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By Jason Michael
THERE’S NO TWO WAYS about it, Derek Mackay’s behaviour was predatory and disgusting. It was right that he resigned immediately from his ministerial brief and that he was suspended from the Scottish National Party. It can only be hoped he has the good grace and the sense to step down as an MSP, and that the police will launch a thorough investigation into his conduct. Over the past six months, by text and private messages on social media, he harassed a sixteen-year-old child, encouraging the schoolboy to meet him in person, in a series of communications which followed a well-known pattern of sexual grooming. This was not only highly inappropriate for a man of 42 in his position, it is also a serious criminal offence – and yes, it is!
Confusion around the legality of this has arisen due to the fact that the age of consent in Scotland is 16, leading some commenters today to defend his actions. One person responded to me earlier on Twitter saying: ‘Fancying sixteen year old Scots isn’t a crime.’ No, it’s not, but then fancying ten-year-olds isn’t a crime either. The crime is not in the thought. The crime is in the act – and in Mackay’s case its two-fold; the act of grooming a minor for the purposes of sexual exploitation and, had matters progressed to a sex act, sex with a minor. How can this be, when the legal age of consent is 16? Well, in Scotland people under 18 are still considered minors, and even though they are of an age to consent to sex, they are still afforded legal protection from persons in positions of trust.
According to the Sexual Offences (Scotland) Act 2009, ‘if a person (“A”) who has attained the age of 18 years (a) intentionally engages in sexual activity with or directed towards another person (“B”) who is under 18, and (b) is in a position of trust in relation to B, then A commits an offence, to be known as the offence of the sexual abuse of trust (Part 5, §42)’ – a crime which carries the penalty of up to five years imprisonment and a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum. So, yes, while it is not necessarily illegal for a 42-year-old adult to fancy a 16-year-old or to have sex with someone under 18, it is most definitely illegal for a Scottish government minister. It is also then illegal for him to groom a child for the purposes of sex. Let’s be clear on this. And, besides, the legalities – seriously, no parent is going to be happy with a middle-aged man in bed with their 16-year-old son or daughter.
But – and dispensing with this Mackay character – there is something else here. Whether we like the terminology or not, the SNP is a revolutionary party. It is the largest political party of the Scottish independence movement, a cause and a movement dedicated to Scottish independence qua the destruction of the British state as it is presently constituted. Our independence is not only about us and ‘Scotland’s future.’ Scottish independence is a question of great concern to the architects of the British state in London. It means the end of the British government’s control of Scotland’s vast resources; oil and gas, and all the potential of our renewables. Losing Scotland will significantly and adversely affect Britain’s spending power, its ability to play as it does on the global stage. London does not want to lose Scotland and will do whatever it takes to maintain its grip on us.
The National’s Kirsty Strickland, responding to people online claiming the timing of the Sun’s exposé was political, tweeted: ‘…it’s not the job of journalists or newspapers to break stories at a time that’s politically convenient for government.’ If you are not shocked at her ignorance and naivety, then you should be. This is precisely the job of journalists and newspapers (and television news) in the United Kingdom. Telling the news is merely a secondary function of Britain’s deeply compromised state-aligned media. British Military Intelligence’s involvement in media and the manipulation of civilian populations even earned itself a name in Iraq and Afghanistan – ‘hearts and minds.’ In its three-decade long dirty war in the north of Ireland, the British government authorised MI5 to infiltrate the media, recruit useful journalists as agents and assets, and to commit crimes up to and including murder. When it comes to maintaining the integrity of the state – the union – the British government’s opening move is always ‘hearts and minds;’ the use of the media to control and direct the narrative, to place stories, and to destroy the enemies of the state.
Behind this propaganda front, behind the open door between a compromised media and the state security services, is active intelligence – the spooks. Britain makes a habit of knowing its enemies, and the SNP is an enemy of the British state. We know MI5 surveilled and infiltrated groups of environmentalists and tiny Trotskyist political parties. So, to think for a moment the SNP is not under constant and intrusive close surveillance is just plain stupidity. It can be taken for granted that every single text sent by SNP politicians is seen by someone in British Intelligence. These watchmen, these guardians of the state, know every single sexy pic, suggestive text or email, and dinner plan SNP MSPs and MPs have ever sent. That is their job!
