Show Me the Mone

Michelle Mone’s intervention in the independence campaign (‘Scottish lingerie tycoon Michelle Mone has threatened to move to England if Scotland votes for independence’) was the first big boob from the No Campaign. It show’s – if anything – that we live in times of enormous cleavage. It’s all a storm in D Cup. Okay, having got the compulsory gags out the way, what’s going on?

Miss Mone, one of the UK’s most successful businesswomen, said she was “passionate” about Scotland but she did not think it could “survive on our own”. Mone’s been on twitter saying about how she said these things two years ago and it’s all no big deal. But the episode tells us a lot about how businessmen and the idea of the entrepreneur have infiltrated our culture.  These people are the new gurus, from Duncan Bannatyne to Lord Sugar we genuflect beneath their greatness. This is the long 1980s, Gordon Gecko style.

Last year’s Holyrood election saw a slew of ‘endorsements’ and Mone’s statement sounds like an anti-endorsement. Remember when Stephen Hendry and Lulu were persuaded to say they’d flounce out of Scotland if devolution was won? It’s all terminally unconvincing. But at its heart is a misconception about how wealth is created. If we hold in high esteem a business based on push-up bras we’ve surrender to  Ultimo Democracy.

Is Michelle Mone a good businesswoman? Definitely, from the Gallowgate to £50 million isn’t bad. Is she close friends with the Labour leadership. Apparently. Should she be allowed  to hold us to ransom? She should not. But we will see a litany of business figures explain how they will leave, how democracy will be ignored, how we’ll be a northern Albania. This is just the start.

Trading on her humble roots Michelle will be portrayed as a star and anyone who suggests otherwise will be pilloried.

Sometimes it feels as if your fighting cognitive dissonance. Watching Ten Years Younger – a women is butchered in plastic surgery to achieve the goal of looking younger. She’s then paraded (the hosts words not mine) in front of 100 men to see what they think of her. Good. Better. Younger. Confidence restored, age defied, we’re off. This in the week we discovered we’d been inserting mattress stuffing into women’s breasts – but hey – neither govt nor the ‘risk taking’ company would be liable. This is the physical equivalent of Location Location Location – the property show that pretends the crash never happened. It’s in this context we’re to pretend that gel-filled bras are an epiphany and Michelle a genius.

The problem is not though the nature of the business, it’s the nature of the political argument.

Miss Mone, who was awarded an OBE two years ago for her contribution to business, said politicians in the Scottish Parliament could not be trusted to make “Scotland PLC” a success.

“MSPs have never run a business in their life. Would you trust them to run Scotland as a business? No is the answer. It’s too much of a gamble,” she concluded.

So, to get this straight, politicians should be businessmen – and if they’re not then we’ll leave?

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  1. I pity anyone who works for this woman, although apparently that means I feel sorry for more Chinese people than Scots, presumably she doesn’t like having to pay Scots wage levels.

    Getting rid of this over inflated ego is a good enough reason to vote for independence. However, I read that she said she’d leave Scotland if the SNP got a majority and she’s still here, so maybe she’s all hot air and no substance like most Unionists.

    She must be worried about going bust (sorry, couldn’t resist)

    1. ***** says:

      Michelle Mone……she has gotta be kidding us!

  2. seven says:

    and I think she fell oot wi labour over a suggested tax rate rise.

  3. Gordon Neish says:

    I’m still trying to work out why this non-story was the lead item on BBC’s Scottish news…

  4. Fred Scotland says:

    Let no one be in any doubt that Mone is fixated on money and all its trappings. And the other thing Mone is fixated on is Mone herself. Hence all the recent celebrity/reality TV stuff.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/sep/12/michelle-mone-lingerie-71-degrees-north

    She ditched Labour in 2009 because of the proposed 50% tax-rate. Then by 2010 she was briefing the Cameron cabinet. Some 95% of her workforce are based in China … whats the markup on a bra made in China ? Yes indeed, “Mone(y) Mone(y)” as Billy Idol warbled all these years ago.

  5. David McCann says:

    Dont be too hard on her. Like Johann, she’s just got her knickers in a twist!

