NPR

Slick wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 10:11 pm Funnily enough I’ve just heard a report tonight of negotiations earlier this week between an overseas company looking at basing its European operations in Scotland and the Scottish Government.

They were apparently stunned at the lack of professionalism from the SG side and their inability to answer basic questions. It got to the stage where the FM turned up at the meeting to try and rescue it but couldn’t give any assurances on basic issues like tax, government support or post independence scenarios. They have gone home

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Wed Dec 02, 2020 7:33 am

Slick wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 10:11 pm Funnily enough I’ve just heard a report tonight of negotiations earlier this week between an overseas company looking at basing its European operations in Scotland and the Scottish Government.

They were apparently stunned at the lack of professionalism from the SG side and their inability to answer basic questions. It got to the stage where the FM turned up at the meeting to try and rescue it but couldn’t give any assurances on basic issues like tax, government support or post independence scenarios. They have gone home

They are utterly clueless when it comes to the economy, there are some ok ministers in there but they are battling against a massive bulk of ineptitude and when you have Hyslop and Forbes in charge of economic matters you really are buggered. Sturgeon herself is clueless on the economy.

Out of interest have you been part of the review of SE as i know you have dealings with them?

Biffer wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 4:08 pm On a completely different subject I’m pissed off that there was no mention of potential changes for Edinburgh in today’s briefings on levels. Edinburgh hits level one on four of the five measures and level two in the other measure. Still at level three. No mention of it, no explanation, nothing.

If you’re going to have a system you have to show faith in it. Or people will just ignore it.

Longshanks wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 10:03 am

Dogbert wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 10:01 am

Longshanks wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 9:11 am
That wasn't what I meant. And no i wasn't.
What i mean is if its used to somehow prove how evil the English are instead of answering a simple question of how things will be financed after independence

Who in this thread have ever suggested the 'English are evil '? -

Do you do hyperbole?
"We're better than you are"

Biffer wrote: ↑Thu Dec 03, 2020 8:03 pm

Longshanks wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 10:03 am

Dogbert wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 10:01 am

Who in this thread have ever suggested the 'English are evil '? -

Do you do hyperbole?
"We're better than you are"

Seems it’s not the Scottish Government who makes statements like that.

Before Covid-19, if you can remember such a time, this was supposed to be a difficult year for Nicola Sturgeon. Her party had been in power in Edinburgh since 2007 and, like all ministries of such antiquity, was beginning to look jaded. There was never any doubt that she would remain First Minister following next year’s Holyrood elections, but the prospect of her winning a majority seemed to be receding.

Opposition parties believed that a relentless focus on the SNP’s record in office would be enough to clip Sturgeon’s wings. After 13 years, it was hard to point to many stunning successes: on the contrary, failures and scandals were accumulating. Time ruins all governments and hers did not seem to be an exception. But, as 2020 has shown, normal rules do not apply to Nicola Sturgeon.

The virus changed everything. Now she is arguably Britain’s most popular politician — more popular in England than Boris Johnson, according to one poll — and her stock in Scotland has never been higher. Opinion polls suggest the next Holyrood parliament will be cursed with a pro-independence majority. The future of the United Kingdom once again hangs in the balance. To save it, Unionists need to work out why.

Rarely has a discrepancy between perception and performance been so stark. Although the prevalence of the virus is currently lower in Scotland than England, second-wave death rates are actually 25 per cent higher. Many of the mistakes made in England were also made in Scotland, not least discharging patients from hospitals into care homes without first checking they were not bringing the virus with them. By any reasonable estimation, Scotland’s performance has been mediocre at best.

But in modern Scotland, relative success counts for more than absolute success. Sturgeon’s rave reviews come not just from fawning Nationalists but also from dismayed Unionists. ‘Nicola has been calm, authoritative and cautious throughout,’ says one senior Tory MSP. And his own party leader? ‘Boris has over-promised and under-delivered. He lacks the appearance of seriousness, to the point where he lacks the appearance of competence.’

The whole theory of devolution — and, now, of independence — is that local decisions are better. Scottish solutions for Scottish problems. But after two decades, it’s not too early to judge success. Five years ago, Sturgeon asked to be assessed on her record. Education, not independence, was to be her ‘top priority’ and specifically the closing of the ‘attainment gap’ between pupils from rich and poor families. But evidence of her success is so hard to come by that the Scottish government’s own analysis of the progress has resorted to claiming that ‘perceptions of success currently present a more positive picture of progress’ than anything ‘emerging through quantitative measures’.

