http://scottishrepublicans.myfreeforum.org
BURNS NIGHT on Friday 25 January 2013 at Elephant and Bugle pub, Maryhill Road, Glasgow.
Soup, haggis, neeps and champit totties.
Speakers: Maggie Chetty (Scottish Socialists for Independence) and Alan Stewart (Scottish Republican Socialist Movement)
Live music from "Fiery Jack."
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/reds4justice/
This group is an Independent Republican Socialist news and debate forum. We support a 32 County Irish Socialist Republic and Scottish Socialist Workers Republic. Support for national liberation struggles for small nations to include all Celts, Basques and Breton peoples to secure Independence. And Freedom for Kernow/Cornwall.
This forum is in Solidarity with the IRSM, Irish Rights Watch, while also being supported by Civil Rights Vets and the Irish Political Status Committee. We urge immediate active support for the Capt.Kelly Justice Campaign, and the urgent repatriation of Irish citizen Noel Maguire to Portlaoise Prison. We also support the campaign to Free Marian Price and an end to selective internment of the Irish by the British.
We also demand Justice for Martin Corey, Gerry McGeough and Michael Campbell for him to be extradited from Lithuania to a jail in Ireland.
We also support human rights and assistance for political prisoners and their dependents particularly those presently detained in Irish, British and US Jails.
Saoirse Go Deo!
Red Justice Board
Dear Comrades
Since 2003 the Communist Party of Scotland has been holding seminars and producing pamphlets to work towards building the left for Independence. We have worked positively with a number of organisations over this time. It was agreed by them that the time has come to form a loose organisation Scottish Socialists for Independence to campaign as one of the many groups who are building unity at the grassroots as part of the Yes Campaign.
We are holding a meeting on Sunday 4th November 2012 to set up the organisation and elect a committee to begin working for an event in the early Spring. we welcome anyone from any party who supports our aims of independence and socialism.
The meeting is from 1.30pm-3pm in the Premier Inn. It is held in the Argyle Room,first floor ,booked in the name of Alert Scotland.
You are welcome to attend and to pass this to anyone who may be interested.
With all good wishes
Yours in comradeship
Maggie Chetty
Statement by the Irish Republican Political Support Group
The IRPSG has been the chief mobiliser for Republican prisoners in the north of Ireland in London over the past few years. We can say without hesitation and we have always extended invitations to all other to participate in our mobilisations and some have responded well on occasion. We have always attempted to participate in the mobilisations of others Republicans. However cooperation has fallen off recently and it has just now come to our attention that vile and baseless rumours are being circulated in Republican circles in Britain that a leading members of our group is a police agent. At the London demonstration of 20 October 2012 an IRPSG supporter was approached by a well known Republican who told him, “Have nothing to do with the IRPSG because ** works for the security services”. He referred him to another well known Republican from a different group who he said had been inquiring about **. When our supporter approached him he then repeated the rumour.
This ‘cop baiting’ is lethal in all the movements of the oppressed and particularly in the republican movement where it has a long and ignoble history. We challenge these rumour mongers to have a meeting with us and present their proof. Who was betrayed, what information was passed on what payments in cash or kind was received? We assert without hesitation these stories are baseless and have their origins in past conflicts which were never properly investigated.
We are convinced that these attacks originate in political opposition. Those who mindlessly pass them on because they suit their current political needs may find themselves caught in a climate of such suspicion and distrust that all political mobilisations in London for the cause of Republican prisoners in the north of Ireland become impossible to organise. And who benefits from that? It is well known that the leading activists of the IRPSG are revolutionary socialists and leftists. We stand with James Connolly,
“If you remove the English army tomorrow and hoist the green flag over Dublin Castle, unless you set about the organization of the Socialist Republic your efforts would be in vain. England would still rule you. She would rule you through her capitalists, through her landlords, through her financiers, through the whole array of commercial and individualist institutions she has planted in this country and watered with the tears of our mothers and the blood of our martyrs.”
