Chasing the story 328
Posted on
November 04, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Archive for the ‘scottish politics’
Disavowed 187
Posted on
November 04, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Below is a letter from the editor of the Daily Record sent to a Wings reader yesterday (and, we presume, to many others). We thought you might find it interesting.
Friends and comrades 141
Posted on
November 03, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Just for fun, we thought you might like to see a list of the Scottish Labour MPs, MSPs and MEPs who are eligible to nominate a candidate for the leadership and deputy leadership positions, but have declined to endorse anyone for either.
If you wouldn’t, don’t look below, whatever you do.
The asteroid approaches 70
Posted on
November 03, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We thought you might be interested to see some of the working of this post from yesterday. Of the 2.4m votes cast in Scotland in the 2010 UK general election, not far short of a million – if a recent YouGov poll is to be believed – are currently likely to be cast for different parties in 2015. And it’s intriguing to see where they’ll go.
Listening and learning 133
Posted on
November 03, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Keen followers of Scottish politics, and in particular Scottish Labour, have in recent days found themselves experiencing something of a deja vu overload. Leadership contender Jim Murphy has been all over the media recycling apologies and pledges of reform dating back up to seven years from previous leaders.
But this morning readers could be forgiven for finding themselves a little confused.
The song remains the same 135
Posted on
November 02, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Wendy Alexander, 2007:
“It is a journey that I am determined will end with Scottish Labour back in power at Holyrood.
So: listen, reform, don’t just bash the Nats. Got it. How hard can it be?
2015 general election: results in 181
Posted on
November 02, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Some SNP supporters have – rightly, in this site’s view – called for calm and caution over this week’s opinion polls, showing the Nats at stratospheric support levels and, supposedly, on course to win either 54 or 47 of Scotland’s 59 Westminster seats next May. Given the huge gaps that the SNP would have to close in order to take each individual seat, those numbers seem extremely optimistic to anyone familiar with First Past The Post, even given Scottish Labour’s ongoing implosion.
So rather than rely on dodgy uniform-swing predictors, we thought we’d try something a bit simpler but also more scientific and likely to come up with a believable result.
Down at the dataface 52
Posted on
November 02, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
There’ll be some more psephology coming up on Wings next week, readers, so we thought we’d get prepared by having a delve around in the inner workings of this week’s YouGov findings and seeing if we could find a few interesting nuggets.
The generation game 122
Posted on
November 01, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Sometimes, readers, analysis is simply unnecessary, because the news speaks for itself. We’re not just saying that because it’s a lovely sunny day outside in unseasonal t-shirt temperatures, either, because it’s difficult to think of what needs to be added to a polling result saying that – far from being sick of the whole issue after three years of constitutional debate – a three-to-two majority of Scots would welcome a second independence referendum within just FIVE years, and a two-to-one majority would be happy to have one within a decade.
When you add in the findings of a completely different poll which revealed that were the referendum tomorrow Scotland would vote Yes by 52-48 (a huge 7% swing in as many weeks), it doesn’t take much in the way of professional insight to deduce the mood of the nation, particularly in the context of pro-independence parties having trebled their membership while the hollowed-out shell of Scottish Labour implodes and a panicking media tries frantically to anoint Jim Murphy – Jim Murphy – as its saviour.
So we’re off to the park for a bit.
Looking for a way in 344
Posted on
October 31, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
It’s been impossible to know where to start today. Last night hundreds of angry protestors picketed a £200-a-seat banquet in Glasgow at which Scottish Labour “showcase[d] the party in front of donors and business figures” in a desperate bid to raise cash for the branch office (which survives on handouts from the UK party), and at which deputy leader Anas Sarwar, less than 48 hours after vowing he’d remain in his position, announced that he’d step down after all.
Despite being the deputy, Sarwar wasn’t stepping down to contest the leadership, but rather to smooth the path of Jim Murphy. Murphy is London’s preferred candidate, but even Labour aren’t dim enough to want to run Holyrood with London-based MPs in BOTH of the leadership roles, so Sarwar pulled a swift U-turn to offer a potential “dream ticket” of Murphy and Kezia Dugdale, a Lothians list MSP who this week told the Edinburgh Evening News that she intends to leave politics within 10 years.
(Then again, in 2011 Jim Murphy told Labour List he wouldn’t consider running for Scottish leader for “maybe 20 years” and he’s only waited three, so who knows?)
But there’s so much more going on.
Every one a gem 451
Posted on
October 30, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Our favourite pundit, Scotsman clickbait troll John McTernan, 23 October 2014:
The first full-size Scottish opinion poll on 2015 Westminster voting intentions after this disastrous routing’s probably going to be a sore one for the Nats, then.