Two years ago, Scottish pupils achieved the country’s worst-ever science and maths results in the international Pisa league tables. The gap between those from the most and least advantaged families amounted to three years of learning. This is the opposite to what devolution was supposed to achieve. Despite being freed from the obligation of paying tuition fees, students from poor families in Scotland are no more likely to attend university than comparable children in England.

As for health, the other main area of devolved responsibility, the SNP’s record is just as bad. At last year’s general election, just 7 per cent of voters said they thought the NHS had improved in Scotland since Sturgeon became First Minister six years ago. A 12-week treatment time guarantee has proved meaningless since, last year, just 71 per cent of inpatients and day cases were treated within that time frame and one in four outpatients also waited longer than they were supposed to. Across a range of NHS indicators, targets have not been met for five years.

But voters are contrary creatures and nowhere more so than in Scotland. While giving the SNP a failing grade on education, health, justice and the economy, they still overwhelmingly endorsed SNP candidates at the general election. And then came Covid. At a stroke, all the facts pointing to the Scottish government’s substandard performance were rendered irrelevant, wiped from the public consciousness.

A weak media does not help. Sturgeon almost never agrees to interviews with a still largely sceptical print media and only rarely faces sustained questioning on BBC Scotland or STV, but in truth it goes beyond this. ‘There is an issue with the lack of scrutiny of the SNP’s record from the media, particularly broadcasters,’ another senior Scottish Tory complains, contrasting the BBC’s treatment of Sturgeon — and its decision to show her press briefings without granting the opposition a response — with the manner in which the UK government is generally handled. Even so, there is a simple explanation for Sturgeon’s success: ‘Essentially, it’s because she isn’t Boris.’

Focus groups conducted for the pro-Union thinktank These Islands bear this out. Voters who are now curious about independence, though not necessarily yet sold on it, contrast ‘bungling Boris and Brexit’ with ‘competent Nicola and independence’. Brexit has been a slow-burning issue, but it is one that has laid the foundations for the surge in pro-independence sentiment. Johnson has added the exterior walls and Covid has supplied the roof.


Compared with the Prime Minister, Sturgeon enjoys very high approval ratings. Not only that, but many of those who do not agree with her still respect her. There is a 100-point differential between Sturgeon’s and Johnson’s approval ratings in Scotland. Hers is +49; his is -57. He is a liability for Unionists; she is the independence cause’s greatest strength.

The frustration in Unionist circles is palpable. Many punches are thrown; none seems to land. Sometimes this frustration appears tinged with a shivering anticipation of grief to come. It is not difficult to find ardent Unionists who whisper that they think the United Kingdom has run its race. The precise timing of its formal dissolution may as yet be unknown but the direction of travel is impossible to ignore. A bell tolls, and it tolls for the United Kingdom. Of course, demographic trends do not guarantee particular outcomes. Nevertheless, two thirds of Scots under the age of 45 now say they back independence. A dozen opinion polls in recent months have each reported a majority in favour of independence. The trend is clear.

Contrasting the reality of devolution with its promise misunderstands its perceived value. The parliament proves its worth merely by existing; it has become the principal forum for public argument in Scotland. And while this argument is often drab and dreary, the parliament is also a testing ground for something else: dreams of a grander future.

It is a question of respect. The Holyrood parliament may be a small thing, but it is Scotland’s own and that makes a significant, a necessary and perhaps even a sufficient difference. To slight it is, in some vague sense, to slight the Scottish people’s estimation of themselves. If this is prickly, it is also reality. Sixty per cent of Scots think the institutions of devolution will work in the country’s best interest; fewer than one in five are confident that the UK government or parliament will do likewise.

Politics is a matter of belonging. Scotland might benefit from its privileged position within the Union but London feels further away than ever. The ties that bind the United Kingdom together have been loosening perceptibly. Scots born before 1960 are twice as likely to strongly identify as British as those born after that date.

And just as the argument for Brexit rested on the presumption that sovereignty is more important than economic forecasts, so too does the case for Scottish independence. The SNP argues that independence will leave Scotland wealthier, but sovereignty remains the true basis for secession. As Sturgeon told her party conference on Monday, only independence will allow Scots to be the ‘decision makers’ in their own lives.

