Oh dear.
Best get it over before Niko does a power of gloating... It was a hellish night. I'm eating crow Niko!
Oh yes, the share of SNP votes in some seats many have gone up, but under the system of voting that the London parliament uses that doesn’t mean diddly.
In Dundee East I was gratified to see Stewart Hosie returned with an increased majority, but in Dundee West they re-elected Jim McGovern for Labour: almost unbelievable when you consider the man’s track record.
All over Scotland they re-elected Labour, and in the seats they lost in by-elections, they elected Labour and overturned SNP and Liberal by-election gains. The result in effect looks like it is unchanged from 2005 except that Labour will have the seat that was Michael Martin’s as Speaker.
So, all the expenses fiddles, all the do-nothing MPs, secure in the seat for life; all the incompetence in London that resulted in the financial mess that we are in... it all means nothing. The Scottish public went out and voted in 41 Labour MPs. Oh well. That’s what they wanted; that’s what they have got. Red rosettes and cabbages come to mind.
What happened to the Liberals? The Clegg bounce? Clearly it evaporated in the last week as Brown and Cameron scare mongered that British politicians were eit
her too stupid or too lazy to cope with a balanced parliament (I venture both), and in Scotland that largely meant reverting to Labour. The economy is in safe hands with Labour. We must have strong government. If we had a hung parliament the markets might not like it. We might have a recession. ...... sheeeesh! That seems to have worked in the UK too, with a reduced number of Libdems seats on approximately the same vote as 2005.
Overall in the London parliament, at time of writing (8 am), there appears to be a majority of Tories and the prediction is there will be more. But where are the Tories in Scotland? Same one seat. David Mundell will be delighted. After his massive TV coverage he has increased his majority. I thought he was appalling in the debates, but there is no accounting for taste.
Who will form the London government? Well Brown says that under the constitution he has the right to stay and try to cobble together some sad acts that will support him. Cameron says that Brown has lost the moral right to form a government (I wonder if he ever had it, being there on Buggin’s turn).
The only parties who can join a formal coalition are the Liberals and the one Green MP. The Celtic parties have no mandate to coalesce on matters that do not affect their countries. I wouldn’t want to be Nick Clegg this morning. Whomever he does a deal with is going to have to do horrific things, and in a few months or a couple of years at the most, a new election will have to be called. The public will be mindful of who supported whom at that point.
One thing is clear either Scotland or England is going to be unhappy with this outcome. In England they have pretty solidly voted Conservative. In Scotland, whether I like it or not, we have voted overwhelmingly for Labour. Whichever party emerges victorious one country will blame the other for inflicting government on them. What does that tell you?
I imagine that in the end it will be the Tories who form the government. So the slogan for Scotland would be: Vote Labour, Get Tory.
When will we learn?
Best get it over before Niko does a power of gloating... It was a hellish night. I'm eating crow Niko!
Oh yes, the share of SNP votes in some seats many have gone up, but under the system of voting that the London parliament uses that doesn’t mean diddly.
In Dundee East I was gratified to see Stewart Hosie returned with an increased majority, but in Dundee West they re-elected Jim McGovern for Labour: almost unbelievable when you consider the man’s track record.
All over Scotland they re-elected Labour, and in the seats they lost in by-elections, they elected Labour and overturned SNP and Liberal by-election gains. The result in effect looks like it is unchanged from 2005 except that Labour will have the seat that was Michael Martin’s as Speaker.
So, all the expenses fiddles, all the do-nothing MPs, secure in the seat for life; all the incompetence in London that resulted in the financial mess that we are in... it all means nothing. The Scottish public went out and voted in 41 Labour MPs. Oh well. That’s what they wanted; that’s what they have got. Red rosettes and cabbages come to mind.
What happened to the Liberals? The Clegg bounce? Clearly it evaporated in the last week as Brown and Cameron scare mongered that British politicians were eit
her too stupid or too lazy to cope with a balanced parliament (I venture both), and in Scotland that largely meant reverting to Labour. The economy is in safe hands with Labour. We must have strong government. If we had a hung parliament the markets might not like it. We might have a recession. ...... sheeeesh! That seems to have worked in the UK too, with a reduced number of Libdems seats on approximately the same vote as 2005.Overall in the London parliament, at time of writing (8 am), there appears to be a majority of Tories and the prediction is there will be more. But where are the Tories in Scotland? Same one seat. David Mundell will be delighted. After his massive TV coverage he has increased his majority. I thought he was appalling in the debates, but there is no accounting for taste.
