Lady Dorrian in the High Court this morning described a position taken by the Scottish Parliament’s legal advisers, on the publication and inclusion of Geoff Aberdein’s and Alex Salmond’s evidence, as “an absurd interpretation of the court order”. She also stated that “The answer is for the committee to take a robust attitude to the question of publication and redaction. But this is not the place for that. It is not my job to tell them that.”
To recap briefly. The Fabiani Inquiry has all but collapsed as it has refused to publish or consider evidence from Geoff Aberdein and Alex Salmond. These are the most important pieces of evidence in the entire inquiry. The Committee has refused to accept them because the evidence names a person who made accusations against Alex Salmond, on which he was found not guilty.
Here is the important point. The evidence of Salmond and Aberdein being refused by the Committee has no relation at all to the accusations that person made against Alex Salmond. She is mentioned in a different role. As I have repeatedly tried to explain, the accusers come from a very small coterie close to Nicola Sturgeon. Those closest to Sturgeon were at the heart of the orchestration of the plot. The Committee which has been pretending to investigate, has been doing so on the basis that the protection of identities of complainers precludes it from hearing any evidence that refers to these people – even if it refers to other actions not connected to the accusation they made in court.
Geoff Aberdein’s evidence proves conclusively that Nicola Sturgeon lied to Parliament over when she first knew of the allegations about Alex Salmond, not just by the difference between her meeting with Aberdein on 29 March and her meeting with Salmond on 2 April, but by weeks, because it was Sturgeon’s office which had set up the meeting over three weeks earlier and the subject had been specified then. Aberdein’s evidence is not the whole story – actually Sturgeon initiated the whole effort to set Salmond up months earlier – but Aberdein’s evidence is the smoking gun that would force Sturgeon’s resignation for lying to Parliament.
So the SNP and Green majority Fabiani Committee has ruled that Aberdein’s evidence must be excluded, and it is being excluded at all costs. Their figleaf is legal advice that the Court Order precluding identifying individuals applies to identifying them in any circumstances, not just as accusers in the Salmond case – this is the interpretation that Lady Dorrian said in court was “absurd” (though it was put to her as a hypothetical interpretation, not with specific reference to the Aberdein evidence, though in the context of being able to publish that evidence.)
The Fabiani Committee is hiding behind its legal advice. The source of this advice is mysterious. There is a Solicitor to the Scottish Parliament, but my information is that this specific “absurd” advice actually comes at source from a large US commercial law firm. As legal advice so often is, especially advice from firms wanting their contract renewed next time, it is very friendly to what the client wants to hear.
Geoff Aberdein’s evidence is therefore excluded because somebody was involved in the discussion and organisation of the meetings with Nicola Sturgeon, who also later added her own accusations against Alex Salmond – something of which she made no mention at the time, as Geoff Aberdein testified at the Alex Salmond criminal trial. I always found it passing strange that someone would go through literally scores of meetings about the Salmond accusations before finally adding the claim that they had been sexually abused too, which claim the jury found against as with all the other accusations. What that manoeuvre did however obtain was the court order protection of her identity, and the Scottish government argument that it means all the actions of this person in her entire role in the plot may not be discussed.
Alex Salmond’s statement to the Hamilton Inquiry is excluded by the Fabiani Inquiry on precisely the same grounds. But this statement has been published, with just one paragraph redacted, by the Spectator magazine. This has led to the absurd situation where the Fabiani Inquiry is refusing to consider Salmond’s statement to the Hamilton Inquiry, causing him to withdraw from the Fabiani Inquiry, even though the Spectator has published the statement. The Committee is absurdly arguing that it would be illegal to publish it or consider this statement, even though the Spectator has published it without being prosecuted.
That is how we ended up in court today, with the Spectator asking Lady Dorrian to amend her court order to make clear that the publication and consideration of the Aberdein and Salmond evidence would not be in breach. Lady Dorrian has been highly resistant, taking the view that it is for the Committee to interpret the order, that is pretty plain, in a sensible way – while making perfectly clear that she finds the Committee’s strange interpretation somewhat baffling.
Just before lunch Lady Dorrian had suggested an amendment to the order to state that complainers must not be identified “as complainers in those proceedings”. She suggested that this would clear up any “misconception” that they might not be named in other contexts. As I write, the court has just concluded with all parties agreed on this.
Lady Dorrian’s amendment certainly should sweep out the legs from under the Committee’s ludicrous excuse for not publishing the Aberdein and Salmond evidence, and thus pave the way for Salmond to appear before the committee. But my intelligence from a committee member is that, whatever today’s ruling, the SNP members will continue to refuse to publish, and they are confident that their lawyers will be able to argue the Spectator case has increased the risk of jigsaw identification.
So the mad charade of an “Inquiry” continues. It is, I think, the most shameless cover-up that could possibly be imagined. Wings Over Scotland have listed some 60 separate instances of the Scottish Government directly obstructing the work of the Inquiry. What has changed in the last fortnight is the SNP members of the Inquiry are no longer feigning that they too are looking for the truth.
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We need a literary giant to illustrate the follies of Holyrood in recent years. Whger is the Jonathan Swift or George Orwell of the 21st century !
I have been reading on “Wings OIver Bath” and find myself more in agremment with this man than with any practising politician. The MINCE I read from those on £80,000+ a year, and from those who aspire to those heights has ended any faith I had in Humanity.
It is Wings over Scotland. Why disparage the best investigative whistle blower around. His j’accuse output regarding the SNP and the A. Salmond stitch-up needs far more urgently widespread dissemination.
“Where is the Jonathan Swift or George Orwell of the 21st century !”
Indeed, or the Shakey.
Soundtrack for this anti-democratic moment, suitably rendered by the indomitable, Scottish lassie Annie Lennox (“Sex Crime – 1984)”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcTP7YWPayU
So the voting papers are out to rank the SNP list candidates.
And how many cabinet members are on the list? NS, JS, FH, KB, FU. And what about the mendacious AR?
On of JM the one who would use the ladies toilet? And how many of them are self certified BAME or Disable? Do we know? And could any of them be one of the fabled alphabet women? And how will the disabled and the Bame be ranked after the members have ranked? And how does the ranking work? Will JM be ranked ahead of someone else who may also have self certified?
