The rather impressive building pictured above is Rutherglen Town Hall, where I’ll be later today. Not campaigning for any of the candidates, of course. In the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election, it’s not so much a case of which party I would like to see win as which I most want to see lose. In the past, this list would have been limited to the British parties and fringe loonies standing on a platform to bring back the medieval punishments and pre-decimal currency. Now, however, just about anyone can make the list.
I confess, there is part of me that would like to see Humza Yousaf and the SNP leadership given a bloody nose. There! I’ve said it! Hands up anyone who wasn’t thinking the same thing. I’d like to see the SNP leadership given a hard electoral slap. But I realise it would do no good. The controlling cabal in the SNP seems impervious to any chastisement. The bubble within which they operate has a hard enamel shell that defies all criticism. If I thought losing badly would provoke a change of thinking in the party leadership, I’d be all for it. But it won’t.
What it might do, however, is better arm the SNP members seeking to effect change from within ahead of next month’s conference in Aberdeen. That is a consideration. On the other hand, it seems foolish to deal the SNP such a severe blow just as the membership are on the verge of taking back their party. Maybe!
It might well be argued that Anas Sarwar and his boss Keir Starmer are even more deserving of an electoral humiliation than Humza Yousaf and his colleagues. The British Labour ‘resurgence’ is a success for the spin doctors, but nothing more. It is quite remarkable how they’ve managed to sell British Labour as the party of change at the same time as Starmer is saying they’d change nothing. This success says nothing very flattering about the voters who have been taken in. But British Labour in Scotland (BLiS) is knocking at an open door. Sarwar didn’t have to win back BLiS voters who had switched allegiance to the SNP. That allegiance was always tenuous and highly conditional. It was always for the SNP to hold those voters. That would be yet another failure chalked up to the SNP leadership.
Alba Party isn’t standing a candidate. Not out of any great principle but simply because staying out of the race was the only way they could claim any kind of prize. Cue months of self-righteous social media crowing from Salmond’s supporters. As if they weren’t tedious enough.
The Tories are still the Tories. ‘Nuff said!
Colette Walker (ISP) looks the independence activist’s best bet for an ineffectual protest vote. At least she’s a nice lady. And the only candidate I don’t actively wish would lose.
There’s one more option, of course. None of the above (NOTA)! Voters can always choose to spoil their ballot paper. Perhaps write ‘INDEPENDENCE’ across it. This is certainly a better strategy than just sitting moping at home. But it is the kind of action that needs a lot of participation before it can make any impact. A few hundred, or even a few thousand, spoiled ballots will be easily shrugged off by slick-shouldered politicians. What would need to happen for there to be any effect would be for the ‘NOTA’ to get more votes than some of the candidates. If the spoiled ballots are talked about as a percentage of the popular vote rather than in hard numbers then that would be some kind of protest.
Maybe it’s best if all the politicians and parties lose. Perhaps this is the way we take forward the fight to restore Scotland’s independence. Give the whole of Scotland’s political establishment a bloody nose.
Right! Leaving for Rutherglen now! What colour of rosette is it for ‘NOTA’?
Peter A Bell 
Look at it this way though. It’s just one seat, and if the SNP get the message about Independence then that seat can be taken back in just one year.
In 2019 in Rutherglen and Hamilton West
TOTAL VOTES 53,91, total rejected 125
Ballot Papers rejected:- TOTAL
(1) Want of official mark 0
(2) Voting for more than one registered party or individual candidate 26
(3) Writing or mark by which voter could be identified 3
(4) Unmarked or void for uncertainty 96
Presumably writing Independence across would be (4) – and if that shot up from 96 to 1200 that would be noticeable. From 0.2% to 2%.
Better than just staying away anyway.
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On your usual criterion “what will best help Scotland’s cause ?” then you should be urging people to vote BLIS as they seem the most likely party to give the party of government a bloody nose. That helps only because it gives more power to the membership of the party at the conference 10 days later in any attempt to oust the cabal and reclaim the party for independence, which would help Scotland’s cause.