Who will form the London government? Well Brown says that under the constitution he has the right to stay and try to cobble together some sad acts that will support him. Cameron says that Brown has lost the moral right to form a government (I wonder if he ever had it, being there on Buggin’s turn).
The only parties who can join a formal coalition are the Liberals and the one Green MP. The Celtic parties have no mandate to coalesce on matters that do not affect their countries. I wouldn’t want to be Nick Clegg this morning. Whomever he does a deal with is going to have to do horrific things, and in a few months or a couple of years at the most, a new election will have to be called. The public will be mindful of who supported whom at that point.
One thing is clear either Scotland or England is going to be unhappy with this outcome. In England they have pretty solidly voted Conservative. In Scotland, whether I like it or not, we have voted overwhelmingly for Labour. Whichever party emerges victorious one country will blame the other for inflicting government on them. What does that tell you?
I imagine that in the end it will be the Tories who form the government. So the slogan for Scotland would be: Vote Labour, Get Tory.
When will we learn?
My reading of the runes is that the only governing coalition / agreement / deal is LibCon.
ReplyDeleteAll other fall short of the 336 overall majority necessary.
Brown cannot, as I see it at 8:25 am your time, make that 336 figure, even with the LibDums.
So standby for a Liberal Viceroy in Scotland and the nation being shafted wholesale by Cameron.
What are we to do with the bottom feeders who etch their signatures every few years for anything and anyone with a red rosette.
I despair.
England wanted the Tories and Scotland wanted Labour. They voted Tory and we voted Labour. We stopped them getting the Tories and they stopped us getting Labour. When will people learn that if Scots want perpetual left wing government and the English want perpetual right wing government. They both ought to go for independence from each other.
ReplyDeletesorry the 336 was my calculation of the Lab Con alliance figure, at that time and you are right, 326 is the break point.
ReplyDeleteI still cannot see how Brown could achieve that figure
Spot on Munguin. Can't imagine why they don't see this.
ReplyDeleteIt's 326 Bugger. (Apparently they now have 650 MPs!!!!) I think the figures may work for that in the end.
ReplyDeleteWe have to accept the voters who vote to be shafted. There's nothing else for it. One of the areas that I worked the gate on yesterday was a poor working class area and from the number of scowls I got, I'm guessing many of them, elderly, retired people were voting Labour despite the fact that Labour has done nothing about restoring the link between pensions and wages, and despite the fact that Gordon Brown took the bottom out of company pensions.
The Labour party is their party, and nothing will change that for them... no matter from how high it pees all over them.
Why do there seem to have an extra 4 MPs? Does anyone know? I thought that the idea was to reduce their number?
(Sorry Bugger I had to take my post down as it had a howler spelling error in it.... so the order of posts is all to hell).
ReplyDeleteI agree it looks like Brown will fail, as he does at most things, and Cameron will be the one doing the dealing. If he deals with Clegg then he's going to have to agree to a PR referendum which he says he won’t do.
He may be able to do a deal with the DUP, who, if my memory serves me, and a pile of religious fundamentalists who will doubtless require people to be whipped if they fail to go to a Protestant church twice on a Sunday. I’d say it might spell the end of the peace in Ireland.... It wouldn’t last more than a few months at most.
At least they have the get out in the UK of when things look like they are going to take some effort and skill, and the politicians can’t be bothered with all that nonsense....they can always pop up to Buck House and get themselves another election.
tris
ReplyDeleteYes the SNP should have gained a lot more seats with the car crash that was Brown's government.
I think the SNP were very low profile at this election. You can't rely on Alex Salmond to carry you all the time. Nicola Sturgeon was quiet and polite whenever she was on politics programmes and should have been getting stuck in to Labour and the Tories. The same for the other candidates. Macaskill was nowhere to be seen. As was Hosie who I used to vote for.I'm surprised he increased his vote. He's a nice guy but no passion.
Talking to my older working class relatives in Scotland the reason they didn't switch to the SNP were numerous. The cover up in Aberdeen by Macaskill, the attack on smokers and drinkers, the blind acceptance of whatever their ethnic constituents tell them, the lack of cannvassing and the usual high profile election banners in fields and gardens and just general apathy on behalf of the SNP.
