I may think Argentina is flogging a dead horse with its endless pursuit of sovereignty over the Falkland Islands, but as a Scottish nationalist I can hardly blame anyone in Buenos Aires who might be feeling a tad cynical about the UK government's reaction to the news that the islands' own government will be holding a constitutional referendum. After all, there does seem to be a slight inconsistency here, both in tone and substance...
London's reaction to the news that Scotland has decided to hold a referendum on its constitutional future :
'Decided'? What do you mean 'decided'? Decisions are things that happen in London.
(Pauses for brief sulk.)
Oh, if you absolutely must. But you'll certainly need our guidance in framing the question - you Scots can barely string a coherent sentence together when left to your own devices. And why on earth do you need to leave time for a proper debate? Why not hold the vote next Tuesday?
London's reaction to the news that the Falkland Islands have decided to hold a referendum on their constitutional future :
What a splendid idea! Next year, you say? Oh absolutely, the longer people have to think about a decision they've already taken, the better. And you certainly don't need our help sorting out the question - whatever you come up with is bound to be first-rate.
Marvellous stuff, chaps! The world must hear your voices!
* * *
Except, of course, that it isn't such a first-rate idea, and in fact it's a massive missed opportunity. Comparisons have been made with Gibraltar's referendum on sovereignty ten years ago, but that misses the point entirely. The Gibraltar vote wasn't purely a stunt. Spain might not have been any more receptive to the principle of self-determination than Argentina is likely to be, but Spain was not really the target of the exercise. At the time, the British government was attempting to go over the heads of the people of Gibraltar and reach a deal on joint sovereignty. The referendum result troubled enough consciences in the UK to effectively kill that idea stone dead.
There is no such target for the Falklands referendum, because the UK government is not trying to sell the Falklands down the river, and there is absolutely no prospect of it doing so. The BBC's John Simpson pointed out the other day that most Latin American countries have now been converted to the curious principle that anything short of an Argentinian colonisation of the islands would represent a continuing 'relic of colonialism', and suggested that this new consensus might have been enough to exert pressure on the UK to give up sovereignty if it hadn't been for Argentina's recent drift away from its Western orbit towards a more pro-Venezuela/Cuba stance. But that simply isn't the case - London wouldn't have given an inch on the Falklands issue no matter how many countries were lined up in Argentina's corner. That's partly because the islanders' case for being able to retain the British link if they so choose is watertight (and I say that as someone who loathes British imperialism), but it's mainly because the 1982 military victory has become so important to Britain's self-image. It wouldn't have been any kind of psychological trauma to betray the islanders prior to 1982, but it certainly would be now.
So if the referendum isn't going to impress anyone in Argentina, and if it doesn't even need to impress anyone in the UK, and if we all know what the result is going to be anyway, what is it actually supposed to achieve? The islanders do have a problem to resolve - but it isn't the one Gibraltar faced in 2002. They needn't worry about being stripped of their right to remain British, but they do need to worry about bullying from neighbouring countries that could make day-to-day life in the Falklands increasingly problematic. So an intelligent use for a referendum would not be to ask a question we already know the answer to, but instead to open up a meaningful debate about how the constitutional relationship with the UK could change in such a way as to finally remove the 'colonial' label, which is what provides cover for the bully-boy tactics.
Realistically, the Falklands are too small to be an independent state, which leaves two potential ways forward. The first is full integration into the UK. It's too often forgotten in this debate that the Argentinian jibe about the anachronism of Britain retaining South American territory could also apply with bells on to France, which actually retains a significant portion of the South American mainland. But the difference is that French Guiana has been scrupulously decolonised under one of the options specified by the UN, with the territory being fully integrated into the French state. It's a bizarre and probably unhealthy situation that the European Union has a seemingly permanent land border with Brazil, but few seem to question it. A more sensible solution would be a free association agreement of the sort that the Cook Islands have with New Zealand. Under this model, the Falklands would become sovereign but would freely enter into an agreement to allow the UK to handle its foreign affairs and defence. In practical terms there would be little change in the islands' governance, but it would have a huge impact in terms of entrenching the islanders' place on the moral high ground.
But it seems the referendum will do nothing whatever to further that necessary debate. And it won't do anything else either. What a waste.
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Man of a thousand faces, every one the same.
Our old chum Tom Harris (affectionately known to some as "Tom4Scotland", "Admin", "Devo Max" and "Shhh...it is I, LeClerc") has returned to a familiar theme on Twitter -
"The Tories used to be the only party in Scotland that opposed devolution. Now the SNP is the only one that does."
This notion that the SNP are currently 'opposed' to devolution, but used to be in favour, is a rather curious one. As far as I can see, the SNP's position now is entirely the same as it was two or three decades ago - namely that devolution is infinitely preferable to direct rule from London, but that independence would be better still. By definition, therefore, if Tom believes that this stance can somehow be characterised as 'anti-devolution', the SNP must also have been anti-devolution in the 1980s and 1990s - including, of course, when they campaigned alongside Labour and the Liberal Democrats for a Yes vote in the 1997 devolution referendum!
But Tom isn't entirely alone in adopting this sophisticated line of thinking. The legendarily free-thinking and non-partisan journalist Kevin Maguire has for some time now been routinely referring to the pro-independence campaign as the "anti-devo campaign". (Seriously, I'm not making this up - he actually calls it that. This is an actual thing that he does.)
So as a public service, I thought it might be interesting to compare the stances of the "pro-devo" and "anti-devo" campaigns (as defined by Harris and Maguire) in respect of a number of key policy areas, and whether or not they should be devolved from Westminster to Scotland. The results are somewhat startling.
Pensions :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes pensions should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes pensions should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Broadcasting :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes broadcasting should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes broadcasting should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Abortion law :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes abortion law should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes abortion law should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Employment law :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes employment law should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes employment law should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Hmmm. It may just be a coincidence, but there does seem to be a pattern emerging here - the "anti-devo" side seems to be considerably more keen on devolution than the "pro-devo" side is. And I don't know about you, but I find that life is never more thrilling than when I stumble across a new and impenetrable paradox like that.