And what if the self-certified Bame who likes using the women’s toilet gets a hundred votes and the number one slot whilst the non-Bame gets two thousand votes and ranked below? Will there be a legal challenge?
Well you know what it doesn’t matter. Last election 953,000 SNP votes got four seats whilst 956,000 got forty five seats for unionists. Truth is a second vote for the SNP is an utter waste of a vote. But then again under the current leadership regime so is a vote for many of the constituency candidates.
And meanwhile, arch unionist and ex U.K. Labour energy minister has syndicated a piece saying that the Government, the civil service, the COPFS and Police Scotland are all compromised. Truth is he’s correct and
his comments more than certainly illuminate the onslaught that is about to poor wee Scotland that cannot run its affairs of state.
Direct rule I’m afraid beckons if we do not remove Sturgeon and her rotten regime who have led us to this.
Willie I listened to the faunt of all knowledge “Peter A Bell ” on a discussion with the two auld heeds that was live streamed he rubbished every attempt to gain more List votes for independence supporting parties , scoffed at the arithmetic involved said these little parties would damage the SNP or their mission to gain Independence , christ that raised a laugh .also the SNP 1-2 has worked out well the reason being in power for ages god yet more laughter I thought ok in power and doing fk all with it whats the bloody point being in power then sitting on their colective arses and moaning about westminster and borris , it dosent take brains to do that one so well suited to this current SNP .
Craig,
I am most concerned, here, about the obvious link with Labour Assembly Member Carl Sergeant, who took his own life after allegations of sexual misconduct were put to him by the then Welsh first minister Carwyn Jones.
Had Sergeant not taken his own life, he may have fought those allegations and won just as Salmond has and this would have prompted a similarly illuminating probe into how the Welsh government handled that case.
I am very clear that the two governments effectively used a proactive technique of finding people (probably in their inner circle) who had had casual sexual liaisons with male politicians which the participants may have regretted or felt were unfortunate later on so the women were encouraged by those in power with a pressing need to remove those male politicians to first present their encounters as non-consensual then make the massive leap to unlawful with the cast iron assurance that their identity would never be known so they essentially, would have nothing to lose and a police and legal system would be automatically engineered for them to be “believed”.
This, of course, is what sent Welsh footballer Ched Evans to jail wrongly for an essentially consensual sexual encounter with an inebriated woman.
The woman complainant at his appeal gave evidence in secret and the legal system did everything humanly possible to protect her interests but as little as possible to protect Evans’s and there are, even now, radical feminists who still brand Evans a “rapist” despite Justice Nicola Davies’s ruling on the case.
What appears to be happening in Scotland is totally Kafkaesque and deeply symptomatic of the current orchestrated political assault on traditional masculinity – deliberately depicted always as toxic and threatening – in that an innocent man has, is and always will, I suspect, be culpable for whatever he did or did not do while women appear to be wrapped in comfort blankets, soothing sympathy and endless opportunities to discredit the legal system which concluded that whatever happened was not unlawful.
If this is not called out and sorted then traditional masculinity will, inevitably, become always toxic and threatening and all sexual encounters between the two genders will be actionable.
Garry W Gibbs not just radical feminists in the Ched Evans case I’m afraid. A participant so inebriated she is incapable of consent and not even aware of a second suitor is not a consenting partner. She is certainly not to be compared with this powerful group of women and I’m certainly not aware of Alex Salmond using his father in law’s money to trawl for witnesses to provide at best highly questionable circumstantial evidence. So in my book the Evans case has ended up as a miscarriage of justice with the girl as a victim and her life significantly changed. While Evans , whether or not he has any belief or concept of consent has apparently moved on to be the source of trouble elsewhere.
Thank you for giving me more detail.
Ched Evans remains a man who was wrongly convicted according to law. Full stop, end.
Carl Sergeant remains a man who took his own life because of allegations he had sexual relations which may have broken the law. Full stop, end.
I thought Alex Salmond would go to jail and he could have taken his own life.
My point in relation to sexual conduct is that the scales of justice are unfairly weighted in favour of the complainant to redress historical imbalance the other way. Do you disagree?
“My point in relation to sexual conduct is that the scales of justice are unfairly weighted in favour of the complainant to redress historical imbalance the other way. Do you disagree?”
110%. You’re way, way out on this one.
“The number of people prosecuted and convicted for rape has fallen to the lowest level since records began …
… Police recorded 55,130 rapes but there were only 2,102 prosecutions and 1,439 convictions in England and Wales in 2019-20.”
And that’s just the reported cases. The real figure for actual sexual assaults is probably multiples higher, with probably significantly over 95% of those guilty getting away with it.
Pop that in your pipe and …
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/jul/30/convictions-fall-record-low-england-wales-prosecutions
Peter,
The definition of rape has dramatically altered over time so you are comparing apples with pears.
In the 1960s/1970s it was a physical assault on men and women which involved clear violence and very clear degradation of an individual by one or more persons who subjects them to a frightening, terrifying ordeal. A rapist, then, was ranked quite rightly alongside a murderer because of the violent degradation of the act.
It no longer needs to be physical assault which involves violence but now encompasses a wide variety of contestable things (often domestically in the marital bed or on a casual encounter) such as, for instance, the Ched Evans case where there was no violence and although everyone was degraded by what happened, there was no explicit frightening and terrifying degradation or violation of one person in particular but an assumption of consent which may have been optimistic at best for activities which the complainant may not have properly understood, woke up in the morning and been bruised by.
These scenarios involving adults are not uncommon and the Ched Evans case was crucial because it offered his legal team the chance to defend him for the first time against charges which he thought were unfair by allowing him to examine the morality of the complainant. Certain political groups seek to ban this.
If you first broaden the definition of “rape” or “sexual assault” to include all these things then of course you will have more complaints and more cases which “go unconvicted”. If you also ensure that all complainants cannot be identified in any way, are allowed to appear at all times as vestal virgins who regularly attend holy communion and are automatically “believed” whatever the circumstances and background leading up to it then you will, obviously, be snowed under with rapes which have gone unconvicted.
1,439 convictions in 2,102 prosecutions is about two convictions out of three, a conviction rate of about 67%. In which other alleged crimes is the conviction rate measured by reference to allegations, not trials?
