Scotland is the only country in the United Kingdom that has voted New Labour out of office and, in part, out of power. As such it is very important in the politics of the UK.
The Scottish government opposes the siting of nuclear weapons in Scotland and is receiving increasing support from the general public, who oppose nuclear weapon threat as a means of assuring security, and from the military whose analysis of the role the UK's nuclear weapons capability has played since the Second war is that it is zero in terms of positive effect and enormous in terms of diverting defence funds from really useful weaponry.
The Scottish government opposes the development of nuclear power and, specifically, the siting of nuclear power stations or nuclear waste disposal on Scottish territory. Not least because there are particularly favourable resources for energy generation by every kind of 'green', and normal means in Scotland.
The Scottish government opposes the development of the surveillance state and of identity cards and of a universal state data base on citizens.
The Sottish government has policies for the husbanding and development of all of Scotland's resources from oil to fisheries, including a tourism that celebrates its natural beauty, to using its Scottish diaspora in support of the homeland.
Old Labour's policy for Scotland was to sink its people into the Slough of Despond and exploit its natural resources and client vote to hold up Labour in the UK as a whole. The Scottish National Party and its skilled, intelligent leadership has succeeded in unclenching the NewLabour and OldLabour two-handed grip of the welfare state and demoralisation from the throat of Scotland.
In 1997 people in the United Kingdom thought they had elected a benign, civilised, one-nation administration with their cultural morality and the advance of their living standards, both in terms of the social and the individual wage, at its heart. The continuous defiance by the Scottish government, which is the embodiment of these aims, of New Labour's Westminster regime attempts to throttle it, and the sharp contrast of the Scottish Parliament with the corrupted shambles at Westminster, has made us understand that the Westminster Parliament represents nobody here. It responds to the exigencies of Brussels and, in compensation for its kiss-up, a kick-down into besmirched imperial practice that was abandoned by the Macmillan administration half a century ago.
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2 comments:
Good post
And to the line I know actively peddled to progressive English folk by Scottish Labour can I point out one further thing.
Scotland in June's Euro's will see the the BNP, UKIP or any zenopphobic group bomb The "right", the establishment in scotland will be represnted by two choices - the Tory Party - moving back towards the centre, beging to reconnect, and the Labour party moving ever faster to the right, ever faster out of touch, cuppupted by power, secrecy and indulgence.
And for thoise of a prgressive left of centre outlook there will be the Scottish Lib Dems ( fully autonomous from Lndan). The Scottish Greems, the damaged but still kicking Scottish Socialists, but above all else the SNP. That's (acoording to NULab spinners) the right wing xenophobic SNP, that opposes Trident, the Iraq War, and nuclear power. Supports asylum rights. gsy rights, civil rights and Scotland's right to self determination. And loads of practial prgressive things also -like free school meals, free prescriptions and mew build council homes
But are Scots some special breed, poles apart from folks in England. in Hatfield or Huddersfield? I think not. Different, bur not fundamentally diffeent. Except we have our owm, (stil llimited) parliamnt, but one with a fair voting sytem and an open egalitarian ethos. And crucially, as your post points out, we have said no to nulab - the first of the free.
Not sure I'd agree with your characterisation of the SNP as "skilled and intelligent".
Skilled at picking fights with Westminster, that I will give you.
It's worth noting, also, that many of their policies (fisheries, for instance), are quite pointless, since the areas they purport to cover are in fact exclusive competencies of the EU, so Scottish - or any other - national views count for nothing.
Now if the SNP were actually interested in independence, as opposed to merely swapping English dominance for Brussels dominance, then my view of them would be much, much more favourable.
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