BBC Scotland's Bluff is Called - Colin Campbell
Let me start by recapitulating events as they have occurred since I wrote my most recent criticism of Radio Scotland's 'Headlines' programme in March. In the April issue Mark Leishman, Head of Corporate Affairs, BBC Scotland, wrote to the SI complaining of my allegations of the programme's dubious integrity' and made a number of assertions. In the May issue I challenged Mr Leishman to prove these asser- tions by naming the participants in each of the programme's between April 95 and March 96; and I promised that if my allegations were shown to be unfounded I would make a full apology to the BBC. In a healthy democracy, such a challenge would have provided the ideal opportunity for any responsi- ble public corporation to prove its innocence of any charges of improper activity. But what does BBC Scotland do? It pro- vides a list of names, surely enough, but in such a way as to make it impossible, without the information that has been withheld (deliberately we must assume), to calculate the number of appearances of each person named in the list, thus, with the list alone, the political balance of the year's worth of programmes cannot be ascertained. However, I have
unsettling news for BBC Scotland: for through the good offices and diligence of SI readers, Rita Ramsay of Killearn, and Colin Darroch of Campbeltown, we have between us been able to prove that during the same year the political balance over 34 programmes (ie: well over half the year's output) has been as follows: LABOUR 33; TORY 33; LIB/DEM 14; SNP 8). Even in the list of names supplied by BBC Scotland, which takes no account of the multi-appearances of such people as Brian Wilson and Phil Gallie, the balance is: Labour 29; Tory 24; Lib/Dem 9; SNP 11.
The three relevant assertions made by Mr Leishman in his April letter to the SI were:
the panel for Headlines is chosen to reflect broad Scottish opinion, not just that of political parties.
over the 52 week series the political parties receive a fair share of airtime.
there is no political skulduggery being exercised by Radio Scotland.
On every count, using all the evidence that exists (including the very fact that the BBC has chosen to withhold the information that could readily have resolved the matter) these three assertions may be seen to be respectively: dissembling, factually untrue--and, as far as 'political skullduggery', is concerned, profoundly unconvincing.
The whole episode has demonstrated openly what has been becoming apparent to a number of us over recent years. The BBC in Scotland has become so arrogant and dismissive of criticism that it resembles more the state broadcasting of the former Soviet Union than the BBC of Reith: once internationally renowned for its moral probity, its fearless presentation of facts and its single-minded pursuit of truth. You may have noticed that Mark Leishman grandly asserts 'I do not intend to pursue this correspondence as I feel that I have answered your original points'. Well, I can assure Mr Leishman, and BBC Scotland, that from the SI's point of view this correspondence has by no means finished, even if it has to be conducted with more responsible bodies; and it will go on until BBC Scotland is either shamed or jolted into doing its duty by the Scottish people.
Independence Panic - Colin Darroch
Congratulations to George Rosie and Les Wilson on their excellent TV documentary "Independence Day". The screening of this programme coincided with a sea-change in Scottish politics. The Scottish voters have realised that an Anthony Charles Lynton Blair Government will be just the same as a John Major Government and they are now willing to be persuaded of the benefits of regaining our Independence. Our opponents realise this, and panic is setting in. What a pleasure it was to watch George Robertson and Jim Wallace squirming as they were forced by Bernard Ponsonby in the follow-up TV debate to sit up straight and discuss the implications of Independence. Their "fans with typewriters" also got into a panic. Rob Brown in "Scotland on Sunday" attacked George Rosie for not making it clear in the programme that he was in favour of Independence. How interesting it would be if all participants on current affairs programmes had to make their political affiliations clear. Especially the "independent experts" who appear regularly and just happen, by coincidence of course, to be Labour or Tory members.
Rob Brown also attacked STV for having the nerve to screen the "Independence Day" programme. As STV shows 1,000 hours of home produced programmes a year, surely the case for Scottish Independence deserves 0.1% of this output. Especially, when we are constantly fed the "John, Tony and Paddy Show" direct from London.
