Why I support an independent Scotland

by 89 year old retired teacher, Ron Mackay

When asked why I wish for an independent Scotland I find it difficult to give a short answer – there are so many reasons. 

There's been a long tradition, going back beyond Burns favouring Scottish independence while maintaining an international outlook. 

“Man to man the world o'er should brothers be for aw' that.” 

Defending welfare programs and promoting genuine socialist policies would be much more possible for an independent Scottish Parliament. 

Some of the policies of the SNP I object to but the opposition to weapons of mass destruction and the call for full independence have my full support . I oppose war – all wars and see a nation free of all nuclear weapons as a progressive step in the struggle for peace in the world. 

The big powers all have major economic problems. We've had two world wars where the big powers sought to solve economic problems by resort to war. 

For the sake of the whole of humanity this situation must not be allowed to develop again. Scotland, a small nation dedicated to peace, could play it's part.

Watch:  A time lapse map of every nuclear blast since 1945.  A compelling yet horrific video... 

Hiroshima Day

Monday 6th August UPDATE -

The Council and Police are being really awkward on this international day of action across the world. Their small mindedness has forced us to move to St Enoch's Square Glasgow - we are there now - so come along and make your lantern and show solidarity with people across the world who want rid of weapons that could spell the extinction of all living things.

Join the Facebook Event for updates and reminders! - HERE

Wall Streets Drive to War by James Klugmann; May 1950

This pamphlet was written by the leading British communist writer, James Klugmann

Notes on this pamphlet:

"Why they want War – They want war because, as Lenin once said, war is terrible, but it is also terribly profitable."


“It is because America does not belong to the American people. The wealth of America, its mineral resources, its great plants and factories, its banks, its press, its government, are in the hands of a tiny group of great capitalists, whose aim is profit and not the welfare of the people.”

This is true of the missiles on the Gare Loch here in Scotland – we don’t own or control them. Instead, the millionaires and corporations controlling our democracy through ownership of the press and their ability to use their financial power to lobby the mainstream parties own and control the weapons of war here.
Back in the dark days of Blair and Bush, millions trod the streets of the UK in opposition to war in Iraq – yet the profitable thing to do for the oil corporations and the weapons of war manufacturers was to sex up documents that in their original form had shown no call for war. Blair’s wars were fought for the capitalist elite. No working class person profited… in fact the majority by far of the hundreds of thousands of people who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan have been the very poor. The majority of the soldiers who have died on all sides are working class people, driven to fight other poor people in the interest of shareholders and millionaires who sit comfortably and increase bank accounts that were used to bring down the economy across the globalised world. How much good would the monies used to build these weapons do for the poor and working class?

“Armaments can always be pushed if private (business) activity slows. War scares are easy to create and are nearly sure-fire producers of money for more and more arms.2 (The business journal US News and World report 17.2.50)


After WW2 bankruptcies in small business in the US increased, whilst because of the “red scare” mongering, large corporations connected with war (who had a 90% share in the national press) increased their sales by 5% by 1948. In a call reminiscent of the present cuts agenda of the ideologically driven Tories and Liberal democrats, the Magazine of Wall Street said about social welfare in 1950 – “this is not the time to strain the economy by pushing ahead with all kinds of social experiments which would add billions to the budget.”

This pamphlet is a great read. A fantastic expose of the post WW2 capitalist ecomomy and a great tract against the use of nuclear power for war.

Click on the pages to expand.

More pamphlets from the past HERE

Sustainability - some thoughts

Ann Kaniuk with Campsie branch member, Ron Mackay.


Ann Kaniuk, Campsie Branch member, shares her thoughts on sustainability.

As if the credit crunch and collapse of banking wasn’t enough, climate change is hitting us before we’re ready, and the oil is running out; it really is finite, and we’re using it up as fast as we can. North Sea oil has peaked, along with all other sources.

It’s a mug’s game to be dependent on other countries for our energy (new French nuclear power stations built in Britain, imported Russian gas, German electricity…). We need to create our own energy. Wave power good, wind power problematic. Huge wind farms are erratic and destructive, and they’re usually owned by profit-hungry foreign powers anyway. Putting small windmills in communities makes more sense – not attached to houses, where they can shake the walls to bits, but standing free in strategic places. What CAN be attached to houses – and SHOULD be attached to every south-facing roof in Scotland – are solar panels. Photovoltaic cells would be ideal – creating electricity that could be used by each household, with the surplus fed into the national grid. The technology for these is still a way off, but people should be working on it. Economy of scale should bring the price down. What we could do right now, though, is put solar heating
panels on all our roofs, providing hot water. We need the hot water for heating, and washing dishes and clothes. By hand (remember that?). No more dishwashers, washing machines, and tumble driers. Too profligate, when we have the sun shining for free.