Where Alex Salmond was, for many, a Marmite politician of the ‘loathe him’ or ‘really loathe him’ kind, Sturgeon is perceived as an altogether more approachable — and representative — figure. She is unmistakably ‘one of us’. Although her faith in independence is unsinkable, she has succeeded in presenting it as a utilitarian choice and the path to a more prosperous, more egalitarian, more democratic future. In doing so, she sells Scots on the idea of who they should like to be rather than who they actually are. (With the notable exceptions of Europe and, to some degree, immigration, Scottish and English attitudes are broadly similar.) Her message is designed to reassure: independence is normal — it’s the Union that’s odd.

Perhaps the most striking feature of the SNP’s present ascendancy is how comprehensive it is. There is no significant class divide on the national question: ABC1 voters are as likely to support independence as C2DE voters, and while support for independence remains higher in the ‘Yes cities’ of Glasgow and Dundee than in Edinburgh and Aberdeen, the gap is closing.


There is a further paradox. As Douglas Ross, the new leader of the Scottish Tories, argues, the case for independence is being made more effectively in London than Edinburgh. The UK is seen as an example of how a country should not comport itself. Sturgeon asks Scots if they really think it has to be like this or if, on the contrary, a different future might be available.

The biggest danger to the Sturgeon supremacy may not come from London but from within her own movement. A Holyrood committee investigating the Alex Salmond affair is due to report at some point before the election next May. It has been established that Sturgeon’s account to parliament of what she knew, and when she knew it, was at best incomplete and misleading. Salmond alleges that he was stitched up by a government-led plot and, if proven, this might yet be enough to destroy his successor. Unionists cannot admit to pinning their hopes on this scandal and, privately, some speculate Sturgeon might be able to survive even if she is found to have lied to parliament and broken the ministerial code. A scandal that might be fatal elsewhere could turn out to be but a flesh wound in Scotland.

For now, however, Sturgeon is untouchable. She has a connection with her electorate that is unmatched in these islands. A fourth SNP term at Holyrood might deliver little in the way of policy successes but it will haunt Johnson for the rest of his time in office. He might insist on saying ‘No’ to Scotland, but if Scotland keeps saying ‘Yes’ to another referendum, just saying ‘No’ is a position subject to the law of diminishing returns. The Scottish question will not disappear.

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 7:48 am I don’t think NS will be around much longer but it worries me more what will take her place. I think the next few years will be dominated by SNP infighting which will dilute the current surge in support of independence but may well leave us with a bunch of nutters in charge.

We’ve talked about the lack of media scrutiny a fair bit on this thread and the truth is that the fear of backlash from the cult is omnipresent and really holds the country back on many levels.

As an aside, the Tory party office is at the end of my road and it was vandalised for the 8th time this year a couple of nights ago. It looks like they might be shutting up shop and moving now, it’s fucking shameful

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 8:46 am

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 7:48 am I don’t think NS will be around much longer but it worries me more what will take her place. I think the next few years will be dominated by SNP infighting which will dilute the current surge in support of independence but may well leave us with a bunch of nutters in charge.

We’ve talked about the lack of media scrutiny a fair bit on this thread and the truth is that the fear of backlash from the cult is omnipresent and really holds the country back on many levels.

As an aside, the Tory party office is at the end of my road and it was vandalised for the 8th time this year a couple of nights ago. It looks like they might be shutting up shop and moving now, it’s fucking shameful

That's because like every other country on the planet we have a large amount of cunts in our ranks, we might have romantic misty-eyed thoughts about our fellow countrymen but that's the truth of it. In this case they express themselves by defacing a political party and demonising their candidates, it was started by Labour but was perfected by the SNP a bit like the croynism in our political and civil service ranks.

The tories are a mess as well, i dont rate any of their team either they are distinclty "B" grade material that couldnt cut in any other industry, profession or vocation. That for me is across the political spectrum, they just arent impressive individuals at all, backed up by a civil service that have individuals in high rank due to loyalty over competence.

Sturgeon is keeping a lid on their incompetence being fully exposed, just look at the rest of her team there is not a leader amongst them. Mackay was the heir apparent until his text messages but there isnt anyone else. Swinney is held up as honest John, the calm hand on the tiller, that is how weak they are.

