The Failures
The SNP were there for the taking in last week’s general election. Across the country they typically lost something around 10,000 votes per seat compared to the 2015 tsunami, and the vast majority of those seats formerly belonged to Scottish Labour.
Yet while Labour did take back six seats of the 41 they lost two years ago (most of them by wafer-thin margins), they fell short in dozens of others despite the huge scale of the SNP’s losses.
And the reason is that, even riding the coat-tails of the Jeremy Corbyn bounce, Kezia Dugdale’s northern regional branch office delivered a showing that was at best barely any better than the 2015 catastrophe, and in many cases actually worse.
We’re still on a break, really, but it’s a rotten dreich day today and we’re waiting in for a parcel, and we completed all our domestic administrative tasks yesterday, so just to kill a bit of time we number-crunched all the seats where Labour came second.
The results, if you’re Kezia Dugdale, should be dismally sobering.
(Note: we’ve rounded all the SNP figures to the nearest 500 in the calculations below to make the page slightly easier to read.)
———————————————————————————————————
SNP vote down 9500
Labour vote down 366 (-4% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 4139)
SNP vote down 10,000
Labour vote down 1012 (-10% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 195)
All Labour had to do to capture Airdrie & Shotts was hold onto its abysmal 2015 vote. It failed to do so, actually LOSING over 1000 and allowing the SNP to hang on by a wafer-thin margin. The pattern would be repeated in numerous seats.
CUMBERNAULD, KILSYTH & KIRKINTILLOCH EAST
SNP vote down 10,500
Labour vote up 38 (0.4% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 4264)
SNP vote down 9500
Labour vote up 2191 (23% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 5262)
SNP vote down 10,000
Labour vote down 467 (-5% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 844)
The other repeating pattern of the night was that picking up just a handful of the SNP’s lost votes – in this case 3% – would have turned seats like D&WF around. But again, Scottish Labour couldn’t even keep what it had.
EAST KILBRIDE, STRATHAVEN & LESMAHAGOW
SNP vote down 12,500
Labour vote up 6 (0.04% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 3866)
SNP vote down 4500
Labour vote up 1002 (22% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 3425)
SNP vote down 4500
Labour vote down 527 (-12% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 1625)
SNP vote down 14,000
Labour vote up 899 (6% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 4923)
SNP vote down 4500
Labour vote up 833 (19% of lost SNP votes)
Majority 2267
SNP vote down 10,000
Labour vote up 220 (2% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 75)
SNP vote down 7000
Labour vote up 1222 (17% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 1060)
SNP vote down 7500
Labour vote up 403 (5% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 2561)
SNP vote down 8500
Labour vote up 1781 (21% of lost SNP votes)
Majority 2027
SNP vote down 9000
Labour vote up 888 (10% of lost SNP votes)
SNP majority 60
SNP vote down 11,000
Labour vote down 538 (-5% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 3267)
SNP vote down 9500
Labour vote up 1144 (12% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 384)
SNP vote down 10,500
Labour vote down 2941 (-28% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 6269)
SNP vote down 11,500
Labour vote down 1652 (-14% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 2919)
SNP vote down 11,500
Labour vote up 1265 (11% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 3878)
SNP vote down 11,000
Labour vote up 455 (4% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 318)
SNP vote down 8000
Labour vote down 1683 (-21% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 2613)
SNP vote down 6500
Labour vote down 3441 (-52% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 2541)
The second seat where Labour merely keeping their 2015 vote would have won it.
SNP vote down 11,500
Labour vote up 575 (4% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 2288)
SNP vote down 2500
Labour vote up 446 (18% of lost SNP votes)
(Majority 1007)
———————————————————————————————————
In the 25 seats where Scottish Labour came 2nd, then, we can see that their total combined vote change compared to the 2015 election was minus 1263. Not only did they fail to gather up any of the votes the SNP were spewing out all over the shop like a political pinata, they actually LOST votes overall on the worst election result in their history, to the tune of 51 votes per seat.
(If you factor in the six seats they regained, the average over the 31 seats flips from a loss of 51 to a net gain of 107 votes per seat, or a combined total increase of 3323.)
In not one single seat did they take even a quarter of the votes the SNP lost, and in only 10 of the 25 did their percentage manage to limp into double figures.