It is also their job, from time to time – as the British government requires, to intervene; moving passive surveillance to active involvement. People who become too problematic don’t always need to accidently fall down a flight of stairs eight times or shoot themselves twice in the back of the head and throw the gun away. There’s more than one way to assassinate deal with a problem. British agents are well-practiced at setting traps, setting people up, stitching them up, and making sure the right journalist in a ‘friendly’ newspaper gets a brown paper package with the evidence. Personally, I doubt this was the case with Mackay. He was a gift to these people. Sleazy morons will be sleazy morons, but he clearly acted as though no one was watching – and that exposes the deeper problem! It reveals an innocence at the top of the SNP that is, quite frankly, dangerous.
Please don’t read from this that I think he should have just been smarter in his grotty antics. No, I am glad the bastard was rumbled. Rather, what this shows is that no one took the time to brief him on his use of online and cellular communications. No one told him his every move was being watched and scrutinised by forces who do not have Scotland’s best interests at heart. What this leads me to suspect is that this prudent and healthy suspicion isn’t a thing in the SNP, that they are really simple – that they assume Britain’s playing fair. Britain is not playing fair!
This, for me, is an important lesson; that our political leadership urgently needs to stop being so complacent. Not only has the SNP had issues with tackling British propaganda and disinformation, it appears not to have a handle on the basics of the tactics of the British state’s clandestine services. MI5 and GCHQ – the British government’s ‘listening post’ – exist for a reason; paying very close attention to anyone and everyone who might pose a threat to the state and the integrity of the union. In the surveilled state, such as Britain is, there is no such thing as privacy. Big Brother knows who’s naughty and nice. When the moment requires it, it will pass the naughty list on to The Sun, The Herald, The Scotsman, The Daily Record, or report on it themselves on the BBC. It will look down the nice list and start dreaming up ways to frame the innocent.
We are at a critical moment in our journey to independence. More people support independence than don’t, and a campaign, given Brexit and the success of the independence movement on the ground, is likely to increase support. This is our first time at this. We’re newbies and rank amateurs. But this isn’t Britain’s first rodeo, and Britain plays a good game. This is a dangerous time. It is at this point, having lost the propaganda war and with democracy working against it, that the British state begins to use violence – oppressive and eventually repressive violence; destroying reputations and lives, and eventually smashing skulls. Britain has always behaved like this. It is predictable and inevitable. We can’t stop British violence, but we certainly can’t cower from it either. We must go on. We must continue the struggle. But we have to be smart. We must stop being so naïve, and we must stop making things so easy for them.
MI5 operatives trying to recruit a Republican activist at Cairnryan ferry port in Scotland
Random Public Journal 
The SNP appear to think this is a Church fate
…and more worryingly
– that Westminster will naturally fold to their obvious niceness. and
– YES won’t mind all those false bravado indy/brexit promises…(inc we will protect our EU citizens)
I fear for Scotland and its beautiful people.
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A very excellent piece. Thank you.
Time perhaps to winkle out the assets, establish our own counterintelligence capabilities and develop a few assets of our own.
I wonder also having expressed this, if I will become a person of interest. Presumably you realise that by writing as you do you definitely are of interest.
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I agree with you Duncan. An independent Scotland will need its own intelligence service, independent from the 5-eyes cartel and with close links to the Scandinavian and probably German services. It would make no real sense to join 5-eyes as the primary existential threats to Scotland’s people come from its two founder states.
Given their sense of imperial entitlement and their proven track record of undermining democracy throughout the world I genuinely believe we will need to keep a Cold War-Level watching brief, particularly on England.
Well, I’ve no doubt I’m also a person of interest too.
See yeez in the Gulag. 😉
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Precisely Jason…. well said and be prepared there’s more to come…. just in time I the run up to the Salmond trial and of course the state will do anything in its power to disrupt the start of the campaign for Holyrood 2021 or Indy ref2 whichever’s soonest.
