Alex MacLeod

That will always be the case. People enjoy the thrill of finals and such but dont enjoy the mundane week in week out football.

2-1 HT Hamilton 2-0 away to Motherwell puts them in second spot for now

So the sensible thing would be to support the party of social justice. The party who will deliver a fairer system of taxation than the current council tax system. One that will maintain free higher education for all. SNP. The only party with socialist ideals. Go on Charles. You know you want to.

Laurence I note your emphasis on roads. Road maintenance was taken out of local council control a few years ago. Indeed I may be wrong but I think it was a Labour administration that done this. Scottish roads are now the responsibility of Transport Scotland and works carried out by BEAR and Scotland Transerve. Secondly I dont think Glasgow are out of pocket as a result of the commonwealth games. Indeed I believe that those games done a lot to regenerate the east end of the city. Slum tenements were demolished and new housing built which is now available for tenancy and assisted sale. Glasgow's biggest problem nowadays is lack of employment. This once vibrant shipbuilding capital of the world has been decimated. No steel industry since the closure of Gartcosh. No Lanarkshire coalmines. No Linwood car plant. No longer any heavy engineering works. Everything has gone except the population.

How many no voters were happy with the status quo? We don't know. It might be an idea to find out. If the Scottish Government were actually committed to doing what is best for the Scottish people they would be urging the UK Government to take their time with plans for further devolution so that we can get it right. The macho threats of holding the UK Government to account in keeping to some absurdly short time table smacks of bitterness. One senses they want the arrangements to fail so that they can justify a 2nd referendum. How many would have opted for independence had devo max not been so grudgingly offered at such a late stage? Very few actually. If Devo max is your preferred option and its not on offer, then you vote NO. Simple. A no vote retains the opportunity for moving to devo max within the union at a later stage. A YES vote removes any prospect of devo max in the union for ever. Why on earth would anyone vote for an option which removes for ever the chance of getting what they actually want? Some of the people of the UK got to speak on Thursday. Quite. Over 90% of the electorate within the UK got absolutely no say in a vote which nearly split their country in two. Now that the small minority of us who did have the luxury of a vote have voted decisively that we do not wish to split our country in two, I think it would be reasonable to finally allow time to allow the vast majority of people in the UK to consider and debate the constitutional issues affecting our country. It is of note that the article does not question how many of those who voted YES actually wanted independence. Clearly many voted YES as a result of the pledges in the White Paper which was as much an SNP election manifesto as it was a Government White Paper. Finally, it should be noted that the SNP have a mandate to govern Scotland in a devolved parliament and they had a mandate to hold a referendum on Independence - which they have now held. Given that they lost the referendum, I would question whether this SNP Government actually has a mandate to lead on the negotiation about the terms of continuation within the Union. Should it not be the majority who voted for the Union who take the lead? Dont think they will be leading the negotiations. Hasn't Lord Smith of Kelvin been appointed by Cameron to lead a cross party committee

Charles, one day you may look in a mirror and see the most miserable and discontented looking gob outwith Scottish politics. Oddquine, why is fracking such a big thing when it happens on land yet nobody cares when its been happening under the sea ever since oil and gas were discovered?

Thats the start of our new powers

So they told us the oil is running out---------http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-29342142

And the wording taken from here http://www.digitalhiguide.co.uk/news/scotlands-first-publicly-funded/ The total value of the project is £146m. The total public contribution is £126.4m with an additional £19.4m coming from BT. The public sector investment of £126.4m is being delivered through the Scottish Government broadband fund, which incorporates funding from Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK), and also includes up to £12m from HIE’s own budget. There is no European funding involved in the initial phase of the project. That article suggests £64 million from Scottish Government. £50 million from UK Government and £12 million from HIE. Now I'm not an expert in politics but I'd assume the current Scottish Government are the ones who secured the funding from UK public purse. I also assume that HIE gets its funding from Scottish Government.

Rene, I believe that goal tally has now doubled

At the end of the day its the statistic that was published after the close of polling that matters. The one that says NO to independence. We all have to live with that and fight on for a healthy future.