Assuming the conference will not be postponed for any number of spurious or real reasons – what a cynical thought.
I’m a bit worried though by something I may have read into another blog post by Robin McAlpine this morning, which implies that the cabal has once again duped the membership into postponing their move to reclaim the party next month until a “special conference” at an undefined future date. How on earth could that happen ?
Good luck in getting your message across in Rutherglen !!!
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Kevin McKenna writes some off piste stuff at times, and I often don’t bother reading it, but this article seems to be spot on.
“Yousaf is afraid of his own shadow and it’s killing the Yes cause”
https://archive.ph/UZIKG
I’d usually quote a couple of the best points, but the problem is its ALL best.
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Every single decision, every single policy failure, every single example of incompetence, and every single party management decision has been planned to destroy the snp That much failure is inconceivable in any sophisticated political party without conscious design.
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Don’t underestimate the human capacity for fucking things up.
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Just tucking this in here by the way before I forget. If the Scottish Government refuse to send anyone down to accept the Stirling Directive, you might have to find another way to “serve the writ”, on a member of the Scottish Government. With evidence of course, witnesses, photos.
And also note that they did so refuse to engage with you.
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The Scottish Government will know that refusing to take delivery of the Stirling Directive would trigger the start of the formal process by which the matter is taken to the European Court of Human Rights. In such circumstances, the Scottish Government would stand accused alongside the British state with a violation of our right of self-determination.
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Absolutely, but the ECHR might well ask what steps were taken to give the ScotGov the chance, and might well not accept “They didn’t turn up, they ignored us”.
It amounts to a Writ, so all efforts must be made to serve it.
I think a future Constitution should force the ScotGov to accept any such submission as yours from the People of Scotland.
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List the ways the directive might be delivered other than giving the Scottish Government several weeks’ notice that it will be delivered by hand at a time and place discussed with them.
The existing constitution obliges the Scottish Government to accept such submissions. Perhaps you should read some of the material relating to the #StirlingDirective. http://www.stirlingdirective.scot
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Good luck with your naivety, and one stop plan.
You NEED backup plans if the first one fails.
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I see that Robin McAlpine has an article out which inter alia says this:
“The SNP (not the movement, mind) were promised a re-democratisation moment at the upcoming conference. That promise has been broken. It’s now to happen at a ‘special conference’ next year some time, presumably like the ‘special conference’ at which we were promised a coherent indy strategy we didn’t get either.”
If true – and I haven’t seen this confirmed elsewehre – then that is yet another delay on the response to the UK Supreme Court ruling (23rd November 2023).
[http://robinmcalpine.org/reconciliation-1-the-duty-on-the-powerful/]
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It’s just too easy to believe. I wonder how the members will take it.
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“what colour rosette”
A large white V on a black background.
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For those who want independence the NOTA proposal is not quite being honest with themselves. There is one pro-independence candidate who is prepared to take serious action here – they will refuse to take an oath of allegiance to our oppressor or take a seat in their parliament. That candidate is Colette Walker/ISP. I would have thought such a stance is surely deserving of any pro-independence vote.
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If ISP had a plan for getting from abstention to independence, I might be more enthusiastic. I ask, what next?
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What next?
“In the December 1918 General Election, the republican Sinn Féin party won a large majority of the Irish seats in the British parliament: 73 of the 105 constituencies returned Sinn Féin members (25 uncontested). The elected Sinn Féin MPs, rather than take their seats at Westminster, set up their own assembly, known as Dáil Éireann (Assembly of Ireland). It affirmed the formation of an Irish Republic and passed a Declaration of Independence.”
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Is this the ISP plan? Something similar, perhaps? Correct me if I’m mistaken, but Ireland had no devolved administration at that time. It was under direct rule from London, as was the entire UK. It is interesting to speculate what might have happened had there been an Irish equivalent of Holyrood when Sinn Féin set up Dáil Éireann. Two assemblies both claiming to be the rightful government? What could possibly go wrong?
