The Great Prestwick Airport Robbery

Posted on December 19, 2023December 19, 2023 by Angry Weegie

A tale of Scottish entrepreneurialism and Westminster treachery by Annie Harrower-Gray

Prestwick Airport offered (and offers) not only uninterrupted access to the Western hemisphere, it sits where the cold air of the surrounding low lying hills meets the warmer air of the sea and the resulting uprising bores a hole through mist and fog. It’s Europeʼs only all year clear weather airport. Heathrow on the other hand, suffers constant delays and cancellations due to bad weather. These facts alone, beg the question – why is Prestwick not the UKʼs second major international airport?

In 1933 little was known about the effects of extreme cold or lack of oxygen on planes and pilots but two Scots, the then Marquess of Douglas and Clydesdale and Flight Lieutenant David F MacIntyre ignored the unknown dangers and flew over Mount Everest in two tiny bi-planes, a Westland and a Wallace, their wings held together by struts and wire. On their return the two men, together with the Dukeʼs brother, the Earl of Selkirk, founded Prestwick Airport in order to realise yet another dream. Planned by experts, Prestwick was to be the greatest international airport in the world.

In the thirties, under the management of David MacIntyre, Prestwick was designing and building planes intended to become the ordinary manʼs bus, on which he could travel to the ends of the earth for 3d a mile. One plane, the ‘Prestwick Pioneerʼ was designed to meet the specific needs of the Highlands and Islands and carried the sick to hospital on the mainland. After the second world war it was denied a license to fly in the UK but sent by the UK government to carry guns in the jungles of Malaya instead.

Prestwick was using skilled labour at a time when unemployment was high in Scotland . Figures for 1935 showed forty nine percent unemployment in Airdrie, and 42% in Port Glasgow. In comparison, Birmingham had an unemployment rate of only 7%. The high unemployment figure was due to the dependence on heavy industry in these areas and an unbalanced economy where most of the lighter industries were distributed throughout England . The airportʼs extensive plans included trade booths for Scottish manufacturers. Scotland had become air minded early on and Prestwick was well on its way to becoming a World Centre of Air Transport. Its accomplishments were far in advance of London Airport where they were still trying to disperse the fog with ‘Fidoʼ flame jets.

Scots had high hopes that a white paper on Civil Aviation published in 1945 would promise a bright future for Prestwick. Instead, neither the airport nor Scotland received as much as a mention in the document.

It was a rare event in that Scottish politicians from every party joined forces to fight for their country and Prestwick. In a House of Commons debate on 29th March, 1945, every available Scottish Member of Parliament signed the motion. Alexander Sloane (Labour:South Ayrshire) opened the debate quite eloquently, though perhaps his speech did not endear the entire house to his cause. For the benefit of those MPs south of the border Sloane explained that Prestwick Airport was situated next to the ‘Barns oʼ Ayrʼ where William Wallace experimented with the very first incendiary bombs. He razed the barns to the ground after tying up the English inside.

Next on his feet was Lieut-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore (Scottish Unionist :Ayr Burghs) he praised Scotland, something we would not hear a Scottish Tory do today. “We are not greedy in Scotland. We realize that the capital of the United Kingdom must necessarily have the No 1 terminal airport for world air traffic. All we do insist on, is that Prestwick should be the alternative and secondary trans-oceanic and Trans-Atlantic Airport . Moore questioned the refusal of the Government to approve an airline service in Scotland
before going on to praise the skills of the Scots: “We have long been seized of the dramatic, indeed the almost miraculous, potentialities of air transport and in this we are many generations in advance of England. Just as for generations we have built the best and biggest ships in the world, so we are determined to handle this new form of transport in the same way and built the best and biggest aircraft in the world. Why not? We have the best scientific brains, the most expert designers and the most highly skilled craftsmen, except for those who are at present loaned to England. “

One by one the Scottish members took the floor each making a solid case for Prestwick to become the UKʼs second international airport.

George Buchanan (Labour) asked in his speech, ‘We read of great things being accomplished by Scotsmen. Our people constantly say this – and it is difficult to answer them: Is our greatness always reserved for the battlefield and the glories of war; have we no great capacities for the glory of peace production?”

The member for the Glasgow Gorbals received his answer later in a patronizing speech from Sir Stafford Cripps (Minister for Civil Aviation) “ I do appreciate very full the pride of accomplishment that Scottish men and women feel in the aircraft industry and in their own contributions to air services and training. They have played a very distinguished part in the course of the war, and I have taken many opportunities of going to Scotland in order to inform them of the appreciation of the Government and Department in the work they have done. I believe that this type of what we may justly call local patriotism is of the very greatest importance in the proper development of our nation as a whole,….”. The underlying message was clear. Prestwick had been allowed quite graciously, to contribute to the war effort but that was their lot.

For those who would like to read the full debate, this can be found in Hansard here.

The protests from the Scottish People, the undisputable facts and the debate were all ignored, Sir Stafford Cripps would not change his mind – Prestwick was not going to be allowed to set foot on the great highway of the air. The government would back Heathrow, which had twice been turned down as unsuitable. The Scottish people, the industrialists, the financiers and others must organize themselves said Cripps . An uphill struggle, as the government undermined Prestwickʼs every effort to realize its potential. Investors in light industries waiting to move into Prestwick would now withdraw as they would be unable to obtain licenses to go ahead with production. Previously in 1935, Prestwick made an application for permission to build and extend the airport. It was refused, because in the opinion of ‘expertsʼ it was ‘exceptionally unsuitable from the flying weather aspectʼ. Later, authorities at Prestwick who applied to go to the Havana Conference of Air line operators were refused exit permits by the Westminster Government.

The Scottish people were right to suspect that in the their treatment over Prestwick they were being well and truly screwed. Sloane warned that Westminster refusing to give the airport its place in the sun could well mean the parting of the ways for Scotland and England.

