A “plebiscite election” on Scottish Independence can only mean an election fought on that issue with the understanding that, if the election is won, Independence will be declared. It cannot mean anything else.

In particular, a “plebiscite election” cannot possibly mean an election which, if won, results in a request for a referendum. We have had lots of those elections already. A “plebiscite election” is not an election about holding a plebiscite. It is the plebiscite.

Plebiscite elections are not a new idea in the UK, and are generally on constitutional issues. The accepted historical narrative is that the 1832 General Election was over the franchise and led to the Great Reform Act. The 1910 elections were on reform of the House of Lords. In both cases victory was taken as an unanswerable mandate on a fiercely resisted constitutional reform.

It is worth noting that electoral victory in UK general elections has always meant winning the most seats under the first past the post system. It is a terrible system, but those are the rules. It is 91 years since any party has gained more than 50% of the popular vote in a UK general election (the Tories in 1931). All Westminster government have been elected in the range of 37 to 43% of those voting.

Nobody has ever argued – at the time or since – that the “plebiscite election” on Lords reform in 1910 needed a majority of the popular vote to be valid, as well as the majority of MPs.

In fact if you took the Liberal Party, Labour Party and Irish Parliamentary Party together you get 47.7% of the vote in December 1910 for parties standing on the platform of abolishing the legislative veto of the House of Lords. Yet the election of 399 MPs between them meant both King and Lords gave way. So don’t let the Establishment now con you into accepting vote share rules for a “plebiscite election” in Scotland.

There is no reason a general election in Scotland won by a majority of pro-Independence MPs should not give a similar mandate to action, and lead to a Declaration of Independence. That is the mechanism by which the majority of countries on the globe have won their Independence. Actual referenda are not only not mandated in international law, they are very rare and often distrusted.

Unionists routinely use the argument that one side cannot fairly declare a plebiscite election when voters are concerned about other things. But that argument does not survive thirty seconds of serious thought. If you fairly and squarely say this to the electorate:

“We are standing on the issue of Independence. If we win we will declare Independence”

then the electorate have fair warning and obviously anybody who does not want Independence can and should vote for somebody else.

If the opponent says

“That is nonsense. I do not accept this is an election about Independence. Vote for me because imposing long jail sentences for climate protestors is a much more important thing to do”

then the electorate have a choice. But if the majority vote for the first proposition, it is self evidently true that the less popular second proposition cannot outweigh the electoral victory, by a denialism which the electorate rejected.

It is a nonsensical argument, even if one beloved of the mainstream media.

Now Nicola Sturgeon announced, as a cloth pressed to the haemorrhage of exiting party members, that if the Supreme Court ruled against the Scottish Parliament having the power to hold a referendum, then the next general election would be a “plebiscite election” on Independence.

Having, through her specially appointed Unionist Attorney General Dorothy Bain, done everything possible to ensure Scotland loses the case at the UK Supreme Court, the ruse has got Nicola through a party conference attended largely by the payroll vote and bought her four months in which to wriggle her way out of the plebiscite election pledge.

Sturgeon pressed hard for a Westminster election now, before the Supreme Court judgement comes in. That would be perfect for her because it would provide a plausible argument that it is too early for the election to be treated as the promised plebsicite.

What precisely would be achieved for Scottish Independence by a UK General Election now? Nothing. It would however keep SNP MPs’ bums on the green benches at Westminster for a further five years. In return, it would lose the chance of a plebiscite election after the Supreme Court judgement.

It is however now clear that we will have to endure two full years of a Sunak government. The state and corporate media will unite in promoting the genuinely far right Sunak as a genial technocrat striving to save the UK economy, as it sails into the headwinds of a disastrous world economic situation utterly portrayed as outwith his control and entirely the fault of Vladimir Putin.

Back in the real world, Sunak’s only difference from Truss is one of sequencing – he wants deep spending cuts first and tax cuts for the rich next. She wanted to do it the other way round. With a wave of deep cuts and public spending rises being planned to be well below inflation, we are about to be hit by an austerity shock that will make George Osborne look like Santa Claus.

In that period, having lost the chance to extend their MPs’ lucrative employment contracts to 2027 with an early election (not to mention extend those of their MPs’ staff and get all the Short money), the SNP will now continue to swivel away from the promised “plebiscite election”.

They are already doing that with multiple party figures close to Sturgeon explaining that a plebiscite election is no different to any other election and not actually to be used as a plebiscite. It was just a figure of speech, with no meaning. “Plebiscite” here apparently just means “mandate to hold a plebiscite should Westminster agree to it.”

It is notable that there is zero SNP campaigning going on, in the streets or even online, for a referendum on scottish Independence they claim will be held on October 19 2023. If they did anything to mark one year to the referendum – which you would think would be a key campaigning moment – I could not find it.

For a pro-Independence political activist like myself, the question is now whether genuine Independence supporters should oppose the SNP candidates at Westminster elections. To do so under the first past the post system could lose SNP seats at Westminster to the Unionist parties.

The question is primarily one for the new Alba Party, of which I am a member. Alba has, through membership votes at party conferences, fleshed out a policy platform different to that of the SNP.

Alba wants immediate Independence, and it wants an Independent Scotland to be a republic, outside NATO, in EFTA/EEA rather than the EU, and to have its own Scottish currency from the outset. In addition to these there are a raft of more progressive taxation, nationalisation and spending policies, so Alba has defined its positon well to the left of the neoliberal captured SNP.

What Alba does not have is any significant number of voters. This is a major failing for a political party. But then it is only two years old, contains almost all the people actually campaigning for Independence, and is starting to be picked up as a blip in the opinion polls at up to 4% in Scotland.

Electorally that would not elect any Alba MPs but it is ten per cent of the SNP’s vote.

