William Duguid

Glasgow University glimpsed through Kelvingrove Park

'At best, Glasgow University is deeply out of step with student sentiment; at worst, it is actively engaging in repression.'
Sam Warnock, via The National
archive.is/M9aPm

The architecture of futility — Common Weal The government’s sweeping asylum reforms promise order, control and public reassurance. What they deliver instead is a system built on precarity, theatrical severity and the deliberate neglect of evidence – a blueprint that deepens chaos while claiming to solve it.

'The right to seek asylum, and the duty of states to prevent destitution while claims are assessed, has been a cornerstone of international protection since 1951. To speak of support as if it were a loophole is to misunderstand the basic architecture of the system.'

The Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, in her seat in the BBC studio, ready for Laura Kuenssberg to ask the same question repeatedly without getting an answer.

'The antisocial neoliberalism of Labour, the Tories and Reform is dependent upon keeping people on low wages, in poverty and in fear so that most people can be exploited by the few who gain as a consequence.'
@richardjmurphy.bsky.social, via The National
archive.is/LCr2m

A Trident Ii, or D-5 missile, being launched from an Ohio-class submarine.

'History indicates that faith in nuclear weapons erodes international law and makes the world much more dangerous.'
Lynn Jamieson of Scottish CND, via The National
archive.is/gI5iu

Police Scotland and Prosecuting Peace The Scottish establishment’s response to the legal challenge offered on the proscription of Palestine Action is growing arms and legs.  After not following up the Metroplitan police’s very un…

'We do not and should not consent to the UK Government naming protesters as terrorists on one hand, and on the other clandestinely supporting governments in breach of International Humanitarian La.'
Janet Fenton, via @bellacaledonia.bsky.social

Budget Pressures The Lesley Riddoch Podcast · Episode

New podcast from @lesleyriddoch.bsky.social and Fraser Thompson.
Rachel Reeves' budget - the guddle that just keeps giving?
Will the missing black hole disappear with the OBR boss?
Plus Saltires, Hampden, North Sea Oil, Highland wind farms, and more.

Communities have been priced out of owning Scotland — Common Weal Two new reports show that the rate of land transfers to community ownership in Scotland has dropped to the lowest level since the start of devolution and that a poll of the Scottish public shows near-unanimous support for more land reform over and above that which may be delivered by the recent Land Reform Bill.

'The latest round of Land Reform clearly won’t be enough to fix this problem, and it’s clearly not enough to satisfy what is as close to a unanimous poll of the Scottish public as it is practically possible to find.'
@thecommongreen.scot, via Common Weal

An unidentified person opening an empty wallet

'The Highlands and islands is an area rich in energy development, providing clean, green energy to the rest of the UK, yet our own people are penalised for the very climate and geography that define our home.'
Emma Roddick, via The National
archive.is/NOZdv

UK Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood standing beside a stonking great Union Jack.

'Shabana Mahmood is engineering the biggest humanitarian emergency this country has seen in decades with the latest shake-up of asylum and immigration policy – and it will fall to civil society to clean up the carnage she creates.'
Robina Qureshi, via The National
archive.is/GHDKO

How the basic building blocks of health and care services are being outsourced — Common Weal Nick Kempe reveals how fundamentals of healthcare that should have been under the control of patients and the National Care Service are instead being outsourced to private companies.

'Outsourcing responsibility for strategic needs assessment to the private sector will do nothing to improve our understanding of the real level of care need in Scotland.'
Nick Kempe, via Common weal

Hope of a better Scotland can defeat the far right Racists complain that migrants don’t want to learn English and integrate, but when migrants do want to learn English and integrate, racists mount a protest outside the school where English la…

'It’s up to us to give a positive message of hope to those who feel angry, disappointed and excluded by mainstream British politics, and divert them from the self-destructive rabbit hole of the far right, the greatest con trick in modern politics.'
@weegingerdug.bsky.social

Rachel Reeves, red Budget briefacase in hand, walking away from 11 Downing Street, sadly not for good.

'It’s simply a lie to describe a system which plunges thousands into fuel poverty as an assault on austerity.'
@richardwalker5.bsky.social, via The National
archive.is/qHUo1

The criminalisation of conscience — Common Weal A new wave of criminalisation is sweeping the UK, targeting activists, communities, and anyone who refuses the official narrative. Here’s why the terror label is no longer about terror.

'There is a temptation to see all of this as heavy-handed policing or bureaucratic overreach. But that understates the cohesion of what is happening. This is not an accident; this is architecture.'
Megan Davidson, via Common Weal

Scotland’s Land Ownership Watch where you walk, you might meet a gamekeeper with a shotgun and dog No other European country has such a narrow base of land proprietorship as Scotland. The Scottish government has passed a Bi…

'How tightly Scotland retains old structures of land and power depends on whether its democracy has the courage to break the bond. We are still waiting.'
Grouse Beater

Opportunism, Hypocrisy and Imperial Disdain Democracy denial and pork barrel Politics are the hallmarks of Labour’s botched Budget. The choreographed messaging around the government’s budget ended in a predictable farce, with the…

'Reeves's inability to define "a generation" is telling. They have nothing to say but to cling to power and deny Scotland a democratic say in our future. But these are the end days for Scottish Labour, and end tactics to suit.'
Mike Small, via @bellacaledonia.bsky.social

A Highland croft with lambs in the fields and a lch and hills in the background.

