Dear All
One thing that the Scottish National Party
doesn’t like is freedom of speech.
As an SNP party member I expressed a view
that the SNP had chosen the wrong candidate in Osama Saeed. I also expressed
that he wouldn’t win that election but he would also return a low vote.
For voicing my opinion, this prompted the
SNP to coerce me into censoring my blog.
That was the first time they did it and the
last time.
Here is another story which mentions Osama
Saeed who worked for Alex Salmond.
The Scottish National Party is run as a
party within a party and these people don’t believe in free speech.
Now, the scandal and it is a scandal of an
SNP Government minister caught up in a row of ‘gagging’ academics in the
independence debate has continued to rumble on, English woman Shona Robison says
she would never try to stifle debate.
Oh really!
Shona Robison, a Dundee SNP MSP has
released a statement after the backlash by academics has spread beyond
Scotland.
She questioned the impartiality of
Professor Chris Whatley.
He is a Dundee University historian who is
involved in a project to investigate issues raised by the referendum.
So, what was Professor Chris Whatley crime?
He appeared at a pro-UK Better Together
event.
That is his crime.
This prompted Robison to ask whether his
views are compatible with the neutrality of the university's 5 Million
Questions project, and it also raises an issue of why the Scottish National
Party are monitoring Better Together events.
After finding out Whatley was there, she emailed
the university principal Professor Pete Downes on November 4 to say that Professor
Whatley should remain neutral as he is a "figurehead" of the project.
Neutral in her eyes means he isn’t allowed
to voice an opinion, some people call that suppression of freedom of speech.
Others call it gagging.
So, having shot herself in the foot, she attracted
such an angry response from opposition parties, she is now backtracking, she is
trying to save her career and reputation.
As well as the anger, there was an open
letter from leading academics worried about freedom of speech in Scotland under
Alex Salmond and Scotland’s unpopular Deputy First Minster Nicola Sturgeon.
Conservative leader Ruth Davidson entered
the row to talk about intimidation, intimidation is used by the supporters of
the Scottish National Party much in the same way that the Nazis used it in 1930’s
Germany prior to coming to power, silence critics.
Nationalist supporters have also targeted me
with a hate campaign.
First Minister Alex Salmond defending
Robison said to Davidson:
"The accusation is total and utter
nonsense. The words 'intimidation' and 'Shona Robison' don't sit easily
together”.
Keep saying it, eventually there will be a
ring to it.
Today see the unpressured SNP Minister who
is the Commonwealth Games and Sport Minister, set out her position in a
statement on her website.
She wants to justify herself.
That is called mitigation.
She wrote:
"Firstly, I am very happy to endorse
the First Minister's support for Professor Chris Whatley's chairmanship of the
project, and his right to participate in the launch of Better Together in
Dundee. My concern was only ever about the perceived neutrality of the project
itself, something it heavily stressed in its foundation statement - all of
which is perfectly clear from the email I sent to Professor Pete Downes,
principal of Dundee University."
She went on:
"Secondly, I actually agree with the
academics who wrote...on Saturday that it is better if we know the views of
people participating in the debate, and then everyone is in a position to view
their contribution in that light. I would never try to stifle debate or attempt
to restrict the right of anyone, whether an academic or not, to have a view in
the debate on Scotland's future."
Her statement concluded:
"I believe that a fully informed
debate best serves Scotland's referendum, and indeed the achievement of a Yes
vote. I welcome open and diverse public debate on Scotland's constitutional
future - engaging our academic community among many others is an important part
of that process."
So, Shona Robison wanted Professor Chris
Whatley ‘gagged’ to help the debate?
She did write to his boss, was that to help
his career, this was a human rights gesture on her part?
What should concern academics is that they
are being proactively monitored, and we should be asking Shona Robison who is
doing it, by I suspect this is one piece of freedom of speech she wouldn’t wish
to impart.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow
University
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