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Scotsman
02-06-2025
- Business
- Scotsman
Scottish Labour leader and UK Energy Minister visit major Scottish wind farm
Key political voices in high praise of energy developers Sign up to our Scotsman Money newsletter, covering all you need to know to help manage your money. Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... The leader of the Scottish Labour Party, Anas Sarwar, and UK Energy Minister Michael Shanks have visited a pioneering wind farm in South Lanarkshire. During the visit to OnPath Energy's Kype Muir Wind Farm site, Mr Sarwar and Mr Shanks met with senior representatives from the firm, receiving a tour of the development, learning about the history of the project and the benefits it continues to deliver. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Home to 26 turbines, Kype Muir Wind Farm generates enough renewable energy to power over 63,000 homes annually while providing over £11m in community benefits across its 25-year lifespan. L-R Richard Dunkley - CEO (OnPath Energy), Gordon Thomson - Projects Director (OnPath Energy), Michael Shanks - Parliamentary Undersecretary of State, Anas Sarwar – Leader of Scottish Labour Party, Lee Wilkinson – Senior Police and Market Affairs Manager (OnPath Energy), Aileen McCreadie – Partnerships & Community Manager (OnPath Energy), Robin Winstanley – Sustainability & Community Director (OnPath Energy), Euan Wright – Wind Farm Manager (Kype Muir Wind Farm) The project is delivering significant benefits to the surrounding area, with over £700,000 distributed to local communities through the Kype Muir Community Panel Fund (KMCP) as part of its OnPath Together commitment. Each area is represented by two members on the KMCP panel, ensuring a broad and inclusive approach to decision-making. The fund was further bolstered with the launch of the Kype Muir Wind Farm Extension developed by OnPath Energy (now owned by funds managed by Schroders Greencoat), which added a further 15 turbines to the overall site taking the lifetime community benefits of both sites to over £21m. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Anas Sarwar, Leader of Scottish Labour said: 'It was fantastic to visit OnPath Energy to see their site at Kype Muir and learn about all the work they do. 'Businesses like OnPath are at the cutting edge of the transition to clean energy and have a vital role to play in delivering energy security and driving down bills. 'Scottish Labour will work hand in hand with companies like OnPath and the U.K government to put Scotland at the heart of the energy transition.' After Kype Muir Wind Farm became the first project in the UK to secure consent for 132-meter turbines, OnPath Energy launched in 2019, the Kype Muir Community Partnership (KMCP) which was established to ensure nearby communities benefit directly from the wind farm's success. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The initiative has proven highly effective, empowering five local community council areas to reinvest a share of the revenue into projects that are tailored to local issues and identified by local people. The purpose is to make community-driven action facilitate long-lasting benefits for the community's surrounding the projects. In addition, the community fund supported a jobs and skills collaboration with South Lanarkshire Council which has supported over 2000 people into employment or education. Notably, in collaboration with NATS, OnPath Energy (then Banks Renewables) funded a new radar system in 2019 for Glasgow Airport, which enabled the development of not only Kype Muir Wind Farm, it also unlocked £500m worth of development in the area from other projects. Kype Muir Wind Farm was also the first onshore wind site to benefit from the UK Governments Contract for Difference having taken part in Auction Round 1. Michael Shanks, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Energy and MP for Rutherglen said: 'OnPath Energy is leading the way in green energy and it was an honour to meet with them and learn more about the project's they lead. The Labour Government is committed to delivering the clean energy of the future and the jobs Scotland needs." Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Gordon Thomson, projects director at OnPath Energy said: 'It's been a pleasure to welcome Mr Sarwar and Mr Shanks to Kype Muir Wind Farm today and to share with them the story of a project that has come to symbolise what's possible in Scotland's transition to renewable energy. 'We set out with the vision to create something special here, and since going operational, Kype Muir has done just that, generating clean energy, creating local jobs, and delivering meaningful support through the KMCP. 'In addition to this, the launch of Kype Muir Extension was a huge moment for the renewables sector in Scotland, not just in terms of the scale and ambition of the engineering involved, but also in how it set a new benchmark for community involvement and benefit. 'These two sites have empowered communities to lead the way in identifying and funding local priorities, and we're incredibly proud of the lasting positive impact this model continues to have.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The original Kype Muir Wind Farm alone is expected to generate a lifetime local spend of approximately £123 million. Reflecting OnPath's ongoing commitment to supporting the local economy, local contractors were also prioritised throughout the construction and delivery of the Kype Muir Extension. Combined, both projects will contribute an estimated £188 million to the Scottish economy, with £159 million of that investment within a 60km radius of the site. Robin Winstanley, sustainability and community director said: 'Onshore wind is the clear winner of any energy generation project when it comes to delivering social and economic value for communities in Scotland, with over 60% of the lifetime spend within 40 miles of the sites' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'We firmly believe that renewable energy must also empower people and communities. 'Through our OnPath Together commitment, we're ensuring that our developments create long-lasting, tangible value for those who live and work closest to them. 'This includes shared community ownership, education bursaries, real living wage jobs, and £5,000 per MW of installed capacity as a baseline community benefit. 'It also means prioritising local contractors to stimulate regional economies and delivering nature-positive solutions that restore and enhance biodiversity. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Together, Kype Muir and Kype Muir Extension will generate over 155MW of renewable electricity annually, enough to power more than 123,000 homes, equivalent to a city larger than Aberdeen.