And those, of course, were their BEST results (excluding the freakish tactical voting in Edinburgh South). In a number of seats they even contrived to lose second place to the Conservatives and shed even more votes, like the 5000 Blair McDougall dropped in East Renfrewshire as Labour fell to 3rd in the constituency where Jim Murphy was defending a 10,000+ majority in 2015.
Put another way: for every FIFTY votes the SNP lost last Thursday, Scottish Labour gained ONE. We would suggest, gently, that their recovery is some way off.
There were swings from the SNP but there was a huge failure in Getting The Vote Out.
It does show that if the SNP can work out what they did wrong they will come roaring back.
It was the unionists using tactical voting as a way of beating the SNP majorities , this should be revealed to every voter in scotland as some obviously don’t seem to understand the ramifications of using this form of voting, would you put a bet on your football team getting beat, your fellow supporters would call you disloyal to the cause as you are basically wanting your own team to lose, so you don’t want them to win the league, you don’t have the belief to back them, then why are you supporting them, find another team that can win, Vote SNP all the time
Labour may yet learn that there are consequences for a party which claims to be a socialist and has promoted tactical voting and posed as defenders of the union.
Who’s in their right mind would support the pale imitation
of a unionist party (when the can vote for the real thing
The Tories) and pretends to be socialist and encourages people to vote Tory to stop the MPs of a progressive party the SNP from being re-elected?
I’m more concerned with the flip side of this which is that so many people felt they could vote Tory.
Just how many of them were SNP last time?
It’s hardly surprising the SLabour vote share actually went down in Scotland – Kez did, afterall, tell her supporters to vote for the blue Tories.
They did.
The Rev says
Overall …
SNP 36.9% -13.1
Conservatives 28.6% +13.7
Labour 27.1% +2.8
Lib Dems 7.5% -0.8
In total across Scotland, Labour gained just 9,860 votes. That equals +167. Which implies they did a little better in seats where they weren’t second. But it’s all in the same ball park where Labour gained little overall.
The big paradox for me is that SNP went down by the same percentage as Tories went up. Did SNP supporters really switch to the Tories?
Using absolute figures reveals a slightly different (worse) picture ..
SNP lost 476,867 votes
Tories gained 323,852 votes
LibDems lost 40,614 votes
… so, did ~280,000 voters abandon the SNP for the Tories?
I can’t believe it. I think it more likely that a large number of SNP voters moved to Labour as a genuine Corbyn surge, but a very similar number of BritNat Labour voters moved to the Tories.
Also, ~200,000 SNP voters stayed at home. This is reflected in the overall lower turnout.
Firstly, the loss to Labour may be of people who still support Indy. Secondly, the SNP need to remotivate and reinvigorate their previous supporters who were no shows.
” handclapping says:
15 June, 2017 at 12:20 pm
It does show that if the SNP can work out what they did wrong they ”
I’m torn between the SNP not trying, perhaps appearing arrogant in their lack of leafletting here (Argyll).
Or perhaps the reality of once again, a hostile media, complacent voters not bothering due to size of prior majority (ie; my m-i-l) and there being absolutely NO WAY of them producing the same result as last time, given its protest levels due to the probably pockled indieref.
I suspect next time will produce a stronger result – my m-i-l has expressed “shame” she didn’t get off her lazy arse to vote.
Then again, maybe Rapeclauseruth is right and we’re all turning blue.
Truth says:
Me too!
However, as per my post above, how many were….
SNP -> Labour
SNP -> Tory
Labour -> Tory
…. some info on all three flows would reveal the real situation.
[…] Wings Over Scotland The Failures The SNP were there for the taking in last week’s general election. Across the […]
The weather last Thursday was abysmal and make have affected turn out in some areas. I don’t think the SNP lost too many supporters – they just didn’t get the support out and part of that could be weather related but there will be other factors too!
