HAS THE SNP GONE MAD?

HAS THE SNP GONE MAD?

There can surely be no debate that the SNP are in trouble, serious trouble. They need to improve the level of competency in Government, avoid controversy and above all not gift to the Unionist media and opposition new policies that will allow them to rerun all the previous mistakes that created all the problems in the first place.

They would have the good sense to do that. Right?. Sorry, wrong, they are engaged in doing precisely the opposite.

Egged on by Lady Dorrian they are now planning some legal reforms including the removal of jury trials in sex related cases. It is a hugely divisive issue that should alone signal a red flag for Humza and his habitual strategy failure colleagues.

There are very few votes in it and a huge potential to gift tens of thousands of votes away with this tactical stupidity.

Let me tell you what I think will happen. Getting rid of the Scottish option of “not proven” will cause anger. Many Scots see that uniquely Scottish option for the jury or judge as a valuable protection against wrongful conviction in our country. God knows we need that as politically motivated cases grow in number. No justice system should be designed to provide a set ratio of guilty verdicts at a level satisfactory to the politicians. This may well be easier to achieve using judges alone but the necessary safeguards to protect the falsely accused must be protected.

Many see the relationship between the Scottish Government and the judiciary through the Lord Advocate being a member of cabinet as a potential problem and would seek a much greater snd clearer separation of powers as this relationship is dangerous.

Nowhere was this clearer that during the judicial review by the Scottish Government to fit up Alex Salmond and the subsequent criminal trial. This was hugely expensive as the judge in the judicial review hammered the behaviour and dishonesty of the Scottish Government awarding Mr Salmond £ 500,000 to cover his expenses. the Scottish Government were forced to drop their defence it was reported, after their own legal counsel, to their credit, made clear they would not proceed with such a flawed case.

Even more incredible was the criminal trial where a cabal of the Nicola loyal did their best to fit up the former First Minister with a farrago of false and trivial allegations. Worryingly despite this being obvious to even the slightest enquiry into the matter the Unionist media, collectively and without exception, managed to completely ignore the evidence from witnesses for the defence which comprehensively exposed the plot to the jury. Equally worryingly this could have been done much earlier by the production during the trial of the WhatsApp messages where discussion on how to “create” sufficient different allegations to engage the “moorov” rules that ensured the judge could award anonymity to the complainants. The judge, the same Lady Dorrian, refused permission for these messages to be revealed to the jury. She followed that up months later denying the same messages from being revealed during Craig Murray’s trial. The involvement and role of both the Lord Advocate and the Crown Office were the subject of extensive redaction to hide their connivance’s in both the judicial review and the Criminal trial. I regard these examples as overwhelming evidence of the enormous danger in removing the safety net of jury trial to provide a break and guarantee against the close collusion between these people, organisations and Government. 

Back to the politics of this. The very same media who previously were happy to ignore Mr Salmond’s defence will be all too happy to discuss and publish stories highlighting that the absence of a jury could well have resulted in a different conclusion. They will suggest this is the real motivation for these new SNP plans to get rid of juries for this type of trial.Huge political  damage beckons.

Anyone who is ever accused of any sexual related offence is already seriously disadvantaged and exposed. While the accusers can hide behind a cloak of anonymity the accused can have their name and reputation traduced by all and sundry. If you want to change anything with the system in my view this is it. I fully understand and support the granting of anonymity to those making the allegations but I do think a measure of balance is required.

I would suggest that the accused should also be awarded anonymity until a guilty verdict has been delivered. Likewise if a not guilty verdict is delivered then the anonymity previously enjoyed by the accusers should be removed.

Now I am no expert on legal matters and am open to listening to others who would oppose such change but I know, from the clear experience of what happened during Alex Salmond’s case, that it is outrageous that some of  his accusers behaved very dishonestly and continued attempting to smear him even after the jury dismissed all their allegations. Worse, they used the services of a Government funded agency to promote that smear. I hope in due course that that incident will form part of any review of further funding for the said organisation. They should certainly face a penalty of sorts for that blatant outrage.

In light of that experience we should be very wary of any proposals from the SNP Government or Lady Dorrian to remove the safeguard of having independent juries in such trials. Too much power in the hands of too few people is a real danger.

I am, as always

Yours for Scotland.

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