Since – barring nothing short of a miracle – abstentionists are not going to win a majority of Scotland’s Westminster seats in next year’s Westminster election, this would appear to be another of those plans that only works if the SNP does the heavy lifting. A bit like all the so-called plans for independence we get from Alba, it is critically dependent on the active support and participation of the party Alba spends most of its time and energy telling us will NEVER do anything about the constitutional issue. Pardon me for noticing the contradiction. I know we’re supposed to turn a blind eye to such things. But I’m just not made that way.
How likely is it that the SNP leadership will adopt the abstention/assembly plan? It’s possible, I suppose. If I sprinkle breadcrumbs on this keyboard and leave tthe laptop outside for the pigeons to peck at, it’s possible that when I retrieve the computer I’ll find a complete screenplay for the next Bond movie. But I’m not taking that plan to the producers.
If we suppose that there is unlimited time and that the British state has no intention of securing its grip on Scotland then the abstention/assembly idea could be in in line to be the chosen plan. A timeframe of 3-5 electoral cycles might be enough. Say, 20 years? Apart from the small problem of the British state and the ‘Greater England Project’ which is currently underway, there might be another difficulty in the form of competing plans and competing parties. Not everybody will like the abstention/assembly plan. Those who don’t will take their seats if elected. I’d follow this thread of speculation were it not so late. But I think we can see where it is headed.
Abstentionism woked in Ireland because all radical Irish nationalists coalesced around Sinn Féin. Sinn Féin had a thoroughly thought-through plan of action and it had solidarity behind that plan. Unless something truly remarkable comes to pass, we won’t see that kind of solidarity again in Scotland before the pigeons’ film goes into production.
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Sinn Féin got 73 seats but didn’t even stand in the previous 1910 election. They got 6 seats from by-elections in 1916 and 1917. Call ISP or Alba the Sinn Féin of Scotland. The IPP who were strong for Home Rule went from 67 to 6. Call the SNP the past their sell by date IPP of Scotland, and anything is possible.
The SNP are currently making noises about more powers = Devo Max Plus / FFA Home Rule. People like me have been patient, understood all the other steps, and even accepted the reasoning for the LA challenge in the UKSC – eliminating all other possibilities, Possibly neccessary for anything to do with international courts or the UN. But the SNP are now stopped dead in our tracks. Just a pocketful of mumbles such are promises, and Slater and Harvie’s hands up their backs.
It wouldn’t need the SNP leadership to become Scotland’s Sinn Féin – just the totally fed up SNP members, denied party democracy at so-called conferences where Yousaf says “Friends Scots and Countrymen, lend me your votes and I come to bury Independence not to praise it”. Given an alternative, iIt’s the SNP members who ultimately have the power, no matter how many times the leadership evades them and the NEC betrays them.
Likely? No. Possible? Yes. Where’s Cleopatra when you need her?
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Still no explanation of how you plan to replace the Scottish Government before the UK general election. So, this is all just fantasy politics.
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Peter, the current ‘Scottish Government’ as an organisation is Westminster’s tool, that is where its allegiance lies and its values derive from. In other words it is a colonial administration.
This is why the dominant national party elite becomes compromised; in trying to serve twa maisters, one group (i.e. the colonized) has to be sacrificed to the other. Hence the rupture we see, also in the Irish example, and others, as well as the remedy.
Upon independence a liberated people do not ‘replace’ a colonial administration, they need to remove it. A liberated people need to build anew because ‘nothing of the colonizer is appropriate for them’ (Memmi).
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We build anew, certainly. But with the same materials. The materials are ours. The materials are us. We don’t get new materials. We take back the materials that have been usurped by the coloniser.
The current Scottish Government is, indeed, “Westminster’s tool”. But it doesn’t have to be. It is not the ‘natural’ role or condition of any national government to be the instrument of a colonising power. This is a distinctly ‘unnatural’ arrangement. The default state of a democratically elected government is as a tool of the people. That is what it is absent intrusion by an external power.
