competent economic case for nuclear power which includes the cost of decommissioning, deconstruction and the return of the site to its original state.
Windmills can be dismantled and the ground turned over to agriculture of forestry.
The corrupt sleazy criminal Brit Nats are scrapping the alleged subsidy because they are full steam ahead for Fracking and Nuclear Power. Nuclear Power that will be even more subsidy intensive and guess who is going to get the radioactive waste sooner or later, well not the NIMBY Tory Shires of England that is for sure.
So much for better together.
Lets not forget about all that Electricity they are importing from France either. They don’t tell us what that costs us in our Lecky bills. You know that part of the bill that a supposed Electricity producer says it spent on ahem “purchasing” electricity.
The London Calling BBC couldn’t hide its delight at the potential negative impact on Scottish jobs either.
Yes, well, it’s all very well and good being wise after the event, Stu.
Social control is best managed through fear.
Michael Crichton (State of Fear)
It’ll be alien invasions next week, then. 🙁
No no no…Yes says at 1:49 pm
Keep it up Rev. By the time the Final Indy ref comes along none of the scare stories will be believed by anyone.
I really love the expression Final Indy” well coined.
Spooky, but true.
Still, I’m sure that there will be a perfectly logical explanation for everything that’s occurred in the past few weeks coming from BTs cheerleaders in the media any day now…
… any day, any at all will do.
Stuff like this is going to play out over and over and over, for the next ten years. Boundary changes and Labour’s hopelessness will ensure the ten years.
The 56 simply don’t have arithmetic on their side, no matter how well they play things.
“Scotland helpless at the mercy of the UK government” is not a great place to be, yet that’s where we are and we’ll be here for a long time.
My neighbour, a No voting Labour voter, stopped me on the stairs this morning. Gist of his conversation was around how terrible the Westminster cuts were.
He seemed baffled when I pointed out that this is only happening because he voted for the possibility for it to happen, in the referendum, and that the cuts were in line with Labour manifesto, so he voted for that too.
“Stop moaning about things you voted for”, I berated him (politely).
Stu, you should save the template of this post as I suspect the format will be rolled out almost weekly, as all the doom unfolds anyway and legislation, that is neither beneficial to, nor popular in Scotland, gets imposed.
I despair at what level of damage needs to be imposed on our society before the eyes of NO voters are opened.
Every minute, not seizing our destiny is a tragedy… and there are 5,256,000 minutes in the next ten years.
The unionists won’t be able to have the same dynamics to their campaign in indyref 2. They can’t claim the civil service is neutral since the head civil servant has publicly admitted it wasn’t neutral in indyref 1.
Labour won’t want to campaign alongside the Tories again thereby radically diminishing any effectiveness to the unionist effort since it will lack any cohesion.
BBC Scotland can’t easily pull their pro-union tricks as often as they did, especially with Boothman gone.
There are only 3 Scottish unionist MPs (maybe 2 if Carmichael resigns and there’s a by-election) to carry the vote No flag.
They can’t make another home rule vow since no one is going to believe it.
And now they can’t claim that renewable energy funding is a benefit of the union.
In my opinion this would be a good time for Alex Salmond to come out in The National to say ” I am sorry I made a mistake I no longer think that the Referendum result of 18/9/14 should stand for a generation current political events have now caused me to change my mind and I now believe we should hold another Independence Referendum within 3 years. ” That might take some of the wind out of their subsidies!!!
@
RogueCoder
Sorry that was 1984
We are being taught a lesson from Westminster/Establishment that bad things happen to you when you dare to stand up to them.
Basically `get back in your tartan shortbread tin you dirty jock`
All with the connivance of our very own countrymen/women.
the previous Govt. screwed the oil companies for more tax which led to a drop in exploration and had to be reversed. How long until they realise their folly in stopping subsidies and have to reinstate them and play catch up again?
When did the Brit Nats as in the Brit Nat Tory – Fib Doom – Labour Alliance ever care about Scottish Jobs or the Scottish Environment.
The jobs they cared about were those that they could transfer down south or out source to maximise their filthy profits. The Scottish Environment representing nothing more than Hills etc where they could blast birds and deer and Lord it over the peasants.
I hope those of you working in Renewables will have a job for the foreseeable. The Naw voters will be too busy gloating and blaming the SNP to care about that though.
It seems to me that all the UK gov’t or project fear warnings of all the bad things that would happen to us if we voted ‘YES’ was in reality a blueprint of their evil plans for us voting ‘no’.
UDI.
Such actions simply further reinforce the feeling that the UK government is implementing a preordained plan that in no way relates to the interests of Scotland or her people. Had Scotland voted YES in September 2014 the UK govn. and the MSM propaganda machine would have had a scapegoat to lay responsibility on.
It is becoming evermore obvious to conclude the sentiments of the Conservative and Unionist party.
We are yet to see many more totalitarian actions from Westminster before Independence is won.
One by one all the Better Together lies are coming home to bite them. They won’t get a second chance at these lies and I think speed with which they crashing onto the rocks of UK reality will hasten the date of that second referendum.
I did think it might be the early 2020s before we revisited a Yes vote but now I think maybe 2018/19.
Reading Stu’s excellent compilations of MSM articles, what strikes me is the sheer scale of what we were up against last year. I did not realise just how much guff was spewed by the MSM in support of the union over a protracted period. It’s only when you see it all together – on just one topic for example, that you realise the relentless nature of the propaganda and the constant drip-drip of misinformation. These guys were hard at it from day one. The fact that we achieved 45% was miraculous and gives me great hope for a final push for independence sometime soon.
No doubt, the crap will continue, but everyday, more and more people see right through it. Actually in hardening the YES side (which continues to grow), they do us a great service. They didn’t stop a majority SNP government in 2011, they didn’t keep YES below the critical 40% level, they didn’t prevent the red tories being wiped out last month, and they won’t prevent the final push for independence when it comes. I trust the instincts of our FM and SG and I trust the Scottish people.
@Graham MacQueen
“before independence is won”
Thanks Graham. We have to win our independence. It shall never be given to us.
Truth!
Being relatively old I remember it being said that if we had a majority of the then 72 MPs for SNP then independence was ours. What happened?
Karmanaut
UDI
I am of the same opinion, though apparently it may be possible to simply revoke the Act of Union. Much less damaging to Scotland’s credit rating, I would imagine, though with all that natural wealth Scotland sits on, how important is a credit rating?
@nodrog 2:19 pm
“In my opinion this would be a good time for Alex Salmond to come out in The National to say ” I am sorry I made a mistake I no longer think that the Referendum result of 18/9/14 should stand for a generation current political events have now caused me to change my mind and I now believe we should hold another Independence Referendum within 3 years. ” That might take some of the wind out of their subsidies!!!”
No. Alex S never said that, and never meant it. He talked about a “once in a generation opportunity”, which was not a pledge, it was a warning. “If you vote no, you’ll not get another chance in a long, long time” was his meaning.
Ever more ghastly creep show at Pacific Quay play it down as only they can
link to bbc.co.uk
End of wind farm subsidies ‘could cost Scotland £3bn’
Just don’t say who exactly has ended Scotland’s wind renewable energy BBC vote SLab Scotland.
Pretty good quality bettertogether BBC propaganda spin though-
“The move was part of a manifesto commitment by the Conservative Party ahead of the general election in May.
“Scottish Conservative energy spokesman said the move was about the “Conservative government standing up for communities that the central belt SNP couldn’t care less about.”
and
Nae that I’m defending the Tories but is it nae future subsidies they are stopping nae the ones already on the go ? If its all windfarm subsidies then ye hiv a point but if its nae then the scare stories ye hiv shown are aboot ALL subsidies and therefore different. If im wrang fair enough but this site needs te be sure its printing good stuff and nae liable te attack.
Cheers
The Tories must have made their money out of renewables so it`s time to make us go for fracking. What`s left of project fear? Is that road works I see at the border or is border checkpoints?
We can expect no support from the abstentions party until they sort out their leadership issues in UK and Scotland and even then it would appear that they have their eye on permanent second place just as they did going into the General Election.
I expect the bullying and revenge seeking to continue from the Establishment and the Tories, they do after all, need to teach us a lesson about our place in this “equal” relationship.
Yes, but, now that everyone knows we will be independent in the not too distant future, they can begin making their threats/predictions become true! Talk about ‘jumping the gun’, ehh?
[…] Tossing your chips […]
Well the Daily Telegraph is to rebuked and forced to write a correction for a “misleading” front-page news story that claimed Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon secretly supported the election of David Cameron as prime minister.
Short term thinking is a central plank in the UK’s unwritten long term economic plan.
Leading up to the referendum, I utilised everything on this site to persuade people that our future would be bleak if we voted no.
The mass media daily pumped out propoganda which contradicted what I was saying,and people questioned my impartiality on the issue,stating that I was too consumed by the idea of independence to see the “real” facts which were being broadcast daily on T.V radio and newspapers.
Well ,we are indeed seeing reality since the referendum.Everything the Unionists said was lies ,falsehoods ,misrepresentation. On a weekly basis,all the promises and reassurances have crumbled like their Parliament building.
The objective now is to completely disenfranchise Scotland.To make it impossible for Scotland to grow and expand. Time is now limited.Scotland can still thrive,but at the rate the Westminster establishment are destroying her infrastructure,perhaps a few years may be too late to recover any lost ground.
There was supposed to be a major announcement today on this and it turned out to be a bit of a squib
Nicola must not think we can win so soon but it certainly leaves you pissed
There’s been too much too soon to be putting up with
We’re getting it ripped out of us here
That silly woman said on the radio this morning Solar and wind power are all very well but you need nuclear if you want to switch the lights on at night
The Conservative and Nazi Party strike again
think again says:
18 June, 2015 at 3:10 pm
The Tories must have made their money out of renewables so it`s time to make us go for fracking.
Apparently, there are many proposals for renewables in the south of England – all offshore of course. They don’t want onshore in England – too many NIMBY types, could cost votes. So they need to reallocate scarce money for offshore England, they want to keep nuclear fizzing away, and they want to give those uppity jocks a kicking. So what to do? That’s it – stop funding onshore renewables. Kill
You’ve got to hand it to them – it’s a blinder!
Hopefully we wont be paying the nuclear subsidy as we dont take any of the electricity produced by nuclear in England unlike our wind energy which gets sent south. How much are we subsidising the new nuclear station down south?
Meanwhile the insane cost of off shore wind farms, which are of course mainly in English waters, will continue to be subsidised.
By the time they have finished installing their 30 GW of off shore capacity the subsidies for it would dwarf those going to onshore even if they continued the on shore subsidy.
It can only be through sheer political spite, to hit Scotland harder. National discrmination, again.
If Scotland were independent they would still have to pay the subsidy because it would be included in the price.
They could either pay up, or face power cuts.
Unfortunately, not being independent, that is not an option.
Also an independent Scottish government would have built a subsea cable in partnership with the Norwegians years ago, thereby providing an alternative market for Scottish renewables energy.
Have they told the French yet that they are going to reduce what they pay to them for the electricity they import from them by the renewables subsidy? No, didn’t think so.
It is quite unbelievable. They refuse to have on shore wind farms in their green (sic) and pleasant land but expect everyone else to do their bit for climate change, take the hit, export electricity to them and then pay for the privilege.
The Scottish Government should announce a moratorium on any new wind farms until such time as there is an alternative route to less flaky markets than the English one. Westminster is clearly becoming too unhinged to deal with.
This is good, rancid The Graun knows UKOK has completely fcuked Scotland’s renewable energy industry but hardly a mention. Rancid Graun rational must be, no one reads our red tory shite so our Scotland region is totally irrelevant to our country of GB.
link to archive.is
Another day of being cheezed off to say the least that I used to buy into this kind of creepy/cloying English only phoney liberal progressive bleh…
The Herald reported the other day that Tory MSP Jamie McGrigor has just signed an £8 million deal with a German firm for a wind farm near Loch Awe on his estate.
Looks like McGrigor has made his money just in time before his party stops the subsidy.
It’s always been the same.
I’m old enough to remember being told that the main benefits of being within the UK were the Ravenscraig steelworks, the Linwood car factory, the Invergordon aluminium smelter, the historic Scottish army regiments and the Rosyth naval base, and that even a Parish Council type Scottish parliament would put all of these ‘at risk’ because it just would.
In the end, they were all gone long before Winnie Ewing reconvened the Scottish Parliament in 1999.
The way things are going, the only ‘benefit’ of the union that will be left will be having dozens of intrinsically unstable nuclear warheads stored just upwind of half our population.
Tory boys give local people power to ban wind turbines but is anyone taking money on tory boys giving local people power to ban fracking?
Stupidest UKOK query of the day goes to me.