We are Trotskyists, Communists, Maoists, Marxist Leninists and Republicans who take our internationalist duty seriously to defend the rights of oppressed peoples to fight with whatever means they see necessary to throw off the yoke of British and every other Imperialist power. We defend the civil and democratic rights of all Republican political prisoners without favour because we recognise none of them would be in prison for the ‘crime’ of trying to liberate their land from British Imperialism if Ireland was not occupied by British Imperialism. We think that political differences after these principles are agreed are matters for debate in struggle but slanders and rumour mongering have no place in that struggle. If you have proof of wrongdoing please present it. If not apologise, withdraw and we can work together as comrades for the cause of the prisoners.
Gerry Downing Secretary Irish Republican Support Group 30 October 2012
Remembering John MacLean
By Peter Urban
It is appropriate today, with the possibility of Scottish independence within sight and the working class of Scotland again confronted by the misery with which the system of capitalism fills their lives, but it is not sufficient to pay tribute to the man; it is important to pay attention to him as well. MacLean may easily lend himself as a symbol, an icon, to the contemporary struggle, but he has wisdom to lend to it as well and the Scottish working class would do well to make use of it.
MacLean was no romantic nationalist. He was a revolutionary socialist and he articulated a compelling case for the creation of an independent Scottish workers’ republic. MacLean observed the reality of the revolutionary temperaments of the Scottish and English working classes and asserted that so long as the working class in Scotland remained bound to that of England, it would face far greater obstacles in the path towards its own liberation through the destruction of the capitalist system.
Is any more evidence needed to testify to the continuing relevance of this analysis than the reality of a Tory government for the UK, while a Plaid/Labour coalition dominates the Welsh Assembly and the SNP dominates the Scottish Assembly? Today, as in MacLean’s day, the Welsh and Scottish working people stand out as far more radicalized than their counterparts in England. Independence for Scotland and Wales represents the best opportunity for those nations to achieve a working class victory over the system of capitalism and it cannot be denied that the dismantling of the ancient regime called the “United Kingdom” would be a blow to the whole of British imperialism.
But there are even greater lessons to be learned from John MacLean and that other great Scottish-born revolutionary, James Connolly. Scottish workers must not fail to learn from these towering figures from Scotland’s history that independence alone is not enough. More, independence alone is meaningless for Scottish workers. The fight for an independent Scotland must be made but an aspect of the larger struggle to create a Scottish workers’ republic; an independent republic wherein the working class alone controls the economic and political destiny of the nation. It is impossible in this era of globalization to separate Scottish capitalists from the interests they share with those of their class in England, as well as elsewhere in the EU, in North America, and throughout the globe and those interests are irreconcilable with the interests of working people. We have born the burden of this wretched and archaic long enough; the time has come to cast it off and move forward under our own guidance and in our own collective interests; and the way forward to such a future lies in the creation of a Scottish workers’ republic and cannot be attained through anything short of that.
In closing, there is yet another lesson from the great John MacLean that I would remind working people in Scotland about. MacLean, with Big Jim Larkin of Ireland, and Sylvia Pankhurst in England were participants in a founding congress for the Communist Workers’ International, convened by the Dutch revolutionary socialist Hermann Gorter. This was a congress of what we have come to call Council Communists today, from throughout the world. I make this point, because the revolutionary socialist current represented by those who attended that congress has been too long ignored and it offers today, as it did then, a path to socialist revolution suited to the conditions of a highly developed capitalist nation; a compelling and liberating alternative to the Bolshevik tradition that workers today would do well to reexamine.It is a fine thing that we today have assembled to remember and pay tribute to the memory of John MacLean; it would be a finer thing still if when we leave here today, we reflected on the insightful analysis that he left to us and seek to apply them to the challenges we confront in this present day. It is long-past due that we should, in this sense, bring John MacLean back to the Clyde.
All Hail the Scottish Workers’ Republic! The future lies before us.
Peter Urban
Comrade, International Republican Socialist Network
Hugo Chavez democratically elected socialist President of Venezuela
An Independent Scotland has a better chance of adopting not only policies that are social democratic in values but a transformation to socialism.