'From the Borders to Benbecula, city estates to island crofts, one message cut through with striking clarity: Scotland continues to need, and to want, land reform.'
Michael Russell, via The National
archive.is/a8dyE

Back at the Beating Heart During the 2014 independence referendum, one of the key talking points from the Better Together campaign was to emphasize how poor Scotland wouldn’t be able to cope without consular support f…

‘Can you imagine how a government that actually knew what day St Andrew’s Day was could do to promote Scottish trade and culture around the world?’
Mike Small, via @bellac

Solar panels installed on rooftops in Yongzhou, Hunan province of China

'Critics will say we can’t afford to transition away from fossil fuels. When you come face to face with the impacts, it’s reasonable to argue that we can’t afford not to. But something interesting is starting to happen...'
Halla Moheiddeen, via The National
archive.is/vth26

A person with a wheelchair getting out of the driver's door of a car.

'This isn’t about freeing up budget, it’s about punching down on the disabled – a group that has repeatedly paid the price for this weak Government and its lack of vision.'
Kelly Given, via The National
archive.is/GWwKV

The left is always playing on the opposition’s turf. No wonder it’s not winning. I wondered if I was being unfair in LabourList and most commentators on the Left when posting about its commentary on bonds and their power over governments this morning, and then this nonsense, published by the supposed left-wing media publisher, Novara Media, this week, was drawn to my attention: Many MPs...

'For too long, the left has absorbed neoliberal framing without noticing, and it still does. It has accepted the idea that the government is a household, meaning that it agrees with the household analogy and all the mythology that goes with it.'
@richardjmurphy.bsky.social

I'll get right on to Byline Times and ask them to action that.

Some troops in an American city keeping an eye on a member of the public with the temerity to hold up a sign saying 'Just Following Orders - War Criminals'.

'How far are Trump and supporters like Bannon prepared to go in ensuring another term, in defiance of the constitution? An even more worrying question.. is whether Trump’s ongoing militarisation of America is part of it.'
@foreigncorr1.bsky.social, via The National
archive.is/1577r

Rachel Reeves surrounded by a sort of haze, reflecting the uncertainty she's inflicted on the devolved governments for so long.

'Reeves’s couldn’t-care-less Budget timing has invited months of unnecessary speculation, and saddled the devolved governments with a frantic festive catch-up as guesswork finally turns into actual numbers.'
@lesleyriddoch.bsky.social, via The National
archive.is/K40i6

Public petitions committee shuts down a legal route to Scottish Self-Determination And shows contempt for the Scottish People's right to self-determination

'The Citizens Participation and Pulic Petitions Committee voted unanimously to close the petition down.
PE2135 has 7,506 signatures, which dwarfs other petitions under consideration.
But the number of signatures clearly doesn’t matter.'
Leah Gunn Barrett, via Dear Scotland.

Nigel Farage's 'Project 2029': The Pro-Trump Lobbyist Pushing His Agenda Into the UK A Trump-aligned anti-abortion lobbyist who hosted Nigel Farage's meeting with a 6 January rioter in Florida has been funding and advising the Reform leader while pushing Project 2025’s hard-right agenda into Britain

'The trail from Florida to Westminster exposes more than a shared ideology – it reveals a trans-Atlantic lobbying operation connecting Project 2025 to senior figures on Britain’s populist right.'
Nafeez Ahmed, via @bylinetimes.bsky.social

The ultra-processed food crisis Ultra-processed foods now make up at least half of all food sold in UK supermarkets. The Lancet has described them as a “corporate-engineered public health crisis.” That is exactly what they are: industrial products designed for profit, not nutrition. They override appetite control, promote over-consumption, and push out real food...

'Human health was never a design criterion in creating these toxic products.
Real food - ingredients from which you can construct a meal - has been priced out of the market or made inaccessible in far too many places.'
@richardjmurphy.bsky.social

How can you wash your hands when this happens to us? — Common Weal Temoka Melindo (Moka) is a student at Glasgow Caledonian University and now lives in Scotland as a climate refugee. She tells her story and asks how we can sit around and watch this happen to families like hers and still do nothing.

'What has been a constant unresolved responsibility is our collective responsibility to keep our planet stable. This has been a blame game for too long, causing the effects of climate change to worsen.'
Temoka Melindo, via Common Weal

To the left, some empty space, and to the right Rachel Reeves in profile. Which is more interesting, I wonder?

'This story undermines the whole "black hole" fiscal space “learned helplessness” that will be central to the coming UK budget. It is a smokescreen to reduce public spending and usher in another round of austerity.'
Malcolm Reavell of Modern Money Scotland, via The National
archive.is/7Hu4m

If we build consistent popular support to significantly over 50%, which we haven't really managed to do in the last 11 years, I think the dial will move. Apart from anything else, that's the point at which we can collectively make it harder for them to keep us than to let us go.

Some at the Convention didn't much like what she had to say, but I thought it was a straight down the line academic analysis. I'm not too surprised at her conclusion that 'legal' routes to independence look unlikely to work. We need to be using political routes more effectively than we are doing.