Another wee quirk in the ointment is that DECC is pushing that solar is as cost effective. Who gets more sun, England or Scotland? Would you rather have a solar array in Devon or Dornoch? Solar subsidies stay.
Who gets more wind? Skegness or Stornoway? Wind subsidies cut.
We are so obviously Better Together; you pool your resources with us and we share them with our pals.
Dearie me everything they said we would cause they have and
this is pooling and sharing,the broad shoulders we luv you lots dont leave us please union,now only after its too late do they show their real face.
What let those Scots have an industry in renewable energy no chance.
Well actually there is more to this than meets the eye imo ,i would not be surprised to see westminster make a dash to try and build up as much renewable energy output they can in the next few years and is a sign even they know its only a matter of time before the union ends.
The lies will get bigger and the plundering more Scotland be prepared to be asset striped like never before as it is now a race to grab as much as they can before we stop them.
Thank you no voters i hope you are proud do the right thing next time.
Damn i can feel those westmister slugs rifling my wallet as im typing this 🙁
I’m very disappointed in the coming renewables cuts,Scotland has led the way in this field for a couple of years.
Jobs will be lost and potential renewable targets will inevitably be missed.
I for one never ever want to return to nuclear power hopefully enough folk in Scotland feel the same way I do.
The Westminster government cannot be trusted.
This is probably just one of many pre-arranged decisions that will be made, over the years, by the Tories to bring Scotland to its veritable knees.
More recently their aim was to see the SNP demolish Labour in Scotland at the Election; with the mission accomplished their main objective now will be to totally undermine the SNP through rising unemployment, unpopular cuts, maybe even being forced to consider fracking and so on.
My main concern, once again, is that too many no voting Scots are influenced by the MSM and are they going to enlighten them of the true facts any time soon? No they’ll just exaggerate, twist, distort and even continue to confabulate to pile it on.
Latest news: Amendment 18 to allow EU citizens living in the UK to vote in the EU referendum. Another one bites the dust with Labour voting with the Tories. Ayes 71 Nos 514.
I just hope that the Scottish electorate keep this in mind at the Holyrood elections next year and oh eh will newspapers like the Daily Liar report on this tomorrow?
The Tories do exactly what you expect of them.
Labour and LibDems now do what you expect of Tories.
This is just the start and it is going to get worse, much worse.
It’s simple. When threatened that something will happen if you vote against them, what they really mean is that it will happen anyway. A Yes vote would just be a convenient peg to hang the “I told you so” coat on.
Not the first, won’t be the last.
I’m old enough to remember being told that the main benefits of being within the UK were the Ravenscraig steelworks, the Linwood car factory, the Invergordon aluminium smelter, the historic Scottish army regiments and the Rosyth naval base, and that even a Parish Council type Scottish parliament would put all of these ‘at risk’ because it just would.
2010 tory boys said vote tory for new British army super barracks central belt Scotland.
Real world, ConDem’s fcuked off all that, shut down RAF Leuchars and Kinloss, moved Royal Scots from Edinburgh to Northern Ireland because we’re bettertogether in Belfast no doubt.
At least they let that Trident nukes whistle blower go free but he’s probably not going to relocate anywhere atomic bomb blast zone covering Glasgow, well the whole of the central belt of their Scotland region.
A lot of Scotland’s renewables energy subsidies come from the EU. If Scotland is taken out of the EU against our wishes in the referendum then it’s a double blow to the Scottish renewables industry. No money for onshore wind farms from either Westminster or Brussels.
The Westminster lack of interest in renewables should be saved for future reference (in the same way that a detailed account of Greek negotiations to enter the Eurozone should have been). And the small nations of northern Europe should be busily strengthening their energy infrastructure links (to give themselves more options) and pushing investment into wave and tidal power R & D.
Reality will prevail.
*swears continuously for hours*
It’s real dilemma for the Tories. If the renewables energy sector is developed in Scotland the revenues will eventually surpass oil revenues and there would be no remotely credible economic arguments against independence since they can hardly spin that renewable energy will run out.
The alternative, which is what they are doing, is to thwart the Scottish renewables revolution. But they know that means the Treasury will miss out on a lot of money which would be a big help for the UK balance of payments problem.
It’s not easy being a unionist!
Rarely repeat posts, but here are a couple from the fairly recent past.
link to wingsoverscotland.com
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Send us 56 of your filthy SNP MPs, will you? Well here’s our reply. See how powerless your SNP MPs are because you didn’t vote for the right type of MP? And our Grand Coaliton of Tory-Labour will make sure they stay impotent until you Scots start seeing sense and sending down MPs we approve of.
Got it? Good.
What’s also interesting is the fact that there were plenty of publishers to talk about this prior to the referendum, but after, there’s only the BBC and perhaps the Telegraph talking about it besides the ones listed here.
Maybe the locust will descend,and the sky fall in after all.
It’s all coming to pass,notwithstanding our No vote,we’re cursed I tell you.
Michelle Mone leaving was the catalyst. Like the ravens leaving the Tower of London.
What to do ?
Rev, just arrived home to my special WBB lying on the doormat. A signed version would have been nice 🙂 Many thanks and keep up the good work.
To be fair, it’s the people who own the land who pocket the subsidies anyway – I wonder how many will continue to run these wind-farms if they aren’t being drip-fed out cash into their already heavily-lined pockets.
Hearing Holyrood has just voted to allow 16 year olds to vote in Holyrood elections
Sitting up in the stand watching the political game, Scotland are playing well. In the first half (Indyref) the game was so close that the Better Together had to resort playing dirty, cheating and lying to go in ahead against Yes Scotland at half-time, aided by a tame referee from the civic service. Scotland have come out in the second half with a reshuffled team, plan (56 MPs}. The experienced Salmond moved to mid-field, and a new striker Nicola leading the line. Better Together are continuing with their predictable cheating and lying. One Better Together player has been cited for lying, another, the team’s “tactician”, nicknamed Fluffy, is under suspicion of involvement, and the third abstains from tackling!
I have faith in the ability and integrity of the Scotland team to win this game.
@Kelpie 1:56pm
I work with a few renewables companies and I suspect that there will be a sudden rush to get as many turbines planted as is humanly possible over the next 9 months or so.
The problem will be with the planning offices who will be snowed under with applications and the response times (as you no doubt know) of the consultees isn’t exactly lightning fast which will add to the chaos.
Do you know if the subsidy is applicable at the point of planning acceptance or is there some other relevant time that kicks in?
As for my business, I have no great expectation of continued levels of work flowing towards me after April next year.
As you say, Aӣ$%^&*
Yep, Rev …got the WBB. Thanks again!
On another wee note (the above article) …well …we’ll have our day. This is just ammunition for the fight to come.
Everything that they ‘promised’ us that wouldn’t happen if we voted ‘No’, has now been seen to be the biggest pack of lies.
And if we do have another Referendum, then by God …what will it make those whom would vote ‘No’ again?
So David Bowie, is this what Scotland had to “stay with us” for?
Yep. IndyRef#2 looms ever closer. These red and blue Tories think that by frustrating and subverting Scotland’s interests we will happily lie back and take it. Why do they not see their idiocy? Every single vote they push through that goes against Scotland’s national interest is just another nail in the coffin of this bUnion.
And when IndyRef#2 comes along–and it will-the SNP cannot have another long protracted affair like last time. We gave them too much time to scare the horses.
It’s as if Scotland voted yes…
What else did Better Together warn about?
While our parliament votes to allow 16/17 year olds the vote, in the dinosuar parliament that sneevling waste of space Murray put in a point of order about SNP MP’s tweeting. What a wee rat faced Uncle Tam fucker, please miss please miss they are tweeting stuff… make you sick
Just been watching The Commons. At the end of the amendment re. voting on the same day as other elections (15 minutes ago) Murray stood up with his face distorted and addressed the speaker by saying that on Monday, Wednesday and today SNP MPs or an SNP MP has been tweeting false information re. the results of the amendments and was he / they bringing the house into disrepute.
I would imagine that he’s doubled checked his facts and if he’s right this will be splattered all over the newspapers tomorrow.
At FMQs Ian Gray questions why the SNP didn’t keep the existing three hospitals operational whilst the new hospital resolves its teething problems.
Logistics? Resources like, by a magic wand having on standby a secondary resource of management, doctors, nurses, ambulances?
But then he did ask some time back ` “Where’s the money to come from for an oil fund?”.
Shouldn’t expect too much of him. Soul.
So let me see if I have got this right here.
Vote NO and we all share in this pooling and sharing.
Vote NO and the renewable energy subsidies are safe.
Vote NO and have a stronger voice in Westminster
Vote NO and stay in the E.U. without question
Vote NO and be respected by Westminster
Vote NO and HS2 will come to Scotland
Vote NO to protect Scotland from low oil prices
Now then remind me how has this vote NO thingy worked out for us so far?
Well from where I cower in my wee box we have Westminster pooling all our money and sharing amongst itself.
We now have the REMOVAL of green energy subsidies
Our voice in Westminster is being shouted down
We now have the threat of LEAVING the E.U.
We are now totally DISRESPECTED by WEstminster
HS2 will NOT be coming to Scotland
Oil prices ARE at low prices, not that WE are that bothered about it of course. 😉
I don’t know about anyone else but for me I’m just over the moon that I voted NO last Sept … oh wait a minute I seem to remember I voted YES! I think I may be just a wee bit p***** off that some of fellow compatriots were so easily taken in by Westminster LIES! I thought we were more intelligent than that!
@Proud Cybernat
I agree. A shorter indyref campaign is needed. And voting should be held in the spring and not in the autumn. Better psychology.
Seems there are some folk think “The Subsidies” come from the English piggy bank again
Scottish Taxpayers contribute to and get back from
Withdrawal of subsidies means Scottish taxpayers will now subsidise to England and get back English Nuclear Power or offshore English Windfarms
The big benefit (For England) is, Scotland loses investment in future renewables which means fewer jobs less RnD in that sector
Join that up with the damage about to be inflicted on Scottish agriculture and fisheries Decommissioning platforms probably going south and you have the depopulation once again of Scotlands young talent because they’ll be heading to that big London for work and Time travel into the past again for Bonnie Scotland
How come Thatcher manages to do it again from the grave
So, Fuck you very much NO voters
Ive been pleasant long enough, I don’t love you and want you to stay I want you to go
@Joemcg says: 18 June, 2015 at 2:50 pm:
“Being relatively old I remember it being said that if we had a majority of the then 72 MPs for SNP then independence was ours. What happened?”
Nothing happened, Joemcg, No one said it would be instant.
Here’s something the 56 could do right now though. The SNP has traditionally never voted upon, “English Only Matters”. Now is the time for them to do so, and here’s why.
There really is no such thing as an, “English only matter”, in what is the legally elected parliament of the, “United Kingdom”. So there is not one single member elected as a, “Member of the Parliament of England”, and thus every member in the Westminster Parliament is equally entitled to speak and vote on any matter that comes before that Parliament of the United Kingdom.
Every SNP member of the UK Parliament should attempt to speak in every debate that comes before the Parliament of The UK and just talk the matter out. They should table as many amendments to every bill as they can dream up and vote as the opposition they are on every matter, (unless it affects Scotland).
They should attempt it intervene in whatever any member is saying, (including each other), and drag every single matter out to as long as they can manage. (remember some matters are time limited and automatically fall if talked out).
Every chance should be taken to draw out the workings of the house and legally disrupt every debate. Raise as many Points of Order as they can manage and make as many objections as they can.
Just as they were chided for politely clapping instead of yelling like yobs and acting like the usual rabble that the House of Commons has become. None of this custom and practice crap it actually written down as rules but is just custom and practice, so break the custom & practice and make the speaker work for his money. As there is no written rules he can only ask them to stop whatever it is they are doing to annoy the English oiks.
Another way to cause havoc is to speak both proper Lowland Scots and Scots Gaelic languages. Both of which are recognized as legal minority languages by the EU and that has been ratified by all UK parliaments. If our Welsh & Irish Friends join in with their protected languages it could become a nightmare for the Unionists.
@ Joemcg
“Being relatively old I remember it being said that if we had a majority of the then 72 MPs for SNP then independence was ours. What happened?”
We were given our own devolved parliament. When that happened SNP policy changed to hold an Indy Ref should they win control of the devolved parliament.
I don’t think that will change any time soon and certainly Nicola, as a democrat, believes that this question has to be settled in a referendum. Not everyone who supports the SNP at a general election actually support Indy (but think the SNP do a good job) so it makes sense that the issue is settled in a referendum.
The question is, will the No-voting Unionist diehards accept a referendum defeat as willingly and democratically as the YES-voters did?
