SNP on Road to Oblivion; ‘troublemaker’ Nicola Sturgeon is to publish Holyrood Brexit Bill in a vain attempt to create dramatic clash with Westminster and fuel a constitution crisis, leaving the legal competent question aside, we are seeing her ‘last roll of the dice’ to save her career and party from destruction

Dear All

We are all know and you all know that the SNP is an incompetent government, in fact their record is so bad that Nicola Sturgeon will try anything to deflect how awful it is, hence the SNP want to have a running fight with Westminster.

To that end, we are seeing the next step not on the road to independence but on the road to the SNP as a viable government. Nicola Sturgeon is said to be going to publish a Holyrood Brexit Bill. The SNP think that by attempting to create a constitutional crisis with Westminster that somehow this will kick start support for another Scottish independence bid.

The SNP reached their high water mark in 2015, the tide has steady dropped for them, and despite twists and turns, and screams and shouts, the decline is irreversible under Nicola Sturgeon. Since Nicola Sturgeon took over the reins of the SNP, the support for the party has dropped in terms, of voters, money and public confidence.

The SNP Government is going to bring forward a Continuity Bill to transfer devolved areas of EU law into Scots law once the UK leaves the EU. Since all powers of the EU go back to the member state, the final decision rests with Westminster, so the Continuity Bill will certainly raise legal questions, the prime one being is it competent to go through Holyrood.

I would say the answer is no!

Why no?

Until the UK and the EU sign off and the membership ends, then technically this remains a reserved issue as it comes under ‘foreign affairs’ which is outside the scope of the Holyrood parliament.

Nicola Sturgeon’s first clash might not be with Westminster but with the Presiding Officer at Holyrood, Ken Macintosh, he may rule this legislation not competent! If that happens; then this whole sorry miserable episode engineered by Sturgeon and SNP ‘strategic thinkers’ will come to a shuddering halt and immediately the opposition win by default, by doing nothing.

And of course everyone will laugh at Nicola Sturgeon, the ‘trained’ lawyer; that would be a ‘low flying’ lawyer as her employment record shows. Nicola Sturgeon’s high-risk legislation won’t stop a Westminster “power grab” after Brexit because power rests with Westminster. Post Brexit, Westminster will as the vehicle which the powers have been returned to, set up a working group to ensure areas which are in the realm of devolved matters will go to Holyrood.

What the SNP won’t be able to do is……….. pick!

In case you have missed it, the SNP is about to get hit by a range of powers and responsibilities which they cannot ignore, this will further show up the SNP in a bad light as their lack of ability which has become and increasing problem will feel like a tsunami has hit them, completely overwhelming them.

Far from solving her problems, and there are many, Nicola Sturgeon is doing something which will backfire on her, such as money is important in government, the issue of time, time to effective governance and change threatens the SNP attempts to hold onto power.

Tick tock!

To show how stupid Nicola Sturgeon is, and that she lacks ‘statesmanship’, it is said that she is ready to introduce the Bill even if Holyrood’s Presiding Officer, Ken Macintosh, rules it is outwith the parliament’s competence. To justify this crap, the Lord Advocate, James Wolffe, is due to explain the government's belief the Bill is competent to MSPs tomorrow.

So, what does it mean if James Wolffe says one thing, and Holyrood’s Presiding Officer, Ken Macintosh says the opposite?

Holyrood’s Presiding Officer, Ken Macintosh opinion wins!

So, does Sturgeon want to start a long legal process against the Holyrood parliament’s Presiding Officer and body?

If she does, then that has to go the full road, and as all roads lead to Rome in the movies, this one leads to the UK Supreme Court, a body the SNP are familiar with having lost major court cases as judgments have been found against them, time and time again. The UK wants around 25 of the 111 devolved competencies to go to Westminster; the rationale is in order to create UK-wide common frameworks protecting the UK single market.

It is said that Scotland-only version of the EU (Withdrawal) Bill going through Westminster, the Continuity Bill is designed to maintain all devolved EU laws after Brexit. In principle this isn’t a big deal, how the SNP seek to use it, is the problem, as the Bill will also give Scottish Ministers the power to amend transferred EU law after Brexit. If the SNP decide to play games, then legal experts warn it could be challenged by the UK government in the Supreme Court as I mentioned.

How many times do the SNP want to go to the Supreme Court to hear a verdict against them?

In order to secure the UK single market, if the SNP will not cooperate, then the UK parliament could ignore the SNP games and pass its own legislation regardless in order to protect economic security. If the SNP haven’t grasped the significance of economic security, they are even bigger losers than people give them credit for!

Rather than garner support in Scotland, the mood will be that the SNP have done enough damage to this country and need to be removed as a party of government.

Finally, although the Welsh have jumped on this bandwagon, I suspect that this isn’t going to work out. If you have watched the news, the opposition to Brexit aren’t getting good news, they are getting called ‘rats’ and ‘scum’ and ‘traitors’, and this is from an angry British public. This spot of troublemaking by Nicola Sturgeon is her attempt to appear relevant but it seems that she still hasn’t grasped the point………. her is over!

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University