These reasons may seem daft to you but people who have never used the internet and have never heard of blogs etc just go by what they see or hear on tv and radio.
I don't think that even with the Judean Peoples' Front and the Peoples' Front of Judea Brown can cobble together a majority with Clegg.
ReplyDeleteThe only game in town is Cameron and Mandelsnake knows it. He will let the Tories in, remove Brown and then Labour will get back in when Cameron's government collapses because of "engineered" union unrest brought about by the pain of the economic measures the Tories will have applied.
It has nothing to do with what is best for democracy or the people, only what is best to put them back in power.
I think I need to move full-time to Shanghai as I hear Spain is looking for a bailout from someone and the Euro must be suspect, as well as the Pound.
Zimbabwean Beetle Nut currency anyone?
Heart broken for the Scos Tories, and for the SNP- who are these new Labour voters? Where have they come from? How did they take 4% off us in Dumfries?! WHAT HAPPENED IN OCHIL?!
ReplyDeleteLabour did well in Scotland because the message about a Tory government was a strong one yet all through the wee hours Murphy, Lamont and Grey attacked the SNP time after time. Not once did they attack the Lib party in Scotland yet they were the main challengers (according to polls) too Labour.
ReplyDeleteLabour will have a cheek to ask the SNP for help after last nights attacks on them. Scotland votes Labour and England votes Tory.
Dean
ReplyDeleteThe extra Labour votes were SNP and Lib votes who voted for Labour to keep the Tories out but if Cameron is PM then Scottish Labour will have some explaining to do.
Anon:
ReplyDeleteThere is of course the “low keys” status of SNP. The main parties arranged that, as we all agree, with the Press and Murdoch in particular, by allowing not one but THREE 1!/2 hour party political broadcasts with massive publicity (one of which, to please Murdoch, was on a station that many of us still can’t get).
I’ve not a clue why this was allowed. We arranged presidential election debates in a parliamentary democracy, and although people complained, we did nothing. The SNP raised the money to fight against the last one and the courts turned the plea down.
Your complaint that they were nowhere is one I find hard to understand. The only window stickers I saw, until voting day, were SNP. I finally saw one Labour sticker yesterday. There is a man not far from me who festooned his whole garden in Liberal Democrat posters. I saw not one Tory poster until I turned up at the polling station yesterday. The presence of the SNP has been high in my constituency. I think, however, that the whole election has been about three men. I think that that was wrong.
I accept your argument that the SNP politicians are too polite. I’d go along with politeness and telling the truth, which is fairly rare in this game. It clearly doesn’t work. I agree. They should try Brown’s tactic of lying through his teeth, or taking a tiny little thing (pensioners in Fife no longer being allowed to travel free on the trains to Edinburgh), dressing it up and making it look like the SNP is going to bring the country down with it, nay, possibly the world.
As I said before the anti-smoking legislation was introduced and passed by the Liberal and Labour administration. People may be blaming the SNP for it, but they are not “guilty” of it. It was law more than a year before the SNP was in power, and then it was introduced by Labour into England.
I don’t know what you’re talking about when you say “blind acceptance” of what ethnic minorities is telling them. What are they telling them? What are they blindly believing? I thought that it was Labour that was in trouble over immigration, which I repeat, unless we are talking plain hatred of anyone who isn’t us, which is surely NJOT the Scottish way, isn’t much of an issue in THIS country, albeit a HUGE issue in England.
Bugger: It seems you are right. From the Times.
ReplyDelete“Nick Clegg rebuffed Labour overtures today and declared that it should be David Cameron and not Gordon Brown who gets the first chance to form a government now that Britain has elected a hung Parliament.”
Although all the constitutional historians say that Brown has to be allowed a chance first. He’ll likely fail. It’s what he does best. Then he’ll be toast because Mandleson will stop propping him up.
Nah, what needs to happen is a massive reassessment of our entire electoral strategy. The whole 'respect agenda' has flopped massively.
ReplyDeleteCameron has a heck of a lot of explaining to do. Goldie should resign.
Dean:
ReplyDeleteI feel your pain mate. I know you worked hard, but that’s how it is in Scotland. You will probably be pretty pleased soon because it looks like Cameron may be able to hatch something up with Clegg. It may be the end of the Liberals, if they help the Tories do some of the things that are coming, but frankly I’m not sure what else he can do.