Another bunch of UKOK liars on display, via rancid The Graun, that gave Scotland goons and thugs like Steve Bell
link to archive.is
So Torygraph gets rebuked for memogate story/shyste but why though? Top UKOK civil service wonk said the leaked memo was the work of a very fine and honest British civil servant, so much so that they cant now release their fine and honest memogate because of relations with the French.
All thats even remotely interesting is how a staggerly corrupt British media can take a total lie of anything that damages Scotland’s democracy or, rebukes for lying reeps like these
link to dailyrecord.co.uk
Scottish Secretary Alistair Carmichael has fingered an official in his own department for writing the note.
But the Lib Dem refused to name the individual now at the centre of a Whitehall inquiry and a furious political row.
Carmichael, who remains in charge of the Scotland Office during the general election campaign, said yesterday: “I know the person involved but I’m not going to go beyond that.
“This is not somebody in public life, it’s a civil servant – so he’s entitled to the inquiry being done properly.”
Fingering by Alistair Carmichael anyone?
Taking the longer view, all their lies have been exposed, as lies. They have no dry powder left, so indieref 2 is there for the winning. We know the MSM do not advertise these falsehoods, or their eventual exposure but, we have been through it once; we can do it again, better prepared and used to the dirty tricks brigade.
Each and every one of us, here on Wings or on Munguin, Bella or the Wee Ginger Dug. Reading Grouse Beater, Tarff Advertiser,Peat Worrier and the many other excellent blogs and sites out there, know the truth and can disseminate it, to those less informed, who by now have realised; they were taken for mugs.
link to clyde1.com
Anyone know if they’re fracking in North Lanarkshire?
I wonder if the bbc will be running with this tonight?
@Feil Gype says: 18 June, 2015 at 3:07 pm:
“Ablins ye dinna jalousie whit the Tory clamjamfrie maum blether aboot, bit thae ainly bether aboot the windmills oan the kintra. Thae dinna want tae cut onythin frae the windmills oot in the watter.
Aiblins ye maun no ken the Inglis hae muckle ploys fir muckle wind ferms out oan the watter in the waters o Inglan. Ye didna jalousie thae wir jist daein yon jist tae fash iz aa did ye?
Robert Peffers @ 5.31pm, I have said since we sent the 56 down to Westminster the only thing we can do is become the midgies of Parliament. We can annoy the hell out of them and make it unworkable. I like the way you are thinking.
Nearly time to start wearing these I feel.
@SquareHaggis
I suspect the contamination in N Lanarkshire is from toxic substances dumped in the Ravenscraig Steelworks site rather than tracking.
By chance I met up on Friday evening with a former BSC employee who mentioned the dumping of chemicals including toluene from the Coke-oven by-products plant there.
If memory serves there was an abandoned mineshaft on-site used as a sump/dump for various nasties.
@Robert Peffers 5.31
Sounds the very dab Robert. Personally I’d have them table entire amendments and debates in Gaelic and have the government benches fetch in translators just for hell of it. 🙂
Another excellent piece by Steve keen regarding tory economic policy…
link to forbes.com
@Macart 6.17
Aye. Kick them in the Erse.
I can remember when not too long ago the Feed In Tariff for solar panels was substantially cut and suddenly the cost of solar panels more than halved.
I wonder if windmills will suddenly come down in price just as the costs of oil exploration will come down due to the fall in the price of Brent Crude.
@handclapping says:18 June, 2015 at 4:13 pm:
“Another wee quirk in the ointment is that DECC is pushing that solar is as cost effective. Who gets more sun, England or Scotland?”
Matter of fact, handclapping, Scotland gets far more daylight hours than England does. I’ve sat reading the newspaper outside the campervan at midnight on the North Coast. BTW: You do not need it to be sunny to get electricity from light.
As for wind power it is much of a muchly across the UK in terms of wind blowing time but the fresh air is in a bit more of a hurry the further North you go. Another factor is the glens, these tend to funnel the wind through the glen and thus speed it up. Much the same thing as the venture system of a carburettor. Again when wind goes up to get over hills it speeds up at the top as it goes over the hill.
Then there is the little matter of natural high level hydro storage power. This, when coupled with either wind or light power, can use surplus power during off-peak times to pump water uphill as kinetic storage power to use to generate hydro power at peak times.
SquareHaggis & Robert Kerr
I live on one of the estates affected by the contamination and the cause is more likely to be caused by the new M8 roadworks or the new Wimpey estate being built next to Holytown Crematorium , both are in the middle of the affected areas .
The old Ravenscraig site is just outside the affected area and as far as I can make out none of the housing estates built on the Ravenscraig site have been affected .
WATERLOO 200
Imperialist/Royalist propaganda
DIEU SAUVE LA REPUBLIQUE FRANCAISE
O/T Watching this repeat of the Labour leadership debate from last night. Why don’t they offer England independence from the UK 🙂 ,they wouldn’t even miss the rest of the UK as it is,not until the bill for rail projects came up at least.
Jimnarlene said:
“Each and every one of us, here on Wings or on Munguin, Bella or the Wee Ginger Dug. Reading Grouse Beater, Tarff Advertiser,Peat Worrier and the many other excellent blogs and sites out there, know the truth and can disseminate it, to those less informed, who by now have realised; they were taken for mugs.”
But not enough of them, Jimnarlene. We’re still fighting an existential war against the BBC and MSM and we still have the problem of the hard-core Brit-Jock-Pretendy-Scots, who don’t understand that, however much they ape their Establishment masters for preferment and status, they’ll still regarded as the wee Scotch monkeys on the English organ-grinder’s barra.
Our hope is that the soft Nos will gradually see over the next, long five years that Westminster has no interest in our legitimate democratic concerns and in fact will act to thwart us at every turn.
The long game is not exciting or heroic but it’s all we’ve got just now.
Re the water in North Lanarkshire – It is highly unlikely that Ravenscraig dumping has anything to do with it.
My father used to go on about all of our water coming from the Daer resovoir. Most of the water in Lanarkshire will come from the resovoir in the surrDesnudando La Noticiaounding moorlands and hills – ironically where they are proposing to frack.
You guys must have misheard the better Together Mafia.
It was Pooing and Shafting Scotland they said.
How could Ian Murray suggest that SNP are misinforming the
electorate?
Can’t he remember that Carmichael got elected on Lying and costing the Public purse £1 Million, doesn’t he recall the
Labour war chant that only the biggest Party can for a government?
Does he recall the letter from pensioner William who was made up at a fake address and used robotic hand writing and who didn’t know his fake address wasn’t in the district that he said it was. Oh and the very same word were used by another made up Labour Support but with an alternative robot writing style.
How about the howler that all the Labour Scotland MPs used ” The support on the door step says that we are going to win”! Well could be, if they only asked question outside of their own front door.
They are goading us Right, far Right, and extreme Right.
Time to call the next referendum.
Lets just abbreviate the pack of lies that was the better together mandate and list how they have broken every promise and Vow, and get it published as an advert in every newspaper and bill board in Scotland.
O/T
link to partyof.wales
Perhaps the story should also reflect that Wind Subsidies is one of the very, very, very few ways Scotland benefits from the National Infrastructure Plan to which we pay £3.5bn a year and get back less than £200m in benefit.
I heard on the news that oil has contaminated the water. Any Tories holidaying in Lanarkshire, lol?
Dugdale seems to be mighty popular on telly just now. She’s on Scotland Tonight with Rona Dougall who’s no doubt going to sook up her arkie. Alex is on Question Time with for example Melanie Phillips. That should be interesting. I wonder if she’ll manage to slot in Murrays allegations in the Commons today about the SNP.
There was a mention on STV news of the wind renewable subsidy ending …… the Government has met its target …. no need for it now ….. individuals who have been against it in Northumberland interviewed. Not a peep about how this will affect Scotland even although Nicola Sturgeon condemned this today in no uncertain terms at Holyrood.
I personally think that the 56 SNP MP’s should walk out en-masse. Cross the border into Scotland and just declare UDI.
I am sick to the back teeth of how Scotland and the Scots are being treated by the Tories and their so-called “opposition”.
Also get out before we face our percentage to repair “The Mother of All Parliaments.”
Let it sink into the Thames for all I care.
Good on ye Kristen Guru Murthy just grilled Amber Rudd.
C4 news has tory energy minister explaining scrapping green crap is all to protect the bill payers of UKOK England and to mix up UKOK green energy and BBC Scotland shills going massive with tory delivering on their 2015 manifesto, so rejoice.
Thanks again proud Scot buts
Tinto Chiel,
That was the point, I was trying to convey; though I’m trying to be more positive about the “long game”. It’s always been a long game, we damn near did it last year, with all their arsenal intact; an arsenal which is now laid bare and open to ridicule.
Thanx for your comment, that’s the beauty of Wings and the others I mentioned, the sharing of information and ideas.
Thinking about the “Vow”, should “Lord” Smith be called to explain to the SG at Holyrood exactly how he intended his work to be used.
@Helena Brown says: 18 June, 2015 at 5:59 pm:
“I have said since we sent the 56 down to Westminster the only thing we can do is become the midgies of Parliament. We can annoy the hell out of them and make it unworkable. I like the way you are thinking.”
The clue to all that was when Salmond said he was standing for parliament. Alex is acknowledged as perhaps the finest expert in the arcane workings of Westminster.
I always remember how Alex Salmond caught out William Waldegrave.
On 13 January 1997, in reply to several questions put by then SNP leader, Alex Salmond, to the then Tory Treasury Minister, William Waldegrave, he, Waldegrave, admitted Scotland had paid a massive £27 billion more to the London Exchequer than it had received since the Tories came to power in 1979. That worked out at £5,400 for every person in Scotland.
Alex knew not only what questions to ask but how to ask them in a manner that Waldegrave had no choice but answer correctly.
Alex will cause them a lot of headaches and I’ve been watching him getting involved in several debates already and making his presence felt. I’ve no doubt the rest of the 56 are being primed to play their part too.
Latest from No2NuclearPower
7. Energy Storage
The UK government just signed an agreement guaranteeing a price of 16 cents per kilowatt hour
for power generated by Hinkley Point. That fresh contract represents an example, Gundersen
argued, of the market price of new nuclear power. Solar power costs six to seven cents, he said,
and wind costs four or five cents. Add 2¢ for the cost of a utility-scale Tesla battery, and
renewables with reliable storage are still at half the price of new nuclear power.
@jimnarlene.
Agree completely. The University of WoS is an important institution now.
Have just noticed your avatar: really clever.
Onward.
At the risk of upsetting folk, I would be delighted to see a dramatic slowdown – or complete cessation – of wind farm development in Scotland. Surely I can’t be the only yes voter who is troubled by the SNP’s enthusiasm for sacrificing our natural heritage to the interests of big business?
Wind farms are great for greedy developers and landowners – some of the very chaps the land reform proposals are (quite rightly) going to hold to account. Take the Duke of Buccleuch, for instance. He is keen to build 160 turbines on the Lowther Hills – totally surrounding the villages of Leadhills and Wanlockhead with a vast sea of turbines, which would be immediately adjacent to the existing 206 turbine Clyde Wind Farm, turning most of upland South Lanarkshire into a giant wind farm.
The subsidies have become a total gravy train for such people to line their pockets. Many parts of the country are being saturated with developments – do people honestly believe it could or should continue at the current rate?
The despoilation of vast tracts of our uplands with windfarms is a grand ongoing act of environmental vandalism. Along with the collusion with Donald Trump over the destruction of the Menie dunes, I was unable to bring myself to vote SNP because of this until this May, when the need to oust the incumbent Labour numpty became overwhelming. The access laws introduced by the SNP were very welcome, but the irony is that large areas of open land are now no-go areas due to their new industrialised character.
I’m sorry, but we cannot sacrifice our unique landscapes, local identities, wildlife, and places for peaceful recreation for this inefficient, destructive and unreliable source of energy.
@lepus t s
Ah but … didn’t we create these landscapes in the first place by cutting down their natural tree cover in pursuit of an inefficient, destructive and unreliable source of energy?
Laying down a marker before you count your chickens!
link to archive.is
Westminster is trying to financially hamstring Scotland and the Media are giving us lashings of ‘too poor’ medicine to usher the confused and uninformed back into the shortbread box again.
This what we expected and we’ll have to ride out the storm and see how it goes for a month or two.
But folk will be reflecting on their decision in the referendum and more of them are asking themselves “why did I vote no”
Indy 2 will come all in it’s own good time.
One last hurrah before a new essay appears: link to grousebeater.wordpress.com
Robert Peffers says:
18 June, 2015 at 7:33 pm
———————————————
After being disappointed and made to feel very angry With how our people (and us) were treated in Scotland Bill debate, I do hope that things are going on behind the scenes. Not only at WM where I hope they have a good strategy, but also at Holyrood. I hope the SNP are researching what currency we would use, for to answer them in next referendum, to give you an example.
