Scottish Parliament Voting Intention

The SNP have remained static (I seem to use that word a lot as there’s not a lot of volatility around!) for Westminster, and Labour have lost a point and the Tories gained one; the SSP have dropped one and the Others gained one. Alex Salmond, Westminster MP, commented that in the UK poll (Times/MORI 28 Feb 02) Labour are at 51% and the Tories at 28%, demonstrating no contest south of the Border.

So not a lot to get excited about, but a steady advance for the SNP in the Scottish elections, some fourteen months away.

I’M TALKING INDEPENDENCE - NOTHING LESS

A rather plaintive letter in the Scotsman from the Minister of Finance and Public Services bleating that Andrew Wilson MSP and Jim Mather, of Business for Scotland, had not mentioned Independence (my capitals, not those of the lackey) in an article on the Scottish Economy. The letter was published on 21st February; one week later, John Swinney launched the Talking Independence campaign. The aforesaid Minister, presiding over a vast underspend of the Scottish Parliament budget while public services are being cut, then commented that the SNP campaign was "the ultimate admission that the SNP’s strategy isn’t working." So damned if we don’t talk about Independence, and double damned if we do!

Initial reports from the SNP National Council in Perth last weekend indicate that the Party reacted enthusiastically to the refocus on Independence; this has to be a big plus, because unless the Party is itself enthusiastic then it will not communicate this to the voters, so full marks to John Swinney. The other plus is that it has long been my belief that the limit for effective campaigning is around fifteen months, and after that activists get tired; at fourteen months, the timing is right. Next time around there will be no Kosovo to pull Labour out of the mire (and Alex Salmond was right in what he said, as subsequent events have proved) but we will still have Afghanistan, probably Iraq, and who knows where else President Bush will drag the pliant Blessed Tony Blair, with or without the approval of the Labour Party.

The need to drive for Independence is now paramount; the people are becoming indifferent to their Parliament, seeing it as a place where dilettante MSPs spend their time on what are regarded as peripheral issue, like fox-hunting (a bill put forward by a New Labour Member of the House of Lords), a Parliament building devouring more and more money ( a Westminster Cabinet decision that we are left to pay for) and a disgraced First Minister apparently mired in sleaze, which had everything to do with Westminster, and not the Scottish Parliament. The Daily Discord, the English Press, and the Scotsman, have all conspired to attack the Parliament, highlighting the above issues, and completely ignoring the vast amount of very good work done in committee by all MSPs. The attitude is one that is severely critical of the Parliament, when in nine cases out of ten it should be the Executive that takes the blame. The job is not even half done, and the fact is that the people were sold a pup in the first instance, believing that they were getting a much more powerful body than they were given.

I commented last week the the First Minister, Jack McConnell, had been using a phrase "the opportunity gap", rather a lot; what the SNP are doing is to highlight the "power gap". We can do so much more, but only with Independence.

A further indication of the need for Independence arose in the Westminster Parliament on Tuesday this week, over the ongoing query about nuclear power stations in Scotland; Brian Wilson, the British Energy Minister, said on 12th December 2001, that planning powers for nuclear power stations were devolved to the Scottish Parliament. George Foulkes, Deputy Secretary of State for Scotland, said they were a matter for Westminster; two members of the same government, and two opposing statements.

The SNP used the subject to initiate a debate in the House of Commons , a move which prompted Brian Wilson to accuse them of picking an issue that was not in dispute; as far as we know, he did not attend the debate. Now, the issue is one of more than passing interest in a country which already exports all of its nuclear generated electricity to England, and which is heading for more environmentally friendly schemes like wave power, wind turbines and hydro electric dams; we realise it does not have the attraction of anti fox hunting, but the SNP has no Members of the House of Lords either. In any event, there is no safe disposal of nuclear waste, and we see no need for nuclear power stations in Scotland.

In the debate, Mrs Helen Liddell, Westminster MP for Airdrie and Shotts, and Secretary of State for Scotland in her spare time (of which she has rather a lot) said "the legislative position in relation to nuclear energy rests with this parliament" and raised the prospect of a new legislative planning regime being considered by the UK government removing the powers of the Scottish Parliament to reject planning consent for a nuclear power station. It is clear that London will do what it wants, and as far as the Scots are concerned "Tough." So we still have an issue in dispute, not by the SNP, but within the Labour Government, with Brian Wilson, Minister of State for Energy in the Real Big Parliament in London, saying the Scottish Parliament has planning powers over nuclear power stations in Scotland , and Mrs Helen Liddell, Secretary of State for Scotland, but also in the Real Big Parliament in London saying perhaps that this is Westminster’s job. In the debate, Mrs Liddell was asked the question six times, and Mr George Foulkes twice, and both totally failed to provide clarity. Alex Salmond has now written to Mr Blair asking him to state what the truth of the matter is; Alex’s letter says "The Scottish Secretary gave a series of convoluted answers, but left the clear impression- shared by MPs across the opposition parties-that Westminster will have the final say."

