Ferry fares

Can anyone reconcile the calls by MSP and MP for CalMac to use some of their £6m marketing budget to fund a Lochboisdale-Mallaig ferry

with

the total unquestioning acceptance of the £2.7m (or £1.3m or whatever) cut in commercial RET fares for the whole of the Western Isles?

Could it be down to the Barra hauliers kicking some backsides?

Moral dilemma

If the consumption of alcohol is such a problem that we have to introduce minimum alcohol pricing to impose the health benefits on the public in Scotland; then why is it acceptable to triumph the growth of sales of our national poison of choice - whisky - to China?

Tax avoidance and tax reduction

Jim McColl, boss of Clyde Blowers, was extensively quoted by the Scottish Government in the
proposal vacuous nonsense that passed for a policy paper on Scottish Corporation Tax.


The STUC rather entertainingly take the paper apart for it's generalities and false citations of the output of right wing American think tanks being described as by "The World Bank".

Mr McColl is on the radio tomorrow am defending his position; which I think needs more examination.

a Scottish business leader

Mr McColl lives in Monaco, making McColl a Monegasque businessman who owns a Scottish business.

Mr McColl - who is one of Scotland's richest men - also hit out at critics who have described him as a tax exile over his decision to base himself in Monaco. 

The Clyde Blowers chief, whose personal worth has been estimated by the Sunday Times Rich List at £570m, said: "For a start I think 'tax exile' is an emotive phrase - I don't think it is a fair phrase to use. 

 Is the phrase "legal tax dodger" less emotive?  His choice of residence means that he pays no personal income tax on the dividends he receives from the company, and were he to sell the company then he would pay no capital gains tax in the UK or in Monaco.  (See also Philip Green and Lord Ashcroft [Belize])

But I would say about most of the people who criticise this - I probably contribute more to the economic benefit of the UK and Scotland in a year than they do in a lifetime

I think he might find that his employees contribute more to the economy, albeit under his guidance, but the difference is that his employees have no option but to pay all their taxes in the UK; whilst he can swan off and avoid contributing his fair share to schools and hospitals.

"So, I am very focused on investing in Scotland and passionate about Scotland."

If that's really the case then he can set an example and confirm that if Scotland ever got control over it's own tax system, then he will tax up tax residence in Scotland and pay taxes on all his worldwide income in Scotland.

The Scottish Government meantime, could promise to crack down on this kind of tax dodge.  Compare the situation to Stagecoach this week, where Souter is UK resident and pays full UK taxes on his obscene income.

You see, McColl's position is based solely on one simple five letter word - G-R-E-E-D.  Reduce my tax bill, and I'll earn more tax-free; far, far away.

Multiculturalism

I've just watched Sky discussing David Cameron's assertion that state multiculturalism has failed.

The English Defence League (sic) are marching through Luton today in an attempt to stir up racial hatred, so they cut to an interview with the two Labour MPs for Luton.

Cue outrage about Cameron's speech.

The presenter then - quite rightly - asked them as simple question: "Do you believe that all cultures are equal?"

Both MPs (and I paraphrase) then waffled endlessly around the subject, saying how complex it was, and how we had welcome the Hugenots, and why it can't be boiled down to a simple yes or no.  But, probably, perhaps, if you aren't upset by what I say, then maybe they are or they aren't, but I wouldn't like to commit.

What a disgrace they are to their constituents and the wider public by pandering to the racist elements in the EDL and by being unable to recognise or speak a simple truth about humankind.

Peter Mandelson - an apology

I've been sitting by the pool reading the latest extracts from the marvelous autobiographical hagiography of Lord Mandelson.

I really had failed to realise just how clever, intelligent, witty, prudent, economically aware and politically sensitive he was, until he modestly laid out his innumerable achievements in graphic detail for us all to look at and appreciate the sheer scale of his polymath abilities.

He really was so wonderful in being able to make all the right calls on every single issue of substance over the past 50 year or so, and it is a pity that he was so badly let down by those pygmies who grasped at any political office for personal aggrandisement, rather than the good of the country.

If only the Prime Minister had listened to him at every opportunity, then nothing would ever have gone wrong, anywhere, at any time.