A Socialist Republic need not be scary for most Scots. We are supporting socialist transformation by way of the ballot box and constitutional change. This does not mean we ditch the idea of revolutionary change but proceed one step at a time.
And why socialism? Well we need to protect vital public services and have a health service and social welfare fit for purpose. We also need to embrace change in society and improve the mindset of the Scottish people to adopt a more positive view of their country. Capitalism promotes profit, greed, hopelessness and general negativity.
However as Scottish Republican Socialists we recognise the need for change by democratic means in other words carrying the Scottish people with us.
Our goal therefore is to firstly gain independence in 2014 but secure a better society thus seeking constant improvement through power gain and socialist transformation.
A Scottish Socialist Republic where politicians do not abuse their power and serve the best intentions and aspirations of the people. We only need to read about the expenses scandal of MPs at Westminster to doubt their sincerity under British rule.
And we need to ditch the monarchy and end the obscene class division in society in an ever increasing gap between the haves and have not. Ensure programmes for jobs and a strong public service
In Venezuela despite it's problem of violence in that country today is a more mature and stable country with the socialist Government ensuring oil wealth benefits the people including poor and needy. President Hugo Chavez re-elected recently with a popular democratic mandate for another six years. And I pay tribute to their modern electronic voting system that ensures the smooth running of elections.
In Cuba the Castro Administration seeks to improve the country with ongoing reform under the gains of socialism. Their achievements are very real and why no society or government is perfect the Cubans are more listened too by the powers that be than Scottish people are by Westminster.
So anyway firstly we must walk before we can run. Our goal is to gain freedom in two years time by persuading the people before then that the choice they face is a No vote achieves no change and more austerity or vote YES for change and plentiful prosperity. Things cannot get any worse under Tory/Lib Dem London rule or even if a Labour government was elected on 7 May 2015 more austerity measures are on the way remaining part of the UK.
We have a choice therefore to break from the failed British system and elect a social democratic government in Scotland while we will campaign for a democratic socialist republic of Scotland.
In short a Scottish Workers Republic.
We have proved in Scotland that we can elect a successful administration or Scottish Government under Devolution therefore the scope for change by way of independence and greater improvement through responsible and better governance is even greater.
Larry
As posted on Poblachd na h-Alba today
http://www.scotsrepublic.com
The following is an appeal by Pauline Mellon of the Justice for Marian Price campaign.
At this point Marian Price is seriously ill. We would ask that people write to their elected representatives and those in authority to demand Marian’s immediate release. I would also suggest that you write to the Justice Minister David Ford, the Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, the Taoiseach Enda Kenny and the Secretary of State Theresa Villiers. I have attached a letter that can be downloaded or indeed if you prefer, write your own.
For further information on Marian’s situation please visit the campaign website on www.freemarian.co.nrPlease request that ten of your contacts write to the following people also.Justice Minister David Ford: private.office@dojni.x.gsi.gov.ukDeputy First Minister: martin.mcguinness.mp@parliament.ukTheresa Villiers: theresa@theresavilliers.co.ukBritish Secretary of State office: sos@nio.x.gsi.gov.ukTaoiseach Enda Kenny: taoiseach@taoiseach.gov.ieSAMPLE LETTERI would like to draw your attention to a situation that can only be described as a travesty of justice. The situation I refer to is the ongoing internment and torture of political hostage Marian Price. Fourteen years after the signing of the Good Friday Agreement a 58 year old woman suffering from a litany of chronic illnesses languishes in isolation under armed guard in a hospital. Her health conditions exacerbated by the treatment she has received at the hands of the Westminster Government, facilitated by the Northern Ireland Assembly.An assembly set up under the same Good Friday Agreement which promised us that its criminal justice system would deliver ‘justice efficiently and effectively’, the same Good Friday Agreement that promised measures ‘compatible with a normal peaceful society’. Need