There is the question of Alba’s two existing MPs, Kenny MacAskill and Neale Hanvey, who under the super vindictive Sturgeon will almost certainly be opposed by the SNP. But leaving that important question to the side, should Alba stand against the SNP in Westminster elections, when this could cost the SNP seats and there appears no realistic chance of Alba winning any?

If the SNP declare an actual plebiscite election, in which a SNP majority will lead to a declaration of Independence, then Alba should not stand against them. It would complicate matters unnecessarily and confuse the electorate. In those circumstances, I would call on all Independence supporters to get behind the SNP, putting aside all differences until after Independence is achieved.

But if the “plebiscite election” tag is purely a ruse to describe a normal election, in which the SNP plan nothing more than to ask Westminster again for permission to hold a referendum (which they know will be refused), then most certainly I shall be arguing that Alba should stand in every single constituency.

If this causes the SNP to lose a handful of seats to Unionist candidates, I shall shed not a tear. Frankly I prefer to argue against open Unionists to the closet Unionists of the SNP, who have betrayed those who voted for them believing they were voting for Independence.

Westminster will never willingly cede Scottish Independence. Never.

The 2014 referendum was only agreed because Independence was at 28% in the opinion polls and Cameron believed a referendum would be easily won. Scotland gave the British establishment the shock of their lives in 2014, and they will not repeat it. Scotland’s economic resources are invaluable to the British elite.

If the British Establishment believed they would win a second referendum, they would not sacrifice so much democratic credibility by refusing it.

Scotland therefore needs to take Independence, not wait to be given it. We have seen moments of great vulnerability for the British state – the Brexit vote and the moment of leaving the EU against the wishes of the overwhelming majority of Scots, the Johnson premiership, the disintegration of Westminster ministerial structures this anarchic Tory autumn – massive opportunities for a bold move on Independence all spurned by Sturgeon.

Opportunities spurned in favour of a legal strategy designed to lose.

Those SNP MPs and MSPs who enable Sturgeon are fast coming to the end of the period where they could claim they were duped.

The SNP MPs at Westminster are achieving nothing whatsoever that advances the cause of Independence. They increasingly get immersed further and further into the processes of legislation for the whole UK, failing to differentiate the interests of Scotland, particularly in the areas of defence and foreign policy.

Unless Sturgeon is ousted in short order, and the plan ditched to please MI5 with a handover to the Robertson power couple, re-electing SNP MPs will continue to do nothing other than to ensure the continued swelling of the bank balances and the pension pots of the MPs themselves, funding for their staff and Short money for the SNP’s smug office bureaucrats.

Independence has not been advanced an inch by these highly paid British state collaborators of the SNP these last five years. That will not change.

Since 2014 the SNP has managed to achieve Scottish Labour levels of both corruption and of incompetence in administration. I once believed that impossible. There are many causes, including crazed over-centralisation where everybody is terrified to take a decision which may displease the dictator, or even to discuss unapproved options.

The limitations of making appointments on the dual bases of personal loyalty and identity politics quotas have also been exposed. There remains a huge amount of talent in the SNP but it has been marginalised and driven from the centre by a leadership that only sees talent as a threat.

Scottish Labour has for decades marginalised any real socialists in the party. But unlike Sturgeon’s continued abuse of state police and prosecution systems systematically to jail or attempt to jail real Independence supporters, at least Scottish Labour did not imprison its internal dissidents.

I have consistently argued that the SNP remains the only realistic vehicle for Independence, it is just a question of changing the driver. But as it continues merrily on the path of Unionism with the passengers apparently too comfortable to care, there comes a time when true Independence supporters simply have to drop the SNP from their calculations as a lost cause.

I believe we are finally there.

So I shall be arguing for Alba to fight the SNP in all constituencies at the next Westminster election, excluding a real plebiscite election. I shall also argue for Alba to fight the SNP everywhere in the next Holyrood election, on both the constituency vote and on the list vote in the d’Hondt system.

This is a hard road. But not an impossible one. There is an extremely close parallel.

The Irish Parliamentary Party of John Redmond was even more dominant in Ireland than Sturgeon’s SNP is in Scotland. In 1906 just two of its MPs, like the two Alba MPs we have now, deserted as a result of lack of progress towards Home Rule. One retired at the next election and one stood and was defeated as a Sinn Fein candidate in 1910.

In the 1910 election the Redmondites continued to be utterly dominant electorally, taking 78 Irish MPs to the Unionists 27. Sinn Fein got nil.

But in the course of just 8 years, by the 1918 general election, Sinn Fein had 71 Irish seats to the Redmondites 6. Simply put, people worked out that the once triumphant Redmondites were not serious about Independence, and they switched to a political party that was. The Redmondites changed their name to the National Party, and quickly descended into irrelevance.

Westminster first past the post is a brutal electoral system. It makes change extremely difficult. But when change does come, it enables it to be exaggeratedly swift and dramatic.

The SNP needs to be opposed simply because it is doing nothing about Independence and has no real intention of doing so. Put bluntly, my patience with the grifters, who grow fat on the backs of betrayed supporters of Independence, has snapped completely.

They need to be shaken hard. If that results in a small temporary increase of open unionists in Westminster, that will be a necessary step in opening the eyes of the Scottish people.

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There is still no explanation as to why the judge chairman Lady Poole, the lead counsel Douglas Ross KC and three other lawyers have all quit the public inquiry into the handling of Covid in Scotland. This is an astonishing event. The inquiry currently is not happening. But nobody in the media seems particularly to care.

Word being put around the Edinburgh establishment is that there is nothing to report, it is nothing to do with remit or evidence, just about terms of service and the length of the inquiry. But that really does not wash. If the inquiry has collapsed over such issues, either the Scottish government has starved it of resources or the lawyers have behaved disgracefully and unprofessionally, abandoning an important public responsibility midway.

Either way, this cannot simply be shrugged off as nothing. And that is assuming it is true that there is no dispute over substance.