Is Nicola reaching out to leaders of other states and also International money markets?
What do you think?
@lepus timidus scoticus
Think the gravy train point is a fair one. I would have liked to have seen much more in the way of community driven energy projects such as wind/solar etc. That way, The proceeds, jobs and other benefits going to the locals. It’s also more resilient having distributed energy but the big power companies would no doubt hate it.
Do I watch QT tonight and see what Alex is up to or do I ignore it on the grounds that Melanie Phillips is just going to channel David Starkey/Katie Hopkins etc?
David Davies is as right wing as a right wing thing but pretty honest and Caroline Flint might be OK (or in full SNPbad mode). Lionel Barber I don’t know but he tweeted “tough crowd” about the show tonight which I take it is already recorded.
Scotland has control coming over the voting franchise
If they can have EVEL, I wonder what we could do?
Lepus: I can’t be the only yes voter who is troubled by the SNP’s enthusiasm for sacrificing our natural heritage to the interests of big business?
If wind farms benefitted only big business the government of big business in Westminster would not be reducing subsidies.
For anyone interested, here’s a link to the Scottish Power plans to build a 70 mile long line of 43m high pylons that they’re about to build across the pristine rural countryside of Dumfries & Galloway, running from approx Newton Stewart to Carlisle.
link to spenergynetworks.co.uk
These pylons are necessary to transport power from the region’s wind-farms to ensure England keeps the lights on.
This is stunning, unspoiled countryside which relies heavily on tourism. Can’t they be forced to lay the lines underground?
Robert,
The ambient wind speed in Scotland is slightly more than in England but that is as much because Scotland sticks out more into the incoming Atlantic systems as for it being further North.
The mountains and glens, though, are a definite over all disadvantage to wind power generation. It is fine when the wind is blowing in the right direction, i.e. up the glen, then, as you say, the topography increases yield but OTOH when it is not blowing in the right direction then the sheltering effect of surrounding mountains tends to reduce yield.
Over all, the effect is negative for what is known as sheltered terrain compared to a similar array in a large open plain with the same ambient wind speed.
That is why the detailed cost effective maps for wind generation for Europe are much more closely aligned to mountain topography than they are for the ambient wind speed which does gradually increase as you move North.
However, deployment along low SW facing hill ranges does make sense, though, when the prevailing wind is South Westerly and wind from other directions is not hindered too much either.
That is also why, the Low Countries have always been traditional wind power users long before electricity came around and that is why Southern England is an ideal location for wind farms.
[Incidentally, the World’s first electricity generating wind turbine was built in Scotland.]
Also, Altantic wind systems vary in size, but tend to have a radius which is about the length of Britain long.
That means, when it is windy in the North of GB it is usually not in the South and vice versa.
It therefore makes more engineering sense to have a concentration of wind farms at both ends.
Another reason why the South of England should have similar levels of on shore wind to Scotland (and the rest of Western seaboard Europe).
Here is a cost effective map for wind power for Europe. Actual costings will be out of date but the relative colourings should still be relevant.
Here is a comparison of England to Germany (Similar ballpark populations, area and population densities) of wind farms in England v Germany (maps to same scale).
Joemcg,
“Being relatively old I remember it being said that if we had a majority of the then 72 MPs for SNP then independence was ours. What happened?”
The rigged referendum of 18th September last year, that is what happened.
If pre-referendum we had elected 56 SNP MPs out of 59 MPs, after being told during the election campaign to vote for an SNP majority for independence, we would have the right to declare independence.
Our cause has been set back much more than folks here think.
Not because we lost, but because we were robbed of victory, while not a single “democratic” country in Europe or the world had the courage to support us.
For our senior citizens: link to grousebeater.wordpress.com
@ lepus, what cost effective source of green energy do you advocate as an alternative?……
The unionist belief seems to be that the Scots are gullible and thick as shit, and that they can say and do whatever they wants to us.
But on the upside, we just need to prove them wrong once.
How about a bit of reverse psychology. The tories keep dumping their shit on the Scottish system, thereby showing the SNP government to be impotent, in order to weaken support and drive voters away from SNP. Object !; to drive the voting preferences back to the status quo and return to a system they are comfortable with.
lepus tmidus scoticus
“Surely I can’t be the only yes voter who is troubled by the SNP’s enthusiasm for sacrificing our natural heritage to the interests of big business?”
A well kept secret, for entirely different reasons, by both sides, is that the Scotland’s on shore wind power plans were hatched in Westminster long before the SNP ever got a whiff of power.
Even before Brain Wilson championed it for SLAB with his nonsensical guff.
I saw the plans and planning maps years before the SNP came to power in Scotland, many already in development, many already through initial planning stages.
Back then, we were looking at around 8000 turbines in Scotland, since then, the number has actually reduced but only because through technological development the power capacity of individual turbines has increased significantly.
Just to fucking depressing, Seem it coming with a No vote, knew what the bastards would do, they have fucking form, every country they touch they destroy.
Channel 4 news tonight, FI gave Amber Dudd an absolute doing re the on-shore wind subsidy. Nailed her by asking, ” Are you doing this to punish Scotland and the SNP?”. Watch her face gurn.
@ann says: 18 June, 2015 at 7:12 pm:
“I personally think that the 56 SNP MP’s should walk out en-masse. Cross the border into Scotland and just declare UDI.
Ann, UDI is an illegal Unilateral Declaration of Impendence but if done properly the Scottish elected Members would be legally ending the Union. First up the UK is not a country. The second letter is, “K”, and it is the initial of the word, “Kingdom”, and a kingdom is a Royal Realm. Not only that but under Scottish Law the people of Scotland are sovereign while in the Kingdom of England, (three countries), the Monarchy is sovereign and the people are her subjects.
So at the signing of the Treaty of Union the situation was that the signers from the Kingdom of England were signing with a mandate from the crown/parliament of England but the signatories from Scotland were mandated by the People of Scotland via their parliamentarians.
Thus if the modern Scottish elected Members had a proper mandate from the sovereign people they would just be legally declaring that an equally sovereign bipartite union had legally ended. The fact is that Westminster has never had legal sovereignty over either the people or kingdom of Scotland.
O/T
I’ve just noticed a story in the Guardian re. an IPSO investigation of the Carmichael leak & Telegraph story.
The Telegraph will be forced to print an apology.
Read it for yourself.
link to theguardian.com
Kosovo made a UDI from Serbia.
Serbia complained to the UN.
The UN referred it to their court, the ICJ.(International Court of Justice)
The ruling from that court, 22nd July 2010, was that Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence was NOT illegal.
One of the 15 international judges for that decision and who agreed it was not illegal was the UK’s Sir Christopher Greenwood.
End of.
Rock
I believe Iceland supported us.
Wouldn’t it be great if out 56 MPs walked into the Commons wearing the “Don’t Blame Me I Voted Yes” tee shirts
show the house the respect it deserves
Ach, there’s billions in gold under Ayrshire to subsidise its wind farms… me worry? We’ll soon hae mair money than a horse can shite. Unless gold prices become too volatile, or it will run out by next year.
@Jim Thomson 5:15 pm
I’ve already spoken to some developers anxious to speed up their projects and get stuff on the ground asap, but with the cut off in March next year there’s a limit on who can make it in time.
I haven’t read the DECC statement carefully enough, it did mention limited ‘grace periods’ but implied that only sites which already had the main consents (planning consent, a grid connection agreement – I think it listed a third – probably a power purchase agreement) would qualify for grace.
Since getting any/all these consents can take months (or years in some cases) and is expensive then it probably does cut the possibilities to developers who already have these. Turbine orders can also take some time to manufacture and delivery.
If the grace periods are cut as short as the deadline has been (set one year earlier than anticipated) then it could cause real consternation.
So, planning won’t be the only possible bottleneck in a rush to build – there’s getting a grid agreement, power purchase, turbine delivery, construction workers with the right skills and trying to get financing as well.
And in all this trying to negotiate a good deal when all these guys know the clock is ticking for you.
Rock-did Cameron and his cronies not pressurise many countries leaders to speak out against independence? Although I get your point, where was our support? It’s ok for 300 odd countries to be independent but not us.
Chic-think we would have a harder time when a “democratic” (what a laugh) vote took place.
@Robert Peffers
You may well be entirely right in theory, but what matters is the perception and the realpolitik among all those countries that we depend on for trade and good will.
A Scotland which unilaterally walks out of the union will be perceived as an illegally seceding state – especially by all countries (most of them) worried about their own secessionist movements. And the famous UK ‘clout’ abroad will be mustered in its own favour. Sanctions would be a very real possibility.
The world’s a wicked place. Countries act in their own interest; no one owes us any particular favours, and no one is going to listen to any special pleading based on a 300-year-old treaty. Sorry – but UDI or unilateral dissolution of the Union is a pipe dream, and the sooner we all stop thinking it’s a realistic option, the better.
The tide is starting to change this is all over the internet with lots of comments saying they are shafting Scotland
Lots of links to here showing what they promised and what they are doing and it seems a lot of people are thinking that it is so the money can go to english fracking companies that toffs including some MPs have invested in
bring it on
UDI
@ Graeme 9.46 i would love all the SNP MPs to walk into the commons with t-shirts on saying the vow is dead and vowdead.com or similar under
then on the link explaining all the lies
Cameron’s plan was never to listen to Scotland after a no vote. His plan was to win, and then economically vandalise Scotland.
This is Thatcher with a tie. The Tories despise Scotland. We are at the beginning of 1979!
However this time we have a Scottish parliament and 56 mps at Westminster. What worked then will not work now.
UDI is being forced on Scotland. We cannot stand by and watch Thatchers Scottish Holocaust again. This is about saving Scotland not freeing Scotland.
jimnarlene,
“I believe Iceland supported us.”
Iceland, a decent, democratic country which jailed the criminal bankers and got its economy back up again without as much austerity as here, where the national debt has actually increased.
Iceland, the country that Gordon Brown used anti terrorist laws against to protect his criminal bankers.
Alex Salmond was ridiculed during the referendum campaign for having said a long time ago that Iceland was one of the countries an independent Scotland could aspire to be like.
But as always, he was right. If we had let the banks go bust and jailed our criminal bankers, we plebs wouldn’t have suffered.
So there is one country who publicly supported our cause.
Thank you Iceland.
Don’t think that diplomatically other countries could say they supported Scotlands independence,but if the YES campaign had won,then on the 19th of september Scotland would have had a lot of new friends. Thanks for that bettertogether no thanks.
Little O/T for consideration:
We are being told that Westminster needs fixed. I’ll cost a mere £5.7billion of the UK taxpayers money.
I recall the shrieking and wailing that the Scottish Parliament cost £414million which was funded out of the Scottish purse (the block ggrant).
Just saying like..
Joemcg,
“Rock-did Cameron and his cronies not pressurise many countries leaders to speak out against independence?”
Yes they did but if any of them had been “fair” and “democratic”, they would have ignored them.
As jimnarlene has pointed out, Iceland did support us.
The point is, bar Iceland, Scotland stands alone in the world in its struggle for independence.
The European Council refused to send referendum monitors “without UK approval”.
The European Commission refused to give their opinion about Scottish membership “without UK approval”.
Which means they are simply toothless undemocratic puppets, lecturing poor countries about “democracy”.
As to the wind turbines ruining the landscape,we need power,and if anyone can come up with a better cleaner way of generating power than by using fossil fuels or nuclear power stations,then turbines can be removed.
Unlike nuclear power stations that take decades to close and hundreds of years till you can grow food safely,the land could be used almost immediately upon the removal of wind turbines.
IvMoz’s link archived, to the guardian story about the Telegraph/Carmichael leak.
link to archive.is
thats the third time I have seen a report on Edinburgh council court case .No mention of which party councillors belonged to so obviously not SNP then.
Sending 56 SNP MP’s to Westminster is one of the best things that has ever happened in Scotland
Surely all of these amendments and votes that the SNP are losing at Westminster is showing the public in Scotland the true value of your democratic vote in the UK.
Before when voting labour etc the paper thin illusion to the naive or uninterested was that your MP was voting for Scotland and not the party line.
Now it’s abundantly clear that the democratically elected SNP MP’s have no say or sway at westminster. English MP’s decide what happens in the UK …… once they have checked with their corporate sponsors
That bill for Westminsters repair sounds like an incoming black hole 🙂
The UK was one of the first countries to recognise Kosovo after their UDI.
However, UDI will not be required for Scottish independence, for pragmatic considerations.
@lepus timidus scoticus says: 18 June, 2015 at 7:51 pm:
” … Surely I can’t be the only yes voter who is troubled by the SNP’s enthusiasm for sacrificing our natural heritage to the interests of big business?