I remind you that this is the year 2012, internment and torture have no place in a ‘democratic and normal peaceful society’. The ongoing detention of Marian Price is in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights and fundamental freedoms Article 5 guaranteeing the right to liberty and security of the person, as Marian’s ongoing detention without trial amounts to administrative internment.Marian has spent 15 months in forced isolation which according to experts should not exceed 15 days. Experts state that any longer than fifteen days should be banned and regard this practice as torture. It is clear this practice is in breach of Article 3 this article prohibits torture and “in human and degrading treatment or punishment.”Marian’s detention is also in breach of Article 6 that provides for the right to a fair trial, including the right to a public hearing before an independent and impartial tribunal within reasonable time. The Public Prosecution Service have failed to bring the case that led to Marian’s internment forward within a reasonable time frame.On September 27th Marian’s solicitor stated publicly that the prognosis was that Marian’s health was “not going to improve”. He said she has been examined by UN, prison and defence doctors and their consensus was that she could play no part in court proceedings. With this said, why does Marian Price remain in gaol on bail with no chance of her health improving in an environment which is not conducive for recovery.As citizens we must ask why have a legal system when an unaccountable politician, with no mandate in the north of Ireland can overrule the judiciary to keep a seriously ill woman in gaol on bail? This politician is a representative of a political system that clearly seeks to contain Marian Price at any cost using methods that contravene the European convention on human rights.With the use of alleged ‘secret evidence’ the grounds for challenge are limited. How do you challenge what you cannot see? A credible justice system includes open and transparent justice with human rights protection, something that this alleged normal peaceful society seems to be lacking. Justice is a core element in the establishment of true peace internment is not!http://107cowgate.com/2012/10/12/letter-writing-campaign-for-marian-price/
Gerry Cairns speaking at the John MacLean Commemoration November 2011
Scottish Republican Socialist Movement
Annual John MacLean Commemoration
Sunday 25 November 2012
Eastwood Cemetery 1PM (next to Thornliebank Railway Station) for a graveside oration. Followed by a march from Thornliebank St/Boydston Rd 1.30 pm prompt. This will be followed by a social/rally at the Shawbridge Tavern, Shawbridge St, with a range of speakers and live music, including the White Rose folk group.
£5. Children free. All welcome.
Numbers 23, 45 and 57 bus (First) will take you directly to Eastwood Cemetery. Speakers include; Gerry Cairns (John MacLean Society), Brian Quail (SCND), Alan Stewart, Iain Ramsay, Celtic League and 1820 Society, The Communist Party of Scotland and Stephen Coyle, historian, who will highlight the links between John MacLean & Irish Revolutionaries.
www.scottishrepublicansocialistmovement.org
SRSM, P.O. Box 16887, Glasgow, G11 9E
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Scottish Workers Republican Party (SWRP) was formed by the Scottish Marxist activist John Maclean (1879-1923) in the 1910s. It advocated the political doctrine of communism, whilst also supporting Scottish independence. This dual communist-nationalist doctrine was heavily influenced by the thinking of James Connolly who similarly believed in socialism and independence for Ireland and had set up his Irish Socialist Republican Party in 1896. MacLean argued that the break-up of the British state and empire would aid the cause of world-wide socialism and thus he supported the idea of an independent Scotland. This inherent nationalism alienated the SWRP from the mainstream British left though. The SWRP carried on its political activity for some time after the death of MacLean in 1923 but never made any real impact politically. An organisation which resurrected the name Scottish Workers Republican Party was formed in 1974 as a split from the Scottish Republican Socialist Clubs (forerunner of the Scottish Republican Socialist Party). In 1976 most of the members of the SWRP joined Jim Sillars' Scottish Labour Party and this SWRP Mark II party also became defunct.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Workers_Republican_Party
Have an email below in which I am welcomed to make public. Michael Campbell needs your support and although this is a Scottish Republican Socialist weblog we will not stand idly by while Irish Political Prisoners suffer in jail because of British Rule in Ireland.