Liberation is more an act of restoration than renewal. We restore our government and other democratic institutions to their rightful status.
The Scottish Government is Westminster’s tool only until the moment we say it isn’t.
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I think you could compare the SNP with the Court party of the last few years of the Scottish Parliament.
“The Political Parties: the Court Party”
Click to access The%20Political%20Players%20-%20Court%20Party.pdf
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If a majority of Westminster seats were won in the General Election of 2024, then the, let’s call them ISP, could do the same as the Sinn Féin, and set themselves up as the Parliament of Scotland for reserved powers, and their first and final act would be to devolve everything else to the current one at Holyrood, and dissolve itself.
Or it does the opposite – declares itself as the only Parliament and assumes all powers and dissolves Holyrood..
Or it bides its time till 2026 and if ISP successfully runs there, then it amalgamates both parliaments and in time, just runs the one.
No more fantasy politics than expecting the SNP to voluntarily accede to the demands of the Stirling Directive – they’ll need to be forced to do so.
And without most of its members, the SNP would disappear, it would cease to exist like the UK itself.
The SNP leadership and NEC won’t change without pressure, threat, coercion, self-preservation. Much like the Parliament of 1707 which resulted in the Union. Dismantlement of the Union is a reversal of the procedure.
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You want us to gamble on an electoral miracle. I think that might not be the best idea.
I have never suggested or so much as vaguely implied that the Scottish Government would “voluntarily accede” to our demands. I don’t do fantasy politics. I have always maintained that they would have to be forced. Yet again I am obliged to correct a willful misrepresentation of my views. It gets to be a wearisome chore.
To equate the possibility of forcing the Scottish Government to do what is required with the possibility of an electoral miracle is beyond silly. Governments are forced to change course all the time. Electoral miracles happen with about the same frequency as any other kind of miracle. It is the very nature of miracles that one does not proceed on the basis that they will happen. Or even on the basis that they might happen. By definition, a miracle is something you assume will never happen.
Forcing change on the government is, by contrast, something that definitely can happen. It is, therefore, something which can be part of a plan. Unless you’re an omnipotent deity, you have no capacity to bring about a miracle. To bring about a change of tack by a government you need only be an effective political campaigner. That’s at least two steps down from an all-powerful god.
All that is required is a plan and the means to implement it plus the vital ingredient of the will to do it. It is the last of these which tends to be missing.
The Stirling Directive could be the trigger for a chain of events that benefit Scotland’s cause. The more people get behind it, the more chance there is that it will be effective. That is the choice facing Yes activists. It is the same choice regardless of which party or faction they belong to. The choice is between doing a small thing to ensure delivery of the Stirling Directive has an impact, and doing nothing so as to ensure it fails.
Tuesday 19 September 2023 is the historic day on which the Stirling Directive will be delivered to the Scottish Government on behalf of the Sovereign People of Scotland.
Assemble at the Scottish Parliament at 11:00 then to St Andrew’s House where the Stirling Directive will be delivered to a representative of the Scottish Government.
Be part of this!
#StirlingDirective
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“I have never suggested …”
I didn’t say you did. What I said was:
“No more fantasy politics than expecting the SNP to voluntarily accede to the demands of the Stirling Directive – they’ll need to be forced to do so.”
You already made it plain in previous articles that you would indeed, try to force them to do so via the ECHR. Similarly:
“You want us to gamble on an electoral miracle.”
That’s not what I said, the whole YES movement is not going to stand still waiting on the result of the by-election. It is, however, a possibility, and my comment was in reply to your question:
“Still no explanation of how you plan to replace the Scottish Government before the UK general election. So, this is all just fantasy politics.”
The shortened answer is – I don’t, and didn’t say I did, you are and as far as I know, neither do ISP. That was a willful misrepresentation of my views.
