IT’S good to talk, as Tommy Shepherd more or less said in his first piece since he transferred from the Sunday National – and he’s certainly getting people talking if Tuesday’s National is anything to go by.
In his quest to find which is the route to indy, he offered us a four-stage plan to find it:
- Having a strategy explaining the necessary steps to achieving independence.
- Drawing up a campaign plan for the 2026 Holyrood election based on celebrating the Scottish Government’s achievements and a demand for specific new powers to allow it to go further.
- Insisting on the right of the people of Scotland to decide their own constitutional future and the removal of the barriers which the Supreme Court confirmed exist to their elected representatives in the Scottish Parliament discussing the matter.
Then what might be the easy bit (irony alert): 4. Winning an election on this basis and build a wide political consensus which would force the UK Government to respond.
Item one can’t be too big a challenge given the Scottish Government has published 12 different white papers considering the elements of a sound strategy for our independence.
For items two and three, I’m not clear which bit of Schedule 5 of the Scotland Act 1998 Tommy doesn’t get when it spells out that our Holyrood brother and sisterhood doesn’t have any rights to discuss the matter in our pretendy parliament which is a wholly owned creature of Westminster.
And anyway the stock answer from our new Unionist masters can only be “now is not the time” and “don’t you know we won a landslide 411 majority and besides we have 28 more MPs than you do … so there”
And on the final point of a wide political consensus forcing the UK Government to respond – you’re having a laugh, Tommy!
Yes we can all agree that the cost of living crisis, the economy and the NHS are current preoccupations but we in the indy movement are equally committed to the idea that independence from the failing state that is the UK, whoever is in power, is the real answer to improving our citizens’ lot and the future for our kids.
To achieve that, we need to disrupt the system, not play footsie with it.
We need to be a grown-up country and have grown-up country infrastructure like Norway, which has more than 900 road tunnels that don’t discriminate between urban and rural populations, like Denmark where the government is the majority shareholder in Ørsted, the national energy company.
Unfortunately as Brian Lawson reminded us in his Tuesday letter, Sheppard and his pals went to Westminster to be good parliamentarians, not disrupters.
So how about this for a disruption plan, Tommy?
The Scottish Government works up their 59-page paper on the constitution, collaborating with and incorporating the work of the various constitution projects of the wider Yes movement.
They publish a draft bill to be presented to Holyrood on St Andrew’s Day, 2024. Twelve months later, the draft document is put to a home-made referendum on St Andrew’s Day, 2025 and six months ahead of the election date.
Let’s make people feel positive about voting for the Scottish NHS enshrined in the constitution, let’s make it easy to vote for the end of nukes because it’s in the constitution, vote for a Scottish Power Company because it’s easy if the ownership and operation are enshrined in a people-owned company protected by the constitution.
And let’s not forget this is the means to give hope to young people for a future in a fair and equitable country because it’s in the Constitution.
And don’t worry, nobody will take such an obvious and blatant breach of Schedule 5 seriously, will they?
But then again, once details emerge, Westminster will undoubtedly issue a barrage of Section 35s to the SNP government prohibiting the appointment of returning officers and the use of public buildings as polling stations for the 2026 election. Perhaps they might go as far as suspending Holyrood itself so emphasising the true nature of our pretendy parliament and highlighting in red pen that the constitution is a reserved matter.
Nevertheless, with the Scottish Government having arranged a glittering array of international observers for the big day, what better provocation could we create for our colonial masters to thwart Scotland’s rights to self determination under the UN Charter?
Compliance or disruption, what’s your cup of tea?
Iain Bruce
Nairn
I FOUND Sabera Bhayat’s piece in the Sunday National last week, titled “Which Muslims are ‘acceptable’ enough for Labour to engage with?” very interesting and illuminating.
Sabera basically explained that for years now, both Tory and Labour governments have only been interested in engaging with compliant “yes” Muslim men and women even though they clearly don’t represent the vast majority of Muslim public opinion.
In particular, I feel Labour’s longstanding refusal to engage with the Muslim Council of Britain – an organisation that Sabera states “holds credibility among Muslims in the UK” – is unforgivable.
Who the hell are high and mighty white Labour politicians to deem which Muslims they see fit to talk to? I’ll be totally honest, there is a whiff of a white supremacy attitude at play here.
This got me thinking generally about British governments’ – both Tory and Labour – attitudes to certain sections of folk in their precious UK. Well obviously anyone here in Scotland or Wales who wants their countries to be independent are persona non grata – as are those republicans in Northern Ireland that want to live in a united Ireland.
Most folk would think that is stating the bleeding obvious, but then again, how is it democratic to dismiss so many folk that these British governments are responsible for?
When you add those on the left of the current Labour Party, environmental campaigners that truly “get” the existential threat of climate change, Black Lives Matter campaigners, anti monarchists, animal activists, LGBTQ+ activists – particularly of the much-maligned trans community – and I’m sure there are loads of others that I can’t think of right now off the top of ma heid – what do you get?
Well I’ll tell ye what you bloody well get! Millions of folk throughout the UK and Scotland totally disenfranchised because they have the temerity not to acquiesce with the “mainstream opinion”.
It doesn’t matter if that’s Muslims, as I’ve started my letter about, or any other sections of society that don’t have the decency to be compliant with the English state, and of course that definitely includes us that ache in our bones for an independent Scotland!
So once all these folk have been well and truly discounted, who the hell is left? Oh, silly me, readers of the Sun, the Daily Mail, Daily Express, et al – the anointed ones! Aye, the folk Starmer is feart of!
This letter has been written by one of the millions of nobodies as defined by the English state.
Ivor Telfer
Dalgety Bay, Fife
THE Winter Fuel Allowance (WFA) is something many pensioners are depending upon and a benefit to be devolved to Scotland in September – yet the Scottish Government has announced today that it simply does not have the money in the kitty for it.
Before continuing, we must take a couple of factors into consideration:
- Westminster still controls 86% of welfare spend in Scotland.
- Energy legislation is still reserved to Westminster.
One of the first announcements by the new Chancellor Rachel Reeves was to scrap the WFA for pensioners in England and Wales not in receipt of Pension Credits and some means-tested benefits.
However, this has knock-on consequencies for Scotland that resulted in Wednesday’s announcement.
The Barnett formula (monies received from Westminster to Scotland) is calculated on the amount of public spending in England, so with the WFA being effectively scrapped for millions of pensioners in England, public spending reduces, reducing the Barnett formula consequencials.
With a reduced Barnett formula, the Scottish Government find themselves in the impossible position of needing to find £160m to fund the WFA in Scotland – a staggering amount that the Scottish Budget simply does not have.
It is regrettable for many pensioners in Scotland, who already pay higher fuel costs and who often suffer colder winters. But in conclusion, we must remember, Westminster has reserved powers over energy policy and ultimately has controling powers over the Scottish Budget.
Catriona C Clark
Falkirk
A RELIGIOUS group calling itself The Forward in Faith Church International Incorporated believes in exorcising “homosexual spirits”, witchcraft and that when a bride says, “I do”, she is saying “I do” to her husband’s desire for sex.
They are setting up branches in Scotland and once again, the need for charitable status to be awarded only on the basis of “public benefit” has been ignored by The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR).
The law that allows “the promotion of religion” in itself to make for charitable eligibility must be re-examined.
Neil Barber
Edinburgh Secular Society
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