THE defeat of the Greens’ council tax motion is a reminder that although the party are in a position of power due to the D’Hondt system, exerting influence far in excess of their share of the popular vote, there is a limit and they still need to get a spread of MSPs to agree with their policies when it comes to major reforms (Green motion to scrap council tax system defeated, The National, March 29).
On this occasion the Scottish Government knew that it would have the support of the Tories and would be equally willing to accept support from Labour and the LibDems if they ever allow policy to take precedence over anti-SNP rhetoric. We can now look forward to months of media, Labour and LibDem unity on the new SNP/Tory alliance in Holyrood, no doubt forgetting that MSPs from all the other parties voted against the Tory amendment while SNP, Tory and LibDem MSPs united to vote down the Labour amendment that was supported by Green MSPs.
Unable to win a single first-past-the-post constituency at the last election, the Greens now need to assess their position in Holyrood. Their increased support came from voters of all persuasions including many who answered the call to SNP voters to split their vote, giving the Greens their “second vote”.The motion that was passed on Wednesday includes work on a land value tax, and reforms mean that in the long term council tax will certainly be modified, but given the unpopularity of any kind of poll tax is unlikely to be scrapped.
The agreed motion is “that the parliament notes that the present council tax system was changed in 2016 to make it more progressive; acknowledges that these changes will result in an estimated additional £500 million over the course of the current parliamentary session; considers that any changes to local government taxation must be done in partnership with local authorities; recognises that the Land Commission is undertaking work on the introduction of a land value tax and that a joint review of local governance is under way, and notes that the Scottish Government is open to further dialogue on options for local tax reform and any plan that would command the clear support of Parliament.”
John Jamieson
South Queensferry
ON Tuesday Cat Boyd suggested that we should have been aware Facebook was using us, and that we could just deactivate our accounts (Facebook is selling us like meet ... and we signed up to the bargain, The National, March 27), and on Wednesday Kevin McKenna painted a picture of Facebook as a benign bringer together of families and purveyor of cat videos (Why I’m not angry with Facebook and didn’t buy a cat called Alan, The National, March 28).
On Tuesday I was banned from Facebook for 24 hours, and as of Thursday our Scottish Solidarity With Kurdistan page was still blocked indefinitely.
Until something better replaces it, Facebook remains a vital tool for political activists, and its power to pull the plug on us is truly frightening. Our “crime”, it seems – because they don’t actually inform you – was putting up pictures that included flags calling for the release of Abdullah Ocalan. Ocalan is the leader of the Kurdish PKK and is beginning his 20th year in a Turkish prison. He is also the inspirational head and main theorist of the movement for Democratic Confederalism, a grassroots, feminist, secular, democratic system that has brought about revolutionary social change in the Kurdish areas of Syria.
This movement and the society it has created are currently being pulverised by an invading Turkish army while the world looks the other way. Ocalan calls for peace and for a democracy deeper than any of us can expect to experience. The campaign for his freedom is backed by such dangerous figures as Jeremy Corbyn, Bruce Kent, Caroline Lucas and Leanne Wood. Turkey’s President Erdogan has imprisoned tens of thousands of his opponents, including politicians, academics and journalists. Turkey has aided and fought alongside violent jihadi militias, and is currently carrying out large-scale ethnic cleansing of the Kurdish areas of Syria. Yet it is Ocalan’s picture that is banned by Facebook, while Erdogan’s image smiles with satisfaction from every form of media. Western governments are fearful of Turkey moving away from Nato and closer to Russia, and have been blackmailed into silence; and the mainstream media has fallen into line. Facebook is doing Turkey’s bidding.
In the long run we need to create an alternative, genuinely social media. This should not be state-owned (and subject to government control), as Cat Boyd seems to suggest, but we could learn from the ideology espoused by Ocalan and build it from the bottom up, with different communities linked together in a virtual “Democratic Confederalism”.
Meanwhile, as my own feline is named after the Kurdish town of Kobani, I wonder how long it will be before I can’t even post cat videos.
Sarah Glynn
Dundee
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