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your language at first really riled me. Then as you moved on into your article and I saw where you were going I rrealised the truth of it. You are right, the Westminster Government and British press will have a lot of dirty tricks at the ready. The SNP need to be ready for a fuselage of these to be fired at them over the coming months. As a supporter I just hope that none of them are too sleazy. The odd broken marriage, or affair will be milked for all they are worth I am sure. Anything worse………! We all have to be tough and look to ourselves. Remember the ‘pot calling kettle black’ saying. Bear that in mind before we cast stones at our politicians.
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Reblogged this on Ramblings of a 50+ Female.
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Well timed press release…. it won’t change my opinion on YES 2
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Not happy with your use of the word ‘child’ and ‘schoolboy’. At 16 you can marry in Scotland and I don’t know about you but I was not a child at 16. The lad is still at school and you could have referred to him as a pupil or a scholar but schoolboy implies a child which he is not. He’s a young man.
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I will not defend Mackay. Is it not the case that the police have stated that no crime was committed and they are not taking further action.
I totally agree regarding the SNP. It is past the time for being nice and cuddly. Get the gloves off, and get stuck in to these lying hypocrites.
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Anybody who does not believe the British are treating Scotland as an existential threat that needs to be dealt with and eliminated by all means necessary is fundamentally deluded.
There is now an undeclared war being waged against Scotland and its people by the British.
However, there actions will only serve to alienate more and more Scots. We can only hope that the psychological shock that comes from losing their toehold in Ireland, as they will, weakens them sufficiently in the eyes of the world that our own struggle becomes a little easier. On the other hand, they may take their rage out upon Scotland in a thoroughly brutal manner, knowing that the USA will make sure the world can do nothing in the same way it couldn’t as Budapest was crushed in 1956…
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Very good analysis of the current situation. I hope the SNP learn the lesson from this episode.
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The party will learn no lessons. They only take action when the press get the story. They are burying internal complaints from branches on a daily basis. If our branch is aware of two serious complaints which HQ has swept under the carpet , there will be many more.
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If you read the life of Major General Hector McDonald “Hector the Hero” who committed suicide in 1903 after being hounded by the British establishment, you will understand this process!!
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My god, the British really are a horrible, cliquey, elitist shower of bastards aren’t they?
McDonald clearly saw them as they were and they didn’t like it.
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I have often posted on Facebook about this covert use of intelligence agencies to undermine the SNP and the Independence movement. The Westminster elite and indeed the ruling classes of England have had hundreds of years of experience of subterfuge, manipulation, deceit and corruption and their corridors of power know no bounds. We all need to be aware of the lengths they will go to in stopping Scotland’s Independence. We are their most valuable asset and they do not want to relinquish the value of our resources. Why many Scots don’t see this and why they don’t see how wealthy a nation we would be as an Independent country is just beyond my comprehension. Why are so many Scots in favour of the Union when Westminster have shafted us for over 300 years??
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My parents were active in the Independence movement since the early fifties. As children we knew not to gossip about any coming and goings while outside the house, never discuss the odd printing press or mobile radio that passed through the basement, and ignored the coming and goings.
But, for years our phone was bugged, every call accompanied by clicks and pauses. Very often mail arrived late and obviously tampered with. That was forty years ago so the tools used against people fighting for their own countries future has become more sophisticated but the need for awareness is every bit as necessary.
It’s either complaisance in our politicians or lack of security training, but either way there should be no dropping of the guard. It was always thus and sadly still ‘ them and us ‘ .
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Precisely. It seems clear that the SNP has neither intelligence nor, possibly more importantly, counter-intelligence working for them. Nobody would be so foolish as to vote me into a senior position, but if I were, I’d be getting rooms swept both irregularly and regularly for bugs as a matter of course – not least in order to spread disinformation into the UK’s intelligence files.
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I absolutely agree with the article above. I have warned people in the movement that they, the establishment, will stop at nothing to keep Scotland under it’s control. We have to be vigilant and very smart when in a position of any power, watch your back.
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Agree with this article we have to deal with these dangerous people they have hundreds of years experience in this type of espionage no one is safe.
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It breaks my aging heart that the state has no qualms about its tactics but I will fight for Independence till I die SAOR ALBA
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You couldn’t really make it up. As if the Mark McDonald ‘inappropriate sexting scandal’ and the forthcoming Alex Salmond sexual misconduct/attempted rape trial were not enough, we now have a Scottish Government minister outed for seemingly grooming a 16 year old boy. Nae wonder they call us the pudding race …
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Wow Jason, you say what many of us know and few are willing to say in public.
