Vote Of Nasty Conservatives

This was first posted on Facebook on 23rd March 2021, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

A few things that occur to me after listening to the no-confidence vote debate in the Scottish Parliament this afternoon. (Video at link: it took less than an hour.)

Immigrants get the job done: the Hamilton Report

This was first posted on Facebook on 22nd March 2021, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

(James Hamilton is not an immigrant, but I regret to say I couldn’t resist the quote.)

The question for the independent investigator, QC James Hamilton, who was Director of Public Prosecutions for the Republic of Ireland (1999-2011) and in 2010, President of the International Association of Prosecutors, and who has been the independent advisor to the Scottish Government on the Ministerial Code since 2013 (first appointed by Alex Salmond, re-appointed by Nicola Sturgeon in 2015):

“When Nicola Sturgeon told the Scottish Parliament she had first learned about the complaints against Alex Salmond on Monday 2nd April, when in fact she was told about them on Thursday 29th March, was she knowingly misleading Parliament?”

To knowingly mislead Parliament is a resigning offence in the Ministerial Code, though when you look at the current Cabinet Ministers and Prime Minister at Westminster, you wouldn’t think so.

Scotland in ice

This was first posted on Facebook on 6th March 2021, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

“…well, imagine a person standing on a block of ice, planning and planning and planning. Planning ways to get about on the ice, ways to decorate it, ways to divide it up, ways to cope with all the possible knowns and givens of a block of ice. That would be a busy person, provident and industrious and independent and admirable, isn’t that so? Except that when the ice melts, none of that is any use at all.” – Native Tongue, Suzette Haden Elgin

This week, the Tories threw their best shot at Nicola Sturgeon – accusing her before, during, and after her giving evidence of having committed resignworthy offences.

Women’s March in Edinburgh

For Donald Trump to be elected President by the electoral college – losing the popular vote by a margin wider than any in over a century – is grotesque in many ways, not least that enough American voters in enough states wanted a grossly-unqualified man to be their President instead of a highly-qualified woman.

Donald Trump’s most profitable venture as a “businessman” was a fraud for which he was due to appear in court on 29th November; when he was declared winner, he hastily paid a $25M settlement. Donald Trump’s businesses have gone bankrupt six times, he’s failed to pay his subcontractors, may well be massively in debt, and was in breach of the Constitution that he swore to uphold yesterday even before he put his hand on his mother’s Bible.

BBC can’t see Green

Why can’t the BBC see Green?

The BBC has decided that UKIP is, in Scotland, now electorally equivalent to the Scottish Greens, and should receive similar election coverage for the 2016 Scottish Parliament elections on 5th May 2016.

In doing so, the BBC Trust doubtless hope that pretending in advance that UKIP is a major party in Scottish politics will make them so.

I am a member of the Scottish Green party, since June last year. What follows, however, is an unexciting post full of statistics on the relative support of UKIP in Scotland versus the Scottish Greens.

Independence and full fiscal autonomy

To me it seems obvious: an independent nation has full fiscal autonomy.

A devolved country within a nation does not.

In my view, and the main reason why I voted No in September 2014, the SNP plan for “independent” Scotland – to be a country without its own central bank – was not independence at all: the only way I think our situation could now be worse would be if Yes had got the majority and we were now facing a situation where both monetary and ultimately fiscal policy would be set by George Osborne from rUK to iScotland.

If you have rose-coloured spectacles you may suppose that Osborne would naturally make decisions that would benefit and profit iScotland.

What are you staying up for?

The exit polls look depressing:

• Conservatives: 316
• Labour: 239
• SNP: 58
• LibDem: 10
• UKIP: 2
• Green: 2
• Plaid Cymru: 4

If the DUP get 10 seats, as some polls predicted, the Conservatives would be able to choose between a coalition with the LibDems or a coalition with DUP, whichever they pleased: either would get them to 326, and if so, we are screwed.

The #indyref campaign begins today

In less than four months, we’ll go to the polls to vote Yes or No to the question:

“Should Scotland be an independent country?”

And today, the campaign period for the referendum officially begins.

But as I pointed out a few weeks ago (and Simon Jenkins pointed out yesterday) the SNP are not offering independence: they want major decisions for Scotland’s governance to be made at Westminster/in London. (It’s all in the White Paper: haven’t you read it?)

I’m voting Green, of course

Tomorrow I’ll be ticking the box for the Scottish Green party, and hoping they get a large enough share of the vote that Scotland finally gets our own Green MEP.

Why I plan to vote Green:

Well, I read their manifesto. They’re the only party I agree with on Scottish independence. They’re the only party taking an economically sound view on austerity. I can’t find anything I disagree with or think unsound or hypocritical in their manifesto: the Scottish Greens have proved themselves to be a party that will aim to do what they have committed to do.

I’ve met Maggie Chapman – at a hustings in Edinburgh last week, at a demo she spoke at. She seems a solid and sensible person, a good speaker, she researches well: she’s certainly working hard to be elected, I think she would work hard and responsibly if elected to the European Parliament. If not, well, we get to keep her as a councillor in Leith – at least until she becomes an MSP.

A better nation…?

When I published Leaning Towards No, I expected reaction from Yes voters who’d been hoping I would come down on their side of the fence.

I wasn’t expecting the reaction to be so supportive of the SNP. From the reactions, [hardly anyone]* who plans to vote Yes intends to challenge the SNP’s plans to install devomax “currency union” in place of our present devolved system, and while some actively support the plan, many simply don’t see changing the SNP’s policy as possible.

*Not quite “no one”, as I initially wrote.

It therefore seems likely that – much to my annoyance and disappointment – I really don’t have any choice but to vote No. I don’t support devomax. I never did. I won’t vote Yes to have devomax replace status-quo devolution, and that’s what the Scottish Government’s White Paper says is going to happen.

Let me go through the various objections I’ve received to this, beginning with the silliest. (None of these are direct quotes from anyone, so if you recognise yourself in them, it’s purely coincidental.)