Clement Attlee and the Labour party ousted the Tories from government in July 1945 but it made no difference to Prestwick. In 1946 Group Captain MacIntyre received a letter from the Minister for Civil Aviation ‘any aviator taking a plane from Prestwick airport will incur the penalty of a £2,000 fine and/or twenty years imprisonment ‘. Prestwick was being paralyzed. It was not to compete with London Airport and show it in an unfavourable light for London was to receive a grant of £30 million, some of it Scots taxes.

In the years that followed, it mattered little what party was in power at Westminster. Labour and the Tories shared the same policy – keep Prestwick in a state of strangulation, ensuring that all the wealth to be accumulated from civil aviation stayed firmly in the South East of England.

In 2013, the Scottish Government bought Prestwick from its private owners Infratil after it having been on the market for eighteen months. Only a small part of aviation, development and planning of airports mainly, is devolved to Holyrood. The regulation of aviation is reserved to Westminster. With the airport in public ownership and plans recently revealed for a £65 billion, manufacturing site near the airport, we may yet see the dreams of its founders realized in an independent Scotland, free from London interference. To quote Lieut-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore “ Scots have imagination in their minds and a spirit of progress in their blood, which are often lacking in those of our compatriots South of the Border”.

Perhaps Nicola Sturgeonʼs vision for Prestwick goes far beyond just saving an airport struggling under private ownership from closing.

My comments

A highly unusual example of Scottish MPs of all parties joining together in support of a single cause. Wouldn’t it be great in today’s political climate to see Scottish MPs standing up for Scotland.

However, much as now, Westminster refused to allow Scottish skills and entrepreneurial spirit to flourish in case it had an impact on Mother England, or should I say Mother London.

I was brought up in Prestwick and was a keen plane spotter for a while. Prestwick’s fog-free reputation was well earned. I remember an occasion, perhaps in 1959/60, when Prestwick was the only airport open in Western Europe. Dozens of flights were diverted to Prestwick from all over Europe to the extent that aircraft were being parked on stands, on taxipaths and even on one of the runways. When the weather finally cleared, Prestwick had almost run out of space. What an evening for a plane spotter.

My thanks to Alycia Hayes for posting Annie Harrower-Gray’s articleand to An Stiubhart Dubh (The Black Stewart) for bringing it to my attention.

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Grangemouth closure symbolic of UK Government failures

Posted on December 15, 2023 by Angry Weegie

Here’s a response to a letter by Brian Barbour (No cash cow) printed in the Scotsman, always keen to highlight any Scot who has nothing but contempt for Scotland and happy to blame the Scottish Government for everything bad that happens, even the actions of the joint owner of a private company, known for his unionist beliefs.

By Jim Stamper

I find Brian Barbour’s perspective in his letter (Scotsman 27 November) very difficult to comprehend. He mentions failures of the SNP not setting up a Scottish energy company but doesn’t seem to question the UK Government not doing so, despite energy being a retained power. Instead UK Governments sold off all our oil and gas resources to private companies leaving us exposed to extreme energy price increases following the Russian / Ukraine conflict with very adverse resultant effects including huge inflation. He doesn’t suggest the UK Government should be taking public ownership of the Grangemouth refinery despite the UK already having insufficient refinery capacity.

He mentions the BBC being soft on Scottish Government’s underperformance yet mentions the ferries which are never out of the BBC news unlike the London underground, HS2 etc. He mentions cuts to Local Authorities finance but no mention of UK Government Economic Austerity policies imposed since 2010, specifically to reduce public spending and which directly affects funding available to the Scottish Government. These policies have reduced resources and the salary values including in education and in the NHS, resulting in strikes in England. NHS strikes would have caused huge suffering in Scotland and cost the Scottish economy millions if they hadn’t been avoided due to negotiations with the unions by the Scottish Government. Negotiations under the leadership of the Health Secretary, Michael Matheson. Not something mentioned much by the BBC. Although I’m sure I have heard Michael Matheson’s name mentioned the odd time in the BBC recently.

It is urgent we gain independence before the UK Government privatises our NHS, further damages our public services and continues to privatise our green energy and defiling our beautiful country with huge pylons to enable private companies to provide electricity to England.

The life and times of a Labour grifter

Posted on November 29, 2023 by Angry Weegie

This week brought the (excellent?) news that a second Scottish Labour MP (there are only two) had been promoted to Labour’s shadow front bench. This is the continued advancement of Michael Shanks who has come from obscurity to ministerial status in the space of just two months, and this from a man with a chequered history of party loyalty and a poor record of success in elections, having been unsuccessful in Local Authority, Scottish Parliament and UK Parliament elections.

Shanks left Labour party in May 2019 citing opposition to Brexit and antisemitism. He rejoined the party in April 2020 when Keir Starmer became leader. Strangely enough, his opposition to Brexit didn’t seem to hinder his continued membership of the party, even as the Starmer led party became more and more pro Brexit.

Here’s a comment he made at the time of his resignation, describing Labour as “a party that has a bankrupt approach to our membership of the EU and is complacent about the impact it will have on the poorest people across the UK”.

Out of the blue, he was selected to stand as a candidate in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election when 3 much more experienced members who had put their names forward were barred by Labour HQ. A complaint about the selection process was made by the local CLP, but was ignored. They didn’t even get a reply. Obviously, there was some reason why the party were keen to see him selected for an election that, given the circumstances, Labour were virtually certain to win. I wonder what it was.

Shanks won Rutherglen and Hamilton West on 5th October, thanks mainly to the huge boycott by former SNP voters, disgusted at the behaviour of the party leaders and by their treatment of the previous MP, Margaret Ferrier. During his election campaign, he promised to be “his own man” and to oppose both the two-child cap and the bedroom tax, both policies Starmer has said will be retained by a future Labour Government. Were these promises made to get elected, to be dropped once in Westminster?