On that substance, obvious mistakes were made – such as the release of patients with covid back into care homes – but plainly they were not malicious. What was extremely malicious was the profiteering – for example over PPE, and Pfizer’s price maximisation on their vaccine. But these are outside the scope of this inquiry. I do not know why.

As regular readers know, I have avoided commenting much on covid on the grounds of lack of expertise. My instincts are libertarian – I would have concentrated more on enabling robust (but voluntary) shielding of the vulnerable rather than locking down healthy young people at low risk. Some things made no logical sense at all – like closing the universities when the schools were open. But I do not share the radical opinions many people genuinely hold, both for and against the lockdowns.

One major issue I have not resolved in my own mind is whether covid-19 was a natural development or an escape from a laboratory of a man made variant. The problem is that the experts best able to determine this are of course themselves in this research industry, which could be at fault in inflicting enormous human suffering.

If it were determined that covid-19 were human engineered, the backlash would result in massive closure of labs and defunding of the industry. I therefore don’t expect the scientists to tell us that any time soon.

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Subscriptions to keep this blog going are gratefully received.

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The legal right of secession of states, outside of a situation of “classic” colonial occupation, has developed enormously in the last thirty odd years. South Sudan, Montenegro, East Timor, Eritrea, North Macedonia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Georgia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Slovenia, Croatia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Moldova, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Ukraine are all amongst the new states recognised by the United Nations since 1991.

All of those involved secession from a larger entity. The notion that the right to self determination relates purely to the freeing of non-Europeans from European colonial rule plainly could not survive this onslaught of real world emergence to freedom by European and Eurasian nations. The international law jurisprudence has moved to acknowledge this, most notably summarised in the advisory opinion on Kosovo by the International Court of Justice.

23 nations born of secession in 31 years, all recognised by the UN, makes it plain there is a legal process in routine operation here. That Scotland wishes to become the 24th is not in any sense novel and unusual. Its right to do so is plainly established in international law. That is the basis on which the Government of Scotland should have been approaching the UK Supreme Court (if it approached it at all).

Yet we have had the astonishing spectacle of the Lord Advocate, Dorothy Bain, ostensibly arguing for Scotland’s right to hold an independence referendum, yet never once in a two day hearing asserting the right to self determination of the Scottish people under Article 1 (2) of the UN Charter.

I cannot get through to you how astonishing that is. Let me put it this way. If the Scottish Government do not believe that the Scots are a people with the right of self-determination under the UN Charter, they have no right to apply to the UN for statehood anyway, whatever the referendum result. So why not assert that right now, in the argument for the referendum?

Astonishingly, Bain did not even mention it in court, once. She did mention it in her written submissions, where she stated that Scotland’s right to self-determination has no legal effect in UK law. She also, as I reported yesterday, did find time to argue before the Supreme Court that the mention of “the union of the Kingdoms of Scotland and England” in the Scotland Act was “a peculiarity”, as the Kingdom of Scotland has no legal existence since 1707.

Bain’s supposed argument that the Scottish government has a right to hold an independence referendum rests instead not on the right of the people of Scotland to decide their own future – which Bain has made plain she does not accept – but solely on this argument:

The Scottish parliament, Bain accepts, is constrained by the Scotland Act from legislation which relates to “the Union.” But as a referendum on Independence would only be advisory, it does not “relate to” the Union.

Which, frankly, is bollocks. Even the most ardent supporter of Scottish Independence cannot really believe in this argument. It is embarrassing to be making it.

The argument that Bain should have been making is this:

1) The Westminster Parliament has no authority to make law which constrains the right of self-determination of the Scottish people
2) Yes, the Scotland Act does, quite deliberately, stop the Scottish parliament holding an independence referendum. Of course the UK will try to stop Scotland leaving. But it has no right to do so.
3) Compliance with UK law is not necessary for Scotland to achieve Independence.

That would be precisely in accordance with this statement of international law:

5.5 Consistent with this general approach, international law has not treated the legality of
the act of secession under the internal law of the predecessor State as determining the effect
of that act on the international plane. In most cases of secession, of course, the predecessor
State‟s law will not have been complied with: that is true almost as a matter of definition.

5.6 Nor is compliance with the law of the predecessor State a condition for the declaration
of independence to be recognised by third States, if other conditions for recognition are
fulfilled. The conditions do not include compliance with the internal legal requirements of
the predecessor State. Otherwise the international legality of a secession would be
predetermined by the very system of internal law called in question by the circumstances in
which the secession is occurring.

5.7 For the same reason, the constitutional authority of the seceding entity to proclaim
independence within the predecessor State is not determinative as a matter of international
law. In most if not all cases, provincial or regional authorities will lack the constitutional
authority to secede. The act of secession is not thereby excluded. Moreover, representative
institutions may legitimately act, and seek to reflect the views of their constituents, beyond
the scope of already conferred power.

That statement of international law is the UK government’s submission to the International Court of Justice in the Kosovo referral.

Read it across to the Scottish postion. Of course the Scotland Act tries to preclude Scottish Independence. As the UK government stated in the Kosovo case: “In most cases of secession, of course, the predecessor State’s law will not have been complied with: that is true almost as a matter of definition.”

Defying UK law will not affect Scottish recognition by the international community: as the UK government stated in the Kosovo case “Nor is compliance with the law of the predecessor State a condition for the declaration of independence to be recognised by third States, if other conditions for recognition are fulfilled. The conditions do not include compliance with the internal legal requirements of the predecessor State.”

The Scottish Parliament has the right to call a referendum or to declare Independence as it wishes in reflecting the will of the Scottish people. As the UK government argued in the Kosovo case: “In most if not all cases, provincial or regional authorities will lack the constitutional authority to secede. The act of secession is not thereby excluded. Moreover, representative institutions may legitimately act, and seek to reflect the views of their constituents, beyond the scope of already conferred power.”