The orange lodge in scotland will do anything to keep us in this union, they are like turkeys voting for christmas, they are so bigoted and entrenched in the battle of the boyne, these idiots will never change, to them everything is about religion, if they or any other religious organisation apply to march on our streets, protest to your local councils, you are paying your taxes to fund the policing of these events, your taxes are better spent on something worthwhile and not on a load of so called religious people who hardly ever enter a place of worship, no marches from them or the AOH, ban them all
A lot of Labour voters voted Conservative and a lot of people who voted SNP in 2015 went back to labour .It was an election inScotland that was heavily influenced by Unionism and tactical voting
Talking of elections
CCHQ already planning for another election. Candidates told to apply “as soon as you can”, no later than 10th July:
link to twitter.com
The wholescale move to west coastism cost the SNP the North East which is traditionally been a small C conservative right of centre area. An area which the SNP traditionally looked after but with this move to full on Westcoastism, feels somewhat abandoned.
The SNP needs to pull the finger out and listen to their branches on that side of the country if they want to avoid leaking more votes in the Hollyrood elections or the coming soon GE.
From Twitter…
Labour increased their vote numbers in each nation:
England +40.8%
Wales +39.6%
Scotland +1.4%
In Scotland Labour got 717,007.
The SNP probably lost ~280000 votes to other parties. Unknown breakdown between Tory and Labour, essentially.
Just suppose ALL went to Labour, that suggests an increase for Labour of 39% which is exactly the same as England and Wales. Odd coincidence?
Then, of course, Labour would have to have lost a similar number to Tory.
We can’t discount some SNP Brexiteers going straight to Tory, though.
Until dissection by new polling of individual voting shifts (1015-2017) clarifies things it remains a reasonable hypothesis that most of the SNP losses actually went to Labour but were counteracted by a shift from Labour to Tory.
That is not an unreasonable hypothesis because SLAB support must surely have been condensed down to pretty much a hardcore Britnat contingent – exactly the type whom might be attraced to Ruth Davidson’s save the Union rallying cry.
Now, wouldn’t it be very interesting if KD’s current cohort of voters now consisted of a significant number of indy friendly types?
Let’s dream even a majority is possible. Where Kezia then?
Yes, it may also transpire that the SNP losses were mainly down to not turning out or defection by hard Brexiteers but we won’t know until someone does the polling.
Errr 2015 🙂
Nana says:
Jeez … new election planning ….
link to archive.is
I fear the objective is to take more SNP seats before Brexit chaos hits and swing folk back to SNP and Indy. Nicola needs to set the heather on fire.
I am as they say dumfunert.
Also more than a bit disappointed that Scottish voters are so shortsighted.
My logic is simple, we as a nation cannot afford to split over idealogical differences. There will be ample scope for us to express our particular preferences for right , left or centre government once we have independence. We will actually get what we vote for in government and live with the consequences of our majority decision.
Now we can vote for this and that, this preference or that preference, but what we get is dictated to us by the voters of another country, who have their own desires and prejudices.
Independence first. Until the voters wise up to the con that is being fed them by Westminster things will go on as before.
We will not elect the government we want.
We will lose our EU citizenship.
We will be dragged out of the Single Market.
We will be dragged out of the Customs Union.
Our friends and colleagues from EU countries are likely to be shown the door.
The above dictated to the Scots by people from another country. We can never move forward as a nation until we are an independent country.
As for indyref2, at the moment it’s a backstop, a lifeboat, in which we can escape if our neighbours seek to drag us down a road which we do not wish to travel. Those who currently control the ship are trying to persuade the crew to throw the lifeboat over the edge and let it drift away from their “unsinkable” ship. It would be madness to surrender this option.
galamcennalath
Great minds eh?
I take it you eagerly await dissection polling too?
I think it more likely that a large number of SNP voters moved to Labour as a genuine Corbyn surge, but a very similar number of BritNat Labour voters moved to the Tories.
I’m almost certain that’s exactly what happened.
Look at places like Inverclyde. Here, it’s a clear fight between Labour and SNP: the Tories only just won back their deposit in 2015. Yet in 2017, Labour regained a fraction of their 2010 vote, SNP lost a significant number of votes, and the Tory vote doubled. Yet the result was that the SNP still had a small majority, Labour failed to reach even 3/4 of their 2010 vote, and the Tories came in at a distant 3rd place.
Where did those 4,000 Tory votes come from? On the face of it, it would seem to be SNP Brexiteers who care more about leaving the EU than achieving independence, which makes me wonder if they ever cared about independence at all. Yet surely they’d know Labour were also committed to leaving the EU, if not quite the hard Brexit the Tories want? Likewise, Unionists would surely view Labour as anti-SNP – certainly the local party’s strongly set against it.