First you won’t be upsetting folks for we mostly have heard all that crap before. Second I’m not about to answer all that long list of rubbish you posted. Let me just tell you a very few home truths to dash your misapprehensions.
That, “Natural Heritage”, you speak of is a total myth. The Highland clearances were still going on around the 1850s in the Highlands. Some folks opine they still are.
That’s just 165 years ago and, BTW, they cleared all of Scotland, not just the Highlands but in a different manner.
The old natural heritage in Scotland was the Great Caledonian Forest and before the Highland clearances the Highlands glens were well populated.
Just walk up any Highland Glen and you will find many signs of old human habitation. Many old ruined homes. If you look around you will also see clumps of stinging Nettles among the heather. Each such clump is the site of a house. The primitive toilet arrangements saw much human waste dumped and the nettles are the result of a nitrogen soil among the mainly poorer heather and bracken.
They cleared out the people to make way for sheep and the sheep and deer destroyed the natural habitat. The Highland are not naturally a barren wilderness fit only for hunting, fishing, shooting and numpties falling off mountains and puncturing mountain bike tyres. If you want the Highland landscapes returned to what they were then throw out the rich Tories along with the sheep and start culling the overpopulation of deer.
Do you know where much of the Scottish Oaks went? To build the old English wooden ships. During the 17th and 18th centuries much of what remained of our woodlands were heavily exploited for timber, charcoal and tan-bark. By the 19th century our native woods were in decline and allowed to degenerate. By 1900 woodland covered less than 4% of Scotland’s land. This led to habitat loss and such degradation led to the loss of those species that needed larger, unbroken blocks, of native woodland. Especially the larger mammals and predators.
Thanks for the link IvMoz. Interesting to see that the SNP reported the Daily Telegraph to IPSO and they’ve dealt with this fairly quickly. I was speaking to a woman at IPSO earlier this week about something the Daily Record had published. …. Torcuil Chrichtons ‘SNP red light voting policy at Westminster’ ….. with no evidence to back up his claim. She was very helpful indeed and explained that complaints can be made online. I reckon this is something we should all consider doing in future.
ClanDonald I’ve just read your post and sympathise with the fact that Scottish Power are planning to mar the countryside to, in the main, transport power South. Ineos through fracking are planning to lay pipes to transport gas from Scotland to Liverpool. England would implode without Scotland and the sooner the brainwashed ‘subsidy Scots’, ‘Scotlands main export to England are tramps’ brigade waken up to this fact the better.
msean,
“Don’t think that diplomatically other countries could say they supported Scotlands independence,but if the YES campaign had won,then on the 19th of september Scotland would have had a lot of new friends. Thanks for that bettertogether no thanks.”
Diplomatically, they didn’t have any problems dancing to Cameron’s tune and issuing veiled or open warnings.
Who would want such hypocrites as “friends” after winning the struggle on our own, when they couldn’t utter a single word in our favour when we were being lied to and bullied by the undemocratic UK government?
I will consider Iceland to be our best friend when we become independent.
A lot of stuff on telly this evening about how Westminster is literally collapsing. Costs of repairs between three billion and eight billion. Our share of this will be more than the four hundred million our Scottish Parliament building cost.
Anyone remember the pelters we all got from the ‘Scottish Press’ about the cost of this brand new building? It went on for bloody years. They were playing the guilt card of course.
Anyone think that there will be a single word of complaint about Westminster’s repair cost?
DIPITY DUG
We’ve going to unfortunately have to put up with her puss more on the telly now that her bid for slab leader has begun.
A lot of comment has been made about her whinny voice. However the thing that irritates me about her is the problem with the media who seem to have exactly the same boring repetitive questions to ask her. This irritates the hell out of me as this gives dipity the opportunity to spew out the prepared answers made up for her. You can tell that they are prepared answers the cogs are turning to move the mouth the eyes are blank but the cogs move in an empty space where a brain should be. Give her a unprepared question and lets see what happens. If this is the new generation of slabbers they’ve defiantly dumbing down way way down.
Fifi confirmed on Scotland Tonight that Labour’s defeated old guard will be allowed on the list for the 2016 elections.
@James Caithness says: 18 June, 2015 at 8:21 pm:
“I hope the SNP are researching what currency we would use, for to answer them in next referendum, to give you an example.
Is Nicola reaching out to leaders of other states and also International money markets?
What do you think?”
I’ve news for you. I’ve been kicking around the edges of this old party since I was a young schoolboy in 1946 and to the best of my knowledge the SNP have been doing their research all that time. As to what currency Scotland should use it will be Scotland’s own currency of course.
The Pound Sterling was agreed as the currency of both of the equally sovereign kingdoms who signed the Treaty of Union in 1706/7. It is as much the Scottish pound as it is the English pound. What is more the so called Bank of England has never in its long history belonged to the Country nor the Kingdom of England.
A London Scot, William Paterson started a subscription scheme to bail out the English Parliament/monarchy. This led to the Bank that is actually properly named, “The Governor and Company of the Bank of England”. Not as many believe because it belonged to England but because the Parliament/Treasury of England banked with it.
It remained a private company until 1946 when, NOT England but the United Kingdom, nationalised it. Since 1997, the Bank has had operational independence over monetary policy, (done by Gordon Brown). As for Sterling it is an international Trading currency and can be used by anyone .
If Scotland were to become independent it would be both a foolhardy England and a foolhardy Bank of England that would attempt to work totally without any Scottish input. The reason being that the Scottish problem would be that our economy would be far more stable and harder than that of the Kingdom of England. You can now see the holes in the UK scare stories they used during the referendum & GE campaigns.
Pope coming to the help of the SNP against Camerons anti-renewable policies and his UKIP climate change-denying freinds
link to seanmunger.com
Dipity Dug on STV.
Confronted with her statement that Labour would not only hold its 41 seats, but it would add at least 2 ?????
She claim that she will be more accurate in future, and that
she has taken her share of the blame for their biggest ever defeat?
I didn’t know that she had resigned along with Smurph, or is it that an apology after a Lie is just how things work?
Completely agree with you Bob. Land misuse is one of the biggest problems in Scotland.
Scotland is one of the few countries in the World where its green house gas emissions from land misuse exceeds its industrial levels.
Hundreds of glens which once supported a significant population which husbanded the land by cultivation, pasturing and drainage are now heather moors and methane producing bogs.
Forestry production practices, while undergoing change for the better re GGEs are still contributors to that.
We desperately need land reform.
And with independence, a new town plan could be implemented which encouraged re-population of the Highlands and make much better use of the posh boy’s Disneyland (which stands for Disnae dae much).
@Robert Peffers@10.42pm
I’m not sure what home truths you think you’re teaching me. I’m only too aware of the clearance of trees and people from the Highlands, however I’m sure you are equally aware how low the tree line is in Scotland due to poor soil at altitude, short growing season and (ironically enough) wind. Unless you are talking about a radically different climatic era, it’s fanciful to say the least imagine a Highlands covered in trees.
Do we have no natural heritage since the landscape has been shaped by man? Of course not. Do we consider our landscapes, diminished as they may be, so worthless that it is acceptable to plaster them in industrial turbines? I have grave doubts as to whether many of these windfarm sites will ever be restored if/when they’ve outlived their usefulness. Look at the fiasco of East Ayrshire Council and the non-restoration of opencast mining sites. Once the ‘stakeholders’ have made their money from dissolved, they’ll disappear. The developers’ companies will have dissolved and no-one will be held accountable for restoration – that’s the way the business world works, I’m afraid.
In any event, I was not referring specifically to the Highlands. High quality landscapes in the south of Scotland and elsewhere are subjected to a constant blitz of applications and developments. Are you happy for the UK’s largest private landlord, the Duke of Buccleuch, standing to make a fortune through billpayer-funded subsidies?
In
blanket bog, wet heath, dry
heath and lichen-rich heaths
@ClanDonald says:18 June, 2015 at 9:03 pm:
“For anyone interested, here’s a link to the Scottish Power plans to build a 70 mile long line of 43m high pylons that they’re about to build across the pristine rural countryside of Dumfries & Galloway, running from approx Newton Stewart to Carlisle.
There’s no such thing as pristine rural countryside. The clue is in that word, “Rural”, = relating to the countryside or agricultural, rustic.
Agriculture is man made countryside. Probably if you have a wee look around with a fresh eye you will notice there are already older latticework pylons marching across that landscape that your eyes and brain cancel out as they are just part of the landscapes you have looked at since you were in the pram. In fact the modern pylons were apparently shown on the box a few days ago but have been on official websites for a while now. They are a damned site more elegant than the old latticework things.
I took a couple of photos a couple of years ago looking out from a hill just outside Cowdenbeath across at Benarty Hill and Loch Ore Country Park. I chose to frame a line of old style pylons and power lines in the photos. Later I Photo-shopped out the Pylons and power lines. When I met people who were complaining about the Lochgelly Loch Wind farm I would show them the doctored photograph and ask their opinion.
Then I’d show them the real view with the pylons. Now I’m talking about folks that knew the view and not one of them noticed the missing pylons and power-lines. That is until I showed them the un-doctored photo. They had all been so accustomed to mentally blocking out the old pylons they had not noticed them missing in the photo.
Laughably I bumped into one guy a couple of weeks ago and he cursed me for making him notice all the pylons in our area he had never noticed before. This is the same mental process that sees amateur photographers take wedding pictures with what seems to be churchyard trees growing from the Grooms Top Hat or a telegraph pole from the bride’s head. The eye and brain blot out familiar objects but the camera sees them all. After a while those new pylons will just blend into the landscape too.
The brilliant Joseph Stiglitz Nobel prize winner for economics and also a positive voice for Scotland’s independence argues that the currency issue is a ‘non issue ….Scotland could continue using sterling – with or without England’s consent …many small countries have managed to have a currency of their own – floating ,pegged,or “managed”
He warns about the consequences of the UK imitating the American economic model ( sadly we are well along the way to widening economic and social inequalities that will affect future generations, a modern day feudal system where poverty is in your DNA) and argues that Scottish independence will have many more economic benefits than costs ‘Scotland can make investments in tidal energy,or in its young people …knowing that the country will recapture more of the benefits from them through taxation’ ( The Great Divide )
WM are going to fail everyone in UKOK with their economic policies because the inequality gap will produce an unstable society -this is not what Scotland voted for. Could we crowd fund Stiglitz to be the economic advisor to Indy 2 ? it will be sooner than we think.
Couldn’t agree more regarding re-population of the highlands – we could easily double or more the population without making the scenery any less bonny. I have long felt very strongly about this.
The single biggest barrier in my opinion is the poor roads – we desperately need a road network fit for the 21st century. But part of this notion of the highlands as a fantasy landscape for the wealthy few is the attitude that shitty roads are ‘quaint’. And we could do with restoring the rail network that was ripped up in the 1960’s too.
Until we get independence, the highlands will get quainter and quainter, the young forced to leave to get work, the towns where ordinary people live getting more and more run down. I would love to see the highlands full of vibrant, thriving communities.
Effijy 11:39
No apology she seems oblivious to her part in Slabs downfall blinded by her ambition to become slab leader. If people repeat telling you ur the best person for the job ur bound to start believing it. She had to resign dipity leader to contend for slab leader position. This is another careerist they have no sense of common decency they live in a wee bubble by themselves fed by ass kissing political spin doctors as with Smurphy they only think of the self.
I believe the Scottish Parliament passed the Land Reform Bill yesterday with cross-party support but don’t yet know the details.
During indyref my MSP assured me it would be radical. Hope he is right.
BBC QT: Can’t quite believe that Melanie Phillips agreed with Alec Salmond in her first reply to a question and also towards the end. She actually seemed reasonably normal for a change.
PS. Got my hard-cover Wee Blue Book today with the Thank You card inside. Many thanks Stu for all your hard work. I will be leaving said WBB in my will to my lovely, red-headed grandson ( now turned 2 just before the GE) who wowed everyone in the ‘Yes’ shop including my MSP who gave him the car Saltire from his own car when he couldn’t find the one he had hidden for him. He had promised my daughter-in-law a flag for him as: “We’re doing this for the children. They are our future.”
@kininvie says: 18 June, 2015 at 10:03 pm:
“You may well be entirely right in theory, but what matters is the perception and the realpolitik among all those countries that we depend on for trade and good will.
You thinks so, Kininvie?
It didn’t happen to Norway in 1905. Having been in union with Denmark and then with Sweden for several centuries, Norway became an independent country again as recently as 1905. So Norway then chose its own king, and elected its own government. You will agree that Norwegians today are a strong and patriotic people who are very proud of their country and its achievements as it is actually now the most wealthy per capita nation on Earth.
A Scotland which unilaterally walks out of the union will be perceived as an illegally seceding state”
As I’ve been posting all day Scotland would not need to unilaterally declare independence as the law of Scotland is based upon the people, not the Queen nor the state, are sovereign.