It is interesting to see the Euro-sceptic Tory MPs, including Bill Walker, temporary MP for Tayside North, highlighting that membership of the European Common Market/Union has cost the UK a total of £38 billion since joining in 1973. Do you not find it strange that Mr Walker and his friends don't tell us that Westminster Governments have received £150 billion from Scottish Oil revenues over the same period?
Independent Ireland is the fastest growing economy in the European Union, with 54,000 new jobs being created last year. A joint report by the "Economist" magazine and the Union Bank of Switzerland predicts that Ireland will grow at over three times the European average this year. UBS senior European economist David McWilliams believes that Wales and Scotland could emulate Ireland's success but only if we are independent, as we are disadvantaged by being part of the UK. Colin Darroch
Scotland Ready to be a European Nation Again
Spring Conference 1996
Each passing week now brings a new sign that Scots are acknowledging and openly expressing the need for a Scottish Parliament governing an independent Scottish State. The BSE debacle, Dounreay alarms, the Skye Bridge scandal, nuclear submarine bases, and corporate corruption in general in the disposal of Scottish assets in the power industry, transportation, the financial sector and many other areas of the fundamentally sound Scottish economy --all are glaring examples of Scotland's being progressively disadvantaged as a direct consequence of remaining in the 1707 Union with England. And the more the new Labour Party reveals its post-General Election plans, the more the public here fail to detect that there will be any significant change in the government of Scotland under Labour. Even the seemingly most loyal British-salaried fans in the Scottish Media are being increasingly frank in their expression of patriotic Scottish protest. It was against this background that the SNP had chosen to stage its special two-day conference in the Caird Hall, Dundee. Originally intended as a means of clarifying the Party's European policy stance, a number of other current political and economic concerns were inevitably added to the agenda.
As usual the Media tried to report schism-in-the-SNP once more, and failed miserably. The Lib-Dem Scotland on Sunday saw the Party as "backing down on Europe''.
In fact Dr Macartney's broad motion invited support for the ''existing SNP policy of joining a single curency but with wider divergence criteria that take into account real economic and social criteria not just financial ones.''
Former Party leader Dr Gordon Wilson and policy vice-convener Alex Neil proposed to amend that to allow the Scottish Parliament, "after consultation with the people in a referendum'', to reserve the right to take "any decision to participate in a Single Currency." Delegates resolved overwhelmingly that this should be the SNP's settled stance henceforward.
The rest of the Conference business ranged across the whole Scottish spectrum of public and private concerns. The nuclear disarmament debate was a lively update, initiated by Glasgow Kelvin. "The Chernobyl disaster left only one per cent of Belorussia uncontaminated", constituency delegate Brian Whale asserted. Much worse even would be a Trident disaster which could "unleash suffering and death at 15 minutes' notice. ''
He called Trident "Scotland's floating Chernobyl'', with each warhead--of which there were 96 on each of the four submarines--capable of slaughtering a million and a half people. Patsy Thomson, of Baillieston, called for the SNP to "impale Labour on Trident" and start by attending a mass protest on June 15th at the Faslane base.
In the economic debate, John Swinney comprehensively shattered the continuing British propaganda illusion that Scotland does not even now pay her way in the UK. He invited all Scots, in the run-up to the General Election, to become involved in the development of an economic strategy which would show the validity of the SNP's Scottish budget proposals.
Conference continued to back the comprehensive education system as the best for Scotland in the current constitutional situation; endorsed a minimum statutory wage, equal pay, protection against discriminatory pay structures, trade union rights, and the Social Chapter; supported the FSN's attack on new Labour's plans for workfare; called on local authorities to stop selling off sports grounds; called for a Bill of Rights; exposed the Scottish Homes staff scam; attacked the Government over so-called local government reforms--urging that, pending a local income tax, there should be adequate central funding to shore up the Council Tax method of local funding; highlighted the urgent need for revitalisation of rural Scotland; resolved to press for substantially better conditions for the retired; and blasted Skye Bridge tolls.