Many bloggers, including myself, warned that Shanks had no interest in Scotland and, once elected, would simply be another Labour stooge. Here’s a blog I published at the time of his selection as Labour candidate.

Shanks was sworn in as MP on 16th October, making his maiden speech in the Violence Reduction, Policing and Criminal Justice Bill debate on 15th November.

Does Shanks’ first month and a half show how closely he’s going to stick to the promises he made to the Rutherglen and Hamilton West electorate to get elected? Is he going to support Scotland or is he going to support Labour?

The first test of his intention was Devolution (Employment) (Scotland) debate on 17th October, the day after he was sworn in. The motion was proposed by SNP Member David Linden and was a proposal to devolve employment legislation to the Scottish Parliament. The motion was lost by 33 votes to 22, with Shanks and his colleague and now boss, Ian Murray, the Shadow Scottish Secretary, along with the rest of Labour Members, choosing to abstain. Was this was an example of the Bain Principle (Labour will never support a measure raised by the SNP) or was it was a continuation of Labour’s reluctance to give any powers to the Scottish Parliament that could make things better in Scotland. (Bear in mind that in the post 2014 referendum Smith Commission to decide what powers would be devolved to the Scottish Parliament, Labour voted against virtually all tax devolution.)

So, within 24 hours of arriving in the Commons, Shanks failed his first test, choosing to support Labour, not Scotland.

His next test was in the debate on a ceasefire in Gaza on 16th November, again a motion proposed by the SNP. Here, strong feelings were expressed by members of all parties (except the Tories, of course). In fact, in advance of the debate, Labour in Scotland had backed the ceasefire as did the vast majority of the Scottish public. However, Starmer had issued a three-line whip for all members to abstain, so voting for the ceasefire would have career implications for Labour members. When it came to the vote, 56 Labour MPs voted for the ceasefire, including several ministers, but neither Shanks or Murray were among the 56.

Shanks’ decision to follow the Westminster party line and go against the Scottish party and public proved to be a career enhancing move as he was promoted to the shadow front bench on 27th November, just 42 days after his arrival in the Commons and 11 days after the ceasefire vote. Probably not a record, but still seeming like surprising haste.

So, Shanks failed his second test, choosing to vote for Labour and not for Scotland.

Of course, Labour have always been against Scottish improvement. Here’s a quote from Jimmy Hood, a Labour MP at the time of the Independence referendum. “Even if the Scottish people are going to be better off economically and so on, I would still be against breaking away from the Union”. That could be rephrased as “Even if my constituents would be better off, I would still vote against it”. Even though a Scottish MP, he was more interested in the UK than in Scotland.

If and when it comes to a vote on the two-child cap or the bedroom tax, we can be almost certain that Shanks will choose to retain his recently acquired ministerial status and vote with the party line, not with the promises he made to the Rutherglen and Hamilton West electors to get elected. Instead of being his own man and campaigning to remove these hated Tory policies, he has shown himself to be just another Labour party stooge, caring about Scotland only at election time.

We told you so, didn’t we.

Thanks to Workers Liberty (https://www.workersliberty.org/) for some Labour background.

Are they the SNP Sacrificial Lambs?

Posted on October 21, 2023October 21, 2023 by Angry Weegie

There was a time when it was said that SNP MPs were going to Westminster to find a way to lose their jobs. It was called settling up, not settling down, a phrase first coined in the early days of the election of SNP MPs and often repeated as a promise (by those seeking election) or an accusation (by those unhappy with their MP’s performance).

Of course, these days are long gone and very few (very, very few) SNP MPs are now prepared to sacrifice their position, their salary and their virtually unlimited expenses just to trigger Scottish independence. Out of the Union or still in a job, there’s really no choice, is there? When you can make all that money and all you have to sacrifice is your country’s freedom, why would you turn down the cash?

“There’s no such thing as society”. So said Margaret Thatcher, and the majority of the SNP MPs seem to be hell-bent on proving that it’s true with their obvious concentration on their own careers, their own positions, and, above all, their own incomes.

But wait. Has something unexpected happened? Have SNP MPs at last found a cause for which they are prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice, risking all that money for which virtually no work is required? It certainly seems like it.

So, what is this cause that so many MPs are prepared to put their futures on the line, prepared to bet £350k annually on a winner takes all gamble.

They’re enthusiastically supporting a three-way bet on GRRB, Hate Crimes and Jury free trials for sex crimes, and at the moment, it looks like their gamble is going to fail.

They’ve found out that the majority of their constituents are solidly against all three, but that hasn’t caused them to have any sort of rethink. The recent by-election in Rutherglen and Hamilton saw the SNP vote fall from 23,775 to 8,399, a fall of almost 65%, but initial reaction from the party doesn’t show any signs of a rethink either. In fact, if anything, the opposite seems to be the case. What they say their loss was due to was Margaret Ferrier, the low turnout, or tactical voting by Tories for Labour. OK, I know parties always blame someone or something else for a defeat, but when combined with no obvious effort to change what they must realise is the basic cause of the problem, it doesn’t bode well.

The only change in SNP rhetoric is the much more frequent mention of independence, though that’s not a surprise. One thing that can virtually be depended on is the party highlighting the advantages of independence as the election looms while, of course, continuing to do nothing to make independence a practical reality and then forgetting all about it once the election is over. The one time they tried to ignore independence before the election, in 2017, they lost half a million votes and 21 seats, so they haven’t repeated the mistake (or haven’t up till now). Unfortunately, they are now finding out that mere mentions of independence, combined with absolutely no effort to make it happen and further combined with a set of policies that only their payroll support is no longer going to cut it.

