Jamie original picJamie Glackin says Kezia Dugdale was right to lead Scottish Labour to vote against the triggering of Article 50 yesterday.

 

Like many Labour Hame readers, when not glued to these venerated pages my spare time of late has been consumed by the unfolding horrors of the Trump presidency live on CNN. Time and again, administration hacks appear on-screen spouting obviously demonstrable lies, yet seem emboldened in doing so with every passing day.

The reason for this is simple; they know that ‘gas-lighting’ works. The very foundations of America, those American ‘values’ about which we hear so much, are in extreme peril because of it. But they had a good teacher – the Leave Campaign in the EU Referendum.

And let’s not kid ourselves that in Britain we were are any less susceptible to untruths. Just the other day, the leader of the Leave campaign admitted that they were unlikely to have won were it not for the preposterous claim that £350 million a week would be spent on the NHS. The shameful antics of Nigel Farage’s obvious racism and an appeal from the far-right in general to our darkest places was enough to shove them over the line.

That they were helped by a Labour leadership that at best had a lukewarm attitude to the European Union will forever be a source of amazement to me. Surely the values that make us Labour, the strength of our common endeavour, our commitment to sharing power, wealth and opportunity, meant that the strongest possible commitment to the European Union was required? That we didn’t give our last drop of blood for the Remain campaign but remained ambivalent will, I believe, prove catastrophic not just for the Labour Party but for the working people for whom we are supposed to be in politics.

To compound matters, the UK Labour leadership is now intent on rubber-stamping the triggering of Article 50, a decision that will haunt us for years. Why? Because there will be no socialist Brexit. There is only the far-right hard Brexit of Nigel Farage and the tawdry trade deals that Theresa May and Liam Fox will make with just about the worst people imaginable. That we as the Labour Party have facilitated this is unconscionable.

Scotland voted to remain in the European Union for the right reasons – to keep access to the single-market, to defend the rights of our people to live and work in mainland Europe and to ensure the supply of people through much welcome immigration. I strongly believe that in that vote, Scotland confirmed that we are an outward looking country, that believes in co-operation with others and the ‘pooling and sharing’ of resources.

And that’s why Kezia Dugdale and Scottish Labour were right to oppose the triggering of article 50 yesterday.

Firstly, because she was standing up for the Labour values that made us all join the Labour Party in the first place. Secondly, because in the Scottish Parliament, MSPs are supposed to be on the side of their electorate. And thirdly, if we had opposed it, or worse abstained, our potential voter pool in the future would have been even more precipitously tiny than it is just now.

Kezia and most Labour MSPs stood up for Scotland yesterday. But they did more than that. They made a stand for what is right, and even though Article 50 will be triggered, and years of economic and social turmoil await, for at least for one afternoon in the Scottish Parliament, we were the Labour Party. And I was proud to be a member.

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41 thoughts on “Standing up for what is right

  1. “They made a stand for what is right, and even though Article 50 will be triggered, and years of economic and social turmoil await”——wait, haud the bus right there!
    So if we are to have “economic and social turmoil” why would we not go for independence and be a self governing country? Yes there will be economic difficulties for some time, but there is no reason for Scotland to NOT succeed where every surrounding small country can, and is successful.
    We can still be a member of the EU, probably a reformed EU. But only as an independent country!
    We can join the EEA, and have a deal a la Norway. But only as an independent country!
    We WILL still have a trading and social relationship with rUK, just like Ireland( which isn’t contemplating leaving the EU and rejoining the UK).
    Scottish Labour would become relevant again.
    Keir Hardie (remember him?) wanted Scotland to have Dominion Status: now is our chance.
    For Gods sake, WAKE UP!

  2. Wow seriously? You think Labour in the rUK should follow suit then? Or are we back to pretending there is more than 1 Labour party in the UK?

  3. Proud of what Jamie?

    A meaningless vote, that only helps to prop up the discredited and anti democratic SNP?

    How Scotland voted in a British referendum made not one shred of difference.

    It was a UK wide vote, therefore, every vote stacked and every vote counted.

    It was not a constituency, regional or national vote.

    In a referendum one side wins and the other loses. You might not like the result, but if you take part in the process, you should respect the result.

    Jamie, you may be a supporter of the EU, but there are plenty of ordinary working people who are not.

    The EU has evolved into a new elite, an undemocratic power hungry sewer that has been shafting the ordinary people of the Europe for well over a decade.

    That’s why millions of Labour Party supporters (including myself) voted to leave the EU.

      1. “72% of Labour voters voted to Remain”

        Jamie: Would that be the 6 million Labour voters that we still have left?

        Or, would it be the 6 million Labour voters that we have lost since 1997?

