The Flag in the Wind
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CAMPAIGNING FOR SCOTLAND
(Owned, Edited and Printed in Scotland since November 1926)
Compiled by Jim Lynch
[Issue 39 - 2 March 2001]

NEVERENDUM REFERENDUM

This week has seen the 22nd anniversary of the Referendum, 1st March 1979, which led to the downfall of an incompetent Labour Government, and ushered in 18 years of the Tories, and we wonder if the Labour dinosaurs have learned anything. This week we have also seen Mrs Helen Liddell, erstwhile Secretary of State for Scotland, reiterating the view that the 1997 Referendum was a once and for all expression of the settled will of the Scottish people, and no further change will happen. This, of course, is a load of nonsense; we were asked if we wanted a devolved Parliament or the status quo, and in good faith, a starving man, asked if he wanted porridge or to be left starving, would opt for porridge, even if it gave him indigestion.

Anyway, the Scotland Act will have to be amended, and while Scottish Westminster Labour MPs do not want any changes, their colleagues in Edinburgh do; it is inconceivable that a reduction in MSPs is workable, as the committee system, which works, would not work with fewer members, but the Scotland Act says that both MP and MSP numbers will be reduced. This is to compensate for the fact that a number of Westminster MPs are surplus to requirements; the hale jing bang o’ them are, in our view, apart from our own noble SNP members! (Nearly an own goal there.)

What we can be assured of is that whenever there is an amendment to the Scotland Act, there will be a Referendum, and as with the second question in the 1997 Referendum, there will be an attempt to influence it in a negative fashion; imagine asking people if they want to pay more taxes, and the Establishment astonishment when the people said "YES!" in a resounding fashion.

Mrs Liddell may of course, be preoccupied, as the publishing of the Robert Maxwell Theft Report is not far away, and she may have to explain to Mr Blair what particular misjudgement or plain human greed made her become Maxwell’s Personal Assistant; we await the report with interest.

WAS NEWCASTLE A BUM STEER?

At one stage in the Foot and Mouth tragedy which is paralysing the farming industry, it seemed as if the source of the epidemic was a farm in Northumberland which had been feeding pigs on waste food from Newcastle Airport. We say, it seemed, as the proof was not yet conclusive, but the most likely cause, as in past epidemics, was infected meat from other countries, and as Newcastle has a lot of international flights, there are a lot of half eaten airline meals to be cleared. A day or two later, this was denied, as waste food from airports must be destroyed by law, and the finger was pointed at Chinese restaurants, still in Newcastle; we do not know what else will emerge, as while airport food may be banned there are often little scams going on that the management do not know about, and no one will admit to, even less so now.

The outbreak, and the speed with which it spread, is back once again to the demands of the public for cheaper food; this demand, fuelled by the supermarkets drive for more customers, has led to bigger farm units, and to what can be best described as mass production farming. The BSE crisis has also contributed to the spread of foot and mouth; until a few years back, there were local slaughterhouses in many rural areas, but after BSE there was an outcry about hygiene and old buildings and equipment. This was generally true, but instead of upgrading and renewing them, it was decided to concentrate on fewer, more modern and much bigger slaughterhouses; this was also for economic reasons, but the net result is that more animals, people and vehicles from a much wider area mix and this enables any disease to spread far and wide literally overnight.

No fingers are being pointed at this stage at the authorities, who seem to have acted with commendable promptness, or the farming community, which is devastated; after all, BSE was also a consequence of feeding the wrong type of food to cows, but the Thatcher government was the one that took away the regulations. We also wonder what notice the present government will take of the Pooley report , which it commissioned, and which recommends that meat inspection should be privatised, making the inspectors the employees of the slaughterhouses. The meat inspectors are against the proposals, which would take away their independence; this is already the case in the poultry industry, and it is only a month or two since people were gaoled for recycling poultry meat unfit for human consumption. It is worth noting that a Which survey has found that all the supermarkets are selling contaminated chicken; the figures from the survey were, Sainsbury 22%, Safeway 21%, Asda 17%, Waitrose 13% and Tesco 6%. The overall figure was 16%.

