Category Archives: Scottish politics

Scotland wasting time on constitutional disputes, says thinktank

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Gordon Brown’s Our Scottish Future says reforms and investment hampered by focus on referendums

Scotland’s devolved government has been beset by poor decision-making for the past decade because of an obsession with constitutional disputes, a thinktank says.

The report, by Gordon Brown’s Our Scottish Future thinktank, which has close ties to Labour, says much-needed reforms to public services and economic investment have been hampered by short-term decision-making and an unrelenting focus on referendums and elections.

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Dominic Cummings tells Covid inquiry foul-mouthed messages about colleague weren’t misogynistic – UK politics live

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Boris Johnson’s former chief adviser denies contributing to an atmosphere of misogyny at No 10, saying he was ‘much ruder about men’

Heather Hallett, the chair, intervenes at this point. She asks Cain if he is defending the 10-day gap. She says she finds that curious if he is.

Cain says locking down the country is a huge, huge undertaking. In government terms, that is government acting at speed. But it was “longer than you would hope”, he says.

Do I understand from what you said earlier that you would defend the 10-day gap between the decision taken that there had to be a national lockdown and actually implementing that decision? Because I find that curious.

As I said, I think it is longer than you would like, but I think it’s important just to emphasise the amount of things that had to be done and the amount of people we had to take with us to deliver a nationwide lockdown.

It’s a huge, huge undertaking and to be honest, from my understanding of government, that is government moving at a tremendous speed – which maybe says more about government than other things.

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Humza Yousaf says parents-in-law are alive in Gaza but have run out of water

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Scottish first minister expresses relief after communications were cut off during Israeli bombardment

Scotland’s first minister has expressed relief after discovering his parents-in-law in Gaza are alive, although they have run out of clean drinking water.

Humza Yousaf said the welcome news had come through on Sunday morning, hours after describing his worries about whether they were alive or dead following the imposition by Israel of a communication blackout in Gaza on Friday.

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Starmer writes to Labour councillors in attempt to quash concerns he’s too pro-Israel – UK politics live

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Letter from Labour leader stresses his concern for international law and sympathy with the plight of the Palestinian people

Rishi Sunak will be taking PMQs shortly. It will be his first exchange with Keir Starmer since the party conferences.

Here is the list of MPs down to ask a question.

We were the victims of an inside job by someone, we believe, who over a long period of time was stealing from the museum and the museum put trust in.

There are lots of lessons to be learnt as a result of that, the member of staff has been dismissed by us. The objects have started to be recovered … We have changed our whistleblowing code, changed our policy on thefts … tightened up security on thefts.

If someone is entrusted by an organisation to look after something and they are the person removing those objects, that is hard for any organisation, and it was hard for the museum, where there is a trusting culture.

If that trust is completely abused and as I think will become clear in the coming months quite a lot of steps were taken to conceal that, it wasn’t just that things were taken, records were altered and the like, it’s hard to spot.

We are intending to put on display the objects we have recovered, there is a lot of public interest in these objects.

350 have now been recovered and titles have been transferred to us so we have the makings of a good exhibition that was not previously planned.

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Tory MP Peter Bone should be suspended for six weeks for bullying and sexual misconduct, says report – UK politics live

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Commons will vote on suspension recommended by independent expert panel after investigation

Peter Bone has issued a statement saying that the bullying and sexual misconduct claims about him made by a former employed, that have led to the IEP recommending a six-week suspension, are false and without foundation. He says the complainant did not raise them at the time and only submitted a complaint years after they had left.

As I have maintained throughout these proceedings, none of the misconduct allegations against me ever took place. They are false and untrue claims. They are without foundation.

The allegations by an ex-employee refer to events of more than 10 years ago that spanned no more than a few months. The complainant first made the allegations years after they left my employment. They did not raise them at any time during their employment, either in writing or verbally with me, nor with their line managers …

I am also firmly of the opinion that on this occasion the independent complaints and grievance scheme investigation was flawed, procedurally unfair and didn’t comply with its own rules and regulations. It is my belief that they have operated outside of the powers given to them by parliament and I am currently discussing with lawyers what action could and should be taken.

The commissioner found the following allegations proved:

Allegation 1: Mr Bone “verbally belittled, ridiculed, abused and humiliated” the complainant, and this was bullying.