If Bain were a half decent lawyer, and any kind of decent Scot, she would have been going at the Supreme Court with The British government’s own words and arguing for Scotland’s right. Instead I have a pile of notes of today’s proceedings so mind-numbingly dull and inconsequential I am not going to bother you with her drivel or that of James Eadie for the UK government.

They conducted a ritual dance across the pinheads of various clauses of the Scotland Act and its schedules, to no useful effect whatsoever.

The Supreme Court will decide that yes, it does have the authority to answer this reference, which it will say was properly made (the judges didn’t like Eadie’s bullying of Bain on this point) and no, the Scottish Parliament does not have competence to pass the draft referendum bill. You will get this decision in late January.

It was an irrelevance. Scotland should of course not be acknowledging any authority of this London court in the first instance.

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Unlike our adversaries including the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, Bellingcat, the Atlantic Council and hundreds of other warmongering propaganda operations, this blog has no source of state, corporate or institutional finance whatsoever. It runs entirely on voluntary subscriptions from its readers – many of whom do not necessarily agree with the every article, but welcome the alternative voice, insider information and debate.

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Sir James Eadie, acting for the Westminster government, closed the day at the Supreme Court with a vicious twist of the knife: “If you can’t even persuade your own law officer, the shutters come down”.

Eadie is well suited to knife twisting, a figure of smooth menace whose polish is undercut by the odd hint of the Estuary in his accent. He had spoken for an hour, after a full day of abysmal performance by Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain. She told the court proudly she is a minister in the Scottish Government.

In an excruciating three hour ramble, delivered with all the concentration of an 18 month old toddling around Hamley’s, the only points of clarity from Bain were the following, which stood out like nuggets of bacon in a lentil soup of obfuscation:

1) “I could not clear the bill as appended. I do not have the necessary confidence that the bill is within the competence of the Scottish parliament”
2) “A referendum on a matter which is ultra vires, is also ultra vires”
3) “It is a peculiarity that the Scotland Act refers to the Union of the Kingdoms of Scotland and England. Those states no longer exist, having been replaced by the United Kingdom”…(two hours later) “Nothing turns on the peculiarity. The union is a full political and economic union between what were two previously independent countries.”
4) “There is clearly a cogent argument that the Scottish Parliament does not have the competence to pass this bill”.

You have not misread. Those are all quotes from Dorothy Bain. A minister in Sturgeon’s government.

Unionists on social media could not believe their luck. Was this really the Scottish Government’s case? I give you one of the more publishable ones:

Yes, Greig, she certainly did say that. Twice.

This is no surprise however, as Bain had very specifically endorsed that view in her written arguments before the Court, as I explained in my analysis of them:

Eadie’s dry observation that the Scottish government could not convince its own law officer of its case, struck home because it was a withering understatement. Bain could not have made clearer her Unionist credentials if she had come into court sporting an orange sash and with a brooch in the form of Ian Paisley.

Bain said she had given arguments both for and against the Scottish parliament having the power to hold an advisory referendum. But she said that by contrast she was unequivocal that it was this, Westminster’s Supreme Court, with one Scottish judge on the panel of five, that had the power to decide the issue.

Her main argument that the Scottish parliament could have the power to hold a referendum was that the proposed referendum was non self-executing, and its legal effect was nil. It was not for the court to anticipate any political consequences that might arise from what was in effect just a large opinion poll that the Westminster parliament would be legally entitled to ignore.

Yes, that really was her argument, particularly about Westminster having no obligation to accept the result. She said the referendum proposal respected the “protection of the integrity of the UK parliament”.

She went on further about the material difference between a vote for a thing to happen, and the thing happening itself. In this context she referenced at huge length cases about cigarette advertising in Scotland and hypothecated NHS spending for pulmonary disease in Wales. We were far now from Scottish Independence, a situation with which Bain was much more comfortable, and she accordingly meandered for two hours in this beguiling pasture, looking down every rabbit hole.

At this stage, even those of us who believe we have known for some years the reason why Nicola Sturgeon would appoint a unionist Lord Advocate determined to scuttle the good ship Independence, were puzzled about why Sturgeon would appoint a Lord Advocate incapable of finishing one single sentence without looking down at her notes, with a deep frown of puzzlement as to their content.

Bain early came under an interesting line of questioning from Court President Lord Reed and from Lady Rose. Did the Lord Advocate really have to certify the legislation as competent? The Scotland Act only indicated that the responsible minister must do so in good faith. They were not obliged to take the Lord Advocate’s advice. Bain relied for this on the Ministerial Code, but that did not have legal force.

Bain replied that a Minister could take a contrary view, but it would have to be reasonable and argued. It would be most unusual – the Law Officers’ (ie Bain’s) role was to give the Scottish Government advice on the law.

This was fascinating to me because there were obvious assumptions underlying these exchanges that did not have to be stated between lawyers.

The first unasked question was that the minister could simply go out and get their own legal advice rather than take Bain’s – there are hundreds of lawyers in Scotland willing to argue that a referendum is within the powers of the Scottish government, indeed Bain had referred to them. The minister could publish that advice and fulfil the “good faith” and “reasoned argument” criteria.

The second underlying question left hanging was why on Earth the Scottish Government had appointed a minister in Bain unwilling to back its flagship policy, and why she wasn’t resigning to make way for somebody who would.

Both these questions were not able to be asked by Lord Reed and Lady Rose because they are political matters not for the Supreme Court – but they hung thick over this phase of the discussion.

When James Eadie came to reply on behalf of Westminster’s Advocate General, he was by contrast a model of brevity and common sense. The Court could not possibly rule, said Eadie, on a matter which was hypothetical, theoretical, abstract and inchoate. Personally, I prefer to eschew sesquipedalianism (that is a joke), but it came over well from Eadie.

Who knows, Eadie opined, what final form the legislation might take, or even if it would be passed at all? Where were the accompanying memoranda and costings? What amendments might be passed? The court could not rule on a mere idea of a bill.

