The petition:
Send rioters to the Outer Hebrides for 5 years
Responsible department: Ministry of Justice
All rioters and looters from the recent troubles in English cities should be banished to the Outer Hebrides for 5 years. This would be much, much, cheaper than keeping them in expensive prisons, saving the taxpayer money. Five years of being forced to live in the Outer Hebrides with none of the comforts of English city living e.g. running water, electricity, decent food, culture and shopping, will put them on the straight and narrow, and frighten them not to riot or loot again. Many local people there look after sheep part-time, so they can earn a small amount of extra money looking after rioters and looters as well.
So, this is what happened to the respect agenda.
If you live in the Outer Hebrides, you don’t have running water or electricity. To save the English government money their rioters can be sent to OUR islands and to hell with the people who actually live there.
Respect my butt.
So the English government has been forced to apologise to us as this petition was actually published on one of their web sites.
Not unsurprisingly Angus MacNeil MP for Na h-Eileanan an Iar is ever so slightly miffed. He suggested that the petitioner might do well to visit the islands, then he might see that a visit there would not be a punishment, but a treat.
According to the English government’s website an e-petition (another of Cameron’s ill-thought-out gimmicks) can be rejected if it contains libellous, false or, defamatory statements or, if it contains offensive, joke or nonsense content. Angus says that the e-petition falls into this category and that he intends to pursue this with the English Ministry of Injustice. I wish him luck.
What kind of ignorant half wit thinks there is no electricity and no running water on our islands?
You'll like this bit. A spokesperson from the Ministry of Justice apologised and said its publication was an "oversight".
An Oversight?
Does no one in the English government know or care about the fact that tourism is big business hereabouts? First we have riots, which are reported as being all over the UK and people are cancelling holidays and breaks, and now we apparently live like savages without any of the comforts of “English life”. Does anyone still want to come here?
The sooner we have nothing more to do with the English government the better. Idiots!
Was the petitioners name not Dick...?
ReplyDeleteConan.
Hey Conan...
ReplyDeleteLoved your pic of Maggie the Zombie. I bet Michael Howard is up for a part too!
http://mypseudepigrapha.blogspot.com/2011/08/hootsmon-headlines_21.html
Dick? Yeah, probably. Richard Head! Ignorant twerp!
To be fair if the SNP policy of 100% windmill power for our energy needs ever becomes a reality then there won't be any electricity anywhere in Scotland. Never mind the Hebrides.
ReplyDeleteThe small minded little Englander idiot thinks we have no culture in our islands either, like they do in their cities. That will be the culture of rioting and looting then??
ReplyDeleteMorning Monty,
ReplyDeleteYou'll be relieved to know, then, that the SNP's policy on generation of electricity does not depend entirely on windmills. :)
tris,
ReplyDeleteAs I work, mainly and occasionally, from home I decided earlier on this year to move back to the Western Isles so I am quite horrified at the prospects of an influx of these visitors from overseas.
The last recorded crime on this island was when an old lady inadvertently forgot to separate her cockerel from her hens on the Sabbath. The subsequent connections sent shock-waves through the island and she was, quite rightly, sentenced to 14 years hard Labour.
With the aid of our steam-driven radios we keep abreast of world events such as Hibs winning a game but we are in no way parochial. At the time of the JFK assassination an old lady shouted to her neighbour "Kennedy has been shot" to which her friend replied "Oh!no! poor Calum".
Actually, believe it or not, there is not a new initiative. Colonel Gordon of Cluny who owned the islands of Barra and the Uists brutally cleared the land of its inhabitants to such an extent that three thousand were forced to be exiled to Canada alone. This fore-runner of the present day Tories then offered the island of Barra to the Government as a penal colony on the grounds that it would be cheaper than sending miscreants to Australia. The government refused probably on the grounds that there was no running water, no electricity, no decent food and no culture.
I've just taken a break from typing tripe and I see that there are yachts (English spies?) bobbing about in the harbour, sea-birds are diving for breakfast and the resident seal is sunning itself on the rocks below the house. Oh, to be in England!
"there is" should read "this is" but as nobody is going to read it who cares?
ReplyDeleteWhat I can't understand, Munguin, is that the government department responsible (Cabinet Office I imagine...ie Mr Francis 'I do so much for the Big Society that I can't remember anything I do' Maude, and Mr Oliver 'We don't want more poor people going abroad' Letwin)let this through. There can only be 4 possible explanations:
ReplyDelete1. They don't bother reading the petitions before they put them up;
2. They do not know the parameters outside of which these petitions cannot go;
3. They do not recognise the fact that The Outer Hebrides are in Scotland... and there is thus an insult to the population of that country. That is to say they maybe think that the Hebrides, outer or otherwise, are somewhere near Tierra del Fuego;
4. They couldn't care less that they have insulted Scotland.
Good point about the culture that abounds in the great cities of England.
tris..
ReplyDeleteWell wave and solar power won't be providing anything anytime soon. Greenies hate hydro so you're stuck with windmill building if the 2020 target is to be achieved :)
brownlie..
Are house prices cheap up there ? Sounds a nice place to live. Although there are rumours Gaddafi is heading your way soon.