Yet I’ve heard significant anecdotal evidence that a lot of traditional Labour voters were inspired by Corbyn, and so voted for Martin McCluskey in the belief they were helping Corbyn. Yet that would only account for 1,000 extra Labour votes. There is no tactical benefit to voting Tory in Inverclyde: if you’re voting Tory here, it’s because you cannot bring yourself to vote for either SNP or Labour – and if you’re unionist, why wouldn’t you hold your nose and vote for the latter?
The single most devastating reason I suspect the young/left SNP>Labour, unionist Labour>Tory scenario is the shameful employment of sectarian language and smears by the Tories. Imagine you’re a proud protestant, if not a LOL member, or even someone who considers themselves proudly British. You are presented with a media bending over backwards to portray Corbyn as pro-IRA; the Scottish Tory leader actually says he “wanted the IRA to win,” and that seeking peace was an “insult” to British soldiers; plenty of Tory politicians have condemned the Good Friday Agreement, and lummoxes like Murdo Fraser throw sectarian language around like burning £50 notes. If you believed the media – and even now, all too many people do – then how could you vote for a man that the media tells you refuses to condemn terrorism and actively supported the IRA?
I can definitely imagine many staunch Unionists in Inverclyde who’ve voted Labour for generations turning to the Tories purely because of these despicable smears against Corbyn – and the collusion with the DUP simply confirms that it isn’t accidental. Likewise, I can easily see Inverclyde’s significant Irish diaspora seeing these smears sympathising greatly with Corbyn, and being compelled to support him through McCluskey (even if McCluskey’s as bad as the Blairites, and would be about as deserving of a victory due to Corbyn as Ian Murray was).
I have a post in mind dealing with all this, but we cannot allow the Tories to weaponise sectarianism in this way again
Know what? I have just become convinced that everything we see is about maintaining the unity of the UK. Brexit in itself is a sideshow. It’s how it might impact on Scotland in the UK which matters most. We are the centre of attraction.
We often feel they think Scotland is a far away country of which they know little and care less. Nope. They currently care a great deal, though they still know little.
The dust from the election car crash has still to settle. Allegiances shifted, probably tactically in some cases and many stayed at home.
As time passes and the SNP remain constant in their purpose and good governance of Scotland then they will be in a position to re-ignite the flame and encourage the vote to come out…the tactical voting may also flounder as Brexit crystallises.
The position is yet strong and we need to bide our time.
O/T Sort of.
Fishermen in the Northeast voted Conservative for full blown Hard Brexit to get their fishing back – May will not be able to deliver that and satisfy the DUP need for a “soft” Brexit for their border.
How are they going to take that if the fishing is not returned?
Anybody know what Ruthies position is on Brexit variety she wants right now? I haven’t heard lately.
FIRST MINISTER’S QUESTIONS. THURSDAY. 15/06/2017.
Now in Archive on Scottish Parliament TV.
YouTube:
link to tinyurl.com
Aweright Jack Murphy ~
Aye, I listened in to FMQ’s on the wireless radio, level up SNP.
Both Ruth and Kezia were failures again today.
Nicola calling the charlatans out… 4 days to go and they got nothing.
What do you think?
As I hinted elsewhere, the “Corbyn Bounce” was felt in Scotland – it just helped Labour to tread water rather than drown.
Nicola destroyed the diddies today.
Exposed Dugdale for telling labour voters to vote TORY.
It will not be portrayed like that though. And there is a danger the story of the Corbyn (mini)bounce will be self generating. That will be the aim in the media up here anyway.
SNP need to be more agressive in promoting achievements and mitigation of westminster cuts. Make more of the new welfare assessment being introduced, shout about the meoney set aside to help those on benefits.
Talk up the settling of the equal pay case in Glasgow against many years of labour keeping the injustice going (party of the workers?).
Hammer home that Scot lab formed four coalitions with the Tories last week and failed to deal with equal pay case.
Start throwing it in Kes face regularly at PMQ.
“a political pinata” – Class!
The photo is something to toy with….Rejoice comrades, Scotland forever in chains! Just say NO! Others can but we cannae! It’s great to be second rate! and similar negatives. Imagination! whit’s that! We’re the NB branch, we don’t need it..