STV News
16-05-2025
- Politics
- STV News
Labour MSP Rhoda Grant announces decision to stand down to 'make way for others'
Long-standing Labour MSP Rhoda Grant has announced that she has made the 'difficult decision' not to seek re-election at the 2026 Scottish Parliament elections. Grant announced her decision to step down from representing the Highlands and Islands on Thursday. The MSP was elected to Holyrood in the first Scottish Parliament election in 1999, and has gone on to serve in five of the six parliamentary terms since then. Grant has served on a number of cross-party groups, including the crofting group and co-convened groups on human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation. Her members' bill on domestic abuse was adopted and became an act in April 2011, which made it an offence to engage in an abusive course of conduct against a current or ex-partner. She is currently Labour's rural affairs spokesperson and has previously been the party's spokesperson for women's equalities and justice and finance. 'Unfortunately, after thinking long and hard about the demands of this role, I do not feel I can continue to give the time and commitment required to do it justice and therefore hand on the baton to others and will not stand at the next Scottish Parliament elections,' she said. 'I have loved representing my region alongside people, too many to mention, who have worked with me, challenged me and supported me. 'I do not think it is possible to entirely switch off from representing the region that I love, and I will continue to push for improvement to our services and opportunities whenever that opportunity arises.' As she prepares to step back as MSP, Grant said the Scottish Labour Party has already selected a number of candidates in the region. 'It makes it easier for me to step back when I know there is such talent waiting in the wings,' she said. Grant joins a growing list of approximately 30 other MSPs who have already announced that they won't seek re-election in 2026. The list includes some of the biggest names in Scottish politics, including former first ministers Nicola Sturgeon and Humza Yousaf. Several Scottish Government Ministers are planning to step back next year as well. Some MSPs are leaving due to age, including MSPs James Dornan and Bill Kidd, who are both in their 70s. Others have said it's time to step back and prioritise other aspects of their lives. Regardless of the various reasons, the resignations will pave the way for a new generation of Scottish politicians to rise through the ranks. Get all the latest news from around the country Follow STV News Scan the QR code on your mobile device for all the latest news from around the country
The National
28-04-2025
- Politics
- The National
This Scotsman represents everything to which our country aspires today
AFTER failing to win the seat of Camlachie in Glasgow for the Scottish Labour Party in 1892 and now free of the constraints of parliamentary life, Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham began to write. At first he penned polemical pieces in political periodicals, turning his fire on targets such as the Liberal Party; British foreign policy and empire (he referred to Queen Victoria as the 'Empress of Famine' and Rhodesia as 'Fraudesia'); and the US government for their treatment of native Americans, notably the Sioux and their massacre at Wounded Knee in December 1890. His writing was soon spotted by Frank Harris, the influential Irish-American publisher of the Saturday Review, and by the mid-1890s Robert was a regular contributor, rubbing shoulders with other such rising stars as HG Wells and GB Shaw. He was free to write more or less whatever took his fancy. 'I was the Saturday Reviewer in the theatre,' wrote Shaw, 'Cunninghame Graham was a Saturday Reviewer in the universe.' As in politics, so in writing, Robert went his own way. Over the following 40 years he published more than 30 books, guided – as far as he would permit it, which was not generally very far – by Edward Garnett, the most brilliant of the new wave of young English editors. His subjects ranged from the lives of conquistadors to episodes and encounters from his travels to portraits of quaint Scottish characters from his childhood, his settings ranging from South America to Spain, North Africa and Scotland. READ MORE: The connections between Scotland and India No follower of literary tradition, Robert developed his own genre, the sketch, in which he presented incidents drawn from lived experience through the voice of a third person narrator, almost as if they were stories. Although not widely read, he was admired by his peers. On a good day, said Harris, he could give De Maupassant a run for his money. Now in middle age, he spent time partly in London and partly at Gartmore, the Graham family seat in Stirlingshire, where he and his wife Gabriela struggled in vain to cope with his father's legacy of debt. Bowing eventually to the inevitable, he sold Gartmore in 1900 to the shipping magnate Sir Charles Cayzer, although it broke his heart to do so. He later described his final 24 hours in the old house in A Braw Day, one of his most touching sketches. Robert was not given to revealing himself in his writing, despite his frequent assertion that everything one needed to know about him was there to be read. This sketch was one of the very few in which he invited the reader into his heart. Travel had