We certainly don’t want religious fundamentalists of the DUP type in the government. That might lead to the end of the Irish peace, and the beginnings of war elsewhere, especially Scotland.
It would be immoral to support Brown, or Labour anywhere other than in Scotland and Wales. Clegg has no choice.
This is not good. It looks like a rough road ahead and the Zimbabwean beetle nut currency may be more of a reality than a joke.
Allan:
ReplyDeleteYou do have to wonder at what was going through the heads of people in most of the constituencies (not all), if they thought that voting anything other than Labour in Scotland was an open door to the Tories.
Just how disconnected from reality do people in Scotland need to be to see that Scotland gets the government that England elects, and that is only acceptable if you see Scotland as a county of England.
I’m not sure what my emotions are at the moment. Anger, disappointment, fear, dismay, disenchantment...
Bugger might be right. China might be a nice place to live.
LOL Dean, it's likely that within the next few days Cameron will be prime minister. He's going to be cock a hoop. It's what he always wanted. I just hope that Vince Cable is the chancellor, and not pretty boy.
ReplyDeleteTris
ReplyDeleteI'm a bit disappointed that the SNP never made gains but look on the bright side. The SNP are now in second place in the popular vote. Your man increased his majority by 4X and the seat Cameron said he needed to win in Scotland, Perth and Kinross, the SNP held onto.
Tris chin up!
Dean: what exactly was the "respect agenda" that now has to be ditched? I would have thought that respect was not something that was taken on like a cloak when it suited.
ReplyDeleteIf by that you mean the new happy clappy nice Tory agenda then that would prove that they are indeed the nasty party all along, wouldn't it?
Hey folks it's not all that bad at least our chance of getting PR has just got better. I've just seen the Cyclops out in front of 10 Downing Street waving that carrot about as immediate legislation. Is PR worth SNP cooperation with Labour?
ReplyDeleteTris,
ReplyDeleteThe worst result is a coalition with the Liberals- I for one am totally against any kind of PR. No concessions to the Liberals. And let Labour have a LibLab pact, let them to the cutting rather than us.
Munguin
ReplyDeleteI think PR for Westminster is worth SNP cooperating but after watching Murphy and Alexander slapping each other on the back last night night and landing astonishing attacks on the SNP then I would like to see Cameron walk into Downing street.
Oh whit sair heids we've aw got th'day. Tryin' tae work oot whit happened, an' whit's gaun tae happen, is far beyond me. Judgin' by aw the commentin', naebody else has much o' a clue either. That's the only thing cheerin' me up.
ReplyDeleteIt's no ma brain that's seized up - it's the entire country's!
An' dinnae let auld Mr Broon gie us the hogwash aboot 'political an' electoral reform' - we want PR or nuthin'. Nane o' this AV or AV+ shite. That wid be just as bad as FPTP.
The polls going into the election were not pointing to any SNP advances so I'm not particularly surprised at the result in Scotland. The polls didn't show any Lib-Dem or Tory surge either so unless there were going to be local variations the unchanged setup in the number of MP's for each party was pretty much on the cards.
ReplyDeleteWhat puzzles me is why Scots vote Labour, or Tory or Lib-Dem. I vote SNP because I want an independent Scotland, no nukes on the Clyde, control over Scotland's mineral wealth to be in Scots hands and all the other benefits that being an independent country brings. It's not a protest vote, it's a positive vote.
Even if I wasn't a nationalist my opposition to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the UK's slavish devotion to US foreign policy, PFI and nukes would make me wary of voting for Labour, Tory or even the Lib-Dems.
The question isn't why do the Scots electorate not vote SNP, it's why do they vote Labour?
I think in this election it may have been the combination of a muddled feeling that it was an anti-Tory vote even though the Tories had little or no chance of additional seats in Scotland, a Labour press in Scotland which is ably supported by the other media and a failure to actually question what the Labour party stands for.
Strangely enough voting Labour in Scotland legitimises a Tory Government in Westminster to rule Scotland. If you vote for a party which believes in rule from Westminster then it's hard to complain when Westminster rules.
David McLetchie said:
"Scotland is taking part in a British general election. The vast, overwhelming majority of Scots want to be part of Britain and they accept the judgment of the electorate as a whole so David Cameron does have a mandate to govern Britain, of which Scotland is a part."
He might have been pilloried for saying it but as long as Scotland continues to vote for the Union, whether it's Labour, Tory or Lib-Dem he is correct.