The takeaway from all this is the SNP’s leadership seem to be doing all in their power to screw up hopes for independence, whether by accident or design.
The ‘perfect storm’ of a bad Brexit deal (destroying Scottish exporters), the unpopular Johnson; likely deeply unpopular Anas Sarwar and his boss in London, the callous Blairite, Sir Keir Starmer, should make the task of winning independence as easy as pushing on an open door. But no, the SNP appears to be spiking its own guns; doggedly pushing highly divisive, controversial woke policies and enmeshed in nasty internal plotting.
It’s more likely the spooks who are infiltrating the SNP, as they did the IRA. There’s nothing worse for Johnson than Scottish independence. He will do anything to avoid it, play any dirty trick.
laguerre – oh come off it. For the destruction of the independence cause, Nicola Sturgeon is much, much better than anything that Boris Johnson or MI5 could ever have thought of. She is a home grown disaster pure and simple.
Sturgeon may be involved or not. What is certain is that Johnson will do anything, dirty or clean, to avoid losing Scotland. It would be catastrophic for him.
Laguerre: thank you for emphasising this point. We know that Johnson is always ready to resort to dirty tricks, as his whole career has been built on them. Sturgeon is a lightweight in comparison. It would be in character for Johnson to push her under a bus if the opportunity arose.
Aye the ISP are going to lead us to the Promised Land !
What’s the gossip?Quiet. Too quiet.
Is there a gag applied? Is there a super injunction? Did the good Lady drop the hammer?
Whassup? Where is CM?
DunGroanin – Lady Dorrian is probably thinking about her pay cheque. She gets paid according to the number of pages she writes and according to the number of hours she can reasonably claim that she spent coming up with her judgement.
Lady D is probably racking her brains to think up a rationale for coming out with the “right” judgement, the one she’s been told to give.
I’ve been looking up this website for a couple of weeks expecting some news of Craig’s court case. Not a word. Surely its not all that complicated. If its a gray and obscure area and the actions of the defendant open to various interpretations then the defendant must be given benefit of the doubt.
My guess the laws have not been fully updated since the internet revolution.
Also the longer it takes then subsequent events may influence a judges decision without a defendant having the right to make new submissions.
I’m just amazed that Craig hasn’t yet been stabbed with an umbrella.
Another crucial aspect of the Ched Evans case was that the woman herself never made a complaint of rape. She reported a missing handbag to police. The two footballers were interviewed and fully admitted sexual activity to police on that night.
The CPS – knowing it had a 70% chance of success – then chose to prosecute the two footballers for rape and Evans was convicted at Caernarfon Crown Court but Clayton McDonald was acquitted.
The re-trial was called because solicitors working for Evans found new evidence which indicated that the woman had enthusiastically participated in sexual activity with two other separate men on two occasions in a similar way to the way she had with Evans on that night. This was considered admissable evidence so was heard in open court and was the only way Evans could contest the rape allegation.
I took a personal interest in this case because I thought something stank to high heaven about it and still do.
I sat in the public gallery at Cardiff Crown Court and took notes and had my notebook seized by a clerk acting on behalf of Judge Nicola Davies who frightened the life out of me by first telling me I should not be doing it and the judge had to read my notes.
I was given the notebook back by this clerk after lunch but no apology. They had acted because they feared I might go on Facebook (as some idiots had) to breach anonymity.
The Ched Evans case was a deeply sinister example of political forces conspiring to make a victim out of someone for a “rape” which the woman never complained of as rape and we need to learn lessons from that.
I have no doubt that Johnson wants to close down any independence movement.
Laguerre
I have not a shred of doubt that you are absolutely right,
Re NS. it is possible if unlikely that she has made an agreement with the british secret state organs or
she too has concluded that independence won’t come without a real physical struggle of some sort or a campaign of serious civil disobedience. I don’t think she has the stomach for that – and indeed neither do I, and I am doubtful that it would work.
Deepgreenpuddock – of course Boris Johnson does not want to see an independent Scotland.
But you are being far too kind to Nicola Sturgeon. She has probably mucked up independence – and she has done this single handedly. Boris Johnson probably simply can’t believe his luck.
She was the one who decided to employ lies, slander and character assassination against Alex Salmond – she didn’t get any help from Westminster there. In fact Westminster advised her against this. She has single-handedly orchestrated the entire series of events which make the SNP look (a) corrupt and (b) career-oriented first, independence secondary and subservient to this.
It is the SNP people (in a generalised sense – I’m including Andy Shightman in this) who voted to suppress the written statements of Aberdein and Salmond, thus making the SNP look particularly sleazy and corrupt. They didn’t get any help from Westminster in this. Indeed, The Spectator (which I consider to be an establishment paper – and one that Boris Johnson is particularly close to) are doing more than anybody to try and get the statements from Aberdein and Salmond published.
So – your assessment that Boris Johnson does not want independence and will do what he can to stop it is absolutely right. But right now he doesn’t have to do anything because the SNP under Nicola Sturgeon are making a very good job of mucking it up all by themselves – and I don’t for one minute believe that the UK establishment were in any way behind the Alphabet Sister scandal which is doing more than anything to prevent independence.
Surely while Westminster advised against the internal enquiry Westminster appointees were involved in transferring the matter to the police.
James thanks. I think I am generally aware of NS’s role over last few years.
Seems to me the seminal moment was the remain vote in Scotland and NS/SNP to ally with the Blairite Labour faction in the EU referendum . That was a toxic choice because it suggested a common cause with Labour and Lib-Dems. The cause in Scotland was always quite different to that being played out in National Labour’s half hearted (Corbyn) campaign. The impulse behind EU remain was entirely different to that behind Labour’s instinct, which was to destroy the independence movement.