        72% of what exactly?

        Some say that more than half of Labour supporters who voted to leave the European Union would now back other parties at a general election!

        Nevertheless, who really knows what polls are right? It’s all a bit of a mystery.

        Still; we can be fairly certain of the following……………….

        Once we leave the EU; UKIP and the SNP will start to decline (hopefully terminally).

        UKIP will have served their purpose and will become surplus to requirements.

        As for the SNP; Even if the Tory government agree to the Nats demands for a second independence referendum (which is highly unlikely), it would be very hard to imagine, that the Scottish electorate would vote for an independent Scotland out with the UK and the EU.

        Our party, the Labour Party will probably split in the near future, with much of the party’s middle class, pro EU, politically correct, liberal wing heading off to join up with their “kindred spirits” in the Liberal Democrats.

        The newly bulked up and emboldened Europhile Lib Lab Dems will probably do ok for a while, hoovering up all the diehard remain voters.

        Nevertheless, overtime it will be the Labour Party, having returned to its more traditional, Eurosceptic, working class roots; that will eventually prevail and remove the Tories from office.

        1. Andy,
          You forget to mention Kezia Dugdale will be Labour’s first woman Prime Minister. Her first appointment after eradicating world poverty will be Duncan Hothersall Ambassador to USA. You will be offered a knighthood but will no doubt refuse as you wont want to sully those dear socialist principles. And, I nearly forgot, Rangers will win the SPL.

        2. A wee heads up, Andy; the “traditional”, by which I assume you mean industrially based, trade union organised working class, doesn’t exist anymore. It was sacrificed on the altar of Westminster/Whitehall’s blind adoration of financial services within the square mile.

        3. “Once we leave the EU; UKIP and the SNP will start to decline (hopefully terminally)”

          UKIP I get but other than wishful thinking, on what do you base the assumption that Brexit will toll the SNP’s death knell?

          1. Jim

            The SNP had their big chance in 2014.

            There can’t be another Scottish independence referendum in the next few years. Say there was, and YES got it over the line 55% to 45%, all hell would break loose.

            If there ever is to be another vote, it won’t be for another 30 odd years or so.

            The SNP have hit their high water mark. How are they going to keep the momentum up, if there is not going to be another independence vote anytime soon?

            You may well believe that “indyref2” is just around the corner. I don’t. And for that reason alone; I believe that the SNP are on their way out.

    1. How is it helpful to call the SNP “discredited” and “anti democratic” when they are clearly neither of these things?
      What is the point of opposition to the SNP just for the sake of it?
      You can’t argue with the facts of how Scotland voted. The results were made available for each country and for areas within each country. No council area in Scotland voted to Leave.
      You seem unable to “respect the result” in Scotland.

    2. Your willful ignorance knows no limits.
      The more meaningless the vote the more meaningless the Union.
      The less difference the vote in Scotland makes the more meaningless the Union.

      In what universe is the EU a greater elite undemocratic power hungry sewer shafting ordinary people than the Westminster Parliament?

      Why you haven’t shifted your allegiance to UKIP yet is a total mystery. Your kind of one eyed blinked sectarian xenophobic pig ignorance is their cannon fodder.

      People like you are an embarrassment to Scotland. I hope you’re in the habit of telling folk yer North British and not Scots.

      1. Mike,

        For your own sake, do yourself a favour and calm down before you do yourself a mischief.

        All that pent up frustration and bitterness of being a full time hypernat is starting to take its toll.

        It’s hard when someone’s hopes dreams have been shattered, nevertheless, it’s best to let them go; Mike, there isn’t going to be an “indyref2”.

        The bread has been broken, the die has been cast and the cookie has already crumbled.

        Scotland voted to stay part of our beloved United Kingdom and in turn, the people of the UK (which includes you) voted to leave the European Union.

        Let it be Mike, try to remember back to a time in your life before you were brainwashed by the SNP, a time when you were a “happy go lucky” regular member of society.

        Remember Mike, we always have been and always will be, Better Together.

        1. Tumbleweed rolls silently across the thread as, stunned, the denizens try to take in what Andy has just posted ….. raucous laughter then ensues 🙂

        2. You sound exactly like somebody who jumped off a precipice repeating to himself so far so good so far so good so far so gooooooooo……………….

        3. Better in a low skills, low wage, low tax, low public services, industrially devastated Brexit Britain trying to turn itself into a northern hemisphere Singapore/Hong Kong dependent on the square mile and fiscal transfers from there to fund what’s left of the state? A state which is about to see that financial industry disappear to Paris,Hamburg, Dublin because it has lost financial passporting rights? A state going cap in hand to an incipient fascist, who aims for bilateral deals in which the U.S’s economic clout can be used to bully smaller nations, and whose health insurance companies are rubbing their hands at the prospect of getting their piggy wee hands on the N.H.S?
          Face facts, Andy, the U.K. with which you want to be better together is going down the tubes.