always been the panacea for Robert's ills. In the 1890s he had begun to turn to Morocco for the excitement and adventure that Argentina had offered him in youth. Tangier, at the crossroads of Europe and Africa, thrilled him with its shifting cast of travellers, diplomats, merchants, artists, indigent aristocrats, phoneys, fixers and chancers of all stripes. Cunninghame Graham during his trip to the 'forbidden' city of Taroudant in Morocco 'Thirteen miles from Europe as the gull flies, millions of miles in feeling and in life …' he wrote, immersing himself in the Arab world as the guest of John Lavery, who had painted Robert a number of times and, now wealthy and famous from his society portraits, had a house on the edge of the city. In 1897, Robert resolved to travel to the southern city of Taroudant, forbidden to foreigners on account of unrest among the local tribes, who were in revolt against the corrupt and collapsing sultanate. Despite warnings from British consular officials he set off, disguised as a local sheikh and accompanied by two guides. Climbing a pass through the High Atlas, he was captured by armed men and taken to the mountain fort of a local warlord, the Caid of Kintafi, where he was held for three weeks before talking his way to release. Why he went is unclear – on an intelligence-gathering mission for the British government; in search of trade concessions from the southern tribes; or simply for the hell of it? Whatever the reason, his subsequent book about the journey, Mogreb-el-Acksa, broke the mould of contemporary travel writing and was hailed by the Scottish poet Hugh MacDiarmid as 'the travel book of the century'. Cunninghame Graham drinking mateThe First World War saw Robert on the move again. His experiences in South America, particularly Paraguay which he reached soon after the end of a savage war against its neighbours, had left him deeply opposed to violence, yet he accepted a War Department commission to buy horses in Uruguay. This war, waged by a great and malign power against small nations, had to be resisted, he believed. Yet he knew what fate awaited the horses when they reached the European front, where they would haul weapons, munitions and supplies and last three weeks if they were lucky. For a supremely skilled horseman and lover of all things equine, this was just one of the host of contradictions which characterised him, which he wore with apparent ease, and which have fascinated every scholar or biographer who has approached his life. By the end of the war, with the Russian Revolution just a year old, it was this same aversion to violence that left Robert ultimately wary of John Maclean and the Red Clydesiders. Despite their shared socialist principles, Robert could not bring himself to support a movement with Bolshevik associations, one that advocated outright revolution. Back in Britain after the war, he continued to divide his time between Scotland, where he retreated to write, and London where his formidable nonagenarian mother still held court to a circle of prominent writers and artists. READ MORE: What's to be done with Hugh MacDiarmid's historic home? Here, after the death of Robert's wife Gabriela, his new companion, a wealthy widow named Elizabeth Dummett, also entertained members of the cultural elite at her home. But Robert had not yet given up on politics. From earliest days, he had believed that Scotland should be running her own affairs. Home rule had been a central policy of his Scottish Labour Party. But now, in the 1920s, Labour under Ramsay Macdonald seemed to lose interest in Scotland, and a disenchanted Robert turned his attention to the small but growing nationalist movement. In 1928 he was present as chairman at the formation of the National Party of Scotland, which was one of two forerunners of the Scottish National Party, founded eventually in 1934, with Robert as honorary president. 'The enemies of Scotland are not the English,' he declared, 'for they were ever a great and generous folk, quick to respond when justice calls. Our enemies are amongst us, born without imagination …' In modern parlance, he was a civic nationalist, forward and outward looking, in marked contrast to the inward and backward-looking fascist tendency which characterised nationalism elsewhere in Europe at that time. Scotland's dire social ills – poverty, ill-health and disease, poor housing and dire working conditions – would only ever be alleviated by a parliament in Edinburgh, run by Scots for Scots, he believed. Robert was also an internationalist by instinct and experience, believing that self-determination was an essential step towards taking one's place among the great family of nations. Robert continued to write and to speak at political meetings until the end, an elderly though upright, patrician figure, arm raised and white locks stirred by the breeze. In 1936 he sailed to Argentina on a final visit to the country he loved almost as much as Scotland, and a pilgrimage to the birthplace of the writer he most admired, the Anglo-Argentine naturalist and novelist, WH Hudson. There, in Buenos Aires, he caught pneumonia and died. The president and ministers of the republic paid their respects at the Casa del Teatro, where his body lay prior to being returned to Scotland. He was buried beside Gabriela on the island of Inchmahome in the Lake of Menteith. In 2018, I interviewed the recently retired director of the Argentine National Library, Alberto Manguel, at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. In our pre-festival correspondence I mentioned Robert. 