So what's going on? It may be that we need look no further than the notoriously subtle differences between standard English and its little-known offshoot Harris-speak. I gather that in Harris-speak, the word 'devolution' has a considerably narrower meaning than the one we English-speakers attribute to it. It's instead an exclusively 'good' word, in the same way that 'honey', 'children', 'kitten', and 'unelected peer' are all good words. And just as English-speakers recognise a clear distinction between good cholesterol and bad cholesterol, and between good bacteria and bad bacteria, Harris-speakers recognise a distinction between Good Devolution and Bad Devolution, with the word 'devolution' itself applying only to the former. This reflects a widespread belief in the Harris culture that Bad Devolution represents a frightening 'going beyond', a kind of 'anti-devolution', unleashing forces that will destroy the Goodness of devolution. Therefore the Harris-speak meaning of 'devolution' categorically excludes any power devolved to Scotland that is baleful or inappropriate, such as control of our own natural resources. Instead, this type of devolution is covered by a unique term that has no English counterpart and is generally held to be untranslatable : "I Can't Believe It's Not Independence".
This is clearly problematical for native English speakers, who are used to the much simpler idea that devolution refers to any power devolved from Westminster to Scotland within the framework of the United Kingdom. It would of course be easier if there was a straightforward way of spotting the difference between powers that fall within the Harris-speak definition of 'Devolution' and those that are 'I Can't Believe It's Not Independence' - but I'm afraid I can't help you there. It's a bit like the 'three-in-one' concept of the Holy Trinity - it does of course make perfect sense that the devolution of health should be considered Good and that the devolution of broadcasting is Bad, but we mere mortals will never understand why. And it is futile to try. We must simply accept, For Thus Is It Written.
"The Tories used to be the only party in Scotland that opposed devolution. Now the SNP is the only one that does."
This notion that the SNP are currently 'opposed' to devolution, but used to be in favour, is a rather curious one. As far as I can see, the SNP's position now is entirely the same as it was two or three decades ago - namely that devolution is infinitely preferable to direct rule from London, but that independence would be better still. By definition, therefore, if Tom believes that this stance can somehow be characterised as 'anti-devolution', the SNP must also have been anti-devolution in the 1980s and 1990s - including, of course, when they campaigned alongside Labour and the Liberal Democrats for a Yes vote in the 1997 devolution referendum!
But Tom isn't entirely alone in adopting this sophisticated line of thinking. The legendarily free-thinking and non-partisan journalist Kevin Maguire has for some time now been routinely referring to the pro-independence campaign as the "anti-devo campaign". (Seriously, I'm not making this up - he actually calls it that. This is an actual thing that he does.)
So as a public service, I thought it might be interesting to compare the stances of the "pro-devo" and "anti-devo" campaigns (as defined by Harris and Maguire) in respect of a number of key policy areas, and whether or not they should be devolved from Westminster to Scotland. The results are somewhat startling.
Pensions :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes pensions should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes pensions should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Broadcasting :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes broadcasting should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes broadcasting should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Abortion law :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes abortion law should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes abortion law should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Employment law :
"Pro-devo" campaign believes employment law should be...RESERVED TO WESTMINSTER.
"Anti-devo" campaign believes employment law should be...DEVOLVED TO SCOTLAND.
Hmmm. It may just be a coincidence, but there does seem to be a pattern emerging here - the "anti-devo" side seems to be considerably more keen on devolution than the "pro-devo" side is. And I don't know about you, but I find that life is never more thrilling than when I stumble across a new and impenetrable paradox like that.
So what's going on? It may be that we need look no further than the notoriously subtle differences between standard English and its little-known offshoot Harris-speak. I gather that in Harris-speak, the word 'devolution' has a considerably narrower meaning than the one we English-speakers attribute to it. It's instead an exclusively 'good' word, in the same way that 'honey', 'children', 'kitten', and 'unelected peer' are all good words. And just as English-speakers recognise a clear distinction between good cholesterol and bad cholesterol, and between good bacteria and bad bacteria, Harris-speakers recognise a distinction between Good Devolution and Bad Devolution, with the word 'devolution' itself applying only to the former. This reflects a widespread belief in the Harris culture that Bad Devolution represents a frightening 'going beyond', a kind of 'anti-devolution', unleashing forces that will destroy the Goodness of devolution. Therefore the Harris-speak meaning of 'devolution' categorically excludes any power devolved to Scotland that is baleful or inappropriate, such as control of our own natural resources. Instead, this type of devolution is covered by a unique term that has no English counterpart and is generally held to be untranslatable : "I Can't Believe It's Not Independence".
This is clearly problematical for native English speakers, who are used to the much simpler idea that devolution refers to any power devolved from Westminster to Scotland within the framework of the United Kingdom. It would of course be easier if there was a straightforward way of spotting the difference between powers that fall within the Harris-speak definition of 'Devolution' and those that are 'I Can't Believe It's Not Independence' - but I'm afraid I can't help you there. It's a bit like the 'three-in-one' concept of the Holy Trinity - it does of course make perfect sense that the devolution of health should be considered Good and that the devolution of broadcasting is Bad, but we mere mortals will never understand why. And it is futile to try. We must simply accept, For Thus Is It Written.
Sunday, June 10, 2012
The intrinsic value of constitutional referenda
After all the Jubilee 'excitement' last week, I speculated that it would be a deeply traumatic experience for some royalists if they ever had to go through a referendum on retaining the monarchy, in spite of the likelihood that they would win handsomely. But I've been thinking about that some more, and it occurs to me that the mere fact of a referendum itself would mean - in a sense - that the monarchists had already lost. After all, the principle they hold most dear is that the monarchy is a fact of life, something that everyone accepts is 'out of bounds' for political discussion. The minority of dissenters who do exist can be rationalised away by pretending that they are much smaller in number than they truly are (the media help enormously in that respect), and are killjoys with perhaps just a hint of mental instability about them. As a royalist put it to me after I condemned the shouting down of a republican protest : "Of course these people have a right to protest, but the rest of us have a right to point out they are plonkers." Really? Wanting a say over who is your Head of State in the 21st Century makes you a plonker?
A referendum would change that narrative forever, despite the likely result. Elizabeth Windsor would be our Head of State not because forces that mere humans dare not interfere with had willed it so, but because we as a people had decided by democratic means that she is preferable to the alternatives. OK, that process would be ad hoc and less than satisfactory, but it's in the nature of any democratic decision that it can be revisited in the future, and everyone would know that. Just think how different the coverage of the Jubilee would have been had such a referendum taken place over the last few years. It would have been unthinkable for 'historians' to go on TV and treat the people as passive (albeit uniformly appreciative) spectators of a grand, ongoing, centuries-old story that the royals are free to shape for themselves. It would have been unthinkable to exclude all anti-monarchist views on the grounds that the crown is an 'apolitical' institution which everyone must unite around. There would have had to be time devoted to the views of the minority of people who voted against the political choice of monarchy, and there would have had to be sober analysis of how the propaganda value of the Jubilee spectacle was being used by the monarchy to win favour with a people who were now demonstrably its democratic masters.