And no Scottish Labour MP will take this one up, as they all hate the Scottish Parliament, who stole their scone, or their publicity, and nor can we expect much of an input from the Liberals, who are in two minds, as usual; they are in opposition in London, and in cahoots in Edinburgh, and have no problem in justifying the fact that they are two faced.

As I said at the start of this article, the need for Independence would remove any confusion, and while the Scottish Executive will accept the diktat of their masters in London, what would be their attitude if it was the real Tories in Westminster instead of the pretendy ones? Maybe the apparently off hand approach of Brian Wilson to the issue is because he does not want it publicised until it is absolutely necessary, as to admit it now would give the SNP a boost. To paraphrase the Good Book "Sufficient unto the day is the lie thereof."

BEHIND CLOSED DOORS

It seems that we may have to wait a while longer; the report was not going to be made public, as according to Fife Council’s chief executive, Douglas Sinclair, they were bound by the Local Government Act, and would not be able to publish a report which named individuals. Now here’s a strange anomaly; the Council published a report in December, saying that the council’s actions were "beyond reproach", and giving the functions of officials, but no names, so how come the latest report has names? It looks very much as if they have looked at the rules and decided that the way to keep the inquiry a secret was to put in names of individuals; the point at issue is why was a charity which ceased to exist given £40,000 of funding for two years? As covered in the Flag 89 of 15th February 2002, the project was staffed by Henry McLeish’s election agents, among others; John Swinney, SNP leader, asked the First Minister if Audit Scotland would investigate the matter, and the First Minister rather shirtily replied "If he did his homework he would know that an inquiry is already under way." It would seem that it is not Audit Scotland, but Fife Council, which is conducting the inquiry, into itself, and in private. We think it relevant to repeat John Swinney’s response "What we have here is a Labour Council, giving money to an organisation run by Labour activists, renting office space from a Labour MP. The connection is Labour, Labour, Labour, and it stinks. Will he clean up Scottish politics and start with Fife Council?" ( BBC Reporting Scotland now tells us that Henry McLeish’s wife knew the charity was defunct; we wrote about that three weeks ago. It could just be that now the BBC is looking at it all of a sudden it will be public!)

Meanwhile, over in the Mafia Fiefdom, the City of Glasgow, another community group with close ties to Govan Labour Party is being investigated by the City Council; the Pollokshields Development Association, which has received £350,000 of public dosh since 1996 (only about £60,000 a year) had to get an overdraft to help its cashflow problems. Apparently the Council’s audit team are investigating abuse of telephones to call overseas, mainly Pakistan; the Association’s committee has many members in common with the East Pollokshields Multicultural Centre which was taken over by the city council last month as its financial records were a mess. They had received £200000 a year, but had not produced accounts, or even had a cash book; this had been going on for four years. So the same bunch of Labour Councillors and Labour Officials, managed to get through £1,150,000 (yes, one million one hundred and fifty thousand pounds); Stuart Petrie, chair and former treasurer of EPMCC (the East Pollokshields Multicultural Centre) and a former Secretary of the Govan Labour Party, also sits on the Pollokshields Development Association. He said that allegations of financial wrongdoings were "all crap". "There’s been a degree of mismanagement but if there was a fiddle I’m not aware of it."

Henry McLeish also said that there was not a fiddle, but a muddle; aren’t the Labour Party good at getting in where there is public money sloshing about unaccounted for? Is it any wonder that the public mistrust politicians?

A SAD DAY FOR SCOTLAND

He is shattered by the finding, as are the people of his home town Aviemore; he will have to undergo a second test, to confirm the findings. We do not know the ins and outs of these tests, or whether they are done in a particular sequence, or indeed whether they have been done already. One expert said that the particular drug would not enhance his performance; it might make him take more risks, but would also affect his judgement, not a very clever way to approach the slalom.

According to Alain’s statement, "I have never knowingly taken any medicine or substance to improve my performance." The head of the World Anti-Doping Agency, Dick Pound, responded "Have you ever heard of anyone responding to a positive case differently."