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Humza Yousaf quells SNP rebellion with independence strategy compromise

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Party leader adopts amendment that a majority of Westminster seats are needed to have mandate to negotiate

Humza Yousaf has quelled a rebellion by Scottish National party MPs by agreeing to a compromise with his critics over his independence strategy.

The party’s annual conference in Aberdeen decided that if the SNP wins a majority of Scotland’s Westminster seats at the general election, it will have the mandate to negotiate independence with the UK government.

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Lisa Cameron, SNP MP who defected to Tories, ‘forced into hiding’

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Cameron says she was threatened with being ‘bricked’ in the street after joining Conservatives on Thursday

Lisa Cameron, the SNP MP who defected to the Conservative party on Thursday, said she and her family have been forced to go into hiding in Scotland after she was threatened with being “bricked” in the street.

Cameron, her husband and their two daughters have moved to a secret location in the Scottish countryside after the MP was emailed threats of violence, including “I hope someone throws a brick at you in the street”, “I hope you burn” and “Think your mental health is bad now – wail til you see what abuse and nastiness yer [sic] going to have to put up with”.

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Scottish first minister Humza Yousaf tells of war’s impact on in-laws in Gaza

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Yousaf renews calls for UK government to urge ceasefire as he describes his family’s fears for trapped relatives

His mother-in-law in besieged Gaza is running out of drinking water. His brother-in-law, a doctor, is dealing with the horror of trying to identify body parts in a hospital nearby. And his four-year-old daughter, at home in Scotland, can only understand that “granny is afraid of the thunder”.

Humza Yousaf, Scotland’s first minister, has described in brutal detail the impact on trapped family members of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in response to the shock attacks by Hamas at the weekend.

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First minister says SNP MP who defected to Tories ‘probably never believed’ in Scottish independence – as it happened

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Humza Yousaf says Lisa Cameron’s move was ‘the least surprising news I’ve had as leader of the SNP’

NHS waiting lists have hit a new record high, with more people facing long waits, PA Media reports. PA says:

Figures for the NHS in England show 7.75 million people were waiting to start treatment at the end of August, up from 7.68 million in July.

This is the highest number since records began in August 2007 and comes despite Rishi Sunak saying cutting waiting lists is one of his priorities.

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Humza Yousaf calls for UK to push for Gaza humanitarian corridor

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Scottish first minister says he has made contact with his wife’s parents who are trapped in besieged enclave after Hamas attack

Scotland’s first minister, Humza Yousaf, has called on the UK foreign secretary to push for the establishment of a humanitarian corridor to evacuate civilians from Gaza.

Yousaf revealed on Monday that his wife Nadia’s parents, who live in Dundee, are trapped in Gaza and struggling to find safe passage.

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Labour’s Wes Streeting interviewed at Labour party conference – UK politics live

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Shadow health secretary questioned by Guardian editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner

Q: You oppose the Rwanda policy because you don’t think it will work. If the supreme court rules it is legal, and deportations start and it is seen to be working, would you still reverse it.

Yes, says Starmer. He says it is the wrong policy. It is very expensive, and it only affect only a small number of people. And the policy does not deal with the problem at source.

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Labour’s stunning Scottish byelection win means there may be little need to bargain with the SNP

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A decade of SNP dominance will be swept away in Scotland if Labour can repeat its Rutherglen success at a general election

Thursday was a big day for Scottish Labour. Within minutes of the declaration that Labour had retaken Rutherglen and Hamilton West from the SNP, phones and social media lit up with triumphant messages from the winning party. And with good reason. This was the best result for Labour in a Scottish byelection since the second world war, and the worst for the SNP since the independence referendum upended Scottish politics.

Some caveats apply. This was one of the SNP’s most marginal seats, where Labour prevailed as recently as 2017. A cloud of scandal hung over a contest triggered after the sitting MP Margaret Ferrier was sanctioned for repeatedly breaking Covid rules. As Boris Johnson has learned, voters judge such behaviour harshly.

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What Labour’s Rutherglen victory means for SNP and UK politics

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Party’s victory may point to a change in Scottish political alignments that spells danger for Humza Yousaf

Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, had used the word “earthquake” last week to foreshadow Labour’s remarkable victory in Rutherglen and Hamilton West, where its winning margin of 30 percentage points exceeded even its predictions.

