A KIST O FERLIES

Since 1980, Peter D Wright has contributed a regular column in Scots to the Scots Independent. The language of the Scottish Court, The Three Estates and Lowland Scotland, though much diluted, is alive and well. Since the reconvened Scottish Parliament was established, SNP MSP Irene McGugan has been to the fore to raise the status of the Scots Leid (Language).

From next week, under the heading "A Kist o Ferlies", Peter D Wright will, weekly, give a few words in Scots, idioms, sayings, or even a verse of poetry which has caught his fancy.

SILENCE IS GOLDEN

There does not seem to be very much noise from the Press about the SNP leadership race, probably because of the mess the Lib-Lab administration is making of the education crisis; when your opponents are in trouble don’t help them out. There was one acid comment in the press about the appearance of John Swinney in a Party Political Broadcast, but as he is the Deputy Leader, and as only Conference delegates will vote, this does not seem a material point. Howver, in keeping with our neutral stance, we publish pictures of Alex Neil and John Swinney.

WHO THEY?

A report in this week’s Sunday Post speaks of a Far-Right plot to influencer the SNP; an offshoot of the National Front, this group claims to have many members in influential positions in the party, branch secretaries and treasurers, ready to do their bidding. The SNP have not heard about them, and we might wonder at how he managed to get coverage designed to damage the SNP? (Well, we think there’s only one of them).

IMMIGRANTS REQUIRED

There is a shortage of skilled workers in Britain and Home Office Minister Barbara Roche has started the ball rolling by claiming that this could be addressed very quickly by immigration. We have not as yet heard the Tory reaction to this, but the general attitude to asylum seekers, mainly in England, is hostile. However, there are two points to be considered; it is not only skilled workers who are required, but unskilled , to do the menial and low paid jobs that UK citizens spurn. As well as, and perhaps more importantly, more young people are required to try to defuse the demographic time bomb; if this is not tackled , then tomorrow’s pensioners will be treated with even more disdain than today’s. To put it succinctly, we need people to pay taxes for our pensions, and there is no sign of a baby boom coming along.

DONALD DEWAR OAP

Great headlines - Donald Dewar is giving pensioners a £100 million boost! Wow! And the small print? The money will be spread over three years, and will be spent on a series of measures aimed at making life for older people more comfortable. The full implementation of the Sutherland report will not be an option (Paying for nursing homes) but pensioners will get improved Internet access. Full implementation of the Sutherland report would cost £110 million a year, and Donald only wants to allocate to pensioners a third of that; what grates is that it is our money, and everyone expected Labour to reverse the "Sell your home to pay for care and make nursing home owners rich" policy of the Tories. You fool!

The policy is to be spread over three years, and it is mere coincidence that in three years we will have the next Scottish elections - perish the thought!

UNLEADED GOVERNMENT

Well, at least we can say that they’re not four star! The ineptitude of the Government over the fuel crisis is hard to believe; with all the levers of power more firmly in their hands than at any time in the last 30 years, we have a Government that either misread or ignored the situation, and Britain grinds to a halt. This is not a miners’ strike, although New Labour apologists keep bringing up that some hauliers helped to break the miners’ strike (Ad nauseam) and go on about the price of crude, perhaps completely unaware that crude oil in Britain is cheaper than anywhere else in Europe. We might wonder that when Tony Blair wants Britain to be at the heart of Europe, why is he so upset when his natural voters emulate the French? The main thrust of the protest seems to be farmers and hauliers, both of whom have been hit by the taxes; it is true that they in theory should be able to pass on this increase to the customers, but in practice this is not the case. Farmers, in particular, have been having a thin time of it, but they are not a group who get a lot of sympathy from the public.

Inadvertently, and that seems to be what Government is all about, the take for fuel tax will be reduced; if filling stations have no fuel, no one can buy it, so no revenue for the Government. However, if it forces people on to public transport, if available, then they will cease to buy fuel on a regular basis and this will reduce the revenue; watch for the Government having to cut back public expenditure (??) because there will not be enough money to go round. They bleat about their green credentials, and funding the National Health Service, and they think we’re green!

QUE SARAH, SARAH --WHO?

