"A senior judge has granted Scottish Trans permission to act as third-party ‘public interest interveners’, which means that they can submit written evidence to the court about why they believe that the UK Government’s reasons for blocking the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill are wrong or inadequate."
Really scraping the bottom of the barrel with this noo. Crying about wellies for inspections while yer man Sunak is roaring about in a private jet, giving 4k a day to the UKIP supporters who own Portland Port, 20k a day to slaveowner founded Bibby Marine.
"A book about Marxism and 21 copies of "How to run a government so that citizens benefit and taxpayers don't go crazy" were also purchased."
"The First Minister was responding to recommendations in a report from Dr Calum MacLeod, who in a paper published on Thursday said a 3000-hectare trigger for public interest tests on Scottish land sales should be cut to just 500 hectares.
Mercedes Villalba, a Labour MSP for the North East, has also called for a 500-hectare limit, calling the Government’s proposed 3000-hectare trigger “timid”."
"Delivery of nuclear reactors to power a new fleet of Trident submarines on the Clyde has been branded as “unachievable” for the second year running by a UK Government watchdog.
The Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) has given a £3.7 billion reactor-building project run by Rolls Royce for the Ministry of Defence (MoD) a “red” rating for 2022-23"
"We need #collectivist solutions to this problem, not punitive individualist ones. The only way I believe that fighting #ClimateChange is a realistic possibility is if we work at serious scale in a coordinated way. The rest is just unrealistic, the appearance of doing things rather than a plan to get them done"
"the limited heating installation we did cost well over the average total savings of a UK household. An air source heat pump would have cost us more. This is painfully expensive stuff to do. If your only tool for getting people to do it is a stick, you need to do a lot of beating... Bullying people into doing the right thing if the right thing is outside their envelope of affordability is just bullying" – Robin McAlpine
"about 40 per cent of our total domestic heat load in Scotland is lost in heat waste from houses not insulated to an acceptable standard... reducing our reliance on ‘dirty heat’ in our homes is crucial given that it is the fourth biggest source of emissions" – Robin McAlpine
In contrast, Common Weal (policy & research head @thecommongreen) propose collectivist - state rather than individual - infrastructure policies & approaches such as district heating.👌
(And the whole renewable energy market is another libertarian “free market” clusterfuck…)
Scottish Greens MSP Ross Greer
“Any party that claims to care about Scottish democracy must oppose this outrageous power grab. Only independence will protect us from these relentless attacks.”
Amendment to Levelling Up Bill contains powers to over-ride Scottish Parliament.
While we're all incensed about Keir Starmer's U-turn on the 2-child limit... Child benefit is reserved to Westminster so Scot.gov cannot change it but the SNP brought in the Scottish Child Payment to try and offset it.
Posting this because I have seen the odd #Labour person on social media saying Scot.gov have the power to scrap it (they don't), like this is some kinda gotcha (it isn't).
Where are the women? Nearly 500 women are 'missing' from key positions of power in Scotland 👇
In a new report: ‘Sex & Power in Scotland 2023’ published today, Engender charts the number of women in key decision-making positions and highlights the significant void that exists in women’s representation and distribution of power in Scotland.
The deep-seated strength of feeling about just how awful the two-child benefits cap and #RapeClause are, and just how many children and families in Scotland it affects, gave cause for a few #ScotPol folk to share and re-watch powerful speeches on it from #Holyrood.
Story on how some Conservatives are lobbying the Home Office and Downing St to house migrants & #asylumseekers in 'remote Scottish islands', if can't send them to Rwanda.
I mean, where to start??
– 'Remote.' Sigh. Remote from where?
– Islands not equivalent to Rwanda.
– Some have already welcomed refugee families.
– Have the #Tories read about housing availability (crisis) in islands? Will they try to build something? (Ferries? Weather? Permission?) #ScotPol#Scotland https://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2023/07/16/operation-gloves-off/
"The MP who records the highest hours outside their work as a backbench MP is Douglas Ross, the leader of the Conservatives in the Scottish Parliament.
He recorded working 3,869 hours on top of his role as an MP: 3,739 hours as an MSP, 89 hours for the Scottish Football Association as a referee, and the rest refereeing in other roles."
It's maddening that this is the thing the SNP found over the line. MacNeil has run over a 17 yr old, had an affair with a journo and put the hotel bills on his expenses, got two teenagers drunk and tried having sex with them while his wife was in hospital giving birth (!) and probably much more we don't know about.
"Angus MacNeil has been suspended from the SNP after not taking up an offer to rejoin the party's Westminster group."
If you've seen the screaming "Scottish" Daily Express headline about baby boxes today. Here is the actual paper where they associate the programme with a small decrease in smoking and a small increase in breastfeeding. Cherrypicking one thing that needs more work is a deliberate tactic of right-wing newspapers.
"Mechanisms mediating these effects... require further investigation."
Scottish Government calls for decriminalisation of drugs for personal use and for supervised drug consumption rooms.
"We want to create a society where problematic drug use is treated as a health, not a criminal matter, reducing stigma and discrimination and enabling the person to recover and contribute positively to society." - @scotgov Minister Elena Whitham.
@scotgov
The #ScotPol reactions to the Scottish Government's calls for #drugs law reforms today are rather lively over on Twitter 🔥
🔵 Scottish Tories are raging in their opposition, one calling it "madness", some knowingly or unknowingly mixing up legalisation with decriminalisation.
🔴 Scottish/UK Labour are divided in views. Mostly against it. Some MSPs support it.
🟡 Scottish Lib Dems are open to, even supportive of drug law reform, but want ScotGov to do much more on drug deaths.
"A Scottish Labour peer told Parliament that officials in the Treasury and the Office of the Advocate General of Scotland were to look into cash spent working on Scottish independence – an area reserved to Westminster.
However, it is understood this is not the case."
Wild that everyone reported this as fact without checking if Foulkes just made it up.