INDEPENDENCE FOR THE SCOTTISH TORY BRANCH OFFICE?

75 thoughts on “INDEPENDENCE FOR THE SCOTTISH TORY BRANCH OFFICE?”

  1. “[S]evere links with London”… actually, I’ve thought for a long time that they were a joke, even if a bad one, on the Ruth Davidson party.

    In an independent Scotland, of course, no party that took its instructions from outwith Scotland would be registered by the Scottish Electoral Commission…

    BLiS and the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party need to change their names and get with the programme.

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      2. I think that there will just be a group leader at Holyrood, with the REAL LEADER being an MP, probably the posh boy who is Secretary of State.

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  2. She hasn’t gone yet and it’s 10:50. Mibbe an announcement at 11:00?

    Is she resigning as leader of the Tories in Scotland? Is she resigning from the party? Will she start a Ruth Davidson party? Is she doing a Tavish?

    I like a comment in the National : Head rat, jumps from sinking ship.

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  3. I’m of the opinion that she will stay on as an MSP until 2020.
    It’s easy money, £70,000 a year, don’t do surgeries and turn up for a wee vide0 to show on FMQ’s day.
    I’ve a friend who is looking after the grandson, 18 months old, kept on the go all day so the parents can get to work, tired out by meal time.
    Maybe she’s just realised she has responsibilities to her child for the next 16 years.
    Maybe she got the horse’s head treatment from the oris.
    Murdo or carless would be great as the new leader, at least we would get a laugh.
    You’ll have had your democracy Scotland, Hollyrood to be closed as well, before they can vote in the legislation for a referendum.

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    1. I have never thought that Westminster will actually close down the Scottish Parliament Dave, just render it almost impotent by returning most of its powers to London, by stealth, or otherwise, such as transferring most of its functions to the new U.K Government in Scotland offices in Glasgow and Edinburgh.
      It seems to me that present unionist parties are doing the Yes campaign for them, and hopefully by next year’s referendum, we can win a convincing victory.

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      1. They’d require new legislation (non-statutory) to remove powers.

        To shut it down now requires no new legislation at all. A statutory order will be perfectly acceptable & NOBODY will be voting on it as it only requires a ministerial signature – the new “Scottish Secretary” will do that no problem at all.

        Scots police to NI (already arranged), Holyrood suspended due to “National Emergency”, English police/troops to Scotland (already advance planned for). Fantasy? I don’t think so now.

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        1. They could try the National Emergency. The irony that they told us we held all the cards and that it would be the easiest thing ever would be totally lost on them.

          They might have to bring back the Scottish police to Scotland though. I don;t think people would take that lying down.

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          1. A few bombs in NI (planted by who knows) and off we go on the imperial merry-go-round of internment/concentration camps/torture & murder again. All on the word of a sociopath identified as such at the age of 12.

            I wonder where they’ll partition Scotland when it comes to the real end-game.

            No, I’m not having happy thoughts.

            You have doggy pictures for Sunday(s) in your email BTW.

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              1. The ones I sent you are 🙂

                There’s a fair few “brutal-looking” ones I know you won’t put up – Moose & Zosha fighting really – because its hardly “soppy” 😉

                Also of course there are likely to be photos of Moose killing grey squirrels. I don’t encourage or discourage this but he’d have a hard time living in Scotland where killing red squirrels is a massive no-no. for obvious reasons 🙂

                There’s a (USA?) phrase along the lines of “squirrels are just rats with good PR”.

                In England/Wales/Southern Scotland that should read “grey squirrels are just pox-ridden rats with good PR”.

                I found some bee photos from when I was testing the phone camera macro function so I may send you some of those. Never realised they had eyelids 🙂

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                  1. I’ll send you the bee sequence which was like 10 frames a second on the dedicated macro camera. There’s a couple of other single-shot macros (bee caked in pollen) which might be OK. I’ll look when I can but won’t be in time for this weekend.