I fully expect them to win next years election comfortably, a coin toss if they get a ruling majority but i think it is looking less likely but they will definitely be the ones calling the shots. Scotland will be weaker after another term in office by them, as they are a tired husk of their former selves and the election after this will see them take a much bigger beating. So we are likely to have another Indy vote which will be close, if they lose it will be Quebec, if they win we will be independence with everything that goes with it.

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 7:48 am I don’t think NS will be around much longer but it worries me more what will take her place. I think the next few years will be dominated by SNP infighting which will dilute the current surge in support of independence but may well leave us with a bunch of nutters in charge.

We’ve talked about the lack of media scrutiny a fair bit on this thread and the truth is that the fear of backlash from the cult is omnipresent and really holds the country back on many levels.

As an aside, the Tory party office is at the end of my road and it was vandalised for the 8th time this year a couple of nights ago. It looks like they might be shutting up shop and moving now, it’s fucking shameful

Biffer wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 9:28 am

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 7:48 am I don’t think NS will be around much longer but it worries me more what will take her place. I think the next few years will be dominated by SNP infighting which will dilute the current surge in support of independence but may well leave us with a bunch of nutters in charge.

We’ve talked about the lack of media scrutiny a fair bit on this thread and the truth is that the fear of backlash from the cult is omnipresent and really holds the country back on many levels.

As an aside, the Tory party office is at the end of my road and it was vandalised for the 8th time this year a couple of nights ago. It looks like they might be shutting up shop and moving now, it’s fucking shameful

I think she will be. Whereas Salmond would have been happy to win the referendum and then ride off into the sunset I don’t think that’s NS’s style. She wants to use independence to achieve things she doesn’t believe are possible to achieve within the UK so she’ll hang around to implement them.

Biffer wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 9:26 am

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 8:46 am

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 7:48 am I don’t think NS will be around much longer but it worries me more what will take her place. I think the next few years will be dominated by SNP infighting which will dilute the current surge in support of independence but may well leave us with a bunch of nutters in charge.

We’ve talked about the lack of media scrutiny a fair bit on this thread and the truth is that the fear of backlash from the cult is omnipresent and really holds the country back on many levels.

As an aside, the Tory party office is at the end of my road and it was vandalised for the 8th time this year a couple of nights ago. It looks like they might be shutting up shop and moving now, it’s fucking shameful

That's because like every other country on the planet we have a large amount of cunts in our ranks, we might have romantic misty-eyed thoughts about our fellow countrymen but that's the truth of it. In this case they express themselves by defacing a political party and demonising their candidates, it was started by Labour but was perfected by the SNP a bit like the croynism in our political and civil service ranks.

The tories are a mess as well, i dont rate any of their team either they are distinclty "B" grade material that couldnt cut in any other industry, profession or vocation. That for me is across the political spectrum, they just arent impressive individuals at all, backed up by a civil service that have individuals in high rank due to loyalty over competence.

Sturgeon is keeping a lid on their incompetence being fully exposed, just look at the rest of her team there is not a leader amongst them. Mackay was the heir apparent until his text messages but there isnt anyone else. Swinney is held up as honest John, the calm hand on the tiller, that is how weak they are.

I fully expect them to win next years election comfortably, a coin toss if they get a ruling majority but i think it is looking less likely but they will definitely be the ones calling the shots. Scotland will be weaker after another term in office by them, as they are a tired husk of their former selves and the election after this will see them take a much bigger beating. So we are likely to have another Indy vote which will be close, if they lose it will be Quebec, if they win we will be independence with everything that goes with it.

Says he, defacing and demonising multiple political parties.

I think she will be. Whereas Salmond would have been happy to win the referendum and then ride off into the sunset I don’t think that’s NS’s style. She wants to use independence to achieve things she doesn’t believe are possible to achieve within the UK so she’ll hang around to implement them

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 2:44 pm We seem to be very stubbornly sticking round the 1000 new cases a day mark. Seems to have been there or thereabouts for a long time.

tc27 wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 10:51 am I feel like Massie (and Chris Deerin) gets away with writing pretty much the same article for years - a kind of endless variation being critical of the SNP but also throwing a couple of paragraphs in about hot the UK is doomed anyway. I find it funny how some view him as some kind of uber unionist - it shows how thin the tolerance for dissention is.

Massie is also now part of Charlotte Street Partners -a SG government funded quango started by Andrew Wilson who is apparently Sturgeons go to guru on all things Independence related.

