Duncan Harley

Today brings news that the Scottish Government has rejected the advice of its own planning reporter and turned down a proposal by Mexican multi-national conglomerate Cemex to extend an existing aggregate quarry on land bordering the UNESCO listed Falls of Clyde upstream from New Lanark. New Lanark is best known as the site of a social experiment set up by Robert Owen.  Owen, a mill-owner come social reformer, had seen first hand the results of the abuse of the labour force in the early stages of the Industrial Revolution and formed the opinion that better conditions would improve production as well as improving the lives of the workers in the cotton mills. Robert Owen's big view was that a “permanent cause of distress was to be found in the competition of human labour with machinery and that the only effective remedy was the united action of men and the subordination of machinery.” Between 1799 and 1813 he improved the lot of the workforce at New Lanark. He introdu...

As the Scottish National Party publicly bicker amongst themselves over who said what to who in the muddle over the sexual harassment allegations against a former First Minister, I have to wonder if the independence movement is heading towards an inglorious end. Many Scots had high hopes when in far off 1967 a bi-election in Hamilton saw a so-called safe Labour seat swing to the SNP in a landslide victory which saw the party take around 46% of the vote over Labour’s 41%. As a new-voter in those heady days, I well recall the scene when Winnie Ewing emerged from the counting office – in the assembly hall of St John's Grammar School – to loud applause. Widely heralded as a watershed in Scottish politics, the Hamilton victory spawned a new pride. Not only had a woman emerged as a voice for Scotland – remember, these were the days of the male-dominated Scottish Office stranglehold on everything north of the border – but a measure of Saltire seemed at least possible. Then came...