There have been some changes at Westminster. Steven Flynn, the Westminster leader, has been shuffling his front bench team to concentrate on the issues which he believes will stem the flow of support in next year’s UK election. However, astonishingly, he has chosen to remove all emphasis from independence in favour of today’s issues like energy prices and the cost of living, effectively blaming independence on the disaster of Rutherglen and Hamilton West. Does he not realise that the majority of SNP voters support independence? Does he not remember what happened in 2017 at a time when SNP support nationally was much higher than now? Has he not read the SNP constitution? Without independence, the SNP are just another British party content with devolution and if they no longer enthuse the independence vote, they will fail.

Support for the SNP throughout Scotland is now much lower than last year. In May, 2022, support for the SNP in a Westminster election was 44%, rising to a high of 51% in December. There’s only been one Scottish Westminster poll this month, a YouGov poll conducted between 2nd and 6th, so the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election would have had some impact on the outcome.

If this was the result in next year’s UK election, the SNP would lose 24 of their current 43 seats, a number they’ve already managed to reduce from 48 through a combination of independence inactivity (Neale Hanvey and Kenny MacAskill) and a desire to purge the party of anyone who wants independence (Margaret Ferrier and Angus MacNeil). Feeding the poll numbers into the Electoral Calculus’s seat predictor gives the following:

The SNP’s pursuit of Margaret Ferrier resulted in the recall petition and their virtual wipe-out in the by-election, something that wouldn’t have happened if Nicola Sturgeon hadn’t been so desperate to get rid of her that she started a witch-hunt eagerly taken up by the rest of the SNP wokies. Only the SNP’s support for her removal kept the issue in the public eye. Without that, the issue would have died following a few obligatory complaints by the opposition parties. As it was, Margaret Ferrier was punished three times for one offence, suspension from Parliament, a community service order from the court and the loss of her job, all for an offence for which virtually no members of other parties were punished.

So, is next year’s UK election going to be more of the same from the SNP? Will they tell us about all the good things that only independence can bring? Will they present the us with what remains of their stock of tired, mouldy old carrots, recycled from 2019, 2017 and 2015 and still expect us to be just as accepting as we were when the carrots were fresh? Do they really think that a lesser emphasis on independence plus the continuation of unquestioning support for highly unpopular policies aimed at destroying the rights of women and children are going to lead to electoral success?

Are all the MPs that stupid (hint, some are) or is this just part of some grand woke plan to get rid of the few remaining semi-sensible ones to guarantee a continuation of the woke dream for years to come?

Is this what the so-called leaders of the independence movement have come to?

The Priorities of the Scottish Government

Posted on August 17, 2023August 18, 2023 by Angry Weegie

What should be the more important to the Scottish Government? Saving the planet or saving Scotland?

Recent activity of the Scottish Government (or should I say the Scottish Green Government) has concentrated on bringing forward legislation that, at least according to Lorna Slater and Patrick Harvie, will make Scotland a fairer place, reduce Scotland’s impact on our planet, hasten the advent of net zero and show the rest of the world how to do it. But whatever happens, we have to be first. It just won’t be the same if we’re not world leading.

So, what’s the plan? Though plan might be the wrong word as there’s not been a great deal of planning so far. We’ve had the GRR Bill debacle, the HPMA Bill debacle, the DRS Bill debacle and now the Great Heat Pump Saga debacle. All these Scottish Green initiatives were characterised by only being discussed with people and groups who agreed with the government and not being interested in taking into account opposing ideas or suggestions.

Were the government shocked to learn that most women weren’t keen on the idea of men with lippy and a wig invading their safe spaces and waving their willies? If only they had been asked.

Were the government shocked to learn that many crofters and others living in places where fishing would be banned by HPMA depended on fishing for their survival? If only they had been asked.

Were the government shocked to learn that many people weren’t keen on replacing a recycling system where local authorities came along and collected bottles, jars, cans and other recyclable material and replacing it with a privatised one which only dealt with bottles and cans and where individuals were responsible for taking stuff back to a recycling centre that could be many miles away and which resulted the cost of purchase for some items increasing by over 100%? If only they had been asked.

Were the government shocked to learn that many people were distinctly unhappy about being told they would quite soon have to replace their gas boiler with a heat pump, in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis at a cost of (apparently) anything up to £50,000-£60,000? If only they had been asked.

As no government estimate of cost (or anything else) is forthcoming (of course, that needs planning), we have to rely on unsubstantiated stories in the media describing the experience of various individuals.

These stories tell us that air source heat pumps are unsuitable for the Scottish climate, not just because they apparently don’t produce as much heat as a gas boiler and therefore need a modified central heating system with larger radiators, but mainly because the cost of the electricity needed to run them is horrendously expensive in Scotland, three times the cost of gas.

We now have the utterly ludicrous situation that Harvie, who appears to be acting on his own in this, is now making it virtually impossible to install one common form of green energy, solar panels, because of his desire for every residence in Scotland to convert to heat pumps.

These fiascos are perfect examples of the actions of Scotland’s Green infused government.

The Scottish Green Government’s new policy introduction goes something like this. Think of an idea. Announce it. Then (if you can be bothered) investigate the practicality of introducing it. But, on no account speak to anyone affected by the policy unless you know they’ll agree with you, even if you have to pay them to agree.

But is there a point to all this (small g) green activity?

Let’s revisit the original question. What should be the more important to the Scottish Government? Saving the planet or saving Scotland?

Will these proposals save the planet or even contribute to saving the planet in any meaningful way? Much has already been said about the DRS, so let’s look at the Greens latest wheeze, the heat pump.

Let’s take it as correct that all countries should reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases to prevent catastrophic climate change, even though there’s a substantial body of opinion against that view.