Councillor Brian Adam, Aberdeen North's PPC, moved the Banff & Buchan motion to "step up the campaign for the relocation of all oil and gas Civil service jobs to Scotland, where they should have been located in the first place to make Aberdeen the real energy capital of Europe." ''This will only happen'', Cllr Adam told delegates, ''when the concentration of key jobs moves from England. In March 1993, the Government promised that 80 jobs would be created with the setting up of a DTI oil and gas office in Aberdeen. Three years on, there are fewer than 60 here. Throughout the 25 years of North Sea production, all we have received are the crumbs from London's table". Conference resisted a move to remit back and endorsed his motion overwhelmingly.
New Labour, Old Unions - Ian Bayne
Spot the growing(?) signs of Union militancy in the current pre-Election atmosphere!
A laconic snarl about rail privatisation from Jimmy Knapp. A low growl from Unison, coupled with a bit of sabre-rattling from the teachers' unions about public-sector cuts, while the relatively militant UCW plans a leisurely ballot on their long-promised postal strike action.
And apart from the odd bellow from old Uncle Arthur and his new Socialist Labour Party -- with all the credibility of a collapsed Yorkshire mine--that's just about it ... Are the Unions still frightened of the present Tory Government? Are they hell! They're frightened of New Labour's Tory-Government-in-waiting. And don't want to be scape goated for yet another unforeseen Election defeat.
Still, old habits die hard, and some signs of inner turmoil duly surfaced at this year's annual STUC congress some weeks back. Despite shadow Scottish Secretary George Robertson's insistence that there would be no change to Tory anti-picketing laws, Davey Hall, the newly elected AEEU President, bravely demanded an end to the ban on secondary picketing. Dream on, Davey.....
At the same fringe meeting, the STUC's deputy general secretary, Bill Speirs, presented a shopping list of Old Labour demands which included an £800 million Scottish job creation programme, the total scrapping of anti-union legislation and of competitive tendering and a crash programme of public sector house building. Dream on, Bill......
And to the almost ecstatic delight of delegates Shadow Foreign Secretary Robin Cook fired a carefully coded warning shot across New Labour's bows. unfashionably reminding the leadership of (Old) Labour's historic duty to speak for the poor.
Watch this man, by the way. Too glibly dismissed by envious critics as a 'garden gnome', his residual socialist idealism allied to his considerable intellectual ability could cause havoc for a Blair administration. It is just conceivable that he could abandon Westminster in disillusioned disgust and concentrate his energies instead on leading a devolved Scottish Parliament out of the Union (Dream on --you're on your own, Ian--Ed)
Meanwhile, the genuinely Neanderthal Tendency, regrettably, also surfaced at this year's Congress. John Parker of the GMB bitterly opposed the General Council's tentative suggestion that it might at long last be necessary for the STUC to consider partially endorsing 'non-Labour' candidates in the Scottish Parliament elections, though, significantly, the relevant strategy document was actually passed.
They'll be asking Alex Salmond to address Congress next! Dream on, fellow-Nationalists, dream on...
News Focus - Beef Export Ban
Pressure Grows for Prime Herds to Lead Way out of Export Ban
Commenting to the SI after a tour of the Angus Show, in Arbroath's Victoria Park Scottish National Party deputy leader Allan Macartney MEP said:--
''One clear message came out of my numerous conversations:everyone in the farming industry is sick to the back teeth with Government incompetence. ''Questions are rightly being asked about how the Scottish Secretary could find the time, at such a crucial juncture, to jet off for 10 days to Korea, but not once in 10 weeks was he able to meet in Brussels with the EU farm commissioner Franz Fischler .
''The Government's wrong-headed determination to have a Cold War with Europe will further delay the growing campaign to ensure prime beef herds lead the way out of the export ban. ''The farming community will not forget that the Scottish Office failed to prepare a distinctive policy response to the BSE crisis--particularly because Michael Forsyth had all the best cards to play.