                    Back of phone is “Sapphire Blue” (not a lot of choice really) and frankly it annoys the hell out of the bees after a few secs in the sun. If anyone has this sort of back on their phone then I really advise you not to photograph wasps close up. Really 😦

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                    2. Reply to Tris – yes you can get covers but they’re all transparent/translucent as the colour is actually quite nice.

                      A bee, presented with a “wall of blue” at a distance of 4cm has other ideas.

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                    3. You get leather/plastic kind of jackets

                      https://www.ebay.co.uk/i/322284436482?chn=ps&var=511185091542&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=511185091542_322284436482&targetid=594652336760&device=c&mktype=pla&googleloc=9046870&campaignid=6466521308&mkgroupid=76196181743&rlsatarget=aud-629407025185:pla-594652336760&abcId=1140486&merchantid=113584192&gclid=Cj0KCQjw753rBRCVARIsANe3o46eost6duzsUyTCHXmzMifHV1n06gfaJDUmTbUH1Sg5NuPPyVKn3KwaAvY3EALw_wcB

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          2. Oh and deploying the Scots police to NI is pure sectarianism anyway (look at Police Scotland’s religious/ethnic makeup) and will probably radicalise most of those deployed once a few of their mates get blown to mince.

            Perfect to then bring them back to stamp out dissent at home.

            Anyone have a feeling of deja vu about this?

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            1. I’m not happy about our police being deployed anywhere.

              We need them here. It’s not like they have run out of crimes.

              If the Brits want to make a mess in Ireland, let them send their police.

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      2. Aye Alex effectively shutting up shop, reduced to a parish council as that’ was the original intention.
        I don’t hold out a great hope of the Shetland msp election going to the SNP but It would be a great starting pistol for the opening of the now overdue Indyref2 if the gain in votes were to be a significant swing.
        We will hear about it tomorrow.
        Just looking through some coverage of the resignation, first thought from the ebc coverage was that she had died but then realised she only got 10 seconds of silence. The usual SNP blanking from the media, allsorts of englandland comments about htis wwonderful leader, but nothing from our Nicola, who it appears was her usual statesmanlike in her comment.
        Onwards to freedom.

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        1. It would be a bit of a miracle if they took Shetland.

          It’s funny that the bloke that’s standing for the Tories is standing under the Ruth Davidson banner, and she cared so little for him that she resigned on that very day.

          Jings!

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      3. To close it would risk civil unrest.

        In the early days of the last referendum there were some opinion polls done (OK, I know, they are dubious).

        I recall that Independence was at around 22% (later went up to 45%, and is now over 50%), Devo max was the most popular. Status Quo was next. The least popular was return to Westminster power… which, as I recall, came in at 2%.

        Try to shut down Edinburgh and 98% +/- will be against you.

        But yes, by stealth… they could try that.

        They have to remember, though, that the original powers to be devolved were agreed in a referendum. (Later ones as a result of the Calman Commission and therefore meaningless)

        Ordinarily they could brush that under the carpet…exigencies, my dear fellow. Privy Council. Her Majesty.

        But they have spent the last 3 years banging on incessantly about the will of the British people… Presumably we are part of that “British People”. They would have to explain why the will of the British people only counted when it was ALL of Britain.

        Not that that would stop them. They have more front than Rothsay!

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    2. It’ll be interesting to see who will replace her.
      Lets not forget the shenanigans that went on before Ruth got the job.
      If memory serves the original top candidate was dropped when their links with the spooks was revealed. Let’s also recall there was a threatened court battle about the selection procedure…which was eventually resolved by an out of court settlement ( for an undisclosed amount).

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      1. Wasn’t there some controversy about Ruth getting the use of Cameron’s head spin doctor, which was against the rules?

        Cameron seemed not to like Ms Goldie. He excluded her from everything.

        She, of course, was far too clever for him, and, I think, pretty much her own woman.

