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The National
a day ago
- Politics
- The National
The Yes movement itself has dreamed up barriers to independence
His perceived problem with the direct route to independence (briefly, making a UK General Election a plebiscite by a simple manifesto seeking a majority of Scottish votes for Scotland to become independent, and undertaking to implement it on such a majority, if necessary by declaration of the Scottish MPs) is that 'Westminster doesn't have to accept our legal argument in that vote, as the election is for a UK Parliament and Scotland would not be able to generate a majority of votes in Scotland alone ... Westminster can in theory prevent us from leaving ... the majority of English MPs have a veto on what Scotland does or doesn't do.' He simply fails to grasp what the direct route is all about, in viewing it as a procedure of the Union parliament and attributing to England a role and a power which it does not have. READ MORE: The lesson for the SNP as new poll puts independence support at 54% Given that a referendum is prohibited, the one and only way which actually exists for the people of Scotland to vote for the country to become independent is by plebiscitary election. If the Scottish MPs, the highest representatives of the people, are elected as indy members by the majority of votes of the people of Scotland, they will occupy virtually all the Scottish seats, mandated by those votes to take Scotland out of the Union. Legal argument does not come into it. It is an election. The purpose and result of an election is the filling of seats. English votes and English seats do not come into it, since their make-up is neither here nor there for Scottish independence, and they have no part to play. The Scottish members would have the legal, constitutional and democratic right and authority (and indeed the duty?) to fulfil the democratic imperative and carry out their mandate irrespective of other parts of the UK (reversing, this time democratically, the step into union taken three centuries ago by their predecessors). There is no prohibition of such a course. If Mr Potts or anyone else can find one, I would be interested to know. In those circumstances, the declaration of Scottish independence by its MPs cannot properly be viewed as occurring either while Scotland is part of the Union or while it is independent. It is rather the deed of an instant marking the transition from one status to the other, a normal operation in steps of great legal effect. READ MORE: Tommy Sheppard: Why I stand by my claim after fierce debate that followed it I imagine that London will actually negotiate the mechanism and details of independence with Edinburgh, but only after Scotland has voted for it and our representatives plainly demonstrate their resolve to carry it through at their own hand if necessary. Mr Potts' position is far from unique in the independence movement, most of which may indeed be with him. Heaven help us, but the fixation with English omnipotence and the barriers it can place in Scotland's way is a concoction of the movement itself, as if we were determined not to succeed. No such claim has ever emerged from London, where any rare UK Government statement on the issue has been to the effect that Scotland may go if it no longer consents to the Union. Alan Crocket Motherwell AMIDST the ongoing chaos, let it be known that Scotland's hydro, wind and other renewable energy sources are helping to keep this broken UK afloat. Yet in return, energy-rich Scotland, pays among the highest bills in the UK and indeed Europe. The SNP and all independence campaigners cannot remain silent about this grossly unfair situation. It's time for the people of Scotland to take back control, believe, stand up and deliver independence. Grant Frazer Newtonmore
The National
3 days ago
- Politics
- The National
FPTP is here to stay because turkeys and MPs don't vote for Christmas
It gets worse. The LibDems found themselves the third largest party (replacing a badly wounded SNP) having won more than 70 seats on just over 12% of the total vote. Even the unlovely Reform UK got a handful of seats. Reform UK (previously UKIP and the Brexit Party) took five seats, all from the Tories, though they've already fallen out with one who committed lese majeste by criticising the sainted Nigel Farage. However, they came second in no fewer than 98 constituencies, 89 of them in Labour-held seats. Cue a very public panic attack from the PM last week. This is the latest legacy of a deeply flawed electoral system. You might wonder why attempts to ditch First Past The Post (FPTP) have always failed. Wonder no more. The sitting MPs in the Commons have figured out that a fairer voting system might well result in many of them getting their jotters. READ MORE: Labour have 'given up' on by-election amid SNP-Reform contest, says John Swinney Turkeys and MPs rarely queue to vote for Christmas. The UK General Election is unique in sticking with FPTP. Scotland wound up with a messy compromise when the Constitutional Commission tried to please all the parties involved in the previous Convention. The result was the Additional Member System (AMS) which has constituency MSPs elected under FPTP then list MSPs given seats in proportion to their vote share. Neither fully proportional flesh nor equitable fowl. For years thereafter, list MSPs laboured under the label of being somehow second-class citizens. Not least the Tories who had fought against devolution and all its works yet, thanks to AMS, found