I've got a feeling that explaining this to your average Daily Record reader would take a while though.
As ah wish ma ain vote respected, an' like you Doug ah make a positive raither than a protest vote, so we must respect those Lib/Lab/Con votes an' voters wha cast pro-Union votes. Scottish Labour voters may indeed have been castin' anti-tory votes, but must accept the English-dominated Tory government which results fae their acceptance o' Union.
ReplyDeleteSophia Pangloss:
ReplyDeleteThose who voted Labour in Scotland may have thought long and hard about voting Labour and you have to respect their choice but I still can't see how voting Labour benefits Scots or Scotland even in the short term.
There's always the sad possibility that they think keeping the Union is worth being ruled by the Tories.
Ah've been sittin' here worryin' aboot haein' tae go through aw this again in a few months, till ah had a thocht. Tae stop GESept2010 bein' just a repeat o' this midden, are electoral pacts in play? How wid an anti-tory slate go doon wi' the English? Should the SNP join in, or risk a throttlin'?
ReplyDeleteMcLetchie ran our Scotland campaign, he ought to resign.
ReplyDeleteSophia Pangloss:
ReplyDeleteIt looks like it may be a Con-Lib pact in Westminster.
"How wid an anti-tory slate go doon wi' the English? Should the SNP join in, or risk a throttlin'?"
More English voted for the Tories than for Labour so an anti-Tory alliance would not go down well in England. The further away the SNP stay from both the Tories and the Labour party the better.
If the Conservatives get into power in Westminster with the Lib-Dems they're the ones who will have to implement all the draconian cuts which are coming and the Labour party is probably going to go into full internal melt-down fairly shortly.
From the Cromwell to Bonnie Prince Charlie all Scottish adventures in England have ended in disaster so let's stay well out of it this time.
Just a quick Gloat but a supremely satisfying one...........Scotland stood as Rock against the Tory storm and came home to Labour once again.
ReplyDeleteSomeone asks why the bottom feeders vote Labour a revealing comment perhaps the analogy of the Jewish people and the islamic peoples and how they feel about each other...
Not just a intellectual difference but an emotional one as well leading to such depth of hatred that any rational thoughts about each other is clouded....
Allan. Promise big smile on my facwe by tomorrow!!
ReplyDeleteAye Sophia... I'm just in and waiting for the 6 o'clock news to find out whats going on... I wonder if they have sorted it ut yet
ReplyDeleteDisnae seem like it tris. We better hae a government come Monday morn, ah've got other things tae get oan wi'!
ReplyDeleteTris
ReplyDeletePeople just voted Labour in Scotland to keep the Tories out. Where the SNP were best placed they voted SNP and where the Lib/Dems were best placed the voted Lib/Dem and so on.
Labour claim it was a vote against the SNP but they know it was nothing of the sort. The big losers in Scotland will be the public because bar one seat every seat was non Tory.
If Labour were in power at Holyrood and the same results came in last night then Labour would had claimed the vote in Scotland was one against the Tory party.
I'm not trying to put a brave face on it for the SNP but everyone knows Labour's surge in Scotland was not an anti SNP vote.
Couldn’t have put it better myself Doug... I really can’t add to that. Thanks :¬)
ReplyDeleteProbably more than the Daily Record Readers too. No one seems to take in the fact that without England, Labour would have a pretty clear run at government most of the time. I’ve been talking to voters a lot over the last few days. It is jaw dropping how little they understand and how much misinformation and misunderstanding they make their choice. One woman was going to vote Labour because she thought that the council was doing a good job.... She didn’t know that the council was SNP.
My vote is a positive vote too. A vote for my own country, though I sometimes wonder if I’ll ever have my own country.
Sophia Pangloss
ReplyDeleteThe Tories will form a government then we will go to the polls again in about 6-12 months so Cameron can seek a proper mandate form the electorate.
The results I want to see is Murphy, Darling, Alexander, Brown, Balls, Millibands x 2 all removed from power.
Sophia. I wouldn't like to have to make the decisions about who to team up with. I maintain that the Celtic parties can't get involved in pacts because 60%+ of what goes on in London is nothing to do with them.
ReplyDeleteWhat does he resign from Dean?
ReplyDeleteHis job in the Scottish Parliament is nothing to do with this, and I'm sure he did the campaign management on a voluntary basis. Maybe someone else should do it next time?