Scotland’s strategic importance to Nato – apart from other important factors (energy) – means that, Trump notwithstanding, the whole weight of the US/UK states is being brought to bear upon the issue of independence. The effect on the UK of Scottish independence would be earth shattering in terms of how the UK is governed. WM would be utterly discredited/the rUK would become irrelevant, there would be a huge tsunami in favour of a complete change in the whole ‘democratic’ process in UK. There are mighty forces being brought to bear upon the Scottish political environment as we dab away on our keyboards. I am sure Sturgeon knows what’s at stake here and is playing a very cautious game in a vague hope that some accommodation can be reached where Scotland is in a ‘consenting’ relationship with the overall aims of the western alliance. I think this explains the pusillanimous or submissive tone to the current SNP. Johnson of course has another hat (the Leave hat) apart from the international dimension, where he must pander to the lunatic xenophobic spirit of ‘independent’ Englishness. But ‘England’ is becoming less and less relevant as we speak. Its ‘power’ (or lack thereof) is being progressively exposed with each new day.
Interesting times ahead for sure.
deepgreenpuddock
I’m aware of all of that – and I did follow the Guardian coverage on the run-up to the Brexit referendum.
They were bigging up Nicola Sturgeon as the most wonderful politician who had ever walked the face of the earth and someone who really was on their side (i.e. just as you say).
It wouldn’t have surprised me if Nicola Sturgeon had gone on to become leader of the UK Labour party.
Everything *can* have the interpretation that you say, but to my mind she was exceptionally chummy with the Guardian, way over and above what was necessary simply to support the anti-Brexit cause.
It did strongly come across to me that she was not at all unhappy with the union; she was not at all unhappy with the involvement of the UK in NATO and she personally wouldn’t have had any difficulties moving to the Labour party and taking a leading role in it.
So I don’t think she is playing a cautious game at all – I think she is going for exactly what she wants (and even if she did achieve `Independence’ it would be `Independence in name only’).
Deepgreenpuddock
If England has made itself repugnant by operating illegal military operations in the Middle East and also by using terrorists to do the same by proxy, it can’t blame more civilised parts of the UK for wanting out.
The Tories and Labour have been subsumed by a stupid, atavistic yearning for lost Empire, like Turkey, like India, like France, like Iran, and possibly like Germany
The difference is that the English politicians are stupid and criminal enough to do it, both against democratic and against international constraints.
Nobody can blame Scotland for the addiction to war. I have a strong suspicion that Gavin Williamson wants to allow debate in Universities about war to take place , completely against ordinary popular opinion. He certainly doesn’t want debates about socialism.
Nicola Sturgeon’s feminism is nothing to do with the political pressure against or for Scottish Independence. Therefore it is nothing more than a waste of time to use the levers of power against her own side. Hopefully she will wake from woke soon.
Just a reminder that the man generally held responsible for getting the UK involved in illegal wars in the Middle East, which were as much opposed in England as they were anywhere else, was one Anthony Charles Lynton Blair, born and educated in Edinburgh. Had Scotland been independent in 1997 he might’ve found himself barred from the top job in Downing Street and having to make do with Holyrood instead. What then?
Kempe – well, it isn’t clear to me that Blair would ever have been elected to Holyrood.
However, Nicola Sturgeon is Tony Blair in a dress and with Glasgow pronunciation – so we do know exactly what would have happened if Blair had been First Minister – we’ve seen it.
(He might have had some difficulties persuading the alphabet sisters to testify against Salmond …..)
He’d have done his best and Scotland was predominantly Labour back in ’97.
” Tony Blair in a dress “
You realise that image is going to stay with me for the rest of my life?
Did that judge come out of the Baraitser School of Law? 🙂
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicola_Davies_(judge)
Independence just won a big victory in the Catalan election.
Watch Neil Findlay Silence every single SNP Members and Nicola Sturgeon with Facts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yhcbB4YEco
Johnson and the Tories are beginning to panic over Scottish independence. Who was it who just called (reported on BBC Toady programme just now) for the appointment of a Big Beast as Minister of the Union, at the level of the Foreign Secretary? I didn’t look too hard to find out, but it is a very striking call.
yes agreed- I am picking up the same developments.
All the more reason to expect them to try to nobble anyone opposed to Sturgeon.
The tories have plenty of beasts, but not a single big beast.
I was quoting the wording used by the Beeb.
It might not be a Tory, it could be Gordon Brown ?
Big Beast is a term used by Tories, not Labour.
Wrong!
“Alex Salmond inquiry: Former first minister ‘clears his diary’ for Wednesday appearance next week
Mr Salmond has resubmitted his evidence via his legal team, with parliamentary lawyers set to decide whether to recommend its publication today.
If published, Levy and McRae have said Mr Salmond has “cleared Wednesday from his diary” for an appearance in front of the committee following the committee offering Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday.”
I would be pleasantly surprised if the committee agrees to the publication of Salmond’s evidence, not to mention utterly astonished.
And if they don’t, what next Alex?
https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/alex-salmond-inquiry-former-first-minister-clears-his-diary-wednesday-appearance-next-week-3137685
Peter – well, by now they understand that if they refuse to publish the statement by Alex Salmond, they are basically admitting that Nicola Sturgeon orchestrated the false accusations against A.S.. So they might be forced into it.
@ James Riddle
Yes, refusal to publish may appear to be admitting that, and people might justifiably conclude that, but they would not in actuality be admitting that. They are seasoned and shameless liars (sadly a primary requirement of being a top politician these days), they will claim that to publish will still, perhaps more so now identify one of the complainants. Had they published when first requested the connection might not so readily have been able to be made, or at least established.
As I understand it, and I stand to be corrected, publication will concretely incriminate Sturgeon – and they’re not going to bow to that.
It seems to me that there’s some way to go in this fight yet.
…. well, of course it will concretely incriminate Sturgeon.
Right now, they’ve basically said, `Sturgeon dunnit, but you can’t prove it and since we have the Crown prosecution office in our pocket, you won’t be able to prove it. She is technically innocent on the innocent until proved guilty principle’.
Aberdein’s evidence would concretely incriminate Sturgeon, Salmond’s evidence would concretely incriminate Sturgeon, Craig Murray’s written affidavits (nobody has claimed that their contents are wrong) all incriminate Sturgeon.
She dunnit, we know it, she knows that we know it – I’m amazed that very few people seem too bothered about it.
Very deliberate and consistent media framing post the trial. The accusers are still victims, let down by the system. Salmond still an incorrigible sex beast who unaccountably escaped the net.
So even if it is decisively proven that Sturgeon organised the fit up, that will be viewed by the BBC consuming masses as having been the honourable, responsible thing to do.
