Wings Over Scotland

Scottish Labour’s record time for a policy U-turn was already pretty low. It took less than 24 hours from Johann Lamont’s infamous “something for nothing” speech before her MSPs were hastily popping up in the papers to insist that various universal services were in fact NOT under threat at all. (Despite the fact that the head of the commission investigating them had explicitly said that nothing was off the table.)

But yesterday saw the hapless party set a new personal best.

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We think this might be that cross-border vortex at play again.

(This post is respectfully dedicated to the wonderful late Scottish folk singer, comedian and actual proper socialist Matt McGinn.)

We’re not impartial witnesses, of course, but we suspect even the most unbiased observer would struggle to dispute that the last 12 hours have seen Scottish Labour’s most spectacular on-air implosion since Iain Gray’s infamous Hindenberg disaster in the wake of Wendy Alexander’s “bring it on” brainfail of 2008.

For openers, a pained and ghostly-looking Johann Lamont on Scotland Tonight. (Starts at 0:51, continues for about six toe-curling, slow-motion minutes. Audio-only recording here for when the video is no longer available on the STV website.)

Then some desperate stalling from Anas Sarwar on Newsnight Scotland. (We’ve linked to a bit four minutes in, which lasts until the end about eight minutes later.)

But the glorious piece de resistance is unquestionably Johann Lamont being speared, skinned and filletted by David Miller on Good Morning Scotland. (The first two minutes or so are a bit slow, but you really need to hear all of the 10 minutes following them.)

And if you don’t have the time to watch/listen to the whole 24 minutes of those right now, here’s all three appearances compressed into just nine seconds.

To be honest, further commentary from us seems superfluous.

We must admit we’re quite jealous of National Collective’s media management. We told Ian Taylor’s lawyers to sod off over a week ago and nobody put US all over the news. But in amongst all the brouhaha around the site’s welcome return, one aspect of the coverage stood out rather startlingly.

“Better Together campaign director Jackie Baillie MSP said she did not have a problem accepting Mr Taylor’s money. […] Ms Baillie also pointed out that Mr Taylor had made important investments in the Harris tweed industry on the Western Isles.

‘Is the first minister equally suggesting that Mr Taylor should disinvest from Harris tweed?’ she said. ‘I don’t think he’s said that today.'”

After a week of stonewall silence, it seems the No camp has finally come up with its defence line (the Tories, Lib Dems and various tame columnists have also been faithfully parroting it all day): there’s no difference between Ian Taylor investing his doubtless-legally-obtained wealth in Harris Tweed and investing it in “Better Together”.

Except there rather obviously is, isn’t there?

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Yesterday saw the release of the latest unemployment figures. They showed Scottish unemployment falling by 11,000 to its lowest level in four years – dropping below the 200,000 barrier for the first time since 2009, after five successive months of falls – with the number of people in work showing its biggest increase for almost 13 years.

The figures came against a backdrop of continuing increases in UK joblessness, leaving the Scottish unemployment rate significantly below that of the rest of the country. The Scottish economy also grew by 0.5% over the most recent measured period, while that of the UK continued to shrink.

We know what you’re thinking – this is GOOD news, right?

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This is from an article in today’s edition of north-Scotland regional paper the Press & Journal about a poll they’ve just conducted among residents of Orkney and Shetland.

Flying in the face of Tavish Scott’s most recent attempts to bang on his battered old drum of how the Northern Isles might want to form their own independent nation/s if Scotland left the UK, the citizens of the two island groups delivered a crushing “No” to the notion, voting by a margin of almost 8:1 to stay part of Scotland.

Why, then, has the P&J chosen to illustrate the “No” section of its pie charts (meaning “No, we shouldn’t be separate from Scotland”) with the Union Jack of the UK, and the “Yes” section (meaning “Yes, we should be separate from Scotland”) with the Saltire? We’ve dropped them a line to ask.

Labour MP John Mann has now given his account of yesterday’s goings-on around a misattributed quote in the Sunday Times and Herald. You can read it on his website, or look at this conveniently-located screenshot (click to supersize) instead:

Speaking as writers we’re especially impressed by the fifth paragraph’s use of no fewer than SIX exclamation marks after a single word. But it’s the next bit, and in particular the section we’ve highlighted in the image above, that’s rather more concerning.

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It’s gone midnight and we don’t normally do speculation, but as it’s already showing up in our incoming searches we’ve spent the last little while trying to work out what’s gone on between SNP MP Angus Robertson, Labour MP John Mann and the Herald in the last 24 hours. So first let’s establish the known facts, then have the attempted deduction, and hopefully by the morning read the official clarifications.

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So here’s a funny thing.

“Blair McDougall: We have said – I think Blair has said something similar as well – that we are acting as if PPERA applies to us at the moment, so we are carrying out checks on individuals who donate to us. We will disclose people who give more than £7,500 as per PPERA within a calendar year. I would also say categorically that we won’t accept any foreign donations.“ (Q.1819)

And here it is again, equally categorically:

And again for good measure:

“Better Together campaign director Blair McDougall, who was also appearing in front of the committee, said he would refuse to take cash from foreign donors, but would accept UK-wide donations up to £500.”

(Our emphases.) That’s pretty clear, then – the No campaign will not accept money from “foreign donors”, but will take “up to £500” from people resident in the UK.

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We’ve received another letter from Ian Taylor’s lawyers. You can read it below.

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Scotland on Sunday, 14th April 2013 (our emphasis):

“[A Labour] MP pointed out that any further devolution would need support from the Labour Party in England: ‘Johann can’t just say to Ed [Miliband, the Labour leader] this is what I want. These decisions and policies have consequences for the whole of the UK. There are Labour MPs in England now who are getting fed up with it, not just Tories.'”

We hate to harp on. But it may be that there are still some people stuck in a cave somewhere in the Hebrides who think Johann Lamont is the “leader” of a political party called “Scottish Labour” rather than a regional branch manager of one based in London, and who imagine that the findings of her commission on devolution – should there actually be any before the referendum – will become official Labour policy.

And for those people, we have four words.

We’ve been documenting of late how the No campaign has grown increasingly negative and smear-based since the turn of the year, as opinion polls show a trend of small but consistent movement towards independence. One of the core characteristics of negative political campaigning is to accuse your opponents of doing the thing you’re actually doing, and the last couple of days have thrown up some striking examples.

That’s our old pal Euan McColm of the Scotsman, of course. And he’s not alone.

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