Saturday, March 1, 2014

Sagacity on Saturday : What Blairites mean when they talk about 'decentralisation'

"In the Soviet Union, whatever the Constitution said, in practice the constituent republics were run from Moscow and by local henchmen loyal to it. This is clearly Mr Blair's model of how Wales and Scotland are to be run after May 1999. Hence Alun Michael and the decision to people the Scottish Parliament only with leadership loyalists. The problem for Mr Blair is that the best conditions for the successful application of democratic centralism are a cowed, defeated nation and a supine press. This is also the challenge to the Scottish people and their media."

Tim Williams, writing in 1998, with a remarkably clear-sighted characterisation of how Tony Blair envisaged devolution working - basically as a rebranded version of the old Scottish Office, with London still indirectly pulling the strings via internal Labour party channels.  And he got his wish too, if only for the first eight years.  Let's have a quick straw poll - do you think the Scottish press have met the challenge that Williams laid down for them a decade-and-a-half ago?  (That may not be an entirely serious question.)

8 comments:

  1. Well our Media failed the test, the test of defending the Scottish People.

    They will pay the ultimate price and the clock is ticking faster and louder by the day.

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  2. 'Supine' disnae quite catch the malign intentionality o the Scottish media at times. They've gaun beyond supine tae 'enablin'...

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  3. I am reduced to taking the House ads paper from the supermarket to use in my wood stove3.

    I just flat out refuse to buy any newspaper.

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  4. Tell me again how that worked out for them

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  5. An English perspective.

    http://www.withoutthestate.com/panchromatica/2007/05/natioanl_parlia.html

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  6. Ian

    It might have worked in 2007 but vested interests ensured that it would not be considered.

    Today it is too late.

    They just go on and on, making the same mistakes, thinking they can get away with it, ad finitum.

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  7. Sagacity on Saturday... ?

    I hand it to you. It beats Snaps on Saturday for style... and it's even better than Wisdom on Wednesday...

    One to you!

    As for your straw poll...

    Bwa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

    Does that answer your question?

    :)

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  8. With a couple of notable exceptions, the Scottish media simply mirrors what we read in the London based newspapers.
    But well done to George Kerevan on today's 'Sunday Politics Scotland'.
    He simply said what we've all known for two years - the London media (all of it) is totally and often viciously unionist.
    Even the 'left of centre' Blairite Guardian has abandoned it's long-held principles when it comes to Yes Scotland (or 'the SNP' as they all call it)
    I'd like to see more genuine high profile social democrats saying the same thing, and demanding that the media explains itself.

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