Ahead of Nicola Sturgeon's statement today, it may be useful to go over what a "Section 30" actually is, because the media usually get it completely wrong.

Section 30 refers to part of the Scotland Act (the act that defines devolution) that covers "Legislative Competence". Section 30 is specifically in place to enable the temporary transfer of powers to the Scottish Parliament that are usually outwith it's competence (or "ultra vires" in legal parlance meaning "beyond the powers"), or to temporarily remove powers already in its competence.

Goodness me, he's going for broke here.

Okay, let's unpack this one:

https://twitter.com/B_HQ/status/1497133024714055692?s=20&t=suK8g6BukZ-fF3XgALe1Ww

"in return for currency/trade access etc"

If he's referring to using GBP, then there's nothing UK Gov can do to *stop* Scotland using it . It's a fully tradeable currency.

We should have our own currency though.

Trade access? He needs to look up "most favoured nation".

I said yesterday that this article was the biggest pile of horseshit I'd ever read.

Allow me to explain why. Thread:

https://twitter.com/bowgroup/status/1496037902773534723

The article is a series of quotes from Ben Harris-Quinney, chair of the Bow Group, a conservative "think tank". The Express refer to him as "a political expert".

It starts by comparing Scotland's "debt" to Greece - a hysterical (and inaccurate) comparison popular with unionists.

I've seen a lot of experts expressing surprise that Russia hasn't been able to cut Ukraine off the internet or stop videos getting out.

I think I have the explanation.

Ukraine is the largest exporter of IT services in Europe.

It's internet speed is eighth in the world. It has five national providers for fixed line data links, and five (different) national providers for mobile data.

And they have a 2,000km border with a hostile neighbour and saw what happened to Crimea.

Fair to say their communications network is probably extremely robust.

But today I read that the UK government is pushing nuclear as a "solution" for climate change. They want to increase nuclear generation from the present ~16% of output to 25%.

Allow me a short thread on how this is f**king insane. First of all, it's one of the most expensive forms of power generation. It only appears "cheap" because of the ludicrous subsidies that it has been given by UK Gov for over sixty years, It is *anything* but "cheap".

How the corporate polluter scam works:

The UK government gives oil and gas companies a tax credit for decommissioning old rigs. UK gov currently covers about 50% of the decommissioning costs. EXCEPT... ... that the costs are essentially charged to Scotland's "budget".

Since ~95% of the oil and ~60% of the natural gas are produced in Scottish waters, the decommissioning costs are attributed to Scotland, despite UK collecting tax revenues for over 40 years.

The rank hypocrisy of this.

The Tories slashed corporation tax for fossil fuel producers, charged it to Scotland's budget, and continue to charge Scottish renewable energy producers SIXTEEN TIMES the grid transmission charges in England and Wales.

https://twitter.com/10DowningStreet/status/1453026346020446211?s=20

Background:

In 2016, the UK government cut Petroleum Revenue tax to 0%, and the Supplemental Charge tax on fossil fuel corporation profits from 20% to 10%.

A short thread on why I'm a big fan of Francis Coppola, and why - if you're an indy supporter - you *need* to listen to her.

1. She's trying to change the world, for the better.

2. She's absolutely right, about *almost* everything.

3. She's much smarter than you. Get over it. 4. You will learn more from her Twitter feed in a month than you will in a year of studying economic text books (yes, I can attest to that).

5. She doesn't take shit, from anybody.

6. She speaks truth to power, always. Even if it's uncomfortable.

Scotland is at a crossroads. We're on the cusp of a 2nd energy boom far greater than oil was in the 1970's. Scotland has the potential to *own* most of northern Europe's renewable energy generation - but only if we're *allowed* to.

Westminster can't afford that. Westminster politically cannot afford a Scotland that powers the rest of the UK. If that were to happen, the entire "you're too poor" narrative falls to pieces.

And the "You're too poor" narrative is what allowed Britain to plunder one-third of the globe for its own benefit.

So... a bit of a rant because I need to get this out, but also to make a point about economics.

A couple of weeks ago I had this guy (a unionist troll) harass *the shit* out of my about "how many ships will be built in an independent Scotland". And when I say harass, I mean it. He literally camped out on my Twitter posting the same question over and over and over again.