To some extent, the independence referendum will have a similar intrinsic value, regardless of the outcome. Although independence is plainly not regarded as "out of bounds" for the democratic process, that is a relatively recent development, and even now the principle of self-determination is not universally accepted - there are still neanderthals like Alastair Campbell who believe that Scotland can quite legitimately be held captive within the UK if the English don't want us to go. So even if the worst happens and there is a No vote, the referendum will be a confirmational moment, one that will represent a defeat for those who would much rather file the 1707 treaty away as some kind of 'eternal union' that the Scots as a people cannot reconsider at a time of their own choosing.
One parallel with the monarchy debate is that there are still some people out there (mostly but not exclusively south of the border) who interpret opposition to the British union as a form of 'immaturity'. A few years ago, there was an item on Alan Titchmarsh's ITV show about independence. Titchmarsh reacted to Angus MacNeil's arguments with an impressively varied repertoire of incredulous facial expressions, and then wrapped up by saying with an exasperated air "let's see if we can all get along for the rest of the programme, shall we?". 'We', of course, referred to the happy British family - or rather a family that would be happy if it wasn't for the children throwing temper tantrums and electing SNP governments. That mindset will certainly be challenged by a referendum campaign that accords independence parity of esteem with the 'happy family' fantasy.
Another parallel is that there are many institutions which treat the goodness of British national unity as a 'given', and don't believe that this in any way detracts from their political neutrality. Regardless of the outcome, the referendum process will force those institutions to make a long-overdue choice - they can be pro-union, or they can be politically neutral, but they can't be both.
A referendum would change that narrative forever, despite the likely result. Elizabeth Windsor would be our Head of State not because forces that mere humans dare not interfere with had willed it so, but because we as a people had decided by democratic means that she is preferable to the alternatives. OK, that process would be ad hoc and less than satisfactory, but it's in the nature of any democratic decision that it can be revisited in the future, and everyone would know that. Just think how different the coverage of the Jubilee would have been had such a referendum taken place over the last few years. It would have been unthinkable for 'historians' to go on TV and treat the people as passive (albeit uniformly appreciative) spectators of a grand, ongoing, centuries-old story that the royals are free to shape for themselves. It would have been unthinkable to exclude all anti-monarchist views on the grounds that the crown is an 'apolitical' institution which everyone must unite around. There would have had to be time devoted to the views of the minority of people who voted against the political choice of monarchy, and there would have had to be sober analysis of how the propaganda value of the Jubilee spectacle was being used by the monarchy to win favour with a people who were now demonstrably its democratic masters.
To some extent, the independence referendum will have a similar intrinsic value, regardless of the outcome. Although independence is plainly not regarded as "out of bounds" for the democratic process, that is a relatively recent development, and even now the principle of self-determination is not universally accepted - there are still neanderthals like Alastair Campbell who believe that Scotland can quite legitimately be held captive within the UK if the English don't want us to go. So even if the worst happens and there is a No vote, the referendum will be a confirmational moment, one that will represent a defeat for those who would much rather file the 1707 treaty away as some kind of 'eternal union' that the Scots as a people cannot reconsider at a time of their own choosing.
One parallel with the monarchy debate is that there are still some people out there (mostly but not exclusively south of the border) who interpret opposition to the British union as a form of 'immaturity'. A few years ago, there was an item on Alan Titchmarsh's ITV show about independence. Titchmarsh reacted to Angus MacNeil's arguments with an impressively varied repertoire of incredulous facial expressions, and then wrapped up by saying with an exasperated air "let's see if we can all get along for the rest of the programme, shall we?". 'We', of course, referred to the happy British family - or rather a family that would be happy if it wasn't for the children throwing temper tantrums and electing SNP governments. That mindset will certainly be challenged by a referendum campaign that accords independence parity of esteem with the 'happy family' fantasy.
Another parallel is that there are many institutions which treat the goodness of British national unity as a 'given', and don't believe that this in any way detracts from their political neutrality. Regardless of the outcome, the referendum process will force those institutions to make a long-overdue choice - they can be pro-union, or they can be politically neutral, but they can't be both.
Friday, June 8, 2012
Euro 2012 prediction
As always seems to happen at moments like this, my sister presented me with a prediction form for her work sweepstake a few days ago. I must say I find football predictions a lot more challenging than rugby, and to make matters worse, exact scores were required. I came up with a potentially very silly theory that the way to maximise the chances of getting any given match score right is to always predict 0-0, 1-0, 1-1, 2-0, 2-1 or 2-2. Obviously many games will have much higher scores, but I reckoned the chances of hitting on precisely the right numbers on those occasions are so slim that it's hardly worth the bother of trying - whereas the chances of being right about a 2-1 or a 0-0 scoreline are a bit healthier.
Anyway, this is what I came up with -
Group A
Poland 1-1 Greece
Russia 1-0 Czech Republic
Greece 0-1 Czech Republic
Poland 0-0 Russia
Czech Republic 1-1 Poland
Greece 0-2 Russia
Table :
Russia 7
Czech Republic 4
Poland 3
Greece 1
Group B
Netherlands 2-0 Denmark
Germany 2-1 Portugal
Denmark 1-2 Portugal
Netherlands 1-2 Germany
Portugal 0-1 Netherlands
Denmark 0-1 Germany
Table :
Germany 9
Netherlands 6
Portugal 3
Denmark 0
Group C
Spain 2-0 Italy
Ireland 1-1 Croatia
Italy 1-1 Croatia
Spain 2-0 Ireland
Croatia 1-2 Spain
Italy 1-0 Ireland
Table :
Spain 9
Italy 4
Croatia 2
Ireland 1
Group D
France 0-1 England
Ukraine 1-1 Sweden
Ukraine 0-0 France
Sweden 0-1 England
England 1-0 Ukraine
Sweden 1-2 France
Table :
England 9
France 4
Ukraine 2
Sweden 1
Quarter-finals :
Russia 0-2 Netherlands
Spain 2-0 France
Germany 2-0 Czech Republic
England 1-0 Italy
Semi-finals :
Netherlands 0-2 Spain
Germany 2-1 England
Final :
Spain 2-1 Germany
Anyway, this is what I came up with -
Group A
Poland 1-1 Greece
Russia 1-0 Czech Republic
Greece 0-1 Czech Republic
Poland 0-0 Russia
Czech Republic 1-1 Poland
Greece 0-2 Russia
Table :
Russia 7
Czech Republic 4
Poland 3
Greece 1
Group B
Netherlands 2-0 Denmark
Germany 2-1 Portugal
Denmark 1-2 Portugal
Netherlands 1-2 Germany
Portugal 0-1 Netherlands
Denmark 0-1 Germany
Table :
Germany 9
Netherlands 6
Portugal 3
Denmark 0
Group C
Spain 2-0 Italy
Ireland 1-1 Croatia
Italy 1-1 Croatia
Spain 2-0 Ireland
Croatia 1-2 Spain
Italy 1-0 Ireland
Table :
Spain 9
Italy 4
Croatia 2
Ireland 1
Group D
France 0-1 England
Ukraine 1-1 Sweden
Ukraine 0-0 France
Sweden 0-1 England
England 1-0 Ukraine
Sweden 1-2 France
Table :
England 9
France 4
Ukraine 2
Sweden 1
Quarter-finals :
Russia 0-2 Netherlands
Spain 2-0 France
Germany 2-0 Czech Republic
England 1-0 Italy
Semi-finals :
Netherlands 0-2 Spain
Germany 2-1 England
Final :
Spain 2-1 Germany
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
Why don't we rub it out and start it again?