'Ah, Cunninghame Graham,' he replied. 'Say no more! I should like to talk with you about his importance, and perhaps about how Borges read him.' At the time I had not begun to write my biography and still knew relatively little about Robert, a good deal less about Borges. In the event I was able to keep our conversation to the more fruitful topic of my guest's life and work. Since then I have come to learn that the great Argentine writer did indeed admire Robert, as he admired the writing of many British travellers, but Robert especially for his unsentimental, unromanticised description of the gauchos in the final days of their ancient way of life. That Robert should continue to this day to be better known in Argentina than in Scotland is a stain on his native country, although with the recent publication of a critical study of his politics and writing, my own biography, and a new edited collection of his Scottish stories, there is a certain groundswell of appreciation. It's pleasing to note that Professor Alan Riach is now including Robert on his reading list for the first year of the Scottish Literature MA course at Glasgow University. With a few deft strokes of the pen, Robert could vividly capture the spirit of a place, the mood of a moment, the timbre of a conversation. Add to this his gift as a chronicler of people and places recently lost to history, and he is more than worthy of inclusion in the canon of late 19th/early 20th-century Scottish writers. But here also is another of those paradoxes which so characterise the man, and which have made him so hard for so many people to grasp. In almost everything he wrote or said or fought for, he was a progressive, yet in so many of the subjects he tackled as writer, not least the gauchos and their dying way of life, he can be clearly seen to deplore progress and its effects on those least able to resist it. The aristocratic socialist (hence his absence from Labour Party history), the Scottish laird with the manners of a Spanish hidalgo, the hard-riding dandy, the romantic realist, the cosmopolitan nationalist, the anti-imperialist, anti-racist admirer of the Spanish conquest, the moderniser with one foot in the past, the lover of horses who corralled them for certain slaughter – Don Roberto ill fits a modern world beset by over-simplified, binary distinctions, by careerism and narrow specialisms. Yet his legacy is plain to see – militant trade unionism; a party of Labour; the vote for women; free education; the eight-hour working day; decent living standards for working people; Irish independence; a parliament restored to Edinburgh; the formation of the Scottish National Party and a vigorous independence movement for Scotland; the establishment of national parks; rights for animals – all bear his fingerprints. Robert's greatest friend was the novelist Joseph Conrad, whom he championed when still an unknown contributor to literary magazines, and whom he encouraged to keep writing when, to the introspective Pole, the world appeared too bleak. They corresponded, met frequently, and shared their innermost thoughts until Conrad's death in 1924. In 1898, following publication of Mogreb-el-Acksa, Conrad wrote to Robert: 'When I think of you I feel as tho' I had lived all my life in a dark hole without ever seeing or knowing anything.' From a man whose own life had scarcely lacked adventure, this was a rare compliment. 'I valued Cunninghame Graham like rubies,' echoed Hugh MacDiarmid on Robert's death. 'We will never see his like again.' (Image: PA) This may, sadly, be true. It is hard to imagine Robert being comfortable with the machinery of modern politics or the world of celebrity publishing and he would quickly fall foul of the media. But it is what he stood for that rings on loudly and clearly today. In conversation earlier this year at Winter Words, the Pitlochry book festival, John Swinney (above) pressed me on Robert's values. I replied that I believe the physical courage and moral indignation that he had, perforce, developed in South America, translated into the moral courage and desire for social justice that he would display throughout the rest of his life. He was immensely principled, often to his own detriment. He was a champion of the oppressed wherever he found them, a believer in tolerance and inclusion. He was outward-looking, an internationalist who loathed the kailyard sentiment of 19th-century Scotland. He believed in the sovereignty of small nations and detested the idea of empire and dominion. Above all, he believed in the right of all human beings, and animals, to a fair and decent existence. Without wishing to portray him as a paragon – he had as many faults as the next man – he was nevertheless a rare and true humanitarian, whose beliefs chime perfectly with those of our modern Scottish independence movement. Born in a different era, he was and remains emblematic of everything to which our country aspires today. The large memorial to Robert in his home village of Gartmore contains stones from Uruguay, Paraguay and Argentina. The latter bears a likeness of his favourite horse, Pampa, an Argentine stallion which he rescued from the traces of a Glasgow tram and rode for 20 years. The inscription on the memorial reads simply: 'He was a master of life, a king among men.'