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 2:44 pm We seem to be very stubbornly sticking round the 1000 new cases a day mark. Seems to have been there or thereabouts for a long time.

clydecloggie wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 2:59 pm

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 2:44 pm We seem to be very stubbornly sticking round the 1000 new cases a day mark. Seems to have been there or thereabouts for a long time.

Aye, it's stubbornly smouldering away like a peat fire. At least that will change with the idiotic Christmas truce. Spike assured early Jan.

That's not to say that our good friends out East can feel hard done by still being in the higher tiers when there doesn't appear to be too much going on over there.

Biffer wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 3:24 pm

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 2:44 pm We seem to be very stubbornly sticking round the 1000 new cases a day mark. Seems to have been there or thereabouts for a long time.

Average in the last 7 days is 790. 7 days before that 932, 7 days before that 1082. It's not stuck but it's not coming down as fast as we'd like.

Biffer wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 3:29 pm Case rate per 100k in Edinburgh in the week up to 1st December is 62.
Test positivity rate 3.8%

Outbreak at Heriot Watt now seems under control.

If we don't get moved down a level soon I'm going to lose the fucking plot.

Dogbert wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 3:25 pm

clydecloggie wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 2:59 pm

Slick wrote: ↑Fri Dec 04, 2020 2:44 pm We seem to be very stubbornly sticking round the 1000 new cases a day mark. Seems to have been there or thereabouts for a long time.

Aye, it's stubbornly smouldering away like a peat fire. At least that will change with the idiotic Christmas truce. Spike assured early Jan.

That's not to say that our good friends out East can feel hard done by still being in the higher tiers when there doesn't appear to be too much going on over there.

The good news is that the percentage of positive cases has fallen to 4.2% , and that's the 3rd day in a row that it has been below 5%

Big number from Argyll and Bute of 96 today . which is a huge spike , yesterday was 13 , the day before only 8

If Scots want independence, they’ll have to pay a lot for it
David Smith
Sunday December 06 2020, 12.01am, The Sunday Times

These are heady days for supporters of Scottish independence. Fifteen polls in a row have shown net backing for independence among those likely to vote, with Ipsos Mori’s latest survey for STV showing 56% in favour of breaking free from the rest of the UK.

Support has risen as a result of the coronavirus crisis. It could have gone either way. Scotland’s death rate per million people from Covid-19 in recent weeks has been higher than in England, although its cumulative total is slightly less, and is also lower than in Wales, though higher than in Northern Ireland.

Scotland has benefited hugely from the UK’s ability to borrow vast sums to fund its crisis response, with the help of the Bank of England, and has gained massively from those UK schemes. As its own independent economic and fiscal forecaster said in September: “The largest increase in spending in Scotland has been through UK-wide schemes.” Separately, the Scottish budget has been boosted by 14% since the projections set out in February, “largely driven by extra funding from the UK government”.

Despite all this, support for independence has grown, because of the perception that Nicola Sturgeon, the Scottish first minister, has had a good crisis, while Boris Johnson has had a bad one. Even the leader of the Scottish Tories concedes that Sturgeon has the better communication skills. Johnson’s jovial old Etonian schtick does not work north of the border. He was toxic even before he described devolution as “a disaster”.

It is Sturgeon, however, who has again exposed the Achilles heel of independence: the economics of it. Her announcement of a £500 bonus for “Scotland’s life-savers and care-givers” — NHS and care home workers — together with her plea for the UK government to waive tax on it, has once more highlighted the weakness of Scotland’s public finances. The Scottish government describes the bonus as an “investment of around £180m”.

Every country is borrowing hugely this year because of the pandemic. The official forecast for the UK budget deficit for 2020-21 is £394bn, 19% of gross domestic product. However, Scotland entered this crisis with a budget deficit of 8.6% of GDP, compared with 2.5% for the UK as a whole, according to its own “Gers” (government expenditure and revenue in Scotland) exercise, published in the summer.

Scotland’s budget deficit this year is likely to be a sky-high 26% to 28% of GDP, according to David Phillips of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), and it will stay above 10% of GDP for years even when this crisis is over. This year’s deficit could be even higher, because of recent additions to spending. As the IFS pointed out: “Under full fiscal autonomy or independence, the deficit would be the Scottish government’s responsibility, and the need for tax rises or spending cuts would be starker.”