Monty,
ReplyDeleteIt's a great place to live. My house is a four-bedroomed bungalow which cost £165,000 four years ago which is round about the average for this area. The area is similar to small villages right across the north of Scotland. Mind you, anyone wishing to sell a house after reading this petition would be as well taking it off the market. However if Gaddafi and his clan are coming up here prices will rocket and I don't mean Cruise Missiles at £500,000 a time.
PS: There is a rocket range in an island to the south so Gaddafi might feel more at home there.
brownlie..
ReplyDeletePrices sound quite reasonable up there. That petition might have been a ruse by a local who was priced out and wants the prices even lower.
Does the rocket range have enough space for scud launches ?
Tris.
ReplyDeleteCould you imagine the uproar had an SNP minister suggested sending English thugs etc over to the Scilly isles and made them out to be primitive outcasts?
You see as long as you are a unionist then bigoted and racist slander is accepted but if you are a nationalist then you are constantly under the microscope even for the slightest wee bit of innuendo.
No doubt the Scots Labour MPs shouted down Angus MacNeil when he protested against the bigoted remarks from Cameron's minority gov??
Ah Mr Brownlie. I wondered if you would see this one as it's a bit close to home for you.
ReplyDeleteHow dreadful that the old lady was so careless with his cockerel and hens. It was a just and reasonable sentence for such a heinous crime.
When the rioters come to stay in one of your spare bedrooms I trust there will be no repetition of that nonsense.
I'm glad you have radio up there. No telly I suppose...? But the English like to keep abreast of what's going on in the Archers on the Home Service!!!!*!
I read it, Brownlie, and so did Monty... There, that's two.
ReplyDeleteOhhhhh Monty, targets are made to be broken... That's government for you.
ReplyDeletelast I heard Gaddafi was staying put. I managed to miss the great statesman's "holiday interrupted for the second time" speech, but I think it may have been premature. Saif got away, after Nato insisted they had caught him.
ReplyDeleteI imagine that shortly they will get him and his pop, and of course then the trouble will really start, and the tribes fall out... [sigh...] It's fortunate that the UK has more money than Croesus and can fund a war for the next ten years.
So anyway if Scotland offers old Gaddafi sanctuary, John, you could have him in your spare room instead of a rioter? He's used to living in a tent, so the lack of running water and toilet facilities won't bother him...
The radio sometimes works but all I can get on my telephone is someone called Alexander Graham Bell shouting "Hello, can you hear me?"
ReplyDeleteAllan. I can't imagine an SNP minister being so bloody stupid.
ReplyDeleteI son't know what reaction Angus got, but you're probably right, specially the right wing ones that don't seem to have much regard for Scotland.
He he, the Scilly Isles... just the place for rioters, don't you think?
His bill must be horrendous, Brownlie, if he's been on teh phone all this time...
ReplyDeleteCome come come ... the Government can't be held responsible for the petitions of the general English voter.
ReplyDeleteGods knows, I wish this government could, because then it would be in a position to better control and influence them.
But I do share the sentiments of disgust at the frankly offensive (and hardly funny) jibe at the Outer Hebs...my great uncle John ran a croft up there (and my family still owns it) ... so damn it... offence is taken!
Interesting group of comments. I've never seen a steam powered radio, but there certainly were gas powered radios in Britain.
ReplyDeleteAs for the larger issue of energy policy. Clean, greenhouse gas emission-free nuclear energy must figure into the future energy policy of any large industrialized economy. The Germans are blowing smoke about this. The French are behaving sensibly. And BTW, wind turbines and hydroelectric projects on this scale despoil the environment.
The Americans have some experience with sending their undesirables to remote locations. They just sent the Native American tribes to the West; until there were no more unsettled western lands to send them to.
But the Outer Hebrides look quite nice actually. Of course there are those laws about chickens. ;-)
Well Dean,
ReplyDeleteThey are supposed to look at the petitions before they go on line, and check them, following the guidelines, so they should have noticed the offensiveness.
Of course it's not the actual fault of Letwin (who you have to admit is a bit of a prat), but his staff can't be up to much.
All jokes aside, that someone could actually think that it was a reasonable idea to get rid of the crap out of England and send it to the Scottish Islands is just unbelievable.
Lucky you having a croft up there, though. I'd love to go. It sounds and looks like my idea of heaven.
Ah Danny... wasn't there something at some time called steam radio... before our time I suspect.
ReplyDeleteI'm not a fan of nuclear power, and I still feel that we can manage without it.
All power is dangerous, and given the inefficiencies in everything in this country I would feel pretty worried by the notion that there was a nuclear power station not far from my home.
Given that even the super efficient Japanese can have a disaster, heaven alone knows what kind of mess we would have here.
In England they very nearly had a disaster due to lack of funding and cutting corners, back in the 50s or 60s., when they were trying so hard to keep up with America.
You're right Danny, about the Hebrides. But the chicken laws are a bit of a pain. Actually the whole Sabbath thing is a complete pain. My old boss went on his honeymoon to one of the islands, and of course he didn't go to the church on Sunday, but went out with his new wife for a ride on his motor bike. They threw stones at him!!!!!! (Actually maybe the English rioters would be at home there!!!!!)
