Salmond "the Craig Whyte of Politics"

Johann Lamont, the leader of Scottish Labour, is in that probationary period to which all new leaders are subject. Her performances at FMQs has been encouraging, with a quietly sensible persona, well chosen questions and the odd shaft of wit to puncture Alex Salmond's ego-driven pomposity. You can see that Salmond is more afraid of her than any previous FMQs opponent.

In TV interviews her schoolmatronly presentation (she actually is a school teacher) commands a hearing and limits interruption allowing her to her meassage across. Respect.

Another aspect of leadership is the ability to generate a good phrase or slogan that captures and communicates an idea (this can be the work of the leader or her advisers, it doesn't really matter as long as it is  appropriate and sums up a situation succinctly and memorably).

Yesterday, at the launch of the Labour local election campaign, she delivered such a bon mot: Alex Salmond, she said was "the Craig Whyte of Scottish politics".

And it's spot on. A snake oil salesman selling a false prospectus based on nothing but misdirection, grandiose but empty promises and the monstrous ego of the self-addicted confidence trickster.

I had previously labelled the Salmond as "the Wizard of Eck" .

Maybe we've found our Dorothy....

Devolution-Max: a dangerous Red-Herring

Devolution Max is a dangerous red herring for the country. Actually, looking at what I have just written gives pause for thought because I don’t actually know what is meant by the phrase, (should that be slogan?), “Devolution Max”.  Do you? Does anyone?

According to the political pundits and its supporters Devo Max is “more powers for Holyrood”. But which “more powers”? And how powerful are these “more powers”? And why do we need them? And what would we do with them? And what would be the effect on Scotland and the UK of Scotland having these magical but still undefined “more powers”? I have to admit, I don’t really know the full extent of it - nor does anyone, least of all the Scottish people.

I do know that Devo Max is not Labour policy. In fact it’s not anyone’s policy. It has never been through the furnace of proposal, analysis, consultation, revision, refinement, explanation, clarification and commitment to manifesto and voter acceptance that any policy needs to gain support and legitimacy. There is no party or democratic mandate for Devo Max.

So that’s the first question: why embrace an idea that is not fully defined, which has never been in anyone’s manifesto, which has no democratic mandate, which is little more than a slogan and of which we know only the outline but which has the potential to take us far beyond anything we have ever voted for? 

But of course we do know something of what its supporters want. They want “Full Fiscal Autonomy”. By that they mean that, broadly speaking, all taxes raised in Scotland will be kept in Scotland. By any analysis I have seen this would shrink the Scottish Executive’s income and the public sector even more than currently threatened by the coalition. They want to keep the Queen as Head of State and the British military as our national defence arm. They want other things, I’m sure, but that’s all I can really pin down from all the endless discussion of Devo Max and it’s suitability as a second question on the “independence” referendum. 

And that’s the other thing the Devo Max brigade wants: they want it as a second question on a referendum ballot on “independence”.

Question: “do you want “independence”?

Answer: no fear!

“OK then, do you want “more powers””?

“More powers”! That sounds wonderful. How can anyone turn down “more powers”?

OK we’ll have “more powers” taverymuch”

Federalism has been a Lib Dem aim, quietly unspoken, never trumpeted, but lurking at the back of their policy locker for use in constitutional discussions when the need arises. Some Lib Dems are attracted to the possibility that Devo Max might be a Trojan horse for federalism. “We want change. Not more Devolution or “independence”. Federalism, that’s it”. And of course “federalism” has no democratic mandate either. And federalism isn’t Devolution or “independence”. Whereas Devolution is the enacted will of the Scottish people and while it could be argued that there is a democratic mandate for a referendum on “independence” (many legal questions still to be answered of course), federalism has no such justification.

So. We have “independence” which is sure to lose in any one-question referendum, and we have this slogan that no-one can (or wants to) define properly in any detail , that would make us worse off but is psychological catnip to the voters. Why on Earth would we want to muddy the waters by including it alongside the SNP’s losing proposition? After all it’s their ideal second prize. “Oh well, we lost this one, but look at the losing bonus....!! Almost everything we want and we didn’t even have to campaign for it, our opponents did that for us”. Quickly followed by: “Whit a buncha dopes”.

