This blog post was meant to be Not Hitting The Wall#7 but we felt that these two contributors to Wings Over Scotland are worth a space of their own.
We don't know the real identities of Mia' and 'Breeks'. All we know about them is that they've been regular commenters on WOS for years. When their comments are C&Ped into tweets they receive multiple thousands of views within hours and the response is always positive.
Unusually, perhaps, both Breeks and Mia seem comfortable dealing with trolls and 77ers despite Stuart Campbell's editorial advice to ignore them, but as can be seen from Mia's responses below, the efforts of mischiefs can sometimes be useful as prompts. We have not included the comments which sparked Mia's responses because their author needs no more attention than he already commands.
“Nobody really buys or cares about all the guff on the Claim of Right”
I would kindly and politely suggest you simply direct your impetus towards speaking only for yourself. That you, personally, do not care about the Claim of Right, does not mean nobody else cares.
Several months ago, before you exited these threads rather acrimoniously, you had claimed on several occasions to be a member of the ALBA party.
I have no reason whatsoever to put that in doubt. However, I include below some quotes from senior members of your party, demonstrating they do indeed care about the Claim of Right and they seem to believe it to remain extant:
“The SNP/Green coalition have promised another referendum in 2023 with “no ifs or buts”.
The Yes movement will take them (SNP and Greens) at their word, and they therefore should also explain the strategy by which they intend to bend Westminster to the will of the Scottish Parliament to agree a referendum or indeed spell out another way of asserting the sovereignty of the Scottish people.
Without that we run the risk of conducting a debate in a constitutional vacuum. Instead we need Scotland’s Claim of Right to resound far and wide.”
Mr Alex Salmond, June 2022
“The UK’s constitution is not codified in a single document, so the question of whether the Acts of Union can unilaterally be dissolved by one party is not clear. However, the accepted position hitherto is that the Union is a voluntary association of equal partners and Scotland has an unquestioned right of self-determination. That is a right underpinned by Scots common law which rests not on the Magna Carta, but on the claim of right which continues to assert that it is the people who are sovereign in Scotland”
Mr Neale Hanvey, House of Commons, February 2023
“The provisions of the Claim of Right Act 1689 in
relation to the right to appeal to the monarch against perceived judicial injustice remain in force to the extent that the right is now exercisable via appeal to the United Kingdom Supreme Court, in accordance with the usual rules of court, and civil procedure”
Mr Kenny MacAskill, quoted on “Claim of Right for Scotland”, House of Commons Debate Pack, Number 2016-0158, 2 September 2016
It seems, therefore, that your assertion “Nobody really buys or cares about all the guff on the Claim of Right” does not apply to your party and, either you have been misinformed or you are bullshiting.
Debates in Westminster regarding the Scotland Act clearly show that both, MPs and Lords accept the validity of both, the Claim of Rights 1689 and the Bill of Rights 1689, which, by the way, constitute the basis for parliamentary privilege. Here is a couple of quotes to illustrate this:
“For the avoidance of doubt, the provisions of Article IX of the Bill of Rights 1689 and of that part of Article XXV of the Claim of Right Act 1689 which secures freedom of speech and debate to members of Parliament shall apply to the proceedings of the Assembly; and those Articles shall be construed accordingly”
HL Debate “Application of Bill of Rights and Claim of Right to Assembly proceedings” 09 June 1998
“That is obvious from the fact that in my amendments I have referred to the Bill of Rights and the Claim of Right Act 1689 which are understood to found the privileges which this Parliament enjoys”
Lord MacKay of Drumadoon, HL Debate “Scotland Bill”, 02 November 1998
“Have those promulgating the Bill adequately considered the position in Scotland? I have heard nothing during the debates on Second Reading or in the other place about the impact of clause 13 on the Claim of Right Act 1689 as opposed to the Bill of Rights 1688”
Mr Paul Boateng, HC Debate “Limitation of Actions: Scotland”, 24 June 1996
Also, if you have a look at SALVO’s website, you will see this organisation is centered around Scotland’s Claim of Right, so it is safe to say that most, if not all the members of this organisation, among whom I am one, believe the original Claim of Right 1689 is not only extant but actually crucial in finding a sound route to achieve Scotland’s independence.
Even the monarch acknowledges the importance of the Claim of Right 1689. He said:
“I understand that the Law requires that I should, at My Accession to the Crown, take and subscribe the Oath relating to the Security of the Church of Scotland. I am ready to do so at this first opportunity.
