‘Fake Scot’ SNP MP Angus Robertson accuses Theresa May of running a 'Little Britain Brexit' campaign which will hit jobs and pay, the grievance mode is deflection from the facts of life, Nicola Sturgeon has to go to the polls in 2018 for an outright SNP majority for a mandate for indyref 2, the Nationalists bluff has been called, put up or shut up!

Dear All

It looks like it is going to be what is described as ‘hard’ Brexit as it should be, there are many issues relating to why people voted to leave the EU but these are symptoms of what the main point was concerning the British people.

Sovereignty!

Sovereignty is the key reason of why 17 million people voted to leave the EU after over 40 years of membership.

I personally doubt we will be the last country to leave, but we have set what could be a trend. I was as many blog readers know a fan of the EU. The EU was set up for noble reasons to promote peace and trade in Europe, but the organisation didn’t develop as it should have done.

It became clearly anti worker and anti country, took over by politicians who put the interests of big corporations before European harmony.

People had put up with a lot but the tipping point came when people like Merkel and Juncker decided that they could threaten the UK and others into doing their will by using denial of finance as a weapon. On and off you will have read my stuff on how currency is a weapon of the modern age just as much as the bomb and the bullet.

Currency was used to destroy Greece so effectively that they have never recovered, it also allow the country to be asset stripped as well.

Yesterday was an interesting day in politics, for some people the significance of the day wasn’t realised as Theresa May made a speech on the EU and upcoming talks on Brexit.

Domestically the Prime Minister Theresa May called unpopular Nicola Sturgeon’s bluff on a second independence referendum by default. The by product sent the SNP into a meltdown as they have been called out to put up or shut up, down the line this leaves Nicola Sturgeon with a question.

The question isn’t whether she calls for a second independence referendum but whether she gambles on going to the polls in 2018.

Nicola Sturgeon needs another Scottish mandate to present to Westminster; the Conservatives may feel that they stand to gain North and South of the Scottish border because the Labour Party is in chaos, particularly in Scotland.

Can the Conservatives in Scotland do better than their 2016 Holyrood showing?

Now, that is a question, clearly between now and a possible 2018 election, I don’t see Scottish Labour making a recovery either within its ranks or with the public. The Scottish Labour Party has an upcoming civil war to fight between Kezia Dugdale’s centre right and Momentum. I expect that episode to dominate Labour’s thinking as everyone expects Labour to be crushed in 2017 at the Council elections.

The SNP are cooked on Brexit, overplayed their hand and nowhere to go, they are reduced yet again to sniping at the Tories. Englishman Angus Robertson who I describe as a ‘fake Scot’ is trying to muddy up the waters so that you the voter get distracted from the disaster that is unfolding before your eyes.

Robertson’s take is that Theresa May is steering the UK into a "Little Britain Brexit" that will hit jobs and pay.

The SNP leader in Westminster added that all political parties in Scotland are united in their opposition to plans to take the UK out of the single market.

This statement isn’t true!

Ukip Scotland isn’t supporting this, regardless how you personally feel about the party; they are a party legally recognised by the Electoral Commission. The Ukip position is to be out of the single market.

What Robertson is going is using language to de-legitimise the party in the eyes of the public; he is doing propaganda, simple and crude, and easily destroyed by simple research that doesn’t go beyond general knowledge.

Angus Robertson being a fool isn’t new by any means, however his demand to know if the Prime Minister will stick to her promise to treat Scotland as an "equal partner" is erroneous. Scotland has 59 MPs and England has 533 MPs, so when people talk about equal partnerships, they are talking about equality in the individual and not the countries that make up the Union.

Clearly 59 MPs cannot have the same influence as 533 MPs.  

During PMQs, he said:

"Shortly after the Prime Minister confirmed that she wants to take the UK out of the single European market, the Scottish Parliament voted by a large, cross-party majority to remain in the single European market, just as a large majority of people in Scotland voted to remain in the European Union. The Prime Minister has said that Scotland is an equal partner in the United Kingdom. Does she still believe this is true or is she just stringing the people of Scotland along?"