It’s even more bizarre that any of the major parties can contemplate offering Devo Max to the nats as a consolation prize when the Calman proposals for “more powers for Holyrood” are currently in the process of being enacted by Westminster. These are our “more powers”. We thought them through and campaigned on them. They are a sensible extension of the devolution powers that Labour and the other parties introduced against the opposition of the SNP. Why would we want another question on “more powers” with Calman on the stocks but not yet tested to see if the “more powers” included in the Scotland Bill actually work?

My old Grannie used to say “Cui bono, youngyin, cui bono”. And the cui who bonos from a second, Devo Max question on the referendum ballot, is one trader in oleum serpens who goes by the name of Eckus obesus. Imagine the grins on nationalist faces the day after they lose the “independence” referendum, but still walk away with a prize. And more importantly, the mood in the country: wily old Alex, he’s lost and yet still won and lives to fight another day. That Labour bunch, they know nothing.

Devolution Max is a dangerous red herring. It is ill-defined, it has no democratic mandate, its effects are unpredictable but very possibly dramatic, it drives towards a federalist position (something no-one wants), it will reduce the public sector in Scotland below even the current planned cuts, it has potential to cause much disruption within the UK, it opens the door to more possibilities for nationalist trouble making and it provides a nice “second prize” to the SNP for losing their referendum on “independence”

Apart from that....

The Balloon Bursts....

It's interesting how the media changes its angle to suit (its interpretation of) the facts......

From yesterday's Herald... Labour Jitters....    Alex Salmond was apparently, "homing in" on the voters of Inverclyde. Seven (or is it eight) visits to the constituency by the FM, (and even reports that yesterday he was touring polling stations as if he was the candidate), had woven that special Eck magic. The SNP was poised for another stunning victory, Labour was on the run and politics in Scotland would (for the umpteenth time) never be the same again....

Then, the actual result...... Labour takes 54% of the vote, the SNP challenge is respectable rather than sensational or even dramatic. The  Herald opines Labour relief...SNP surge...

According to their report ....

".... the result allows Mr Salmond to claim the momentum of May’s Scottish Parliament victory is still behind the Nationalists. He will say the result strengthens his case for increasing the scope of the Scotland Bill and that there is a groundswell in favour of the additional powers he wants. It will also be a confidence-builder for his planned independence referendum..."

But that's not how I see it. Labour needed to hold to feel better about itself, but the Nats needed to come a lot closer to keep their momentum going.

Labour will take more from this result than the Nationalist Party.

People who voted SNP in May voted Labour in June, which tells me that, whatever their reason for voting Nationalist in May, it was not to give the SNP a carte blanche to do what they want. And in particular it says "independence" is not on the agenda.

It also says that the people may have intended to give Labour a bloody nose in May, but they never thought that the consequence would be an SNP majority in a parliament that was designed to ensure that no party would ever get a majority. They voted Nationalist for any number of reasons, an anti-Labour vote being one of them, but they didn't vote for a triumphalist Nationalist Party to attack the courts or to rush through and consequently cock-up anti-sectarianism legislation and they certainly didn't vote for "independence".

Cuts are coming and the SNP, having been in power for four years, can no longer blame everyone else for the outcomes. They're the government and they will have to begin to govern and take their share of responsibility for the state of the country.

The SNP may wish to take whatever encouragement they can from the Inverclyde result, and the Herald may wish to encourage them, but it was not a good result for the Nationalist Party and it signals, IMO, the bursting of the SNP bubble, or at least the first hiss of escaping gas.....

How many makes a majority...???

A few weeks ago I posted this ....One referendum, etc....  Including this statement;

"...you cannot change the constitution of any organisation (golf club, drama group, whatever) without a solid majority in favour. A 51% vote in favour of change leaves just too many supporters of the status quo feeling denied and frustrated. You have to demonstrate a solid majority if you want to take everyone with you. Freqently in these cases a two-thirds majority is needed to bring about radical change...."

Today the Herald publishes an article by arch-nationalist columnist Ian McWhirter in which he writes ....

"...Well, in Canada....the Supreme Court did indeed rule on the wording of the independence referendum in the French-speaking province of Quebec in 1998. ...in a landmark ruling now internationally recognised as a definitive statement on the rights of secession by disgruntled minorities, it ruled there was no right at all in international or domestic law for one part of a state to leave unilaterally. And even if independence were to be agreed by the other parts of the state, there would have to be absolute clarity over what the independence question meant, and a substantial majority in favour of independence, not just a simple majority..."