The world total of greenhouse gas emissions in 2021 was 54,593 Megatonnes (million tonnes). In the same year, Scottish emissions were about 41.6 Megatonnes and, like most Western countries, are reducing, mainly thanks to the Western trend of outsourcing manufacturing to China and other Far Eastern countries. 41 million tonnes sounds like a lot, but putting it in context, Scottish emissions represent three quarters of one tenth of 1 percent of the global total (0.076%), which could be described as a drop in the ocean (or a puff in the air?).

Looking at the longer-term trends, in 2015 (the first year of the Sturgeon era), Scottish emissions were 48.1 Megatonnes, so the 2021 figure shows a reduction of 14% (average 2.3%/year) over that period and a 49.2% drop from 81.9 Megatonnes in 1990 (average 1.6%/year), so as you can see the reduction in emissions is accelerating without the drastic intervention proposed by the Scottish Green Government.

The three biggest greenhouse gas emitters are China (25% of 2021 levels), USA (11%) and India (7%). China’s emissions have shown a 12.8% increase since 2015 to the 2021 figure of 13,710 Megatonnes. Should China maintain that level of increase, it would result in a daily increase of 789 tonnes. Or, to put it another way, should Scotland miraculously reduce its emissions to zero by tomorrow, it would take China about 53 days to replace the Scottish figure.

So, the Green Government proposals would result in a 53 day reduction in world emissions. It would also result in a vast amount of money (£ billions) being spent by Scottish householders on upgrading their heating systems and if they’re spending all their money on heat pumps, they’re certainly not spending on anything else. Is all the financial pain to the Scottish people and the knock-on negative impact on the Scottish economy inherent in the Government proposals justified by the virtually zero impact on world emissions?

Surely, for any right-thinking person, the answer is no.

The Scottish Green Government proposals will not save the planet or even contribute in any meaningful way to saving the planet, but they will wreck the Scottish economy and put hundreds of thousands of Scottish households into debt.

Global and country data quoted above has been sourced from https://ourworldindata.org/greenhouse-gas-emissions. See full figures here. Scottish figures come from the Scottish Government website.

A Scottish political disgrace

Posted on August 2, 2023 by Angry Weegie

After a thoroughly nasty set of campaigns from her opponents, the recall petition for Margaret Ferrier has succeeded, with the two major parties in Scotland (with loads of help from the media) managing to persuade just over 14% of the electorate to sign. Commons rules meant Margaret was not permitted to put her case before the recall was officially announced, but by that time Labour had already been campaigning for about 2 months. Margaret immediately leaves the Commons and will likely be succeeded in a by-election sometime later this year by a numpty from the Labour party, whose only contribution to the Rutherglen and Hamilton constituency will be his smirking appearance at the post-election photoshoot. You can be sure that he was only picked (over 4 real local candidates) because he agreed to do what he was told by his London bosses.

The recall petition was ‘cleverly’ arranged to conclude while Parliament was on holiday, so maximising the disruption as the by-election can’t be arranged until the Commons returns in September. It means that Rutherglen and Hamilton West will be without representation for some months, so constituents, please make sure you have no problems needing support from your MP until after the by-election and even then, hope that the MP has a team who have some clue and can be bothered to make the effort, though, as we’re talking Labour, that’s far from guaranteed.

Certainly, Labour’s contribution to the campaign was a series of leaflets more notable for their lies and smears than for their policy content. For one example, see here.

At least, you can understand what drove Labour to create the opportunity, first by voting in the Commons committee to make sure that a 30 day suspension was agreed, triggering the recall petition and then conducting this nasty campaign, disguising their party self-interest in a cloak of public concern. They desperately wanted this by-election success to demonstrate that Labour are back to being a political force to be reckoned with in Scotland, even though victory, if it happens, is likely to be more to do with the expected disintegration of the SNP vote rather than any increase in Labour support.

But what’s in it for the SNP? When Nicola Sturgeon prompted this witch hunt against arguably the most hard working SNP MP, but one whose support for independence was at odds with the leadership of the current party, the SNP were riding high in the polls, with the worst of the Hate Crimes Bill, the GRRB, DRS, the offshore wind auction and the rest still to come. Could she have anticipated the backlash and the impact on SNP support or, as many have said, could she have planned it?

But now, with SNP support heading for the toilet, Sturgeon’s replacement decided to continue the persecution of Margaret Ferrier, thus really annoying the large number of constituents who previously supported the SNP, but who had no desire to get rid of Margaret. Of course, they had no voice in the recall, but will certainly make their voice heard in the by-election.

Let’s not forget that the SSP, the Scottish Socialist Party, another supposedly independence supporting party, were also campaigning for the recall, even though they had virtually nothing to gain from a by-election. Perhaps they thought they were on safe ground with no actual independence party standing to point out that the SSP, like the SNP and the Greens, are another party who seem only committed to independence when it suits them.

So we are where we are. If Margaret chooses not to stand again, the constituency will lose a hard-working MP with a proud record of backing local issues and local people. Even worse, her replacement will be either be the Labour candidate who lies about being local (unless you think Partick is part of Rutherglen) or the SNP one, said to be the laziest councillor in South Lanarkshire. Some choice!

So the good people of Rutherglen and Hamilton West have a choice to make. We don’t yet know all who’ll be standing, but the two candidates who have so far been put forward by Labour and SNP are certainly not ones I would vote for (and I have a vote).

One last general point. Are the recall rules fit for purpose? Is the tiny 10% of the constituency electorate (OK 14% in this case) really sufficient to end the career of an MP, especially when the combined might of parties attracting virtually 100% of the voting public are campaigning for the recall? Is it fair that those who oppose the recall get no voice? Is it fair that parties supporting the recall get to campaign for weeks before the recall petition is officially launched, when the MP is prohibited by Commons rules from putting her case during that time? Is it fair that parties can spend up to £10,000 each and make use of party members time, limited only by the number of members in each party, when the MP is effectively on their own? I realise you can’t expect fairness from Westminster, but surely this is just too one-sided.