themselves with a healthy clutch of seats in Holyrood. The Single Transferable Vote (STV) has several merits compared with FPTP. Most importantly it reflects what most voters actually want, it tends to stop tactical voting, and, not at all incidentally, it stops parties from deciding themselves how they want to rank their own candidates on a list. Plus it lets voters assert their personal preference even when these cross party lines. So, even if your favoured candidate doesn't win, his or her votes will be redistributed. Waste not, want not. This might help to reduce the widespread scunneration factor about politics and politicians generally, from which Scotland is certainly not immune. The upcoming by-election will be fiercely fought on all sides but is unlikely to produce much in the way of voter enthusiasm. If half the electors sit on their hands it's not much of an advert for democracy. Remember the heady days of the 2014 referendum, when an astonishing 85% of folk trotted off to the polling stations? All parties, including the SNP, have misused the party list system by putting candidates they've taken agin well down the list in the certain knowledge that will ensure electoral death. Not so much power to the people as too much power to the parties. The Welsh Senedd has decided that AMS too is flawed and will move to another system next year while STV is the preference in our Scottish local elections as it is elsewhere in the UK. Only the Commons sticks with a system which most often results in a successful candidate the majority of voters don't want. And certainly didn't vote for. Again, hardly an advert or an argument for democracy. It's likely that a lot of Westminster -centric MPs are not even aware that they are the only chamber left where FPTP manages to survive despite public opinion being only too well aware that their vote, in too many constituencies, is of no consequence. Why bother voting when you know your voice will never be heard or acknowledged? And let's not even think about the House of Lords which has been about to be abolished since God was a girl. It's a salutary fact that only the Chinese assembly has more members than the 800-plus HOL, where a few doughty members do the lion's share of any work going while the rest are – sometimes literally – sleeping partners. It's also instructive to note that almost all new peers say they favour abolition themselves, before undergoing a Damascene conversion shortly after their posteriors make contact with the red benches. The self-proclaimed conceit that they are a house of all the talents has been somewhat diluted by successive Prime Ministers giving out gongs with an enthusiasm at which even David Lloyd George might summon a blush. (In six years from 1916 the Welsh Liberal PM managed to create 120 hereditary peerages, not even to mention more than 1500 knighthoods. He noted that a fully equipped duke cost as much to keep up as a couple of Dreadnoughts and were just as scary and lasted longer!) The modern equivalent, certainly for the Conservatives, is to hand over peerages to major party donors which is little more than a kick in the pants distant from selling them off. Buying peerages is notionally illegal, but tell that to the raft of party appointees who march with unseemly haste to the Lords should their seat be required for a more 'deserving' candidate. I admire the way in which the SNP have set their face against nominating anyone to the so-called upper house, even though there have been a number of SNP 'grandees' who might have fancied a daud of ermine as a kind of long service medal. The latest was former Westminster SNP leader Ian Blackford who suggested SNP peers would help give Scotland greater influence. Wonder who he could have had in mind! IT may be too much to hope that there will be any significant change to how Scotland votes in an election which is now less than a year distant. Yet we did manage to effect change in the teeth of opposition when we extended the franchise to teenagers who could get married while being deemed 'too young' to have a vote. How frustrated these young voters must be to find that they are still banned from other electoral processes. Yet the one constituency to which every elected politician lends an ear is the voting public. If enough of us say 'up with this nonsense we will not put' it just might light a fire under the party top brass. And a nonsense it truly is when voters, who are not daft, realise that their own vote in too many areas is totally wasted. In truth, there are only a few constituencies where voting actually matters any more. One of them is Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse, previous fiefdom of the late and much lamented Christina McKelvie. If the opinion polls are to be believed it's now largely a two-horse race between the SNP in which she was a popular minister, and Reform UK which have the distinction of having no track record in Scotland, no costed policies, and is predicating its pitch on 'Change'. Seem to remember that was also the war cry of the incoming Starmer government. That's gone well. So anyone prepared to be seduced by a one-word slogan from a party now in its third incarnation and led by Donald Trump superfan Nigel Farage will soon find out just how hollow his promises always are. Apparently, he's about to grace us with his presence. Let's hope he requires rescuing by Police Scotland again. The party leader Nigel unceremoniously dumped, Richard Tice, says a Scottish breakthrough is very much on the cards. Seemingly he has his own pack.