Interestingly, Eadie was given a much harder time by the judges than Bain. They seem far keener on Scotland’s democratic right to hold a referendum than Bain is. They suggested the draft bill was pretty clear and short and unlikely to change substantially. They asked how in Eadie’s view the Scottish Government could go ahead in circumstances when the Lord Advocate could not certify. That is what drew from Eadie his closing barb:

“If you can’t even persuade your own law officer, the shutters come down”.

Eadie will continue his argument tomorrow.

Lord Reed, who has a gentle manner, had opened proceedings by explaining that the Supreme Court was the court of the whole United Kingdom, included Scottish judges, and took Scottish cases under Scottish law. He added that a decision would take “months” in view of the mountain of paperwork involved.

Reed is however the only Scottish judge on this panel of five, with two English, one Welsh and one Northern Irish. This is very much the UK Establishment deciding on Scotland’s future. Reed himself is a Tory appointment as President and widely viewed as a Tory.

I confess I was fascinated by Reed’s accent. He has taken the title Lord Reed of Allermuir – that is the hill I look at from my study here; I can walk out the back and be on its slopes in less than ten minutes. He has lived nearly all his life in Scotland. Yet there is no trace at all of Scot in his accent, not even the refined tones of Morningside or The Grange. He was privately educated in Edinburgh then Edinburgh University, but the accent really is remarkable. It is beyond posh Scot. I have no explanation.

On a much more profound matter, I do not believe Dorothy Bain referred one single time to Scotland’s right of self-determination in international law, or indeed to the international law context at all. Nor did she reference the SNP’s written intervention in the case on precisely those points.

This is to double down on an omission that to any practitioner, legal or diplomatic, in the field of sovereignty, secession, decolonisation or newly Independent states, will find beyond astonishing. It simply misses out the fundamental argument. Remember, Dorothy Bain is speaking here, not as an individual but as a minister in the Scottish Government.

That the Scottish Government does not believe in the right to self-determination of the Scottish people – but the governing party the SNP, which has intervened separately to assert it, does so believe – is a situation of astonishing farce. It is, frankly, the perfect illustration of the blind alley into which devolutionist political careerism has shunted the entire future of the Scottish nation.

My reading of today is that the judges of the UK Supreme Court are sympathetic to the democratic argument for an outlet for the will of the Scottish people, but that Dorothy Bain has – not by accident, and in collusion with Sturgeon – presented so poor an argument as to make that decision virtually impossible for the court.

I don’t think James Eadie can believe his luck.

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Unlike our adversaries including the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, Bellingcat, the Atlantic Council and hundreds of other warmongering propaganda operations, this blog has no source of state, corporate or institutional finance whatsoever. It runs entirely on voluntary subscriptions from its readers – many of whom do not necessarily agree with the every article, but welcome the alternative voice, insider information and debate.

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The video is now available of this discussion in Liverpool in the furthest fringes of the Labour Party Conference. While the session lacked any adversarial spark, it was a deep dive and I believe very informative. I am here with Stella Assange, Iain Munro, Deepa Driver and Ogmundur Jonasson. Ogmundur’s experience as an Icelandic minister dealing with the FBI is particularly interesting as an example of the lawlessness with which the USA has pursued its vendetta against Assange.

You can find videos of other Future of the Left discussions here, I also feature in a couple of others. The discussion on Ukraine was beset by first morning technical difficulties and the video is not there as I post – it may return.

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Forgive me for pointing out that my ability to provide this coverage is entirely dependent on your kind voluntary subscriptions which keep this blog going. This post is free for anybody to reproduce or republish, including in translation. You are still very welcome to read without subscribing.

Unlike our adversaries including the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, Bellingcat, the Atlantic Council and hundreds of other warmongering propaganda operations, this blog has no source of state, corporate or institutional finance whatsoever. It runs entirely on voluntary subscriptions from its readers – many of whom do not necessarily agree with the every article, but welcome the alternative voice, insider information and debate.

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Saturday’s Hands Around Parliament event for Assange was massively uplifting. We hoped for 5,000 and feared we would fall short and fail to link the chain due to transport strikes. But in fact 12,000 people showed up for what became a glorious celebration of dissent and a festival of mutual support.

I walked the entire circuit across the face of the Houses of Parliament, though Westminster Park, across Lambeth Bridge, along Lambeth Palace and St Thomas’ Hospital, across Westminster Bridge and back into Parliament Square, and can assure you the chain was fully complete – indeed in places replete – with determined people proudly expressing their opposition to the persecution of Assange, and proclaiming their dissent in an atmosphere that was one of joy and celebration.

Thousands of protesters gathered in London on Saturday in the first ever Human Chain around Parliament: calling for the release of Julian Assange | via @DiEM_25 #SurroundParliament #FreeAssangeNOW pic.twitter.com/xaj8sHknpH

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) October 9, 2022

Walking the circuit, I spoke with many hundreds and bumped into small organised groups who had come from France, Belgium, Germany and the United States, and individuals who had traveled especially from as far away as Chile, Australia and New Zealand. I met more than a few tourists who had joined in the demonstration after simply coming to look at Westminster. And I met hundreds of readers of this blog, many of whom had actively campaigned against my own imprisonment. I appear in an improbable number of selfies. It was like an afternoon in a warm bath of comradeship.

But what was most striking was that this was a gathering of individuals, with real personal concern for freedom, the truth and the right to dissent. There were no large organisations involved and no money behind it. The diversity was beautiful – almost every race and culture on the planet was there, and also every social class. I quite literally chatted with a Duchess and with a Big Issue seller within a minute of each other.

