Standard Life’s Far Right Board needs exposing:
Keith Skeoch, Executive Director of Standard Life, is on the Board of Reform Scotland, the neo-conservative lobby group which wants to abolish the minimum wage, privatize the NHS and pensions, and still further restrict trade unions.
It is difficult for Tories openly to campaign against Scottish Independence as everyone in Scotland hates them, so they do it with their corporate hats on. This is most of the board of Standard Life:
Garry Grimstone, Chairman, “lead non-executive” at the Ministry of Defence, London
Keith Skeoch, Executive Director, right wing political lobbyist
Crawford Gillies, Non Executive Director, Chairman of Control Risk Group, of London, the “security consultancy” of choice for ex MI5 and MI6 officers
Noel Harwerth, non-executive Director, Director of “London First” – [Honestly, I am not making this up]
David Nish – Chief Executive, Member of the “UK Strategy Committee” of “TheCity UK”. “TheCity UK” being a body of the City of London.
John Paynter, non-executive Director, was vice chairman of JP Morgan Cazenove until the 2008 crash
Amazing that lot oppose independence, huh?
Standard Life also threatened to leave at the time of the devolution referendum and gave out No campaign materials to staff. “Leave” of course is a relative concept – the above bunch just pop up from London from time to time to check on how the serfs are doing.
I published this information on 27 February when they last tried to influence the independence debate. Standard Life is again trying today to influence the referendum campaign by a press release claiming it will move key departments to London in the event of independence, enthusiastically amplified by the BBC, Guardian and all the other reactionary media.
Well, here is an opposing press release, from me. If anybody thinks that an Independent Scotland will be a place where major strategic companies can still be controlled by swivel-eyed right wing ideologues, they may get a very nasty shock from the people of Scotland.
Isn’t it odd that in June over 50k marched in London against austerity cuts and on September 18th,we’ll have folk voting no in Scotland so basically they are happy to continue with them,also happy to have food banks continue and say “I’m all right Jack.”
Bonkers,totally bonkers.
@DS
Exactly what the Daily Telegraph opined when the minimum wage was first mooted: “People have the right to work for less than the minimum wage.”
Tory policies are NOT welcome in Scotland.
You misrepresent what I said, which was:
Rather than forcing people onto welfare with the minimum wage, it would be vastly better to have a free labor market and a negative income tax regime for those earning less than a living wage.
Is that hard to understand? It is a proposal to reduce unemployment, and hence to cost of welfare, while ensuring all those who work receive an income they can live on, i.e., presumably equivalent to at least the minimum wage.
Benefits of such a scheme include: (1) the opportunity for unskilled workers to gain workforce experience and thus increase the market value of their labor and hence the wage they are able to earn, and (2) the creation of a low cost source of labor for businesses in competition with Third World labor that works under often unhealthy or unsafe conditions for pennies an hour. In other words it would bring back some of the jobs off-shored by corporations that benefit from the globalist regime that CM so strongly approves.
t sounds impressive. But under Komodo’s preferred system there would be no wealth at all*, as every socialist economy the world over has demonstrated.
(Anon. who was leaving forever, lol.)
Although you obviously regard any anticapitalist as a stereotypical old-school Marxist – saves you having to think, and allows you to trade on some historical demonisation of the breed – in fact you don’t know my preferred system. I can say this with confidence. I think systemising economics has been its downfall. I imagine it would require coercion of some sort to row back from the monstrous inequality which your system not only demands but increases year on year, and, if you were in the top 1% , I would understand your reservations. But you’re not. You might be in the bottom quintile, with 0.6% of the national wealth. Or the next one up, with 4%. These are the sectors which do essential work for crap wages. Even if you are something managerial, which I rather doubt, you could only gain from a readjustment of the national priorities to reward people who make and do stuff. If your management role actually enhances production, that is. Which I also doubt.
@Muttley
I honestly believe the likes of the board Standard Life would not care if thousands died right in front of their faces of starvation.
I think they would prefer the poor to starve out of their sight. Was it not at Eton, David Cameron’s old school that the debating society passed the motion “that the faces of the poor be ground” with the amendment that “they be underground.”
But the question you don’t address is whether a Scotch capitalist is any less ruthless or grasping than a London capitalist who may very well be a Scotchman, anyhow.
