\n Most strikingly, Reform\u2019s single biggest recent donor is Fiona Cottrell, who has given \u00a3750,000 in the past year. Her son, George Cottrell, was once Farage\u2019s aide \u2013 and was jailed in the United States in 2017 after pleading guilty to wire fraud in a dark-web money-laundering scheme.\n<\/p>\n
\n These are not grassroots fivers. They are boardroom and offshore cheques. When Farage shouts about immigration and dangles populist slogans, remember Brexit\u2019s economic fallout and ask: who really benefits<\/a> from his politics? History suggests it is not the working families of Britain, but the very elites \u2013 and even convicted fraudsters \u2013 who bankroll his campaigns.\n<\/p>\n \n Peter Macari<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n Aberdeen<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n THE snake-oil salesman that brought you Brexit is now selling racist-inspired economic fixes.\n<\/p>\n \n That\u2019s correct, folks, the problems with the UK budget can be fixed easily enough by getting rid of all those foreign types. Well, that is the thought process behind the latest \u201cboot them out\u201d policy by the ultranationalists.\n<\/p>\n \n His ability to do so hinges on him getting into power and then striking down the Human Rights Act 1998 along with the Scottish Act of the same year and the Wales Act and Northern Irish Act of 2017. Once he does that, and we have all lost our rights, our protection under the law, he can move with impunity.\n<\/p>\n \n \n \u201cAnd welcome to Fascist GB, a place that has become so isolationist in its outlook that barb wire once more guards the beaches, and the cliff tops are patrolled by the Fundamentalists Division of the Free Corps.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cLoudspeakers on every street corner blare out warnings about harbouring anybody deemed a non-citizen!\n<\/p>\n \n This is a sentence, long since used on everyone that shows any criticism towards the dictator or his party. Without citizenship, you can\u2019t work, gain travel privileges or get a ration card.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cRationing having been introduced on the breakdown of all trade agreements with our former trade partners when the excesses of cruelty of the concentration camps became common knowledge on the world stage.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n You consider that statement over the top? Do you think it is pure fantasy? Then I suggest you read up on Germany in the 1930s.\n<\/p>\n \n We can\u2019t let the seller of snake oil a toehold in Scotland, and we certainly need to stand up to all unilateralists as and when they raise their flag of racist hatred.\n<\/p>\n \n Cliff Purvis<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n Veterans for Scottish Independence 2.0<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n IT\u2019S official! I\u2019m deemed by society to be a total weirdo! Why? I ain\u2019t got a bloody, god-awful smartphone! I can\u2019t stand the damned things. Smartphones, with their \u201camazing\u201d touchscreen technology, dinnae like auld gits like me wi seriously clumsy fingers! Gie me a laptop any day o\u2019 the week, wi the satisfying whack, often in temper, o\u2019 that keyboard, that never fails tae deliver, despite the serious abuse the poor thing gets fae me!\n<\/p>\n \n So where the hell am I gaun wi this? My partner, wi the same political beliefs as me, is deemed by society tae be normal (ie she has a smartphone!). She kindly, therefore, from time to time, shows me clips on it that she reckons will interest me. Recently she came up wi a total gem!\n<\/p>\n \n She showed me a short clip fae one o\u2019 these podcast thingies by Skotia. It was The National\u2019s very ain editor extraordinaire (it\u2019s pathetic what I\u2019ll dae tae get ma letter published!), Laura Webster, defending the accusation by god knows who that The National is an \u201cactivist newspaper\u201d, for god\u2019s sake!\n<\/p>\n \n How does The National’s editor, @LauraEWebsterr<\/a>, feel about people calling her and the team ‘activists’ rather than journalists?<\/p>\n Speaking to @TheSkotia<\/a> podcast, she dives into it. pic.twitter.com\/xIuoNGdtEH<\/a>\n <\/p>\n \n \u2014 The National (@ScotNational) September 22, 2025<\/a>\n <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \n Laura, quite rightly, knocked back this garbage in a very calm, controlled manner (that widnae be me, a wis raging!). She argued that naebody wid accuse the Daily Record o\u2019 that even though it\u2019s biased in favour o\u2019 Labour and likewise wi the Daily Express which is a massive pal o\u2019 Farage!\n<\/p>\n \n Aye, there jist ain\u2019t such a thing as an impartial newspaper so The National, quite rightly, has tae be the only kid on the block not only tae support independence, but tae highlight the evils of grotesque inequality, the genocide in Gaza<\/a> and basically other stuff aw the other papers winnae touch wi a barge pole, even The Guardian for god\u2019s sake!\n<\/p>\n \n Talking aboot newspapers, back in the gid auld days o\u2019 the 1970s (a ken, am a nostalgic auld git!), ma dear auld late faither read The Scotsman every day. That\u2019s when I first started tae read serious stuff. The Scotsman was clearly a liberal newspaper of note back then, but without going intae the history, it\u2019s now unrecognisable o\u2019 that paper today (ie ownership, dear boy, ownership!).\n<\/p>\n \n Back in 2018, I had a hernia operation at the private Murrayfield Spire hospital in Edinburgh<\/a>, very much against ma political beliefs. However, the circumstances were that due to the waiting list in the NHS, they decided tae pay for my treatment there, so thankfully it was NHS dosh, not me being a total hypocrite! It still didnae sit well wi me though!\n<\/p>\n \n The point being is that one of the \u201cperks\u201d there was tae get a complimentary copy of the Scotsman tae read. I read it and it was utter garbage compared tae what I read back in the 1970s. Jist another Yoon rag as far as I\u2019m concerned, but that apart, it had totally lost its soul!\n<\/p>\n \n Aye, Laura o\u2019 The National, yer quite right tae totally defend the paper\u2019s right tae plough its ain furrow against the rising and inexorable tide o\u2019 right-wing extremism and at best pathetic mediocrity! Jist gaun fur it, hen!\n<\/p>\n \n Ivor Telfer<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n Dalgety Bay, Fife<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n SO, this is the new world? Courage only from comedians?\n<\/p>\n \n From Volodymyr Zelenskyy to Jimmy Kimmel \u2013 comedians holding the line for democracy where politicians fawn, fail and are afeared and media moguls collaborate, kowtow and cave to authoritarianism?\n<\/p>\n \n You must be joking \u2026\n<\/p>\n \n Amanda Baker<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n Edinburgh<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n I SEE an Edinburgh University audience backed the Union in an indy debate. Well, well … the university where English students have the unmitigated gall to look down their snouts at students from this country? Knock me down with a gnat\u2019s wing!\n<\/p>\n \n JR<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n Fife<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n THE Labour Government is clutching at straws. Digital IDs will become mandatory to allow one to work in the UK, as said the PM!\n<\/p>\n \n Those proposals are yet another attempt by the Westminster<\/a> Government to tackle illegal immigration and it will become like previous attempts and fail. But let’s be honest, it is the Labour Government panicking over the rise of Reform UK.\n<\/p>\n \n \n We already have so many forms of ID: passport, driving licence, National Insurance number, NHS number, bus passes, so what is the need for Digital IDs?\n<\/p>\n \n Westminster digital ID proposals will portray us all as British, something many will be very uncomfortable with. Scottish Secretary Douglas Alexander MP suggests that the new digital ID could be stored on a smartphone. This idea would surely exclude many who have simply not gone fully digital for whatever reason.\n<\/p>\n \n This is a recipe for fraud and neither the UK Government<\/a> nor security will be able to contain the fallout that could follow.\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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