Thousands of demonstrators form a human ring around the Houses of Parliament to protest Julian Assange's planned extradition to the USA #surroundparliament #Assange #freejulianassange #protest #london #Parliament #HumanChain4Assange #FreeAssangeNOW #humanchain pic.twitter.com/zEjgbBAsK9

— Richard Ings (@richardcings) October 8, 2022

There was also by far the most diverse age profile I have ever seen on an Assange protest. Thousands of young people had come out to support Julian and Freedom of Speech – that is something I had never witnessed before, which had always worried me.

From talking with them on Saturday, I think that climate change activism is motivating young people. They are then realising that climate change cannot be tackled without understanding who truly wields political power, and coming up hard against increasing restrictions on the right to protest to try to change society.

Russell Brand and Jeremy Corbyn were among those who turned up in support. I met many, many old friends and veterans of other campaigns. The fight to save Julian continues through the courts and continues in both local and international politics.

If we believe in free speech, then Julian Assange should be free from Belmarsh prison.

Thank you to the thousands of people who formed a human chain around Parliament to oppose his extradition, and stand up for independent & democratic journalism everywhere. pic.twitter.com/8tbnJDKNPs

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) October 8, 2022

Needless to say, Saturday’s event was not much covered in mainstream media, which reported that “hundreds” of supporters had turned out. You could not form that chain over several kilometers with just hundreds of people. I jokingly suggested that we had made a mistake by completing the chain – if we had failed, the media would have put it on TV to mock us!

This was the biggest Assange event so far, and a remarkable achievement given the transport network was entirely crippled by strike action that day. It felt more mainstream in the numbers and kinds of people who were represented. That a man is suffering without end, for publishing nothing but the truth about war crimes, is coming home to more and more people.

That degree of support means to continue to build. All extraditions are political, and the display of public concern is helpful. But the inspiring effect of Saturday on those of us campaigning is invaluable. I feel a huge burst of new energy and commitment, and I know that others do too. Stella gave Julian an account of it on the phone, and it gave him a big boost. He needs it, as he is currently down with Covid and in even greater isolation at the prison.

————————————————-

Forgive me for pointing out that my ability to provide this coverage is entirely dependent on your kind voluntary subscriptions which keep this blog going. This post is free for anybody to reproduce or republish, including in translation. You are still very welcome to read without subscribing.

Unlike our adversaries including the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, Bellingcat, the Atlantic Council and hundreds of other warmongering propaganda operations, this blog has no source of state, corporate or institutional finance whatsoever. It runs entirely on voluntary subscriptions from its readers – many of whom do not necessarily agree with the every article, but welcome the alternative voice, insider information and debate.

Subscriptions to keep this blog going are gratefully received.

Choose subscription amount from dropdown box:

Paypal address for one-off donations: [email protected]

Alternatively by bank transfer or standing order:

Account name
MURRAY CJ
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Subscriptions are still preferred to donations as I can’t run the blog without some certainty of future income, but I understand why some people prefer not to commit to that.

On Saturday we try to put Hands Around Parliament in opposition to the extradition of Julian Assange. Human chains are being formed in support internationally in many different countries.

It is more important than ever that we stand up for human rights, freedom of speech and the right to oppose US military hegemony and expose its crimes. Threats to the right to protest are multiplying at home, and the war in Ukraine has driven to an extreme degree the regimentation of the entire state and corporate media behind a single and extremely partial narrative.

The total destruction of Julian Assange as a demonstration of the untrammeled hegemonic power of the United States is very much the aim of the political establishment.

"I hope he gets at least 176 years in jail for what he did."

Ambassador John Bolton discusses Julian Assange's imprisonment with the WikiLeaks founder's wife Stella.@AmbJohnBolton | @StellaMoris1 | @piersmorgan | @TalkTV | #PMU pic.twitter.com/JGWiEBszZg

— Piers Morgan Uncensored (@PiersUncensored) October 5, 2022

We are gathering at 1pm on Saturday at Westminster. Because the Houses of Parliament border the river, a human chain around them involves crossing two bridges of the Thames and a distance of several miles. It is therefore a logistical challenge that will require many thousands of people and a fair amount of patience and getting into position.

There is a real worry that transport strikes – which I fully support as workers have been exploited too long and too easily – will reduce the numbers, so I absolutely urge everybody who can get themselves to Westminster to make a special effort to do so.

Sadly I will now have to miss the simultaneous Yestival event in George Square, Glasgow, which had been rescheduled due to the Queen’s funeral. I do urge everyone in Scotland to get to that; the AUOB event last Saturday in Edinburgh showed the attendance for Independence campaigning is starting to grow again, and it is important that we retain the momentum.

This week saw the death of the great Ian Hamilton KC. I have written before that one of the happiest nights of my life was a dinner at Gordon and Edith Wilson’s home in Broughty Ferry forty years ago, when I sat next to Ian Hamilton and he retold the story of liberating the Stone of Scone from Westminster Abbey.

They had become adept at smuggling around large heavy broadcast equipment as they ran the pirate radio station Radio Free Scotland, which in those days needed a lot of bulky and heavy gear. They frequently had to shift from tenement to tenement as the police were searching for them to close the station down. So they had lifting harnesses and tackle and were adept at smuggling around boxes much the size, if not the weight, of the Stone of Scone.

The aim, of course, was publicity for Independence, then a fringe cause. None of them particularly believed Westminster housed the real Stone of Scone, which all the early sources describe as black rock and not sandstone. King Edward had been sold a dummy.

The daring and audacity of Ian Hamilton should be an inspiration to us. It is not wrong to break the laws of the colonial power. The London Supreme Court will shortly rule that Scotland has no power to hold an independence referendum. The only correct reaction to that is – well they would say that, wouldn’t they?

No London court can deny the Scottish people their inalienable right to self-determination.

I have spent the entire week in bed with an absolutely horrible cold, and now all of me hurts. This is the first time for four days I could look at the screen to blog without an unbearable headache. I shall however get to Westminster on Saturday, just to be one link in that chain.