But perhaps there are to be no Scotch capitalists. Although the policies to be implemented by the Government of Free Scotland are a secret nobody to know what they will be or even to ask what they will be, it not difficult to believe from what members of the yes “crew” are saying that Scotland is to become some kind of new North Korea with, perhaps, beheadings of capitalists in Charlotte Square.
Muttley79,
This left/right thing doesn’t really describe anything much of any political meaning. I have to give this expansion of meaning to Craig Murray for this more than 1 dimensional political view of the world – cos he published this other chart…It had an x axis left..right…and it also had a y axis up down on this website a few years ago.
(x was supposed to represent the political left & right (commie to the left – fascist/nazi to the right)( and y was supposed to represent up authoritian (dictator) to down libertarian (do what the fuck you want so long as it doesn’t cause me or anyone else any serious problem)
When Craig gets down as we all do a bit particularly me after a very heavy weekend on a Monday morning with a slight…hangover….
He should think about defining the y axis….
Sorry I am trying to explain things in 3D…and I bet you haven’t got a 3D Camera or a 3D TV…and even if you have…it gave you a headache…and you got ostracised.
Mine works O.K…still and that ain’t bad cos I am somewhat older than Craig….
Come on Craig…You are Doing a Brilliant Job…but what if The Scottish Independence Side wins???
I Reckon The New Scottish Government should Offer you a job, cos though I think you are a bit of a cunt (that’s a compliment from someone from Oldham)..I also think (despite the fact that I disagree with you a lot of the time)
I also think (note the repeat)
You are also a Bit of a STAR
PS (Your Film Crew are Really Good – Both The Sound (The sound is Amazing – that is the hardest thing to do well) and The Photography – Well done Guys – I bet You Volunteered Your Skills – Cos You Too Think Craig Murray is a Bit of a Star – so are you – especially the bloke with the surfboard)
Tony
Moderator,
Can you please be a star for me..I made a mistake above
I wrote “He should think about defining the y axis….”
Can you please correct what I wrote and meant to
“He should think about defining the z axis….”
A mistake with one letter can change the entire meaning and you might lose an entire dimension and sense
Like this
Muttley79,
This left/right thing doesn’t really describe anything much of any political meaning. I have to give this expansion of meaning to Craig Murray for this more than 1 dimensional political view of the world – cos he published this other chart…It had an x axis left..right…and it also had a y axis up down on this website a few years ago.
(x was supposed to represent the political left & right (commie to the left – fascist/nazi to the right)( and y was supposed to represent up authoritian (dictator) to down libertarian (do what the fuck you want so long as it doesn’t cause me or anyone else any serious problem)
When Craig gets down as we all do a bit particularly me after a very heavy weekend on a Monday morning with a slight…hangover….
He should think about defining the z axis….
Sorry I am trying to explain things in 3D…and I bet you haven’t got a 3D Camera or a 3D TV…and even if you have…it gave you a headache…and you got ostracised.
Mine works O.K…still and that ain’t bad cos I am somewhat older than Craig….
Come on Craig…You are Doing a Brilliant Job…but what if The Scottish Independence Side wins???
I Reckon The New Scottish Government should Offer you a job, cos though I think you are a bit of a cunt (that’s a compliment from someone from Oldham)..I also think (despite the fact that I disagree with you a lot of the time)
I also think (note the repeat)
You are also a Bit of a STAR
PS (Your Film Crew are Really Good – Both The Sound (The sound is Amazing – that is the hardest thing to do well) and The Photography – Well done Guys – I bet You Volunteered Your Skills – Cos You Too Think Craig Murray is a Bit of a Star – so are you – especially the bloke with the surfboard)
Tony
Wealth; what is it good for? As it’s been asked ‘How much better can you eat?”
You buy stuff, then a house to keep it in. Then you need a bigger house cuz you have more stuff.
Yes. financial independence is good but they can be gotten without wealth. When i was a kid, there were still Hobo camps comprised of many heirs and Wall Street types who threw the towel in after the crash; deciding that being happy had nothing to do with money.
If we did away with currency, and started trading out labor, services and goods for necessary instruments of living, what would we be giving up?
As Tony suggests; an edit button please?
what would we be giving up?
Parasites.
