Workers' Liberty

In a television interview on Sunday 4 May Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander suggested she was in favour of an early referendum on Scottish independence — “Bring it on!” was the expression she used. Later Alexander said she wanted a referendum during the next twelve months and that Gordon Brown backed her position.

At the time of going to press, 1,200 members of Amicus/Unite employed at Grangemouth oil refinery are due to begin 48 hours of strike action at 6.00am on Sunday 27 April – the first strike in a British oil refinery since 1935.

In mid-December of last year Tommy Sheridan, former Scottish Parliament member and leader of the Scottish Socialist Party was arrested and charged with perjury.

In 2006, after the News of the World had carried articles alleging that he had engaged in extra-marital affairs and visited a swingers’ club in Manchester, Sheridan took the newspaper to court and was awarded £200,000 in damages after the jury found in his favour.

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According to SNP leader and Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond, Scotland will be independent by 2017.

Salmond’s claim follows earlier SNP predictions which came and went but left the Union unscathed. The SNP’s best known prognostication was its slogan of the early 1990s: “Scotland Free by 93.” As the then Scottish Labour Party leader, Donald Dewar, commented in a rare moment of humour: “It’s a good slogan. It rhymes, and they can revive it every ten years.”

Around 150 delegates and members turned up to the Scottish Socialist Party’s 2007 annual conference, held in Dundee last Sunday (21 October).

The 23 October edition of the Daily Mail featured a rant by the odious High Tory Max Hastings, the boldface of the title screaming “How much longer will we put up with the Scots spending so much of our money?”

Kelvin branch of the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) has submitted a motion to the 2007 SSP conference calling on the party to support the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign and its campaign for a boycott of Israel. Unremarkable? Not when you know about the SPSC.

Just nineteen motions have been submitted for the 2007 annual conference of the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP), being held in Dundee on 21 October.

Just nineteen motions have been submitted for the 2007 annual conference of the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP), being held in Dundee on 21 October. Four of the motions have been submitted by the party’s Executive Committee. The Republican Communist Network (RCN) platform in the SSP and the SSP Assistant Secretary (website) have each submitted one motion.

£581,000. That was Sir George Mathewson’s annual salary as chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) when he stood down from the post in 2006. As RBS chairman, Mathewson also enjoyed the benefit of one-off bonus payments – such as the £2.5 millions he was paid after the RBS’s takeover of the NatWest bank in 2000 (a bonus dismissed by Mathewson as something which “would not give you bragging power in a Soho wine bar.”)

In the Scottish Parliamentary elections held in May this year the Scottish National Party emerged, albeit by the narrowest of margins, as the biggest single faction within the Scottish Parliament.

In the Scottish Parliamentary elections held in May this year the Scottish National Party emerged, albeit by the narrowest of margins, as the biggest single faction within the Scottish Parliament.

By Stan Crooke

The Scottish National Party (SNP) is a bourgeois political party committed to the achievement of an independent capitalist Scotland. And it does not pretend to be anything other than that.

For our last postal workers' bulletin, see here.

The last three days have seen thousands of postal workers across Scotland walk out on unofficial strike in solidarity with victimised colleagues, and the strikes have now apparently spread to a number of cities in northern England.

By Maria Exall

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the leader of Scotland’s Catholic church, has made an unprecedented threat to Catholic politicians: support the church’s position on abortion or face excommunication. While Catholic intervention on the issue of abortion is par for the course, such a direct intervention is a new departure. What has caused this outbreak of “political Catholicism”?

by Stan Crooke

In the 3 May elections for the Scottish Parliament, the Scottish National Party (SNP) emerged as the largest party. It looks likely to form a minority administration.

The Scottish Socialist Party (SSP), within which Scottish supporters of Solidarity and Workers’ Liberty are active, did very badly on 3 May.

Its vote went down from 128,000 in 2003 to 12,731 this year, and it lost all its seats in the Scottish Parliament.

AGAINST AN SNP GOVERNMENT

The SSP must be clear that the likely Scottish National Party (SNP) government, pro-capitalist and pro-independence, is no advance on a pro-capitalist and pro-Union Labour (or Labour/Lib-Dem) government. As the SSP has pointed out, "the SNPÅfs increasingly pro-business vision of an independent Scotland... promises hundreds of millions of pounds in corporate tax cuts to big business. This could only be achieved by plundering our public services".

The Labour Party has “no moral authority left to govern Scotland, Scotland has chosen a new political path,” said Scottish National Party (SNP) leader Alex Salmond after the final results from last Thursday’s Scottish Parliament elections had been announced.

“Bad result in those elections a week ago? Nothing to do with us, guv. It’s all the fault of that bloke over there. You know the one I mean - the one with the dodgy sun tan. Real chancer, that geezer. Gets people like us a bad name.”

The Scottish Socialist Party has been using its campaign for the 3 May Scottish Parliament and local elections to win back some of the ground lost when Tommy Sheridan split to form his personality-oriented “Solidarity” group last year.

Below is a press release from RMT revealing that the Scottish National Party (SNP) has dropped its previous policy in support of rail renationalisation after ... getting big bucks from private rail owners.

According to the polls, the Scottish National Party is likely to become the biggest party in the Scottish parliament after the election on 3 May.

By Keir Lawson, Glasgow SSP and Scottish Socialist Youth student organiser

The Scottish Socialist Party is currently in the midst of campaigning for both councillors and MSPs in the upcoming Scottish elections.

Unlike Tommy Sheridan’s Solidarity, the SSP is standing on an explicitly socialist platform, while emphasising our key demands of free public transport for all, scrapping the council tax and opposition to the occupation of Iraq.

RMT escalates Signal workers strike in Scotland

MORE THAN 400 RMT signallers working for Network Rail in Scotland are to hold two further 48-hour strikes over the company's continued failure to implement the 35-hour week agreement signed last summer.

By Stan Crooke

In November of last year the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign (SPSC) hosted Gilad Atzmon at one of their fund-raising events. Apart from being a renowned jazz musician, Atzmon is also well-known for his own brand of anti-semitism.