        4. “our beloved United Kingdom” Ahh ha ha ha ha, ahh ha ha ha ha, I can’t believe you just said that. You ARE HG Wells Time Traveller coming forward from the 1890’s!

    3. Regardless of your feelings about the EU institutions, you can’t pretend that being outside of a single trading area of 500 million people without easy access to some of the strongest and most developed economies in the world somehow don’t matter to jobs and prosperity here.

      Sheer geography alone suggests that the UK will always rely heavily on continental Europe for trade.

      In this respect you are no better than Scottish Nationalists who argue that somehow you can wish away the self-interests of the rest of the British Isles when coming to terms with any future independent Scotland.

      At least the SNP have the potential bargainning power of the nuclear weapons on the Clyde and a short term lease deal for Coulport to negotiate withe the UK Government in the 10-20 years it would take to replace the base.

      Because of NATO and France’s nuclear weapons, the UK has no such bargainning chip.

      1. I have never said that leaving the EU would be a cakewalk. However, I do believe that leaving was the only option to restore democratic sovereignty, to the people of the United Kingdom.

        I have more respect for authentic Scottish Nationalists such as Jim Sillars, who campaigned for both Scottish independence and to leave the EU. I personally do not support this position, but I do understand the logic behind it.

        Nevertheless, I am truly baffled by the “fake” Scottish independence promoted by Sturgeon and her followers.

        The majority of today’s SNP promote “plastic” independence; they want to drag Scotland out of the UK union, to then be totally submerged in the much bigger EU one! Talk about being twisted.

        In my book;

        The Europhile SNP supporters are frauds. They don’t truly believe in Scottish independence.

        The Eurosceptic SNP supporters are genuine. They truly believe in Scottish independence.

        1. The people of the UK have never had democratic sovereignty since 1707. Only the people of Scotland have sovereignty over their Parliament.
          All people like you have done is given a despotic fascist Government more control and authority over us.
          And from Scotlands perspective a foreign run Government at that.
          So all this talk of “Independence” and “Sovereignty” is utter demented and gibbering bullshit because the truth is you’re another one of these Rule Britannia xenophobic sectarian Uncle Tam “Loyalist” morons.
          This is about you being unable to develop a perspective outside of this blind blinkered “Loyalist” cringe mentality.
          I’m betting you’re Orange Lodge. Am I right Andy? Did you take your blinkered one misty eyed thinking that far?

        2. Other extremist Yoon nutjobs similar to yourself Andy in their “convictions” want to shut down the Scottish Parliament altogether and end Devolution.
          Is that where you are as well?

          What about this Andy?

          http://www.pakpassion.net/ppforum/showthread.php?256123-UKIP-Immigration-Spokesman-retweets-quot-If-you-want-a-Jihadi-for-a-neighbour-Vote-Labour-quot

          Do you feel “Better Together” with these people? Do they speak for you? Speak your language? Is this the UK you love so much Andy?

          1. “Other extremist Yoon nutjobs similar to yourself Andy in their “convictions” want to shut down the Scottish Parliament altogether and end Devolution”.

            “What about this Andy?”

            Mike,

            Tell me Mike why should a constitutional vote regarding the very existence of the Scottish Parliament not be revisited?

            If we were revisit constitutional referendums once in a generation, the 1997 Scottish devolution referendum would be up for reconfirmation or rejection around 2027.

            It would be very hypocritical for you to object to this, seeing you want another “indyref” vote every couple of years.

            If the Scottish Parliament does eventually get shut down, at the hands of the Scottish electorate, it would be a very sad day for Scotland.

            The Blame would lie squarely with the relentlessly undemocratic antics of the SNP and their brainwashed followers.

            Every action provokes a reaction.

            Extremism breeds extremism.

            The SNP have a lot to answer for. The sooner the people of Scotland kick them out the better.

            Our beloved Scotland deserves better than this.

            Much better.

        3. What does ‘democratic sovereignty’ even mean?

          There is no such thing as genuine independence in this day and age. Only America, China and Russia can make any reasonable claim to be truly independent.

          That is why the EU was set up in the first place.

          Everyone else relies on or is defined by their relationship to America, China and/or Russia.

          In terms of domestic politics goes, governments and politicians do whatever big corporations and powerful lobbyists do what they tell them to.

          The bottom line is if the European economies suffer because of Brexit, that will play into the hands of Russia because a strong European economy balances the power of Russia.