Another of the Standard Life directors is Pierre Danon. He chairs a telecoms outfit in Ukraine. Very topical.
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=6202886
~~
The Standard Life CEO David Nish takes (can’t say earns) £4.05m per annum.
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/person.asp?personId=765134&ticker=SL/:LN
When I heard that Newsnight has ‘Lord Robertson’ on I decided that enough was enough.
Personally, I think my interest in 3D came from eventually in about 1976/1977 being given the job of writing The Test Plans and Supervising the Trials of The Most Powerful Computer in The World Distributed Array Processor (ICL DAP)..at By Now Ashton-U-Lyne, Oldham…Whilst The Government CCA then…not only attended – but some of us went to THe Girl’s STAG Night (I personally didn’t go -and I didn’t shag her either – nah She was a girl -totally legit…but we all worked together for a number of years)
Sure it had largely been Developed at ICL in West Gorton, Manchester (opposite to where they filmed the First Series of Shameless about 20 years later and at ICL Bracknell..yes well of course- Bracknell is famous for being even more boring than Skelmersdale at night)
I was Gradually Transferring My Motor Cycling and Sports Car Skills To Learning To Fly a Glider in 3D at the same time…
Sex as well…Screwing a Thermal is something Amazing…
And Still I had Not Met My Next Girlfriend and Yet I was Still Working at ICL…
She said Try This…I did – thought nah…and again..nah..I’d rather have a couple of pints any day…
So then we became…and I was sat in her council house in Buttershaw..and She was just so Beautiful skint as anything …two kids..dad in the nuthouse or jail…
Tony – Try This…and she had other friends there and Jimi Hendrix was playing on the record player…
And I smoked Cannabis for the third…
I literally left my body and went up to the corner of the ceiling…I looked down at my body..and all the people in the room talking and laughing so politely…I thought it impolite to have a conversation with them from up here..so gradually came down, had sex and went back to work…No I didn’t accept the offer of my mate I was working with to take up Diving with him the North Sea…I didn’t do that till years later in the local swimming baths..when I just happened to tell my boss at work..that my wife and I and kids…had booked a holiday in the Maldives..He said I am a Diving Instructor..Bring Your Wife and Kids along..You’ve got 2 weeks yet before you go…so we did…kin awesome… we all did it..our kids are like fish.
Tony
“Isn’t it odd that in June over 50k marched in London against austerity cuts and on September 18th,we’ll have folk voting no in Scotland”
The ones that know about Ireland will.
I have always done sex in 3D – unlike Dan Hodges (Glenda Jackson’s Son)..no one succeeded in punching one of my lights out..I didn’t even have to duck about 5 girls jumped all over me..and Lianne said if anyone is going to punch that cunt it will be me…He was being horrible to All The Girls and He was Being Horrible to Me on The Dance Floor..I was just trying to watch The Band…I said if You Don’tFuck Off (Much Bigger Bloke Than Me) I am Going To Hit You…He Still wouldn’t go away..and all The Girls Could See. Fuck Tony Means it..and So Did I…
I still haven’t hit anyone since the age of 14, and no one has hit me.
It doesn’t mean I don’t want to though…but something or someone always stops me.
Buy Robert Plant’s New Album – It is As Different and as Interesting as what for me is one of The Great Classics of all Time (But This is Largely Morrocan (which we know understand and been there and bought the (traditional folk) in The market depths)
Robert Plant’s maybe as original and good and as different as Brian Eno & David Byrne’s My Life in The Bush of Ghosts…
Where The Hell is Peter Gabriel…He has to get his head back out of his arse – stop doing the Best Covers of Brilliant Bands in The World…And Write and Perform Something
NEW
Tony
My view of the campaigns is that of an expatriate Scottish non-voter whose instinct is to vote No.
The Better Together arguments that change will be for the worse have been mainly addressed to its own supporters. In contrast, the Yes campaign’s rhetorical question “Surely we can do better than this?” has appealed as well to those who don’t think Scottish independence is the solution. That rhetorical question has deep echoes within British culture, notably Oliver Goldsmith’s “Deserted Village” :
Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates, and men decay:
Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade;
A breath can make them, as a breath has made;
But a bold peasantry, their country’s pride,
When once destroyed, can never be supplied.