Off course SNP is even infiltrated at Branch level.
Too many astute activists who suggest action short of civil disobedience are sidelined or witch hunted out.
So all you say here is highly believable.
Works both ways though within the other Indy movements new activists are ‘screened’ watch given lead in positions and info to test them.
A well known MP for SNP had an MI5 operative found out by YES activists, she left under advice that if she did nt she would appear I several media sources friendly to the cause.
Keep doing what you do.
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It’s not just MI5 & GCHQ that will be monitoring the activities of Scottish politicians and the SNP in particular. There is no such thing as the Scottish Civil Service – the civil servants who work in the Scottish Parliamentary service are employees of the Whitehall Civil Service and, by extension the UK Government – so you can bet your bottom dollar that Whitehall knows about every aspect of Scottish Gov’t activity (briefings, tactics, strategies, etc) long before any public/media announcements are made. It’s a bit like the world of cyber security: the minute an organisation develops a system, the hackers are one jump ahead in trying to penetrate it and the first the organisation knows about it is when it gets hacked and its data stolen.
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In that case, it is imperative that the Yes side develop a similar capability.
Fortunately, the young, where Yes is dominant have the best of these skills which may well become the nucleus of our counter intelligence effort.
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Excellent post/comment/article and along the same lines as l posted some 4 to 6 hours ago. If the publication of McKay’s nonsense wasn’t proof to the SNP hierarchy that the likes of MI5 will do everything in its power to destroy the SNP, othing will.
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Totally agree. We have to be continually balancing between the lies being portrayed while supporting and encouraging people to continue to commit to Scottish Independence. We are up against a well organised and experienced enemy. Who are without boundaries to ensure their outcomes.
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This has only reiterated my apoplexy at the SNP hiring Murray Foote as their new Communications Officer! A man who says he supports Independence but was instrumental in the publishing of “The Vow” across the front page of the Daily Rectum!
Was he really that naive? If the answer is yes, then he should be no where near the job he has been tasked with! If the answer is No than I would have thought that he would have realised that what he published could potentially have been a double edged sword and sway floating voters to believe the bastards like they have done so for years.
Foote says he wanted to have something that could hold the BT Leaders to account but he should have had the foresight to know that nothing of that sort could be done without the backing of WM because if I knew that, he definitely should have!!!
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I have to agree with the conclusions made in this post. My experiences with the State watchdogs and their goons two decades ago would not let me say other. There is however one glimmer of light on the horizon. The more people they pish aff and offend, particularily in the EU …..the more those people are likely to discreetly aid a country that has proven its willingness to keep close ties with their friends in Europe. The EU are not going to turn a blind eye to a rogue state operating off their shores with impunity. The EU will willing take a hit or two and a manageable loss of trade with their former partner in their stride. England won’t, it is far too weak and financially insecure. It no longer has the wherewithal to prosper or to offer security to its citizens. Its not in a position to bargain for any new trade deals from a position of strength. Little Englanders full of bluff and bluster are the achitects of their own misfortune. I think I’ll just patiently wait a year or so. A declining and weakening England will no longer have the reserves, the means or the influence to fulfil their ambitions. Then will be the time to take advantage of that. Why not, everyone else will.
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This article is not new news to me. I have no doubt the British & America operatives will gladly spill Scottish blood to preserve England’s hegemony over us. My concern is the breathtaking naivety of the snp. They simply refuse to acknowledge the depravity of the beast we face to gain our freedom. It’s almost like there are unionist operatives in charge at the snp…
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Absolutely 100% please don’t do last resort wildcat ref 2 that’s what the British state hope to push us to rush at something before we really know who we are dealing with
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I support your moral and legal stance overall and agree with your security concerns, both from personal and Irish political experience. But I question whether the SNP is “a revolutionary party”. It has the stated objective of removing Scotland from the UK but whether its leadership is a) absolutely sincere about that and b) intent of initiating a revolutionary uprising to bring that about are points open to doubt.
But perhaps you have come to your definition in some other way?
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