The UK Parliament took it’s sovereignty from the Monarchy in 1688 when they threw out their correct royal line, James II, and imported the foreign King Billy & Queen Mary of Orange and removed from them their veto over Parliament that, under then current English law, was Divine Right of Kings”. Although Scotland shared the person who wore the English Crown he wore the Scottish Crown as an independent kingdom. So he remained the King of Scotland but the Scots had declared independence in 1320 by the Declaration of Arbroath but had also declared that the Monarch was not sovereign but the people were.
So when we signed up to the Treaty of Union we were still an independent country and the Treaty agreed that Scots law was to remain independent. So the English crown/parliament has no sovereignty over Scots.
Westminster only exercises sovereignty in Scotland via the people of Scotland’s sovereignty that is vested in the MPs we send to Westminster and that only because we have mandated the MPs to wield our sovereignty.
If we, the sovereign people of Scotland, mandate our MPs to walk out they are NOT declaring independence but ending a Treaty between two legally equally sovereign kingdoms. It’s like a Husband leaving an cheating and abusive common law partner.
It’s legally a bipartite treaty, for God sake, and bipartite agreements are ended every day. We are not part of a country and we don’t even need to end the United Kingdom as a kingdom is a Royal Realm and we keep the Queen of Scots. We just withdraw from the abusive equal partnership of the Westminster Parliament and we already have our own parliament.
My grandfather was a government minister in Ireland from the 1930’a through to the 1960’s while the independent Ireland hung onto the pound.; The link to the pound was an economic set of manacles.
Ireland only really became independent when we ditched the British pound and could follow our own monetary policy in I think 1979
Robert Peffers 12:36
Two questions for you:
A is this what Big Eck was trying to say after the referendum and the unionists media tried to call him a nut? Or he had lost the plot or something like that? And did he explain that somewhere?
B is there anything written down somewhere that can ratify that position be interested to read that?
Re the other countries thing,we must realise that no other country can help us be independent,and they have their own interests to look after economically and otherwise. Its up to us in Scotland. Still disappointed though that so many were against independence , like Spain,India and the like,afraid some their own people might want democratic self determination.
Am listening carfully to BBC news hourly, waiting for the shock horror and approbium over the cost over runs at the Westmonster parliament to start. Currently estimated at £2 billion
Clearly such a cost overrun means they cannot rule themselves?
@lepus timidus scoticus says: 18 June, 2015 at 11:55 pm:
“I’m sure you are equally aware how low the tree line is in Scotland due to poor soil at altitude, short growing season and (ironically enough) wind. Unless you are talking about a radically different climatic era, it’s fanciful to say the least imagine a Highlands covered in trees.”
More bloody claptrap, Mountain Hare. That low tree line is just one more result of the sheep, deer and bad forestry.
I’m done arguing with you and you know I’m correct. I’ll give you a wee indication of how nature returns in spite of neglect and bad practice. I was born in the Lothians when Shale Mining was still extant and active.
The big Red Bings dominated the landscapes but after a while we saw wee green/yellow spots show up on the bings. Close inspection showed it was the first signs of vegetation to grow on that poor quality burnt rock. It was Coltsfoot and Coltsfoot is often the first sign of nature fighting back. Soon there was bigger and bigger patches of the weed and then the decayed Coltsfoot began to support other plants an mother nature was off and running to return some semblance of natural growth.
If tress once grew higher up the mountains they will return and BTW; the loss of the former habitat affects the climate and the return of fauna and flora changes it too.
Ever visited Lochore Meadows Country Park? In was built upon what had been the old Kelty Burning Bing’s spoil and a thin layer of soil in which they planted much Blackthorn. The Blackthorn leafs and habit of shallow root-growth that sends up suckers that they periodically whacked down and left lying to rot built up the soil until they could plant other trees and shrubs.
A former industrial boggy wasteland is now a really wonderful landscape. I want to see the Highland recover from being made a barren waste.
BTW: Some people think the turbines are elegant and beautiful and they are certainly better than the old latticework monsters of yesterday.
I wonder if lepus timidus is any relation to Alcedo atthis?
Just sayin’ like..
Kevin I picked up on that too. If they had been SNP councillors the media would have been making a big deal of it. Reminds me of football hooligans or criminals. When a Scot committed a crime it was made clear in the news that it was a a Scot. If it was someone from England they were British and vice versa for accomplishment.
Lack of support: David Cameron made a point of contacting all EU, Commonwealth leaders (via Embassies) and Obama to help him scupper the Referendum (over and above his network of banking, supermarket etc cronies). Let’s not forget that if they weren’t seen to help us neither did the vast majority go along with his bidding. Additionally we have millions of supporters worldwide. UK MSM may be duping rUK and some Scots but people abroad are exempt from this. It was highlighted last year by foreign journalists cheering Alex Salmond when he retaliated against Nick Robinsons / BBC guff. The Celtic League also reported Cameron to the UN for interfering in a democratic process and manipulating the electorate by contacting the leaders (one of three points made). People are watching and waiting from afar and I’m in no doubt when we do get our Independence we’ll be inundated with business contracts from our many allies around the world.
AMcRitchie the thing that annoys me most about Dugdale is the manic way that she tries to cram in as much pre-rehearsed ‘data’ as she can and in the process never answers any question put to her. I also get the impression that Lab politicians have a wee confab with some of these presenters before they sit in front of the camera to ensure that they are in ‘sinc’ …. I’ll ask you this which will give you the opportunity to say that.
Time’s marching on and I better get off to bed but before I do I’d like to thank Stu for the time and effort he’s given to this cause, affording us all a place to unite and disseminate information but most of all enlightening thousands of people who visit this site by giving them a clear idea of what is actually going on in this country of ours. He’s absolutely inspirational and Scotland owes him big time. Thanks too to EVERYONE who contributes on here such as Robert who’s a veritable font of information … Parliament, Sovereignty ….. I thought I had some brilliant history teachers over time but the latest, for example, ‘nettles amongst the heather and the Clearances’ highlights that my education was somewhat lacking and most definitely boring.
It’s time to get the gloves off. I sincerely hope our 56 representatives do all they can to put a spanner in the works. WM makes decisions which have consequences on Scotland. In my opinion that works two ways, so they can stick their EVEL up their posterior orifice.
As for sneevling waste of space Murray, I’m sure if we all start digging around, there are some skeletons in his cupboard. We can post the results through the letter boxes of his constituents.
As for the Carmichael saga, the pressure must be kept up to have the memo released. It was available for release to the press. so what’s the problem? Perhaps it’s the squeaking noises emanating from that apology of a politician, Mundell.
They will not grant us another referendum in the foreseeable future. We will have to take our independence before they destroy everything.
Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, East Lothian, was a Scottish parliamentarian prior to the 1707 union. He believed that no country, (and he cited Ireland and the Americas),had ever benefited from economic union with England, which was intent on exploitation in it’s own interest.
Nothing’s changed.
Phroneses the brilliant Joseph Stiglitz was on Alex Salmonds Fiscal Commision team, along with some other great economists, and therefore economic advisor to Alex re. Indy1.
Sad to say VERY few people knew about this due to MSM suppression of facts and thought that Alex was talking nonsense re. currency and so on.
Let’s hope that Stiglitz is available for Indy2.
For anyone who is interested Wikipedia lists his many achievements.
@rob
Frenchgate memo.
Only the text of the memo was released not the full memo which would identify the writer, distribution list date and time.
ACH Tiime tae get the sword oot o the attic, the gun oot o the press, cock oot o the wife and tack tae the road agen,
hell dont forget ma troosers
Dr Ew says:
18 June, 2015 at 2:08 pm
Yes, well, it’s all very well and good being wise after the event
Aye, but we were wise BEFORE the event. I can’t remember how many times I told people, “If we vote no, Westminster will give Scotland such a kicking!” Sometimes I just hate being right.
Lepus Elm Disease: I’m only too aware of the clearance of trees and people from the Highlands, however I’m sure you are equally aware how low the tree line is in Scotland due to poor soil at altitude,
You are talking bullshit to bolster your argument.
No one is “plastering” the Scottish landscape with wind turbines. Please stop being inflammatory.
link to caltonjock.com
Did anyone else notice the vitriolic rendition of rule britannia being rolled out at the end of today at ascot? (C4 – just before the news).
My gawd, thousands of them under the bunting waving thier toty wee UJ’s, they’re so brainwashed they can’t even see they already are slaves.
The Daily Telegraph is set to be rebuked by the press regulator for a “misleading” (a brazen lie) front-page news story that claimed Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon secretly supported the election of David Cameron as prime minister.
The ‘new’ rules state a mention must ne made on the front page, but the bulk of the apology can be stuffed away inside the newspapers. Of course, it’s where you place the full apology that counts – and you can divert the reader’s eye by placing it at a certain point on the page so that it is overlooked, perhaps with an attention catching photograph on another topic next to it.
I wonder if liquid lunch ‘Cochers’ will resign?
I don’t know what I’d do without the Rev and all those below the line who contribute to my education.
Thank you one and all – even the eejits/trolls because they are corrected by those of superior knowledge ( though some just keep digging and are too stupid to accept verified truth – not looking at anyone in particular!)
whits a the hummin and hawing its simple windmills or big dirty Nuke reactors,i will have the windmills please.
Though i do agree we should put them offshore on a kind of oil rig platform,but not just windmills on them turn them into a renewable power station doing everything from solar,hydro,wave generation and anything else we can stick on them if we can transport oil then electricity should be a dawdle,and any old oil rig not pumping instead of scrapping it recycle it.
But all that will need to wait until we get out of this perpetual mugging as they are not going to allow it for a few reasons the first being a renewable energy industry would kill dead the old oil lie and unlike oil they cant steal the weather(they would probably give it a go though)
this is the one issue that scares them the most that Scotland will have a world class renewable energy industry and will be minted(its not a case off if but when)
Robert Peffers,
thanks for your excellent posts on this topic.
Interesting.
So our share of the Westminster refurbishment will cost more than the final bill for building Holyrood. Ironic indeed. That is another Unionist myth blown out of the water.
I hope after spending that much money on it they make sure it has enough seats. It should be a bit easier as they will not need so many once we get Indy.
I wonder how much funding Scotland got from Westminster to build Holyrood?
Got my wee blue books today so thanks Rev Stu. It was a nice surprise as I had waived them to help get Paula Rose her golden wings. So I hope you do not want them back?
For the WBB2 You will need to add a very large appendix with all the indy scare stories that came true but only after the No vote. Just the same as after 1979. You think that folk would have learnt by now.
Hopefully, with WBB2, next time things will be different!
ProudScotbuts + Katorga = re-populated Highlands
Only kidding ProudScotbuts.
With regards to the endless argument over whether Scotland can maintain itself as an independent nation, it is a pointless exerciser IMO. Unionists will always be able to cook up a counter-argument and the MSM will sell it as fact. Most folk don’t understand ‘high-economics’, but they know when they are being diddled. So I think we need to move towards arguments of principle, e.g. the democratic deficit that has just been highlighted over the last few days in the ‘Mother of all Parliaments’.
lepus timidus scoticus
In principle, I support the protection of the natural environment, though it can be argued that Scotland has little of it’s natural heritage left. However, wind-farms are temporary constructions and their sites can be easily returned to their former state. The same can’t be said about coal, oil/gas or nuclear power plants. Wind-farms are also a relatively benign form of power generation, in comparison to the carbon intensive alternatives. Yes, nuclear power plants are extremely carbon-intensive, not only during their construction. Uranium mining isn’t exactly environmentally friendly. So, although wind-farms may appear unsightly, the alternative are simply not deemed sustainable.
Finally, nature is far more robust than some might imagine and evolution is actually quite a rapid process – there are a number of species that have only come about due to the industrial revolution’s impact on the environment. Anyway, human beings won’t be around for ever as I don’t think we have what it takes to survive (99% of all life that has evolved has become extinct). The planet will have plenty of time to repair itself, once we have gone. I would like Scotland to become independent before this eventuality. 🙂
the universe = 13 million years old
earth = 6.5 million years old
cellular life = 3 million years old (?)
Homo sapiens = 200,000 years old
Hoss: So our share of the Westminster refurbishment will cost more than the final bill for building Holyrood. Ironic indeed.
And not the first time the Cathedral of Gothic Horror fleeced the taxpayer.
link to grousebeater.wordpress.com
CameronB brodie 8.19
wind farms are not unsightly.IN MY OPINION.
Re windfarms around the Borders area.
Firstly if we want lights etc to come on at the flick of a switch then we need electricity. We have a choice; nuclear, oil/gas or renewable. Personally I prefer renewable with wind or other intermittent sources being used to provide power for hydro pump storage or used to produce hydrogen that can be used as fuel for turbines, cars or what have you.