FM: “This from a Labour leader whose party, for the first time in living memory, came THIRD in Scotland in a General Election.”
Ouch!!
Lab-Tory coalition in Aberdeen Council to axe 150 jobs.
I expect Labour will be pouring over the runes too. The pressing need to save the union might mean helping Labour recover at the next election. Lesser of two evils to the Westminster establishment. They failed to get the SNP down to a minority of seats in the 2017GE. So another election will be imminent.
The Tories have been targeting the NE for years. In the 2016 Holyrood elections they managed to conjure up an extra 40,000 votes in WAK (from memory). Any constituency with a potential military forces, holiday home and oil industry transient population will be able to increase votes. It’ll be interesting to see the postal and proxy vote numbers.
Boundary commission changes are also due to reduce the Scottish MPs to c 50 so that will be another 9 or so gone.
Chris Whyte says:
Put most eloquently 🙂
The Corbyn Bounce probably accounted around half of the SNP’s lost votes.
Just posted a comment in a previous thread. For anybody dissatisfied with the performance of the SNP or who thinks momentum is flagging, just ask them how they’d feel about a hard Brexit next year WITHOUT the safety line of a ScotRef vote to save ourselves.
Like it or not, like them or not, the SNP is looking after Scotland’s interests and NO other party can claim to be doing the same. As a non-SNP member, I say THANK F__K for the SNP.
Brexit for Scotland:
Tory Policy – We hurl ourselves into the Abyss.
Labour Policy – We hurl ourselves into the Abyss.
Lib Dem Policy – who cares? We hurl them into the Abyss.
SNP Policy – we wait until we know what Brexit will mean for all of us, the real and actual Brexit mind, not any “soft” Brexit fudgy notional cuddly Brexit, and then we decide if we follow the madness over the edge or we exercise our sanity, I mean sovereignty, to remain in Europe.
There is no “soft” Brexit. There never has been. It’s a British euphemism which does not translate into any European language. The fundamental concept of a “soft” Brexit is a very British delusion perpetuated by the cretins in Westminster and their puppet media. A soft Brexit is the mythical presumption that Europe will “see sense” and not punish the British, which may or may not be true, but even if Europe was bent double in support of the British position, and they’re not, it is still beyond the reach of Britain to give itself a soft Brexit, and it always has been.
Only the EU can offer a soft Brexit, and the EU has repeated over and over that the UK will not be allowed the cherry pick the parts of EU membership it likes, and dispense with the parts it doesn’t. Theresa May is not listening. Ruth Davidson is not listening. Jeremy Corbyn is not listening. Nicola Sturgeon has listened, has asked Europe whether there are other options, and understands exactly where Scotland stands.
We save ourselves with ScotRef, or sell out our country with Brexit.
I just don’t buy the “SNP voters go Corbyn, Labour voters go Tory” hypothesis. I’m sure there was a BIT of that, but the numbers are just too ludicrous for it to be the widespread explanation.
10,000 Labour voters in Glasgow East suddenly going Tory? Come off it.
I’m afraid I’m more Occam’s Razor about it – there was a big swing to the Tories because a lot of SNP voters switched to the Tories. (And a fair number just stayed home.)
Over 30% of SNP voters voted Leave. It’s hardly shocking that they wouldn’t be enthused by a “Vote for us again to try to stay in the EU” message. The poorer parts of Glasgow were the most Leave-friendly, as were Perthshire and the NE for different reasons.
There’s no way I’m swallowing a huge SNP exodus to Labour conveniently mirrored by almost the EXACT SAME number of Labour voters going Tory. That’d mean the core Labour vote was down to about 8%.
I think folk saw it as primarily a Brexit election (with an indyref crossover), and voted accordingly, plus local factors.
I suspect people will find out the hard way that you get who and what you vote for.
If you vote for parties that would deny you a right to choose, (in fact a good deal of your rights if things pan out for the worst), then don’t be shocked when they do just that.
That East Kilbride result is *brutal*. Only 6 more people wanted the Labour candidate than wanted to keep Michael McCann in 2015?
I mean, it’s not a great result for the SNP either, but talk about damning with faint praise.
I’m sure all 3 mechanisms come into play, perhaps in the end we will find roughly a third for each.