He did it cheekily, stealing one of the favourite lines often used by the former Scottish National party leader Alex Salmond when the nationalists were crushing Labour at repeated elections in the past. That theft of Salmond’s phrase has additional resonance. It points to a change in Scottish political alignments that spells danger for the SNP and its current leader, Humza Yousaf.

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‘Seismic night in Scotland’: Labour crushes SNP in Rutherglen and Hamilton West byelection

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Michael Shanks wins contest Labour considered a crucial test of apparent turnaround of its fortunes in Scotland

Scottish Labour’s Michael Shanks has won the Rutherglen and Hamilton West byelection in an overwhelming victory over the SNP that his party leadership declared “seismic”, and a clear demonstration that Scotland could lead the way in delivering a Labour government at Westminster at the coming general election.

In a result that exceeded Scottish Labour expectation, Shanks beat his closest rival, the SNP’s Katy Loudon, by 17,845 votes to 8,399 – a majority of 9,446 and a resounding swing of more than 20 percentage points.

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Veteran MSP Fergus Ewing suspended from SNP over rebellions

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Former minister had voted with the opposition in a motion of no-confidence against Green co-leader Lorna Slater

The veteran MSP Fergus Ewing has been suspended from the Scottish National party for a week.

The Inverness and Nairn MSP – the son of the late SNP trailblazer Winnie Ewing – has been an outspoken critic of the party’s leadership in the past year.

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Almost 90% of voters – including 65% of Tories – say Britain needs fresh team of leaders, poll suggests – UK politics live

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Rishi Sunak’s government seen as less competent that Boris Johnson’s administration

The UK economy is set to witness the highest inflation rate of the world’s G7 advanced economies this year, according to new forecasts, PA Media reports. PA says:

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) also increased its predicted average UK inflation rate for 2023 compared with its previous estimate.

Economists at the globally recognised organisation also reduced their UK growth forecast slightly for next year amid pressure from higher interest rates.

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Rishi Sunak says he told China actions to undermine British democracy are ‘completely unacceptable’

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Prime minister says he told Li Qiang, the Chinese prime minister, at G20 that Chinese interference with the work of parliament will ‘never be tolerated’

Simon Clarke, who was the levelling up secretary during the Liz Truss premiership, has defended the government’s decision not to explicitly label China as a threat. In posts on X, or Twitter as many of us still call it, he said:

There are legitimate reasons why it is difficult for ministers to say China is a threat – that’s the nature of international relations. What matters more than words is that our policy choices change to reflect the undoubted danger of China’s actions.

Here I think the Government’s record stands up pretty well. You have the soft power of our new Pacific trade bloc membership in the CPTPP (which notably does not include China) and you have the hard power of the new AUKUS alliance - itself a response to Chinese aggression.

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Raac crisis: pupils at 24 schools in England forced to study remotely

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Newly published government list identifies 147 schools as having potentially dangerous concrete

Twenty-four schools across England will receive some remote learning because of the concrete crisis, according to a newly published government list of schools identified as having a type of potentially dangerous concrete

They include four where lessons have been taking place on a fully remote basis since the weekend, along with 20 where there is a mix of face-to-face and remote learning.

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My view on Scottish independence has ‘moved’, says Kezia Dugdale

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When asked how she would vote in a referendum, former Labour leader in Scotland says she will ‘decide at the time’

Former Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale has said her stance on independence has “moved”, as she can no longer argue for staying in the UK with the same strength she did in the run-up to the 2014 referendum.

Dugdale said she felt that Scots will eventually get a second vote on the future of the UK but did not believe another referendum would take place within the next decade.

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Scottish public spending deficit falls as oil revenues hit record high

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Both sides of constitutional debate use Gers data to argue case for and against independence

Scotland’s public spending deficit has fallen from a record peak last year, as oil and gas revenues reached their highest-ever level after a global rise in oil prices.

The government expenditure and revenue Scotland (Gers) report calculated a per-person deficit – the gap between the amount raised through all tax and spending on all public services – as £1,521 in the 2022-23 financial year, down from £2,184 the previous year.

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