Margaret Ferrier – Labour’s medical lies

Posted on July 5, 2023July 5, 2023 by Angry Weegie

A few weeks ago, I published a post commenting on a leaflet issued by the Labour party pretending to be a personal letter from Richard Watson, part time local GP and full time Labour activist. The leaflet set out Labour’s campaign strategy if a by-election should occur in Rutherglen and Hamilton West constituency. Their campaign would be solely based on smears, lies and exaggerations about Margaret Ferrier, the sitting MP, with no indication of any policy or planned activity to benefit the residents of the constituency because, as Labour is an English party, policy is made in London and is rarely designed to benefit anyone in Scotland. In fact, Labour policy is now indistinguishable from that of the Tories, so they definitely would want to hide it from Scots voters. Do you think it’s a good idea to elect a man whose party is based in another country?

In the post, I commented on the exaggeration (some would call it lies) in the leaflet of the current stage of the pandemic and, specifically, how many people were affected at the time of Margaret’s travel to London. Remember, at the time, there were no restrictions on travel to work and as Westminster rules prevented MPs participating in debates remotely, if Margaret wanted to take part in the debate, she had no choice but travel to London.

In the leaflet, Watson claimed that at the time of Margaret’s journey to London on parliamentary business, on 28th September 2020, Scottish hospitals were full and the virus was spreading faster in Scotland than anywhere else in the UK, a bold claim considering the much greater incidence of the disease in England.

Do the statistics justify the claims?

Were Scottish hospitals full? Based on Scottish Government figures, the number of patients in hospital with suspected or confirmed Covid were as follows. I have compared the 28th September figures with those on 21st January to show how close to full the September figures were.

Date	Number in Hospital	Number in ICU	New admissions
28th September, 2020	123	12	26
21st January, 2021	2,053	156	179

Scottish hospitals were not full on 28th September. The Labour statement is a lie.

Was the disease spreading faster in Scotland than in any other part of the UK. Based on NHS England, here are the comparative figures for England on 28th September, 2020. For context, the English population in 2020 was 10.3 times that of Scotland, so, if the virus was spreading at a faster rate in Scotland, you would expect the English figures to be less than 10.3 times the Scottish figures.

Date	Number in hospital	Number in ICU	New admissions
28th September, 2020	1,955	245	308
	15.9	20.4	11.8

The second row shows how much greater than Scotland the English figures are. In all comparisons, the English figures exceed the population multiplier. The disease was not spreading faster in Scotland than in other parts of the UK. The Labour statement is a lie.

For those who think that this is petty point-scoring, that the actual numbers don’t really matter, just consider. Labour didn’t have to make these statements. But they did. So, if Labour are prepared to lie about the Covid situation at the time of Margaret’s journey to London to get their own way, what else would they be prepared to lie about.

Of course, the Labour Party have a bit of a history of lying to us Scots. Remember Labour canvassers in the run-up to the independence referendum telling pensioners that a Yes vote would mean they would lose their pension? Labour thought it was an acceptable campaign tactic to terrify vulnerable Scots pensioners so they could get their own way. Not much has changed.

Do you really think it’s a good idea to elect a man whose party believes that lying is a reasonable campaign tactic?

As the quote at the top says, once you’ve been shown to have told a lie, everything else must be suspect. Labour’s whole argument against Margaret Ferrier is riddled with lies. Can we believe anything they are telling us?

Sweet music from the Plastic Humza Band?

Posted on June 18, 2023 by Angry Weegie

The Scottish Government are deeply frustrated. They’re deeply frustrated by the UK government’s failure to allow them to implement laws passed by a majority of MSPs. They’re also deeply frustrated by the Scottish public’s inability to see the multi-cultural and anti-discriminatory benefits of women with willies and the health benefits of walking miles to the nearest recycling point with your load of glass bottle returns.

So, what do a bunch of immature government ministers do when they’re deeply frustrated? Well, of course, they lash out.

However, they can’t lash out at Westminster. They’ve tried that before, but unfortunately (for them), Westminster has a bigger lash available so it did them no good. They will always end up on the losing side.

So, the Scottish Government have decided to punish the public because the public find it much more difficult to fight back. They can show the public who’s boss without too much danger to their egos.

As they haven’t yet been allowed to re-introduce the death penalty for misgendering their ultra-sensitive, wee wokey friends, their latest Green-inspired wheeze is to give Local Authorities the power to introduce financial and potentially criminal penalties for misgendering recyclable rubbish. If you look at a piece of plastic packaging and your eyes tell you this is recyclable waste, but someone from the council has a different view, you might be fined up to about £60 for putting it into your recycling bin. Do it a second time and you may be referred to the police for possible criminal prosecution.

Now, I hear you say, surely there’s nothing wrong with asking householders to be careful filling their recycling bins, with a wee incentive if necessary.

But wait, aren’t there snags?

A lot of plastic packaging isn’t marked as recyclable or not, so you’re left to guess whether you can put it in your recycling bin. You may opt for the safe choice and consign it to landfill, defeating the whole purpose of recycling. Or you may think it fits the local authority criteria for recycling and take the risk that it’s OK. A risk that might cost you £60.

All local authorities in Scotland have their own rules about what they’ll accept and that probably won’t cover every type of packaging marked as recyclable. Even when you’ve learned them, the local authority’s rules are unlikely to cover every possible type of packaging, meaning you will have to contact them to get a definitive ruling or face another £60 mistake.

How will the local authority know you were responsible for putting the packaging in the bin? As bins are generally put outside at night and are not locked, the opportunity is there for neighbours or others to put their overflow in your bin. Will the presence of the packaging in your bin be sufficient to levy a fine? Will you be required to prove the identity of the real culprit to escape punishment?