[Substitute “industrial manufacturing” for “bold peasantry”]
and Robert Burns’s “To a Mouse”:
But Och! I backward cast my e’e,
On prospects drear!
An’ forward, tho’ I canna see,
I guess an’ fear!
These two sentimental poems express a heartfelt sense of loss. When providing examples of “hastening ills” or “prospects drear” in order to flesh out “better than this”, there will be different views of what has gone particularly wrong, viz:
uncontrolled immigration;
the ill-considered war to depose Saddam Hussein;
membership of the EU;
low wages (so that the great majority of welfare benefits go to those with jobs);
inadequate and over-priced public and private housing for ownership or rent;
present and looming crises in the PPI-crippled NHS;
depending increasingly for foreign language skills on permanent or temporary immigrants rather than through schools teaching new languages effectively;
making the maintenance of the UK’s nuclear weapons the core of our cost-inefficient Defence policy;
tolerating, creating and subsidizing private monopolies and cartels;
rising prison numbers with insufficient resources or policies to run them humanely;
loss of liberty and much inefficient and counter-productive expenditure in the name of the War on Terror etc.
Top of my list would be that in the past year 50 people have been given prison sentences for not paying their TV licence fee while no-one has gone to prison for frauds and lies which have each individually done hundreds of millions of pounds damage to the UK’s public finances and to many individual citizens.
However, looking backwards with regret or forwards with fear are not the only responses to “Surely we can do things better than this?” The Yes campaign has, sensibly, put more emphasis on looking forwards in hope rather than backwards in anger (though making Scotland the unwilling mount of her tactically unwise poll-tax cavalry charge has meant – to change metaphors in mid-stream – that Mrs Thatcher’s chickens have been coming home to roost).
Of course, Yes hopes can be seen as hopelessly optimistic. However it is hard to convince people of this if the negative forecasting is seen as threats on the part of the other party to the divorce. Indeed, that metaphor is only slightly less tendentious than Boris Johnson’s shamelessly topical one of the UK being “decapitated” at Carlisle [leaving Southern Britain unable to think and North Britain unable to move]. If family metaphors are to be used to analyze profound changes in the body politic, a better one might be of children moving to adulthood and taking full responsibility for their actions (including family budgets). That could include continuing to live in the same physical home – the island of Britain/ Great Britain – and sharing the maintenance and redecorating costs – cf a common currency, as Eire had with the UK for many years after becoming independent.
I wish the Better Together campaign had not turned three racing thoroughbreds, all suffering from colic but each with their own pedigree, into a novice ploughing team, finding it hard to adjust to a steady plod. It’s far too late in the day for Gordon Brown to produce his ridiculously short timetable for new forms of devolution. It would have been far better if each of the four main parties hoping to govern after 2015, on their own or in coalition, had offered their own rationale for forms of decentralization that could apply at different levels throughout the UK, metropolitan and other authorities and/or regions as well as the four nations of rugby, football and £1 and £2 coins.
That could have led to a more believable offer of devomax. Tactically, it was stupid for that not to be in the referendum. Strategically, however, that was right, because it would have been far more effective if all the main parties had made it clear that – each in their own ways – they agreed that it was possible for political arrangements in the UK to be better; and that part of that – for all of them – would have included new forms of decentralization, to Scotland, but not only to Scotland.
As it is, the Scottish devomax timetable now on offer is a belated attempt to cobble together enough Danegeld to pacify the Northmen insurgents. And this from a government (and opposition) that claims to object in principle to ransoms and bribes.
I will vote No (virtually), in the vain hope that after the early crash of the 19 September Brown Flying Devomaxman, the next UK election campaign will have constitutional reform as a central theme. Otherwise one might find a Frankenstein monster coalition coming to power in Westminster, the Cameroons and the SNP MPs, together with a number of Scottish Labour MP rebels, with Cameron supporting Scottish Independence (the writing on the wall is The Fire Next Time) and Scotland’s and the rest of UK’s continued membership of the EU.
Prescott Samples Magic Mushrooms….
http://en.ria.ru/world/20140910/192821530/Tony-Blairs-Former-Deputy-Backs-Merged-Football-Team-If-Scotland-Decides-to-Stay-in-UK.html
He’s definitely not got the hang of motivation (and probably can’t pronounce it, either)
People of Scotland
3.3 million Iraqis were killed in your name using your taxes.