Ann with SSP Campsie member Thomas Swann campaigning recently in Glasgow East.

Flying and trucking food from all over the globe is becoming increasingly expensive. Oranges, pineapples and bananas may become unaffordable luxuries again. We need to grow our own food. That means not using our land for biofuels, but using all our land for food. Look your last on vast lawns with stripes made by power-mowers. Dig them up. Grow food.

We need to stick together to overcome the challenges ahead. Sticking together sounds good to me.

Faslane protest - continued

More photos from the SSP contingient at the "Arms Around the Base" demo last Saturday- page down for more. more photos here:

Campsie Branch join SSP members in the CND Peace Chain around Faslane

Campsie Branch SSP joined the CND PEACE CHAIN around Faslane Nuclear Submarine Base today. This Chain signified four aniversaries (five if you include comrade Morag Balfour's birthday! - Make birthday cake not war is slogan of the day...).

These anniversaries were -

• One year ago, 14 June 2007, the Scottish Parliament voted against the UK Government’s plan for a new nuclear weapon system.
• The day of the Peace Chain also sees the celebration of the 26 th birthday of Faslane Peace Camp.
• 40 years ago, 14 June 1968, the first British nuclear patrol – HMS Resolution – sailed from Faslane.
• This year is also the 50 th birthday of CND and its struggle against nuclear weapons.

The Scottish Socialist Party support and actively campaign for the scrapping of Nuclear weaponry in Scotland and beyond. From our manifesto:

The UK followed the US into a war on a sovereign state because, allegedly, it had Weapons of Mass Destruction.
Neither of the aggressors appeared to see the irony of waging war over WMD while having, between them, the biggest nuclear arsenal in the world.
One of the supreme ironies of the Iraq war is that more and more countries now believe it is imperative they invest in a nuclear capability - or risk invasion by the world's only superpower.
Despite this, we believe the policy of nuclear deterrent is a failed policy. Since the dawn of the nuclear age, that the number of wars has not declined but escalated.
As a result, entire national economies are skewed towards accumulating weaponry, particularly nuclear missiles, in an arms race that only the richest nation on earth can win.
Furthermore, we are not convinced that nuclear war is an impossibility. If George W Bush gets his way, and the US successfully launches the National Missile Defence system, aka Star Wars, then a limited nuclear war, with Europe, Asia or Africa as its theatre, is a possibility as the American mainland will be shielded.
We, alas, won't be. Against the will of the people of Scotland, we have been forced to live with a devastatingly destructive nuclear arsenal just 30 minutes drive from the centre of Glasgow.
The Faslane nuclear base contains four Trident submarines, each bearing 16 missiles. This in turn amounts to 48 Trident nuclear warheads. Each of these warheads has a nuclear capability seven times that of the warhead dropped on Hiroshima.
This makes Scotland, in particular the dense conurbations in the West, a target for a direct nuclear or terrorist strike Trident is also hugely expensive, at a cost of £1 billion a year.
The SSP has consistently opposed the presence of nuclear warheads on our soil, with members and MSPs alike risking arrest to attend the Big Blockade every year at Faslane nuclear base.
We will continue to work shoulder-to-shoulder with organisations such as Scottish CND and Trident Ploughshares to campaign for immediate, unilateral nuclear disarmament.

The SSP stands for:
* The closure of the Faslane nuclear base and the scrapping of Trident with all jobs guaranteed via a diversification programme.
* Support for non-violent direct action and civil disobedience to disrupt the functioning of nuclear bases.
* Support for those arrested and imprisoned for resisting nuclear weapons.
* Outright condemnation of nuclear testing by other nations, such as France, India and Pakistan, which causes radiation-induced cancers.
* A united campaign across the UK and Europe to halt plans to establish nuclear weapons bases at Fylingdales and Menwith Hill in Yorkshire.
* A ban on the use of weaponry tipped with Depleted Uranium (DU). These have been used on Iraq since 1991, and in Bosnia, Serbia and Kosovo during the 1990s and are known to cause fatal cancers and birth defects.
* A ban on testing DU-tipped missiles including at the at the MoD's Dundrennan firing range, near the Solway Firth.

Aldermaston 2008 - the Bomb Stops here

(click on image to see leaflet)
















Aldermaston is Britains nuclear bomb factory.

This Easter marks the 50th anniversary of the first march to Aldermaston.

Let's join in telling Gordon Brown we want a safe, nuclear free UK and world.

Help build a future of peace and international justice.


www.cnduk.org/aldermaston/