It's been quite a long time since I last spread my wings and wrote a guest article for another site. (Believe it or not, I think my last one was for Political Betting!) Manuel from The Eurovision Times was kind enough to ask if I'd be interested in contributing to the site, and you can read my first article HERE. He also asked if I could think of a witty or distinctive name for my column, but after quite a bit of thought all I could come up with was something that Bob Monkhouse almost certainly never said - "In bingo lingo, it's Kelly's Eye..."
The weekend when democratic dissent became "bad manners"
So it's over at last. I think what I found most troubling about the Jubilee Weekend was the reports of republican protesters being shouted down and told to go away, on the grounds that they were "spoiling people's day". It suddenly dawned on me what it is about monarchism that makes it entirely different from other democratic political beliefs - it depends for its sustenance on the fiction that everyone, without exception, agrees with it. How else can we explain just how absurdly upset monarchists became at even the tiniest, vaguest reminder that there is an alternative to their own view? It also perhaps explains why the broadcast media, which usually makes at least some efforts to provide balance, shamelessly turned itself into an unalloyed propaganda organ over the weekend ("Britain is absolutely united"), and banished all but the most slavishly loyal monarchist views during their coverage - maybe they felt they would be "letting down" or unduly "upsetting" the majority of their viewers by reminding them that democratic dissent extends to the question of how the Head of State should be selected.
Heaven only knows how these people would cope with a referendum on the monarchy. Opinion polls currently suggest that a comfortable 70% would vote for retention, with only 15% opposed - but simply posing the question and countenancing the inevitability of a non-unanimous verdict would, I suspect, be enough to make many monarchists feel violently ill. Oh, and the campaign - how grubby.
* * *
This from the Herald raised a smile -
"Following talks between Mr Salmond and BBC chairman Lord Patten, who met the First Minister at Holyrood earlier this year, it has been reported that guidelines will be issued to the broadcaster's staff on how to avoid terms favoured by the independence and pro-Union camps.
Nationalist politicians have complained about the use of "separation" instead of independence.
Phrases favoured by the SNP such as "normal European state" are also likely to be discouraged."
Which is a bit like saying "14-18 year old males will be told not to drink Buckfast - and are also likely to be discouraged from attending Barry Manilow concerts". The latter is a worthy precaution, but almost certainly superfluous.
Heaven only knows how these people would cope with a referendum on the monarchy. Opinion polls currently suggest that a comfortable 70% would vote for retention, with only 15% opposed - but simply posing the question and countenancing the inevitability of a non-unanimous verdict would, I suspect, be enough to make many monarchists feel violently ill. Oh, and the campaign - how grubby.
* * *
This from the Herald raised a smile -
"Following talks between Mr Salmond and BBC chairman Lord Patten, who met the First Minister at Holyrood earlier this year, it has been reported that guidelines will be issued to the broadcaster's staff on how to avoid terms favoured by the independence and pro-Union camps.
Nationalist politicians have complained about the use of "separation" instead of independence.
Phrases favoured by the SNP such as "normal European state" are also likely to be discouraged."
Which is a bit like saying "14-18 year old males will be told not to drink Buckfast - and are also likely to be discouraged from attending Barry Manilow concerts". The latter is a worthy precaution, but almost certainly superfluous.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
The No campaign's poll backfires : full figures show commanding SNP lead on Holyrood constituency vote
Many thanks to Marcia on the previous thread for alerting me to the proper publication of the notorious "Alistair Darling poll", the full details of which were kept secret for several days, and weren't exactly shouted from the rooftops even when they were published - we can now see why. Here are the full figures for Holyrood and Westminster voting intention...
Holyrood constituency vote :
SNP 43% (+3)
Labour 35% (-1)
Conservatives 12% (-)
Liberal Democrats 4% (-4)
Others 5% (+1)
Holyrood regional list vote :
SNP 36% (-2)
Labour 34% (+2)
Conservatives 13% (-)
Greens 6% (-)
Liberal Democrats 4% (-3)
Others 6% (+2)
Westminster vote :
Labour 40% (-2)
SNP 35% (+5)
Conservatives 14% (-3)
Liberal Democrats 5% (-2)
Others 6% (+2)
The most important thing to say is that the fieldwork took place well after the local elections, so the SNP's significant advance on two out of the three counts (and solid result on the other) postdates the rather desperate attempt of certain sections of the media to portray the SNP's historic victory in the local elections as some kind of 'setback'. Evidently that coordinated effort has gained absolutely zero traction with the public - back to the drawing-board for Cochrane and his ilk. Probably the most impressive showing for the SNP is on the Westminster figures - 35% is a full five points higher than their all-time best result in a UK general election in October 1974.
The other thing that leaps out is that the Scottish Lib Dems are in (as Labour's high heid yin on Glasgow City Council might put it) a dehhhh-sperate, dehhhh-sperate position. Heaven only knows how bad things would be if they didn't have such a popular leader.
You might be thinking to yourself - these figures for the SNP are great, but isn't the only thing that matters for now the level of support for independence? Not quite true, actually - it hasn't been mentioned much, but there is still one more test of public opinion to go before the expected referendum date of autumn 2014. The European elections will be held in June of that year.
While I'm thinking of it, one other thing that I noticed when browsing through the YouGov archives was this highly encouraging finding on public attitudes to capital punishment...
The death penalty for murder :
Would like to see return - 46%
Would not like to see return - 43%
I've never believed that majority opinion can overrule the most fundamental of individual human rights (ie. the right to life). But it just goes to show that if a referendum was ever held, it wouldn't be the foregone conclusion that some people assume.
