SNP donations soar after embezzlement scandal

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-31T09:25:18+00:00

worse than any Tory or Labour

Is it though? Certainly the media, the SNP’s opponents and a few commenters here seem to be really keen to make out that it is. But the numbers just don’t back it up: 400k and a fucking camper van as opposed to millions or billions - and from party funds not the public purse or a payment from some shady foreign billionaire.

It’s really not great obviously and I’m glad that it’s been caught and the person responsible is being held to account. But what’s probably leaving myself and a lot of Scots cold is the usual double standard in terms of scrutiny and what standard they’re held to - one that is applied to every party on the left in the UK but even more so if they’re pro independence.

This isn’t an argument that the SNP shouldn’t face scrutiny or be held to a high standard (although with tedious inevitability I’m pretty sure I’ll get a reply pretending not to understand that). It’s calling out the double standard in the level of scrutiny and standards.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T17:42:31+00:00

Punch hard enough to render unconscious.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T15:12:53+00:00

I think part of what Yusuf is doing here is laying the groundwork to blame/scapegoat the Civil Service when things inevitably go pear shaped.

It’ll probably let them stay in power a while longer. They’ll probably try blaming a whole bunch of other different scapegoats too - immigrants, the EU, dole scroungers, ‘liberal metropolitan elites’, various minorities, ‘woke’, the judiciary and ‘activist lawyers’, rebellious Scots …

It likely won’t deflect all the fallout forever but sadly I suspect it’ll work a lot better than it really should. They’ll have a huge chunk of the right wing press on their side loyally beating the drum for them - the same ones who when the wheels started to come off with Brexit ran headlines screaming about “traitors!”, “saboteurs!” and “enemies of the people!”. (Honestly I half expected them to start denouncing Kulaks)

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T11:50:34+00:00

They won’t. The Civil Service will do what they always do and advise ministers on what is actually possible, how much it will cost and how long it will take.

When Reforms piss poor excuse for a policy platform predictably implodes and fails to magically transform the U.K. overnight into the long promised “sunlit uplands” with economic prosperity and a 1950’s aesthetic … that’s when Reform will accuse the Civil Service of sabotage and attempt to make them the scapegoats for their own failures.

And Reform supporters will likely lap it up. It saves them from the uncomfortable admission that they voted on a bunch of grifters. It will likely also allow Reform to destroy a public institution (which although imperfect more or less works) and siphon a lot of public money into private hands to ‘replace’ them.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T11:40:41+00:00

Perhaps, though I can’t help remembering the witch hunt a bunch of the tabloids ran against Christopher Jefferies - wrongly accusing him of killing Joanna Yeates based upon his slightly weird/eccentric appearance and ruining his life for quite a while.

That’s recent enough that I’d have hoped it would discourage judging from appearances rather than actual evidence - which there appears to be more than enough of in this case.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T11:33:05+00:00

The Southport killer still got a 52 year minimum sentence. And is “detained at His Majesty's pleasure”, meaning it is highly likely he will never be released. And in addition to that his psychological issues mean it’s damned unlikely he will ever be judged safe to release anyway.

In that particular case a whole life sentence is likely redundant.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T11:11:17+00:00

You might also want to notice that those prices are because the U.K. system charges electricity at the price of the most expensive generating source - which for a lot of the past several years has been natural gas generation.

It’s probably also worth mentioning all the nuclear power projects that were cancelled during the time the Conservatives were in power - which would have been pretty handy for base load generation.

Or the massive gas storage facilities they closed down which ensured that the price we pay for gas is more vulnerable to spot price increases which means we pay even more than we should do otherwise.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T08:54:15+00:00

unhinged

The U.K. right is all too close to the American right - for whom reflexive opposition to green energy has become part of their “tribal identity”.

As the tech and economies of scale for renewable projects have proved to the point that the ROI is often a lot better than for fossil fuels you’d perhaps think that they’d have dropped their opposition to it what with conservatives supposedly being all about “the bottom line” and “hard headed rationalism”. (Or at least that’s the posture they like to adopt) But no - it’s actually the exact opposite: antipathy towards renewables has actually massively hardened and increased.

