Scottish politics

The coming of age of the Scottish Parliament … but has power shifted to the people? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, May 8th 2019 Twenty years ago last Monday Scotland went to the polls in the first democratic elections to the Scottish Parliament. This coming Sunday marks the anniversary of the first session of that Parliament which Winnie Ewing famously opened with the words: ‘The Scottish Parliament, which adjourned on March 25^th 1707, is hereby reconvened.’ The new Parliament was elected with much goodwill, hope and energy, following the decisive 1997 devolution referendum. Polls showed that large majorities expected the Parliament

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The importance of hearing the sounds of silence Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, April 24th 2019 Art Garfunkel performed in Glasgow on Easter Sunday; in an age filled with what seems to be incessant noise, it has never been more critical than to listen to seek out, and listen to, the sounds of silence. Despite everything, they can be found. Years ago when I was thinking about public debate I read A.L. Kennedy’s first book ‘Night Geometry and the Garscadden Trains’ – which has in it a passage which is an evocative hymn to the power and prevalence of silence. Kennedy

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Scotland’s Independent Story isn’t over: A Review of Yes/No: Inside the Indyref Gerry Hassan Bella Caledonia, March 19th 2019 As British politics enters a mixture of meltdown and an endgame, convulsed by Brexit, everywhere in political discourse there is an obsession with the past. From the rise of Churchill to unquestioned national hero, to the ultra-Brexiteers talking of the UK reduced to a ‘vassal state’ of the EU; and now, Speaker John Bercow announcing there cannot be a rerun of parliamentary votes due to a 1604 English convention, while being compared to Speaker William Lenthall who presided over the long

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The Importance of the McCrone Report and Scotland’s Future Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, March 6th 2019 There was major interest and debate last week about a UK Government paper on Scotland - the McCrone report - written nearly 45 years ago. The McCrone report was written in March 1974 by then Scottish Office civil servant Gavin McCrone for ministers in the aftermath of the UK general election the month previous. It was subsequently given a wider circulation in government in April 1975 with a covering letter but remained publicly unknown and unpublished until it emerged as a result of a

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1979: The beginning of the end of the ancien regime that ruled Scotland and the UK Gerry Hassan Bella Caledonia, March 1st 2019 Today is the 40^th anniversary of Scotland going to the polls to vote in the first devolution referendum on Labour’s proposals for a Scottish Assembly. This marked the beginning of Scotland’s constitutional revolution through referendums which, at the moment, stands at a triptych of 1979, 1997 and 2014 but which may have another addition. Despite this there will be no bunting, no ceremonies and no plaques unveiled to mark today. Both then and now, Labour’s plans for

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The Birth of the New: BBC Scotland Finally Takes Off Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, 27 February 2019 BBC Scotland’s new channel launched on Sunday at 7pm. There was a small amount of expectation, a countdown, and even nervousness. Sitting, waiting for it to begin, in those last few seconds I reflected how seldom a new TV channel is born on old-fashioned telly. The last I remember being Channel 4 in the 1980s, with Five not at the outset or since really registering. Then it came on air. The first night opened with the Chvrches and had ‘A Night at the

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Independence is about more than an indyref. It is about changing minds and Scotland Gerry Hassan Bella Caledonia, January 25th 2019 Independence has to be about more than tactics and processes – which has dominated too many conversations since 2014. Independence is about more than an indyref - and in particular, timing, the question asked and how it comes about. This is politics as process and taking the substance for granted. And it is a trap too many independence supporters have fallen into post-2014. The last four plus years have been a strange time in Scottish politics. The democratic spirit

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We Scots have to start listening to each other Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, January 23rd 2019 Brexit seems to have no end, consuming nearly all political energy and devouring those who come into contact with it. Or so it seems for now. The Economist recently made the point in its ‘Bagehot’ column that one of the seldom understood groups in British politics were the long haulers. These were people who once occupied the margins of political life, and have now in the case of Brexiteers and Corbynistas, come centrestage and turned politics upside down. These two groups involved people

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Salmond, Sturgeon and the End of an Era for the SNP Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, January 16th 2019 Britain stands at an abyss. Three years of endless Brexit deliberations have resulted in the UK facing crisis, doubt and anxiety about what the future holds. Politics has become a high wire act of competing intransigencies and denials of reality – with the only certainty that there is no easy way out of this mess or simple resolution. This is a crisis of mainstream politics, democracy and Britain’s political parties. The Tories continue their thirty-year civil war on Europe, while Corbyn’s Labour

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Where is Radical Scotland and does it really exist? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, December 12th 2018 As the United Kingdom seemingly collapses and its political class shows unprecedented incompetence, where stands Scotland? Where is that much talked about sentiment that we are radical, different, and more left-wing than the rest of the UK? For some all that matters in the above is difference and the elixir of sovereignty; ‘Take Back Control’ and don’t worry about detail and all the other stuff until we are on the other side of independence. This is rather reminiscent of the version of Brexit as

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