I, Charles the Third, by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of My other Realms and Territories, King, Defender of the Faith, do faithfully promise and swear that I shall inviolably maintain and preserve the Settlement of the true Protestant Religion as established by the Laws made in Scotland in prosecution of the Claim of Right and particularly by an Act intituled “An Act for securing the Protestant Religion and Presbyterian Church Government” and by the Acts passed in the Parliament of both Kingdoms for Union of the two Kingdoms, together with the Government, Worship, Discipline, Rights and Privileges of the Church of Scotland.
So help me God”
Charles the Third, King of Scotland, England and Northern Ireland, published 10 September 2022
The Claim of Right referred to in Mr Windsor’s oath is the original Claim of Right, as stated in the Treaty of Union. Please note that Mr Windsor says quite clearly “I understand THAT THE LAW REQUIRES (my capitals)…”. In other words, Mr Windsor (and his royal advisors) understand the Claim of Right 1689 is part of UK law and fundamental for the UK and his own claim to the crown to continue.
After listening to somebody as senior in the British establishment as the monarch himself swearing the oath, frankly, your claim that “Nobody really buys or cares about all the guff on the Claim of Right” rings completely hollow.
I am sure you know that in 1989 a new multi-party Scottish constitutional convention was formed. This convention issued an updated version of the original Claim of Right 1689. The wording of the new Claim of Right is
“We, gathered as the Scottish Constitutional Convention, do hereby acknowledge the sovereign right of the Scottish people to determine the form of Government best suited to their needs, and do hereby declare and pledge that in all our actions and deliberations their interests shall be paramount”
You do not need an IQ above average to realise that the above is simply an actualised and modernised rewording of the original Claim of Right 1689 which reasserted Scotland’s popular sovereignty and the right of the people of Scotland to remove the crown from a monarch who dared abusing their position of power to impose absolute rule.
Even conservatives acknowledged this:
“Conservative MSP David McLetchie recalled the original Claim of Right, passed by the old Scots Parliament in 1689, adding: “Notwithstanding its offensive prejudices, the act of 1689 appears to have been an inspiration, 300 years later, for a new Claim of Right”
This new version of the original Claim of Right has been mentioned and debated several times at Westminster. It has always been accepted. It cannot be other way, because the original Claim of Right remains extant and is a fundamental condition of the Treaty of Union at all times.
A quick search in Hansard for the words “Claim of Right 1689” from 1/01/1800 to 13/01/2024 reveals the existence of as many as 197 entries. The most recent one is from October 2023. So, it does seem your assertion “Nobody really buys or cares about all the guff on the Claim of Right” is really baseless.
“It was SFA to do with imposing direct rule”
Either you have no awareness of the need to have separation of the three powers – executive, legislative and judicial- for a proper democracy to function, or you are bullshiting on this assertion too.
When you have an unelected representative of the crown sitting in the middle of what should have been a democratically elected government cabinet, controlling what laws can enter the chamber and effectively seizing control of the executive and legislative bodies when the crown already has control over the judicial power, you do not have a democracy. You have absolute rule exercised by the crown.
Control of the legislative body cannot be shared or taken in turns. Either it is controlled by the people (democracy) or is controlled by the crown (dictatorship). When an unelected representative of the crown seizes from the people control of the executive and legislative bodies and hands it to the crown, you do not have “a legal, limited monarchy” which is what Scotland’s constitution recognised as legal. What you have is a despotic power exercising absolute rule and overruling popular sovereignty. That is in direct violation of the Claim of Right 1689 and therefore unconstitutional.
“the Scottish Government over-reached itself”
And so did the crown. The point I am making here is that, in my opinion, Sturgeon’s government purposely facilitated this, therefore you cannot claim that they were caught like a rabbit on the headlights. It was, in my opinion, done by design to add in yet another fabricated layer of excuses against progressing independence to prolong the life of the UK union.
“I just don’t credit them with the smarts you seem to think they have”
I think you have completely misunderstood my thoughts.
I have never credited Sturgeon, Yousaf or the rest of post-Salmond SNP with “smarts”. Since January 2020 I have considered them nothing more than deceitful useful idiots acting in the service of the crown and against the interests of Scotland. The only ones who I think have demonstrated independent thought are Mr MacKaskill, Mr Hanvey, Ms Cherry, Mr Angus Brendan McNeil, Ms Regan, Mr Chapman and Mr Ewing.
I do not consider Sturgeon capable of successfully planning strategy. The same applies to Yousaf. They are, in my view, crown tools. For the last 9 years I have seen nothing, nothing at all, that points towards Sturgeon, or heaven forbid Yousaf, being in control of strategy.