In regard to the upgrading of the Fort William to Mallaig road, I seem to recall that a big part of the upgrading was done prior to the SNP being in power; and other work was "sanctioned" by previous governments. You may well be right KoB. Completion of the work was mid 2009 so chances are it was Labour who sanctioned it.

Alex... "up to £126 million". Have you been borrowing that SNP oil revenues calculator again? Renewable energy projects.... there are lots of people up here who could (and indeed do!!) see them far enough. As for the rest of that fairly unremarkable "sanctioning" heavy list, I would be very disappointed if they were not doing things like this. That, after all, is what they got elected for and with any luck, with their total preoccupation with the referendum now at an end, maybe they might get back to doing the rest of what they were elected to do. Thats what it says here Charles http://www.hie.co.uk/regional-information/digital-highlands-and-islands/next-generation-broadband/

A new and seperate topic following on from comments made by Charles B in another thread. Upgrading of A830 Fort-William to Mallaig which has reduced journey time between both towns to under an hour from previous nearer two hours. Funding of up to £126 million for a fibre network that will bring broadband to many more people in the highlands. Sanctioning of A9 dualling. Work should start very soon and be completed by 2025. Sanctioning of A96 dualling. To be completed by 2030. Investments and sanctioning of a number of renewable energy projects that will provide jobs and income for communities. Sanctioning of improvements to A92 between Glasgow and Fort-William. These are the things that come to mind for me that will go a long way to improving life in the highlands. Long overdue are the various road improvements. I'm sure there are other things going on in smaller scale but these are major investments.

Alex... much of what Ayeseetee has said in this debate I have disagreed with, but I am totally with him in what he says in post 1614. There is also a sub-plot to the carrying of guns question in that it is certainly even less necessary in the likes of Inverness than it is in the central belt, but our one size fits all National Police Force dictates that our local cops should have to have them as well, hence depriving us of local control. There's the irony. At a time when there is much shouting about devolving powers from "Westminster" to Edinburgh, we are also seeing powers being centralised from areas like the Highlands... also to Edinburgh. and until yesterday many of us would have said 'even less necessary in the likes of Shetland'. I may be wrong but I believe Police Scotland headquarters are actually in Alloa.

Nothing unusual there then. We've been fighting in Afghanistan since 1839

Dig out a copy of Dambusters and study the bounce. And if you're too young to know what I'm talking about google Barnes Wallace Bouncing Bomb

Can someone please explain why it is that average speed cameras are such a problem. The law dictates the speed you can drive at. Go over and you are a lawbreaker. People make jokes these days about speeding in the same way they would have forty years ago about drunk driving. Now we realise that drink driving is not on and nobody complains about the measures in place to discourage it so why the fuss when measures are put in place to discourage breaking the speed laws? Those cameras have already shown that driver behaviour is improving on those stretches and they aren't even switched on yet. http://a9road.info/safety-statistics/average-speed-camera-myths/

When and where are those activities going to take place Scarlet? Before the game when players are warming up? Most people dont even start filling into the stadium till half hour before k.o.

Scarlet, when do you suggest those activities take place? In the fifteen minutes of half time there is normally something happening on the pitch. Sometimes it even involves young kids. Most fans are in the various food queues at this time as well. The club and CJT already do a lot to promote themselves to schoolkids. There's player visits to schools. Free tickets for schools. Coaching sessions in school holiday time etc. Personally I dont think entertainment on the day has anything to do with dwindling crowds. I think cost is the big factor. The country is in a recession. Most people just dont have the spare funds for a family day to the football. They can go to cinema for a quarter the cost. Many others have other pastimes. The reductions in numbers is not only at Inverness. Its at every club in the country.

Think if you check again DD you'll find we also had 16 points from first seven games last season.

Mr Bannerman, may I ask have you ever been outside of this UK. Up until recent years we were one of the very few countries in the world with a police force who didn't carry guns. We also live in a country where police officers are being killed or seriously injured in the line of duty by guns so why shouldn't they carry the ultimate protection?

Have you stopped to think that maybe its not the postage cost that put folk off. It could well be the product.

Scarlet, Pom Pom girls in Sneck? Dont think the thick tights and woolly jampers would add to the look.