The arithmetic behind this is straightforward enough. Even leaving aside the £500 one-off bonus and this year’s budget boost, public spending per head in Scotland, £14,829 in 2019-20, was more than 12% higher than the UK average of £13,196. Taxation, meanwhile, brings in less per head in Scotland than in the UK as a whole, even including a geographical share of North Sea revenues, at £12,058 versus £12,367. You don’t have to be Mr Micawber to know that this is a recipe, if not for misery, then for a big budget deficit. Scotland’s budget deficit per head last year was more than three times the UK average.

Supporters of independence, though not yet the Scottish government or its fiscal watchdog, have tried various devices to escape from this economic and fiscal reality. Some say the country would not be obliged to assume its share of UK debt on independence and, indeed, the former SNP leader Alex Salmond said in the run-up to the 2014 referendum that Scotland would renege on its share of the debt if Westminster did not allow continued use of sterling. Some on the wilder wings of the independence movement advocate the adoption of modern monetary theory (MMT), dealt with here a few weeks ago. That is never going to happen.

Independence supporters are fond of drawing a parallel between Scotland and successful smaller economies, particularly Scandinavian countries. A common feature of them is that they have higher levels of taxation, about 43% of GDP in Sweden and 46% for Denmark. That compares with a pre-crisis 37% for the UK as a whole and less than 35% of GDP for Scotland. If the Scottish people want fiscally credible independence and the public services they currently enjoy, they and their businesses will have to pay for it with higher taxes.

The public finances are not the only issue. The noted US economist Barry Eichengreen, who has taken a close interest in Scottish independence, writing recently, was happy to describe the prime minister’s EU negotiations as “shambolic” and a reason for rising support for a breakaway from the UK.

However, Eichengreen also lamented the lack of any plan for post-independence currency arrangements. This has become more, not less, difficult since the 2014 referendum, he pointed out. The plan suggested by some a few years ago, for a monetary union with the rest of the UK and continued use of the pound, would not work because Scotland wants to be a member of the EU. A country in a monetary union with a non-EU country cannot join the EU.

Scotland could try to start a currency from scratch, with its own central bank, but it would take time to establish the credibility of both in what Eichengreen described as a “politically charged environment”. Or, there could be continued use of sterling on a temporary basis. Either would be a staging post on the road to euro membership. None of the options is palatable, which is perhaps why we have not seen a currency plan.

Stranger things have happened than people voting for what they think of as independence even though it will damage the economy and make them poorer. Look at Brexit. The economic challenges faced by an independent Scotland would be even greater.

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Tue Dec 08, 2020 2:42 pm Embra still level 3

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Tue Dec 08, 2020 2:42 pm Embra still level 3

Holyrood ‘taken for a ride’ on deal to rescue BiFab
Kieran Andrews
Tuesday December 08 2020, 12.01am, The Times
JV Driver blamed the government for failing to provide financial guarantees needed to secure contracts

The owners of the troubled BiFab manufacturing firm directly invested just £4 in the company before it was placed into administration with a likely taxpayer loss of £37 million, it can be revealed.

JV Driver, the Canadian business brought in by the Scottish government as part of a rescue deal in 2018, bought four £1 shares in the company as part of the transfer of ownership agreement struck with SNP ministers.

Its board blamed the government for failing to provide financial guarantees needed to secure contracts as well as being unable to compete on the prices offered by state-backed operations in Europe, the Middle East and Far East.

Graham Simpson, Scottish Conservative infrastructure spokesman, said the Scottish government had “been taken for a ride” on the terms of the deal. “The SNP assumed all the risk, got dreadful value for taxpayers and let the yards go to waste with no plan to secure their future and save the jobs,” he said.

JV Driver said last night it was invited to take over the company under an agreement in which Holyrood remained the primary investor of the business. A spokesman said the agreement “always envisaged that the Scottish government would be the primary financier” of BiFab as it bid for new contracts but that ministers provided less than 50 per cent of the working capital financing requested by the firm.

“Scottish ministers continue to focus on JV Driver’s alleged lack of investment, guarantees and capital as the primary cause for its situation. This cannot be further from the truth,” he said.

Last week JV Driver bosses refused to say how much the firm had invested in the yards when they appeared before the economy committee.

It was brought in to rescue BiFab after it fell into financial difficulties during a contract for the Beatrice offshore wind farm. The Scottish government invested some £37 million in the company and converted its loans into equity to give it a minority stake.

