Last weekend we had Alf Baird on our podcast to discuss the Salvo/Liberation action at the UN Decolonisation Unit.This midweek we are joined by Sara Saylers of Salvo to further investigate this bold move.
It is a tremendously interesting and enlightening conversation.We look at the legal position regarding the UN plea. We talk about unity, political will and possible outcomes.
Rather than go into all the points we discussed I will just recommend the video to you.
Please watch, listen, comment and share this video it is very important to Scotland’s cause.
I make these comments, drawing them from many of the discussions I have had.
Lao Tzu Quote: There is no greater danger than underestimating your opponent.
We face that danger because we can be 100% sure Ruk cannot face the very real consequences of Scotland regaining it’s independence, politically, economically, and internationally, example – would it retain its seat on the UN Security Council?
As the threat of Scottish independence grows, and appears to be all but inevitable there may be a phone call made between 10 Downing Street and Bute house.
The suggestion may be made that to settle the whole question – a Referendum should indeed – now – be considered, but there would have to be a clear understanding of the conditions that would have to be accepted.
Straight question: Knowing everything you know – are you sure Bute House would immediately end the conversation and put the phone down?
That would depend who was in Bute House at the time.
Agreed … so maybe head forward by drawing on Sara’s reference on another elected body eventually being created and not present in Holyrood and your reference to the Dáil in your discussions today.
May I offer this post of mine from elsewhere – it may well be that Bute house no longer has the relevance we attach to it today, and how we choose who truly represents Scotland’s interest via an alternative Body/Convention/Congress. Post follows:
” Regaining Scotland’s independence will require a revolution – specifically a revolution in the choices that we make. This is one of such choices – and you have time to think about it.
It is the 6th of May 2026, the day before the next Scottish Election, you have a decision to make. There are two pro-independence candidates seeking your vote.
Candidate #1 has told you – in advance – that they will swear the Royal Oath.
Candidate #2 has told you – in advance – that they will NOT swear the Royal Oath.
You know that the Scotland Act 1998 makes clear that to become an MSP swearing the Royal Oath is a requirement. Refuse to swear the Royal Oath and you will not be an MSP – no matter the number of votes you received. Makes it all kinda tricky doesn’t it – but perhaps consider this:
There is a Scottish – Coronation Oath – it can be sworn or not, it is also a choice, just as the above items are a choice.
Since the 18th of April 1689 (involving William II and Anne) no subsequent monarch has sworn the Scottish – Coronation Oath. It is the same manner of choice as that above – swear an Oath or not!
Perhaps – just perhaps, that might make you consider your choice for the 7th of May 2026, Candidate #1 or Candidate #2?
Perhaps – just perhaps – when those two candidates tell you their choice, it may help you make yours?
It may require a revolution in the choices you make – one that may perhaps determine whether Scotland does regain its independence. One of many such choices that will decide Scotland’s future.
This extract from the Declaration of a Sovereign Scot was written by me in December 2020:
” I do not consent to the terms of, nor the continuation of, the Scotland Act 1998, and all subsequent relevant Acts of like nature and purpose, and demand that any Oath of Allegiance to be sought from, and given by, a potential Member of the Scottish Parliament recognises the Sovereignty of the Scottish People in the following terms: “By this oath, I acknowledge that if elected as a Member of the Scottish Parliament, it will be as a result of votes cast by Sovereign Scots, and I do solemnly swear and affirm that my allegiance is, and will remain, to the Sovereign people of Scotland.”
While I certainly agree with most of what Sara has said here, and nothing actually precludes our being a colony because we satisfy every condition, I am at a loss to understand how there can be no Treaty, or have I misunderstood?
The Treaty absolutely underpins the UK, and, if there is no Treaty, then the UK falls immediately, because there cannot be a UK, and Scotland cannot be colony because it cannot be a colony of something that never was or is. If Scotland is a partner in the Union, it is being ill-treated and abused within that partnership by a controlling and manipulative partner, and deserves to be free.
If there is no Treaty, and no UK, and never was, then the Scotland Act is invalid. If there is a Treaty, then the Scotland Act is still invalid. I agree with that lawyer. It would also be invalid within the Treaty because it has been an asymmetrical devolution, leaving England-as-the-UK non devolved. Not the English regions, but England itself, as a country, is non devolved, as Scotland is devolved. Ultra vires and illegal. No stipulation in the Treaty that Scotland would be the inferior, no stipulation that England would be the superior, so cannot be argued on that basis either.