        He wanted Ruth, presumably becasue she was young and inexperienced and would do what she was told, which I imagine Goldie would not!

        And so it was proved. She simply agreed to everything that Cameron and then May said.

        To her credit the idiot Johnson is a step too far for her, and she has left.

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      1. Yes, but she has said that she supports Mr Johnson’s decision to prorogue Westminster. This is an example of her ‘principles’.

        Of course, she does have principles, but they are not the ones that the media trumpets her espousing.

        I suspect that, after a short while, she will be off to the House of Lords. This will mean ‘billets’ on the board of companies, it will give her time to appear on Have I Got News For You, Bake Off, etc. She can claim expenses for stepping into Westminster and only voting in debates where the Government might lose. Via her partner, she will probably take dual Irish citizenship (if she does not have it already).

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        1. Dear heavens… she said she approves of the prorogation?

          Good lord.

          Like I say, I couldn’t face watching her press conference.

          As a rule she has always had the principles that London told her to have.

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  4. Somebody had better tell “Team Ruth” at Westminster that they’re drifting away from the London Head Office. They clearly didn’t get the memo.

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    1. I think a lot of them in the London parliament went native a while ago and some of them seem to smile much more adoringly at BoJo than at Ruth… or whoever follows her.

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      1. I do not think the MPs were ever really on her side, although they did use the “Ruth Davidson’s Candidate” literature in 2017. While I think her success in making herself the face of unionism in 2014, gained her party popularity, I think that the 2016 referendum result, particularly in the fishing areas helped swing votes back to the Tories. Historically, they were strong in these areas. Add to that the fact that the SNP did not run a good campaign and a large number of voters simply stayed at home, and, finally, there was some tactical voting by Labour and Lib Dems. The majority of the Tory MPs are ‘posh boys’, privately educated, and who, probably perceive Ms Davidson as a bit of an oik (working class, attended local school in Fife), and she is a woman and she is a lesbian. So, their education and background sense of entitlement meant they tolerated her. They see being an MP as more important than being an MSP. So, I do not think they really saw her as Leader. The Tory party at Westminster was much more their kind of people, who were members of the same club.

        So, they did not really ‘go native’ – they were among their own kind and were ruling, as their education taught them to expect.

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        2. Initially, of course, her team were going to stick together to get the best kind of deal for Scotland!

          Remember when Arlene got a bribe of £1 billion to keep the hapless Maybot in her job, and Wee Fluffy said that he wouldn’t let it happen without a consequential for Scotland… just before he was told to shut up, and then Rossy fell in love with BoJo and so did Douglas and several others, presumably including the Jack blokey, of whom no one had ever heard until BoJo fired Fluffs.

          You’re right of course, she wasn’t of their class (pronounced closs). I mean, one wonders if she even knew which wine to serve with the pheasant.

          I’d have expected her sexuality to have been more of a barrier to the blue rinses voting for her, but apparently not. Maybe their hatred of Nicola, also a working class girl, overshadowed Ruth’s shortcomings.

          Close your eyes and think of England, sort of thing.

          So the Labour Party moved to the left and basically if you wanted the union, it had to be the Tories.

          Most have been spectacularly unspectacular though and probably most will lose their seats, and so it will go… Ruth was the saviour, now she’s gone we’ve lost all out seats.

          Whereas, perhaps one of the reasons Ruth is leaving is that she knows that most of them won’t survive an election and she doesn’t want the blame.

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  5. I can think of a few names to throw into the ring to become the next dork, sorry, Tory branch office manager ….

    wee Murdo “perpetual loser” Fraser
    wee Jackson “whaur’s the paintings” Carlaw
    wee Professor Adam “I’m an academic you know” Tomkins

    Surely though the favourite to win the title of next Tory dork, sorry, Tory branch office manager MUST be wee Annie “I know nuffink” Wells. 😂

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    1. I’ll vote for Annie!