But my money would be on the SNP to Corbyn shift as being the biggest.
SLAB were pretty much down to a hard Britnat contingent backed by the SMSM.
In the recent GE, SMSM propaganda effort had switched to RD and Brexit made an indyref2 probable. Lots of reasons why some of that core Britnat support to jump to Tory.
Hopefully there is a high enough percentage of most recent SLAB voters to be problematic for Kezia.
The Scottish Parliament should vote whether Scotland should remain in the Single Market.
If Scotland’s Parliament votes Aye, then Scotland should stay in the Single Market. What the rest of the UK does is up to them.
Scotland’s wish to remain within the Single Market should be part of EU negotiations. Scotland should be given permission to negotiate directly with the EU regarding its relationship with the EU. If the EU refuses this, then the UK can’t force the EU to accommodate Scotland’s democratic decision.
However the UK Govt MUST respect that decision and accommodate it.
If the Scottish Parliament votes that Scotland should leave the Single Market if the rUK leaves the Single Market, then that vote should be respected and Indi-ref2 cancelled.
If the UK Govt refused to accept Scotland’s democratic vote to remain in the Single Market. then they are refusing to accept Scotland’s sovereignty within the Union.
Scottish democracy within the Union would be dead.
In that case UDI or an indy-ref would be the only sensible option.
@Breeks 2.51
Pretty much.
anyone else getting this FOI pish from 38 degrees , the signatories include the BBC- Common space , and no doubt cheered on by labour – tory – libdems, they are having a laugh .
from now on their petitions are going where the should go in the bleedn bin .
“May’s deal with DUP in danger as Treasury warns against bribes”
link to archive.is
@ colin Alexander at 3.13
They already have.
Here’s the BBC report of it:
link to archive.is
Oops – premature inadvertent submit.
I meant to include this quotation from the report:
I would expect a similar result if the debate is repeated, with or without an even firmer commitment to remaining in the SM.
It says a lot about the FPTP voting system that even when the results are posted you can’t be sure what they mean. (except the Tories got away with it again)
What did voters really want when they voted Conservative? Who knows? You’d have to ask each one separately. Same applies to Labour and Lib Dem and this applies on both sides of the border.
It’s nonsense to have an electoral system where voters are just sticking two fingers up to the party they least favour. Especially if you can’t even be sure that’s what they were trying to say.
I’m still trying to get my head round the scale of collusion it took to get 13 tories into Westminster. And for what?
Galamcennalth@0148pm . Yes the REAL reason for the GE was to weaken the SNP prior to Brexit negotiations ( the smokescreen excuse was ” stronger mandate” for PM ).They have failed as SNP has retained a majority. However, the likelihood now is a further GE ( which the Tories will lose , and THEY KNOW that they will lose ).However, as I have stated previously , the ” English establishment “will accept the ” reserve” Labour government for a period if the union can be saved.
The GE when it comes will result in a fierce attack by the establishment propaganda wing on the SNP in the urban areas and they will swing right behind Corbyn and ” Scottish labour” during the election campaign. They would hope thereafter that the SNP would thereafter lose the Westminster seat majority and the calls for No Indyref2 will reach a crescendo . The SNP have to move quickly now and the FM has to defend the democratic mandate she has for 2nd vote and strongly resist all calls to ” call off” a 2nd vote . Holyrood ‘s vote must be defended as a ” sovereign vote”.The Tories don’t want the details of the Brexit negotiations to be made public before the next GE as this could well result in support for Independence to increase . Consequently this is why an early election is more likely rather than say in 2 years time. They will sacrifice Tory rule for the ” greater good” if this further degrades support for the SNP and possibly support for Independence.They don’t want to get into detailed Brexit negotiations with Indyref2 still hanging over them for obvious reasons.Corbyn is a 100 percent ” Britnat” and has told Dugdale to ” toe the Britnat London led Labour Party line”. This is why Dugdale has “changed her tune” over the past year and is now fiercely Pro union . Finally it is obvious that their has been collusion at the ” highest level of the ” Britnat establishment” and London controlled unionist parties PRIOR to June 8th .The plan was a ” unionist bridgehead ” in Scotland and they have had limited success. The SNP must be fully alert to the danger of a 2nd GE before the impact of a disasterous Brexit becomes apparent to the Scottish electorate.( and support for Independence rises).The Holyrood vote was and is so very important.Remember, the SNP only had a handful of MP’s prior to the 2014 referendum.