It would seem that the gas of Sarah Boyack, the transport and environment minister is at a wee peep; according to some reports she is to get an assistant to help her out. Since her appointment last year she has created a storm by road pricing proposals which were hurriedly dropped, she then messed up negotiations to prevent a strike at Caledonian MacBrayne , which would have isolated the isles (Could be a title for a song) and now she has been accused of sitting on the Lingerbay quarry report because she doesn’t like it. The public enquiry reported four years ago, and Ms Boyack, has now asked Scottish Natural Heritage to assess if the area contains enough rare plants to qualify as a Special Area of Conservation; the Reporter to the public enquiry recommended that the quarry scheme go ahead.

And now, when there is a fuel blockade, no petrol or diesel, and Scotland grinding to a halt, the Scottish Executive’s case on Newsnight was put by Susan Deacon, the Health Minister; is Ms Boyack persona non grata? Should not either Donald Dewar, or Henry McLeish, or Sam Galbraith (Well the weans can’t get to school to fail exams) have stepped into the breach to pick up Ms Boyack’s marbles? It would be nice to know.

WHO’S SORRY NOW? SAM?

Sam Galbraith must be grateful for the petrol debacle, for it diverts attention from his own debacle, the SQA, and all its works and pomps. He performed well enough last week with his prepared statement, and indeed handled most of the questions fairly well, but lapsed into arrogance towards the end. The next day, however, Alex Salmond MSP, SNP, homed in on Donald Caesar at Question Time; reading the small print of the Education (Scotland) Act - speed the day when Scotland does not appear in brackets- he quoted that it did give Mr Galbraith the power to give the SQA orders, and they had to take them. Mr Galbraith said it was a "scurrilous and baseless" allegation that he had misled Parliament; the truth hurts.

The affair runs on, with denials all round, leading Kenny MacDonald to comment on "Holyrood Live" "The difference between the IRA and the SQA is that at least the IRA sometimes claims responsibility" - coorse. * The point with Mr Galbraith is that while he denies that he is responsible, he has to remain in office to deal with the problem, a case of having his cake and eating it.

The inquiry by the Parliament’s Education Committee starts on 27 Sep, and will hold hearing twice a week, including during the parliament’s recess in mid-October; the remit will cover marking, quality assurance, administration, and the implementation of Higher Still, which seems to be where it all started to go wrong. One item I picked up concerned the amount of assessments pupils had to undergo; a visiting Norwegian educationalist commented "You don’t make a pig fatter by weighing it all the time".

Still no sign of the 29 Board members of the SQA, and no public messages of support from Brian Wilson or Helen Liddell, previous SQA architects; Helen Liddell was too busy, up at Balmoral to get the Queen to sign an Order in Council to take police action against the voters blockading the refineries.

* Coorse - naughty, bad, wicked.

LANARKSHIRE LIVES

Those who have made uncomplimentary remarks about the Scottish Parliament have been in general confusing the Executive with the Parliament; this comment was made by Tom Brown of the Daily Record, who now expects everyone to forget that he was one of the main proponents of that line. We had a further example in the ways of the Labour Mafia at the time of Sam Galbraith’s statement; Tom McCabe, Minister for Parliament, issued an overt threat that the Executive would take back debating time allocated to opposition parties. In other words "We don’t like what you say, so you are not going to be allowed to say it" in best Labour hegemonial style. The Presiding Officer pointed out that this would be a breach of the rules, and Mr McCabe, a former leader of Lanarkshire Council, was duly chastised. It shows quite clearly why the Parliament can get a bad name. I can never remember whether Mr McCabe was leader in North Lanarkshire or South Lanarkshire, and he’s probably trying to forget it too.

THIS DOME IS NOT A JOKE

Mr William Hague, speaking in Glasgw, said that the Dome was the "laughing stock of the world"; aside from the fact that I wouldn’t have thought that he’d feel as sensitive as that about his head, he chooses to forget that it was a Tory idea, and that the Tories went to great lengths to persuade Labour not to reject it. Like the SQA, the guilty people are well clear, but New Labour ignored the old adage which I repeat "Learn from other people’s mistakes, for you don’t have time to make them all yourselves".