How will the local authority know what’s in the bin? You can’t expect the refuse collectors to check every bin for incorrect content. It’s impracticable, it would take far too long. Another method would be to have a group of bin inspectors who would tour round the area making random inspections of bins, though even that would be difficult if they were expected to view everything in the bin. Of course, the cost of the inspectors would have to be paid for by finding enough people to fine.

These are real problems making it more difficult for householders to stick to the rules and avoid costly mistakes. These are real problems that really need to be addressed before implementation, but which almost certainly won’t be because it isn’t in the government’s and local authority’s financial interests to make the scheme easy to use. The Scottish Government are searching for a win to make up for recent setbacks, but you have to wonder if, like so many of their recent initiatives, this has all the hallmarks of policy announced without considering all the possible complications. Or is it just another policy to be announced but quietly dropped in a year or so, having done its job of creating a virtuous headline.

Margaret Ferrier – The final countdown

Posted on June 7, 2023 by Angry Weegie

So finally, we have the answer to what happens to SNP members when Nicola Sturgeon takes the huff.

Margaret Ferrier was much too keen on independence to have a place in Sturgeon’s SNP and, on top of that, she was getting too much publicity for all the hard work she put into campaigning. How dare she take some of the attention away from the glorious leader.

In Sturgeon’s SNP, you’re either ‘in’ or ‘out’, and Margaret wasn’t one of the ‘in’ crowd. So, when the chance arose to get rid of her, Sturgeon grabbed it with both hands.

“Off with her head”, said the yellow Queen, and all the obedient courtiers followed her lead. A nod and a wink to the media led not only to a deluge of column inches and TV and radio minutes, but also to a crowd of reporters (definitely not journalists) surrounding her home for days on end, making normal family life impossible. Imagine the stress that would be creating.

Losing the whip and suspension from the party followed, all arranged to make sure there was no let up on the stream of bad publicity, painting Margaret as pretty much the most evil person in Scotland, all this for trying to do your job and support your colleagues.

Sure, Margaret made a mistake. She should have waited until she got the result of the test, but she was under pressure to stick to arrangements she had made, particularly the debate she was leading in Westminster, where remote attendance was not permitted at that time.

While all other parties would have supported their member in such circumstances, the SNP were leading the charge to get rid of her. The difference between Margaret’s treatment by the party and that of other SNP elected members who made mistakes was huge.

Think of Patrick Grady, who made unwanted sexual advances to a junior member of staff. From the very top of the party, every effort was made to minimise the incident and support Grady, but not his victim. See The National’s view of it here. By the way, his punishment from Westminster was a two day suspension, though two years earlier, a Tory MP had been suspended for six weeks for a similar sexual offence.

Think of Jordan Linden, former leader of North Lanarkshire Council, also accused of sexual impropriety (SNP have a thing about sex, don’t they). Again a cover up and again more support for the alleged perpetrator than for the victim and those who reported it. A police investigation is on-going. See the Daily Record’s view here.

Calls for Margaret’s resignation followed. Do the ‘right’ thing, they all said. Just resign. Don’t make us have to get you suspended from Westminster and launch a recall petition. Just make it easy for us to replace you. Among the many calling for her resignation were members of her own constituency party. How could the local MSP and the local councillors be so quick to jump on the hate Margaret Ferrier bandwagon when they all owe their positions to the support they got from Margaret. They are the lowest of the low.

By this time, the Labour party had joined in the witch hunt. Sensing the opportunity to double the number of Scottish MPs (yes, they’ve only got one, Ian Murray, the only Labour party member in Scotland who owns his own Union Jack suit), they joined the SNP in campaigning as if the by-election had already been called.

Both parties conducted pretty nasty campaigns, focussing entirely on spreading abuse and lies about Margaret Ferrier, though Labour wins the prize for the nastiest leaflet.

But none of this would work without a suspension from the Commons. Following an investigation by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, the Standards Committee recommended a 30 day suspension, which had to be approved by Parliament before becoming effective. In the last 50 years, only three MPs have been suspended for 30 days or more, Ian Paisley Jnr. (DUP) for failing to declare family holidays paid by the Sri Lancan Government, Keith Vaz (Lab) for offering to buy cocaine for sex workers and the aforementioned Rob Roberts (Tory) for breaching Parliaments sexual misconduct policy. No other MP has been suspended for breaching Covid rules, even though many have admitted to doing so.

Yesterday, 6th June, a vote in parliament resulted in approval of the committee’s recommendation. Both Labour and SNP members voted in favour, with Alba MPs being the only Scottish MPs to vote against. A recall petition is therefore triggered, with a by-election if 10% of the constituency electorate vote for it.

The action of the Labour MPs is understandable as they see this as the opportunity to revive their flagging fortunes in Scotland. Party advantage always trumps common decency.

But what’s the excuse for the 14 SNP MPs who voted in favour. There’s unlikely to be any party advantage as the SNP are unlikely to win the by-election. So why? Did they think they were doing the ‘right’ thing? (don’t make me laugh), or was this a case of Nicola Sturgeon’s spite being carried forward despite the change of leader? Does Sturgeon still wield that much influence that they were too afraid to go against her wishes? Or was this another case of acting despite the likely party disadvantage. Not the first time this has happened, of course. I am reminded of the party refusing to support Neale Hanvey (another strong independence supporter) in the 2019 election despite the opportunity to remove the then shadow Scottish Secretary of State (Neale won anyway as an independent without party support).

Here are the 14 SNP MPs who put Nicola Sturgeon’s spite above common decency, failing to support an ex-colleague, despite several of them probably in part owing their position to Margaret Ferrier’s campaigning efforts.