I find windmills elegant both from an aesthetic point of view and also as a simple solution to an old problem. They have been around in one form or another for hundreds if not thousands of years.
To come to the Borders – Leadhills/ Wanlochead in particular. I know the area reasonably well since I’ve been gold panning that way for over 20 years. I have no objection to their presence with this proviso. There are important bronze age sites in the area and I myself found a beautiful bronze palstave axehead in one of the burns (It’s now in Dumfries Museum having been properly declared through the Treasure Trove process)
Any sites being disturbed should be assessed by competant archeologists with a dig if deemed necessary before potentially destructive work goes ahead. We have a long and important history predating the Romans and it would be a sin against the Nation not to take full advantage to learn more about who we are and where we came from.
boris says at 7:12 am
link to caltonjock.com
Thanks for the BBC link Boris. It’s all there. Their sheer greed and biased approach to the Referendum. How they can deny this, with the amount of evidence that’s on record, is beyond me. Oh I forgot they’re brazen liars!
DerekM says at 7:33 am ”whits a the hummin and hawing its simple windmills or big dirty Nuke reactors,i will have the windmills please.”
Yeah I’ll go with the windmills too Derek although I prefer wave energy. Additionally windmills can be easily removed in the future if need be. My greatest concern is fracking as it would absolutely destroy Scotland and the damage is TOTALLY irreversible.
There’s no doubt that Westminster / House of Lords can’t wait to get their hands on our land. MANY fracking licenses were passed last year to frack all over Scotland (from Aberdeen to Dumfries and Galloway) by the EAC House of Lords elite many of whom have financial interests in the industry (at LEAST 5 out of the 13 on the committee). Licenses approved include a Chinese company with a record of Human Rights abuse. But hey ho who cares? … that doesn’t matter as long as you’re lining your pockets to the tune of billions (check out Greenpeace – newsdesk – fracking).
Scotland has over 31,000 lochs and water is essential to fracking. England has around a hundred and most of those are used for drinking water so are exempt: Get the picture?
Mealer
I did say wind-farms may appear unsightly. 🙂
Bean an Tighe, with reference to your remark regarding the poor roads being the problem with re-population, I had a very similar discussion on the Independent a few years ago and was told this would reduce the amount of tourism we would get. I said that the problem for so many people is that outside of Scotland they want a Disney land, one which disney work but looks grand and empty. We do need a better infrastructure everywhere in Scotland, roads regardless of Patrick Harvie would be a good start. Railways could follow but that takes time and more money.
I sat in the public gallery at WM many moons ago. It’s an impressive building alright. What I remember most though was the unbelievably level of security barring the public entry. Worse than any airport you have been to. At least 7 or 8 phases to get through with hundreds of staff. A money pit.
“the universe = 13 million years old
earth = 6.5 million years old
cellular life = 3 million years old (?)”
Ahem, correction! Your figures are 1000x too small.
the universe = 13.8 Billion years old
earth = 4.5 Billion years old
cellular life = 3.5 Billion years old
Xaracen
I thought the figures didn’t look right when typing. Thanks. At least the Homo sapiens figure was correct. 😉
The poor soil in the Scottish Highlands and other areas is mainly the result of hundreds of years of burning off vegetation to create grouse moors.
This process leaches nutrients from the soil and produces a “podzol” incapable of supporting natural habitat. Historical records show that Scotland was previously covered in the Caledonian Forest. Indeed, walnut trees are recorded in Wick. But the heath land we now have is largely man made.
“… in Western Europe podzols develop on heathland, which is often a construct of human interference through grazing and burning. Many podzols in this region may have developed over the past 3000 years in response to vegetation and climatic changes.[citation needed] In some British moorlands with podzolic soils there are brown earths preserved under Bronze Age barrows (Dimbleby, 1962).”
link to en.wikipedia.org
Take note of wee Sweetie Wife Rennie another Libdem / Unionist liar and hypocrite.
‘Lib Dems to float commission on ‘Home Rule’ for Scotland’ Sep 19, 2011′
‘The Scottish Liberal Democrats have announced plans for a new commission to examine Scotland’s role in the United Kingdom, with leader Willie Rennie MSP calling for “fiscal federalism” and “Home Rule” for Scotland.
“Liberal Democrats and Liberals before have a long and proud history advocating Home Rule, not separation, for Scotland. Working with others our ambition has always been control over our own affairs but recognising that our destiny remains shared within the UK family,” Rennie said…….
Subject to approval of a draft motion at the party’s conference in Dunfermline in October, the new commission would look at the potential for handing over more powers to Scotland than included in the Scotland Bill currently being debated.
“Now that the Scotland Bill, with its substantial transfer of financial powers, has almost completed its parliamentary passage I want to develop a blueprint for full Home Rule. This will build on the highly acclaimed work undertaken by Lord Steel in the Steel Commission – which established a framework and principles for Home Rule.”
Rennie added: “Liberal Democrats are ambitious for Scotland’s people and, with Home Rule in the United Kingdom, we can shape our own future whilst sharing risk, security and international relations in an uncertain world.”………
The proposed motion reads as follows:
“Conference reaffirms that the Scottish Liberal Democrats believe in federalism and that a federal political structure for the United Kingdom, including home rule for Scotland, offers the best way for people in all nations and regions to achieve their potential.
Conference welcomes the initiative of Scottish Liberal Democrat Leader Willie Rennie to establish a Home Rule Community Rule Commission to design and promote a precise federal approach to the future of Scotland within the United Kingdom; looks forward to receiving proposals from the Commission in the early part of 2012; and believes that this blueprint can build on the principles developed by the Steel Commission, will map the next constitutional steps after the Scotland Bill and provide an inspiring and positive vision for the future of our country.
link to legacy.holyrood.com
(Taken from weegingerdug site)
Westminster: Wouldn’t it be a better idea to start from scratch and relocate it as I’ve read that it’s going to be overwhelmed by flooding from the Thames eventually.
@Petra says: 19 June, 2015 at 2:15 am:
“Sad to say VERY few people knew about this due to MSM suppression of facts and thought that Alex was talking nonsense re. currency and so on.”
There is a great many things that the British people have been misled about. Including who and what they are and where they came from. There have been some quite obvious facts, not exactly hidden, but have had the facts spun by the people who were running the various systems of keeping the people ignorant. It has gone on for as long as there has been people in Britain.
Genetics has blown great big holes in the old historic facts as have the other sciences. An interesting one came from a BBC Scotland Radio Programme. This programme was travelling round Scotland taking genetic tests and asking the question, “Who are the Scots”. They got some really eye opening answers.
In the Northern Isles they came up with a significant number of strange results. Some of the islanders claimed Viking descent but no significant difference was found in their genetics. The reason being that the original Britons came from the Scandinavian areas and not, as so commonly believed, from the area of Europe over the English Channel. The European land bridge was round the corner where the Dogger Bank is now.
More startling was the discovery of a fair number of the genetic patterns of native North American native tribes. So family histories were traced back. What was discovered shone a light on forgotten Scottish History. When the Hudson Bay Company first began it was manned by what were called, “Bay Boys”, recruited mainly in Scotland. These people were the traders in Canada and the Northern Territories. The Scots, Irish and Welsh traders were quite different in outlook than the English. Where the Scots, Welsh and Irish trappers & traders
@petra, yes, my absolute nightmare is fracking, and I’m involved with my local group.
They are going all out in England now, and the Lancashire Council is expected to grant a drilling licence next week, demo organised. For anyone that knows Lancashire, there are some beautiful areas, but more importantly, as Petra says damage from fracking is catastrophic.
Scotland against Spin are delighted by the removal of the wind farm subsidy of course, and are quoted in the Torygraph. SNP bad of course for pursuing wind power.
England will be coming for our water next, they can’t pursue fracking without horrendous amounts, there is an early drought in California due to so much water taken out of the system.
Fracking has got to be the stupidest, exploitative industry in a very long time. Pursued in areas which are working class, destructive in the extreme, injurious to everyone’s health, damaging to house prices if that’s your thing, and a disgusting legacy, that taxpayers will bear for clean up.
Xaracen
Thanks, I thought there was something wrong when typing. At least I got the Homo sapiens figure correct. 😉
It’s like we are living in some sci-fi film where the aliens come and take all our resources and plunder the land only it’s real. A living nightmare.
How bad is a Windmill
Well not at all really is it
It just stands there delivering electricity and doing as far as I know no harm or damage, it could look better or be invisible but it doesn’t and it’s not
But what it does do really well is make itself easily replaceable with the next new and improved gadget which will no doubt be less intrusive visually and more productive
Nuclear things are rubbish in that they hang around causing all sorts of expensive and bad for your health problems for ever, that’s what always puzzles me when the various Governments say “We’re investing in Nuclear” when in fact you can’t “Invest” in Nuclear if you can’t “Divest” yourself of it later
So no planetary genius am I but seems to me Windmills for the moment are OK and no bad thing until some of our smart Tech people come up with something prettier and smarter
and then even the Nimby folks will be happy
Because the alternative is a big poisonous belching planet eating fish killing people killing “Thing” in our garden
Capella: Scotland was previously covered in the Caledonian Forest.
That old thing?
It was needed to build England’s warships to fight France.
Part two, (I hit the wrong button).
Lived among the native Americans, married them and Christianised them the English tended to attempt to wipe them out. These trappers and traders had a dangerous job and there was a high death rate. The Hudson Bay Company, (in its wisdom), would send the Trappers wife and family, “Home”, to a country they had never seen or visited in their lives. So there is a genetic strain of North American Natives in Scotland and mainly in the Hebrides and Northern Isles.
The Hudson Bay Company was still recruiting Bay Boys in Scotland right up to the 1980s :-
link to bbc.co.uk
Another day of nothing happening in Scotland as per, from the British media, wish they’d just call themselves the English media but we did vote no.
Its nice to compare and contrast liars lying instead. How these guys have the gall to keep trousering their pay as journalists is another UKOK mystery. At least Ed Davie’s gone. That one UKOK liar in particular was going around telling England their oil industry was the “jewel in the crown” and then telling Scotland it was worthless at best.
link to bbc.co.uk
An independent Scotland could expect to lose subsidies to green energy investment from the rest of the UK, the UK government has warned.
link to bbc.co.uk
Scotland could lose £3bn in investment because of a UK government decision to exclude new onshore wind farms from a subsidy scheme a year earlier than planned, an industry body has said.
frogesque wrote:
“To come to the Borders – Leadhills/ Wanlochead in particular. I know the area reasonably well since I’ve been gold panning that way for over 20 years.”
You’ll be aware of this recent find then!
link to archive.is
Poor bloke nearly threw it back as well, ooft!
There’s gold in them there hills!
😮
i like the hydro/osmosis idea Petra i think it could be the one to watch as renewable technologies go.
link to wfs.org
@Robert Peffers
Love these posts Robert.
I knew most of the Scottish history of the Union myself but you have an excellent way of getting to the point.
Hard times ahead and it’s good to be reminded that we are a nation in spite of the constant media smokescreen, especially good old auntie BBC.
Keep on posting.
Just a wee and half remembered bit of info wrt soil quality. I’m sure someone in the Highlands did an experiment about 15 years ago, where they took a poor soil area on a glen side and fertilised it with very fun crushed stone, which I think was granite but not sure. The minerals were then able to be taken up by plants do to the fine nature of the crush. It was a bit like speeded up weathering.
I wonder what happened to the idea?
@ Caroline Corfield
I wasn’t granite Caroline it was volcanic rock which was shown to be a better soil conditioner than animal manure, full of trace elements, they grew a vegetable plot with the crushed rock and got some fantastic results, I’ve driven past the place its somewhere in highland Perthshire
Thinking about it I have bought plants in Tenerife and they’re planted in volcanic soil in pots.
@Robert Peffers 5.31
yup, throw them into confusion
they dinna ken their erse fae their alba 🙂
Caroline Corfield,
Maybe they couldn’t find enough ‘fun’ to crush the rocks with.
Dave Cameron certainly knows how to win friends and influence people
He’s now decided that finger pointing at the security services over the Radicalisation of Muslims is not on, so no more of that thanks BUT !!
It’s in fact the Muslim communities who are at fault for
“Quietly Condoning” the practice
A helluva guy is Dave eh
Not racist at all is he
At least we know he loves us Scots
Deer and sheep graze out the trees too. Reforesting Scotland submission to the Rural Affairs Committee:
link to reforestingscotland.org
we are powerless and are being ignored at westminster, the snp mp’s will continue to do all they can, ie, highlight the duplicity of the unionists at every moment, while continuing to be ignored.
where we do have power is at holyrood. much of the conversation above is about wind farms on rich landowners land is based on the status quo which exists today. the land reform bill which will pass through holyrood next year will be a game changer here. (andy wightman is greens no2 on the list in lothians ???) this will have a demonstrable effect scotland and will be noticed by the remaining 25% of the population who still vote labour, 10% of whom are our target audience. the other 25% who still vote tory/ukip/libdem will be outraged…fukc em, they wont vote ever with us regardless of the outrages inflicted on scotland.
