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So in finally realising they are about to be sold down the river by Westminster, the fishermen are going to sail up the river to Westminster.* My understanding is that while fisheries is technically devolved to Holyrood, the setting of policy around fishing, quotas, etc., happens in Brussels under the Common Fishing Policy. It is only the implementation that the SG are involved in. The same principle applies with Farming. The issue here is two-fold, firstly any relations with other nations falls under foreign policy which is reserved, so the SG could do nothing if the UK government agreed to open up the territorial waters to the Spanish, for example. Secondly, there is no guarantee that post Brexit, Fisheries and Farming will automatically be devolved. The Tories are careful not to commit to this and the coded lines around having a Farming and Fisheries policy that works for the whole of the UK and that no current devolved powers would be repatriated to Westminster from Holyrood suggests strongly that they won't be. *available as a speechwriter.

100%

She really is a class act. In the middle of that, I don't think I've seen anyone talk for so long without being interrupted by Andrew Neil.

Is this yer man? If times are tight maybe he should have reconsidered the 50 grand he gave to BT.

Regardless of whether that is right or not, the point still stands that I suspect they know more about the facts, detail and background than anyone else on here. On your second point, I'm not a grass.

Good point - another Brexit bonus.

I think a lot of balanced journalists and broadcasters - there are some - would admit, if only privately, that they as a whole did not put the same level of scrutiny towards the Better Together case as they did to Yes Scotland. I've certainly heard James Cook say exactly that. I think to an extent that's understandable as you could argue that as Yes was the "change" option and BT was the status quo, it was incumbent on them to prove their case, perhaps a view that "well we know what things are like now, it's how things will be different in the future that's important". I'm giving a really big benefit of the doubt here. The broadcasters - and BBC in particular - really didn't get it the whole idea of balance either at first. They seemed to be stuck in the mindset of political balance meaning that they had to give an equal say to each party, whenever it was party politicians involved. Of course the problem with that was that meant a three v one as Labour, Tories and Lib Dems all lined up against the SNP, the Greens were also pretty sidelined. As an aside, I think there is some convention or regulation within the Scottish Parliament that a party has to have a minimum of five seats to be considered as an official political group. With that comes a lot of rights when it comes to parliamentary time, funding and treatment by the media. I picked up on this on the night of last year's Scottish Elections where someone pointed out that the Lib Dems just scraped over the line and the look of horror on the Lib Dem spokesperson on the panel was palpable. This changed a bit during the official campaign as it went straight down Yes Scotland/Better Together lines. Once the referendum was over though, it was right back to normal and the best example was the 4-1 gang up on Sunday Politics Scotland - here. I'd like to think that things will be different with the next referendum and I strongly suspect that Yes will be better supported in the print media - for example, I fully expect the Daily Record to endorse independence this time around - but the problem with the BBC and News and Current Affairs is that they do not seem to be capable of the self-reflection and introspection you are talking about as they seem to flat out admit that they might be wrong or have made mistakes. The current example of BBC News' reaction to the BBC Trust's review of Laura Kuenssberg's report on Jeremy Corbyn brings that into sharp focus. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/jan/18/bbc-trust-says-laura-kuenssberg-report-on-jeremy-corbyn-was-inaccurate-labour

A load of senior people at BBC sport are Liverpool fans which can be the only explanation.

One of my absolute favourite things on the TAMB is when an uninformed but optionated individual tries and argue facts with someone who works in, or has in depth knowledge of a particular subject. The best one was on the subject of post office closures when one TAMBer told another that he didn't know what he was talking about, obviously blindly unaware that the person he was arguing with was actually running the closure program.

What do you want to do when you grow up, Kezia?

Eric Joyce came out for independence some time ago. The clue is in the URL, "fromnotoyes".

Louis van Gaal indeed.