The question overhanging all of it remains: why is British state/unionist media determined to prop up the hugely popular figurehead of the hated Scottish independence movement?
T – because it’s an open secret that she isn’t particularly enthusiastic about independence – and she never has been.
A smart lady. She was smart enough to understand that if you want a career in politics, then the Labour and Conservative parties (at least north of the border) are for `stone cold losers’ (to employ an annoyingly memorable phrase). She only joined the SNP as a career move.
Otherwise I really don’t understand the Guardian’s coverage of her back in 2016.
It has to be that because otherwise it makes no sense for them to downplay this scandal and save her skin. She is regarded as the greatest asset of a movement they despise.
As James Riddle says 15:25 on February 2021 “She is technically innocent until proved guilty principle”.
Unlike Mr Salmond, to whom the presumption of innocence was denied him by the press and commentariat, who was acquitted on all charges, and yet treated by the same press and commentariat, as only being ‘technically’ innocent, as if there’s another kind of innocence.
Ingwe
” press and commentariat ” owned by Tory Unionist shills who want to continue to exploit Scotland. It actually takes an ideologue of the calibre of Alex Salmond or Jeremy Corbyn , to not buy, or be bought by pure Thatcherite greed.
We are at a stage of political weakness like a hospital patient who has sold all their internal and extetnal organs to pay for their hospital treatment. You are now just a brain floating in a bowl.The sturgeons now want to sell that too.
” You don’t really need a personal identity to be alive. You might as well sell that too.”
The Americans don’t care if Scotland is Independent or not. As long as they can have bases there, they don’t care. The Security State has the ways and means to ensure SNP MP’s are never going to leave NATO, or remove Trident and the vast array of communications ariels needed to talk to the subs deep underwater. Scottish Labour as with Westminster Labour, long ago packed with Security State little nobody’s. The EU follows NATO. The fact the EU can order German Navy to board Turkish vessels and we can tell Egypt to stop Iranian tankers using Suez and stop Iranian vessels entering the Mediterranean from Gibraltar explains everything to me.
The EU supports Navalny. EU supports US having a Naval base on Crimea. EU supports fascists in Ukraine. EU is an economic protectionist gangster club. And we left it…..
Wikikettle,
” And we left it…..”
Please complete the sentence “…. and still remain a vassal state of the US.”
The EU supports Navalny, because it supports NATO, which is still considered of high value in many European quarters. I am not sure that if NATO and the US alliance did not exist, that hostility to Russia would be so pronounced. But Russia can always be produced as a historical bogey.
The Naval comm stations were decommissioned 30 years ago. They use satellites now.
Austrian national broadcaster ORF showing a documentary on Assange and the story of Wikileaks tonight
Quite a fair report.
Since we’re all still waiting for something to happen I’ve had a legal pondering.
According to the corrupt COPFS you are guilty of “Jigsaw Identification” if you reveal information which doesn’t directly identify someone given court approved anonymity, but which can be added to other information to enable such identification to take place.
How can this actually be legal and not a breach of your fundamental Human Rights and basic rights against any vexatious, spurious and politically led prosecutions under Scots Law?
You are not being prosecuted for committing a crime, but are being prosecuted because someone else, or several somebodies, did something which is then applied to your actions rendering them illegal after the event.
Is it any wonder that there is no case law and no successful prosecutions under this law which Kafka couldn’t have dreamed of.
It is vital that Craig be acquitted. Otherwise we know our legal system is ruined. That is very important. Maybe one of the most important things that will happen in Scotland for a while. If he is found guilty we are really in an awful place.
I keep seeing Yoons attacking Angus (heir apparent and wife of the fragrant JD) Robertson for covering up the dread Salmond airport terror affair.
Which is interesting as they are correct in that he is guilty of a cover-up, but not to protect Salmond.
If there had been any sort of public investigation, or had the dossier of evil jokes been passed on to the police, the whole smear would have died a grisly and well deserved death.
The whole purpose of keeping it secret was to allow the scum media to use the false claims against Salmond, should he ever present any sort of threat to his beloved kweeeen.
Which just goes to show that Yoons be crazy and Agnes R is a total canute.
Gosh Craig, this is dragging on a bit. I hope you are bearing up.
So the committee, once again voted not to publish Salmond’s information, and that would appear to to be that, but maybe not.
The committee from what I’ve read has passed the final decision to the (SPCB) the Scottish Parliament Corporate Body, for a final decision whether or not to publish.
Interestingly there are five members of the (SPCB) one SNP MSP, one Tory MSP, one Labour MSP, one Lib/Dem MSP and the gutless Andy Wightman.
Now gutless Wightman and the SNP MSP will undoubtably vote to shoot down Salmond’s dossier, but I’d imagine the other three BritNat members will not.
Its a sad day when you opt for BritNat MSP’s over SNP MSP’s however we need Sturgeon out if we want to dissolve this rotten union.
More stalling and procrastination, like a stew in a kettle, slowly boiling the last pieces of veg. into and unrecognisable mash that nobody can decipher. Today’s i paper mulls the possibility of the FM having to resign over this multiple state actors affair, they could not possibly print that the offense of breaking the ministerial code of conduct could land her and her co conspirators in jail.
They dare not come out with the same speculative rubbish they threw at AS before and during his trial, after all there are servants of the Crown involved.
It is still called the ‘Alex Salmond Inquiry’ allover google and the wider media at large,, not the Scottish Government handling of the Alex Salmond case inquiry.
They’re meeting at 9.30 this morning.
Stand by your screens.
Now would be a good time to release a decusion before the 1 pm bbc schnews, mind it has to go through the spin cycle first.
Not going to happen I’m afraid.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/19100216.alex-salmond-inquiry-decision-censored-evidence-delayed-yet/
Try again later, but just don’t hold your breath.
(Public comments in the above article also make for some very interesting reading.)
Craig also had comments he was hoping to make today:
https://twitter.com/CraigMurrayOrg/status/1362129571852730372
They might have to wait too.
The Record version.
Alex Salmond Inquiry again votes to refuse to publish former first minister’s evidence
It is the second time the Committee has reached this decision.