Earlier this month the Scottish Football Association (SFA) changed its constitution to allow a different voting structure. The change required a 75% majority. The SFA is an important organisation in Scottish life, and many people have an interest in its effective operation, but its governance is far less important than the governance of the state itself or the country.It therefore seems unacceptable that the currently effective governance of the country could be overturned by a simple majority of Scots voting in a one-off referendum. 

If the turnout  at a referendum was at the same level as recent elections, a 51% vote in favour of independence would need the actual votes of less than a third, maybe even a quarter, of the electorate. This is no basis to create a new country. If the referendum is to go ahead there must be a threshold  - two-thirds of votes cast or 45% of the electorate, or some similar substantial proportion – that would secure the acquiescence of the minority in the upheaval implied by breaking up the UK. 

After all, if a majority threshold is a necessary requirement to change the constitution of the SFA, or your local golf club, it’s not a lot to ask in respect of radical changes to the governance of Scotland.

Has Eck Finally lost it....?

I've blogged previously on the SNP's attacks on judicial independence.

Last night I came across this. It's an article in Holyrood Magazine which has Alex Salmond saying some quite astonishing things about the eminent Scottish Judge Lord Hope and the Human Rights Lawyer, Professor Tony Kelly. The tone is nasty and querulous and shows Eck in a light you don't often see but which I suspect is a private mood he keeps hidden from his public persona.

I meant to blog on it, but it was late and other things were going on, so I left it for this morning to follow up......

Imagine my surprise to pick up the Herald this morning and read this "Leading Lawyer to sue First Minister". It appears that Professor Kelly has had enough of Nationalist posturing on the justice system and ad hominem attacks on people within the system and he has decided to take the FM to task, and to court, to enforce some respect.

We all know that Alex Salmond has a streak of arrogance a mile wide, and he shows no respect for Holyrood or people who disagree with him, at Holyrood or anywhere else. The question now must be: has Eck finally lost it? Has the real, arrogant, posturing, contemptuous Salmond finally ememrged from the behind the hail-fellow-well-met false bonhomie that he has been trying to cultivate as First Minister?

SNP Opposes "foreign control" of Media... mebbies..

The current SNP war against the UK Supreme Court as described here  and here is just the latest battle by the Nationalist Party to oppose anything to do with the UK, particularly anything that is an undoubted success. There has been a long running war against other British institutions, including the BBC, which is routinely accused of "bias" against the Nationalists. The underlying problem seems to be that any successful UK institution is a threat to the Nationalist obsession with trying to prove that the UK is a "failed state", a proposition so ridiculous that it defies all reason and all the evidence but which, nevertheless, must be proved.

Anyway, in their one-eyed obsession with trying to convince themselves that the BBC, a UK institution in UK ownership, is somehow "biased" against them, the Nationalists miss the point. Spectacularly. The BBC has a mission to remain "neutral" in its political coverage, a stance that benefits the Nats on many occassions when their position is treated with a respect it does not deserve or earn.

During the recent Scottish Parliamentary Elections Alex Salmond was never off the BBC. He appeared on Question Time (no other Scottish party leader did) in the middle of the campaign, on the UK section of Newsnight (no other Scottish party leader did) and he profited by blanket coverage of the sectarian bombs issue which was a national story and widely covered on the BBC with copious quotes from Eck at all times of night and day. No bias there, except against the other main parties in Scotland.

But what the Nationalists also ignore is that they newspapers which supported them in the latest Scottish Parliamentary elections, most eminently the "Scottish" Sun and the Herald, are both American owned...!!!

So we have the ridiculous position of the SNP complaining that the BBC, a British nationalised institution with a mission to report politics in a balanced fashion, and which offered their leader a highly visible platform in the recent elections, is "biased" against the Nats. But the same SNP is quite willing to accept the overt and covert support of American owned media outlets... no complaints of "bias" on that score.

I have to say that its a strange world where a British political party can complain about the (non-existent) bias and the British ownership of a British media outlet, while accepting with equanimity the bias (in their favour) of foreign owned newspapers, with a total lack of embarrassment or even comment.

It seems that The Nationalists don't really oppose foreign control of UK media at all. They are quite happy with American control of Scottish media. In practice, they are only opposed to British control of British media...

Hypocrisy or what?