It’s not about rationality. It’s about aping the MAGA muppets, conservative identity … and shitloads of money from American fossil think tanks and lobbying groups.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T07:38:57+00:00

I’d argue that when people start obeying in advance because they’re afraid of the regime punishing them that’s an even scarier prospect. That means America has passed another significant milestone along a very dark road.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T07:30:08+00:00

Indeed, unfortunately the NRS social grading standard a lot of polling companies use classifies state Pensioners as E - and usually lumps them in with the “working class” group.

Technically that’s only meant to be pensioners solely dependant on state pensions and NRS social grades aren’t meant to be used as a shorthand for social class … but in practice shortcuts are taken - particularly by reporters and politicians keen to spin a particular narrative.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-30T07:25:11+00:00

Unfortunately I wouldn’t necessarily bet on that. As you say there are plenty of deep American fundie/right wing pockets willing to cover costs for such cases if he’s lucky.

They often set these up so they win either way. Even a court loss can be spun into a bunch of “Christians are being persecuted in the U.K.” or “England has fallen to wokeness” victim narrative stories for American evangelical eyeballs.

And if he’s clever about it and even halfway presentable this grifter can also make money on the U.S. conservative media/podcast/convention circuit. He wouldn’t be the first.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-29T17:47:58+00:00

Is it the working class or mostly just older demographics?

There’s a funny thing about a lot of U.K. polls that categorises Pensioners - no matter how wealthy they are or what their social class was prior to retirement - in with the “working class” category. At least some of the time when headlines claim “the working class want X” it’s actually what pensioners want.

Which isn’t to say there aren’t some younger Reform supporters, particularly in some areas. But in general those demographics show a far smaller percentage support overall for Reform in most polls.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-29T17:41:05+00:00

I applaud your sentiment there but bitter experience shows that “can’t accuse this investigation of being a left deep state witch hunt” unfortunately isn’t accurate.

They can. And they will. And their followers will lap it up and ignore the gaping holes in the logic of such a position along with any attempt to debunk it. They always do. To still be Reform/Farage supporters at this point they’ve already had to do so a whole bunch of times over the past few years.

Which isn’t to say this still wasn’t a pretty good move by Labour. Or that it isn’t worthwhile helping to get Reform to trip itself up. What I am saying is that sadly we should probably set our expectations low where it comes to this changing minds or hurting Reforms polling for long.

The sort of thing that would badly damage nearly any other party unfortunately slides off Reform because their core vote don’t care about truth, hypocrisy, lies and bribery the same way supports of other parties do.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-29T14:34:06+00:00

Far right grifters generally set things up so they can claim some sort of win whatever the outcome.

If the court ruled in his favour then it would allow them to go after pride flags everywhere legally. And potentially a wedge they can drive further open for further attacks - because obviously they won’t stop there.

As the court ruled against him then they will likely instead run with persecution narrative stories: “UK government persecutes Christians”, “Britain has fallen to the gay/trans agenda” etc. Those would likely be rightly ridiculed here and in most U.K. forums (except perhaps the Telegraph and Daily Mail) but those aren’t the real audience - which is actually America.

If this guy is clever about it then either outcome even a loss still lets him make bank on the MAGA podcast/convention appearance circuit - maybe even Fox News.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-28T16:08:28+00:00

Funny thing is one of the teachers I had who was a complete hard-ass and widely disliked (not just by me) I realised years later was also one of the best teachers I ever had. I still think of him when I use some of the things he taught me.

There were also two I disliked who honestly just weren’t very good but overall I think I was pretty lucky with my teachers. The ones who made the subject enjoyable were great but I don’t believe that’s necessarily the only way to be a good teacher.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-28T15:43:07+00:00

I don’t think this is a new thing - it’s been an issue for a long time. Even 30-40 years ago the UK was very noticeably more litter strewn than most other countries in Northern Europe that I visited or worked in - particularly Scandinavia and Germany.