Anyways, back to hedge cutting before it rains.
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Precisely the problem with all the ‘plans’ having timescales counted in electoral cycles is that the people who propose such plans never acknowledge the time they’ll take or the actual timeframe imposed by circumstances. They present these plans as if they are feasible when they could only be feasible if there was a way to replace the Scottish Government before the UK general election.
You deny fantasy politics while postulating ISP winning a majority of Scottish seat in next year’s Westminster election. Aye, right!
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“while postulating ISP winning a majority of Scottish seat in next year’s Westminster election.”
It’s an “if”, do you know what that little word means? “If” lets you explore all possibilities, no matter how likely or unlikely, something the logical mind has to do.
“Postulating” implies some sort of meaningful possibility which you can be called to expand on. I did NOT postulate as I expressed absolutely no opinion about the likelihood. Try reading what I say, don’t put words in my mouth, something you are often guilty of.
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And still you list an electoral miracle among “possibilities”. Oh, well! I tried!
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Peter, the cow didn’t really jump over the moon, sorry to disappoint you, you were so excited!
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From small acorns do mighty oak trees grow. The oppressor likes having pet house Jocks about to laugh at in Westminster. If one decides the game isn’t worth the candle and refuses to play the game it sends a shiver up what passes for John Bull’s spine. This might spread. ISP is planning to do more next GE. This opportunity to trot out our stall in Hamilton & Rutherglen is valuable. We have stolen a march on Alba and by the looks some of their activists too. This could be catching so it is worth doing.
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Your acorn/oak analogy would be more illuminating if it was completed. From small acorns do mighty oak trees grow – but it takes hundreds of years and there’s a mad axeman hacking lumps out of it the whole time.
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The Anglo-Irish treaty was signed in Dec 1921, just 3 years after the declaration of independence by abstentionist MPs.
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How likely is it that the precise same circumstances might be replicated in Scotland? It’s not the time between the declaration and the treaty that is the problem. It’s the time it would take to get abstentionist MPs into a position to make the declaration. That timeframe starts at eight years and has no upper limit.
The second part of the same problem is what the British state will do while we wait through countless electoral cycles for those abstentionist MPs to get elected in sufficient numbers. We can be absolutely certain that the British will not be idle. We can also be certain that their efforts will be devoted to maintaining Britannia’s grip on Scotland and securing that grip in perpetuity. That effort is in train NOW! Which rather suggests we need to act NOW! Not in eight or eighty years, but NOW!
As things stand, we can’t even be sure there will be a Holyrood election in 2026. Even if it does happen, we can’t be certain it will be an election to the Scottish Parliament as we know it. In fact, it is highly improbable that there will not be significant constitutional ‘reform’ imposed on Scotland before 2026. It is, therefore, very difficult for me to take seriously any ‘plan’ which requires us to take the double gamble that (a) the plan will be effective; and (b) that the British state will not in the meantime institute measures which negate any effectiveness the plan might have.
The Westminster election in 2024 is the game-changer. Whatever British party comes to power, the ground on which our cause is pursued will change dramatically. All of that change will be to the significant if not considerable disadvantage of Scotland’s cause.
Or, I could be wrong. We could gamble on me being wrong. So long as the nature of that gamble is clear. What is at stake is our nation. The player sitting opposite not only holds all the cards, they have the ability to conjure new cards.
We have one way to avoid this reckless gamble. We have one chance to pre-empt the British state’s play. We have a matter of a few months at most to make our play. We cannot afford to be seduced into complacency by schemes which assume no time constraints. And those schemes can be very seductive indeed. It is not at all uncommon to hear Yes activists one moment talking about how urgent is Scotland’s predicament and the next moment insisting on some plan that cannot possibly have any effect in less than two electoral cycles. It’s doublethink.
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Wheesht for Indy eh!
One more push and the members will take back control of the SNP……..despite all the rule changes to block that very thing happening.
You dangle more carrots than the SNP.
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