Alex Salmond 1954-2024

Seeing as I was involved in politics in Linlithgow and Scotland wider for 10 years I of course encountered the Royal Burgh's most famous political son in many ways. Whilst our political viewpoint differed it does not undermine the shock that I felt when I returned home last night to hear he had died while attending a conference in North Macedonia.

He was born on Hogmany in 1954 and one of my first times standing at a polling place for council elections I encountered his parents, who lived just across the road, as they came to cast their votes for our main opponent that day.

As I spent more years going around the doors of Linlithgow I would encounter more of his former school mates both at Linlithgow Primary School and Linlithgow Academy. Some were very supportive of Alex and his agenda, others less so. However, it was always interesting as many of these people actually volunteered their thoughts on the then leader of the Scottish National Party to the Lib Dem canvasser/candidate on their doorsteps.

There were also encounters with Alex on the campaign trail, never in Linlithgow and Falkirk East sadly but in some of the by elections up at down the country.

One morning I was out campaigning for the Dunfermline and West Fife by election in a housing estate and had already encountered a Labour team already which included later leader Kezia Dugdale. Both our teams had heard a SNP loudspeaker going around the area with what we thought was a pre-recorded message from Alex. That was what I thought until a few minutes later emerging from one of the paths linking the streets into a large communal parking area I came across the car with the loudspeakers attached, only to see the SNP leader sat in the passenger seat with a microphone in his hand. That estate certainly was getting a lot of activity and focus from the three main parties that day.

While I disagree with much of what Alex stood for, he certainly had charisma and under him the SNP did what many felt was impossible in 2011 and gained a majority of members of the Scottish parliament under the additional member system.

He flitted between Westminster and Holyrood throughout his political career being MP for Banff and Buchan from 1987-2010, concurrently MSP for Banff and Buchan from 1999-2003, MSP for Aberdeenshire East 2007-2016, MP for Gordon 2015-2017. He led the SNP for over 20 years during to 10 year spells 1990-2000 and 2004-2014 and was the first SNP First Minister of Scotland from 2007-2014. 

He reigned from the SNP, who he'd joined in 1973 when he attended St Andrews University, in 2018 to fight allegations of sexual misconduct allegations. He was found not guilty of all the charges levelled at him. But he subsequently fell out with his pordigy Nicola Sturgeon and formed the Alba party in 2021 but failed to win a seat as the party's lead candidate on their North East Scotland list, the party returned no MSPs.

He'd been married to his wife Moira since 1981 but the couple had no children, my thoughts are with her at this difficult time.

Nine years on Lib Dems have fought back

On the equivalent day 9ish years ok I wrote this it was after a tough couple of days and no sleep as I took a train up from England, through Scotland and back to Northern Ireland. I wrote:

I believe last night we [the Liberal Democrats] faced the sound of gunfire and many of us fell on the battlefield. But now is the time to entrench, bring in the reinforcements to fill the ranks and prepare for the next offensive in 2020. We have a fight on our hands to get back to the strong voice we have gained in recent years, but it is a fight back that I sure is worth the effort.

Well today after a similar lack of sleep, and actually two elections 2017 and 2019 after the Conservatives undid the Fixed Term Parliament Act, we as Liberal Democrats have a differnt look on our faces. We have not just fought back to the levels of 2005 (the actual high level mark) but beyond that. There are currently 71 Lib Dem MPs an the former area where Charles Kennedy is remembered Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire has gone to a recount tomorrow.

Among those seats we have taken are three once held by former Tory PMs Maidenhead (Theresa May), Henley and Thame (Boris Johnson*) and Witney (David Cameron). Also the:

• Home of golf - (St Andrews) North East Fife - Wendy Chamberlain
• Headqurters of Rugby - Twickenham - Munira Wilson
• Home of Scottish Rugby - (Murrayfield) Edinburgh West - Christine Jardine
• Home of Tennis - Wimbledon - Paul Kohler
• Home of Rowing - Henley and Thame - Freddie van Mierlo
• Home of the Derby - Epsom and Ewell - Helen Maguire
• Worthy Field - Glastonbury and Somerton - Sarah Dyke

You could if you wanted, via a little indirect route, travel from the Sussex coast (Eastbourne and neighbouring Lewes), via the lowest lock on the Thames at Teddington (Twickenham and Richmond Park on both banks), all the way to the Severn Esturary (Thornbury and Yate, or further West at Wells and Mendip Hill) or carry on the whole way into North Devon. Both Lands End (St Ives) and John O'Groats (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) are in Lib Dem seats.