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/alex-salmond-inquiry-again-votes-23519554
17.2.2021
Alex Salmond Inquiry branded ’embarrassing disgrace’ by SNP MP over evidence delay
A Holyrood committee has twice voted against publishing evidence submitted by Alex Salmond
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/alex-salmond-inquiry-branded-embarrassing-23522344
18.2.2021
Whilst we await CM. Let us ponder…
The Great Knight Hope(tm) being hoisted upon his nag and led out to conquer the naughty schoolboy spaffer and save the world!
The launch sequence is initiated.
‘Outlining what he called “our moral crusade”
What was needed, he said, was “a new partnership between an active government, enterprising business and the British people”.
‘…likening current times to the postwar period, with a “determination that our collective sacrifice must lead to a better future”.’
—————————
‘Crusade’! – Really? That is not tin-eared it is a calculated taking of the piss (readying for further adventurism in the ME using ancient anti-Muslim lexicon).
‘New partnership’, ‘Collective sacrifice’ – Why not just revert to that post-war covenant instead of trying to fob the boomers grand kids off with a tawdry imitation of it?
It seems that Bozo’s spaff gobbling sock puppet GKH is being fanfared towards the only action that will save their Union and keep their Ancient City independent – a GNU led by a GKH(tm).
“Crusade’! – Really? That is not tin-eared it is a calculated taking of the piss (readying for further adventurism in the ME using ancient anti-Muslim lexicon).”
What else do you expect from a self-described Zionist?
https://www.timesofisrael.com/keir-starmer-elected-uk-labour-chief-apologizes-to-jews-for-party-anti-semitism/
What is the Western occupation of Palestine if not a continuation of the crusades?
Labour has lost an average 250 members every day since he became leader. Outside the PLP he excites about 75 middle aged media people in North London.
That a baseless lie can gain traction and be amplified to a deafening din by the entire media establishment shames the UK.
I get the fact some disliked Corbyn and his politics, but using a lie to besmirch the man and hundreds of thousands of his mainly young party members, was and remains beneath contempt.
The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men… Corbyn is far better than his critics.
Everything is coming out into the open. The rot goes back a long way, before the founding of the “Scottish Parliament”
Rt. Hon. John Smith QC MP
In December 1993 MAI plc acquired Anglia.
The terms of agreement put to the shareholders incorporated this statement:
“The Board of MAI have given assurances to the Board of Anglia that all employee rights, including pension rights, will be fully safeguarded.”
On that basis the employee share ownership fund accepted the offer.
Two months later, Michael Heseltine, Minister of the Crown at the DTI and President of the Board of Trade opened an investigation into insider trading, by Lord and Lady Archer.
All the directors were questioned by the inspectors. All will have taken legal advice. All will have been told to discuss Anglia with NOBODY AT ALL.
Some bright spark at MAI realized, “hey, the Board of Anglia is paralyzed. They can’t do a thing to enforce those assurances we gave, on pain of self incrimination.”
So Lord Hollick put the squeeze on the Chairman of Anglia. A Board meeting was scheduled for 14 April.
Three directors of MAI were appointed to the Board of Anglia, being Lord Hollick, Peter Hickson and Roger Laughton.
Another Board meeting was scheduled for 10 May 1994.
At that next meeting the MAI trio took over. They outlined a savage slash and burn, pillage and rape, completely at odds with the assurances given employees prior to the takeover.
The meeting broke up in disarray. The “old” Anglia Directors fled and hid. The Chairman resigned and backdated his resignation to 30 April, that is, before that Board meeting of 10 May.
So far as the official records are concerned there was a Board meeting on 14 April 1994, then another on 21 July 1994, and nothing in-between. So far as the official records at Companies House are concerned there never was a meeting on 10 May.
(You see the parallels with the Scottish Government records of meetings with Nicola Sturgeon)
The plan was then hatched to parachute in Malcolm Wall as the phony Managing Director. That is, on or just after 10 May 1994.
John Smith “died suddenly” on 12 May 1994.
You see it wasn’t just about Anglia Television and the employees thereof.
John Smith was an unexpected leader of the Labour Party. Neil Kinnock had been widely forecast to win the General Election in1992, but the idiot messed it up.
If John Smith would not knuckle under for this, then he certainly would not go along with her plans to subjugate Scotland.
The phony parliament with the backdoor to the legal system we are watching with amazement today.
He had to be removed.
What sayeth the Bard?
If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well
It were done quickly
And that tells me that the assassin was very close indeed to John Smith.
I know the identity of that assassin. More importantly, so does Sarah Smith, John Smith’s daughter and prominent NUJ member in good standing.
And even though that meeting never took place on 10 May 1994, I have the minutes. How fortunate I am!
Cast of Characters:
https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/00611130/officers
Anthony Blair had a premonition of Johns death, he wrote of it in his memoirs. I briefly met John and his family on Iona in the summer of 1993 at the Abbey during a grand lunch. I was struck by his general niceness and his family were at ease with the whole affair. I’m not sure if Gordon Brown was there, it was before he was thrust into the media lens, but I remember a very grumpy scotsman glaring determinedly at me in the cloister, who, looking back bore quite a resemblance to that dour ball of intensity. I was quite young but at the time I wondered about the power relationship between the ecumenical popular church and its centre at Iona and a Scottish socialist politic. It was a long time ago, how things have changed.
It appears that Salmond’s evidence will be published and he will speak to the committee next week.
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/alex-salmonds-bombshell-evidence-holyrood-23523818
Does this mean that Alex Salmond himself can now publish what will be published?
Like much else, that’s not entirely clear.
Actually, it’s not clear at all what exactly will be published (will there be redactions?), when it will be published, or who will publish it.
I don’t like to say it, as an English external commenter, but I do think that concentrating on the evils Sturgeon has done is a mistake for independentists. She has perhaps been suborned by Westminster, it is likely. All that means is that she will be no help for independence. She will have to be forced into the independence path. Plan it out, please.
Quite right. Personalities are secondary. Devolution was invented and painstakingly designed to prevent independence happening. This tactic worked briefly in Ireland too, but the Scottish version is far more cunning, and nobody will be shot on their doorstep over it. This whole debate is depressing proof of its success.
Personalities are secondary, but lies, slander and character assassination to achieve ones political ends is not secondary. Corruption of the Crown Office by the ruling party is not secondary.
