Tag: Pensioners for Independence

Scottish Independence Podcasts. You’ll find us on our website or wherever you get your podcasts.

Scottish Independence Podcasts

MmH

We have a good relationship with the Scottish Independence Podcasts team.

During the Covid lockdown when we moved to online meetings and talks, we asked them to take on producing podcasts from our events.

If you scroll down through our blog posts on this website you’ll find lots of really good talks and discussions from Glasgow and Edinburgh Groups. Those podcasts are also available on Google, Apple, Podbean and wherever else you get your podcasts. And if we recorded a video then the video is up on their YouTube channel. In all our talks and discussions have had over 5,000 downloads on these podcast channels.

All of that is down to the Scottish IndyPod team. So we thought we’d write this to say thank you and tell you a bit more about them. First thing to say is that they recently published their 800th podcast. And have just passed 250,000 downloads overall. Dedicated is the word that comes to mind!

This is a recent chat they had with Laura Pollock of The National

.

You can sign up to their mail-list for advance notice of the podcasts. Click here.

Scottish Independence Podcast YouTube Channel

Although their main activity is creating audio podcasts, they have a YouTube channel called IndyPod Extra where they upload any video footage that they take. Recently they have been tackling the joys of outside recordings. If you go to the channel you’ll find footage from rallies in Skye (wet & windy), Ayr (windy & sunny) and most recently from Edinburgh (sunny and gorgeous). There is some great content and chats, eg two of their collaborators went to Loudoun in Ayrshire with the Saturday Saltire Group and our of that came a great chat about the Battle of Loudoun and Bruce’s victory of the Earl of Pembroke. Click on the image and you can tune into that one: 

Scottish Independence Podcasts

Scottish Independence Podcast Website

They publish a new podcast every Friday. It’s great being able to tune into their weekly podcasts. And as well as making sure those are available widely online, their website operates as a resource and archive. You can browse through the categories on the website. So say you’re interested in defence, you’ll find all the podcasts touching on that topic in one playlist. If you want to find out about ferries or freeports – cos let’s face it, Scottish ferries and freeports are touchy subjects in some quarters – then just click on their Infrastructure Category. Click on the image and have a look.

.

Thanks again, IndyPodcasters!

What Is Salvo?

MmH

In July, Sara Salyers of Salvo was the guest speaker at a meeting of our Edinburgh Group. What is Salvo? what are its aims? and how might those aims be achieved?

Historical Context

Sara spoke for about the historical context of the 1707 Treaty of Union in terms of related legislation in both the Scottish and English Parliaments. She also spoke about the role of the Monarch in England and Scotland. This is an important point to understand because the role and position of the monarch is very different in the two nations.

Salvo’s Aim

Salvo’s aim is to clarify Scotland’s constitutional situation.

  • Is Scotland a voluntary partner in a political union?
  • Did England annex Scotland? making us an annexed territory?
  • Or are we a colony?

Salvo’s position is that England annexed Scotland. And Sara went into some detail of how they have reached that conclusion.

The next step is to take their research and conclusions to an international body for clarification. Sara said that when and where that will happen will be announced nearer the time.

Questions from the audience

What gave the English Parliament the right to declare a Supreme Court above Scots Law?

What is Liberation.scot?

We’ve put up with this for a long time. How do we convince international authorities that this is a pressing matter?  Comparisions between what happened in British Colonies re how people were treated and what happened in Scotland.

Our language has certainly be annexed

Will England pay attention to your efforts? Or just treat what you say as some historical anachronism?

Had the Brexit vote gone differently with the EU would we be in a stronger position or a weaker position? 

Salvo and Liberation is about restoring to Scotland something that belongs to Scotland

Have you got any feelers out to other nations, Norway, Iceland maybe?

What are the actual next steps to move this forward?

Joanna Cherry has said that she thinks Salvo is not a viable option. What is your reply to that?

Can there be some debate / conference between Salvo and those who doubt your approach?

Our Greater Glasgow Group Out & About

MmH

Mary McCabe and her team of stalwarts set up their stalls twice a week in Argyll Street and another team set up another stall once a fortnight in Milngavie. Rain or shine or windy…. they’ll be there. And – they get themselves and their stall to marches, to demos, to events.

A few months back they organised a Hit The Road, Jack demo at the UKGov HQ in Glasgow. More recently they were at Bannockburn March. Mary was one of the speakers, and spoke about the 1800s Scottish Wars of Independence.

They’ve got some new banners for the stall, too. One is research from Ember-Climate Org about how energy flow across the UK are expected to develop in the next 6 years. In a nutshell, Scotland will be providing 40% of UK’s energy supply… all produced from nice clean wind and solar sources.

.

Last week, the Glasgow Stall gang supported the Cost of Living Crisis demo outside Tesco in St Enoch Square. The demo called on the UK Government to use its reserved powers to tackle inflation by putting a cap on big business profits instead of focussing  everything on restraining wages. This year TESCO is expecting a profit of £2.3 billion.

Here they are.

I bet King Robert was impressed with their determination. And by the way, that wreath was in honour of Winnie Ewing.

Hit the Road, Jack!

MmH

Last week Greater Glasgow Pensioners for Indy staged a demonstration in Atlantic Square outside the UKGov Glasgow Hub. This is a substantial office building housing several thousand employees and known – in Indy circles – as Governor General Alister Jack’s Glasgow HQ. He has another HQ over in Edinburgh.

Mary McCabe and the Glasgow P4Indy Stall Team, who organised the demo, were pleased with the turnout. People came up from Dumfries & Galloway, over from Edinburgh, Fife and Hamilton. We got toots from passing traffic. The Polis even showed up and chatted to us!

.

The Scottish Independence Podcast team and took some photos:

.

Why Have the Demo?

Before the actual demo, the Scottish Independence Podcast team helped us record a chat with Mary McCabe about how the demo came about and why they were doing it. We were amused to discover that the video was banned by TikTok. Maybe TikTok decided we were encouraging a pensioners’ insurrection YouTube must be used to insurrections as they were happy to host us. Here it is:

In Arbroath for the Independence Rally…

MmH

Highlights from a visit to Arbroath for the AUOB March

Marlene, member of our P4Indy National Group, writes:

I was up in Arbroath at the weekend for the AUOB March. I went up on the Friday with a friend, Fiona McGregor also a member of Pensioners for Indy. We had all day Saturday to wander around, visit the Abbey, find the statue of King Robert and Bishop Bernard, Chancellor of Scotland and Bishop of Arbroath, take photos and chat to strangers!

Here’s a video blog that we made:

.

And here are a couple of the speeches: Mike Russell, former MSP and now President of SNP, and Dave Dougan, MP for Arbroath.

.