7:12PM April 16, 2021.It has been seven years since Alex Salmond...

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    7:12PM April 16, 2021.

    It has been seven years since Alex Salmond fired a stinging riposte to then Australian prime minister Tony Abbott, but the rejuvenated Scottish independence politician has gone back a lot further — seven centuries — for inspiration for his new political party, Alba.The former Scottish first minister this week told The Weekend Australian — unprompted — that Mr Abbott, who intervened in the 2014 Scottish referendum, backing the English establishment and the No vote, was an “idiot’’. Three times.In an appeal to Scots’ sense of heritage, Alba has resurrected Robert the Bruce, who led Scotland in the 14th century war of independence against England. In a stirring video, actor Angus Macfadyen, who played Bruce in Mel Gibson’s 1995 blockbuster Braveheart, calls for a “uniting of the clans’’ to “break the spine of English superiority”.Read NextMr Salmond insists the video is tongue in cheek, but maintains it points to a serious issue of respecting sovereignty and the mobilisation of people power.Mr Abbott’s intervention clearly still rankles Mr Salmond, even though support for breaking away from the UK in Scotland climbed from just 30 per cent to 45 per cent during his time as first minister (2007 to 2014), although the No vote prevailed with 55.3 per cent on September 18, 2014.“’I don’t want to interfere in Australian politics, but I do remember when that idiot, oh sorry, the prime minister of Australia, Mr Abbott, that idiot Abbott decided to interfere in the Scottish referendum and said Scottish independence would be a dreadful thing, a bad thing,” he told The Weekend Australian this week.“Of course Australians had the great sense to kick him out.“That idiot Tony Abbott exemplifies the dangers of politics, for any politician, anywhere, but particularly in Australia, of being anti-Scotland. He was too busy trying to curry favour with the English establishment and he still is, trying to be some sort of trade ambassador. ”Last September British Prime Minister Boris Johnson appointed Mr Abbott as an adviser to the UK Board of Trade. But back in 2014 Mr Abbott, who was born in England, had questioned whether the world would be helped by an independent Scotland, saying: ”I think that the people who would like to see the break-up of the United Kingdom are not the friends of justice, the friends of freedom, and the countries that would cheer at the prospect … are not the countries whose company one would like to keep.”Mr Salmond — who hasn’t visited Australia, but is keen to take up an invitation from the Robert Burns Club of Melbourne — relished seeing Mr Abbott toppled in September 2015 by a domestic rival with Scottish ancestry — Malcolm Turnbull. ‘’I regarded that as Scotland’s revenge against Tony Abbott,’’ Mr Salmond, 66, said.Mr Salmond is immediately concerned with another political coup, this time wresting votes to support his Alba, just three weeks old, in the May 6 elections for the devolved Scottish parliament.Under the Scottish system 73 constituencies elect one member of parliament using a first past the post system and then eight regions each elect seven additional MSPs under proportional representation. Alba is directly targeting the regional list votes. In its first week, the party attracted over 4000 members and preselected 32 candidates for the election, 18 of whom are women.Mr Salmond believes the political momentum is behind breaking away from the UK, which after the election could result in a parliament with multiple pro-independence parties holding up to 90 of the total 129 seats, instead of just the ruling Scottish Nationalist Party at Holyrood demanding a new referendum from Westminster. He backs the SNP — which he led for 20 years — in the popular vote, but believes Alba will contribute a handful of regional seats based on the latest polling.“To have a super-majority for independence would strengthen the Scottish hand overwhelmingly with Boris Johnson and the Tory government at Westminster,’’ Mr Salmond said.He said Alba had filled a political void because it advocated an immediate independence vote “and we will be demanding one within the first week’’, as opposed to his successor as SNP leader, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who is content for a vote in 2024. He also senses voters are tired of the SNP’s “complacent’’ social and economic policies.Mr Salmond claims not to be waging a vendetta against Ms Sturgeon, who three weeks faced down a vote of no confidence over having misled parliament about sexual harassment and assault allegations against Mr Salmond. Mr Salmond won both civil and the criminal cases. Her popularity has been dented by the back room manoeuvring and she faces a delicate task of not antagonising independence supporters who may vote Alba in the regional lists but for SNP in the seats.Jacquelin MagnayEurope Correspondent

    https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/idiot-tony-abbott-still-gets-under-skin-of-scottish-usurper-alex-salmond/news-story/2efbe7a8fe00878f2c99ce41a3cbf118
 
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