So, a non devolved England (as a country) should have been devolved along with Scotland, Wales and NI, and the four parts would have had equal status within the Union. Westminster routinely deflects this issue by stating that the English regions should be devolved. That is still asymmetrical, but even worse because the English regions will be set up to challenge the other three parts as regions, not as a country, a principality and a province. No one can doubt the English regions would come out on top because the whole thing would be engineered to allow that – through funding, etc.
I can see why the colony route was chosen and I really hope it is successful, but I think we should be aware that not only England, but also the Unionist Scots and, deplorably, the SNP, will almost certainly try to undermine that case. The SNP might not have the gall – I’m not so sure, though – to state outright that we are not a colony, but any future Unionist government would act against the suggestion, citing the Treaty and the Union. Not trying to rain on your parade Sara by any means, but Lloyd was right on Sunday when he said that this could be a possibility.
Lorna, I have spoken with Sara and this is her response to your comment.
If there is no UK, that is because the sovereign and independent state of England continued as it always was – demonstrably in terms of its Crown, constitutional provisions and political system – while Scotland was colonised, annexed. GB and the United Kingdom of GB are pseudonyms for England, which colonised Scotland along with Ireland, India, Kenya, Malaysia, Singapore etc. etc. England is the coloniser and always was!
At the risk of seeming pedantic, Roddy/Sara, the Treaty created the UK, it underpins the UK. Without it, there is no UK. If Scotland was absorbed as a colonized territory or as part of a Greater England (as per Crawford and Boyle) it cannot have been through the Treaty because the Treaty negates both positions. You cannot sign a bilateral Treaty as a partner and also make yourself either a colony or to be part of a greater whole.
Scotland has become a colony in all but name, but that is because the Treaty has been breached so much and because we have been treated abominably by England-as-the-UK. If we dispense with the Treaty, we could be in danger of having little on which to negotiate apart from the usual international rules, which go only so far to protect our resources and assets.
Yes, I absolutely agree that the names, UK/GB are synonymous with England-as-the-UK, but they are not synonymous with England having continued as England and not part of the UK. All the speeches by Queen Anne show this to be the case. She distinctly stated that both her kingdoms of Scotland and England ceased as autonomous states and became one state comprising two nations. She also stated quite rightly that there are two crowns on one head, and that this is the Union of the Crowns, not that the English crown became the British crown and the Scottish one was dropped completely.
I really do hope that this effort to appeal under the colonization legislation will work but we know that Crawford and Boyle were commissioned to thwart any continuator state status by Scotland by using the premise as the conclusion: Scotland was subsumed, therefore Scotland was subsumed. It is a legal circular argument and a philosophical and jurisprudential cul de sac. Yet, there was no grand fight to repel such an argument in 2013/14, which there should have been.
It would have led, had Scotland voted, in 2014, to leave the Union, to a challenge in the international court to
settle continuator status between Scotland and England, unless Scotland conceded the case, which would have been the better course because it would have meant that the nuclear weapons would have had to have been withdrawn from Scotland, in accordance with international law which states that the continuator state takes them into its own custody. Here’s the rub, though: if Crawford and Boyle’s argument had been accepted by Scotland, and, largely it was at the time, England could then have claimed both continuator state status and subsumption status for Scotland, leaving Scotland with nothing and still holding the nuclear weapons.
I’m with Lloyd here in that England-as-the-UK will almost certainly try to thwart Salvo/Liberation’s colony status argument, and we have to be prepared to argue the toss this time. No backing down and no backing off from any challenges. England-as-the-UK has not yet completed its total by-pass of Scotland, and we still have time. Had the energy and renewable by-passes been complete now, our case would have been less robust for management of our own resources. I wish Salvo/Liberation all the best, but, please be careful, Sara, because they will muster their forces to try and destroy your case by claiming that we are not a colony, but a subsumed part of the UK. The Treaty negates that argument and we cannot afford to dismiss it. We did that far too readily in 2013/14.
Great show with Sara talking about and reenforcing the importance and value of what Salvo and Liberation have been doing for three years. Yes there is a growing awareness of the work, and Project Arbroath hope they have had an influence in that awareness with their booklet How We Take Back Our Independence which helps to explain and guide people to the cause for Independence this hour with Sara is all about. Now I’m going yo listen to Lorna now.
