It really is a remarkable state of affairs, nationalists now have nothing left in the tank when it comes to this myth, especially now that their DWP letter has been shown to be an error, and yet here they go again trying to revive the zombie.
I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. It would be an emotional body blow for the Yes movement to admit that when it comes to pensions they are the ones that lied. Their entire post indyref narrative on the subject of pensions is based on Better Together lied to pensioners.
Imagine the intellectual contortions which would be involved in such an admission. Imagine Campbell having to admit to his followers that the Wee Blue Book was indeed based on a fundamental error? Imagine Salmond saying that when he stood up in the Scottish Parliament brandishing a redacted DWP letter he was in fact wrong.
These are people who just can't admit that they are wrong despite all the evidence to the contrary.
A new letter - a false hope
So it was with some surprise that I witnessed the start of the Pensioners for independence movement. At first I had some hope, here was a new group not bound by the baggage of the past which hopefully would set out a new rational position of pensions in an independent Scotland. Afterall what is more patriotic that saying that Scottish pensioners would be supported by Scottish workers.
My hopes lasted about three mouse clicks.
Not only did the site contain the usual myths about the UK being legally bound to pay pensions to Scots after independence, not true, but there was the zombie letter as part of their downloads. Along with a leaflet designed to encourage pensioners to write to the DWP in the hope of getting their own letter which would "prove" their case.
But then I noticed that the DWP letter in question was actually different, no longer the well worn facsimile brandished by Salmond in Holyrood and distributed by the Yes movement this was a colour scan and was entitled "Rab's letter". On closer inspection it was the same letter, just a better copy but also included "Rab's" NI number because they had forgotten to redact it. I've redacted the NI number in the copy hosted here.
I played nice and contacted the site setting our their numerous errors, but they didnt want to post any of my comments. I did at least point out their DPA breach and said I didnt think Rab would be happy and the letter has at least been taken down. Sadly I suspect that it was only removed due to their amateur attempts at redaction rather than an admission that they accept that the letter is in fact wrong.
However Pensioners for Independence have got themselves a new DWP letter.
Again their redaction techniques are not very good as they have included the name and signature of the DWP employee so I wont be including a link to their version of the letter, my further redacted version is here.
However the relevant section on independence is:
This seems to have been received with some euphoria from Pensions for Independence, the fact that there are no current changes to state pensions in Scotland has been taken as some sign of a guarantee that they won't change on independence?
It's not saying anything other than what we already know, currently there are no plans to change the State Pension in Scotland. That could change in the future of course, such as if the Scottish Government decided to increase the State Pensions (as they could do now), or if things changed under independence.
It's good to see that the DWP have learned the lessons from the last independence referendum and are able to give a simple civil service answer to a difficult and loaded question. It provides an answer but doesn't tell you anything - Sir Humphrey would be very proud.
So all I will say is that it's a very bad start and if this is the quality of evidence and argument we are going to see on this subject then I guess I'll be writing a lot more blogs on the topic of pensions.
Sadly it looks like the nationalist movement are either prisoners of their own recent past, or just haven't learned the lessons of the last defeat.
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