In the dim and distant past, the system was designed to prevent independence, but that was predicated on the fact that the Unionist parties would not turn out to be completely clueless and filled with numpties. It was predicated on the fact that the unionist parties would contain politicians of stature such as Donald Dewar.
The whole assumption on which the design was based (that the unionist parties might be able to produce politicians who were not numpties) has been well and truly banjaxed.
If only you were right. Rendez-vous here in a year? We can compare your optimism with my pessimism, and I hope you win.
laguerre – depends what your priorities are. My priority is: first and foremost deal appropriately with people who think that lies, slander and character assassination is a legitimate political tool to use against one’s political opponents and to deal appropriately with obvious corruption in the Crown Office. The Crown Office should have integrity and should be seen to have integrity. I would like to see independence, but not at any price – I’m not completely Machiavellian.
‘the experience of the Salmond inquiry demonstrates that Scotland remains firmly in the Dark Ages. It’s perfectly plain that our leaders are very frightened that the truth might emerge here. We are entitled to ask why.’
Alistair Bonnington (former honorary professor at Glasgow University School of Law)
https://www.scottishlegal.com/article/alistair-bonnington-salmond-inquiry-reflects-poorly-on-scotland-s-democratic-traditions
Rab – thanks for this – a very interesting link.
He is (of course) right about `democratic’ traditions – but we used to have a legal system which had real integrity and was actually considered by some (e.g. Margaret Thatcher of all people!) to be superior to the English (she appointed a Scottish Lord Chancellor to sort out the whole English system). So we did have solid legal traditions – which all seem to have gone up in smoke over the last 20 years.
Something has gone very wrong since the Holyrood parliament was introduced – I find it difficult to believe that the Crown Office was so completely in the pocket of a corrupt cabal at the heart of the ruling party before Holyrood.
??? A Nation must be built on strong foundations
Sorry, me again.
I am sure that Levy and McCrae have recognized that when Alex Salmond goes into the Fabiani quagmire and raises his hand he puts himself in the same position as the Anglia Television Directors following the takeover by MAI in 1994.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2021/02/the-legal-attempt-to-end-the-fabiani-farce/comment-page-3/#comment-977762
Do not underestimate the malevolence of the opposition. If Alex leaves ANY opening they will take it. Look at poor Julian.
If they get Alex he won’t come out.
I know he has been provoked.
I know he wants his ‘day in court’
I know he always leads from the front.
But if he goes in on anything less than 100% of the protections demanded by Levy and McCrae AT LEAST, he will live to regret it. Or rather, he will not live to regret it.
Just having another look at this Lady.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Smith,_Baroness_Smith_of_Gilmorehill
I think this is significant:
Baroness Smith is president of Scottish Opera
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Opera
Nothing wrong with that of course, but I don’t know much of the lower classes you will encounter. And I do wonder how many of the Judging classes she might run into in her guise as president of Scottish Opera.
Yes it is significant, running the opera whilst her daughter is in charge of the BiBiCe spin dryer.
Do you know if the committee wrote to Mr Murrell after his last appearance about the existence of material that was listed in the case of the Crown vs Craig Murray? Formed part of the first set of questions posed to him on 8 Feb by Ms Mitchell.
The Scottish Parliament: Committee on the Scottish Government Handling of Harassment Complaints – 8 February 2021 (YouTube, 58m 17s)
I’ve been following Scottish independence closely now for about six months, and so have formed a view of the protagonists. Nicola Sturgeon puts me in mind of Lady Mary Archer, someone I knew for about four years. She is oh so sweet and polished on the outside – indeed a High Court judge famously said of her “is she not sweet? Is she not fragrant?”. But on the inside….phew!
I believe it comes from a sense of impunity, a sense they can do anything they like, however disgusting and depraved, and there is nobody that can touch them because they are best female friends with Queen Elizabeth II. And the result is, well, abomination.
Let me give you some insights.
The source of wealth for Lord Archer is Lloyds of London, specifically the asbestosis fraud. The quotes I am about to relate come from David McClintick’s “The Decline and Fall of Lloyds of London”, Time Magazine Europe, February 21 2000 vol 155 no 7
Caressed by a soft breeze, Ralph Rokeby-Johnson and Roger Bradley surveyed the forbidding fourth hole of the vintage Walton Heath golf course south of London. It was a bright Thursday in early October, 1973.
“Orator, you’re not orating,” Rokeby-Johnson said. “Have I upset you?” Rokeby-Johnson had been needling the normally loquacious Bradley for inside information since they’d teed off in the autumn golf outing of Lloyd’s of London, the world’s pre-eminent insurance market. Bradley and Rokeby-Johnson were leading executives at competing firms in the market and Lloyd’s men maintained a spirited rivalry in golf as well as business.
But as they shop-talked their way along the first three holes, “Orator” Bradley had fallen silent, because he sensed that Rokeby-Johnson was himself harboring information that could prove explosive: the threat to Lloyd’s posed by asbestos, the ubiquitous, benign-looking insulation material that was slowly but surely infecting workers in the asbestos industry with deadly lung diseases–asbestosis and cancer–prompting lawsuits and insurance claims in America.
“What can you tell me?” Bradley finally asked as they idled on the fourth tee, waiting for the players ahead to clear the green.
“What I can tell you,” Rokeby-Johnson replied in a stage whisper, “is that asbestosis is going to change the wealth of nations. It will bankrupt Lloyd’s of London and there is nothing we can do to stop it.”
It was Jeffrey Archer who devised a means to turn an impending disaster into the Midas touch.
Fast forward to February 2000. Over a quarter of a century has passed since Ralph Rokeby-Johnson shared his apocalyptic vision with Orator Bradley. Legendary Lloyd’s of London, pioneer of the insurance industry and synonymous with it, has escaped bankruptcy. But the organization that was once part of the very bedrock of Britannia has been devastated by losses including massive compensation claims from American workers afflicted by asbestosis and lung cancer. The wealth of nations may not have changed dramatically, but Lloyd’s fundamental character has changed, and thousands of Lloyd’s investors–the so-called Names who pledge all their personal wealth to underwrite insurance policies issued by Lloyd’s syndicates–have been ruined.