Slan agus Beannacht
Larry
Larry a chara
I notice on the Republican.ie board several postings re Michael Campbell. I'd like to inform everyone that Michael DOES in fact receive mail sent to him at the prison. He curently has to share a cell with several other prisoners (in medieval conditions) and is only allowed less than one hour out of his cell for exercise and fresh air. He is confined to the cell for 23 hours a day. He would like to reply to all letters but is only allowed a small allowance to buy stamps and writing paper, so replying to each and every letter is nigh on impossible. He is in contact with me on a regular basis and has received all my letters so far. He appreciates very much people writing to him. Michael would like to apply for repatriation to a prison in Ireland to serve his sentence but as he is appealing against his sentence he cannot be repatriated until all such matters are out of the way. His appeal could take several years and even then his term of imprisonment could be extended, not reduced. He needs all our support Larry. Please feel free to post this on the Republican.ie board - in fact on any board. Hope these few lines find you well. Many thanks for all your updates Larry, much appreciated.
Slan go foill.
Michael H.1.07.2012.
He is locked up 23 hours a day.
Write to Michael
His address is:
MICHAEL CAMPBELL
LUKISKIU TARDYMOIZOLIATORIUS - KALEJIMAS LUKISKIU SKG. 6 VILNIUS LT-01108 LITHUANIA.
Dr James D Young, Scottish Labour Historian and Scottish Republican Socialist died at home after a long illness in Polmont Sunday June 24 on the anniversary of the Battle of Bannockburn. He was aged 81
Funeral Service to place on Monday 2nd July at 3:30pm - Falkirk Crematorium.
http://www.falkirk.gov.uk/services/corporate_neighbourhood/cemeteries_and_crematorium/crematorium.aspx
Reception to follow at The Inchyra Grange hotel at 4:15pm.
http://www.macdonaldhotels.co.uk/our-hotels/macdonald-inchyra-hotel-spa/
His wife, Lorna, is thinking of scattering his ashes on the field of Bannockburn where he was howled off the mike by an "apolitical" group. His wife Lorna, a retired nurse, had to take him home. This was his last pubic appearance.
Yesterday would have been Che Guevara's 84th Birthday....A great Revolutionary who fought to his death to stamp out Capitalism and poverty, Che traveled throughout Latin America and was radically transformed by the endemic poverty and alienation he witnessed. His experiences and observations during these trips led him to conclude that the region's ingrained economic inequalities were an intrinsic result of capitalism, monopolism, neocolonialism, and imperialism, with the only remedy being world revolution.
Britain's Secret War: Tartan Terrorism and the Anglo American State
By Andrew Murray Scott & Iain MacLeay Sutherland
ISBN 1-85158-313-0
Errata by Donald Anderson
Iain MacLeay Sutherland interviewed myself on several occasions at my home and in pubs. Unfortunately, he never took any notes. I gave him an errata at the time of the publication, which he accepted and said he would correct the mistakes should there be a republication. To date, this has not happened. This is why I have now decided to put it online. I have lost my copy, though he should still have his, as did others. I gave a copy to him at the time. I am now revisiting this and making amendments from memory,
The full errata can now be read at the link below.
http://www.scottishrepublicansocialistmovement.org/Pages/SRSMArticlesBritainsSecretWar.aspx
All Hail, The Scottish Workers Republic!
www.scottishrepublicansocialistmovement.org
SRSM P.O. Box 16887 Glasgow G11 9EP Scotland
Comments, discussion information, agreements, disagreements, are all are welcome on our SRSM forum HERE
http://scottishrepublicans.myfreeforum.org
Free Scotland - Saor Alba T-Shirt now available to purchase. This shirt is in the colour Blue and can be purchased from SRSM at the link below.
http://www.scottishrepublicansocialistmovement.org/Pages/SRSMShop.aspx
Saturday June 23. 1.30 pm from the 1314 Inn to the Rotunda for short speeches and back to the 1314 for Scoriach Admission free. Raffle. Proceeds to the group. "Freedom's Flame".
Billy Kay, broadcaster, author and journalist, who specialises on the Scots language, will speak at the Rotunda. Others to be confirmed. Any groups wanting a speaker please let us know ASAP.
The Tartan Arms social is always later, in the village of Bannockburn, with Ted Christopher and Gaberlunzie, organised by the local SNP, who will have Tartan Arms tickets, £15, on sale in the 1314 Inn.