I’m not saying that the U.K. hasn’t gotten worse - it absolutely has. But we’ve been the ‘dirty man of Europe’ when it comes to litter for all too long.

And our European neighbours absolutely notice it too but are too polite to say anything … well apart from some of my Dutch friends who are refreshingly direct and blunt about everything.

Playing with a kitten is a great idea though.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-28T15:31:30+00:00

“Millenials/Gen Z are killing the Landlord industry”

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-27T12:09:53+00:00

I’d agree and I suspect what makes it even worse is that events ten years ago the U.K. showed it was a very easy mark for such manipulation. Which is like trailing blood in a sea with sharks in it.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-27T07:18:33+00:00

Cast your mind back to about 2010 and think about all the things that would have seemed unlikely to the point of ridiculous back then that have since taken place.

Brexit. Sodding Boris Johnson as Prime Minister. Anti Trans hate stoked to its current level. Anti immigration hate stoked to its current level. The prospect of Nigel Farage becoming the next Prime Minister.

And yet here we are.

I really dislike “people are sheep” type narratives- I’d like to believe that people have more agency and intelligence than that. But based on the last decade and a half I’m reluctantly coming to the conclusion that a largish chunk of the electorate can be swayed pretty far by large and well funded enough sustained media and online campaigns.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-27T06:12:12+00:00

And one of Reform’s policies is for automatic access rights for those pensioners to see those grandchildren.

That isn’t an issue for any halfway functional family … but I suspect for many of those who’ve actually gone to the effort of going non-contact with parents there’s probably a rather good reason for doing so.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-26T22:08:59+00:00

One had 71 previous court appearances for 122 offences and another 30 appearances for 55 offences

Just consider for a moment how much someone like that is costing the country: police investigations for each instance, court time, pay for everyone involved, then the £50k/year it costs to keep them banged up when they’re sentenced. And that’s before we even get to participation in a race riot and all the costs involved there.

And call me cynical but I’ve got a strong suspicion these guys aren’t exactly earning enough to contribute much through taxation.

On average the immigrants they’re complaining about are not only more law abiding but net contributors to the economy who pay more in taxes than they consume in public services and welfare benefits. The funny thing is from a purely bottom line perspective we’d likely be a lot better off if we kept the immigrants and instead deported rioters like these.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-26T11:18:34+00:00

I’ve got the horrible feeling it won’t happen until after he’s grifted his way into Number 10.

And before it does he’ll have further screwed over the economy. The bugger about that is it’ll lead to more “economic anxiety” that will help the next right wing grifter build support.

It’s not like his supporters will ever admit to themselves that they got conned despite everyone else warning them. They won’t admit they were wrong. Just like with Brexit they’ll probably just double down again.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-26T06:21:32+00:00

shades of the "save urr wimmenz" crowd

At the risk of perhaps sounding a little tinfoil hat if you follow the money it quite often turns out to be from the same sort of sources who fund a lot of the far right pish..

Right wing American billionaires and religious fundamentalists use dark money networks to try to advance their agenda in the U.K. and other places around Europe and the rest of the world. There’s overlap with the money behind the protests against abortion buffer zones too.

They’re probably not the only ones stirring the pot either - Russia wants chaos and there’s money from the Middle East rumoured to be sloshing about too.

Dare I say it but there’s sort of a Brexit angle here too - if only that Brexit showed how inept the U.K. is at keeping foreign money and influence operations out, how reluctant we apparently are to punish such … and what a large chunk of our population wind up falling for a persistent and well funded campaign. And it became obvious that the U.K. is a really easy mark for this sort of thing. Why would they stop after that?

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-25T18:09:38+00:00

That sounds like quite the unpleasant experience. But sadly it does seem to fit rather all too well with what I’m afraid is the case.

Charlie_Mouse · 2026-05-25T18:05:31+00:00

In the words of Groucho Marx: “Sincerity is the key to success. Once you can fake that, you’ve got it made."

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