I will be flying (which I generally avoid where possible) very early on Saturday morning after with Nadira seeing the Royal Scottish National Orchestra perform Saint Saens Symphony No. 3 on Friday night. This is one of my favourite pieces of music. It requires a large orchestra, concert organ and two pianos so is not performed that often.

I have never seen it live. I have been trying for fifty years. On about eight occasions I have had tickets to see it and not been able to get there. I seem to be fated. This has happened to me all round the world including in London, Edinburgh, Warsaw, Vienna and Paris. Funnily enough it has generally been something urgent cropping up in work/activism, rather than illness or family crisis, that has kept me away.

The last time was in Edinburgh, and it was some large Independence event I was invited to speak at, I think during the 2014 referendum, that stopped me using my tickets. I recall telling my friend Hugh Kerr, who was unsympathetic as he’s not a Saint-Saens fan, and infuriatingly he was going anyway!

I don’t generally have this problem. I must have seen Bruch’s first violin concerto, possibly my very favourite, a dozen times. This problem is peculiar to Saint Saens third symphony.

So this Friday nothing is stopping me, even though it means a 6.00am flight the next morning.

When I started this blog it used to be much more personal. Nowadays, with a vastly larger readership, some people don’t enjoy it when I tell something of myself. But I think it is important to emphasise that these articles are the thoughts of a very ordinary person, at this moment feeling pretty rotten, who has a life outside thinking about politics and society. We have, after all, to live in society.

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Forgive me for pointing out that my ability to provide this coverage is entirely dependent on your kind voluntary subscriptions which keep this blog going. This post is free for anybody to reproduce or republish, including in translation. You are still very welcome to read without subscribing.

Unlike our adversaries including the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, Bellingcat, the Atlantic Council and hundreds of other warmongering propaganda operations, this blog has no source of state, corporate or institutional finance whatsoever. It runs entirely on voluntary subscriptions from its readers – many of whom do not necessarily agree with the every article, but welcome the alternative voice, insider information and debate.

Subscriptions to keep this blog going are gratefully received.

Choose subscription amount from dropdown box:

Paypal address for one-off donations: [email protected]

Alternatively by bank transfer or standing order:

Account name
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Subscriptions are still preferred to donations as I can’t run the blog without some certainty of future income, but I understand why some people prefer not to commit to that.

Anyone who knows the former Soviet space well understands the crucial difference between “grazdanstvo” – citizenship – and “narodnosc” – nationality. It featured on all identity documents, including passports, in the Soviet Union and on post Soviet national passports, at least until countries joined the EU.

I don’t know if it is currently retained on Ukrainian passports, or if not when it was dropped – perhaps someone might advise.

Everybody in the post Soviet sphere knew the distinction. In Uzbekistan, an inhabitant of Samarkand would almost certainly enter their citizenship – grazdanstvo – as Uzbek and their nationality – narodnosc – as Tajik, for example.

There has been a strange failure to counter the myth that the inhabitants of the Donbass are mostly Russian. They are not, and have not been so for many centuries.

The last census in Ukraine was in 2001, conducted under the pro-Russian president Leonid Kuchma. These are the narodnosc results as percentages for the regions Putin has just annexed.

Donetsk Region

Ukrainians 56.9
Russians 38.2
Greeks 1.6
Belarussians 0.9
Tatars 0.5
Armenians 0.3
Jews 0.5
Azerbaijanians 0.2

Luhansk Region

Ukrainians 58.0
Russians 39.0
Belarussians 0.8
Tatars 0.3
Armenians 0.3

Kherson Region

Ukrainians 82.0
Russians 14.1
Belarussians 0.7
Tatars 0.5
Moldavians 0.4
Armenians 0.4
Crimean Tatars 0.2

Zaporizhzhia Region

Ukrainians 70.8
Russians 24.7
Bulgarians 1.4
Belarussians 0.7
Jews 0.2
Armenians 0.3
Tatars 0.3
Georgians 0.2

In none of the regions Putin has just annexed were Russians a majority in 2001, let alone a 99.7% majority. Apparently 6.4 million Ukrainians have simply vanished.

For completeness here were the 2001 results for Crimea:

Russians 58.3
Ukrainians 24.3
Crimean Tatars 12.0
Belarussians 1.4
Tatars 0.5
Armenians 0.4
Jews 0.2
Poles 0.2
Moldavians 0.2
Azerbaijanians 0.2

There is an extremely important validation of these results available. They only show small changes from the last Soviet census in 1989. In all of these regions (bar Crimea) a majority identified their nationality as Ukrainian in the Soviet census too. So it is not a factor of Ukrainian independence.

Here is the region with the highest concentration of Russians – Donetsk – in the Soviet census in 1989.

Donetsk 1989 Soviet Census

Ukrainians 50.7
Russians 43.6
Greeks 1.6
Belarussians 1.4
Tatars 0.5
Armenians 0.2
Jews 0.5
Azerbaijanians 0.1

As I said, there has never been a Russian majority in the Donbass.

There may have been a slight Russian speaking majority. 14.8% of those, Ukraine wide, who identified their nationality as Ukrainian, gave Russian as their first language. This was higher in the East and lower in the West. But those who self-identify as Ukrainian but speak Russian as their first language, are no different to English speaking Scots. Russian speaking was advantageous in the Soviet Union.

There has never been a Russian majority in the Donbass. Never. The Russian minority in Donbass is mostly derived from the great population movements of 1946, when the Polish city of Lvov became Ukrainian and German cities like Breslau and Posen became Polish.

The Russian minority in Donbass is heavily urban, concentrated in the cities. The Ukrainian majority in the Donbass is heavily rural. The Russians are thus much more concentrated, visible and easy to mobilise. That is why it is genuinely possible to mobilise a pro-Russian demonstration in the cities of Luhansk or Donetsk. It is why journalists visiting those cities get a false impression of the wider population of the region.

That urban/rural split is of course not absolute, and just one factor in patchiness of distribution. Some eastern portions of the Donbass probably did have a Russian majority population.