His argument was (and is) that the British government will *never* contract building a warship to another country.

A thought thread on independence, Alba, and the SNP:

(Please note that this is just a thinking exercise, please let's not bring the Holy Wars to it. But I welcome considered feedback). Something I've been thinking a lot about lately:

1. You have a revolution, and you win.
2. And then what?

Good to see the FCA finally get serious in dealing with rogue banks and bringing actual criminal charges instead of imposing a paltry fine.

Still, I predict that absolutely nobody will go to jail.
thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/… This is the problem worldwide; money talks, bankers walk.

Until bankers start getting jail time for their crimes, there is absolutely no incentive for banks to change their culture.

I think there's still a misconception about what the Section 30 in 2014 was actually about, so I'll try to clear that up.

In 2014, the Scottish Parliament didn't actually have the power to call elections or referendums. Elections in Scotland were held under UK law. So the Section 30 "granted" in 2014 was actually to empower the Scottish Parliament to pass legislation required to hold a vote. It wasn't "You're allowed to have a vote" (that was the Edinburgh Agreement), it was "Here's the power you need to actually call a vote".

I'm watching Apollo 13.

Because despite upsets, accidents and differences, humans can achieve truly *astounding* things.

As long as we all work together towards one goal. I love the Apollo 13 story because it was "a successful failure".

The entire Apollo program was a near-miraculous achievement and remains the pinnacle of human achievement (IMHO) to this day.

But 13 stands out because it was unscripted, unplanned. It was the best of everybody.

How different it is from 2014.

Back then, most of England thought that we had gone absolutely mad. I know, I lived in England back then.

Now most of England is looking on in envy, trying to decide whether to encourage us to leave or beg us to stay.

Interesting times. For most of us in the Yes movement, 2014 was a massively positive experience and a watershed in politics - despite the obvious disappointment at the outcome.

For most people in England at the time, it was a remote possibility in a remote land.

But now it's all too real.

So I have some thoughts on this.

There's video of police officers *opening* barriers to let the "protesters" through - and yep , holy fuck, I want to know what was going on there! BUT...

Once they got into the building, why didn't the police use deadly force? I'll tell you why. There's two parts to this. The first is police tactics. They were up against a large armed mob, and aside from shouting at people and waving some guns, there really wasn't a whole lot that they could do. Start shooting people?

I've been reflecting on yesterday's events and how the Scottish independence movement conducts itself.

For a long time I've warned against factionalism and how the British state will exploit that to divide us. But yesterday's events have really brought that to the fore. I didn't think that it was possible for Trump to have done the things that he has done. I credited the American people with far more sense than that.

But it really happened, and we need to draw lessons from it.

I've been thinking a lot about democracy these last 12 hours.

Americans have a proud history of defending democracy and taking up arms against oppressive regimes. But that is not what happened today.

What happened was a demagogue-incited insurrection. I don't blame the people on the ground - except to say that they were misled and likely gullible - but real blame lays with a President who lied to get into office, lied all the way through his office, and is trying to prevent his democratic removal from office by lying even more

I found the footage of the woman who was shot in the capitol building. I'm not sharing it.

Regardless of her political beliefs, she didn't get up this morning thinking that today would be her last day on Earth. Neither did the 3 others who died as a result of today's events. Their blood is on Trump's hands. He misled them, he incited them, and he sent them to the Capitol.

That young woman probably thought that she was defending democracy. She gave her life for it. That is normally commendable. But she was lied to.

She died because Trump lied.

An important thread on #COVID19, #PPE, and what I and my not-for-profit ayeMail are going to do to help.

This is for everybody. ❤️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Over the past few weeks I've been horrified by stories of the lack of PPE in the NHS, care homes, and for home carers.

I'm equally horrified by the sky-rocketing prices of essential life-saving equipment, with many companies cashing in.

So I decided to do something about it.

Wading through the @WingsScotland donor database crunching the numbers to dispatch perks (easy tiger, they haven't even been made yet, so won't ship for another month!) and I was feeling nostalgic.

THIS is the *ENTIRE* perk mailing from 2014. This is JUST the Notepad perks we dispatched in 2018. There was another two pallets loaded with the *other* perks sent out shortly after.