Yep Sophia, there's stuff to do eh? Cannae be waiting around all day for some posh boys to sort out who's having what in the government... LOL
ReplyDeleteI think "the markets" which we must, it seems, always respect, demand that they get it sorted by Monday. I guess people at the top in the Tory party with loads of money riding on the markets have told Dave that he has the weekend and no longer.
I wouldn't deny you your gloat Niko. Fair's fair. You got all you wanted...well, except a Labour government.
ReplyDeleteBut John lost his seat and wee String Bean Spud kept his. Not to mention Supergord coming in with a much increased majority. I'm wondering if after that we shouldn't ask the Pope to beatify him when he pops over to spend a few million of ours in September.
Allan:
ReplyDeleteThere weren't enough Portillo moments. Jacqui Smith was fun to watch. I couldn't find it in my heart to do anything other than laugh as she looked close to tears.
You should have thought about that when you were buing your patio heater on our expenses, and when your odious husband was buying porn films at our expense, and you signed them off.
But that Hazel "thieving cow" Blears is still in a job is utterly sickening.
All the other ministers that lost thier seats (apart from Clarke) were third rate no-hopers that I'd never heard of.
Woolarse, the entire defence team, but most especially Ain't-Worth should have been bopoted out.
There's no justice.
Most of the Tories that were seriously on teh fiddle left parliament of their own accord, presumably because with the new regime there wouldn't be enough to fiddle to make it worth thier while.
ReplyDeleteI really hope none of them is going to the Lords.
YOU HAVE TO FACE THE FACTS
ReplyDeleteTHE SNP IS NEVER EVER EVER GONNA WIN ANY INDEPENDENCE REFERENDUM
THEY LOST LOST LOST
ALEX SALMOND IS EXPOSED AS A BAR ROOM BRAGGART AND BUFFOON
The SNP shorin' up ANY Westminster government is the last thing ah wid want tae see. Leave this hung parliament swingin' in the wind as long as possible. No, ah widnae countenance it, ah'm jist still tryin' tae make sense o' whit the Scots want, an' whit they're tryin' tae achieve.
ReplyDeleteMibbe Scots Labour voters were votin' honestly an' positively fer auld Mr Broon tae lead them intae sunlit wheatfields an' ower the hill tae Nirvana.
But surely tae god they see that sae long as they vote Labour an' support the Union, some o' the time they're gaun tae get a Tory government which they never chose, an' sooner or later they'll get son or daughter o' Maggie Thatcher. They get this due tae one simple fact - England an' Scotland are twa different nations, an' acceptance o' this wid see us a lot further along that path tae Nirvana.
Ah believe that the only majority in this new parliament is that o' the new faces. Interestin' tae see if they are indeed new faces, or jist new yins oot o' the same mould.
ReplyDeleteTris,
ReplyDeleteMcLetchie should resign from Holyrood. And Annabel Goldie ought to resign as leader of the Scottish Conservatives- replace her with Jackson Carlaw.
Time to clear out the failures, they cannot be forgiven for their abject and complete incompetence.
As for the GE as a whole,
ReplyDeletewhat he have seen is the death of the notion of a 'celtic fringe'. Wales voted for the Tories, as did England- though with differing scales.
Scotland stands alone in its strange and weired desire to see more Labour votes.
If anyone wants vindication of the fact that the Union of Britain does badly when the Tories do badly up here- this is your evidence.
The real mistake was Goldie refusing to back a referendum on independence a couple of years ago. But then, her judgement is now clearly disasterous. Time for her to resign.
Very seriously Niko, Party politics aside... What is it about the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland that makes it so lovely to stay in it? I’m not being facetious; I’m asking you what it is. OK? Because I don’t understand it.
ReplyDeleteIs it nostalgia for the days of the war and Vera Lynn and all pulling together under the red white and blue, the King and Winston?
Is it a genuine fear that we couldn’t manage on our own, because we are too small, or too stupid, or too lazy or not sophisticated enough to cope with the wiles of France and Germany and The United States... or to be more modern, China, India and Abu Dhabi?
Or is it that it would mean a whole pile of upheaval as we got new money and new passports and ... well.... and.... humph, well not much else.
You see, the way I see it we are different from the English. We are a left of centre nation; they are a right of centre nation. Our attitudes are more akin to those I’m used to encountering in France and Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, whereas they’re very much more like Americans in their ways.
