“TIME FOR LEADERSHIP, ACTION AND UNITY” – MACASKILL
ALBA Depute Leader Kenny MacAskill MP has called for an Independence Convention to break the logjam between the Westminster and Holyrood Governments over Scotland’s right to choose her constitutional future in an Independence Referendum. In a statement Kenny MacAskill MP for East Lothian said:
“The right of Scotland’s people to determine their constitutional future is theirs and theirs alone. 2022 must be the year when we as a nation begin to proclaim that political reality.
“Boris Johnson’s Government uses the doctrine of unlimited parliamentary sovereignty to deny our people the right to choose our own constitutional future in an Independence Referendum. Meanwhile Nicola Sturgeon’s Government squanders a renewed mandate in 2021 for that referendum, citing the need for full recovery from Covid, before she will introduce the Referendum Bill for which she has a majority and fails to assert the right to hold the referendum for which she has a clear and unambiguous mandate.
“Faced with such an impasse and the clamant need for political leadership what is to be done if we are to break the constitutional log-jam?
“First, we need leadership. 2022 must be the year when the Scottish Government and Holyrood seize the political initiative and stop handing a veto to Boris Johnston. That means no more delay and no more prevarication.
“Second, we need action and a seriousness of intent. There must be a clear and unambiguous statement from the Scottish Government that the Scottish people and the Scottish people alone have the right to determine their future. Furthermore, that no legal judgement or act of the Westminster parliament can override the sovereign will of the Scottish people to determine our own constitutional future. The unlimited sovereignty of parliament is a uniquely English principle which has no counterpart in Scots law. It is high time that our Government and our Parliament asserted that sovereign will.
“The Scottish Government must signal that they are serious about taking Scotland forward to Independence. No more pressing the ‘restart button’ or beginning the campaign ‘in earnest’ every time there is an SNP conference.
“Third, we need unity. The way to break the constitutional log-jam is to convene a Scottish Independence Convention to which all of Scotland’s elected representatives would be invited – MSPs, MPs and Councillors to determine the way forward, decide the strategy and unite behind it.
“The three ingredients for success are leadership, action and unity. An Independence Convention allows us to achieve all three and it is why following next year’s Local Government Elections ALBA will push for that Convention to be established without delay.”
Yeh ! Unity, Yes with a new leader prehaps ,The SNP and the lord Advocate are proposing to debate the removal of trial by jury on rape cases .We are told this is to reduce the back log of cases and also to get higher conviction rates. If they can create jigsaw crime to silence dissidents and get their flying monkeys to make false accusations of rape, no one is safe. If the lord Advocate genuinely wishes to reduce the back log of cases then create temporary courts. There is a culture to use the law as a political weapon in Scotland to silence people this cannot be allowed to happen in a democracy. We are also told Scots are not entitled to trial by jury. I say it is a human right and if trail by jury is good enough for Englishman it’s good enough for me. Prehaps the Lord Advocate should be charged with preverting the course of justice. This position should be separated from political state control.
MacAskill brings into clear focus the current SNP philosophy that the Scottish people are not sovereign, that the Scots Parliament is a powerless talking shop, and that Scottish MPs are of no relevance whatsoever, as only Westminster has authority.
And so like a battered and abused wife, Scotland has no voice, no say, no volition to end the rotten marriage.
Scotland, a land where the wife is owned by the master, it the wife, like a chattel takes her beatings.
Keny MacAskill is right in what he is saying. Unfortunately too many Scots see wife beating as a way of life.
I’d like to see Lady Dorrian go to jail for the crime of arrogance.
Your post reminds me of G. K. Chesterton’s remark , that it was terrible to contemplate how few politicians were hanged these days.
Kenny MacAskill is an upright and strictly honest politician – someone to be trusted. We need his likes in the Scottish Parliament. As he believes this is the way forward, I support him totally.
100% agree Jan.
