The Scottish Government

135. K Brown
Congratulations too, to Annabel Goldie who showed no supportive reaction at all when a young "firebrand" MSP of her party did the usual party slagging (of Labour I think, though my memory dims).

I don't think there's anything wrong with younger hot-blooded and hot-headed members going a bit too far, but credit to Annabel Goldie for acting with maturity and towards concensus.

I'm not a Tory by the way, I guess I'm apolitical when it comes to parties!

135. K Brown
Congratulations too, to Annabel Goldie who showed no supportive reaction at all when a young "firebrand" MSP of her party did the usual party slagging (of Labour I think, though my memory dims).

I don't think there's anything wrong with younger hot-blooded and hot-headed members going a bit too far, but credit to Annabel Goldie for acting with maturity and towards concensus.

I'm not a Tory by the way, I guess I'm apolitical when it comes to parties!

Just want to say what en excellent result yesterday in the budget vote. John Swinney has done a fantastic job in getting this through parliament with a minority government. This really shows how the SNP have been so successful in government, i.e being able to work with others for the greater good of us all. Just think what more can be done if we had the full set of tools avaliable to us.
What we now desparatly need is the chance for us to vote for that in an independence refurendum. Yes would be my vote to that and Yes to Independence.

:0))) so the budget got the nod pity we didnt get the extra five billion they are coining in out of the oil from the scottish north sea. and labour are still sitting greetin with faces like skelped erses.:0(( labour and their policies are the biggist incentive for independance weve got

Sir,
I have liced near to the River Kelvin for many years now and find it amazing that no-one has considered using these hydro resources to produce cheap elecricty for the immediate area.
Surely many small water turbines placed alone many Scottish rivers would be cheap, efficient and, lets face it in Scotland, unlikely to fail due to lack of water.
It must be a possibility, either with state funding or through agencies to encourage local groups to purchase and deploy such equipment.
Gings!, we many even be able to export some of that hydro power for cash money!

Well judging by the comments so far there are a lot of people with their own thoughts. As a national debate I would have to say that is questionable. Certainly there are many well read people placing there comments and views on the various ministers streams but overall what percentage of the scots population does this really represent! Anyway thats not the reason I am making this posting.
My question is what is this government actually doing to support the many thousands of people who are involved in the voluntary sector. These people provide many varying services to our communties to help those less fortunate than many in todays society and yet all I hear these days is "There's no guarantee that I will have a job in a few months time as no decision appears to have been made about the availability of future funding for my post/project". Many people are now activley seeking alternative employment outside of this sector because of the uncertainty of their posts and this is a sad state of affairs. Even if long term funding cannot be announced prehaps an interim announcement that levels would be at last years levels for at least one year whilst the goverment debates the future support for all of these organisations. When I search the governments site for funding there is nothing say that support is forthcoming, indeed I personally find it difficult to find out exactly who is responsible for this area.
There are many people who may be forced to leave this particular vocation that will be a loss to our communities so come on, stop the rot and announce something that will encourage these people to stay. Our communties need them as they work on the ground and really understand the people behind the statistics.

alan m largs. we still have oil and gas fields to be found in the scottish north sea there is the pentland firth and its powerful tides to be harnessed like another massive north sea oil field we have wave power we have wind power we have hydro power.there is solar power imagine 3 million homes with cheap solar panels from america produceing electricity.every home could have a wind turbine.there is geomass to be exploited and biomass.hydrogen and titanieum fuelcells we could have them all in scotland and no more nuclear waste it will be a great planet that doesent need destructive oil.sadly the next wars in the middle east will be over religion and water we have that in plenty too

I am not for independence because I believe that, once you start to break up or fragment anything, power and strength diminish and in-fighting starts -- with all the subsequent problems. Also, reading all these blogs, all I seem to pick up is 'chip on shoulder' attitudes, the 'we was robbed' syndrome. Scotland wasn't the only area that lost fishing rights -- many areas of England, Ireland and Wales suffered, mainly due to the fact that Ministers rolled over, belly up, to the EU. As for reclaiming oil and gas supremacy -- dream on. And that's just what it is, an unrealistic dream. Frankly, any Executive-with-dreams-of-being-a-Government that can waste time debating the rights and wrongs of mink farming when there's not a blessed mink farm to be seen with a telescope needs to first taste reality. Unity, no matter how imperfect, gives us all strength; separation will lead to a plethora of blethering folks each out to carve their own little bit of power. 'Oh men of little brief authority as would make the angels weep' -- to miss-quote furiously. STICK TOGETHER.

I'm all for renewables, but the biggest point missed was that more than 70% of our energy comes from fossil fuels.
I'm disappointed in the somewhat selective response to John Hutton's announcement regarding nuclear power. To say that they are "unwanted and unnecessary new nuclear power stations" without asking anyone (no-one I know has ever been asked, or maybe that's because I live near a nuclear power station?) or without mentioning how Scotland is going to make up that 8% energy shortfall is shortsighted.
The Government need to do something, whether it is enforcing the building of windfarms (locally there are protests holding up the renewables build in my area).
I'm not fond of nuclear, but I can't see how we can provide the energy we need without the big push to enforce uilding of renewable stations.

126. Gordon Murray - Livingston
Happy New Year to you and fifey, and all.

No, there has been no response to my Novemeber posting, and in fact this "National Conversation" has only had one posting by a Scottish Government Minister or MSP on any list.

It would be nice to see at least some discussion on these lists by some of the 129.