“LORD” David Frost – the Tory peer who as Boris Johnson's Brexit negotiator managed to sink the British Government's reputation to a nadir from which it may never recover – hit the headlines last week following an article he wrote for the Telegraph newspaper in which he called on the Conservatives to roll back devolution if they win the next UK General Election.
Frost insisted that there is no need for the Scottish Parliament to have tax-raising powers and took particular umbrage at Scottish Government ministers representing Scotland abroad. He demanded that the next Conservative government at Westminster should unilaterally curtail the powers of Holyrood and put devolution into reverse.
It was telling that nowhere in his comments did he acknowledge any need for the Conservatives to obtain a democratic mandate from the people of Scotland for his plan to vandalise the devolution settlement – despite the Conservatives signing up to a solemn vow in 2014 that no changes would ever be made to the powers of the Scottish Parliament without the express consent of Holyrood.
READ MORE: Tories cry 'crocodile tears’ over Frost’s attack while supporting gender reform block
For Frost, it would be more than sufficient for the Conservatives to use a Westminster majority based upon MPs representing constituencies in England in order to impose its decision to destroy the devolution settlement on a Scotland which had rejected the Conservatives at the ballot box.
The Tory peer's suggestion was immediately disavowed by the Scottish Conservatives, who fell over themselves to insist, not at all convincingly, that they are huge enthusiasts for the devolution settlement. However, actions speak louder than words, and this is a party which has mounted numerous attacks on the powers of the Scottish Parliament by giving Westminster the ability to intervene directly on devolved matters and to bypass Holyrood entirely. Frost merely said out loud what a lot of Tories privately think, but dare not say in public.
If there is one thing that we ought to have learned since 2014, it's that the vows of the Conservatives to Scotland are not worth the faux parchment paper that they are printed on in anti-independence newspapers.
Now, in an interview on GB News Frost has doubled down on his suggestion to roll back important aspects of the devolution settlement, claiming that there are “sympathisers” in his own party who encourage him to keep expressing anti-devolution sentiments. That's one utterance from a Tory that really isn't hard to believe.
Frost said: "We've ridden this tiger long enough, it has come close to dismembering the country. It's time to stop and have a proper debate on: Does Scotland need all these powers?" The debate that Frost is calling for is very clearly not a debate amongst the people of Scotland.
The point that Frost is blind to is that destroying the devolution settlement and reducing Holyrood to a toothless regional authority will not make the issue of Scottish independence simply go away. It would only strengthen calls for independence because what people in Scotland really love is Tories that we don't vote for telling us what is good for us.
While we are on the subject of “Lord” Frost, surely it is long past time that Scotland has a conversation about the use of honorific titles bestowed by British nationalist politicians upon their cronies. Titles are very much like money, they only have value as currency as long as people are willing to accept and use them.
“Lord” Frost, “Lady” Mone (above), and “Lord” Foulkes are only lords and ladies if the rest of us are willing to indulge them in the pretendy noble titles that their pals have given to them for time serving, back scratching, or services rendered. They cease to have any value or meaning the moment that the rest of us recognise these ridiculous affectations for what they really are and stop using them.
By continuing to use these ludicrous titles we are colluding in the anti-democratic cronyism and corrupt patronage which has hollowed out accountability in British politics. Frost suffered no ill consequences for his disaster of a Brexit deal which Johnson's successor is now timidly attempting to unpick. Instead he got a seat in the unelected upper chamber of Westminster and we are all supposed to pretend that he's a lord.
Covid vaccines and an expelled MP
The Tories have expelled controversial MP Andrew Bridgen from the party after he compared Covid-19 vaccines to the Holocaust and was found to have breached lobbying rules. Bridgen had said on social media that saying the vaccine rollout was the "biggest crime against humanity since the Holocaust".
Bridgen has been involved in a long-running legal dispute with his family over the family's potato and vegetable business which sued him over claims he had failed to pay rent on a £1.5 million property owned by the firm.
In April 2022, High Court Judge Brian Rawlings ruled against Bridgen (above), stating that the MP "lied under oath and behaved in an abusive, arrogant and aggressive manner", was "an unreliable and combative witness who tried to conceal his own misconduct", and "gave evasive and argumentative answers and tangential speeches that avoided answering the questions".
Despite losing the case, Bridgen continued to insist that he had actually won, showing that the Tory inability to accept that they are in the wrong runs from the top to the bottom feeders of the party. In August 2022, Bridgen was evicted from the property at the heart of the dispute, and ordered to pay £800,000 in legal costs.
Even now Bridgen is claiming that he's right and everyone else is wrong, attempting to portray himself as a doughty campaigner for truth who has been victimised by the establishment. There's no delusion like Tory delusion.
This piece is an extract from today’s REAL Scottish Politics newsletter, which is emailed out at 7pm every weekday with a round-up of the day's top stories and exclusive analysis from the Wee Ginger Dug.
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