Who Can Hold a Referendum?

Amending the Scotland Act. What About the Claim of Right? and How Do We Leave This Voluntary Union? These are the four topics under discussion in this episode. Yes Glasgow South Side shared their zoom Q+A event with Professor Aileen McHarg, Prof of Public Law at Durham University. We’ve taken selected questions from that event and spliced them together with clips from the Westminster Opposition Day debate on the topic of what next for Scotland’s Future.

A distillation of the analysis presented about the Sturgeon era by Independence Captured over the last year. It argues that whoever wins the day in the SNP leadership contest inherits weak foundations and immediate challenges, in large part thanks to the outgoing administration.

https://jonathonshafi.substack.com/p/whoever-wins-will-inherit-weak-foundations?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

A poverty gap is opening between England and Scotland, in particular in child poverty rates, according to a new report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. In its annual report: “UK Poverty 2023: The essential guide to understanding poverty in the UK”, the charity reports that rates of child poverty are diverging between the two countries. 

ALBA Depute Leader and fair energy prices campaigner Kenny MacAskill MP has obtained new figures from the UK Government which show that Scotland, with almost 1 in 5 domestic properties, has the highest number of households off the gas grid, of any of the home nations.  In addition, the figures reveal that the areas which are most affected in Scotland also have the highest levels of fuel poverty. 

It has now been almost seven years since the UK voted to leave the European Union and three years since the UK left the EU in direct conflict with the stated democratic will of the Scottish people. The Scottish electorate was ignored and Scotland was ripped from the European community against what has now been proven to have been Scotland’s better judgement. 

When Shell announced the biggest profits in its history – £32.2 billion pounds for 2022 on Thursday – the BBC morning news flagship, the ‘Today’ programme gave listeners misleading information about how much tax it is paying in the UK compared to other countries.