Holyrood constituency vote :
SNP 43% (+3)
Labour 35% (-1)
Conservatives 12% (-)
Liberal Democrats 4% (-4)
Others 5% (+1)
Holyrood regional list vote :
SNP 36% (-2)
Labour 34% (+2)
Conservatives 13% (-)
Greens 6% (-)
Liberal Democrats 4% (-3)
Others 6% (+2)
Westminster vote :
Labour 40% (-2)
SNP 35% (+5)
Conservatives 14% (-3)
Liberal Democrats 5% (-2)
Others 6% (+2)
The most important thing to say is that the fieldwork took place well after the local elections, so the SNP's significant advance on two out of the three counts (and solid result on the other) postdates the rather desperate attempt of certain sections of the media to portray the SNP's historic victory in the local elections as some kind of 'setback'. Evidently that coordinated effort has gained absolutely zero traction with the public - back to the drawing-board for Cochrane and his ilk. Probably the most impressive showing for the SNP is on the Westminster figures - 35% is a full five points higher than their all-time best result in a UK general election in October 1974.
The other thing that leaps out is that the Scottish Lib Dems are in (as Labour's high heid yin on Glasgow City Council might put it) a dehhhh-sperate, dehhhh-sperate position. Heaven only knows how bad things would be if they didn't have such a popular leader.
You might be thinking to yourself - these figures for the SNP are great, but isn't the only thing that matters for now the level of support for independence? Not quite true, actually - it hasn't been mentioned much, but there is still one more test of public opinion to go before the expected referendum date of autumn 2014. The European elections will be held in June of that year.
While I'm thinking of it, one other thing that I noticed when browsing through the YouGov archives was this highly encouraging finding on public attitudes to capital punishment...
The death penalty for murder :
Would like to see return - 46%
Would not like to see return - 43%
I've never believed that majority opinion can overrule the most fundamental of individual human rights (ie. the right to life). But it just goes to show that if a referendum was ever held, it wouldn't be the foregone conclusion that some people assume.
Saturday, June 2, 2012
Is Tom Farmer the independence referendum's 'Alec Douglas-Home in reverse'?
To return briefly to the subject I discussed the other day, it's gloriously ironic that Mike Smithson suggested that Tom Farmer's intervention this week was somehow a 'blow for the SNP', because in truth it's an early illustration of the massive dilemma that the No side will face as the campaign progresses. In a small way, Farmer can be seen as this referendum's "Alec Douglas-Home in reverse". Douglas-Home was someone with impeccable credentials as a devolutionist who voted No to devolution because it was "the wrong sort of devolution". By the same token, Farmer has impeccable credentials as someone who has always supported the union, but he is nevertheless minded to vote Yes to independence because the wrong type of union will be on offer (ie. the status quo). Now, he might not be enough on his own to make the kind of impact that Douglas-Home did in 1979, but if he and Jim McColl are joined by other well-known public figures over the next two years, and if the polls begin to show that a significant number of people who are essentially anti-independence are minded to vote Yes to independence as the only alternative to the status quo, then London's insistence on a single question is going to start looking like a monumental tactical blunder. So can the No side (to coin a phrase) get themselves off the hook? Other than backing down and accepting a second question on Devo Max, which would be both the most sensible and the most democratic option, the only other alternative would be for Cameron to put some flesh on the bones of this Top Secret Devo Plus Plan of his that supposedly has a chance of being implemented if there is a No vote (but only if we're very nice to him and if he's in a good mood, of course).
A list of specific powers to be transferred and a proposed date of implementation would probably do to be getting on with.
* * *
As I mentioned at the time, by completely freakish chance I managed to miss the whole of the Royal Wedding last year because I was stranded on Arran. No such luck for the Jubilee Weekend, though. I have a couple of royalists in the family, and when I walked past the TV set last night, I kept hearing snatches of Prince Charles saying things like "what the Queen means to us as a nation, or even as one of her children", and Alan Titchmarsh (!) saying things like "the Queen was determined that ceremony should not detract from Kate and William's special day", and I just thought, for the love of God, this is supposed to be a modern 21st Century democracy, not North Korea or Iran. Shouldn't it be possible to make a clear-sighted documentary about our Head of State? It doesn't even have to be particularly critical - just anything shy of hagiography would be great.
When I was at university, I winced when an American politics tutor informed us that the UK media's reporting of the Royal Family is "deferential". All I could think at the time was "what about the American media's fawning deference towards politicians?" But in retrospect I realise that it's utterly impossible to dispute her point.
A list of specific powers to be transferred and a proposed date of implementation would probably do to be getting on with.
* * *
As I mentioned at the time, by completely freakish chance I managed to miss the whole of the Royal Wedding last year because I was stranded on Arran. No such luck for the Jubilee Weekend, though. I have a couple of royalists in the family, and when I walked past the TV set last night, I kept hearing snatches of Prince Charles saying things like "what the Queen means to us as a nation, or even as one of her children", and Alan Titchmarsh (!) saying things like "the Queen was determined that ceremony should not detract from Kate and William's special day", and I just thought, for the love of God, this is supposed to be a modern 21st Century democracy, not North Korea or Iran. Shouldn't it be possible to make a clear-sighted documentary about our Head of State? It doesn't even have to be particularly critical - just anything shy of hagiography would be great.
When I was at university, I winced when an American politics tutor informed us that the UK media's reporting of the Royal Family is "deferential". All I could think at the time was "what about the American media's fawning deference towards politicians?" But in retrospect I realise that it's utterly impossible to dispute her point.
Friday, June 1, 2012
No, a sham consultation is not 'proof' of anything
Rather like Arnold Schwarzenegger refusing to die in the Terminator films, the one slice of Marxist-inspired thinking that Scottish Labour remains quaintly wedded to has just reared its ugly head again. The Highlands Labour MSP Rhoda Grant has picked up where Trish Godman left off, and embarked on yet another attempt to impose on society the dogmatic and faintly ludicrous notion that the buying and selling of sex, no matter how consensual, always constitutes "violence against women", and that it is somehow possible by legal means to "end demand" for prostitution, thus eradicating the "violence". Her bill would introduce the discriminatory Swedish model, which criminalises the clients of prostitutes, but regards sex workers themselves (even those acting entirely independently and earning a decent living from their chosen form of work) as "victims" who don't know their own minds.