Supreme Idiocy

The argument that the Nationalist government has stirred up over the UK Supreme Court has been given a lot of air time, mostly concentrating on the legal aspects of the case.

But for me the most interesting thing about the spat is the cracking of the veneer of tolerance that has disguised the SNP's anti-English heart for the past four years. Having spent 70 years stirring up anti-English feeling, and having been at last elected to power on the back of it, the newly "responsible" SNP decided that it didn't look good to the honest voters of Scotland, so the message has gone out to tone it down. And for the last few years, all has been quiet on that front: "Hate the English? No' me, laddie. Never did. How could you think that!!??" has been the Nationalist chorus.

Now the mask is slipping. The SNP doesn't seem to mind if Scottish decisions are sent to Brussels for French/German etc. judges to examine. But to London!!?? for English judges!!?? that's an ethnicity too far for our newly "tolerant" civic Nationalists. And the Brussels route takes 4 - 5 years, while the London route takes a few months. Why would anyone of sound mind make such a bizarre choice?

As for the actual case against the Supreme Court: I'm no lawyer, but I would think that any jurisdiction of any integrity would deem the withholding of evidence from the Defence as a good reason to allow an appeal in most cases. Or is it SNP policy to allow the Prosecution to try any dirty rick to get a conviction? Not exactly a great precedent for an independent Scotland, is it? "Vote for us and we'll fit you up, guilty or not"., and you'll have to wait 5 years for an actual foreign judge in an actual foreign country to hear the appeal... it's nuts, frankly.

Kenny McAskill has always been the SNP administration's weak link. From the Lockerbie bomber to the sectarion legislation fiasco, he has shown a lack of judgement and a poor grasp of the job.

Now he has lost it altogether. His anti-sectarian knne jerk legislation is on course to crash and burn and his rants against the judges (two of whom are Scots, BTW!), have left him looking silly, peevish and anti-English all at once.

He must be the favourite for the first minister to be dumped by this administration....

Biased BBC.....

...is the call we frequently hear from the SNP and Tories.... A lot of lefties cry our  Conservative friends, wet liberals preparing for a Marxist state..... you often get the impression that many Tories would like to see the back of BBC News and Current affairs... they ask too many pointed question, dont'ye know...

...Scottish establishment Labour stooges, cry the Nats. They're out to do us down at every opportunity and puff up Labour. It'a cosy unionist cabal....

I wonder what the Tartan Tories and the real McCoy would have said if their spring conferences were barred from live broadcast by the BBC? Would Eck speak only to the faithful? Would he heck! Would  Dave travel all the way from Kensington to speak to the yokels if Live TV wasn't on offer. Yoiks to the oiks! he would cry, I'm orff!

Seriously, this is a strange decision by the BBC in Scotland. The excuse (that Labour's autumn conference was covered live) is weak. There wasn't an election campaign on in the autumn but there is now.

I knw that the BBC is committed to "balance", but to cover all the conferernces live, except for Labour, is an extraordinary decision and hardly balanced by any sane definition.

I can just hear Annabel and Eck phoning in their protests to the Controller Scotland: "Not fair my man. Hardly balanced and democratic.. we insist that Labour gets equal treatment with us...".

SNP U-Turn on Education Cuts

SNP-led Renfrewshire Council has dropped its planned dilution of teaching staff. 

The local authority had planned to hire more than 100 part-time non-teaching staff to work with classes for 2.5 hours each week to cover such issues such as healthy lifestyle, citizenship, sport and culture. The proposal was designed to help save £1.1 million a year, with teacher numbers being cut  through redundancy and fewer supply teachers being used.

Last week at FMQs, Ian Gray challenged Alex Salmond to intervene to stop his party carrying out these  education cuts in Renfrewshire. Salmond responded with typical bombast and bullying bluster, shouting and bawling and waving his arms to such an extent that the Presiding Officer had to cut off his microphone.

But today, lo and behold, the policy has been dropped.

One up for Gray, I would say.

The Holyrood Gap Narrows

There's an interesting Ipsos/Mori poll today, commissioned for the Times, which has the SNP catching up, and on some measueres, passing Labour in Scotland.

Resurgent SNP take narrow poll lead as Holyrood election draws closer.

The headline suggests that the SNP is ahead, but the figures are a bit more complicated than that.