The issue is one of complete puzzlement to his family, and to all of us who were so proud of him; we know he took something, a nasal spray, which contained, unknown to him, a banned substance. The spray is among those products permitted on the UK list, but the American version contains a banned substance. If he is guilty of anything it would seem to be bad luck, but he should have confirmed what the product contained. This will not help him, as it was his responsibility to ensure that he was squeaky clean, and he should have taken medical advice. We certainly could not believe he tried to cheat; he had too much to lose.

We hope that he is cleared.

JOHN McGRATH 1935-2002

We have included under Features the Obituary to John McGrath, by Michael Russell MSP, taken from the March copy of the Scots Independent Newspaper; on a personal note, I was at the performance of "The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil" at the SNP Conference in Oban in 1973. I reported on the Conference for the Scots Independent, including the story from Billy Wolfe, and wrote that I asked Billy "How can these people not be Nationalists?", to which he responded "If we knew the answer to that we would sweep Scotland tomorrow." 

So without Government cash (ours) they would have lost £35.2 million in 2000, and £48.2 million in 2001; no doubt they paid a dividend last year. I must be missing something.

The Scottish Executive, through the Health Minister, Malcolm Chisholm, is going to make a concerted effort to clear beds blocked by elderly pensioners.

Not at all sure what they mean by sending in "hit squads"; are they going to shoot them?

I thought that was what the Olympics were about.

The headline said "Boost for Glasgow Housing Stock Transfer"; it went on to report that First Minister, Jack McConnell, had given his approval to the scheme.

As it was a Labour plan, by a Labour Council, and the Scottish Executive had already agreed to give the Glasgow Housing Association £300 million, it would have been headlines if Mr McConnell had not approved it!

Last winter, the Homelessness Tsar (no she wasn’t homeless, she was in charge of it) Louise Casey, told everyone not to give money to beggars on the street, as it only encouraged them; instead, she set up a donations hotline , called "Change a Life". This attracted £10000 income.

Advertising the hotline cost £240000; not sure how may Labour appointees were in that one.

Noted that the BBC Holyrood programme misspelt the name of the Transport Secretary, Stephen Byers; they spelt it Byres.

Now everyone knows that byres are places where you keep cattle, and are usually knee deep in manure; ah well........

A detailed plan was drawn up in 1962 at the height of the Cuban missile crisis; in the event of a nuclear attack, it was to remove valuable paintings at night and take them to a Welsh quarry for safety. The plan was known as Operation Methodical.

We do not know if Her Majesty was aware of that plan, but in 1965 another plan called Operation Turnstile was set up to take all key Government Ministers to a safe bunker in the event of a nuclear attack; Her Majesty was not on the list.

SYNOPSIS

SNP USE "STEELGATE" DEBATE TO TAUNT LABOUR OVER CASH DONATIONS

SNP MP Pete Wishart taunted the Government last night over sleaze allegations - pointing to donations to Labour in Scotland. The North Tayside MP intervened in a heated Commons debate on the steelgate affair over Prime Minister Tony Blair's letter supporting an Indian billionaire's bid to take over a major Romanian steel plant. He said that in Scotland, too, there were concerns about perceived cash for access. He said waste company Snowie donated 5,000 pounds to Labour after winning 30 million pounds of foot-and-mouth clean-up work. Then he brought up the issue of Ballathie Estates, a Perthshire fishing and hunting estate, which he claimed made a donation of 25,000 pounds to Scottish Labour, followed, a month later, by the appointment of a director of the estate to chair the Scottish New Deal Advisory Task Force. He also claimed a director of an Aberdeen property company said he could not imagine why anyone should think his company's donation of 5,000 pounds to Labour could have had any impact on a decision to grant it planning permission to build on greenbelt land.

MSPs GATHER TO MARK INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY

The Scottish Parliament's women MSPs gathered together in the Parliament's Main Chamber to mark International Women's Day, the first time all 48 women MSPs have been photographed together formally. Commenting on a Members' business debate on the same subject, SNP frontbencher Fiona Hyslop said: "It is important to recognise the central role of women in our communities and examine how women's needs and rights might more effectively be addressed across the range of services, departments and organisations." Meanwhile the SNP MSP encouraged members to visit the Parliament's online International Women's Day forum being hosted in conjunction with the day.