Farmers cling to their land, and a surprising number of rural Ukrainians remained even within the minority proportion of the lands of the Donbass that became a Russian military enclave post 2014. Most of the land of Donbass, outside the Russian controlled areas, became even more Ukrainian as some population exchange between the areas occurred.

The majority of the territory of Donbass has been conquered by Russia only within the last six months and the population there certainly remains majority Ukrainian. Only in the easternmost areas, the post 2014 enclaves, is there at this moment almost certainly a Russian majority. But even they still have some Ukrainian rural populations.

The notion that the entire Donbass voted 99% to join Russia is just so ludicrous that I don’t know what to say to people who believe it, except that they are so blinded by ideology and hatred of western governments that they have quite literally stopped thinking.

I probably dislike western governments in a deeper and more informed way than they do; it just does not lead me to the ridiculous illogicality of believing that because the west is bad and run by warmongers, rival warmonger Putin and his oligarchs must be better.

You see Vanessa, I do know better. I speak Russian and Polish, have lived in St Petersburg and Warsaw, and have almost certainly both spent more time in Ukraine than you, while I have very definitely forgotten more Ukrainian history than you will ever know.

The idea that in Zaporizhzhia – where 24% of the population self identify as Russian – or Kherson, where 14% are Russian, 97% of the population voted to join Russia is so ludicrous that I can’t believe I find myself explaining it. I have friends in Kherson.

Equally ludicrous is Vanessa Beeley’s idea of election observation. Knowing nothing of the country or its history – and I am quite certain she has no idea of the above census facts – you cannot fly in for a few days and judge a democratic process free and fair.

There are international rules for election observation, long established by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe and more recently by the United Nations. These include that observers should not be funded by the host country or by any party involved or be dependent on either for logistics, transport, accommodation and communications. Observers should not be accompanied by any officials when observing.

I have asked Vanessa a few questions on the absolute basics of international referendum observation 101. Let me expand on those a bit here:

What electoral register was used? When was it taken?
What was the supervising body of the referendum? Where are its published rules? How independent was it?
Which people or organisations represented each side of the referendum question? How were they registered?
How long was the campaign period?
What broadcast debates were held?
How was equality of airtime on local broadcast media implemented? how did the observers monitor it?
What were the spending limits for each campaign? How much was spent? How was it audited?
Was each side able to campaign freely without fear and intimidation?
How were the observers dispersed geographically? How many in rural how many in urban areas? For how many weeks?
What campaigning was seen? Where is the observers’ photographic evidence of democratic campaigning by each side?

That is the basic work of any monitoring mission. Democracy is a process, not merely a vote. Only after that do we get to secrecy of the ballot, access to voting, intimidation at polling stations, security of the count etc.

The plain truth is that I resemble a Ducati motorbike more than what happened in Ukraine resembled a democratic process. Anybody who claims otherwise is simply an appalling liar. I was amused by a comment from Eva Bartlett, for whom I generally have much respect, who said she did not meet anybody opposed to the annexation.

If you think carefully, Eva, that is not the win you think it is.

These annexations are deeply unhelpful. They go way beyond anything to which Russia can have the slightest reasonable claim. I could see a negotiated settlement around Ukraine acknowledging Russian sovereignty over Crimea, and perhaps those parts of the Donbass within the control line as at February 2022.

But by declaring as Russian territory large regions of Ukraine to which Russia has no valid claim whatsoever, Putin has made a negotiated settlement almost impossible. He has also bitten off far more than he can chew. As I keep explaining, Russia is not the military superpower NATO wants us to believe in order to keep us fueling the military industrial complex.

Putin is playing into the hands of the United States’ strategy, to bleed Russia and degrade its military whilst expending only Ukrainian lives. Western military technology is vastly superior to Russian. Putin is sending 300,000 conscripts into a meat grinder. As more and more of that western weaponry reaches Ukraine and becomes operational, the Russian conscripts will neither see nor have a chance to fight the person killing them from way over the horizon.

The dangers of escalation towards the nuclear are becoming very real.  I fully acknowledge and condemn the toxic nature of much Ukrainian nationalism, the glorification of Nazis, the banning of opposition parties and of Russian language teaching and media. I utterly oppose NATO expansion. Of course it was not Russia who blew up the Nordstream pipeline or shelled the nuclear power station they were themselves occupying.

I absolutely get all of that.

But unless Armageddon appeals to you, and if you have the slightest respect for truth over ideology, the cheering on of Putin has to stop.

————————————————-

Forgive me for pointing out that my ability to provide this coverage is entirely dependent on your kind voluntary subscriptions which keep this blog going. This post is free for anybody to reproduce or republish, including in translation. You are still very welcome to read without subscribing.

Unlike our adversaries including the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, Bellingcat, the Atlantic Council and hundreds of other warmongering propaganda operations, this blog has no source of state, corporate or institutional finance whatsoever. It runs entirely on voluntary subscriptions from its readers – many of whom do not necessarily agree with the every article, but welcome the alternative voice, insider information and debate.

Subscriptions to keep this blog going are gratefully received.

Choose subscription amount from dropdown box:

Paypal address for one-off donations: [email protected]

Alternatively by bank transfer or standing order:

Account name
MURRAY CJ
Account number 3 2 1 5 0 9 6 2
Sort code 6 0 – 4 0 – 0 5
IBAN GB98NWBK60400532150962
BIC NWBKGB2L
Bank address Natwest, PO Box 414, 38 Strand, London, WC2H 5JB

Bitcoin: bc1q3sdm60rshynxtvfnkhhqjn83vk3e3nyw78cjx9
Ethereum/ERC-20: 0x764a6054783e86C321Cb8208442477d24834861a

Subscriptions are still preferred to donations as I can’t run the blog without some certainty of future income, but I understand why some people prefer not to commit to that.