Where the Labour Party went awry was in not appreciating his many skills and putting them to good use by giving him more control over the levers of power that he would have wielded so magnificently - with hindsight.

It is unfortunate that he was not given the third opportunity to resign from the Cabinet for misleading his colleagues and for financial irregularities and compromising his position with those who could have exploited these opportunities. But they were all honourable men, and wouldn't have done such a thing to a prominent politician on the make.

Peter is absolutely right to expose the division at the heart of Labour and how the main protagonists despised and insulted each other; and every time he highlights the lies he decided he had to tell, the misleading impressions he knew that he had to portray, the duplicity he had to promote to try to keep the truth from being exposed, then the more we realise that here was an honourable man caught up in untruths of his own creation who knows absolutely that he could should have been a leader of the Government in whom we could place our trust.

The Kings are dead - knifed in the back by this book. Long live King Peter I. He'll get my vote at the next election.

NIMBY's have your say.....

It only took a few minutes before some of those who opposed all the Lewis wind turbines removed their heads from their derrierres and looked out to sea, to look at the possible site of the offshore wind power they supported*.  Until this week.

Complete the following sentence

I really support renewable energy and think it is a good thing, but we don't need onshore wind power, when the real resource is at sea......

The site lies on the ley lines between my house and the grant giving departments in the Scottish Government.  My plans for mass producing Gaelic surfing gnomes will bring jobs, prosperity, tourists, a Gaelic language plan for surfing gnomes and the value of my house will all be affected if the turbines are erected and I don't get my grant.

Further submissions welcome.....

* Those who genuinely and sincerely opposed the plans have my respect.  They are and were, however, the minority.

Is there a cupboard in the White House in which the Council keeps the Councillors who are a danger to democracy?

Has one escaped the armed guards, scaled the barbed wire and shrugged off the straight jacket and gag, only to let let rip with the kind of comment which will have the Press Officer banging his head off the desk, and the lawyers writing suicide notes?

In the great spirit of the democratic system, public and civic responsibility and the maturity to make a decision based on the facts, ones understanding of the circumstances: and all tempered with the nuances of beliefs, public interest and a sense of judgement; the ability to ditch all of those and drop you colleagues into an expensive and embarrassing position whilst trying to avoid taking any kind of stance takes some doing.

Step forward Cllr Murdo MacLeod to receive the Arse-from-Elbow award for ludicrous decision avoiding.  The prize is a large pair of pliers to remove the splinters from the fence from your backside.

Unwilling to take a stand either for or against the application for a Sunday licence at Stornoway Golf Club, in true fashion he praised both sides and feigned an inability to come to a conclusion so as to try to offend no-one.

"This is not a cop out.  I have to abstain."

Hear that noise?  It's the bullshit detectors exploding.

You never HAVE to abstain, unless he is implying some kind of conflict of interest that he didn't declare.  Just what was the position of the Free Church of which he is a Deacon?  Should he perhaps have declared an interest and not participated?

He conceded that the club would be "highly likely" to win an appeal.

WTF?  He is pretty sure that the Licencing Board are taking the wrong decision, yet he allows the decision to go the 'wrong' way and encourages an appeal that he thinks the applicants will win.  Oh yes, and we the public will pick up the tab of perhaps £15,000 in that event.  But that's not important enough to take a stand about?

Now imagine the appeal by the Golf Club, and the Board having to write their defence of the decision.  Just how will Cllr MacLeod defend his view that the Board were wrong and their decision should be overturned, yet not feeling any obligation to prevent a waste of people's time, energy and money on something that he thinks was "highly likely" to be wrong.  And how will his colleagues on the Board appreciate him undermining them?

Of course, he has form in this area.  As a vocal and highly public opponent of Sunday transport to the islands, he was previously caught taking a secretive private Sunday flight on a Council sponsored trip to the US to go and see some tourist sights.  And let's not mention using another Councillors pin number to access executive lounges, so other Councillors could get the free booze.

Time to close that door again and double the guards.