BORDERS COUNCIL LEADER QUITS

Drew Tulley, the Leader of Scottish Borders Council, today resigned before he faced a vote of no confidence at a full meeting of the council on Wednesday. Local people have been left furious as the Council announced swingeing cuts of 5 million pounds because of budget overspends including a massive 3.9 million pound overspend by the Education Department. South of Scotland MSP Christine Grahame said the SNP had been calling for Mr Tulley's resignation since last summer and said that 5 million pounds of the Scottish Executive's 200 million pound overspend should be given to help the area as it went through a "culture change" of administration. "It is very strange that it is only after thousands have taken to the streets and village halls that the Lib-Dems had no alternative but to help in his downfall," Ms Grahame said. "The real victors are the people of the Borders. Now that we have had a change at the top, further changes must be made to the way that the Council administration operates."

EXECUTIVE IN 600 MILLION POUND UNDERSPEND ROW

The Scottish Executive was accused today of financial mismanagement. The accusation came after it emerged that up to 600 million pounds of public money could remain unspent by the end of this financial year. The disclosure came in a letter from finance minister Andy Kerr to John Pentland, financial spokesman for the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. SNP shadow finance minister Alasdair Morgan said today: "This underspend is basically an admission of financial incompetence and mismanagement by the Executive. We have a health service in Scotland under enormous pressure with fewer nurses, longer waiting lists and increased waiting times for patients."

WHY THERE IS SO MUCH TO BE PROUD OF IN GLASGOW - NICOLA STURGEON

There's so much about modern day Glasgow to be proud of, according to Nicola Sturgeon. Writing her first weekly column for the Glasgow Evening Times, she writes: "The city is vibrant and cosmopolitan. It is the fastest growing tourist destination in the country. Our art galleries and museums are amongst the best in the world. Glaswegians have a reputation for resilience and straight talking which, as the Clyde shipbuilders have proven time and again, is based on more than myth." The Glasgow MSP goes on to challenge readers to celebrate what's good about the city - but also to face up to Glasgow's problems. Promising that her column will spark debate and make people think about how Glasgow can fulfil its enormous potential, she concludes: "I believe passionately that, with vision and political will, Glasgow can thrive. And it must. More than 600,000 people live in Glasgow, but half of Scotland's population depends on it for work and play. It's a simple fact but one that we should never forget. To succeed and be all it can be, Scotland needs Glasgow to thrive."

SNP CHALLENGE MINISTERIAL VETO

The SNP put Jim Wallace, the justice minister, on the spot today over the executive's controversial inclusion of a ministerial veto in the new freedom of information bill. Michael Mathieson, the SNP's deputy justice spokesman, moved an amendment in committee to abolish the first minister's power to override a decision of the information commissioner. Mr Mathieson pressed Mr Wallace to justify the need for the first minister to have the power, after consulting colleagues, to veto disclosure of information by the commissioner. "The issue of who has the final say - ministers or the independent commissioner - is an absolutely central principle of freedom of information," Mr Matheson said.

LET's ASSERT OUR NATIONAL VOICE

Far from reaping the rewards of a buoyant economy, Scotland is in danger of being left on the blocks unless, SNP's Andrew Wilson says, it takes control of its own destiny. Writing in the Sunday Herald, the shadow economy minister argues it is time that Scotland wake up to the fact that in the UK the dice is loaded so heavily in London's favour that there is a "material wealth gap opening up between us and our neighbours in the south". Mr Wilson writes: "We want to equip Scottish government with the powers to create the conditions for growth in the Scottish economy. And in a 21st century globalising context, that means delivering full financial independence, garnering a political consensus around a pro-enterprise agenda: not for reasons of doctrine but because we believe that this is the only way we can tackle both Scotland's relative decline and properly compete not only with London and south-east England but with the rest of the world."

TAXIS FOR MINISTERS AND CIVIL SERVANTS AT A COST OF 1000 POUNDS A DAY

Scottish ministers and civil servants are spending 1,000 pounds of tax-payers' cash on taxis each working day, according to a Sunday newspaper report. Despite having access to a fleet of ministerial cars, the Executive spent 236,000 pounds on taxis in 2001. The taxi contract is in addition to the ministerial fleet of 22 chauffeur-driven cars which cost the taxpayer a further 586,075 pounds a year. The bill is a six-fold increase on the figure for 1996, before the creation of the Scottish Parliament. Opposition parties have attacked ministers over the soaring costs of their administration - accusing Labour ministers of spending public cash recklessly. Controversially, many ministerial cars spend long periods parked on double-yellow lines in central Edinburgh, causing chaos for other drivers. SNP MSP Mike Russell said: "The Scottish Executive's transport policy is to give two fingers to public transport and flaunt ministerial cars and fleets of taxis. The taxi bills are not only shocking - they are disgraceful. Someone has to get a grip. I thought that's what Jack McConnell was there for."