Och, now’s the hour and now’s the day for the Historic Announcement of the Historic Date for Scotland’s Historic Referendum on Independence. It’s only taken the SNP the best part of two years to get to this point and, of course, there’s only another 18 months or so to wait for the Historic Day itself.
So today’s parliamentary announcement is hardly the stuff legends are built from. Never mind. But this being a banner day for the SNP and all that, let us pause to recall one of the party’s most dismal – yet telling – failures. I refer, of course, to the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communciations Act. This preposterous, cock-eyed, bill has proved just as illiberal and capricious as its critics predicted. If it provides a forecast for life in Caledonia, Free and Braw then god help us all.
Kenny MacAskill, the Justice Secretary, boasts that 83% of prosecutions pursued in relation to the bill have resulted in convictions.
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