There is a bus from Glasgow, 10.45 am, North Frederick St, George Square. £10. Children free. The bus will leave the 1314 Inn at 7 pm. Those staying for the Tartan Arms will make their own arrangements to get home. Some find it a long day and the aim is to try and please as many as possible. All are welcome.
It is important for all disparate groups to Unite behind the YES campaign and build it up. It will be a long slog with the whole establishment and their agents against. The SNP managed to win a thumping majority, despite having the whole media against them, plus establishments such as the Anglicised Universities and Colleges and their paid perjurers making sure our teachers cannot teach what they are not themselves taught: Scottish history. That is why it is important to try attend as many of these events as we can, as well as making it as enjoyable as possible.
As posted on a public forum by Donald
Here is the link to the Bannockburn Ceilidh held every year in the Tartan Arms Bannockburn by the local branch of the SNP. There is a phone number where you can book your tickets.
http://www.snp-bannockburn.org/bannockburnday.html
Concern is growing about the health of Marian Price regarding her unjustified and continued imprisonment. She is only guilty of holding beliefs and opinions unpopular with some opposed to a free democratic united socialist Ireland.
This weblog supports Marian and would support improved conditions for Republicans held in Maghaberry.
Surely it is time to come together on these issues and the rights of Irish Political Prisoners.
See Below Red Plough Vol 3-4 on unity for prisoners movement
Formation of 'National Prisoner Solidarity Committee/Movement'* which would include representatives of each aforementioned groups, to organize and coordinate campaign and turn it from being a regionalised campaign into becoming a National Campaign. Draw up a 'charter' or constitution which deals with mutual respect among representative groups., (focus on what unites us rather than what divides us).
As well as the above this weblog supports the unconditional release of Marian Price on compassionate grounds.
See website Justice For Marian Price http://www.freemarian.co.nr
Matt Lygate 1938-2012
Matt Lygate was born on 26/12/1938 in Govan Glasgow. From early on, he became an accomplished artist, orator, and thinker. He always loved the great outdoors and would often dissapear for hours up hills and down gullies to the distress of his parents. As a teenager, he moved to Sunderland with his family and became one of the best renouned tailor's cutters of his time. Matt loved his family and family life, however when ordered to join the British Army (forced conscription was still in place at that point, even after the war), Matt, like his father during WWI, refused stating he would never join an imperialist British Army. That same week, he was on a boat to New Zealand before the powers that be could abscond him. Matt had been an avid member of the British Communist Party as well as a devout Christian, believing that Christ himself was a revolutionary socialist. Once in New Zealand, Matt's fervour and passion for justice as well as adventure blossomed. In his years on the islands of New Zealand, he travelled from village to village without map or tent, taking on local hard labour jobs as he went. He was institutional in the setting up of the first railway worker's union and fought for the rights of the Maori people across the island. His travels took him from the heights of the Alps, picking deadly weeds in the snow, to the fields of grain where he worked along side many of the industrious indiginous people of the island. On leaving New Zealand to return to his family, the New Zealand secret service met him at the docs to make Matt aware he would not be allowed back any time soon. Such was the impact Matt left everywhere he went. Many took inspiration from his great work and polemics on justice, liberty and equality, others saw him as a grave threat to the established order. Matt excelled at and loved playing both the saint and the sinner in the eyes of different beholders. He was never one for cult status. He always insisted people judge him on what he said and not who he is.