STV News
5 days ago
- Politics
- STV News
Who are the Labour, Reform, SNP and Tory candidates in crucial by-election?
Candidates from SNP, Scottish Labour, Tories, and Reform are battling it out in the final week before the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election. The vote will take place on Thursday, June 5 with polling stations open between 7am and 10pm. But who are the candidates and what do they stand for? Reform UK Reform candidate Ross Lambie Reform UK candidate Ross Lambie is fighting to win the first MSP seat in Scotland for his party. Lambie began his career as a Conservative, only defecting to Reform UK in March. He was elected as a local councillor in South Lanarkshire for Clydesdale South in 2022. However, he has run for multiple other seats in the region. He ran as a Tory in the 2021 Holyrood election for Central Scotland and in the UK General Election in 2024 – losing both races. He's hoping the third time's the charm for breaking into national politics in Hamilton. Lambie said he was 'born and raised' in a small mining village of South Lanarkshire, and worked in London as an architect before moving back to the area. SNP SNP candidate Katy Loudon SNP candidate Katy Loudon is fighting to hold the seat for her party. She's currently a local South Lanarkshire councillor for Cambuslang East. She was first elected in 2017 and re-elected in 2022. Loudon has previously run for other seats in the region. At the last Holyrood election in 2021, she lost out on a Glasgow region seat, and she lost both the Rutherglen MP by-election and General Election in 2023 and 2024. She is also hoping that the third time's the charm for breaking into national politics in Hamilton. Loudon comes from a family of educators. Prior to politics, she was a primary school teacher for ten years. She said she has lived in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West region for nearly 14 years, raising her family in the area. Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party Tory candidate for the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election Richard Nelson Scottish Conservative is currently a South Lanarkshire councillor for Larkhall. He was first elected in 2017 and was re-elected in 2022. Nelson ran in the UK General Election in Hamilton and Clyde constituency last year and came third. This is his first attempt to get a seat at the Scottish Parliament. He said he was 'born and raised' in South Lanarkshire and currently lives there with his wife and two young children. Prior to joining politics, Nelson worked for the NHS and has more than 20 years of experience within the health and care sector. Speaking about his platform, Nelson said he wants to 'put that experience to good use' as an MSP for the region. Equipped with first-hand experience of the issues facing residents, he said he wants to make sure South Lanarkshire Council delivers a better future for the town and enhances the sense of community for everyone who calls it home. Scottish Labour Scottish Labour candidate for the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election Davy Russell Running in his first ever election, Davy Russell is Scottish Labour's candidate. In a campaign video, Russell says he is 'not a politician'. 'I've never stood for election before,' he says, 'But I'm standing in this by-election because this is where I was born, where I live, and where I've raised my family.' Russell has called himself a dad and grandad who wants to 'be a champion in parliament' for the Hamilton, Larkhall, and Stonehouse constituency. Prior to getting involved in politics, Russell began his career as a roads trainee in 1980 and ended up as a director at Glasgow City Council. He also helps run a local hospice and represents King Charles as Deputy Lord Lieutenant in Lanarkshire. 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
Sky News AU
02-05-2025
- Politics
- Sky News AU
Reform UK wins Runcorn and Helsby by-election by six votes in blow to Labour
Council and Mayoral Election results are starting to come in across Britain as Nigel Farage's Reform UK Party attempts to position itself as the country's major Conservative Party. The party is building on its shock UK General Election swing last year, where it gained five seats. Early results show it could challenge the status quo and position itself as the major challenger to Labour going forward. Reform UK has seen swings of more than 20 per cent in early council and mayoral results. It has also claimed a historical victory in the Runcorn and Helsby by-election - its candidate winning by just six votes, the smallest winning margin in UK history.