The Independent
23-02-2025
- Health
- The Independent
Scottish Government should follow law on single-sex spaces, Starmer says
The Prime Minister has said the Scottish Government 'should follow the law' on single-sex spaces, amid a high-profile tribunal surrounding a trans doctor using a female changing room. Sir Keir Starmer said he supported 'safe spaces for women' and the Equality Act, which protects workers from discrimination. Following his speech at the Scottish Labour Party conference in Glasgow, Sir Keir was asked about the ongoing tribunal against NHS Fife and whether he would clarify the law around the definition of a woman. The tribunal was brought against the health board by nurse Sandie Peggie, following her suspension after she had complained about sharing a changing room with a trans doctor. Asked about the tribunal, he said: 'Look, I'm aware of the case. I'm not going to pretend I'm across all the details. 'I've been very focused, as you will probably have seen, on the question in Ukraine and the question in Grangemouth. 'But I'm aware of it but I don't know every twist and turn in the case. 'I do believe in the Government's support in safe spaces for women and the Equality Act and I think the Government should follow the law. 'I think that's straightforward.' First Minister John Swinney has repeatedly refused to comment on the issue, saying to do so could mean breaking the law because it is a live case. However, he has said he agrees with his deputy Kate Forbes, who offered her 'unequivocal' support for single-sex spaces. The SNP leader has also said the Equality Act allows for trans people to be excluded from single or separate-sex facilities, adding these decisions should be 'made on a case-by-case basis' and that managers must 'balance the needs of the trans person' to use such a facility 'against the needs of other members of staff'. The Scottish Government has been urged to clarify whether it thinks single-sex spaces for women include trans women or only those who are biologically female. The UK Supreme Court is yet to announce its ruling on the definition of a woman, after concerns about single-sex spaces by the campaign group For Women Scotland. Judges will decide whether trans women can legally be regarded as women under the Equality Act.
Yahoo
23-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
British PM Starmer says there can be no Ukraine talks without Ukraine's participation
LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Sunday that there can be no talks about the future of Ukraine without the participation of Ukraine, setting his stall out before a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump this week. "Nobody wants the bloodshed to continue. Nobody, least of all the Ukrainians," he told the Scottish Labour Party conference in Glasgow. "But after everything that they have suffered, after everything that they have fought for, there could be no discussion about Ukraine without Ukraine, and the people of Ukraine must have a long-term secure future." See for yourself — The Yodel is the go-to source for daily news, entertainment and feel-good stories. By signing up, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy. Starmer visits Washington on Thursday in the footsteps of French President Emmanuel Macron, who will meet Trump on Monday, exactly three years after Russia invaded Ukraine. Both leaders are expected to try to convince Trump not to rush to a ceasefire deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin at any cost, keep Europe involved in the process and discuss military guarantees to Ukraine. On Friday Trump told the Brian Kilmeade Show on Fox News Audio that Starmer and Macron "haven't done anything" to end the war in Ukraine. Starmer said on Sunday that the need to maintain solidarity with Ukraine is not only right morally, but is also in Britain's national interest. "Instability in Europe always washes up on our shores, and this is a generational moment," he said. Starmer said he supports U.S. calls for Europe to take greater responsibility for its security and that Britain will take a leading part. "We have to be ready to play our role if a force is required in Ukraine once a peace agreement is reached, and we have to be ready to reshape our economy with industrial policy, to stand up for Ukraine, to stand up for Europe, but most of all to stand up for our security."