I develop a bit of a headache every time I try to work out how on earth infantilising women in this way, and telling them that they alone are incapable of taking rational decisions for themselves, is supposed to assist the cause of gender equality. The explanation from radical feminist groups would doubtless include the all-purpose get-out clause of 'patriarchy' rather a lot. But are we really expected to believe that a patriarchal system, in Scotland in the year 2012, makes it so impossible for women (but not men) to have access to money that they literally have no choice but to become prostitutes? That is the only way that sex workers acting independently could even conceivably be regarded as "victims of male violence against women", but it just doesn't describe a world I recognise. Many people of both genders have money problems, and I'm quite sure that many sex workers would in an ideal world rather be doing another job or no job at all - but then so would many cleaners and factory workers. Are those people all victims of violence? In many cases, sex workers have simply looked at the range of options open to them and chosen the one they most prefer, or least dislike. That is indistinguishable from the choice made by the vast majority of people in the working world - the only gender difference being, frankly, that some women may feel that an extra (and potentially lucrative) option is open to them that is not open to men. But even the latter point is far from an absolute - men pay men for sex, women pay men for sex, and women pay women for sex. All of those facts make the claim that paid sex is always a form of male violence against women, somewhat problematical to say the least.
Indeed, if Rhoda Grant's proposal became law, one of two things would be bound to happen -
1) Women who paid men or other women for sex, or men who paid other men for sex, would be convicted of a criminal offence on the implicit grounds that they had committed "male violence against women".
2) The law would be implemented selectively, in order to maintain the ideologically-driven fiction that the only form of prostitution that exists is women being "forced" to have sex with men in exchange for money (often rather a lot of money).
Call me cynical, but scenario 2 seems far more probable.
The greatest absurdity of all is that Ms Grant is seeking a waiver that would allow her bill to proceed without a consultation process - on the grounds that the outcome of the consultation on Trish Godman's doomed bill in the last parliamentary session has already "proved" the need for a change in the law. For the uninitiated, that consultation would have been a strong contender in any 'Sham Consultation of the Year Awards'. It made the UK government's recent consultation on the independence referendum look like a model of neutrality and open-mindedness. The first question enquired whether respondents wanted to criminalise both the sex worker and the client, or just the client, and simply took it as read that no-one in their right mind would want to maintain the status quo of criminalising neither. That wording was presumably intended to 'lead' anyone opposed to the criminalisation of sex workers, and nudge them towards the Swedish model as the 'only' option available. Many of the other questions related to 'barriers to enforcement' of the proposed law, which again was intended to communicate the message that the only objections any reasonable person could possibly raise would be technical and practical ones, rather than objections to the whole principle of a discriminatory law.
A tiny number of responses was received, mostly from groups and individuals with a fierce ideological commitment to the Swedish model. When news leaked out that two-thirds of respondents had answered 'yes' to a question which essentially made 'no' impossible, one of the respondents tweeted "Yay!". Which is as much as to say "Yippee, we all agree with ourselves!".
Of course a consultation is needed if this bill is going to see the light of day, and a genuine one this time.
I develop a bit of a headache every time I try to work out how on earth infantilising women in this way, and telling them that they alone are incapable of taking rational decisions for themselves, is supposed to assist the cause of gender equality. The explanation from radical feminist groups would doubtless include the all-purpose get-out clause of 'patriarchy' rather a lot. But are we really expected to believe that a patriarchal system, in Scotland in the year 2012, makes it so impossible for women (but not men) to have access to money that they literally have no choice but to become prostitutes? That is the only way that sex workers acting independently could even conceivably be regarded as "victims of male violence against women", but it just doesn't describe a world I recognise. Many people of both genders have money problems, and I'm quite sure that many sex workers would in an ideal world rather be doing another job or no job at all - but then so would many cleaners and factory workers. Are those people all victims of violence? In many cases, sex workers have simply looked at the range of options open to them and chosen the one they most prefer, or least dislike. That is indistinguishable from the choice made by the vast majority of people in the working world - the only gender difference being, frankly, that some women may feel that an extra (and potentially lucrative) option is open to them that is not open to men. But even the latter point is far from an absolute - men pay men for sex, women pay men for sex, and women pay women for sex. All of those facts make the claim that paid sex is always a form of male violence against women, somewhat problematical to say the least.
Indeed, if Rhoda Grant's proposal became law, one of two things would be bound to happen -
1) Women who paid men or other women for sex, or men who paid other men for sex, would be convicted of a criminal offence on the implicit grounds that they had committed "male violence against women".
2) The law would be implemented selectively, in order to maintain the ideologically-driven fiction that the only form of prostitution that exists is women being "forced" to have sex with men in exchange for money (often rather a lot of money).
Call me cynical, but scenario 2 seems far more probable.
The greatest absurdity of all is that Ms Grant is seeking a waiver that would allow her bill to proceed without a consultation process - on the grounds that the outcome of the consultation on Trish Godman's doomed bill in the last parliamentary session has already "proved" the need for a change in the law. For the uninitiated, that consultation would have been a strong contender in any 'Sham Consultation of the Year Awards'. It made the UK government's recent consultation on the independence referendum look like a model of neutrality and open-mindedness. The first question enquired whether respondents wanted to criminalise both the sex worker and the client, or just the client, and simply took it as read that no-one in their right mind would want to maintain the status quo of criminalising neither. That wording was presumably intended to 'lead' anyone opposed to the criminalisation of sex workers, and nudge them towards the Swedish model as the 'only' option available. Many of the other questions related to 'barriers to enforcement' of the proposed law, which again was intended to communicate the message that the only objections any reasonable person could possibly raise would be technical and practical ones, rather than objections to the whole principle of a discriminatory law.
A tiny number of responses was received, mostly from groups and individuals with a fierce ideological commitment to the Swedish model. When news leaked out that two-thirds of respondents had answered 'yes' to a question which essentially made 'no' impossible, one of the respondents tweeted "Yay!". Which is as much as to say "Yippee, we all agree with ourselves!".
Of course a consultation is needed if this bill is going to see the light of day, and a genuine one this time.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Or alternatively, Mr Smithson, you could have just put the "Scotland - where's that?" sticker on your forehead
"Gawd." Can he "be arsed"?
Yup, you've guessed it, it's our old friend Mike 'Varied Vocabulary' Smithson, editor of the right-wing discussion forum Political Betting. Back in March and April, Mike raised a few eyebrows among the small Nat contingent over at PB by directly asking us a number of questions about the SNP's prospects in the local elections. For a moment, I almost wondered if he was showing some uncharacteristic humility by being open to hearing more information about a subject he realised he wasn't an expert on - but I should have known better. His phraseology (ie. "has Salmond's popularity now passed its peak?") ought to have given the game away - he was in fact busy crafting a new PB gospel of 'the SNP are in crisis', and was only interested in hearing confirmation of his own predetermined narrative.