Bells and balls

Somewhat amusingly, the RSPB are requesting that cats have bells put on their collars to alert the corncrakes (right) and stop them being killed by the domesticated moggies of the Western Isles.

I like wild birds as much as the next man, and roast pigeon is one of my favourite dishes, but the developing attempt by the RSPB to effectively designate the whole of the UK as a nature reserve goes beyond the rational and into the dominating and obsessive.

Although there is obviously a need to protect our wildlife, when offered the chance to enforce a permanent ban without cost on commercial shooting on the hunting estates in Lewis, the RSPB declined to get take up such an opportunity and refused to get into a debate about the subject.

Why on earth could that be? What double standards could be being applied here?

I think we should ask their Patron (below), seen caring for the wildlife on one of her estates.

Scottish Football Team

When researching the previous post, I found a whole host of SNP press releases and news stories about the Olympics and a Scottish football team:

21/12/08: Scottish Sports Minister Stewart Maxwell has given the SFA his full backing over their opposition to a GB team at the London 2012 Olympics as Gordon Brown continues his efforts to force a GB football team.

10/3/09: The cut and shut creation of a GB side would endanger Scotland’s long term ability to compete in international football, and the UK government must ditch their crazy proposals and look at ways in which the situation can be resolved.

We must allow no precedent that could be used against us in the future, and no reason or argument given by those who seek to change the status quo has addressed that.

11/11/05: The Scottish National Party has called for a Scottish football team to be given "a shot" at the London Olympics.

Then I found a photo (thanks to The Steamie)..... just who do you think is a member of the GB Football Team, albeit the Parliamentary one?


You might have to squint a bit, or enlarge the photo, and look to the person fourth from the left at the back, unusually hiding themselves and not sending hourly press releases to the Gazette is our MP, Angus MacNeil.

Remember that phrase from Pete Wishart MP, "We must allow no precedent that could be used against us in the future"? Oh dear, oh dear!

Where the Sun don't shine.....

It's not often I feel a modicum of pity for Gordon Brown, but I feel myself strangely angry at The Sun, and it's manipulation of a greiving mother.

We all sometimes suffer from word-blindness, where you misread a word. I suppose it is a very mild sort of dyslexia, but one that tends to imprint the wrong word onto your consciousness.

Is the Chancellor Alastair, Alasdair or Alistair Darling? Why do people insist on spelling my surname with an H? At the PLI into the Eishken wind farm I read the wrong name out from the statement I wrote by myself, and made a bit of an ar$e of myself.

But to attempt to pillory a disabled person (for that is what he is!) for not being able to write neatly and for some spelling mistakes is a nasty and spiteful piece which reflects badly on the newspaper and the lady involved.

The secret tape-recording of the subsequent phone call smells more of an entrapment by The Sun to further their own political agenda, rather than making a truly serious political point.

This will, I suspect, backfire on both the genuine campaign to support the soldiers and on the attempts to demonstrate the general incompetence of Mr Brown. If anything this series of articles will strengthen Brown's position and gain him a substantial sympathy vote.

Berlusconi backs Blair for EU job

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has endorsed Tony Blair as his preferred candidate to be president of the European Union.

One is a right-wing millionaire megalomaniac within Messianic self-belief who destroyed the economy of his country, and the other is Prime Minister of Italy.

As you're judged by the company you keep then you can already see where the EU is going.

Is there nothing Tony won't do for a large wedge of cash?

Sunday working

Good to see that the Sunday (non-)working policy of the Council has been abandoned again.

Martins Memorial Church are meeting in Stornoway Primary this week (and last?) and presumably the building will open itself and there will be no need for a caretaker to work on Sunday moving chairs and then moving them back before the kids arrive on Sunday Monday morning*.

No doubt this fits perfectly with the definition of "essential" or as "an act of mercy".

However, as a debate on the opening of the Sports Centre on a Sunday is banned by those who want consultation on everything but that which they want to prevent, it seems more an "act of hypocrisy".

Perhaps someone can tell me where and when the Council sanctioned the employment of staff at the Primary on a Sunday?

Update 19/7: * Yes, I know that the kids are on holiday, but the use of the Primary by the Church is going to continue well into the new school year.