I noticed a post on bella asking if people would be willing to vote 1. snp, 2. solidarity in next years he, 95% said they would. not a proper poll by any means but it gives terry kelly (sgp)something to think about.
the momentum is still with us and as much as i would love to declare udi or have indyref2 tomorrow, holyrood 2016 is our only real option, objective, goal or destiny
I am sure i read somewhere unlike England and the rUK the Scottish government still holds power over the licenses to frack in Scotland i might be wrong,but i think what a lot of people are seeing in Scotland isnt fracking its deep well gas extraction its basically the same thing but without the need to blow the crap out of the shale to get the gas by pumping loads of daft chemicals into it,Scotland is riddled with old mine shafts from the first TeamGB great robbery or was that the trees.
But you are right those evil fracking companies are just waiting to pounce.
@Robert Peffers
Robert, I like reading your posts, I generally copy and post them to my files. I then if a subject is on Facebook that is helped by your post I place it on Facebook thread, I remove your name but add that it is from a post on WoS.
Is this acceptable to you?
If not please tell me and I will desist.
@Caroline Corfield
Here are some pictures of the SEER centre (Sustainable, Ecological Earth Regeneration) – living proof that remineralisation of the soil works. It is now possible to buy the crushed rock.
link to seercentre.org.uk
Here is an explanation of how our oil was hijacked. From the Independent, some time ago.
link to independent.co.uk
A view from a room:
Two-thirds way through this life and i feel politically crushed. 18 years under Thatcher, then 13 under Blair and Brown, and now after the last 5 years of Tory Libdem government there is the reality of another 10-15 years of further Tory government. What is a poor boy to do?
Even an unimaginable 56 SNP MPS wont make a difference and even with a comprehensive 70%+ YES vote in Indyref 2, I very much doubt if the English Overlords will just sit back and legislate the unshackling of England’s colony. They don’t give a shit about ‘democracy’. They are pathological in continuing their inbred need to rule.
Bad day at branch office.
@Caroline Corfield says:19 June, 2015 at 10:49 am:
“Just a wee and half remembered bit of info wrt soil quality. I’m sure someone in the Highlands did an experiment about 15 years ago
I don’t know about that one Caroline but watched a Gardening programme by, I think Alan Titchmarsh, that looked at a garden created in the North West costal area of Scotland. Everything about the site was against the gardener. It was on a steep, almost clift, slope. It was rocky exposed to the salty strong winds and the soil was almost non-existent.
Yet the lady who created it, (she didn’t do all the hard graft herself), had turned it into a real horticultural paradise. She had terraced the slope and brought in local poor quality soil and used lots of lime and local seaweed from the shore and carefully chose plants to suit the conditions. As the plants shrubs and trees produced leaves and so on that enriched the soil she planted things suitable for the improved soil.
The process continued until she had a rich soil. Remember that the North West of Scotland has the warm Gulf Stream and loads of rain. Remember too there is the sub-tropical Inverewe sub-tropical Botanic Garden in Ross Shire to see what North Scotland’s highlands could be.
link to nts.org.uk
frogesque
Any sites being disturbed should be assessed by competant archeologists with a dig if deemed necessary before potentially destructive work goes ahead. We have a long and important history predating the Romans and it would be a sin against the Nation not to take full advantage to learn more about who we are and where we came from.
Maybe you’ve seen this before? Some pretty interesting, and some previously unknown, archaeology discovered as a result of a high tech survey for a wind farm development…
link to aocarchaeology.com
Hi Caroline Corfield & John King.
You’re typing about the SEER Centre, at Straloch, just up the road from Kirkmichael. Here’s the web site:-
link to seercentre.org.uk
“The SEER Centre Trust is a Scottish charity (SCO37139) with far-reaching global aims that are achievable via down to Earth local projects.
The SEER Centre Gardens are open at different stages in the growing season, so the public can see, smell and taste our mineral-rich fresh produce grown in the SEER Centre terraces and also attend educational lectures in the gardens.”
It’s run by my sister and brother-in-law.
As Robert Peffers has eloquently explained, Scotland can now declare independence at any time. However, we need to take a clear majority of the people with us (otherwise all hell breaks loose). The SNP understand this. At present, it is only 50:50. To declare UDI in such circumstances would lead to a repeat of the Irish experience (and who wants that?). IMO, UDI is a nuclear option that can be used if all else fails. If we are patient, we won’t need UDI, because the soft NO voters are gradually moving over to our side. It’s a one-way street, once the Rubicon has been crossed, there is no going back. The pace is painfully slow at present, but this will quicken as the reality of five years of Tory majority rule begins to bite. The behaviour of the MSM has had two significant effects: 1) to slow the movement from NO to YES (but not able to halt it completely), and 2) to harden the YES side (now almost completely immune to their propaganda). It’s only a matter of time, but we need to take the people with us. We need a popular mandate (ideally 60% YES).
Alistair @3:29 a.m
Despite their denial of the FOI request for the memo, they will have to produce the original for the civil action which has been raised. Any attempts to withhold it could result in further action against them in relation to withholding evidence. They are tying themselves in knots trying to protect Mundell, who no doubt has left his grubby finger prints all over it.
@James Caithness says:19 June, 2015 at 12:13 pm
“Robert, I like reading your posts, I generally copy and post them to my files. I then if a subject is on Facebook that is helped by your post I place it on Facebook thread, I remove your name but add that it is from a post on WoS.
Is this acceptable to you?
If not please tell me and I will desist.”
You do what you wish with my posts, James, I don’t care if you credit me or not. I had my own website way back when you had to create the site with HTML in a text editor. I wrote poems, short stories and articles. There were many hundreds of pages built up over time.
Then I changed my ISP and had backed up the website on disks. While doing some home DIY I had the misfortune to have an accident in my workshop that dropped a heavy bit on machinery onto the box of discs and smashed most of them. I still have the original work in text format, though. So may find time to redo a new website.
So I’ve nothing to hide and I never attempted to make money from my work, I do photography, video as well as writing. I do it as a hobby and have no desire to make my pastimes into work.
So anyone who wishes can use my work just don’t claim it as your own.
Laughably my work was first plagiarised when I was around 8 years old. A local kid submitted one of my humorous poems to, of all things, the Beano as their own work and won a prize for it.
Yay, no cake and not getting to eat it! It’s just as well you’se didn’t choose the alternative.
O/T sorry.
@Robert Peffers
Robert I would never claim it. I always say from a very good poster on WoS.
For interest to all, I joined a FB site called ”Scottish Unilateral Declaration of Independence” I found myself involved on a couple of threads, it was enough to get me a wee bitty concerned, they slag the SNP . Seems they trying to make SNP bad. I keep thinking 77th Brigade.
I’ll admit that at first I was not too keen on windfarms.
To me they were a blot on the landscape and spoilt views.
However having travelled to Ireland from Stranrear passing the lowland windfarms and bussing up the East Coast to Thurso passing windfarms on the East Coast and passed by the vast Eaglesham Moor and Whitecraigs Farms I see them in a different light.
Still not too keen on them, but like many other manmade structures erected over the millenia from castles to standing stones to brochs, which I just love scrambling around and which could be deemed as eyesores on otherwise barren landscapes.
However at the particular point in time when they were erected, they were for religious, defensive and protective purposes and like the structures of the past, these modern windmills are now part of the ever changing landscape and are a source of clean, natural energy which is less damaging to our ancient planet.
My only real complaint is who gave persmission for the windarm overlooking Stirling Castle and the Carse?
That is one windfarm that should never have been built.
Imagine the uproar if a windfarm was erected on the Pentlands overlooking Edinburgh and the castle.
An excellent expose of media distortion of Scottish news in todays National, by Gordon McIntyre Kemp of “Business for Scotland.”
James Caithness 2.25
Don’t bother my butt with Facespook so haven’t seen what you’re talking about but does as you say sound very much like some kind of false flag type thing. There’ll be plenty more where that came from.
Helena Brown – agree with the ‘Disnae’ view! The Highlands are not a theme park – real people live here! New railways will have to remain a pipe dream until Scotland can have the benefit of its own resources instead of having to pay for Trident and patching up the palace of Westminster.
The SG can only do what they can with limited resources, and I would still prefer that they continue to support our young people in higher education for example, as a priority. If only we had been able to plough the revenues from our oil industry into worthwhile projects for everybody’s benefit, like the Norwegians.
Wind-farms are only there to make money for wealthy landowners anyway. The sooner they are stopped being subsidized the better. And strangely enough, as soon as the subsidies stop, the turbines tend to grind to a halt too.
I was an SNP supporter, and always favoured Scotland being independent, until I did some research into a wind factory being built on one of my favourite mountains in Scotland, Ben Wyvis. Wind turbines are a scam. They produce unreliable, intermittent power, destroying precious Scottish landscapes, killing 1000’s of birds and bats, and provide massive wealth to landowners and (usually foreign) developers. Westminster is doing Scotland a favour by scrapping subsidies, and if any of you lot who complain about this were to do some research into wind power, and I don’t mean info from the renewable industry or the crap produced by Fergus Ewing, you would find some very revealing facts which show what this scam is all about. Including how the SNP gov. have bent over backwards to aid wind developers, and been completely undemocratic in their attitude and decisions in approving the blight of our countryside with useless wind turbines. In less than a decade, Longannet will be closed, along with both our nuclear power stations. Where will Scotland’s electricity come from then, when the wind does not blow? It will be the begging bowl out to English power stations. So, by all means campaign for Scottish independence. By all means slag off the Tories and the UK governments. By all means complain about spending cuts imposed upon Scotland. But unless you are prepared to do some research into the wind scam, do not spout the nonsense I have read from some on this site. IMPORTANT. WIND TURBINES DO NOT RUN ON WIND. THEY RUN ON SUBSIDIES.
I wonder why on earth so many people here think that cutting subsidies for new onshore wind a year early has anything to do with the referendum? This was a manifesto promise by the Conservatives and was in the manifesto because English and Welsh backbenchers insisted on it. There are not enough Scottish Conservative MPs to have enough clout to get anything in the manifesto.
Basically, this has nothing to do with the referendum.
msean,
“Re the other countries thing,we must realise that no other country can help us be independent”
We don’t need any other country’s help.
We also don’t want other countries interfering in our democratic decision by issuing veiled or open warnings as many did.
When the colonies were fighting for independence, they had the open support of many countries around the world.
In Scotland’s case, Iceland was the only country which publicly stated that it would be happy to work with an independent Scotland.
The rest of our future “friends and allies” danced to the Westminster tune and issued warnings about Scotland becoming independent.
Wind-farms are only there to make money for wealthy landowners anyway. The sooner they are stopped being subsidized the better. And strangely enough, as soon as the subsidies stop, the turbines tend to grind to a halt too
Right then how would you suggest that we can produce clean and cheap energy?
Yes it isn’t great that landowners make easy money from wind turbines but what else would you suggest we do? Try thinking of others and future generations instead of yourself
maxxmacc at 5.40
Absolute rubbish. See how the world’s fastest growing and strongest economy is expanding its wind power capacity as related by the BBC. Unlike the broke UK the non capitalist Chinese economy does not have to offer bribes to rich individuals and companies to do this for them.
“China has embarked on the greatest push for renewable energy the world has ever seen.
A key element involves more than doubling the number of wind turbines in the next six years.
Already the world’s largest producer of wind power, China plans further massive increases.
From a current installed capacity of 75 gigawatts (GW), the aim is to achieve a staggering 200GW by 2020.
By contrast, the European Union countries together have just over 90GW of installed wind capacity.”
Scotland produces 25% more than it uses. It could either sell or tax the surplus. Scottish consumers could pay 10% less, The rest of the UK could pay 1% more and consolidate energy prices in the UK. Wind over time is cheaper than nuclear. Wind farms are run as businesses and pay corporation tax on profits. Any subsidy goes back to Westminster.
The land the windfarms occupy should have been bought outright, using compulsory purchase if necessary, at the kind of prices a sensible man would pay for rocks & bogs.
Why cant the snp revoke the act of union. They have the majority in scotland, therefore the mandate. No if’s no buts, no argument.
Mycorrhizal fungi are the key, to return of the natural habitat.
Three-hunnurr-in-aechtae-three-thoozin-nine-hunnurr-in-thurtae-seevin win-mulls, urr proferrt tae seemilurr numurrs ah fief-coalumist naw erses.