If you think back to my BBC appearance on the Big Debate, I said that all the devolved administrations should have some role in the Brexit talk;, something that Gordon Brewer said was ‘very noble’.

It may or may not be very noble but it was more to do with practical matters which needed to be taken into account, later on the Conservatives announced the same idea as me.

George Laird right again and ahead of the curve.

The Prime Minister has insisted she is committed to working with Scotland and all the devolved administrations as she severs ties with Brussels which is pretty standard fare, nothing much can be read into that at present.

According to her the biggest threat to Scotland and the Scottish economy was the nationalist threat of another independence referendum.

She said:

"I refer you to my speech yesterday, where I reiterated my commitment to be working with the devolved administrations to ensure that their voice is heard, that their interests are taken into account as we proceed along this path of negotiating our exit from the European Union. And, also, I specifically referenced the Scotland plan. I understand the Welsh Government will be producing a plan for Wales for us to look at too. That Scotland plan will be being considered by the JMC (Joint Ministerial Committee) on European negotiations tomorrow, I believe. We will be looking at it seriously and working with the Scottish Government on the proposals they bring forward."

Is there a possibility of another independence referendum?

Yes, there is that possibility but the SNP need to win another outright majority like they did in 2011 and given the list system that is a crap shoot. The second independence referendum won’t be given on the basis a majority in Holyrood, Sturgeon is effectively forced to get an outright majority by the SNP.

If there is a second campaign, I don’t see a Better Together 2 being formed, that project turned out to be a costly disaster that didn’t properly mesh together.

So, who could set in and be BT 2?

http://www.scotlandinunion.co.uk/our_team

Scotland in Union, this is a group of various people; however you might want to check out who’s who in their team, some of whom I know in passing.

An interesting person to note is ex Labour MSP Graeme Pearson, he is the Chief Executive, he maybe in charge of a campaigning organisation but the reality is he doesn’t really know sweet FA about campaigning really. He stood for Labour and was selected as a candidate based on his past employment not on his history of political activism.

If I was a betting man, I would lay money that he isn’t going regular activism for the Labour Party week in week out.

The Scotland in Union organisation seems to be the only logical choice as the main vehicle for any indyref 2 that comes down the pipeline for the pro UK side, although they aren’t developed enough at present they are gearing up their ground operations.

Keep a weather eye on their future activities.

After being called out a panicked and hysterical is keen to shift the spotlight off Nicola Sturgeon’s failure, to that end, grievance mode is in full swing with Angus Robertson saying Scotland's leading economic forecaster has warned that "real wages will fall" as a result of Brexit.

He added:

"The forecast for people's income is that it is likely to drop by £2,000 and that 80,000 people may lose their jobs in Scotland as a result of the hard Tory Brexit plan of the Prime Minister. Does the Prime Minister believe that this is a price worth paying for her little Britain Brexit?"

If that is the case, the question then arises how many jobs would have been lost if Scotland had voted for independence.

The losses are estimated at 320,000 job losses and £32 billion in GDP; let that sink in for a moment. Think of it in these terms every public service body hit by savage cuts, every council shedding jobs, services and cutting budgets and critically the Health Service is a crisis you can fathom.

Change can be progressive if thought-out and planned, but in certain scenarios, there will not be goodwill on both sides and as the threats escalate from Europe; hard Brexit maybe a pain worth paying because it won’t be one sided.

The British market for cars is said to help employ about a million people in Germany, if there isn’t a tariff free trade agreement you might find down the line that there will be a lot of Germans facing unemployment, and when big business loses money they ‘lean’ on politicians.

Lots of things are happening at present so you have to look close to see if there is a pattern emerging, I think that a risk is taking place, a gamble, that gamble is whether the SNP risk going the polls in 2018.

Will unpopular Nicola Sturgeon have the bottle to risk her political future not on the win but getting an overall majority in her own right as proof of mandate for a second indyref 2?

In the mean time, watching the Nationalists squirm has a certain amusement value don’t you think?

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University