David Sillars

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Scotland a country not a county.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@IanGrant_edwest By your logic we should still be using puffers and land them on the beach.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@ScottishLabour Now there is a change Labour promising Change.
I think the record is stuck on the same track.
If Scots believe them, it will be downhill from here.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@JohnSwinney @lindamccorr You are a total brown nosed sook.
Labour will give us the same tunes from a different singer.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@miladreaamy 72

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@onlyskypace 16

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@Grouse_Beater @KizzieWiz Add those jobs to the thousands for British Energy, thousands for data centres, thousands for nuclear power stations, thousands for building warships and we have to lower the starting age and increasing the retirement age for workers.

[Grouse Beater @Grouse_Beater]

ISLANDS ROYAL MAIL

The mail Alex Salmond wanted to nationalise for the betterment of Scots is struggling to deliver

A Consumer Scotland study finds island communities in Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles face unreliable deliveries, surcharges of between £10 and £50, and retailers who refuse to deliver at all.

The watchdog said postal services were a "critical economic lifeline" for the 94 inhabited islands whose economies contributed around £3bn to Scotland's economy in 2023.

Business owners in Scotland's islands say they feel "forced" to plan around an unreliable postal service, which has left some worrying about their futures.

One electrician told BBC News she has had to buy spare equipment so she is not caught out by late mail, while a jeweller said he feels particular pressure to deliver goods on time for important milestones like birthdays and Christmases.

The watchdog Consumer Scotland is calling on Royal Mail to improve standards and make prices fairer for island communities facing surcharges of up to £50.

Royal Mail said serving island communities involves some of the "most complex delivery routes in the UK". It said it depended on ferry and air services which can be cancelled at short notice because of severe weather.

The company pointed to its £500m investment plan across the UK. [Which has nothing to do with serving Scotland rural districts or islands.]

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@DaveLukewarm I do not see much punch from the SNP govt.
Whether on loss of industries, power charges, resource expropriation, SEZs, Barnet threats, Tuna licences or direct council funding.
I started the list above and realised, it could go on and on without independence.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@Torcuil @RachelReevesMP Heh brown tongue and sore knees, what is happening with tuna licences?

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@ChrisMcEleny https://t.co/mGIc3G3K7E

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@gowdavy @piersmorgan https://t.co/mGIc3G3K7E
Always hope

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@DickWinchester I hope they give Margaret Thatcher’s grandchildren a helluva beating in the next round.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@Grouse_Beater Yes

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@ScotNational @Normanjam67 Why would a self-appointed prime minister, at this stage, show any respect for a colony’s democracy.
Westminster appointed Glasgow overlord next.

[LustraSkye @LustraSkye]

This is exactly the right question, and APRS has already done the maths.

Their own analysis: hyperscale data centres employ 20-50 permanent staff on average.

Not thousands. Twenty to fifty.

Government and developer jobs figures don’t hold up under scrutiny.

One 2024 announcement claimed a £10bn Northumberland data centre campus would support 4,000 jobs.

Later clarification: that included 1,200 temporary construction roles and 2,700 “indirect and induced” jobs.

The actual data centre itself directly employs 100 people.

APRS went further they analysed data centre investment in Northern Virginia, the world’s largest data centre cluster.

$71bn invested there in a decade created just 3 jobs per $100 million invested.

That’s not a rounding error.

That’s the actual employment ratio of this industry.

So where does the money go? Per Scotland’s own tax structure: income tax on those 20-50 jobs stays here.

But corporation tax, capital gains tax, and tax on the energy consumed all flow to Westminster.

Scotland provides the land, water, grid capacity and community disruption.

The bulk of the tax take doesn’t come back.

And the “who benefits” question gets sharper once you look at the visitors’ own history:
Auchtertool is one of 24+ Scottish proposals, including the £15bn “Stoics” cluster of three of the largest data centre developments in the world.

That’s an enormous claim on Scotland’s resources for an industry that, by its own operators’ figures, barely employs anyone once built.

APRS’s verdict, on record, in their own words:

“hugely inflated jobs estimates,”

“preposterous” figures.

This isn’t campaigners guessing.

It’s a countryside charity that went and checked the actual figures against the actual promises.

So where is the proof that this leaves Scotland better off?

On current evidence: it doesn’t obviously exist.

Twenty to fifty jobs, most tax revenue routed elsewhere, and Scotland holding the water, energy and land costs.

That’s not a benefit. That’s an extraction, dressed in growth language.

Every figure here is sourced directly to APRS’s own published briefing and Press Association reporting from March 2026

@WeeJinty4 is on solid ground here! Thankyou!

Full APRS briefing with all figures and sources: https://t.co/Kl7PA1gNIV

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@ScotNational @ChildOfAlba Has any government in the Uk done and published any form of independent assessment on the impact of these machines?

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@MikeyTheBuddie @ChildOfAlba And 2 days to Shetland by ferry.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@Prae54Rae @Dungarbhan Did you not see our leaders bowing and scraping to Charlie the other day, indicative of a total lack of spine.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@DietHeartNews @itsdaniryan More like Europe wants what Russia has.

[David Sillars @david_sillars]

@GeorgeFoulkes @CllrSMcCabe Labour ran Glasgow like petty fiefdom. The stories of Labour corruption were rife.
The de-industrialising of Glasgow began under Labour albeit accelerated by Thatcher.