Never mind the SNP, I would dearly like to see a respectable English National Party.

One thing I found distracting when Nicola Sturgeon was speaking in the Scottish Parliament, was that a woman sitting behind her, kept nodding vigorously. I was'nt sure whether she had Parkinson's , or was agreeing with her views. Very strange behaviour.

She would have been one of the 'official nodders'.
All senior politicians have several official nodders. You can see them in every televised Commons discussion.

For the sake of completion, I should add that there are also 'official shakers'. Their job is to repeatedly shake their heads from side to side when anyone on the opposite benches holds forth.

Meet the new member of the SNP!!

meet the new member of the snp!!

I agree, and if things were to be done fairly and equally, central government would award the English a proportionately much greater Barnett formula series of payments.

We could then all benefit from free prescriptions and free university tuition.

And another one that doesn't understand the Barnett formula, of which Scotland isn't the greatest beneficiary.

The Barnett formula is said to have "no legal standing or democratic justification", and, being merely a convention, could be changed at will by the Treasury. In recent years, Barnett himself has called it a "terrible mistake".

In 2009, the House of Lords Select Commifttee on the Barnett Formula concluded that "the Barnett Formula should no longer be used to determine annual increases in the block grant for the United Kingdom's devolved administrations... A new system which allocates resources to the devolved adminstrations based on an explicit assessment of their relative needs should be introduced."

Following the September 2014 Scottish independence referendum, the Barnett formula came to widespread attention amid concerns that in a last-minute government bid to sway voters against independence, Scotland had been promised continued high public spending.