''Scotland, along with Northern Ireland, has a separate agricultural administration and veterinary system and therefore could have devised and implemented a credible eradication policy which properly reflects their lower incidence of BSE.
"We had received a clear indication from the European Commission that it would look at proposals from the UK Government for the progressive lifting of the export ban via a regional or zoning policy.
''Plus, four of our European partners suggested separate treatment for Scottish and Northern Irish herds. Scotland's interests in Europe have been better represented by Franz Fischler, the Germans, Dutch, Spanish and Irish, than they have been by the Scottish Office. Our problem is that the onus lies squarely on the UK Government.
''The sooner the Government starts to speak up for Scotland in Europe, the sooner the export focused producers, processors and hauliers will have some hope of returning prime Scotch beef to its premium place on dinner tables across the world.''
Dh'ith Rhoda NicDhòmhnaill M'Hamstair ! - Alasdair MacCaluim
Ged a tha a' Ghàidhlig air an telebhisean agus rèdio gu math tric 's an latha an-diugh, chan ann tric a chi sibh i air a sgrìobhadh anns na pàipearan naidheachd. Tha Ghàidhlig ann an iomadh pàipear ionadail ach tha e gu math follaiseach gur ann anns na pàipearan Gaidhealach, mar am Pàipear Beag, a tha na colbhan. Gu mì- fhortanach tha mi gu math cinnteach gun smaoineadh neach-deasachaidh a' Khirkintilloch Herald (m.e) gu bheil mi glan às mo chiall nam molainn colbh Ghàidhlig anns a' phàipear aice/aige.
'S e An t-Albannach an aon pàipear nàiseanta anns am faic sibh colbhan Gàidhlig. Chan eil tè anns an Herald ged is e am "broadsheet" leis a' chuartachadh as motha ann an Alba a th' innte. Chan eil dad anns na "tabloidean"-- ged a bhios an Daily Record agus An Sun a' reic milleanan gach latha. Ged a bhios An Star, Am Mail agus An Express an còmhnaidh ag ràdh dè cho "Albannach" 's a tha iad an- dràsda, chan eil facal Gàidhlig ann an tè dhiubh a bharrachd.
Tha mòran Ghàidheal ann nach eil còmasach air a'Ghàidhlig a leughadh no sgriobhadh. Cha d' fhuair iad cothrom Gàidhlig a leughadh anns an sgoil. Ged a tha cur- saichean air tòiseachadh do Ghaidheil mar seo, chan eil eil mi a' smaoineachadh gum bi cus dhaoine a' dol ann air sgàth 's nach bi iad a' faicinn mòran stuth air a sgrìobhadh 'nan cànan fhèin. Chan eil aon cholbh fo na bàs-chlàran anns an Albannach gach seachdainn gu leòr airson luchd- ionnsachaidh ùra a tharraing dhan Ghàidhlig agus gu dearbh, chan eil e gu leòr airson nan Gaidheal.
A thuilleadh air a' mheud, cha bhi na colbhan Gàidhlig a' tadhal air raointean farsaing. Mar is abhaist, 's ann mu dheidhinn phoileataics, a' Ghàidhlig fhèin no cuspairean ionadail a tha iad. Tha oileanaich an t-Sabhail Mhòir a' dèanamh iris an dràsda. Nuair a bha mi a' sgrìobhadh leir- mheas cuirm-chiùil Big Country dhan iris, smaoin mi gur e dòcha gur e sin a' chiad turas a' sgrìobh cuideigin leirmheas de chuirm-chiùil "rock" anns a' Ghàidhlig o chionn greis mhath. Ma tha sinn ag iarraidh fior athbheothachadh anns a' Ghàidhlig, feumaidh cothrom a bhith againn a bhith leughadh mu chuspair sam bith anns a' chànan againn. A bharrachd air cuspairean troma ann an irisean agus pàipearan troma, tha feum air stuth eibhinn agus a h-uile rud eile a tha ri fhaighinn anns a' Bheurla.