I'd make them all learn how to conjugate every single Gaelic verb, and until they could ask for what they needed in the language, they'd get nothing!
You'll have them linguistically squared away in short order Tris. ;-)
ReplyDeleteNice to hear that what in America would be called small-town attitudes are not limited to rural America. Actually, for me, watching sea birds feeding and seals sunning gets old REALLY fast. I'd soon be heading for Edinburgh or Dundee or Glasgow. With a side trip to the Abbey and British Museum in London no doubt.
I heard the story of some friends who vacationed in beautiful South Seas Tahiti. Another couple who joined them after a week, wondered why they seemed so extravagantly glad to see them. Turns out that well before a week passes, you realize that there's nothing to actually DO in Tahiti.
As for me, maybe I can catch the Fall theater season in Omaha. Did I ever tell you about Nebraska? Sort of our Midwestern Outer Hebrides....without the sea birds and the seals. ;-)
That raised a smile, Danny.
ReplyDeleteI think I could watch sea bird and seals, and wonder at the hills and probably climb a few, and try to figure out what the plants were, and learn a bit of Gaelic, and maybe a bit of some songs and ... oh I could easily spend a week there.
As for Tahiti, much the same I suppose... and never lie on a beach. I'm happier doing that than being in town.
It brings to mind a bit of Burns you might like, Danny:
Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the North,
The birth-place of Valour, the country of Worth;
Wherever I wander, wherever I rove,
The hills of the Highlands for ever I love.
My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not here;
My heart's in the Highlands a-chasing the deer;
A-chasing the wild-deer, and following the roe,
My heart's in the Highlands wherever I go.
Farewell to the mountains high covered with snow;
Farewell to the straths and green valleys below;
Farewell to the forests and wild-hanging woods;
Farewell to the torrents and loud-pouring floods.
My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not here;
My heart's in the Highlands a-chasing the deer;
A-chasing the wild-deer, and following the roe,
My heart's in the Highlands wherever I go.
Of course I'd love to do the theatre season with you in Omaha, Nebraska.... Still, it's not REALLY worth the trip from Scotland for one Wednesday matinee of "Annie"... and a Saturday afternoon at the "Wild West Show"...
Ah Nebraska... yeah, you did mention it Danny... not quite as often as the snows of new England, but getting on for...
:¬)
Lovely Burns! I'd never read that.
ReplyDeleteAnd you're right Tris to pass on the Omaha theater season.....LOL.
"Oh, the moonlight’s fair tonight along the Wabash,
From the fields there comes the breath of new mown hay.
Thro’ the sycamores the candle lights are gleaming,
On the banks of the Wabash, far away."
Certainly not Burns. And not about the Highlands. But not bad really, when you're talking about Indiana. ;-)
Ah well Tris, the fact that we still have it is no thanks to the SNP and their (stupid and centralising) crofting reforms from last parliament...their bloody-minded reforms have made it harder to legally maintain possession of our croft...
ReplyDeleteI have to confess absolutely no knowledge of the Crofting reforms, Dean, so I'm unable to argue the party line, or for that matter criticise it. :¬)
ReplyDeleteYes Danny, I think that one is particularly emotive. How intellectual Munguin's Rep is becoming, huh? Poetry!
ReplyDeleteIndiana... Isn't that a part of the rust belt? Still I suppose they have new mown hay many places.. and it's hard to find a scent to beat that.
It's a sad piece. About a man who misses his mother and his teen love, isn't it?
Tris.....The state song of Indiana is indeed as you describe it. And Indiana is now considered a part of the "rust belt", the old heavy industrial northern Midwest.
ReplyDeleteBut Indiana is a big place and has lovely small towns and rural agricultural regions. So there's still the scent of new mown hay on the banks of the Wabash. :-)
Of course, Danny. I have the small country mindset... but Indiana might be several times the size of the UK, never mind Scotland, even though it has a relatively small population.
ReplyDeleteWould the Rust Belt be PA, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois?
Tris....As the states go, the Midwestern states are sort of middle sized, compared with the large states of the West. Actually, Indiana and Illinois taken together are almost exactly the size of the UK....with Illinois just a little bigger than England, and Indiana, just a little bigger than Scotland. For that matter, Indiana has a population comparable to Scotland. Scotland has a little over five million, and Indiana a little over six.
ReplyDeleteYes, what's now generally called the rust belt extends in a band across those states, primarily around the Great Lakes region. The rust belt also includes the old industrial cities of the southern half of the lower peninsula of Michigan, and a strip of western and central New York State. Normally, only an area of western Pennsylvania is included in the rust belt, to encompass the old steel town of Pittsburgh. Andrew Carnegie made steel, and money, in Pittsburgh, and then vacationed at his castle in the Highlands. BTW, Wiki says Pittsburgh was named after William Pitt the Elder, and was intended to be pronounced like "Edinburgh." Must be so! ;-)
Must indeed if Wiki says so, Danny.
ReplyDeleteThank you again for your explanations... :)