What better time could there be to explore what shapes our identities? Fay Young goes in search of the emotional museum
UK’s remarkable energy transition
Looking to 2019, with more renewable capacity being installed, it is possible that solar could overtake coal, and renewables could generate more than nuclear for every single month. They could also generate more than coal and gas combined over a month for the first ever time.
Happy New Year
At the still point of the turning year, Sceptical Scot paused to toast all of you – contributors and readers – the best possible New Year. And a hope that we may all work well together for shared understanding and common purpose in 2019.
Labour’s Brexit trilemma: the least bad outcome? (2)
One silver lining from the Brexit debacle is that the Tories have been exposed as deeply divided and hopelessly incompetent. If Labour can successfully exploit these divisions, there is a very real opportunity to put the Tories out of power for a generation.
Labour’s Brexit trilemma: the least bad outcome?
‘with the political calculus in parliament balanced on a knife-edge, the decisions taken by the Labour Party leadership over the coming weeks could have huge repercussions for the party, and for the country.’ Pt 1 of a new analysis
Edinburgh Makars mak mischief in Poetry Garden
Taking a break from Brexit Fay Young finds subversive mischief in the poetry of Edinburgh Makars, as performed in Edinburgh’s Poetry Garden (aka St Andrew Square)
Commons Brexit choices narrowing
Soft, hard, Norway plus, no deal or second referendum? However divided the parties and however unstable UK politics becomes, the UK’s politicians cannot put the choice off any longer.’ Kirsty Hughes on Tuesday’s Commons vote
VAT assignment – bridge too far for fiscal devolution?
A key aim of the Smith Commission was to improve accountability and make Scotland’s politicians responsible for the money that they spent. Unfortunately rather than helping to deliver this aim, the current proposals for VAT assignment risk undermining that principle.
Why politicians need to take a bus ride to reality
In his short story, The Nummer 14 Bus, James Robertson evokes the daily struggle played out on a bus ride through Scotland’s affluent capital. It could be a bus ride in any UK city.
Too big to reform? How banks capture the state
‘What we have done is to allow the banks to get away with this scot-free and, in the crisis that was caused, we have made the poor pay for it and we have made them do that through cutting benefits, through austerity, through cutting government spending generally, but also through Quantitative Easing (QE)..’