They do but they're worth about 15% less than it was six months ago. ? SG always said they would accept a fair share of the debt *as long as* there was a fair share of the assets. FWIW, I suspect that the preferred currency option put forwards next time will be a Scottish currency - the Poond to suitably windup the uber Yoons - pegged to Sterling for the foreseeable future.

And a pro-rate share of the UK's currency reserves would more than cover that.

Criminal Law and Civil Law are two completely different things. There's a good summary of the differences here. http://www.inbrief.co.uk/legal-system/difference-between-civil-criminal-law/

Well he would do, wouldn't he.

"Asked" by the law, not by anyone specifically.

Absolutely, we are all speculating. Making an assumption that all the evidence that was available to the PF back in 2011 was led in the civil case, i.e. no new evidence was brought to light that might have influenced the PF's original decision then even recognising the different levels of proof required in a civil and criminal trial, it does call into question the original decision. That's not to say that a jury would have found him guilty, or indeed that even the same judge, applying the criteria of "beyond reasonable doubt" would have reached the same conclusion but it surely suggests that there was a reasonable chance of a conviction. Pretty embarrassing for the PF and/or the Crown Office, IMHO.

At PMQs today, in response to a question from Angus Robertson, the PM gave this response. Which of course now makes absolutely no sense whatsoever given that the UK is leaving the Single Market. Just as she got to the end of that, she had a bit of a stutter and stammer which was obviously the brain kicking in and realising that this stock response to the SNP was now total bollocks.

See my response above. What is particularly interesting in this case is for what specific reasons did the PF have in the first place for deciding whether or not a conviction would be obtained and so dropping the case. We've no idea and can only speculate but on the surface it would seem a fairly straightforward case on one person's word against another. Goodwillie and Robertson don't deny they had sex with her but insisted it was consensual. The victim asserted that she hadn't given consent. If it's the case that the PF didn't think the victim would have been a credible witness, then given the judge's findings, that looks like it was a mistake.

Point 1. Yes, but what happens is that the PF makes a call based on the "balance of probabilities" as to whether there would be a conviction due to reasonable doubt. I accept that my original post might not have been clear but the point I was trying to make is that the PF makes a call on whether or not there is likely to be a successful prosecution, not whether the accused is guilty or not. These two things are very different. Point 2. I doubt it just based on the Civil case but if there were further, new, evidence then it's not outwith the realms of possibility that the PF may look to reopen the case.

It's pretty simple and straightforwards. There are two routes in law, one is the criminal courts and the other is the civil courts and there are different levels of proof applied in each case. One does not overrule the other. It's worth pointing out that while Goodwillie has no criminal conviction and therefore is free of any implications that has. That said, the criminal case was never put before a court as one person - the PF - decided that there wasn't a chance of getting a conviction, presumably that test itself is one that is on the "balance of probabilities". The judge in the civil case heard the evidence and felt differently. I've no huge problem with this practice in principle as it stops people being prosecuted maliciously where there really is no case to answer but in this case it would be interesting to know on what basis the case was dropped especially if that was to do with the credibility of the victim as a witness. The law was changed in 2015 to allow victims of crime to request a review of a decision not to prosecute, perhaps if that had been the case in 2012 then Goodwillie may have faced a criminal trial.

It's a complete bluff. No deal is the absolute worst set of terms they can get. Anything they can negotiate with the EU will be de facto better than that. it might not be a good deal, but it will be better than no deal and trading under WTO rules. The bluff of course, is that no deal will also be the worst case scenario for the EU. It's a case of who blinks first.

I was at the football tonight and bumped into an old friend of mine, like myself an expat Scot. Hadn't seen him for 18 months or so. He used to be a regular home and away attended at Scotland games but he gave up about 5 or 6 years ago. A big Rangers fan and probably one of the biggest Unionist guys I could think of that I know - Unionist rather than Loyalist. To say that I was gobsmacked that he was reconsidering his view on Independence as a result of Brexit is an understatement.

Likely to be high, and it'll depend on who wins the case and whether the judge thinks that the losing party's case had merit.