Dear All
When you look at the history of the SNP Government over 14 years in power, and their relationship with the UK Supreme Court, it is a history of failure after failure to prove their cases. Court cases at this level are highly scrutinised by the most learned and senior senior judges of the land. To me the most famous SNP Govt case at the UK Supreme Court was the Cadder Case.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadder_v_HM_Advocate
The basic concept of this case was that the Police with Crown Office approval took away the human rights of a person in a criminal case and replaced them with 'safeguards'. This isn't how Human Rights, you cannot take away a person's human rights and replace them with 'gifts' from the Crown. They don't have the authority legally or morally to do this to any person accused of a crime. Any first year law student would know this, but the SNP Government, and their army of lawyers choose to support a corrupt justice system. The rationale for denying rights was simple, it was to give an fair advantage to the Crown Office. In the aftermath of the Cadder case, police effectively had to give people back full human rights in Scotland, which meant access to legal representation when arrested. To me, this case was a watershed moment in Scottish politics, and I had blogged several times on this case as being significant. What it showed was the extent that once the SNP had got their feet under the establishment table, they were willing to let abuses of human rights go, protect abusers because the people doing the abusing where now 'their' abusers. Protecting a corrupt system was more important than protecting justice.
The route that Cadder had to take to get to the UK Supreme Court wasn't as simple as A to B, in fact it had many twists and turns before it got there. Once found guilty, it seemed every avenue to appeal was being blocked by the system. But Cadder and his lawyer didn't give up. So, we have a train of events that sees Cadder having sought leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. This was refused as the Criminal Appeals Administration Judge was of the view that the refusal of the earlier attempts to appeal did not amount to a determination of a devolution minute. Cadder then sought special leave to appeal directly to the Supreme Court. It was asked to consider whether Cadder was able to obtain special leave to appeal; matters surrounding his identification; and also matters relating to there being no right to have a consultation with a solicitor before an interview by the police. So, although the SNP Government at this stage must have know they were acting illegally, they still pressed ahead. When I started reading this case in the mainstream media, I quickly formed the conclusion early on that Cadder's rights had been breached. The fact that the Crown Office had espoused that they had written 'safeguards' as replacements for Human Rights as a presumable defence for their actions spoke volumes. The Crown Office knew exactly what they were doing in denying people their rights, there is no question in my mind on this point. This was all done to get conviction rates up in order to appease their political masters.
In the present day, the SNP have continued supporting bad law, passing bad and using the processes of Government for their own political ends. There is nothing new in law as 'testing the law', it has been done since law was first written. In the shape of the SNP 'testing the law' is all about the SNP using manufactured grievance. I cannot think of any SNP Government case of significance before the UK Supreme Court that they have won, you see if they had, they would be screaming from the rooftops, it would be like hearing how England won the world cup in 1966, something that never goes away. The SNP Government passed an illegal Bill at Holyrood, in this nationalist scheme, they sought to suck in all the left leaning Scottish parties using children's rights. The Bill of course was a front, it had an ulterior motive, that motive was to have the UK Supreme Court accept that a devolved administration could legislate on reversed issue which fall under the remit of the UK Government. It was a trojan horse, and not a very bright idea, but you cannot expect very bright ideas from devious people. Everyone knows what the SNP is all about, people know how they are made up, what they are doing, who they are doing it with and where they are going. Of course, you also have to recognise that in their latest attempt at grievance, they still exhibit a startling lack of contempt for Westminster. The Westminster Government reads every single thing the SNP produces, line by line, and have some of the finest legal minds on law and specifically constitutional law in any developed country in the world.
The UK Supreme Court ruling that a Scottish Government Bill on children’s rights was outside Holyrood’s powers was always going to happen. The Court said parts of the Bill, which is designed to incorporate the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into Scots law, were incompatible with the Scotland Act underpinning devolution. To recap what the SNP plan was.
1/
It was used for grievance.
2/
It was an attempt to get the UK Supreme Court to accept a devolved
administration can legislate outside its remit.
3/ It was used an election tool for the Holyrood.
It was never about the rights of the child, they were just a front, an add on to their campaign to stay in power!
In the ruling against the SNP Government, SNP ministers have been accused of “shamefully using children’s rights to play nationalist games”, and this is what the SNP did, they consider children as 'props'. I mentioned this on the blog many times in relation to Nicola Sturgeon an her use of children particularly at election times. The use of kids by Sturgeon is a staged managed PR stunt, the impression that you are supposed to get is that Nicola Sturgeon is a decent caring woman, that she is a regular family woman, which the ultimate idea that Sturgeon is the 'kindly mother' of the nation. Well, those who follow politics regularly will know, that the stylised and carefully crafted PR image of Nicola Sturgeon as a caring decent human being interested in the people of Scotland is sham. Nicola Sturgeon is a pretty horrible nasty small minded individual who rose up in politics by shouting against the short comings of others. When she achieved power, the short coming of her and her party clique were then exposed, do you see the real Nicola Sturgeon when her mask slips.