I want us to have control of our economy in Edinburgh; I want the interest rates and other economic measures to be set for the Scottish economy which is a million miles from the economy in the South of England where the top people all live. I want to have my capital city as the place where the head of state lives and all the important things go on. I’m not bothered about the head of state persopnally, but I find it insulting that she is in residence here for only 10 days of the year. I want Scots to come first, not last. I want my parliament to be able to make decisions with its own money. Not wait for Barnet consequential to English spending before we get new health measures. I want the transport system to reflect Scottish needs; I’m fed up with new transport spending to be between London and Birmingham. I want my pride in my country to be mine, and my country to be recognised. I’m fed up looking for “Scotland” on scroll down menus and not finding it.
I want my taxes paying for my country; I don’t want the taxes I pay in disappearing off down to London to be given back in pocket money to Scotland because my country’s parliament isn’t even allowed to borrow money like my city council is. I want to stop paying for my country to assist America to run the world while there is such incredibly poverty and misery on my own doorstep.
That’s just some of the reasons that I want my country back Niko.
I thought that Wales returned a majority of Labour seats Dean.
ReplyDeleteAnd I thought that you thought that Goldie was best if they would stop telling her what to do from London.
I know you're pissed off about the outcome mate, as I am, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Sophia. That's pretty much what I mean.
ReplyDeleteScotland gets the government that England elects, and it is rarely the government that Scotland would have elected.
Yes! Yes! It's the drap-doons! It gets me every time! How can it, ah mean how can it be that if ah came fae Sao Tome, or Senegal, or St Kitt's an' feckin' Nevis, that ah wid get tae click oan ma ain country. But no here. Oh no! Ye've got tae scroll aw the way doon, right tae the very bottom, but afore the Virgin Islands. Ye've gaun too far there.
ReplyDeleteAh still look fer Scotland an aw. Every time.
ReplyDeleteTris
ReplyDeleteIts a silly notion like wishing to live in a village when you actually live in an inner city.
and so you make this fantasy construct of everything being small and local and everybody knows everybody else.
I spose you hit the nail on the head when you say 'my country' which is Scotland an independent nation on its own..
Whilst I and many (most?) see scotland as part of the united Kingdom an organic part joined together socially(with family)politically,economically and culturally.
If you like (you probably wont) as a Yorkshireman sees himself in relation to Yorkshire and the United Kingdom.
Whilst his local culture is important it is linked into the larger British(to coin a phrase) one.
I wonder if the Scotland you Describe/Dream of owes more to Walter Scott than todays reality.
I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place. He put in your heart certain wishes and plans, in my heart he put other and different desires. Each man is good in his sight. It is not necessary for Eagles to be Crows. We are poor..but we are free. No white man controls our footsteps. If we must die...we die defending our rights." - Sitting Bull, Hunkpapa Sioux
Niko: I didn’t say anything about villages. I said that the economy of Scotland was very different from the economy of England.
ReplyDeleteI said that I would rather that we had control of it. Scots with control of the economy in Scotland, for Scotland.
It was Eddie George who pointed out that unemployment in the North was worth the trouble to make sure that the City of London (ie him and his cronies) stayed competitive.
Why was unemployment in the south not worth it. Niko yer daft if you think that they give a toss about us. They never have and they never will, and when we have something good, they lie to us about it. They rape us of our wealth just like they did with their other colonies.
I don’t know what a Yorkshireman feels, no more than I know what a Clackmannanshire man feels like. What I know is that Yorkshire is a county in England and that Scotland is a country with its own law, its own religion and its own languages and its own education system. It is not a county in England, although it’s treated as if it is.
It was independent, until its greedy king went off to London for a better paying job and a hundred years later its nobles (was there ever a noble that wasn’t a greedy sod?) sold out for a few hundred quid because they were broke.... ironically because they had invested all their money in some bloody nonsense, just a bit like right now. So the poor had to pay, just as they will right now.
They gave our country to England for money to spend on drink and clothes and women. Stinking rubbish that they were.
Well that’s how I feel. You may feel they did a good job.
Yeah Sophia,
ReplyDeleteIt's intersting that San Mario, Vatican City, Monaco, Andorra, etc have their own address, but Scotland doesn't.
We are less entitled than San Marino...and you can walk round that in an afternoon. Ho hum... How embarrassing.