CAULD WINTER WAS HOWLIN’

As if the devastation in the countryside caused by foot and mouth disease was not enough, this week the weather added misery; roads were blocked, schools were closed, power was cut off, and the main arteries, the M8 and the M74, were closed by snow and wind -- and people. There were severe weather warnings on TV and radio, and the motoring organisations and the police were all saying do not travel unless it is absolutely necessary, and no one paid a blind bit of heed. Why would that be so? Perhaps we are so used to watching severe weather warnings on TV, and then finding that conditions were nowhere near as bad, or perhaps our definition of what is necessary is at variance with the authorities.

Certainly, I know that at New Year, we were going up beyond Inverness, and watching the TV news and forecasts, we thought of abandoning our journey, but we’d paid the bill! We set off with great trepidation, and the worst conditions encountered were in the street where I live; as we got north of Perth, we wondered "Where’s the snow?", and the run up to Inverness and beyond was trouble free. That may be one reason people go out in all weathers. I liked one comment I heard, either from the police or the motoring organisations, "Don’t phone us up to ask about the weather; look out of the window!"

Bruce Crawford, Shadow Minister for Transport and the Environment, is urging the Transport and Environment Committee to hold an inquiry into the transport chaos caused by adverse weather conditions over the last few days. He pointed out "Snow and wind have always been features of Scottish winters, and they happen to a far greater extent in many other countries, without the chaos that we are experiencing.

"Scotland should not come to a standstill - with all the dislocation to our transportation, public services, and economic life that this entails - - just because of adverse winter weather.

"We have winter every year, and simply cannot afford this week’s chaos to be repeated every time we have heavy snow and wind."

If we think the chaos this year was bad, wait until next year, when the main trunk roads will be cleared by the private sector, and the secondary roads by the local councils; all done in the name of reducing costs, and the redundant council workers will go on the dole and be paid from Westminster funds. No, Sarah Boyack wouldn’t possibly think like that, would she?

AUCTION OF PROMISES

Saw a notice from the local Liberal Democrats advertising an "Auction of Promises", but as usual with the Lib Dems, one is a bit puzzled as to what they really mean, as their definition of words contrasts sharply with one’s own. (What a nice pretentious word "one" is, but we are talking about the Lib Dems.) Jimmy Reid, who has now migrated from The Herald to the Scotsman, had a go at them last week, rightly pointing out that there was a fundamental difference between Abolition of students’ fees, and Deferment of students’ fees; in politics, words mean what politicians want them to mean, a la Humpty Dumpty.

This came to mind as I listened to Ms Susan Deacon, erstwhile Health Minister, defending the rise in waiting lists; remember the scenario? Labour set a target of reducing waiting lists by 10000; this was their target, trumpeted loud and long. The figure to be achieved was 75000, not exactly a flea bite; as it is, with the General Election breathing down their necks, there are 85000 on the list. Ms Deacon, in a radio interview, tried to infer that this was not really an issue, and used the hackneyed political phrase "Let me say this...." No I don’t precisely remember what she said, just something to the effect that the NHS is performing much better after the 18 years of Tory neglect, and waiting lists are only one measure, and not the most important one.

We can agree with the 18 years of Tory neglect, and that waiting lists are only one measure, even that it might not be the most important one, but New Labour were the promising auctioneers. 

PFI , PPP, PSBR, FOOL SOME OF THE PEOPLE

How nice, if you have shares in Quayle Munro, the Edinburgh merchant bankers, to see that profits have risen by 46% in the last six months, due to a greater involvement in PFI projects; the government now like to call them not PFI (Private Finance Initiative) but PPP (Public Private Partnerships) and they are designed to keep down the PSBR (Public Sector Borrowing Requirement). This infers that the Government is hard up, and that by getting help from the private sector, they can do things that need doing. Britain’s public finance surplus has reached £40.7 billion, and the Chancellor is due to give us back somewhere between 2 and 7 billions of our money before the General Election. one could imagine that without much sleep loss we could be funding a lot of the PFI projects from this stash.

What makes the whole PFI scam so scandalous is that when in opposition New Labour were vitriolic about PFI, and condemned it time and again as Tories putting business and fat profits to their financier friends; New Labour have now done more PFI work in the last four years than the Tories did in eighteen years.

As Abraham Lincoln said "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time." New Labour are so fortunate that their main English opposition, the Tories, are so appalling.