  6. Dave McEwan Hill says:

    She needs to be here to support the tits in the unionist parties

  7. Doug Daniel says:

    I believe she’s a Tory now, which’ll be why she was invited to speak to the coalition cabinet in 2010. That’s what happens though, isn’t it? People start off supporting Labour, get a bit of money, and start thinking “hey, why should I make all this money only to give it away in taxes? I’m going to start supporting the Tories.”

    I’ve got no time for people like her. It’s one thing to be against independence, but it’s quite another to think that having a few bob makes you important enough to announce to the world, “well if you do that, I’m off! Just you think about THAT, sonny Jim!” Her threats are hollow anyway – the vast bulk of her workforce is based in China, so I’m not sure what impact it would have to “move her company” to London. We certainly wouldn’t be losing any jobs.

    It annoys me that unionists are saying stuff like “Michelle is getting savaged by Cybernats for expressing an opinion.” I’ve seen people on Twitter that I know for a FACT are not SNP supporters, and they’re annoyed at her too. People are just tired of idiots making baseless claims that Scotland can’t afford to be an independent country, so when you make some pithy remark like “everything will cost more, so screw you guys, I’m off”, people are going to criticise you for it. In a way, it’s an encouraging sign – it suggests that perhaps we’re turning a corner and people are rejecting the negative rubbish. If so, then the unionist campaign is scuppered already.

    By all accounts, she’s not a very pleasant person anyway – Rod Stewart is certainly no fan!

  8. FrankyB says:

    If you are good at making money this does not automatically mean you are also good at making decisons for the wider society.

    If we left social welfare and justice to people with an unquentiable thirst for money we’d all be living in the worst possible of all worlds.

    Money does not equal wisdom.

    1. Doug Daniel says:

      I don’t agree with you, FrankyB. I bet if we elected a government that filled the UK cabinet with millionaires, they would do nothing but good for society!

      Oh, wait a minute…

      Sarcasm aside, the cut-throat nature of business means those who “succeed” (assuming success = making yourself a fortune at the expense of others) tend towards ruthlessness. Certainly, ruthless is a word that is used in any article you read about the likes of Ms Mone, Mr Sugar etc. This is entirely at odds with the concept of making decisions for the welfare of wider society. The actions of the current UK government show you what happens when you put people whose sole obsession in life has been “the bottom line” in charge of a country. The results are ugly and brutal – mirroring much of the business world.

  9. vronsky says:

    What vanity! If you don’t do as I say, I’ll leave! It depends a bit on questionable assumptions about how we’d all feel if she disappeared. Would we even notice? She actually reminds me of my mother, whose habitual threat, delivered daily, was ‘I’ll just put on my coat and go out of that door’. I painfully remember how much we all wished she would, but of course she never did. Let’s get some of these promises in writing – it could be a good way of getting rid of a few drones.

  10. Sae Scotland ocht tae be run as a business…. I despair. A co-op or a social enterprise mibbie, but I dout that’s no whit she haed i mind.

    Oniewey, how monie MSPs actually huv run a business. I’d wager there wis a fair few. Yer mannie Carlaw, for instance… aye – he’s the guy I’d want at the top.

  11. Bob Cotton says:

    Michelle Moan has one vote, same as all the rest of us. We do live in a democracy and she should accept the result of the referendum. If she wants to leave Scotland I’m sure plenty of men will help her pack.

  12. Teri Forsyth says:

    I suppose that just like the last times that she threatened to leave us, she will still be here after the SNP win the independence referendum. She may be a good business woman, but she’s not much good at doing what she says. More hot air from La Mone just to seek attention.

    The only people who would miss her if she were actually to go, would be the few Tory supporters who reside here.

    Just go if you’re going, Michelle

  13. John Campbell says:

    Without her ‘support’ where will we be…?

    Anyway, enjoy London when (or should that be if) you do go.

  14. striker21 says:

    She was almost bankrupt untill another Scot, Tom Hunter bailed her out ,
    The woman has an inflated idea of her own importance,
    so what if Chinese lose their jobs, she does not give a sh**t about anyone
    other than her own over inflated ego.
    OK BUSTer you want to go, leave like you did with your husbnd

  15. Keef says:

    Who is she?
    I’ve never heard of her to be honest.
    Another one who is making money on the backs of slave labour in China. Do we really want this sort of person living in Scotland?
    The order of the brittish EMPIRE!! It;s a dead give away. She’s a self serving money grubber.

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