Now, while it's easy enough for Mike to filter out views from SNP posters that departed from this new PB orthodoxy, you might think it would have been a tad harder for him to ignore the elephant that noisily arrived on his doorstep on May 4th, when the SNP's historic victory in the local elections comprehensively disproved his theory. If so, you severely underestimate the man. No, within hours, he had posted an article declaring that Salmond was one of the day's "losers". This, let's recall, was an election in which the SNP had won more votes than any other party, more seats than any other party, had seen a bigger increase in votes than any other party, and had seen a bigger increase in seats than any other party. It was the first time in history that the SNP had won the popular vote in local elections, and only the second time in history that they had come out on top in terms of councillors. They had also achieved this feat while in mid-term, after five years in government - a point in the electoral cycle when an incumbent government can normally expect to be hammered in local elections. And yet all of this, according to Smithson, constituted a "defeat". Righty-ho.
The only possible explanation I could think of is that he'd mixed up his Collins Pocket Map of Scotland with his street-map of Glasgow. Easily done.
But just when I thought his journey into the fantastical had gone as far as it could possibly go, he took time out from his holiday in Spain yesterday to inform us that "the SNP leader is now in a mess". Yes, folks, the leader of a party that has just won an historic victory in the local elections, that achieved a miracle last year by winning a parliamentary majority under an electoral system that was supposed to make majorities impossible, and which last week helped to line up a galaxy of stars to back a Yes vote in the independence referendum, is "in a mess". And what are the factors that have led Smithson to this extraordinary conclusion? If I was being uncharitable, I might say that they're about as substantial as Yousuf Hamid's reasons for deducing that "something must be going on". But I'm not feeling uncharitable, so let's take them in turn -
"One electoral fact that hasn’t been given much attention is that the SNP’S vote share in the Scottish council elections on May 3rd was 13% down on what Salmond’s party secured a year earlier in the Holyrood elections."
It is nothing short of astonishing that a man who regularly savages politicians and fellow political pundits for their misuse and abuse of statistics would be brazen enough to try this wheeze. If anyone had tried to claim that the SNP's vote share had risen by 26% between the Westminster election of 2010 and the 2011 Holyrood election, Smithson would have laughed in their face. And rightly so, because different types of elections are not directly comparable - people have different voting habits in Westminster elections than they do in Holyrood elections, and they have different voting habits in Holyrood elections than they do in local elections. A meaningful comparison can only be made with the previous election of the same type.
Nor is this some kind of hair-splitting point that only makes a 0.1% difference. In 2007, when the Holyrood and local elections were held on the same day, the SNP's vote share was a full five per cent lower in the local elections than it was in the Holyrood constituency vote. The effect also extended to the SNP's performance relative to Labour's - the SNP were actually 0.2% behind Labour in the local elections, but 1.8% ahead on the Holyrood list vote. So the SNP's margin of victory this month has to be seen in that context. It's not at all hard to see why the party's vote share would be lower in local elections - in parliamentary terms, the SNP are strong in rural areas where people tend to vote for independent councillors.
And that's before we even factor in that this year's election was a mid-term contest in which you'd expect an incumbent government to lose votes and seats, not gain them as the SNP in fact did.
"Not only did the SNP fail to take its much hyped key target of Glasgow it saw the city’s council move back to Labour overall control."
Has Mike actually noticed that a) Labour only ever 'lost' overall control of Glasgow because of mass defections, and b) Labour suffered a net loss of seats in Glasgow and the SNP had a significant net gain?
Well, he's a busy man.
"Now comes news that one of the party’s leading donors, Sir Tom Farmer doesn’t want independence. What a gift to the unionist campaign on two levels."
Funnily enough, I always thought the word 'news' meant something we were previously unaware of. Tom Farmer made clear that he was a supporter of enhanced powers for the Scottish Parliament, as opposed to outright independence or the status quo, when he first donated to the SNP in 2007. Not only has he not changed his view, he has today gone further by revealing that he would on balance prefer independence to the status quo, and is likely to vote Yes to independence if London succeed in denying the people of Scotland a vote on enhanced powers for Holyrood within the UK.
Now, that really does qualify as 'news'. Crikey, what a devastating blow for the SNP, eh, Mike?
"This development comes in the wake of a YouGov Scotland poll which found that just 58% of those who voted SNP in 2011 want an independent Scotland and that 28% are against."
'Just' 58%? When someone says something like that, they might as well be openly admitting that they haven't been paying attention to Scottish polling data for the last four minutes, let alone for the last forty years. There has always been 'cross-voting' by people on the constitutional issue - a significant minority of SNP voters don't back independence, and a significant minority of Labour voters do back independence. That has been the case for as long as the constitution has been a live issue. There was a time in the 1990s when the SNP were polling at 20-25%, and yet only half their voters wanted independence. The fact that 58% of the near half of the entire electorate who voted SNP last year now back independence is a formidable figure - and let's not forget that these numbers are being drawn from a poll commissioned by the No campaign, and which posed a loaded question that departed significantly from the proposed referendum question.
"All this points to a massive mis-reading of the SNP’s success at the Holyrood elections last year."
What in the name of John Pienaar is "massive misreading" supposed to mean? Is the implication that the SNP looked at their vote share last year, and said to themselves : "Hey guys, this must mean that all these people support independence. What say we hold an independence referendum? We're bound to win." Er, no, Mike. The SNP have always been well aware that not all of the people attracted to voting for them are supporters of independence - that was the whole point of separating the issue out by making clear that a vote for the SNP was a vote for a referendum (among many, many other things), not a vote for independence. That was also why Nicola Sturgeon replied with a flat 'No' when David Dimbleby asked her on the 2011 election results programme if the SNP's win was a vote for independence.
The true reason that the SNP are holding a referendum on independence is remarkably simple, Mr Smithson - it's because they're a pro-independence party, and that's what pro-independence parties tend to do when given a mandate. But if you'd rather believe that it was instead a half-cocked, Laurel and Hardy type plan dreamt up on the spur of the moment, and that Salmond now "has to find a way of getting himself off the hook" (yes, really!), then you just carry on talking to yourself, old chap. The rest of us have got a referendum to win.