A Scottish government official said BiFab needed investment packages to secure new contracts that JV Driver “was not willing to provide”. He added: “If the majority shareholder is not prepared to invest in the business, it is very challenging to demonstrate that another commercial investor would invest. We can only act as a commercial investor would in this situation.”

Blame game over ferry ‘fiasco’
Report condemns ‘catastrophic failure’
Greig Cameron, Scottish Business Editor
Wednesday December 09 2020, 12.01am, The Times
The two new ferries being built in Scotland will be delivered fours years late

Nicola Sturgeon’s government oversaw a “catastrophic failure” in the building of two new ferries and should be investigated by the public spending watchdog, a damning report has said.

The SNP administration and other public sector organisations are accused of poor decision-making and a lack of transparency in a report into the procurement and construction of the vessels that are now projected to go £100 million over budget from the Holyrood cross-party economy, rural economy and connectivity committee, which described the affair as a “fiasco”.

There was also condemnation of Ferguson Marine, the operator of the Port Glasgow shipyard that was controlled by the industrialist Jim McColl. The report said there was a lack of “due diligence, poor project management and a failure by all parties to take the necessary action to resolve problems”.

Edward Mountain, the Conservative MSP and committee convener, said: “The evidence to our inquiry into this fiasco has revealed that all parties involved must share in the responsibility for the catastrophic failure to deliver this contract on time or on budget.”

The committee wants Audit Scotland, the public spending watchdog, to investigate why £45 million of loans was made to Ferguson and what that money was spent on. It also wants an inquiry into the financial management of the ferries contract by Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited (CMAL), which was responsible for the procurement, and Transport Scotland, the public transport agency. The committee said it was concerned neither had carried out their duties “competently and effectively”.

The contract to build two vessels for £97 million was awarded to Ferguson in October 2015, almost a year after Mr McColl had bought the yard out of administration.

One was to be for the Ardrossan to Brodick route while the other would run on the Uig, Tarbert and Lochmaddy triangle.

A series of contract disputes and spiralling building costs saw Derek Mackay, then the economy minister, nationalise the yard last year with neither vessel close to being ready. Mr Mackay would resign just a few months later after being exposed for sending messages to a teenage boy by social media.

The final bill for the ferries is expected to top £200 million and the first one will not be in service until 2022, about four years later than expected.

Behind the story
With a few weeks to go before the 2014 vote on independence there was a real threat commercial shipbuilding on the River Clyde could peter out.

The Ferguson shipyard was in administration after running out of cash and its workers were being axed. After a few anxious weeks Jim McColl, the industrialist who was on friendly terms with Alex Salmond, was unveiled as the preferred bidder. The deal was concluded shortly before the referendum vote.

Mr McColl pledged millions of pounds of investment. A competitive tender in 2015, when John Swinney was finance secretary and Derek Mackay transport secretary, saw it selected to build two ferries for £97 million.

It was hoped that might usher in a renaissance in Scottish ship building. Instead it has descended into one of the costliest debacles overseen by the SNP government.

Ministers ploughed in £45 million of public cash to try to help Ferguson finish the ferries but it was not enough and the loans later had to be written off.

Increasingly public spats ended with the yard, once again, being placed into administration in August last year.

The ferries, which are now expected to cost in excess of £200 million, should have been serving island communities in 2018 but instead the first will not be ready until 2022 with the other following in 2023.

Mr McColl, who is on the government’s Council of Economic Advisers, has stated he will never again work with the current SNP administration because of their behaviour during the demise of Ferguson.

Timetable of delays
August 2014 The Ferguson shipyard goes into administration after running out of cash.

September 2014 Jim McColl’s Clyde Blowers Capital buys the yard and promises to reinvigorate it.

August 2015 Ferguson wins the tender to build two new ferries for the public fleet for a fixed cost of £97 million. The first is to be delivered in the summer of 2018 and the second slightly later.

November 2017 It is confirmed the delivery of the vessels has been delayed until the winter of 2018 at the earliest.

August 2018 Scottish ministers state the first vessel will not be ready until summer 2019 and the second in spring 2020.

September 2018 It emerges the Scottish government gave £45 million of loans to Ferguson.

August 2019 Directors of Ferguson file a notice of intent to appoint administrators.

December 2019 The Scottish government says it has taken the shipyard into public ownership and will press ahead with building the ferries with one available in the autumn of 2021 and the other in 2022. A report published later in the month projects the cost of delivering them will have doubled to around £200 million.