On return from New Zealand, Matt's political and social work continued. He became heavily involved and a leading figure in the Scottish and Irish republican and socialist movements. He was a leading founder of the Workers Party of Scotland which was a Marxist-Leninist Republican party advocating the establishment of a Scottish socialist republic in the same tradition of John Maclean's vision. He was also instrumental in the establishment of the John Maclean Society which did much work to reserect the memory and life's work of Maclean. He believed in the emancipation of mankind worldwide. He was a true internationalist, involved in the struggle for Irish and Palestinian independence, meeting many world figures over his time. In fact when nominated years later for Glasgow University Rector, he stood down to allow votes for Yassar Arafat. Over his time he has been nominated and rejected two honourary degrees from both Glasgow and Edinburgh University. He rejected them on the political grounds that they might corrupt him and remove him from his working class route, but in truth it was also because Matt was a brutally modest man and shunned any idolisation or cult status. In 1972, Matt and 4 others were convicted of bank robbery and handed out the longest sentences in Scottish legal history for non murder crimes. During the case, Matt dismissed his defence team and represented himself. Knowing the fact he was to be tryed, not on bank robbery, but his politics, he used the court rather than to defend himself, but to attack the very system he knew aimed to destroy him. In his closing statment, he told the judge it was not his violence that had brought him to court, but that of the state against the working class. The same violence that had put 150,000 people out of work at the time in Scotland and stolen children's milk leading to the return of Rickets in Scotland. He announced that the day would come when those who judged him would themselves be judged, an announcement that Lord Dunpark did not take too kindly too. On announcement of his 24 year sentence, Matt looked to the public gallery and with clenched fist shouted "Long live the workers of Scotland" and with that began the longest bank robbery sentence in Scottish history. Although the judge himself admitted the crimes to be political and although it was proven in court, none of the alleged stolen funds went to Matt, he was not allowed political prisoner status. He was also denied appeal, a basic right in Scots law based on the statement by the presiding Judge that Matt openly supported bank robbery and so did not require appeal. A political belief in the redistribution of money in s capitalist society did not account to acceptance of guilt of specific robberies, yet the judge refused to accept this and Matt was denied appeal against his unequivically long sentence.
Once in prison, Matt's work against injustice continued and as ever, he remained a thorn in the establishment's side. On issue of a boiler suit and ID number for instance, Matt refused both. The suit did not fit nor did the shoes. He was told to like it or lump it and lump it he did, choosing to spend his first experiences in prison in solitary confinement naked and on hunger strike. Matt's flare for art and creativity never dulled at any point in his life. Many of the prison inmates were illiterate and Matt spent much of his time actively teaching some of Glasgow's most hardened criminals to read, write and paint. He would often write poems and paint minature Burns portraits and the likes for other inmates girlfriends and mothers, so much so that he was called to the Governor's office in Peterhead and told "You've outgrown this place". By this point much of the mail leaving Peterhead had Matt's imprint directly or indirectly. Matt seen this as an opportunity to address the hypocricy of a system that refused to help and educate those in need and instead punish those who tried to do so. Matt was eventually moved round from prison to prison, however not before forcing the governor to introduce reading, writing and art classes for Class A prisoners in Peterhead for the first time ever. He set up organisations to protect the rights of prisoners and object to the antiquated Victorian style prison systems where 'slopping out' and three to a cell were still common place. Despite often spending much of his sentence in solitary confinement, under constant light (even through the night which is a documented form of torture) and regular movings, Matt never capitulated or lost his passion for his beliefs. If anything, Matt only ever became stronger in the face of adversity. After 8 years behind bars, Matt was offered his first parole hearing. Matt's response was unique in denying his opportunity for parole. In a letter of explanation to the hearing, he demonstrated his view that the parole was a sham and had no intent of releasing him yet. As such he chose to not waste his time in their presence and in doing so giving his family false hope that there was ever a chance of his release at that time. Matt knew the system and was never afraid to challenge it, even (and most often) at the expense of his liberty. He had a clean record his entire time in prison and yet was kept in Class A for 8 years, much of which in solitary confinement. One lawyer once commented publically on Matt's case that he was given 8 years for robbery and 16 for his politics.
His fight against adversity and injustice continued further after his eventual release 12 years later. He reinstated the Workers Party of Scotland and began one of the biggest political movements Britain has ever seen. From humble beginnings, the anti-poll tax movement was born in Maryhill. Some of the earliest 'non-payment of poll tax' movements began when Matt and a friend tramped the entirety of Scotland, just like he had back in New Zealand. They knocked on people's doors and explained what the poll tax was and how they could resist it. The movement picked up pace, however to begin with neither the Labour party nor the Communist party nor any of the left would support Matt. They all claimed the anti-poll tax to be a Scottish phenomenon and thought nothing of it. How wrong they were.
