Labour leapt into Brexit's fires - and now the party is burning

[Denzil_DC]

29. I've had to knock this myth down before. Sorry, your first argument is just nonsense.

Sadly, the election night hack wiped out part of my journal so I can't refer back to that. So, instead, I'll direct you to this authoritative post from Scottish blog Wings Over Scotland (sources at the link, too long to paste here):

Why Labour doesn’t need Scotland

...

– on ONE occasion (1964) Scottish MPs have turned what would have been a Conservative government into a Labour one. The Tory majority without Scottish votes would have been just one MP (280 vs 279), and as such useless in practice. The Labour government, with an almost equally feeble majority of 4, lasted just 18 months and a Tory one would probably have collapsed even faster.

– on ONE occasion (the second of the two 1974 elections) Scottish MPs gave Labour a wafer-thin majority (319 vs 316) they wouldn’t have had from the rest of the UK alone, although they’d still have been the largest party and able to command a majority in a pact with the Liberals, as they eventually did in reality.

– and on ONE occasion (2010) the presence of Scottish MPs has deprived the Conservatives of an outright majority, although the Conservatives ended up in control of the government anyway in coalition with the Lib Dems when Labour refused to co-operate with other parties in a “rainbow alliance”.

– which means that for 65 of the last 67 years, Scottish MPs as an entity have had no practical influence over the composition of the UK government.

http://wingsoverscotland.com/why-labour-doesnt-need-scotland/

Now, having dispensed with that argument: Why does it matter to you so much? I mean, it's touching to see you so concerned about our welfare in Scotland that you feel "Scotland needs a REAL opposition". But you don't live here, so what's it to you? I don't obsess about how you're doing in Canada and what would work best in your political system, because you seem to be doing OK generally and it's not much of my business because you're generally well-behaved on the world scene.

I'd agree - hell, I'm pretty sure Sturgeon and the rest of the SNP would agree - that a "REAL opposition" would be nice.

That would be one that doesn't just waste everybody's time (and invariably fall flat on its collective face) at First Minister's Questions every week trying to score petty points against Sturgeon on spurious evidence while offering no solutions to any problems that actually affect the people of Scotland in Holyrood's committees etc. It would be one that comes up with some constructive input on the issues we face now and then, rather than just timeserving and waiting for the SNP to fail (imagine Waiting for Godot set in an ornate hypermarket decked with flashy desks, only the performance goes on for ever).

It would also be one that isn't hampered by ties to a UK national party, because that's always going to lead to irreconcilable friction and contradictions in terms of policy, since we're fed up of the compromises accommodating what the rest of the UK will wear politically, and that's a sentiment that's been growing for years.

"Devo Max" is a dead duck. It was looking very poorly the morning after the first indyref, when Cameron sprang EVEL as a wake-up call, then was finally smothered in committee when Labour voted against any measure that would have given Scotland meaningful control over the levers it needs to function coherently as a polity. Last I heard, Gordon Brown had escaped again, and was again offering his same old tired solution along "Devo Max" lines that next to nobody takes seriously any more because most of our heads don't button up the back. We were bitten. We won't forget.

As for your utter ignorant trite bilge about "the SNP's cuts" and the Greens, you've just convinced me that I need to take a good look at my life before I waste any more time arguing with you.

You evidently know sod all about Scotland, including what powers are devolved and what aren't (a.k.a. reserved powers - hint, that's where the fucking cuts have come from, and we've - that is, through our elected government's initiatives - paid dearly to mitigate a number of them, often against Labour opposition; yeah, they can mobilize their idle arses then, right enough), how much else the Scottish government's had to do to counter Westminster's austerity policies, how socially progressive a number of its operational policies are, or just about anything else about the whole political dynamic and life for those of us who actually live in Scotland on which you've ventured an opinion.

You're as ridiculously out of touch with what's going on in Scotland as Corbyn is. Unlike him, you're not being paid to supposedly know about this stuff, granted, but I probably shouldn't be surprised as it seems like you sip from the same cup of misinformation.