Definitely and important to say, Kenny MacAskill is an upright and strictly honest politician.
Looking forward to the imminent Prism with Scotland’s Alex Salmond.
2021 is not finished yet!
on the button Kenny we have a Government of fearties scared to tell Westminster where to go, its people of your honesty and determination which we do not have in the Scottish Government, they are carrot danglers when they need re elected the problem is they keep the carrots for the next time and writing to the likes of G Dey to get their Independence hats on I end up with the ignorance of no response so much for being my MSP and for Independence its now a farce caused not by Boris but by the SNP.
I support Kenny 100% and a convention is the right way forward but you must ask why the Scottish government/ SNP has not pushed this having had several mandates. Now Alba is here we must get behind them and vote with our feet. if we fail to do this independence under the SNP is dead. Dissolving the union has always been in their power.
We need to keep shining a light on Nicla and her grand plans, none of which are remotely focused on Indy. We are sovereign, she needs to go. Unity will only happen when we are all heading in the same direction with the same destination in mind. That can’t happen with the present Scottish government in place.
All the more reason to have a Convention. This would put pressure on SNP Scottish Government to act and when she refuses this will expose her to the public and more importantly to her party. She forbids any talk of independence in her own party. She cannot forbid the Scottish public from talking about it and making a plan in a forum of the people.
Excellent and timely initiative by the ALBA National Party, to consolidate Scotland’s pro-independence democratically elected majorities at all levels of governance and to assert that immense political sovereignty in ensuring the right of all Scots to our national self-determination is fully respected and delivered. This is what we might rightly term ‘national leadership’ which is a key requirement at what is now a critical time in our country’s history and (re)development.
The SNP are either for Scots or agin us and by ignoring such a Convention and opportunity to assert Scotland’s political sovereignty they are agin us. Fowk cannae ser twa maisters; the SNP either want an independent Scotland or they want only to work for the British state, sae mak yer mynds up Sturgeon, Robertson, Blackford, Wishart et al!
As read elsewhere: “sovereignty is traditionally said to lie with the people and to favour a limited rather than absolute form of authority”, then surely that ought to be one of a number of important points of consideration among Scotland’s people? “The right of Scotland’s people to determine their constitutional future is theirs and theirs alone. What about the Acts of Union 1707?
Presently, our world is entirely different from what existed over 300 years ago and, of course, normal people are also different in almost every way, from standards of health, wealth and so forth! Indeed, The current voting age is very much younger than it was in my youth… A difference which is notably different to our neighbouring country, England! ~ Will UK mean the Unravelling Kingdom, in future, I wonder?
Whatever may come to pass, we need to react according to this day and age while still being aware of the mistakes and successes of the past whilst remembering that the future’s solutions are today’s youth! Here’s hoping for a better future!
Kingdom? (UK)
But unrealistic, expecting changes made overnight,
It’s Internationally recognised – that’s without doubt…
Anyway – more importantly, that Union IS NOT right;
England’s there —- but Scotland really NEEDS OUT!
© Ewen A. Morrison 🏴
Keep the pressure on the SNP leadership. They must not be allowed to postpone our independence for their own personal pet projects.
I agreed with everything until I got to the last paragraph, “following next year’s Local Government elections”. That’s more than 6 months from now and a lot can happen in that time. Why is now never the right time for action.
I agree Ron, that is why I will be pushing for dome immediate action.
Sooner as preferred to later for it, YES.
Time goes by so fast in the night.
To the table with it.
Dynamics.
The one thing that the Scottish government has failed to do, is assert that it operates only under Scots Law, and as a democratically elected body, insist that any future rules, laws created by Westminster will have no power within Scotland. Also hold a National Assembly/Convention of all Scottish Parliamentarians, Westminster and Holyrood to restore by vote the full Constitutional Powers necessary. It’s time for Scotland to use the tools of Scots and International Laws to prevent any further weakening of powers by Westminster.