We’ll all remember these names next year when the UK general election comes along and we’ll be pleased to offer them as much support as they offered Margaret Ferrier, a thoroughly decent and hard-working MP who in no way deserves what she is going through.

The rotten corpse of the Labour Party in Scotland speaks from the grave

Posted on May 31, 2023June 13, 2023 by Angry Weegie

Last weekend brought what must be one of the worst examples of political canvassing in Scotland as the Labour party continued running an election campaign when no election has been called. Labour’s attempts to generate excitement for an election which may never happen has been going on for weeks now, with them spending vast amounts of time, effort and money on a campaign that doesn’t yet exist and may yet never exist if the Tories in Westminster get their own way.

If Labour want to spend their money on non-existing elections, that’s up to them, as long as they stick to the bounds of decency and propriety. However, on this occasion, they definitely crossed the line.

Labour sent out an election communication to constituents in Rutherglen and Hamilton West pretending to be a personal letter from a local doctor using a handwriting font, presumably to try to fool people into believing it was a genuine personal letter. The imprint at the end of page one of the leaflet (let’s call it for what it actually is), which political parties are obliged to add to election material, gives away the source and the reason for it being sent out.

Note that so-called Scottish Labour couldn’t even bring themselves to support a Scottish printing business. The leaflet was printed in Wales. The imprint is only on the first page of the leaflet, hoping, no doubt, that people won’t notice it.

The local doctor, Dr. Richard Watson, the alleged creator of the leaflet, is a Labour party member, one of the few remaining Labour party members in the constituency, but at no time in the leaflet is he identified as such. (Am I the only one who has difficulty in referring him as Dr, Watson, bringing back memories of the much nicer Dr, Watson in the Sherlock Holmes stories.) As an aside, he was recently in the press for getting punched by one of his patients. While no one will condone violence against a doctor, or anyone else, his reputation is such that some may be surprised that it’s only happened once.

The leaflet reveals that the Labour party’s master plan for regaining the seat is to trash the reputation of the incumbent MP, Margaret Ferrier. They are helped in this by Commons regulations which prohibit Margaret from challenging Labour’s nasty slurs, but allow Labour free hand in making them. Slurs are all Labour have as they don’t have any Scottish policies, policy making being reserved to London, and, in any case, London’s policies are virtually indistinguishable from the Tories and wouldn’t go down well with many Scottish voters. So best not to tell anybody.

Is this leaflet, piling more stress on Margaret Ferrier, the action of a doctor, whose Hippocratic oath requires him to do no harm, or is it the action of an uncaring politician who will do or say anything, no matter what harm it does, as long as his candidate benefits. Is there not a conflict here that needs to be investigated? I wonder what the General Medical Council’s view would be?

Let’s look at the leaflet in more detail.

We’ll ignore the first part of the first page, which is just Watson telling us all how good he was during the pandemic and how he thinks he never made a mistake (would it be churlish to say he’s just not admitting to any mistakes?), because he apparently believes that making a mistake, no matter what else you’ve done, means the end of everything. We know Margaret made a mistake. I won’t go through the background to it as I’ve already covered it here for anyone who hasn’t read it, but should it be the end of everything, especially as she’s already been punished, much more severely than any other MP who broke the rules.

I’ll just make a couple of comments.

Average daily new cases and admissions to hospital because of Covid at the last week of September, 2020, when the incident took place, were low at 538 and 35 respectively, compared with (eg.) 2,352 cases and 201 admissions the following January (from Scottish Government statistics). As a GP, Watson would know that, so his statement is at least an exaggeration.

The leaflet was sent out last Thursday, before the planned Commons vote the next day. The statement that Margaret was suspended for 30 days is therefore incorrect (the vote wasn’t held because of lack of MPs), just wishful thinking on Labour’s part.

The second page is just party political nonsense. Labour’s replacement “lives here and cares about our community”, so what so does Margaret.

“While Margaret was breaking rules”, really, when we are talking about one incident. He was “trying to support his students in impossible situations”. “Impossible”, does that mean he didn’t succeed?

However, there is one sentence in the leaflet that I agree with. “We deserve to have a functioning MP.”, because that’s what we have now. Margaret is a well-liked, hard-working MP who helped many of her constituents during the pandemic, a fact to which many would attest. She has not “failed to represent the people of Rutherglen and Hamilton West “, but there’s every likelihood that replacing her with a Labour party stooge would do just that. People stopped voting for Labour because they realised they were useless, all promises and no delivery, and this nasty leaflet is unlikely to change many minds.

Labour are calling for a “fresh voice”. Remember what the Labour party brought to Scotland when they were in charge in Westminster. They brought PFI, a funding scheme for building projects which forced local councils to pay vastly more for schools, hospitals and other public buildings than they were worth and is arguably the main reason for the funding pressures councils are in today, because they are still paying for Labour mistakes as they will be for the next 20 to 25 years. Remember also when Labour returned £1.5Bn to Westminster, because they really couldn’t think of anything to spend the money on. Still, it got Jack McConnell a peerage, so it was money well (not) spent.

So, let’s look at the person Labour are proposing to replace the hard-working incumbent, Margaret Ferrier. Even local Labour activists didn’t want him. He was imposed by the party in preference to four other local possible candidates and many activists have said they won’t support him. An admittedly left-wing view of his anointment can be seen here.

Remember too that Labour want to deny the people of Scotland the ability to decide on their form of government. The Labour party died in Scotland following their alliance with the Tories in the Better Together campaign in the independence referendum which showed clearly that they were just another English party with little or no interest in Scotland. Nothing that’s happened since them has made anyone rethink that view.

Is this the fresh voice the people of Rutherglen and Hamilton West want and need, a bunch of unionist chancers whose only policy to support the people is to try to trash the reputation of a well-liked, hard-working local MP?

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