Sturgeon has always came across to me as an implementer, not even a shaper. Shapers encourage members of the group to progress towards common objectives. She did not precisely “encourage” anyone. She forced compliance by throwing under the bus all those who did not abide by her say so, by throwing the CPS towards pro-indy dissenters of her doctrine of nonsense, and by removing democratic processes from the party to avoid dissent. She has shown she ain’t a democrat. It seems obvious she was tasked with implementing the halting of independence even at the cost of losing credibility, a huge chunk of the party’s membership and making the party unelectable. She was neither working for Scotland neither for the SNP as a political vehicle of independence. She has been destroying it on behalf of somebody else.
With regards to the MPs and MSPs you have almost enough fingers in one hand to count the number of them who had enough backbone, pro-independence conviction and independence of thought to challenge this political fraud by standing up to her. Had there been more of them and this political fraud would have not got away with stalling Scotland’s recovery of autonomy for 9 unbearably long years.
13 January, 2024 at 7:18 pm
“if it’s true (or at least arguable), tell us how we overturn this unconstitutional turn of events then?”
“Never attribute to malice what can more reasonably be attributed to stupidity”
In a context where support for the monarchy is falling fast* and allegiance to the Claim of Right by the crown has recently been confirmed by the monarch himself to be a requirement by UK law for the preservation of the Treaty of Union, for the crown to then overtly abuse power and seize control of executive and legislative powers so as to give itself absolute control to stop Scotland’s independence is, in my personal view, a magnificent display of arrogant stupidity.
*Based on Savage, M (2022) “Scottish support for monarchy falls to 45%, poll reveals”, The Guardian and Curtice, J (2023) “Another Look at Attitudes to the Monarchy”
Hatuey says:
13 January, 2024 at 4:07 pm
Nobody on here or anywhere seems willing to admit the obvious truth, that independence is on hold and, under the circumstances, that is probably a good thing…..
…We have two or three years in this limbo-land. What we do with that time matters but it’s hard to see right now where arguments for independence help. I think the time would be better spent dealing with those that put us in this hole.
If Scotland was already an Independent nation, there would never be a second, minute, or hour in any day, week or month, where Scotland’s “lot” would be enhanced by forfeiting that Independence or national integrity. There would NEVER be a day when “not” being a Nation would be a good idea. Never.
As far as I am concerned, Scotland IS that Independent Nation; our popular sovereignty is intact and extant, our Claim of Right is manifest throughout Westminster’s historic attempts to subjugate Scotland. Scotland’s captivity in this Union is both an illusion that the Union was ever sound to begin with, compounded by the inexplicable “blindness” towards the litany of breaches and betrayals which have long ago destroyed the legitimacy of an “Union” had a Union of some integrity ever existed to begin with.
Scotland is entranced by a great and mighty deception. Nothing more. That we also suffer a raft of delinquent and dishonest political arsewipes masquerading as our leadership is both a symptom and consequence of our delusion, not the cause of it.
Scotland is Snow White of the Global Community; a nation tricked into a perpetual slumber with all her beauty and integrity intact but dormant, but then surrounded by a thicket of thorns designed to isolate our captive from restorative contact with the outside world.
You want to sleep on until a better day? There will not be a better day than the day Scotland opens its eyes and wakens from this coma. The monstrous machine we’re hooked up to is NOT our life support. It’s there to administer our sedative while it bleeds us dry.
Fuck your Sturgeons, Tommy Sheppards and Humza Yousafs who pedal the myth that Scotland needs ANY facet of the bent and corrupt SNP, be it in Holyrood or Westminster, to rouse our Nation from its enforced stupefaction.
Purge the fking lot of these parasitic, placebo politicians from your mind. When we come to our senses, these t(reacherous) bullshitting imbeciles will not be the ones in control. In more turbulent times in less tolerant countries than Scotland, they’d be strung up from lamposts by now. That, or hung, drawn and quartered; as the prevailing penalty for T(reason).
Be clear, I’m not calling for that. I’ll be content just to see the back of the fkers. Maybe there’s hope for a little decency from them once the enchantment afflicting them is broken. Apparently there was an appetite to forgive NO voters, so delinquent YES voters cannot be beyond redemption.
Admit an obvious truth eh? No Hatuey, don’t believe I will. Not now. Not ever. There is only one solution to Scotland’s predicament, and hitting the snooze button isn’t it.
A sordid and sorry afterthought….
Maybe Scotland’s “slumber” isn’t the sanitised Disney cartoon version of Snow White. It’s probably closer to Beatrix the Bride’s comatose condition in Tarantino’s Kill Bill.
