A People Once Again? The Irish Questions

Fintan O’Toole and Sam McBride, For and Against a United Ireland, Royal Irish Academy, £18. Reviewed by David McCrone We have become used to the parade of prejudices masquerading as analysis in much writing and journalism. It is refreshing, therefore, that two of Ireland’s best journalists have set out the cases for and against a […] Source

Refusing the Frame: Why Our Language Helps Hate — and How We Can Stop It

This past Saturday I stood outside Cameron Barracks in Inverness with more than two hundred others at the Highlands Against Hate counter-protest. Across the line the anti-immigrant turout who we’d come to stand against, was much smaller but the language they brought with them was loud, familiar, and telling. They stood behind banners reading “People […] Source

Westminster and Scotland’s energy, fool me once…

Scotland is, by far and away, the most energy rich country of the islands of Britain and Ireland. Moreover it has more in the way of energy resources than just about any other country in Europe, with the exception of Norway (Russia’s vast fossil fuel resources are overwhelmingly concentrated in the…

Farage’s contemptible attack on Glesca weans

Nigel Farage has been a racist bully again. But don’t worry, he’s only doing it indirectly and without intent to offend or insult. So that’s OK then. Just days after the Scottish Languages Act came into force the English nationalist golf club boor has taken aim at school children in Glasgow….

The Scottish Languages Act

Scotland’s status as a multilingual country is now recognised in law with the Scottish Languages Act coming into force on St Andrew’s Day. The Act beefs up the legal protections previously given to Gaelic and elevates it to the status of an official language of Scotland. For the first time in…