The Sunday Times today gleefully reports that "support for the SNP, for Nicola Sturgeon and for Scottish independence has fallen sharply as the party’s crisis over transgender rights deepens" (£). A single poll doesn't tell us much, of course. But there are occasions when a sharp change in polling is so closely associated with a … Continue reading The Sturgeon effect
Invoking Section 35 isn't so much a new and shocking development as merely the latest phase in a process which was foreseen a decade ago and more. It has been evident since 2007 that the British state regards devolution as a failed experiment. What was supposed to kill the SNP 'stone dead' had instead empowered … Continue reading As it was, so shall it be
It sometimes happens that people get so involved with disputing the relative merits of different ways of doing something that the omit to ask whether the thing should be done at all. A case in point is the argument about whether a Westminster or Holyrood election should be used as a de facto referendum. Actually, … Continue reading Bad ideas and worse ideas
I like to tell the story of the vague epiphany I underwent some years ago when, during the open discussion section of a meeting at which I was guest speaker, someone used the phrase "dissolve the Union". One of the things I most enjoyed about those speaking engagements was that I almost always came away … Continue reading Old thinking. New thinking.
So, the UK Supreme Court (UKSC) has issued its judgement and it is that the Scottish Parliament doesn't have the competence to authorise even the pretendy referendum that Nicola Sturgeon proposes. This was, you will recall, a referendum that had been stripped of all its legal and constitutional effect so that it was no more … Continue reading Rightful anger
The choice in a new independence referendum should be much bigger than in 2014, as Sir John Curtice puts it. But we are not being offered a choice. The referendum as proposed asks only for a preference on the basis that the expressed preference doesn't actually change anything. In 2014, we went into the referendum … Continue reading The judgement and what matters more
I am honoured to have been asked to speak at the All Under One Banner (AUOB) rally outside the BBC's Glasgow headquarters on Saturday 26 November. I have accepted that invitation. Some may suppose this hypocritical given my comments regarding other such rallies being held to coincide with publication of the UK Supreme Court's judgement … Continue reading BE AWARE! BE ANGRY! BE ACTIVE!
It is almost physically painful to hear the SNP bleating about the consequences of Brexit (UK accused of 'outrageous power grab' as experts sound alarm over EU law bill) when it was the choice of that party's leadership to let Scotland suffer those consequences. They promised that they would not let Scotland be dragged out … Continue reading Outrageous!
I don't know this David Clark. He may be every bit the foreign affairs expert John Drummond says he is. But I still need to pull him up on a couple of points. The reason federalism is a "non-starter" is even more "simple and straightforward" than Mr Clark suggests. A federal settlement acceptable to the … Continue reading If you want it broken, break it!
You were warned! (UK could bypass Scottish Parliament in devolved areas, MSPs warn) Even before the first referendum it was obvious that the British establishment considered devolution to be an experiment which has not just failed but seriously backfired. There was already considerable opposition to tis experiment when it was first embarked upon in an … Continue reading Sort yourselves out!
Peter A Bell 