Yup, you've guessed it, it's our old friend Mike 'Varied Vocabulary' Smithson, editor of the right-wing discussion forum Political Betting. Back in March and April, Mike raised a few eyebrows among the small Nat contingent over at PB by directly asking us a number of questions about the SNP's prospects in the local elections. For a moment, I almost wondered if he was showing some uncharacteristic humility by being open to hearing more information about a subject he realised he wasn't an expert on - but I should have known better. His phraseology (ie. "has Salmond's popularity now passed its peak?") ought to have given the game away - he was in fact busy crafting a new PB gospel of 'the SNP are in crisis', and was only interested in hearing confirmation of his own predetermined narrative.
Now, while it's easy enough for Mike to filter out views from SNP posters that departed from this new PB orthodoxy, you might think it would have been a tad harder for him to ignore the elephant that noisily arrived on his doorstep on May 4th, when the SNP's historic victory in the local elections comprehensively disproved his theory. If so, you severely underestimate the man. No, within hours, he had posted an article declaring that Salmond was one of the day's "losers". This, let's recall, was an election in which the SNP had won more votes than any other party, more seats than any other party, had seen a bigger increase in votes than any other party, and had seen a bigger increase in seats than any other party. It was the first time in history that the SNP had won the popular vote in local elections, and only the second time in history that they had come out on top in terms of councillors. They had also achieved this feat while in mid-term, after five years in government - a point in the electoral cycle when an incumbent government can normally expect to be hammered in local elections. And yet all of this, according to Smithson, constituted a "defeat". Righty-ho.
The only possible explanation I could think of is that he'd mixed up his Collins Pocket Map of Scotland with his street-map of Glasgow. Easily done.
But just when I thought his journey into the fantastical had gone as far as it could possibly go, he took time out from his holiday in Spain yesterday to inform us that "the SNP leader is now in a mess". Yes, folks, the leader of a party that has just won an historic victory in the local elections, that achieved a miracle last year by winning a parliamentary majority under an electoral system that was supposed to make majorities impossible, and which last week helped to line up a galaxy of stars to back a Yes vote in the independence referendum, is "in a mess". And what are the factors that have led Smithson to this extraordinary conclusion? If I was being uncharitable, I might say that they're about as substantial as Yousuf Hamid's reasons for deducing that "something must be going on". But I'm not feeling uncharitable, so let's take them in turn -
"One electoral fact that hasn’t been given much attention is that the SNP’S vote share in the Scottish council elections on May 3rd was 13% down on what Salmond’s party secured a year earlier in the Holyrood elections."
It is nothing short of astonishing that a man who regularly savages politicians and fellow political pundits for their misuse and abuse of statistics would be brazen enough to try this wheeze. If anyone had tried to claim that the SNP's vote share had risen by 26% between the Westminster election of 2010 and the 2011 Holyrood election, Smithson would have laughed in their face. And rightly so, because different types of elections are not directly comparable - people have different voting habits in Westminster elections than they do in Holyrood elections, and they have different voting habits in Holyrood elections than they do in local elections. A meaningful comparison can only be made with the previous election of the same type.
Nor is this some kind of hair-splitting point that only makes a 0.1% difference. In 2007, when the Holyrood and local elections were held on the same day, the SNP's vote share was a full five per cent lower in the local elections than it was in the Holyrood constituency vote. The effect also extended to the SNP's performance relative to Labour's - the SNP were actually 0.2% behind Labour in the local elections, but 1.8% ahead on the Holyrood list vote. So the SNP's margin of victory this month has to be seen in that context. It's not at all hard to see why the party's vote share would be lower in local elections - in parliamentary terms, the SNP are strong in rural areas where people tend to vote for independent councillors.
And that's before we even factor in that this year's election was a mid-term contest in which you'd expect an incumbent government to lose votes and seats, not gain them as the SNP in fact did.
"Not only did the SNP fail to take its much hyped key target of Glasgow it saw the city’s council move back to Labour overall control."
Has Mike actually noticed that a) Labour only ever 'lost' overall control of Glasgow because of mass defections, and b) Labour suffered a net loss of seats in Glasgow and the SNP had a significant net gain?
Well, he's a busy man.
"Now comes news that one of the party’s leading donors, Sir Tom Farmer doesn’t want independence. What a gift to the unionist campaign on two levels."
Funnily enough, I always thought the word 'news' meant something we were previously unaware of. Tom Farmer made clear that he was a supporter of enhanced powers for the Scottish Parliament, as opposed to outright independence or the status quo, when he first donated to the SNP in 2007. Not only has he not changed his view, he has today gone further by revealing that he would on balance prefer independence to the status quo, and is likely to vote Yes to independence if London succeed in denying the people of Scotland a vote on enhanced powers for Holyrood within the UK.
Now, that really does qualify as 'news'. Crikey, what a devastating blow for the SNP, eh, Mike?
"This development comes in the wake of a YouGov Scotland poll which found that just 58% of those who voted SNP in 2011 want an independent Scotland and that 28% are against."
'Just' 58%? When someone says something like that, they might as well be openly admitting that they haven't been paying attention to Scottish polling data for the last four minutes, let alone for the last forty years. There has always been 'cross-voting' by people on the constitutional issue - a significant minority of SNP voters don't back independence, and a significant minority of Labour voters do back independence. That has been the case for as long as the constitution has been a live issue. There was a time in the 1990s when the SNP were polling at 20-25%, and yet only half their voters wanted independence. The fact that 58% of the near half of the entire electorate who voted SNP last year now back independence is a formidable figure - and let's not forget that these numbers are being drawn from a poll commissioned by the No campaign, and which posed a loaded question that departed significantly from the proposed referendum question.
"All this points to a massive mis-reading of the SNP’s success at the Holyrood elections last year."
What in the name of John Pienaar is "massive misreading" supposed to mean? Is the implication that the SNP looked at their vote share last year, and said to themselves : "Hey guys, this must mean that all these people support independence. What say we hold an independence referendum? We're bound to win." Er, no, Mike. The SNP have always been well aware that not all of the people attracted to voting for them are supporters of independence - that was the whole point of separating the issue out by making clear that a vote for the SNP was a vote for a referendum (among many, many other things), not a vote for independence. That was also why Nicola Sturgeon replied with a flat 'No' when David Dimbleby asked her on the 2011 election results programme if the SNP's win was a vote for independence.
The true reason that the SNP are holding a referendum on independence is remarkably simple, Mr Smithson - it's because they're a pro-independence party, and that's what pro-independence parties tend to do when given a mandate. But if you'd rather believe that it was instead a half-cocked, Laurel and Hardy type plan dreamt up on the spur of the moment, and that Salmond now "has to find a way of getting himself off the hook" (yes, really!), then you just carry on talking to yourself, old chap. The rest of us have got a referendum to win.
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