"With the Holyrood election now under three months away, the latest poll from Ipsos MORI reveals a significant reversal in fortunes for the two main parties, with the SNP now holding a slight advantage, having been 10 points behind Labour in November 2010. Among those certain to vote on May 5th, the SNP’s share of the vote now stands at 37%, up by 6 percentage points since November 2010. In the same period, Labour’s share of the vote has fallen by 5 percentage points and is currently at 36%, while the Scottish Conservatives and Scottish Liberal Democrats are largely unchanged at 13% and 10% respectively. This is first time since February 2010 that an Ipsos MORI poll has shown a lead for the governing SNP."

The figures quoted are from those who say they are certain to vote. But if you take all respondents, Labour is on 38% and the SNP 36%.

Even so, to close a ten point gap in three months is a remarkable result. The question is: is this an outlier, a rogue poll, or does it really reflect the voting intentions of the Scottish electorate? Unfortunately there are not nearly as many exclusively Scottish polls as there used to be, so we'll just have to wait for the next one...

In the meantime, the SNP will take heart and Labour will take the lesson that complacency won't win the election. If this poll is an accurate reflection getting the vote out is going to be key....

Pontius Pilate Rules

From time to time over the last year I have been struck by the similarities between the fate of the SNP administration in Holyrood and the performance and travails of the ToryDem coalition. Both unexpectedly in government, and now both suffering in the polls.

The problems started before the parties "won" their respective elections. The Lib Dems and the SNP both made the classic mistake of promising anything to the voters: after all, neither of them expected to be in government, so they felt  able to make any reckless promise, appeal to any disaffected minority, to scare up a few votes here and there.

"We'll match Labours school-building programme brick for brick".

"We'll abolish tuition fees".

"We'll scrap PPP and replace it with a Scottish Futures Trust".

"We'll oppose fast and deep cuts to solve the defecit problem".

"We'll scrap the Council Tax and introduce a Local Income Tax".

"We'll keep the EMA".

"We'll abolish all student debt".

 Ho Hum.

 Another similarity is that, in government, they use the same tactic of offloading unpopular decisions to the local level while simultaneously starving local government of powers and the cash to solve the pronblems. In the case of the SNP it's the Concordat that allows them to point to the local authorities and say "nuthin' to dae wi' me pal", a tactic Alex Salmond has used contless numbers of times at FMQs.

With the coalition, it's the Localism agenda that forces decisions down to local authorities while the cut-deep-and-fast policy deprives them of the ability to actually address these problems. When challenged they can reply, "sorry old chap, isn't that the local authority fellas responibility?".

The case of Riven Vincent is another illustration of making rash promises and hoping someone else will pick up the blame. This family's personal tragedy is above politics, but the individual case provides a general rule: ministers and the government can only avoid blame for so long. The people know where responsibility lies and they expect ministers, in this case the Prime Minister, to keep meet their responsibilities. Waving your arms and saying "It's the local fellas' job" won't do it: we elected you, you made a promise (implicit or explicit) and we expect you to keep it.

The lesson is clear and it's for all time: opposition is easy, government is difficult. Glib promises are not the same as thought out policies And the people are not stupid. In the long-run they refuse to be fooled.

For the SNP the long-run has arrived and they've been found out.

For the coalition it's only the short-run and the troubles have already begun. The long run looks like very interesting from here.....

Health Service Reel

An interesting post over at Carons Musings. The Lib Dems have lined up behind the Tory rehash of the NHS in England, but Caron's not convinced. She raises quite a number of reservations, many of which have been raised by Labour during the debate so far.

I'm not surprised that Caron is leery about her coalitions suppport for these changes. They seem to be, at the least, a very big gamble with the English NHS. IMO they are a serious first step to the creation of a health sector in the national economy, i.e.turning the Health into an industry. Whether the changes will work to deliver as good (never mind better) services to the people of England seems not to have been considered, such considerations being subordinate to the ToryDems' neoconservative beliefs.

They also raise the intriguing question of whither the Scottish Lib Dems. With a Holyrood election in the offing, will we see equivalent proposals in the Scottish Lib Dem Manifesto for the Scottish Elections in May?

The Lib Dems are engaged in a coalition waltz with the Conservatives at Westminster. Will Tavish and Anabell be tempted to take the floor for a Combined Scottish NHS Reel? If not, why not?

P.S. 17:20 It seems that the good Dr Death agrees with me on the marketisation elements of this bill.

