Mike Vickers' Blog

Two articles in today’s Scotsman on Sunday (22/12/2019) by Euan McColm and Dani Garavelli

McColm berates Nicola Sturgeon on yet again pressing for a 2^nd Independence vote. McColm makes the point that the votes of SNP together with the Greens in last week’s general election didn’t make the 50% mark ie taken together they wouldn’t win the vote for Scottish Independence. In any case he stresses the point that even with the matters derogated to Scotland the SNP has made a mess of them eg Education and the NHS

Read Euan McColm here:

https://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion/columnists/euan-mccolm-nicola-sturgeon-divides-and-rules-with-myth-of-the-mandate-1-5065710

Dani Garavelli comes from another direction. We have Johnson for 5 years at at least and probably 10 years. During that time, he is likely to move the UK drastically to the Right. Already he has gone back on allowing child refugees entry into the UK to meet up with their parents. He is also considering making appointments to the judiciary on a political basis (as in the US).  And Heaven knows what will happen to working conditions.

Read Dani Garavelli here:

https://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion/columnists/dani-garavelli-naked-power-grab-of-boris-the-emperor-is-all-too-clear-1-5065718

Comment

In my view McColm is correct in that the SNP Government has not made a good job of the opportunities afforded to it over the last 10 years. But his article dwells on the SNP continually pressing for a 2^nd referendum which is unlikely to succeed and, in the meantime, the SNP failing to tackle the outstanding Scottish problems; rather than the devastation that a Johnson Government could make to the UK Social Fabric as a whole. Surely it is better for Scotland to go its own way, free from the Social destruction under Johnson. As the expression goes, Scotland ‘to take back control’.