The decline and fall of Lloyd’s, like all engrossing tragedies, has been building to a spectacular d?nouement. The final act is now upon us and waiting in the wings are a group of Names who could yet prove to be Lloyd’s nemesis. These are the dissident investors, including members of the so-called United Names Organization, who have refused to settle their asbestos-related debts with Lloyd’s because, they claim, they are the victims of a massive and calculated swindle. Back in the 1980s, they argue, Lloyd’s duped them into becoming Names by fraudulently misrepresenting its profitability and concealing the ruinous asbestosis losses that were in the pipeline.
Do they have a case? The truth, they say, will soon out. Later this month, in what could prove to be the trial of the new century, the Lloyd’s dissidents will claim in England’s High Court that they have been the victims, not just of negligent underwriting, but of one of the greatest fraudulent conspiracies of all time. They will argue that they were recruited to Lloyd’s at a time when the 300-year-old institution knew it was facing massive asbestosis claims and needed extra capital to absorb its forecast losses. The dissident Names will further charge that this massive fraud was not the work of a few posh-mannered, money-grubbing Lloyd’s underwriters, but was condoned and indeed orchestrated by the Lloyd’s hierarchy itself.
How much was involved?
Admonished by their partners to stop the shop-talk, Bradley and Rokeby-Johnson dropped the subject until after the game when they settled with drinks in a corner of the tweedy bar of the clubhouse.
“Were you serious about asbestosis destroying Lloyd’s?” Bradley asked.
“Of course,” Rokeby-Johnson replied. On the back of his scorecard, he then proceeded to calculate that Lloyd’s could be swamped by claims far in excess of the market’s ability to pay–perhaps as much as $120 billion by the year 2000.
“Do you mean ‘million’ or ‘billion’?” the incredulous Bradley asked.
“Billion,” Rokeby-Johnson stressed. “It’s the time bombs that worry me.”
“What are the time bombs?”
“The time bombs are the young victims [of asbestosis] who will gradually develop lung disease. When they die, the lawyers are going to have a field day. Pick a figure, but it won’t be far off what I’ve told you. See whether I am right. I shall be gone long before you.”
The day after the golf match, Bradley recounted the conversation to a senior Lloyd’s colleague who warned him against repeating it to anyone else. It seemed to Bradley then that at least a few Lloyd’s insiders were aware of the looming asbestos problem even as they recruited new Names to bolster the market’s capital base.
And recruit they did. The number of names soared beyond 7,000 in the early ’70s to 14,000 in 1978 and reached over 34,000 by the late ’80s. After nearly three centuries of genteel, discreet one-by-one recruitment in Britain, Lloyd’s salesmen fanned out across the world, especially North America, touting Lloyd’s as an exclusive club offering secure investments to only a select few who qualified for membership. According to many of these new recruits, the Lloyd’s sales pitch promised not only risk-free profits, but the opportunity to join an elite and prestigious “society” which had existed for 300 years and whose membership included titled British aristocrats. New investors signed up in droves. As one Name recalled later, “You don’t need to drop the names of many English earls to attract a bunch of North American dentists.”
Evans says the clinching argument for joining came again from Coleridge, who boasted to recruits that Lloyd’s was backed by its own act of Parliament. “He said, ‘Parliament would never have passed the act had Lloyd’s accounts and regulation not been impeccable.’ I thought to myself, if Parliament has given its seal of approval to Lloyd’s, what more do I need?”
None the wiser, Parliament on July 23, 1982, gave Lloyd’s its exemption from lawsuits. It could be held liable for damages only if a plaintiff could prove “bad faith,” which is difficult to establish under English law where the “buyer-beware” principle is more firmly established than in the U.S. (an obstacle the Jaffray suit will have to surmount). Not only was Lloyd’s still self-regulating, it was empowered to determine itself what was meant by the notion of self-regulation, unilaterally making rules governing its operations, without answering to any outside authority, even Parliament. Lloyd’s secrets were still safe.
And Jeffrey Archer, what was his big idea?
In 1986, Lloyd’s quietly added a clause to its contract with investors. Any legal dispute over the investment would have to be resolved in England under English law. Investors were not told that Parliament four years earlier had effectively inoculated Lloyd’s from lawsuits in England…..Most lawsuits by private investors against Lloyd’s in the U.S. were stymied, too. The fraud allegations for the most part never got a hearing because Lloyd’s invoked the clause it had slipped into its contracts with investors beginning in 1986 calling for any legal disputes to be litigated in England. Even though the investors argued that they had been tricked into signing that clause–and Americans’ rights under U.S. securities laws generally cannot be waived by such contracts — U.S. appellate courts ruled that the contracts were valid and that Names had to sue Lloyd’s in England.
Archer has a plot in one of his books where a contract is central. One protagonist asks another “Did he sign”? And the other replies “Yes, he didn’t see that, nor any of the other three clauses I had slipped in.”
If you understand what happened you will understand why Lord and Lady Archer are such favourites of the British royal family.
But my point is about Mary Archer, and the blackness within. It was not enough for this person to reduce others to absolute penury, oh no. She had herself appointed as Chair of the Lloyds Hardship Committee.
If you tell Lloyds you cannot pay your bill you can claim hardship. But you will have to justify yourself before this committee. Can you imagine Mary’s joy and pleasure at making others beg for mercy? Her ecstasy as she noses through the most personal matters of other women she has just cut down to size. She probably became quite moist at the excitement of it all.
No, this is not my imagination. When “Lady” Archer got rid of her secretary for “disloyalty” she didn’t just fire her. She sued her, took away her house and bankrupted the poor woman. Remember, she’s best friends with the Queen.
These people are monsters. And Nicola Sturgeon is one of them.
Note to Craig. I do not have a link to the Time Magazine piece, but i’d be happy to post the entire text if your readers are interested.
A very strange though from the common sense part of what remains of my mind (Lockdown Syndrome)
just arrived: the hotties? Mr. Salmond laid hands on the hotties? Where the hotties at.
He got to the hotties, the hotties got to him? What, no hotties? Wait a minute…
Bumping uglies? I have been there, but that is not what this is supposed to be about. Is it?
When the nonsense stops making sense: your indoctrination is a bit broken. Whoopsie!