Sorry if that shocks you, but tell me how I’m wrong
“I’m not sure why you think it’s relevant?”
Goodness, isn’t it obvious?
What effect on public acceptance of the monarchy (and politicians) do you think realisation that the whole political edifice in Scotland is nothing more than a facade to cover up for the fact that the crown might be exercising absolute rule whenever it pleases?
And what do you think is going to happen when that realisation of betrayal grows to critical mass?
How long do you think the monarchy (and its rotten political construct) can continue limping on if public support permanently falls below 40%?
“Who calls this convention then?”
Who called the original convention of the estates?
Who called the convention of 1989?
“How are those in the convention selected?”
How were those in the original convention of the estates selected?
How were those in the convention of 1989 selected?
“Who elects the convention?”
Who elected the original convention of the estates?
Who elected the convention of 1989?
“Impeaching the government (I assume you mean Holyrood govt?) on what grounds?”
Yes, I do mean Holyrood government. On what grounds you ask. Goodness, have you been sleeping for the last 9 years? Isn’t there more than enough to impeach them 50 times over?
“Who puts the crown on notice?”
Who removed the crown from James VII and handed it to William and Mary?
“Of what?”
Abuse of power
Encroachment on the people’s sovereignty.
Breach of the Claim of Right and consequently breach of one of the fundamental conditions of the treaty of union that is currently supporting the right of this royal line to the throne.
“What does it even mean?”
What do you think it means?
“So ownership of Edinburgh airport together with a swathe of Scottish ports has transferred to Blackrock”
What is happening in Scotland mirrors exactly what is happening a UK level:
Many say that every now and then a UK labour government is needed to implement the toxic policies the tories would not dare to. If the tories implemented those toxic policies, they would never be elected again. But tory governments have to be the default UK government and labour just the exception, because that is how the aristocracy retains its power and privileges, and keeps democracy at bay in the 21st century.
So what is the solution? Transform the labour party into a hollowed out empty vessel and then fill it up with covert tories. The present labour leader is more right wing than the ERG and more of a warmonger than many tories. The same applied to Blair. Mr Corbyn did not fit the profile therefore he could never be let anywhere near n10.
But Labour is a pro-colonialism party because it is most keen to retain for Scotland the status of colony what come may. If Labour was in control of Scotland’s government while the British estate conducted a savage asset stripping, the immediate consequence would be a massive backlash against unionism and unstoppable progress towards independence. No, the British state could not have that. The asset stripping and irreparable damage had to be seen by the people to be done by the SNP so the backlash was directed towards nationalism.
We see the same strategy used at UK level and Scotland. The only thing that changes is the brand of trojan horse.
Which entity orchestrated the hollowing out of Labour and its pulling to the right and warmongering?
Which entity orchestrated the raise of Yousaf to the position of SNP leader in what had to be the doggiest leadership context in Scotland’s democratic history?
Which entity has enough contempt for democracy to do such thing?
What/who were all those SPADS and Civil Servants in Scotland helping to prop up Yousaf’s leadership campaign really working for?
Could it be the same entity which orchestrated the pull of labour to the right?
Democracy in the UK and certainly in Scotland is an illusion. It has never been more obvious than now. We are being taken for fools.
14 January, 2024 at 3:58 pm
“Seeing a whole lot of deflection there." in your comment? Absolutely! My answer was very clear: use a similar procedure to what has already been used before. I am neither employed by you nor paid to device a detailed strategy so as to satisfy your curiosity. If you want one, design it yourself. Aren’t you a member of the Alba party? Well then, if they want to get into Holyrood and reach government they must have a strategy.
“Same old, same old I suppose”
Which indeed applies to you. You are issuing the same arrogant and deaf responses you used to issue before you left on a huff: pretend not to read or see what is in disagreement with your own point of view and then berate a bit the messenger for good measure. Same old same old. Who designated you as the arbiter of this site and what makes you think the rest of us have to abide by your command/rules/caprices?
“This is 2024, no the 17th century or 1989”
Precisely. Attempting to bully those who do not agree with you into silence does not longer work.
“You STILL didn’t answer what “impeachment” meant”
And why on earth should I? Haven’t you got a brain and fingers? Aren’t you capable to do research by yourself and find out what it means? When exactly did I become your unpaid research minion?
“The obvious way to get rid of a Scottish Government which is not fit for purpose, or no longer represents the wishes of the majority is to vote them out”
Yeah, but that only works in a functioning democracy. But when what you have is absolute rule disguised as “democracy”, your proposal is pure wishful thinking, and that is being generous.
