Last weekend, the Scotsman quoted unnamed Labour sources as confirming that Scottish Labour was effectively abandoning most Labour-held seats in Scotland by deciding to name just twelve seats it was trying to “rescue” from the SNP onslaught. The last time Labour did as badly as this in Scotland was 1931 when it won only 7 seats (though […]
Posts under ‘British Regions/Nations’
Minority government, Scotland and the grilling of Ed Miliband
May 1st, 2015 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.What did you think of last night’s grilling of the main party leaders? As much as I detest Dave and his Nick Clegg mini-me, I think they performed creditably by the criteria one judges media appearances. The Prime Minister was polished and a little bit sweaty, but his question dodging body swerves saw him through […]
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The new sectarian politics of Scotland and the demise of working class unity
Apr 30th, 2015 by Jon Lansman.Yesterday, canvasing the streets of Stevenston in North Ayrshire, a former Labour voter told me that the only way forward was for Scottish Labour and the SNP to merge. He meant it not as advice but as explanation of why he could not vote Labour. Some are hostile to Labour, others just confused. And even many of those […]
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What the SNP says versus what the SNP does
Apr 30th, 2015 by Manuel Cortes.Last week, when I spoke at the STUC Congress against the SNP putting both Scotrail and the Caledonian Sleeper in the hands of privateers, I said that actions speak far louder than words. Let’s face it, the SNP hardly misses an opportunity to argue that the public sector should play a key role in delivering […]
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Is Willie Bain going to be the last man left standing for Labour in Scotland?
Apr 28th, 2015 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.You’re in a secure military facility and there’s an intercontinental ballistic missile, inbound. The anti-missile batteries have fired and missed. Electronic counter measures cannot dissuade it from its course. You glance helplessly at the blip on the radar getting closer and closer, hoping the blast doors are thick enough, that the concrete bunker is buried […]
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It is Sturgeon who would take Scotland out the EU
Apr 9th, 2015 by Andy Newman.The Scottish TV leader debates have been revealing. Where the SNP have had to defend their actual government record, Nicola Sturgeon has come over as tetchy, and the audience skeptical. However, the point that gripped me was that Scotland’s First Minister talked of a London Tory government taking Scotland out of the EU, against the will […]
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Are the English media fawning over the SNP?
Apr 8th, 2015 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.Are they? Nicky Tyrone seems to think so. Well, to be absolutely accurate he’s talking about the left wing media here. Continuing our exacting theme, while his piece asks about “the left media’s worship of the SNP“, he qualifies this by noting “the slightly pro-SNP slant of the left of centre media“. Idolatry vs a […]
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The rise of Nicola Sturgeon
Apr 6th, 2015 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.Alex who? I always thought the Tories ‘Vote Labour, Get Salmond‘ schtick was as weak as it was pitiful. It’s all very well photo shopping an Ed Milli-band in the former first minister’s oversized coat pocket, but when far fewer people south of the border know Salmond and he’s no longer calling the shots? Well, after […]
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There is nothing radical about little Englandism
Mar 21st, 2015 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.I’m not an avid follower of Paul Kingsnorth’s work, but I do remember his One No, Many Yeses. This was a contribution – some may say cash-in – to the burgeoning library on the internationalist, anti-capitalist, and fashionably networky movement of sundry NGOs, anarchists and occasional Trots of the early part of the last decade. […]
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Scotland: the patriot game’s a bogey
Mar 8th, 2015 by Guest.by the collective editorial team of Uncivil Society In the lead-up to the General Election, Scottish politics is constrained within the stifling discourse of who best represents the national interest. Whilst SNP billboards imagine a House of Commons complete with tartan benches, Jim Murphy has foisted a commitment to patriotism and the service of the nation […]