Want to help kill more? Vote NO.
Want no further part of it? Vote YES.
Latest news: BBC ten o’clock news, Royal Bank of Scotland will take HQ out of Scotland, George Robertson on Newsnight saying NATO wouldn’t let Scotland in, and that there is nowhere in the UK that nuclear deterrent can be located at the moment.
This is really getting spiky. All so last minute… issues like this should have been fully aired months ago.
“People of Scotland 3.3 million Iraqis were killed in your name using your taxes.”
And they accuse the No side of being desperate…
Something has just occurred to me…and it is about another blogger. I have never even tried to post anything on his blog…and despite what he writes…I think his blog is probably open for anyone in the world to post anything…but I simply am not in the same league…Now I find this very interesting because I don’t think anyone from any side of this battle for human survival comes anywhere near…except they haven’t abused that basic human deceny
And I have no idea what his name is…except I think he is a Russian former military analyst living in the USA -and posting completely honestly…I can’t say a word there…and no can or has so far as I know anyone else…come on even Mossad, The CIA, NSA, MI6 – all The Intelligence Services…
The Vineyard of The Saker Come On…
This Guy is Number ONE
http://vineyardsaker.blogspot.co.uk/
Such Brilliance and Respect and Truth and Analysis is Very Rare
Tony
“saying NATO wouldn’t let Scotland ”
What? Is it the same disqualifier as Ukraine? Disputed borders?
Scare mongers rule the roost, or else!!
The saker rocks Tony. You should visit more often.
Saker often referenced here by b.
http://www.moonofalabama.org/
“This is really getting spiky. All so last minute… issues like this should have been fully aired months ago.”
They were.
Look if Scotland becomes independent with a different currency then all financial institutions with more customers south of the border than north will move south.
It’s nothing personal, they just make more money that way. Patriotism doesn’t matter, all that matters is the bottom line. The share holders could probably sue the directors if they didn’t.
No Ben… because they are antinuclear.
Last shot on Newsnight… Clydesdale Bank will also pull out of Scotland if “Yes”.
Yet an economist on Newsnight earlier said the location of a bank’s HQ is irrelevant now because we have a worldwide banking network. Hmmm! Well, there’s always Bitcoin…
They’ve only come out and said this categorically today, Fred. Since the Prime Minister’s visit. Perhaps the magnificent three should have ridden North six months ago.
Also general agreement on Newsnight that Scotland would have to keep the pound for two years no matter what.
This is worth a read:
“The Scottish Nationalist Party alongside Labour, Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have all promised to defend the interests of oil companies. For 30 years, the UK’s North Sea model has functioned as a form of corporate welfare, delivering massive profits to multinationals and minimal public benefit. With the second weakest tax system in the world, the UK collected only $21.50 per barrel of oil in 2008, compared to Norway’s $48.50 – less than half”
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/09/scottish-independence-an-energy–20149953957684597.html
Anon1 10 Sep, 2014 – 11:09 pm
In reply to me saying ….
“People of Scotland 3.3 million Iraqis were killed in your name using your taxes.”
…. you say “And they accuse the No side of being desperate…”
I don’t understand your point. It’s one of the reasons I will vote YES. It’s a good reason for voting YES. Why do you imply it’s a sign of desperation?
@Tony: The Saker may be right, but folk on twitter are saying if that is so it makes Putin as bad as Obama in terms of suppressing progressive movements.
Speaking of progressive movements, one commentator on Newsnight referred to Scotland and Ukraine in the same breath (presumably indicating Scotland = Donbass), but other commentators just looked confused/aghast.
“They’ve only come out and said this categorically today, Fred. Since the Prime Minister’s visit. Perhaps the magnificent three should have ridden North six months ago. ”
The subject of financial institutions in general has arisen here before and I made it clear what the situation was. If they have more customers south of the border they would go.
“Also general agreement on Newsnight that Scotland would have to keep the pound for two years no matter what.”
Only two years? I’d expect longer than that. You can’t expect an entire financial sector to just pack up and move south over night.
It’s nothing to worry about, I’m sure we can manage fine without them.
NATO seem to be upset about it, though, Fred.
(or is it just George Robertson trying to do his thing for the union).