So what now for those 71 MPs? Well hopefully we now get the recognition and air time we deserve as the third largest party in Westminster. There should be a Lib Dem on most panels going forward, their will be a question every week in PMQs. We can use that exposure to get our ethos, philosphy and policies across to to the public at large without out leader having to pull off stunts to get the air time. Let's not forget that in a blind poll of policies that the pubic supported 8 of the top 10 were Liberal Democrat policies. The people actually like what we are proposing, we need to tell them about it and then even more of them should decide they can vote for us.

This morning, unlike that long trip I made in 2015, I have the largest smile on my face (even though my own MP lost his seat**) and so many more Libs across the country are also reinvigorated. Many of our Young Liberals weren't around in the party in 2015. Many of us old hands have sunk to the depths but like the cockroaches Tim Fallon said our party was we were not eradicated and have come back.

For the last couple of election cycles I've taken more of a backseat that I had prior to 2015, that is part of being a carer. I'd love to get more involved if time allows going forward, but one thing I'm sure I will be doing is starting to blog again more. I know this format is probably so last decade but I'll do what I do, watch this space.

*Admittedly the one he held before he came back to become MP

** Stephen Farry of Alliance sadly lost here in North Down

The Time I Met Paul O'Grady and Lily Savage at the Same Time

 Back in the 1990s I worked for H. Samuel and for three years of that time I was based in the store (no longer within the group) that was positioned at the Piccadilly Circus end of Shaftesbury Avenue. It was the flagship store of the chain at the time, with the famous semi-circle window up in what was our ring sizing and buffering room and being right under the neon lights. It also of course was right in the heart of things.

Right in the heart of the hustle and bustle of the City of Westminster. Shops, Government and Theatre land were all walkable. Although our branch didn't shut until 10pm we ofter got a last minute rush of customers after the theatres got out.

Further along Shaftesbury Avenue during that time a musical version of Prisioner Cell Block H was having a run. A very well dressed man in a suit entered early one afternoon and went straight over to the costume jewellery cabinet. When he say what he wanted there was a familiar Birkenhead accent that called over to me:

"Excuse me! I'd like to take that red necklace and earings to match please."

It was not the most expensive sale I ever processed in that store, that would undoubtledly be the three times I sold the matching his and hers Raymond Weil Parsifal watches which at the time were a neat £2,750. But this was the time I took the credit card of Mr P O'Grady knowing full well that these items although going to be worn by someone else were going to grace his neck and ears. He had obviously dropped in before heading up the Queen's Theatre (now the Sondheim) to get Lily ready or her staring role in Prisoner Cell Block H.

RIP Paul O'Grady 1955 -2023

Is Government asylum policy "fair and right"?

 So Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has broken the ministerial silence since the BBC asked Gary Lineker to step back from presenting Match of the Day. In doing so he says that Linker "was a great footballer and is a talented presenter" before going on to say that that he believes that the government's policy is "fair and right?

The question though should be is it?

Firstly we need to rebuff the phrase branded about claiming there are illegal asylum seekers. The Refugee Council point out:

There is no such thing as an ‘illegal’ or ‘bogus’ asylum seeker. Under international law, anyone has the right to apply for asylum in any country that has signed the 1951 Convention and to remain there until the authorities have assessed their claim

The UK is a signatory of that Convention. This is the Convention was actually in part drafted by Winston Churchill. It is also something that is enshrined into the European Convention on Human Rights. It was the ECHR that when presenting her policy to the House of Commons the Home Secretary Suella Braverman wrote:

I am unable to make a statement that, in my view, the provisions of the Illegal Migrants Bill are compatible with the Convention rights, but the Government nevertheless wishes the House to proceed to the Bill.

Herein lies problem number one. We are already calling those that arrive my small boats Illegal Migrants, see the Refugee Council above. But also this Government knowingly wants to proceed when it could break a Convention drafted with British input. 

Maybe we can rule out that the Bill is going to be right on that basis.

As for is it fair, we need to look at how anyone claim asylum in the UK under the Bill. Let us return to the Refugee Council.

It is recognised in the 1951 Convention that people fleeing persecution may have to use irregular means in order to escape and claim asylum in another country – there is no legal way to travel to the UK for the specific purpose of seeking asylum.

Yet the Government are saying that the provisions of the Bill will not affect people who seek a legal route into the UK to claim asylum, such routes do not exist.

The Bill also aims to detain those that reach these shores by small boat without trial, without access to a lawyer for the first 28 days, or the courts, and then deport them, with no legal right to appeal and to be barred for ever from entering the UK.

 
However, arbitrarily depriving an individual of their liberty is prohibited under international human rights law. Article 9 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights decrees that "no one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile"; that is, no individual, regardless of circumstances, is to be deprived of their liberty or exiled from their country without having first committed an actual criminal offense against a legal statute, and the government cannot deprive an individual of their liberty without proper due process of law.  