Labour Soars Ahead in Poll

Labour is the only party that can take any encouragement from the latest TNS poll on voting intentions in Scotland in the Herald.

Top line figures for the constituency vote are;

Labour 49% (up 7% since August)

SNP 33% (up 1%)

Tory 9% (down 3%)

Lib Dem 7% (down 5%)

The Lib Dems and the Tories must obviously be worried about the collapse in their support to almost derisory levels.  Seven and nine percent respectively are almost unthinkable levels of support for parties that have ambitions to be "national" parties in a Scottish context.

Nor can the SNP take any comfort from these results. Their support is roughly the same as it was in 2007. The article doesn't say so explicitly, but I suspect that, on these figures, the SNP looks set to lose seats in the Scottish Parliament, while Labour would gain substantially.

That would make Labour comfortably the largest party, and a vote of of around 40-50% would give Labour a strong mandate to govern as a minority or make them the overwhelmingly dominant party in any coalition.

Whaur's yer Arc o' Prosperity noo?

In past years Alex Salmond was fond of pointing to our Irish cousins across the water and crowing..."Look how bonnie they look, well fed and everything... Scotland could be just like Ireland, y'know, if only the English would get off our backs..."

Today Fitch, the credit ratings agency, relegated Ireland's rating to A+, meaning even more pain and trouble for the Irish economy and its prospects of recovery..... 

In 2007, Eck also favoured less banking regulation.......from The Times, 7th April, 2007;

"....We are pledging a light-touch regulation suitable to a Scottish financial sector with its outstanding reputation for probity...."

What can you say? The man's a comic genius.....

At least as funny as Spike Milligan and the Pakistani dalek..... if not quite so grounded in mundane reality...

FMQ's Revisited...

The SNP administration at Holyrood has had an easy ride. They achieve nothing in terms of the Scottish economy and public services, the Scottish press does not hold them to account, and the weekly knockabout at First Minister's Question Time has hitherto been a cockpit for Alex Salmond to avoid answering questions while pouring contempt on any idea that he could ever be held to account.

What with General Elections and Tory Coalitions and resigning ministers, it's a while since I had a look in at FMQs. What a change! Ian Gray, that apparently well-named grey man and supposedly inneffective questioner of Alex Salmond, has changed his spots since last I looked, and how. 

On this evidence Gray is a different man: strong, eloquent, scathing and dismissive, he attacked the SNP and Salmond and Education Secretary Michael Russell with aplomb and elan. At today's session, Gray tore into Salmond on the issue of teacher unemployment and education generally (with a bit of lost nursing jobs thrown in). And it wasn't just his eleoquence that shone through: he was passionate and angry and pointed. He ended with the demanding that Mike Russell should resign and with the charge that young teachers and nurses, who find themselves out of work, would have to emigrate to find work: a shaft to the heart of the SNP, the so-called Party of Scotland.

I've never seen Salmond so defensive. And the long shots of Salmond, Russell and Nicola Sturgeon revealed a baffled and  defensive trio.True to form, Salmond blamed the Westminster Government, and then he blamed the Councils, and then he blamed specific Councils, but he never took any responsibility on himself or his government. All in all, his whole demeanour, and that of his party, was downbeat and unconvincing. 

Gray, on the other hand, looks like a man who has found his form: he has lost his inhibitions, and is swinging verbal lefts and rights and uppercuts with abandon. Today he landed a few solid blows, and took none in return.



Interesting times at Holyrood.

Why the Tories Have Lost Scotland.

Iain Dale's diary has a post by a "Scottish Conservative" which bemoans the fact that the Tories are unable to make any progress north of the border.

It has this opening sentence...

You know that bit of land that if you forget to turn off the M6 onto the M55 for Blackpool, eventually becomes visible through the rain. The land where some parts of it largest town have worse statistics than Zimbabwe. Where snouts in the trough "socialist" crooks run councils with expertise that the Cosa Nostra is jealous of. That place where the Labour Party has its lair, where evil thugs train as the Tartan Taliban to destroy any prosperity in England. Where Macqueda spin against anyone (including their own side) who does not fit the mould. Even those nominally appearing to be English have names like Campbell and McBride.

If this is typical of Scottish Conservatives and their opinions of their country and countrymen, it's no wonder they cannot persuade their fellow Scots to go along with them.

Ignorant, bitter, deluded, in denial. And the contributor apparently cannot see it....nor does Iain Dale nor many of the contributors on his blog.