So, let me get back at you: how on earth do you plan to get rid of a coloniser by using a “democratic vote” at an election that has to be approved by the coloniser, when that coloniser controls the rules, controls the vote, controls the ballots, controls who counts the vote, when it is counted and by whom, controls the “official” results and controls the franchise?
How on earth can you use such avenue when you are going directly against the coloniser? Do you seriously expect the coloniser is going to lay back and let you?
How do you expect to use such avenue to get rid of a corrupt to the core Scottish government when that government has worked hard for 9 years to become that coloniser’s ultimate minion, making itself indispensable for that coloniser to continue asset stripping Scotland and maintaining the yes movement on a leash?
Do you seriously think the coloniser is going to open the gates and let you in to remove its most useful minion?
What is the point of “voting out” a corrupt to the core Scottish government if that coloniser is just going to replace it with another equally corrupted one?
How on earth can you use democracy when democracy is not on offer?
Did you not see what that establishment did to Mr Corbyn and the Labour party when he was at an inch of reaching n10?
Did you not see what they did to the leader of your own party?
Did you not see what they did to Tommy Sheridan?
Did you not see what they did to the SNP and how they totally destroyed its democratic structures ensuring members lost control the party?
Did you not see the mockery of democracy that was the SNP’s latest leadership election that parachuted the hopeless Yousaf to the post?
“It’s called democracy”It is only called democracy when the people can elect the government they want. For that to happen, ALL options must be available. If the establishment deliberately removes or blocks some of those options (as Sturgeon did in 2015 when she declared that a vote for the SNP was not a vote for independence), or deliberately tarnishes them to make them unelectable (like they did to Mr Salmond) or engineers a strategy to stop them winning (like they did to Ms Ferrier), then you cannot talk about “democracy”. What you have is absolute rule with the illusion of democracy.
Does democracy exist in the UK? I am arguing it does not. I argue that we do not have a democracy, just the illusion of one. For democracy to be usable as a tool to remove a corrupt government, it has to be a fully functioning democracy, not just the illusion of one.
The way Ms Ferrier was hauled out by the SNP and Labour was not just vomit-inducing but a magnificent example of how democracy in the UK does not exist. It was a forceful removal of the first choice of that constituency because, for whatever reason, that choice was not convenient for the establishment at the time. It was a profoundly undemocratic overruling of the will of the people in that constituency.
The same sly attempt to thwart democracy was seen in 2019 in Mr Hanvey’s constituency. Again, that was a vicious attempt to remove the favourite candidate. Fortunately, it did not work. Looking at the way Mr Hanvey conducts himself in Westminster and comparing it with the useless lumps from the SNP, it becomes very clear why they attempted to stop him.
We also saw it in the way the SNP blocked Ms Cherry’s bid for Holyrood, parachuting instead the shocking Robertson to the post.
Another wonderful example took place in 2016, when, despite 62% of those voting in Scotland doing so against Brexit, brexit was forced down our throats. What did Scotland voted for? It only served to legitimise this undemocratic abuse.
Another example was in 2015, when, before the election and leaving no time for a proper pro independence party to emerge, the political fraud Sturgeon proceeded to remove the dentures of the SNP as a political vehicle for independence. She did this AFTER the polls announced it was going to win by a landslide. As it is, with that maneuver alone, that political fraud left us without a fit for purpose pro-independence party to vote for, at a point when support for independence was just over 50%.
In the last few weeks we have witnessed how David Cameron, no longer an MP, has been, out of the blue, parachuted, by someone/something, to office. If that is not a magnificent display of absolute ruling and a mockery of democracy, what is.
In the last day or so we saw yet another example of absolute ruling at work: the way Laura Pascal has been suspended days before the election, leaving those supporting her, disenfranchised.
And that is the kind of “democracy” you want us to use to get rid of the coloniser and its minion Scot Gov? I am sorry but you are either kidding yourself or incredibly naive.
“It seems too many people are still wedded to the idea that if they can’t construct a democratic majority for what they want, it’s OK to just throw the baby out with the bathwater and do something else instead because reasons.”
It seems to me that some people are incredibly determined to fool us into believing that hitting our head against the same reinforced concrete wall over and over and over and over again, will eventually lead to a different result other than a nasty bruise.
9 years of nasty bruises is quite enough, thank you. Democracy is only useful when it is fit for purpose. An illusion of democracy, which is what we have and will have for as long as we remain in this union, is not a functional democracy, therefore completely useless to remove from office a corrupt government that happen to be the ultimate gatekeeper of the coloniser we want to rid ourselves of.
Time to change the game, the game board and the rules.
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