So not looking very fair or very right. Also, before I get apologists saying but these are all international treatings and conventions remember one thing. In the shadow of World War II it was Britain that was at the forefront of drafting and writing the conventions and treaties that are mentioned here. This was done to prevent a nation treating other humans in a lesser way. At the moment the UK Government is steering us into a clear breach of so much international convention we are heading to being a pariah state on a par with Russia, North Korea et al.

Not just close to the language of 1930s Germany

 So the outrage over Gary Lineker's comments that some of the language used by the Home Secretary to launch and defend her asylum policy has wreaked havoc to this weekend's football schedule on the BBC. Now this is the thing, Gary only compared that language to 1930s Germany, anyone with a little knowledge of the diaries, biographies from pre-war British politicians will be able to point out to something a little closer to home.

There are three types of sources we can learn from history. First there are straight forward history texts, these are often written long enough after the event to sanitise some of the comment. Then is biography of those involved, these need to be taken with a pinch of salt, some as sycophantic in their praise for their subjects, others are the reverse written by those who disagree with them, occasionally you will find a balanced view but even that will have omissions. Then there are the firsthand documents, speeches, diaries etc. 

As someone who is still plodding through the unabridged diaries of Chips Cannon (I'm now on volume 3) I have read the pre-war entries. I can see why when the diaries were first to be printing that many leading lights in politics were nervous until they were told they would be heavily edited. You see the thing is in those diaries are recorded the language, thoughts and opinions of many of those in the Conservative party and British aristocracy that Cannon mingled with. The language used by Braverman is actually very similar to that of many in pre-war Britain who were sympathetic or enthusiastic for the National Socialist Party in Germany.

Now I doubt that Gary has an extensive a political library that I have. There were of course members of the Conservative Party who were opposed to too close a link with Germany during that period. But as Churchill himself pointed out these were his wilderness years as he was away from the main thrust of his party. However, there were many to the right of the Conservative party at that time who either flirted with or espoused fascist ideology. That group is worrying, looking at them and the attack on asylum seekers from the current Conservative party they would seem to fit right in with the current party and policies, some of which are actually taken straight out of the National Front policy book from the 1970s.

So here's the thing the actions from the Government calling out against the criticism of their policy, forcing what is meant to be an impartial public service braodcaster take a side is this debate, is exactly the opposite of impartiality. They never rile against opinion when it is strongly in their favour. They never stand up when the exclusion of pro-European voices such as the Liberal Democrats were missing from many of the political panel shows during the lead up to the referendum to leave the EU. No, the cries from Westmister, despite the wolf call from the Department of Culture, Media and Sport that "indivual cases are a matter for the BBC" are actually the signs of repression of freedom of speech. One side of a culture war is given carte blanche but dare to speak out on the other side and we will shut you down.

Today there are no presenters, pundits or commentators, willing to bring football to the BBC. So no Football Focus, no Final Score no match commentary of Radio 5 Live, no Fighting Talk on the radio tomorrow either. Match of the Day  itself will have no pundits, no commentary (from the usual freelancers) and maybe also not any interviews with players or managers. 

People are standing up and wanting to be counted. The mood may be that the language is divisive, the language is hedging towards that of Mosley's New Party in the early 30s here on British soil. The football community this weekend may be making a stand against that language in their own version of Cable Street. 

Kate Forbes misses out the liberalism of same-sex marriage legislation

 So Kate Forbes, who at the time of writing this, is running in the leadership election of the Scottish National Party has said she would have voted against same-sex marriage legislation at the time, if she had been elected to Holyrood. She is also accusing others of being illiberal who speak out against her views.

The irony is that same-sex marriage was from the time was written as policy the whole way up to legislation shows how liberal you can be, while not excluding other. You see same-sex marriage legislation could have forced faith groups to carry out such marriages. However, nobody in a same sex relationship wants to celebrate or have that recognised in somewhere they don't feel welcome. That is why in my opinion one of the key phrases in same sex marriage legislation is "allow faith groups that wish to do so". 

You see prior to SSM legislation nobody could carry out a same sex marriage, not in civil law, in a faith setting or in Scotland by a humanist celebrate. At this point I'll ignore the fact that at Lib Dem Federal level the policy for Same Sex Marriage had to be amended to allow humanist celebrants to carry out mixed sex mrriages (which had only been possible in Scotland up until then). You see when drafting the policy in Scotland it was clear that nobody would be forced to carry out same-sex marriages. 