FOOT IN THE MOUTH NOTES

Slightly embarrassed at the use of the above title, but I’ve been using it for about three months, so I will continue...

Glasgow’s male population is more at risk from early death than any other community in Scotland; the average life expectancy of a Glasgow man is 68.4 years, compared with 72.3 years for Scotland as a whole. Male life expectancy in the United Kingdom is 74.4 years.

Glasgow also comes in 59th, out of a total of 215, in a survey of the most desirable cities in which to live. It beats Lisbon, Rome and Hong Kong, and is the only Scottish city in the survey. The survey is judged on the quality of life; obviously not the length.

We are all expecting tax cuts from the Government during the run up to the Election, still expected to be in May; this is the way to achieve votes, sorry prosperity.

American millionaires are not happy with George Bush’s proposal to cut inheritance tax; they think it will be bad for charitable foundations. Mind you, they will also be dead.

The Swedish English football coach, Sven-Goran Eriksson, has engaged a Norwegian sports pschycologist to programme England’s football team to win.

William Hague cannot make use of his services, as his anti European tendencies preclude it. 

On the Nordic theme, there is uproar at the Scottish Nordic Council’s decision to hold a conference at Skibo Castle; while half of the £45000 cost will be paid by the Scottish Executive, and half by Scottish Enterprise/Highlands and Islands Enterprise, all of the money will be paid by us. By the way, it is the Civil Servants who will be staying at Skibo; the Scottish Ministers, suffering an attack of electoral conscience, are staying at bed and breakfasts.

We know Madonna had her well publicised wedding at Skibo, but she was spending her own money, not ours.

South Lanarkshire Council has accepted proposals for opencast coal development in the Douglas Valley, without proper consultations with the locals involved. This was pointed out by SNP Prospective Parliamentary Candidate Jim Wright at a meeting in Clydesdale.

He also mentioned that the Council were ploughing money into tourism in New Lanark and other parts of the area, while allowing opencast working which would result in dross laden lorries trundling round the countryside.

Speaking of blatant bribery, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, currently Gordon Brown, has decreed a 2p a litre reduction in unleaded fuel from 7 Mar (Budget Day) to 14 Jun (After the General Election?)

Shell put up the price of unleaded by 1p a litre the day after the announcement.

DATES IN HISTORY

2 March 1316
King Robert II, first of the House of Stewart, was born at Renfrew. His mother was Marjorie Bruce, daughter of Robert I and wife of Walter, Great Stewart of Scotland.

4 March 1890
The Forth Railway Bridge, designed by Sir John Fowler and Sir Benjamin Baker, opened for traffic. Total length : 1 mile 1005 yards. Main spans : 1710 feet long, the track 156 feet above high water, the cantilever towers 361 feet high.

6 March 608
Death of St Balfred, hermit of the Bass Rock.

THE REBELS CEILIDH SONG BOOK

MHIC IARLA NAM BRATACH BANA
(As sung by Kitty Macleod)

Mhic larla nam bratach bana (3 times)
Chunna mi do long air saile.

Chorus:
I llean beag O ilioro, (3 times)
Hiuran O Hu O eile.

Bha stiuir oir orr, 's da Chrann airgid. (3 times)

Sioda reamhar ruadh na Spainne. (3 times)

'S cuplaich do shioda na Gallbhainn. (3 times)

Cha b'ann a Glaschu a bha e. (3 times)

No'n Dun-bheagain, 's beag O lar e. (3 times)

Ach ann Dun-tuilm nam bratach bana. (3 times)

See the Songbook in our features section

A KIST O FERLIES
A Keek at the Guid Scots Tung
By Peter D Wright
(Note: All words underlined in this section are RealAudio links)

See Scots Language in our Features Section
for other poems, stories, sayings and words in the Scots language

THE MONTHLY PRIZE CROSSWORD

Each month the Scots Independent Newspaper offers a prize crossword and we're now offering this online in the Flag in the Wind as well.   Should you complete the crossword by the deadline you can fax it over to the SI and the first correct one opened on the closing date will win a £10.00 book token.

SI Prize Crossword No. 15
[Clicking on the picture will bring up a life size version which you can copy to your desktop or print out]