Air an adhbhar seo, bha mi glè thoilichte nuair a fhuair mi litir an latha roimhe bho Fìonan, ag ràdh gu robh iomairt air doigh airson barrachd Ghàidhlig a chur anns na pàipearan. Bha iad a' lorg dhaoine a bha deònach sgrìobhadh do na pàipearan mu chuspairean mar ghàirnearalachd, an àrainneachd, leabhraichean agus T.Bh. Tha mi an dòchas gum bi an iomairt aca soir- bheachail agus gum faic sinn cinn (headlines) Gàidhlig anns na pàipearan mar "Dh' Ith Rhoda NicDhòmhnaill M' Hamstair" a dh' aithghearr!
Ma tha sibh a iarraidh leth-bhreac de "Gheum", iris oileanaich an t-Sabhail Mhòir, cuiribh seic airson £2 (gu "Sabhal Mòr Ostaig") gu: Geum, Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, An Teanga, Slèite, An t-Eilean Sgitheanach, IV44 8RQ.
Desparate Days Draw Desparate Measures
It seems quite possible that when, in the not far distant future Scotland regains her independence, we may look back at the summer of '96 as the turning point in our political fortunes. The growth of the people's desire for full national status can be measured by the reaction over the years of our Unionist opponents. In the '60s the SNP was ignored in the hope that it would go away; in the '70s, when the Labour Party was forced to recognise the 'threat' it sought to forestall it by promising devolution--a promise it failed to deliver when it had the opportunity in 1979. Now, as we approach the end of the '90s, Scotland's sense of nationhood has become so rampant and obvious that Unionists have abandoned coherent argument for the spuriously emotive cry of 'Save the Union', thus the political initiative now firmly lies in the independent Scots camp as Unionist forces have for the first time been driven collectively onto the defensive.
John Major's wrapping himself in the Union flag-- and getting perilously close when in Scotland to crying 'No surrender', is born of desperation but it also illustrates how dangerously irresponsible and out of touch with Scottish aspirations he and his party colleagues have become. Theirs is no positive message of hope or expectation for the fortunes of the Scottish people whom he so patronises when temporarily among us. It is a message designed to invoke fear and anxiety in order to sustain an unsustainable political structure on the verge of collapse. Meantime his Scottish Secretary, Michael Forsyth flits about Scotland like one possessed with the sense of his cause's imminent demise. Here and there he throws a few bawbees to bare-leggit laddies and lassies. Here and there he drops in on a chieftainly pow-wow to sow friction and dissent. His sense of Scottish history is so circumscribed that he still believes it may be profitable to exploit ancient divisions between Highlander and Lowlander to further his desperate party's desperate interests.
While this pantomime is going on there is an ominous silence from the Labour Party. It appears to have been so overwhelmed by Forsyth's tartan tax onslaught that the stuffing has been knocked out of its entire devolution campaign even before its members' bottoms have secured parking on the green benches of government. If they can't maintain the devolution momentum in the face of just one Tory politician, how on earth can they persuade the Scottish voters that they will pilot the scheme through Parliament in the face of the combined opposition of the whole Tory party and an increasing number of their own New Labour members from England. The Labour party too is thus in full intellectual flight in Scotland and is itself reduced to banging the Union drum.
Meanwhile opinion polls show a progressive rise in the number of Scots prepared to admit to pollsters that they would prefer independence. There seems little doubt too that a growing number of those who still say they want a devolved parliament are in fact envisaging that as the easiest and least stressful means of moving to complete independence. As 1996 rumbles on through a hot and turgid summer with England, in a state of moral disadvantage, having to host Euro '96 --with all that that is likely to entail for its reputation on and off the playing fields of Europe--the appeal of the case for Scotland regaining her statehood, within a wider and less introverted international community, is unlikely to be lost on our increasingly sophisticated electorate.
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