The more we hear, the more ineptitude is revealed; the NMEC (The New Millennium Experience Company) is being castigated for major financial blunders, for paying premium rates to contractors to get the Dome ready by 31 December, for signing contracts which ran past the projected closure date, for overestimating the numbers who would attend, and for recruiting the Chief Executive Piers-Yves Gerbeau. There were two Piers-Yves Gerbeau, one was inspirational in reviving interest in the Paris Disneyland, and the other one was the chief executive in charge of services; yes they got the man who looked after the ticket machines and the lost weans.

And, almost finally, they sold the Dome to Nomura, the Japanese merchant bank, for £105 million, because they thought that was a better deal than to a British consortium, Legacy, who offered £155 million; yes, wrong again, the Japanese have now decided they don’t want it. Nomura has just bought First Quench, the off licence chain which owns Victoria Wine, Threshers, Wine Rack and Bottoms Up; they think they’ll get their £220 millions worth there.

What a scandal; almost £1 billion wasted, which was Lottery money mainly supposed to be "for good causes". Meanwhile, the money which should have been spent on the National Health Service from the Lottery will come from fuel taxes!

HUBRIS.

DATES IN HISTORY

16 September 1745
Canter of Coltbrig where Jacobite forces routed Hanovarian dragoons on the outskirts of Edinburgh.

21 September 1745
Hanovarian army under the command of John Cope were surprised and overwhelmingly defeated, in ten minutes, by the Jacobite forces of Prince Charles Edward Stewart in the Battle of Prestonpans. The victory left most of Scotland open to the Jacobites and Cope to ridicule:

'Hey Johnnie Cope, are ye wauken yet?
Or are your drums a-beatin yet?
If ye were auken I would wait
To gang to the coals in the mornin.'

22 September 1990
Alex Salmond elected as National Convener of the Scottish National Party. He defeated fellow Westminster MP, Margaret Ewing, by 486 votes to 186 at the Party's Annual National Conference in the City Hall, Perth.

THE REBELS CEILIDH SONG BOOK

COME A' YE TRAMPS AN' HAWKERS
(As sung by Jimmy McBeth)

Come a# ye tramps and Hawker lads, ye gaitherers o' blaw,
That tramps the country roon an' roon, come listen een an' a'.
I'll tell tae ye a rovin' tale, an' sichts that I hae seen
Far up intae the snawy north or sooth by Gretna Green.

I've seen the high Ben Nevis, a toorin tae the mune,
I've been by Crieff an' Callander an' roon by bonnie Doon;
I've been by Nethy's silvery tides and places ill tae ken,
Far up intil the stormy north lies Urquhart's fairy glen.

Aft times I've lauched untae mysel' when trudgen on the road,
Wi' a bag o' blaw upon my back, my face as broon's a toad,
Wi' lumps o' cake and tattie scones, an' cheese an braxie ham,
It's nae thinking faur I'm comin' frae nor faur I'm gyaun tae gan.

But I'm happy in the summer time beneath the bright blue sky,
Nae thinking in the morning at nicht whaur I'm tae lie,
Bothies or Byres or anywhaur, or oot amang the hay,
And if the weather does permit I'm happy a' the day.

Loch Catrine an' Loch Lomond hae a' been seen by me,
The Dee, the Don, the Deveron that flows intae the sea,
Dunrobin Castle by the way I nearly had forgot,
And sye the Rickle o' Carlin marks the Hoose o' John O' Groat.

I'm often roon by Galloway and doon aboot Stranraer,
My business leads me anygates, for I travel near and far,
I've got the rovin' notion, there's naething fae't I loss,
And a' my day is my daily fare, an' what'll pay my doss.

I think I'll go tae Paddy's land, I'm makin' up my mind,
For Scotland's greatly altered noo - sure I canna raise the wind,
But I will trust in Providence, if Providence will prove true,
And I will sing o' Erin's Isle when I come back to you.

See the Songbook in our features section

AND AS WE CONTINUE.........

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THE FLAG IN THE WIND

The above was the title of a book written in the early Fifties by John MacDonald MacCormick, one of the founder members of the Scottish National Party in 1934. The sub-title was "The Story of the National Movement in Scotland". His comment in the book said "It is perhaps in the symbols which men use that their deepest sentiments are most readily expressed. Flags as well as straws show which way the wind is blowing". A fuller account appears under Features.

 

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