  4. I voted remain brexit is a disaster I also know your views have to be acknowledged .Also we are now preparing for indy ref 2

  5. “much welcome immigration”, didn’t you get your “controls on immigration” mug then Jamie.

  6. Labour failed to win a single Brexit concession and yet once again voted with the Tories to allow the Tories a blank cheque to negotiate.

    Why don’t you just merge with them? There isn’t anything you don’t share or cooperate on.

    1. The thing is Mike it was a UK vote. Nowhere do I see you acknowledge that. Are you calling Jeremy Corbyn a tory

      1. It was an unconstitutional vote. The constitution of the UK is the FACT that its a Parliamentary union between 2 equal Parliaments 3 equal Nations and a Province which appears to be growing a Nation status.
        That’s something the Yoon community needs to acknowledge not least of all within Scotland Wales and NI itself.
        Therefore there is no constitutional nor legitimate mandate for Scotland or NI to be taken out of the EU just a despotic assertion being imposed by a larger in population only PART of the UK.
        Stop pretending the UK is a single country IT ISNT never has been never will be.

  7. We are now being told it looks as if FM will tell PM in August that indy ref 2 will be in 18. I am a labour member voted remain on EU and Indy ref 1 . I make my own mind up on this. I have to say Alec Salmond has been great on EU in the Commons in the last few days. Agree with him or not he has been head and shoulders above everyone else. I include in that all leaders including the PM and FM

    1. Brexit means that Indyref2 is a completely different affair to indyref1. We must now vote Yes to get the ‘best of both worlds’ – retaining membership of the single market plus getting our sovereignty back – and also Scotland will be ‘Better Together’ with the rest of the EU.

  8. So Labour MSPs can choose to vote in the way that serves the best interest of Scotland, but Labour MPs from Scotland are expected to ignore the best interests of Scotland and vote the way the UK Labour Party demands?

    So Labour MPs can now only be relied upon to serve Scotland’s interests if they are willing to defy the UK party whip?

    Either the Labour Party, Scottish Branch, has to become a separate party with its MPs following the whip of the leader of the Scottish party, or it has absolutely no future north of the border.

  9. “Tell me Mike why should a constitutional vote regarding the very existence of the Scottish Parliament not be revisited?”

    Except your Yoon colleagues are not calling for a constitutional vote in Scotland on the existence of the Parliament they are calling on the UK Government to use their prerogative to close it down. But of course you knew that already you just decided to willfully gibber pure pish as usual.

    The Labour parties official position is to increase Devolution not abolish it that’s UKIPs position. You seem to be in the wrong party Andy. Everything you believe in everything you argue for is pure unadulterated UKIP not “Official” Labour policy or ideology. Mind you its difficult to know what Labour’s position is from day to day and from country to country. Labour seem to have different ideals and policies for Scotland England and Wales except for when they are in power then its all the ideals and policies directed for and from London.

    You’re the extremist Andy. Every view you have is extreme. National self determination is mainstream across the globe. Its the mainstream view of every Independent Nation on the planet. Its your view that’s out of step. Way way out of step. And before you jump in with more garbage about supporting the UKs Independence remember that the UK is not a country or a Nation its a Treaty of Union just like the EU itself nothing more.
    Only the treaty with the EU is balanced and equal whereas the treaty of the UK is unbalanced unequal despotic and criminally corrupt.
    Brexit has proved that beyond all argument and contradiction.

  10. The EU is run by the Council of Ministers which is made up of members states of sovereign nation states.

    In the Council, government ministers from each EU country meet to vote on laws by qualified majority or each country has a veto.

    In what way is that not democratic?

    We held a vote to leave and a majority voted to leave. At no point did the EU have any say in this voting process.

    Therefore the UK was, is and always has been democratic while being an EU member.

    The UK were, have and always will be sovereign and will exercise that sovereignty while being a member of the EU when we trigger Article 50 to leave.

    We share decision-making as part of the EU but that doesn’t mean to say we aren’t sovereign.

    By your logic that means the UK has to withdraw from NATO too.

    It is also a supranational organisation where we share decision-making power.

  11. Come and oppose Brexit: Show your support for the EU
    Where: outside Perth Concert Hall
    When: Sunday 26 Feb, 12-2pm
    Why: Jeremy Corbyn is addressing the Scottish Labour Party Conference. We want proper opposition to Brexit.
    All political parties welcome and none.
    Interested?: Email perth4europe@gmail.com
    If you play an instrument (anything – fiddle, euphonium, kazoo) bring it along and join an enthusiastic rendition of ‘Ode to Joy’ starting on B
    (http://abcnotation.com/tunePage…)

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