I WROTE to The National on Friday saying that Geoffrey Chapman, who jointly published the report indicating that the Scots economy would be viable after independence, would either start backtracking pretty quickly or no longer be required as a Westminster government adviser. His report doesn’t fit the narrative of too wee, too poor, too stupid. It was refreshing to hear about his report nonetheless. I wrote “at least it hasn’t been suppressed yet – oops, they must have missed that one”.
At the time of writing, I was not aware that the blog post in question had been taken down. According to the LSE hosts this had been done at the request of the authors. So much for independence of mind and academic freedom.
READ MORE: Westminster refuses to deny it pushed academics to delete blog on indy Scotland
One can only wonder why the authors have retreated. Are they going to put the blog post up again, this time containing a revised opinion on the viability of the economy in an independent Scotland? If the Westminster government has brought pressure to bear, we are surely entitled to ask who’s the banana republic now?
In view of the developments with the blog I will be after claiming the second sight and offering my services for a Clairvoyant Column in The National.
Melvyn Gibson
via email
IS there a link between Saturday’s Financial Times front page calling out Scotland as an economic basket case and the deleted blog post published by co-author Geoffrey Chapman?
The LSE’s British Politics and Policy website posting made a compelling economic case for an independent Scotland. It was mysteriously deleted and only the next day a think piece on the front cover of the Financial Times has a story making the case for a bankrupt Scotland if it wasn’t for the deep-pocketed borrowing powers of a Westminster government.
READ MORE: Blog post deleted after UK Government adviser admits Scotland can thrive after indy
Mr Chapman’s article torpedoes the Tory assertion that Scotland is too poor to be independent. It must have been hugely embarrassing for the secretive Union Unit, especially since Mr Chapman advises the Department for International Trade on economics. Yet another political nail in the coffin of Unionism.
Mike Herd
Highland
THANKS to David Pratt for reminding everyone Palestine still lives (Election can be crucial in building a new Palestine, April 1). Its right to exist is constantly under threat, physically and ideologically.
So are some of its supporters. I am one of 15 constituents who recently wrote to Neale Hanvey MP. We asked him to withdraw his name from an MPs’ letter to Bristol University management demanding the dismissal of sociology professor David Miller. Dr Miller’s special subject is political “spin”, so he researches powerful lobbying groups. He has documented the intervention and influence of pro-Israel lobbyists on high levels of decision-making UK institutions.
READ MORE: David Pratt: Coming election can be crucial to building a new Palestine
The facts are not in dispute, but certain political opponents of Palestine are offended and want him gagged and deprived of his livelihood. He is accused of anti-Semitism. His colleagues call it a bogus claim, and John Pilger, Ken Loach and philosopher Noam Chomsky are among the many who don’t believe it either.
At root is a refusal to see that anti-Semitism (a hate crime) is not the same as opposition to the imperialism and human rights crimes of the state of Israel. Those of us who support Palestine are the ones upholding international law.
If Dr Miller is sacked, the attack on academic freedom will spread to Scotland. We should proudly defend it now and expect our parliamentary representatives to do the same.
Lici Kopiej
via email
AS Scotland was playing a very important football match the other night, I had a look at the public TV programmes thinking we might get coverage. Nope. STV had an English match on, again – free of course to all those with TVs. So I had a look across the board. I did BBC1, BBC2, STV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 and found not one item that could vaguely be described as Scottish on any of it. Nearly 100 hours. Not one Scottish programme.
Apart, of course, for the little Scottish news programmes on BBC 1 (and of course its tiddly wee Scottish BBC, which I have now stopped watching – I felt before there was an obligation to support it, until I watched Martin Geissler’s absolutely despicable treatment of Shona Robison last week.) I come from a generation in which BBC Scotland (on radio) morning to night from Queen Margaret Drive was our broadcasting and it was 95% Scottish in content.
I don’t think we understand just how comprehensively we have been Britished.
David McEwan Hill
Sandbank, Argyll
HOWEVER fervently most of us desire to manage our own affairs, I feel that we must come to terms with traits that will forever be “British”. After a year of lockdown, people being told to stay at home and not to travel, just as things are starting to ease ... as predictable as an Ealing comedy, Network Rail announces engineering work over Easter. What have they been doing for the past year?
Ian Richmond
Springfield
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