August 2020 The coronavirus pandemic is blamed for a further delay in the delivery of the vessels. The first is now expected in the middle of 2022 while it could be 2023 before the other one is ready.

Biffer wrote: ↑Tue Dec 08, 2020 3:03 pm

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Tue Dec 08, 2020 2:42 pm Embra still level 3

That's fucking nonsense.

The Times Scotland view on the lessons of Ferguson Marine: Losing Streak
Ministers must take the blame when vanity projects keep going wrong
Wednesday December 09 2020, 12.01am, The Times
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Five years ago, Nicola Sturgeon boasted that the £100 million contract to build two new ferries for Caledonian MacBrayne had been awarded to Ferguson Marine Engineering. These would be “the largest commercial vessels to be built on the Clyde since 2001”. The decision was a symbolic affirmation of the Scottish government’s desire to restore Scottish shipbuilding. It underlined, the first minister said, “our commitment to creating the vital jobs needed to boost local economies and help stimulate growth across Scotland”.

Fine words. But what followed was a shambles. The ferries remain unfinished and Ferguson Marine is now owned by the taxpayer. The cost of delivering the vessels has spiralled with no end in sight. Island communities dependent on ferry services have been let down; so too have taxpayers generally. As a Holyrood committee report now concludes, the management of the procurement and manufacturing process has been a “catastrophic failure”. A “root and branch overhaul” of the approach to such large-scale works is now needed.

Until now, no one has been required to accept responsibility for a procurement process that, if it had run twice as smoothly would still merit being considered a fiasco. That is an intolerable state of affairs. Ultimately, however serious the failings at CMAL — the contracting body responsible for the design specifications — and Ferguson may have been, the delivery of new ferries is a ministerial responsibility. The government is extremely quick to take responsibility when projects, such as the Queensferry Crossing, are delivered successfully (although recurring weather-related closures may yet prove damaging); by the same token, it must assume responsibility for failures.

The decision to nationalise the Ferguson shipyard looks increasingly unjustified. Far from putting the yard on a more sustainable footing and ensuring the new ferries will actually be delivered, progress appears as slow as ever. If the new ships are ever completed, they will be more than four years late and close to three times the original cost. By any standards, this is failure of an extreme sort.

Alas, it is also consistent with the government’s other interventions to save failing firms. Far from “picking winners”, hitherto the Scottish government has displayed an unerring ability to pick losers. It is seven years since the Scottish government purchased Prestwick airport and began, as Ms Sturgeon put it, “making it a viable enterprise”. As yet, no private sector operator is ready to take it on.

Prestwick’s problems seem trivial, however, when set beside those afflicting the BiFab yards in Fife and the Western Isles. Last week the fabrication firm went into administration, after years being propped up by the Scottish government. Ministers took a minority stake but, despite the injection of £52 million of public money, BiFab has proven unable to win a significant share of lucrative contracts for the burgeoning offshore wind engineering sector. The government’s promise to support “the reindustrialisation of Scotland” was always a grandiose hostage to fortune; it now stands exposed as the hollowest of empty promises. Altogether, hundreds of millions of pounds have been spent propping up these enterprises.

That alone suggests it is past time the Scottish government reassessed its industrial policy. The alternative is wasting ever greater sums of public money on industrial vanity projects and, worse, doing so to no great effect at all.

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Wed Dec 09, 2020 3:28 pm
With the mess the public finances are in we really need them to be a lot more careful with our money.

fishfoodie wrote: ↑Wed Dec 09, 2020 6:07 pm

Northern Lights wrote: ↑Wed Dec 09, 2020 3:28 pm
With the mess the public finances are in we really need them to be a lot more careful with our money.

It's not terribly surprising really.

Competence isn't something that happens overnight; & nor is developing the structures to stop this kind of crap happening. The same shite happens in NI, & I'd be fairly confident that the Welsh Assembly has invested in some white elephants of their own.

What matters is that the Electorate, & the Legislator evolves; & the voters need to kick out the incompetent, or corrupt; & the Legislators need to make sure the structures are in place to remove the corrupt & unfit for office.

dpedin wrote: ↑Thu Dec 10, 2020 9:24 am https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-55246112

So it looks like we almost reached elimination of community transmission of covid19 in the summer in Scotland but then ended up bringing it back into the country from holidays abroad. If only we had listened to experts like Devi Sridhar and managed the borders and travel better!