During this period, Matt met his first love who helped create the success that was the anti poll tax movement ran initially from their small Phoenix Press shop. After the success of the anti-poll tax movement, Matt began to move out of public life and became the family man, raising 3 happy children and looking after countless others. Matt the family man was just as passionate a man as Matt the political fighter. He raised his children open mindedly and lovingly but just as they flourished into their own lives, Matt himself was struck with the onset of Alzheimer's disease. This however never for one day removed Matt's ultimate passion for life, liberty and nature. Over the next 8 or so years, Matt's short term memory slowly deteriorated, but his character remained the same as ever. He remained the firebrand optimist he ever was and every day was greeted with a smile and a laugh. Every leaf on every tree was just as beautiful and every moment just as fullfilling. Right up until Matt's final moments on this earth, he never passed another human being without acknowledging them and offering comment on how beautiful a day it was. He never walked without noticing a new colour or pattern on a bush or flower he maybe had passed every day for years. He never lost his love of nature, walking and talking. He remained a thinker and philosopher of epic proportions. Even in the latter stages of his Dementia, he could still recite Burn's quotes that could epitimise the feeling of a million words. He still loved his beloved books from the many book stores he had ran in his life, and his house was always adourned with many of the great artworks he and others had completed.
His life is a story of adversity, a fight against injustice and for the liberty and freedom of all men and women. His life is a story of love, of love for his fellow man, of every creature and living thing on earth, of his beloved partner Linda whom he shared so many of his adventures and loved so dearly, of his children who he passed so much of his wisdom and passion for life, for his beloved dog/s who saw him through to the end, sharing in his delight of nature and his epic walks, a story of love of all life itself. His life is a story of passion and adventure, adventures that spanned the globe, that influenced untold thousands, and whose ripples can still be felt today. His life is a story of hope, hope for humanity, of never ending optimism in the face of all adversity and seeming impossibilities. Hope that even in all our darkest hours, light, laughter and beauty can always be found. His life is a story of many lives, of many faces, of many chapters hardly even touched upon here.
His exit from this world in fittingly dramatic circumstances ends the final chapter in a life that touched so many, that changed so much and that even today, continues to inspire and motivate others. In that way his life lives on after a death that outlived the old enemies like the News of the World,a life that saw Scottish republicanism move from a fringe movement to the very centre of Scottish politics and watched over all of his children becoming the flourishing adults they are today.
In the end, Matt Lygate was never consumed by his disease. He died the "giant inside a small man's body" he ever was. He died a fundamentally happy and independent man on his own two feet living by no one else's but his own will. What more could any of us ask from the game of life and death?http://www.scottishrepublicansocialistmovement.org/Pages/SRSMMemoriamMattLygate.aspx
Friday 27th January 7pm Upstairs lounge 'Elephant & Bugle', Maryhill Road, Glasgow. Just past the Wyndford flats, (known locally as the "Barracks" across from Maryhill Police Station). Wee row of shops and the pub is first, next corner after the barracks, on the same side,
Group: White Rose
Piper: Andrew Tennent
£10 admission. Children free
Cockaleekie Soup Haggis Champit totties and neeps Pudding undecided yet Vegetarians please notify us first for a vegetarian haggis
All welcome
February 12, 2012 Annual Glencoe Commemoration Rally
February 12th. Sunday. 1.30. pm from Glencoe Car park to monument for Speeches and back. Bus leaves immediately and stops at the Henderson Stane (next layby) for a brief ceremony.Then on the Lomond Park Hotel, Balloch, for a Scoriach.
White Rose group
£5 admission Children free.
Bar meals optional
There is a railway station round the back of the hotel and a bus stop at the front. Both good services if anyone wishes to leave early.
Bus leaves North Frederick St, George Square (next to Queen St) 10.30 am prompt. £10. Children free.http://www.scottishrepublicansocialistmovement.org/Pages/SRSMEvents.aspx