If you think that in future that more illegal Bills of this nature will not be produced for the three purposes I have stated above, you need to spend more time reading about what is going on in Scotland. I suspect that the Scottish Conservatives know this as there was a furious row at Holyrood, where they said the Scottish Government had "cynically engineered and manipulated the timing of the Bill to facilitate a pre-election stunt" and pick a fight with Westminster. They got 2/3, the third point although a very long shot has to be considered as well. Disgraced Deputy First Minister John Swinney, who ignored warnings the Bill was flawed, said the decision showed the weakness of devolution. In other words independence solves everything, which it doesn't. Swinney had successfully craved out for himself a reputation as a competent finance minister, when he transferred to education, his reputation as a minister took a nose dive. Swinney became a front man for pushing an lgbt agenda for sexualisation of kids at Scottish schools. A kid may have not be able to read and write properly but the same educational 'weight' was placed on them learning how to shag someone up the arse. The SNP Government even sanction 'props', banana and a tub of nutella, I am sure that you can work out what the tub of Nutella represents as well as the banana. Some kids will leave school with no qualifications, no future, no hope, no career, no social mobility but they will always remember the lesson on the tub of Nutella and the banana. Years ago, I blogged on an lgbt activist from Sturgeon's southside clique who took a homeless man down a one way alley, checking his wallet before he entered it, do you think he wanted to discuss politics?
To get back to the illegal Bill, five supreme court justices, including the court’s Scottish president Lord Reed, ruled unanimously that the legislation had been flawed. The UK Government knew they were going to win before they ever stepped foot in the Court, in fact they were so confident in their case. The Court ruled four sections of the UNCRC Bill and two sections of a similar Bill on local government had been incompatible with Holyrood’s powers.
Tory MSP Donald Cameron MSP, said:
“This unanimous Supreme Court judgement confirms that the SNP shamefully used children’s rights to play nationalist games. There was never any dispute over the substance of the policy, only the legality of parts of the Bill. The Scottish Conservatives supported this legislation from the outset whilst pointing out the legal problems. But the SNP sought to politicise it from the very beginning. They cynically engineered and manipulated the timing of the Bill to facilitate a pre-election stunt where they provoked a grievance with the UK Government. The instant response from John Swinney to this decision was to make it all about nationalism, instead of focusing on children’s rights. The SNP’s disgraceful approach has delayed a Bill on children’s rights that every party in the Scottish Parliament supported. We hope they will now hastily apologise for doing so and make the necessary changes immediately so that this legislation, that all MSPs support, can be passed. The Scottish Conservatives are building the real alternative to the SNP so we can end this era of divisive nationalism for good.”
Scottish Secretary Alister Jack, who has previously urged Swinney to change the sections ruled incompetent by the Court, said:
“As set out in the Scotland Act 1998, the Scottish Parliament cannot legislate outwith its areas of competence. As we have been clear, our concerns were never to do with the policy of the Bills, but about whether they are within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament. We will continue to work collaboratively with the Scottish Government to address any competence concerns with future Scottish Parliament legislation.”
Scottish Greens human rights spokesperson Maggie Chapman said:
“This is a dark day for democracy in the UK.”
What I would say to Chapman is that she clearly doesn't grasp the concept of devolution and where its limits end.
She
added:
“The fact the UK Government has used the courts to overturn a decision by the Scottish Parliament to protect the rights of children reveals their disregard for human rights and their true intentions when it comes to respecting the will of the devolved nations. The idea that this UK government sees international law and human rights as a hinderance to their policy decisions is chilling. On top of this, they want to impose those values on Scotland. Boris Johnson’s government is rewriting democracy to ensure the Conservatives have an in-built majority across the UK and can ignore the devolved parliaments. It is becoming clearer than ever that Scotland needs a way out, to chart a different path as a modern progressive nation that respects human rights and looks after our children.”
Using the Courts to restore democracy and rights isn't new, does Chapman support democracy because it is hard to see how she does after what she has said here. Is it democracy if you happened to agree with illegality? Chapman is one of the reasons that trust in Holyrood and politicians is so low. One thing I found in her wiki page is something which I think should be brought to your attention. Until June 2021, Chapman was Chief Operating Officer at Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre. In a statement in August 2021 which did not specify her connection to the centre, she defended the centre's CEO Mridul Wadhwa, a trans woman without a gender recognition certificate. Wadhwa had said on The Guilty Feminist podcast that rape victims who objected to the presence of trans women in such centres were "bigoted" with "unacceptable beliefs" which should be challenged because "therapy is political". Mridul Wadhwa who is legally a man was connected to the SNP and put himself forward as candidate for Holyrood. I also want you to read up on this clown for your own education.
https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/mridrul-wadha-sacro-and-the-14-million
Finally, I blogged now in a few posts about the decline of Scotland, the decline of Scottish politics, I wonder at what stage of our broken politics and society do the majority of Scots say that enough is enough. Scotland is being ruined right across our social fabric. There must come a point when the UK Government acts, okay, they have acted on the illegal Bills via the UK Supreme Court, but when will they act internally. Years ago Kurt Russell made a movie called Escape from New York, about people trapped in a walled up city as their society continued to decline. The city state was run by a rogue government which abandoned law, justice and decency, we have that now in Scotland. How much longer can this decline continue, what is the trigger and waking up moment for Scots? The SNP have robbed Scotland and people of a future, and we need to get rid of them, and their allies from every level of government and society, via the ballot box, and where necessary stopping their access to funding. Yes, the UK Government has done well at the UK Supreme Court, but we need to see more from them in terms of boots on the ground in Scotland.
Yours sincerely
George Laird The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
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