      Murdo is a boring old soul. (Seriously he tweets some right bigoted stuff concerning football).

      The Car sales man … I’m not sure he can stay awake for long enough to be a full time leader.

      I don;t think anyone would argue Tomkins is clever, but he has absolutely no charm whatsoever and seemingly no people skills.

      I doubt he’d be popular.

      Annie’s the lass, though. Guaranteed to open her mooth and let a load of garbage pour out.

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        1. Yes, I thought that too.

          Annabel was probably more the broadsheet type… but to be fair, Goldie knew how to take advantage of a minority government to squeeze what she could out of it.

          She was in many ways a more successful leader than Ruth.

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    1. Well, it was her only policy.

      I simply can’t think of another policy.

      All her colleagues and she did was to criticise everything the SNP did and say that they only talked about independence.

      This utterly regardless of the fact that pretty much everything run by the Tories in England is far less effective.

      Additionally, of course, they tried to blame the SNP for matters which the government in England controlled… Drugs and internet come immediately to mind.

      If anyone can think of a policy put forward, I’d be pleased to hear it.

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      1. Testing in primary schools …… until it became part of the SNP programme (although in a different form and for a different purpose than Ms Davidson wanted) and so she was agin it.

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    2. Just had a look. So – hearing on the merits on 6 September, Lord Doherty to pronounce on something or other tomorrow at 10 a.m. I will expect BBC Shortbread to cover it extensively (koff koff koff koff).

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        1. They’re trying to tease a sound-bite out of Jeremy or anything resembling an idea of what he’s planning to do. Leotard is bobbing about behind him grinning sheepishly.

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          1. You can bet your life you’ll get nothing sensible out of Corbyn.

            If ever a man was a disappointment, then he is it. Just at the time when you actually needed a good strong opposition.

            As for Leotard (as you so sweetly call him) Hells bells, he’s even more hopeless than Corbyn.

            And both the governments need oppositions to keep them on their toes.

            In both cases, they fail.

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            1. I’m still waiting on the tear jerker, when Phil is thawed out from the freezer. The Scots can be distracted by funeral, we do enjoy a guid burying.

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            2. We’ve had hatches and matches.
              I’m still waiting on the tear jerker, when Phil is thawed out from the freezer. The Scots can be distracted by a funeral, we do enjoy a guid burying.

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  9. Aye well she’s hinging ontae her MSP seat. Really easy money now given she’ll not have to do FM questions and she never does constituency surgeries. Plus when the Tory MPs lose their seats as predicted, she and the media can claim it’s cos she’s gone whereas we know it’s the other way round! She can claim to be untainted then either bog off to England if any safe seat will have her or bog off to Ireland with the Mrs.

    I suspect Carlow will be interim leader.

    Re Shetland I suspect the LibDems will win but with a much reduced majority.

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    1. It is a pretty good job when you think about it. Not doing surgeries and only turning up occasionally at parliament to be seen. She’ll be able to do a fair bit of colonelling. (I know, I know!)

      Yep, I suspect the Car bloke will be interim leader.

      And regretfully, I agree it is a massive ask from the SNP to win in Shetland which has been Liberal Democrat and before that Liberal since Noah was a boy.

      But wouldn’t it be a lovely surprise if Tom won!

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      1. it could pretend I’d made fun of ol’ Jackson’s name but heck it was a typo, I confess. But actually a good one methinks- he is pretty low. I saw him once in the local shopping centre – I presume getting some messages. If Tories get messages.

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  10. You’ve missed the youth vote.
    I think Muddle the younger has the eye of the party.
    That would be a good laugh, my local mp has carless as his mentor, just worries about the local post office closing.

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      1. Aye, with Banger Carless and Thumper Kelly on rythm. Yip that would do it, grannies knickers and bloomers cascading as giant confetti from the galleries.
        Sorry Tris, hope that image doesn’t stay with you too long and spoil your weekend.

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