Labour is facing a lot of soul-searching in the wake of its defeat in the General Election, a necessary cleansing will undoubtedly follow.

The Tories have been wiped out in Scotland in four successive elections: it's time they woke up and had their own heartfelt review of the reasons for this failure. Starting with the attitude expressed and finding ways of rooting it out of their party would be a good route to understanding why they fail so consistently in Scotland.

Reality Eck Style

Been on the baby-sitting trail since 7am, an enjoyable but exhausting pastime, so have had not a lot of chance to keep abreast of the campaign.

I did see the Labour Manifesto launch which went quite well. Gordon and a bunch of hostile hacks, but he handled them well, I thought.

I also caught a snippet of the BBC Scotland 6.30 news. Alex Salmond was being questoned by a woman in Edinburgh about the SNP and its relevance to the UK elections...

He replied, and I kid you not "I see a vote for the SNP as being the only worthwhile vote in this election"...

Now, politicians have to have self belief and optimism. They need to believe in their party and it's reasons for existence. But, I mean: can there ever have been a statement so out of touch with reality?

The SNP is barely relevant at Westminster at the best of times, and Eck is so keen on the UK Parliament that he is chucking it (has already chucked it actually), and not standing again.

So the SNP "is the only vote that counts", is a very strange version of reality: most people would see the exact opposite as being true....

Whatever happened to "Independence, Yes or No"?

The SNP has finally got around to publishing some proposals for its long-delayed referendum on independence. Except it isn't really a referendum on independence, it's a consultation exercise on two, SNP chosen, options for the constitution.

The BBC reports

that we will be asked two questions on two separate ballot papers.

Firstly, voters would be asked to vote 'yes' or 'no' on whether they support the Scottish Parliament being given new devolved powers.

The consultation paper offers two alternatives for this question, one based on the so-called "devolution max" option of giving Holyrood control of everything except defence, foreign affairs and financial regulation, and another based on the more limited powers put forward by the Calman Commission.

They will then be asked whether: "The parliament's powers should also be extended to enable independence to be achieved."

Interesting. Why two ballot papers? Does Alex Salmond think that separating the questions will make the issues appear separate to the electorate. Surely it's not some attempt, along the lines of "Alex Salmond SNP", to fool the voters?

And, if the question is as described, how can we decide on wanting "new powers" if we do not know and are not told, what those new powers might be?

Even the question on independence isn't posed honestly...what exactly does "The parliament's powers should also be extended to enable independence to be achieved." actually mean. Whatever happened to a simple "Independence, yes or no" referendum.

Why not pose the question: " Do you want an independent Scotland",

A simple, straightforward question with no room for confusion or obfuscation, and likely to produce  a clear answer?

Unless the last thing the SNP wants is a clear answer. Because it's odds-on that  it would be a clear "no", and that would be that for them.

What Nicola did...but why did she do it?

What exactly does Nicola Sturgeon, Deputy First Minister and Secretary of State for Health in the SNP Administration think she is doing?

The BBC reports that she has intervened in a court case to plead that a convicted benefits fraudster be treated with leniency because, she says, she had a "duty" to help her constituency.

But as Tom Harris MP states here, there is no such "duty" on any elected representative. Of course MPs and MSPs must listen to any constituent's case, but there is no obligation to act, and certainly no "duty" to write to courts in the case of convicted fraudsters or any other convicted criminal.

Following on from the "dinnergate" affair where she and Alex Salmond were seen to sell off time with Ministers at Holyrood in return for donations to the SNP, this decision asks serious questions of Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP.

A New Scottish Online "Newspaper", The Caledonian Mercury

In the last few days a new approach to newspapers in Scotland has been launched. It is an online newspaper, called the Caledonian Mercury.

It will be interesting to see how this experiment works, and if it can be any more successful in the current economic climate than the traditional newspaper model.

One interesting story is covered today, here.

The story concerns a move by the opposition parties at Holyrood to demand a view of the SNP's capital budget. The aim is to see if any capital is being held back, or is being treated "flexibly", with the possibility of cash being released for the other partys'priorities.

The obvious target is Labour's desire to see how and if the Glasgow Airport Rail Link (GARL) could be financed. Andy Kerr has said that he believes the money for GARL could be found. Lifting the veil on the capital budget may just reveal if he is correct.