But I hear you say what about making registrars carry out same-sex marriages. Those who raise an argument about this based on their religious perspective seem to leave their religious views at the door when they marry divorced couples or even couples who Kate Forbes would say were wrong already had children.

You see SSM is a legislation that enables faith groups to come to their own decisions. With the exception of the Church of England and Church in Wales that some people thought it would be better to legislation against those churches solely making a decision on their own, and thus amended to exclude them from the enabling to carry out such marriage if they wanted to.

But it is something I have faced through the 13 years that there has actually been a Lib Dem policy in place for SSM. Something that I am proud to have had a hand in When people in faith groups accuse it of impinging on them when n fact the only thing impinging on them is their own views. It is ironicly something that I still struggle with coming from my own church The Presbyterian Church in Ireland, although I do feel excuded from there because of the judgement those in high places put on people from the LGBT+ community. In a strange way Covid actually makes my church accessible to me once more even though I haven't set foot in it for years.

The irony is that today a spokesperson for the Free Church of Scotland, of which  Kate Forbes is a member said:

"It is lamentable that Kate's honest adherence to simple traditional values would, for some, disqualify her from contributing to the public good of Scotland.

"Kate Forbes is standing on the basis of her policies - the fact that she is being criticised for her Christian convictions shows a level of bigotry that has no place in a pluralistic and diverse society." 

As I have pointed out above the views themselves are actually protected in the legislation she is opposed to. But the Free Church like one or two others likes to play the victim in all this.

It was faith that made homosexuality illegal in the first place and every step of the way LGBT+ people have had to slowly move towards equality, not getting there in one step like banning did, but incrementally. At every step we are told that people of faith don't agree with loosening the hod they have over our civil lives, while some of our are also in dialogue with them in relation to our faith lives. Kate Forbes has put this front and fore of her campaign during her launch, yet apparently we are not to take her stances as a step towards leading a Government as a possible move to restrict freedoms. If we speak up against it we are the illiberal ones, despite constantly bending over backwards to get small change after small change to not upset those with certain faith views to object to everything.

Conservative and Unionist Party hoisting the union on a Trans Petard

The full name of the party that is in Government in Westminster is the Conservative and Unionist Party. However, today that took a shocking step that may well rock or even split up that union.

It is being announced that the Scottish Secretary will this evening inform the Scottish First Minister that tomorrow he will take the legal steps to invoke a Section 35 which allows Westminster to overturn a piece of legislation passed by the Scottish Parliament. This is something that has never been done in the 25 years of the Socttish Parliament. 

The piece of legislation that it is seeking to overturn is the Gender Recognition Bill that was passed with an overwhelming vote of 67% of MSPs voting in favour. The breakdown by party was

• All 4 Lib Dem MSPs in favour (100%)
• All 7 Green MSPs in favour (100%)
• 21 out of 22 Labour MSPs in favour (95%)
• 54 out of 64 SNP MSPs in favour (84%)
• 2 out of 31 Conservative MSPs in favour (6%)

So as you can see every party in Scotland bar one was overwhelmingly in favour. The fact that the Westminster Conservative Government is now going to block this going to Royal Assent is a political football being played in an increasingly right wing leaning Conservative party. The language that the party has been using on assylum seekers, Trans peoples, workers rights to strike and protest are all now looking more and more authoritarian. 

However, by invoking section 35 for the first time in history this is also piling up gunpowder under the very Union itself in a way which unlike Guy Fawkes may explode the union. It is such a minor piece of legislation in the grand scheme of things, but it opens a flood gate and leads to a slippery slope. At a time when those who want another independence referendum are already heated, the act of stopping a Scottish Act gaining Royal Assent just might push many who were agnostic to Scotland's independence into the independence camp.

The worse thing is that the Scottish Government's Gender Recognition Bill has no actual impact on UK-wide equality legislation, this was pointed out in the wording of the Bill itself. It is only impacting the right to change your gender on your birth certificate and only impacts those who wish to do so not anyone else. We in the UK do not currently* need to carry our birth certificates around with us. 

The Secretary of State of Scotland also calls for there to be more consideration of this. However, there was already 6 years of public consultion into this bill it was not rushed, what is rushed in the UK Government's response.

Yet this is the petard upon which the Westminster Government is prepared to hoist the Union.

It is laughable that the West Lothian Question which caused Tam Dalyell great ethical quandry over Scottish devolution will pale into comparison to what today has become the Westminster Question. What is a Secretary of State for Scotland opposes the will of a supermajority of the devolved Scottish Parliament.

By saying currently the more right wing, authoritarian and dare I say facist the Conservative Party are becoming me may well start to single out individuals and groups of individuals may not be far off.