Just to add https://projectarbroath.scot is where everyone can get a copy
Great show Roddy and Sara. Bookmarked for reference later. 🙂
A few things stood out for me throughout the length of the show as being areas that there is now a widespread common understanding and or agreement.
1) We need the splintered YES community to unite with a combined purpose to advance our cause.
2) We acknowledge and accept that Westminsters ‘Section 30’ process, created by the British State, cannot and will never lead to restoring Scotlands Independence. Thus Scotland must leave the whole ‘Seeking Westminsters approval’ phase firmly behind us in the past and move on.
3) The upcoming Holyrood Election provides us with a ‘democratic Event’ and must be seized upon as an opportunity for the People of Scotland to express their democratic will to restore our Independence.
4) ALL votes for ANY Independence party should be counted towards this end. Not just votes for one dominant party.
5) The people are accustomed to the British voting system whereby parties put their commitments in their manifestos, then they ‘win’ the election, they ‘have a mandate’ to enact those manifesto commitments, that the people voted for. Thus all independence parties should put THE SAME commitment into their manifestos so that there can be no room for refusing to accept their legitimacy after the event and ‘we’ win 😉
6) Voters have been staying at home in their hundreds of thousands at recent electoral events. Independence supporting parties should be leading on Independence for this Scottish Election cycle. They will reinvigorate huge numbers of sleeping YES voters to turn out, because they will have been given something to vote for.
7) As Sara correctly recounts the uniquely Scottish precedent of our indigenous constitution plus the international precedent of the Kosovo situation, there is indeed widespread understanding now that calling a constitutional convention is and will be a legitimate mechanism by which the settled will of The Scottish People can be enacted.
Only the Brits might whinge about that.
The International community has been observing for years, the Chagos Islands, New Caledonia, Palestine. There are likely to be AT LEAST 120 – 160 votes FOR Scotland to _restore_ its autonomy out of the ~190 if the UN General Assembly were to vote on it. An overwhelming majority seems almost inevitable. 🙂
8) Some countries have continued for years without official UN recognition (due mostly to superpower intransigence) while their neighbours just get on with the business of having a neighbour. It is not a disaster. Especially if your friendly neighbour it the European Union – the largest and richest market on Earth!
9) ‘winning’ this project at the UN would be great. But it is not enough on its own, as Sara has acknowledged.
The critical thing is to provoke and then demonstrate the political will here at home in Scotland.
These all seem like things we can _all_ agree on: Roddy, Sarah, Independents 4 Independence, ISP, liberation.scot even Peter Bell has been saying them!
Lets all stop bickering about the small stuff and just agree that these points are above arguing about!
How about it Roddy? Would it be possible to get all the grassroots yessers to demand that the politicians just bloody well agree to get on with it.!!!
grrrrr
I agree aLurker, there is a real opportunity for those who genuinely desire the restoration Scotland’s full self-government and return of Scotland’s independent statehood to coalesce around some of the points you make.
Specifically I see the importance of Salvo/Liberation move as
a) internationalising Scotland’s self-determination dilemma
b) educating the people about Scotland’s colonised condition
Both aspects will hopefully garner much needed support for Scotland’s Cause both abroad and here within Scotland.
However, the #ManifestoForIndependence detailed by Peter A Bell provides the tangible political process by which we can both self-determine and liberate ourselves from our oppressive and exploitative neighbour. It is formed of 6 simple and logical steps along a path at the finish of which the Union is ended.
Importantly it is supremely democratic in that people first grant the power to the Scottish Parliament on matters relating to the constitution by voting for candidates/parties that have signed up to the #ManifestoForIndependence in an election – Westminster or Holyrood – and, subsequently, vote in a proper referendum overseen by the Scottish Parliament and its agencies explicitly on the question “Do you wish to end the Union?” or very similar wording that puts the Union on the spot and marks it as the anomaly (as opposed to the normal country status of Independence).
The details of the #ManifestoForIndependence are here:
https://newscotlandparty.scot/manifesto-for-independence/
The petition that would be sent to parties/candidates if sufficient signatures are obtained is here:
https://newscotlandparty.scot/petition/
I commend both of these to you and all readers.