All things are relative
file:///C:/Users/User/Downloads/wingsoverscotland.com-All%20things%20are%20relative%20(1).pdf
PS I expect the published election expenses figures will be a bestseller the fiction charts.
PPS I thought you were taking a break, Rev.
Sides splittin’.
I think many realized that even the 56 SNP MPs we sent to Westminster last time were subject to the inbuild unfairness of the union and Scotland’s voice was ignored by Westminster – as usual.
All things are relative
link to wingsoverscotland.com
WGD is back aff the lavvy:
Let’s do what the Tories don’t want
link to weegingerdug.wordpress.com
crazycat @ 15:38
I’m not even sure that Labour would abstain next time, and instead vote with the Tories and their wee pals.
That last vote was taken when Kez was still in her “WTF” mode after Brexit. Now she is fully back on message and following London orders: Brexit must be accepted for the sake of the Party and to hell with the consequences for Scotland.
On the day of the EU referendum I was working offshore, I was only going to be there for a few days for a specific purpose but it meant I missed the EU vote.
Anyway my main contact on the platform was known to me and the next morning when the result was announced he told me he had a proxy vote and had voted leave. He didn’t want or expect leave to happen but he, his wife and two adult children all voted leave he said. Though I thought he looked a little shocked at the result.
The reason being his family didn’t want Scotland’s vote to differ greatly from that in England, he feared another Independence referendum if they did and his family had all voted No.
Now the craziest thing of all is that again as a bloc in 2015 they all voted SNP!
WTF some strange thoughts obviously go on in peoples minds at election time. I would guarantee that they all voted Tory this time. I’d bet my house on it, because every election for them seems to be about an absolute hatred and fear of Independence.
The BBC Sectarian and Unionist party now have all the votes they’re ever going to get, the dividing factions have now been exposed for what they are, now it’s up to voters who didn’t bother to vote to make a decision
Vote Labour get Tory, it’s a fact, so Labour folk out there it’s time to get sensible, the SNP are the good guys in the white hats with the silver six shooters and they’re on our side not the Tories
Brexit will destroy Scotlands progression and you can’t keep crossing your fingers decade after decade hoping for something that wont ever happen, and even if it does Gordon Brown was the last one you got, don’t be sucked in by John McDonell because that’s who’s running the Labour party not Jeremy Corbyn
Poor old help me Obi Wan has spent over 30 years sitting doing nothing, what’s different now? a Che Guevara bunnet and a smiley attitude unfortunately isn’t enough when all you’ve got to offer is a lefty version of Nigel Farage
and where’s Nigel now? do you see him out and about getting stuck in for his dream? I don’t think so and it’ll be the same with These are not the Tories you want Jeremy Corbyn
This particular Jedi doesn’t even know where Scotland is except it’s somewhere in the frozen North beyond the wall
@ RJS
Yes, that’s what I meant by similar; ie not identical – the overall outcome would be the same though. A split parliament with a small majority for the government.
Given the new Tory MP’s from the North East, have ANY so-called ‘journalists’ in Scotland actually nailed Ruth Davidson down on fishing rights. Is she guaranteeing them post brexit? Does she have cast iron re-assurances from Theresa that Scottish fishermen will regain full fishing rights in Scotland?? It is a very easy question. I think we can all guess the answer.
Such a pity the fishermen in the North East seem to have fallen for it, hook, line and sinker (if you’ll excuse the pun). Again. It was the tories who traded away their fishing rights to get the ‘rebate’ from the EU in the first place, and they will not hesitate to do so again. ‘Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice shame on me’.
The SNP needs to nail her hard on that point. Pity the so-called scottish ‘Journalists’ won’t ever do it.
Meanwhile the TORYLABOUR council in Aberdeen are cutting teachers posts. Well done Aberdeen voters. Don’t say you were not warned. Vote Labour get Tory.
Question for anyone.
Has the Lab councillors in Aberdeen been brought back into the fold and its being keep or are they still doing what their friend the Tories tell them.??
O/T
Some bad language
Ishmahil Blagrove had some strong words for the mainstream media outside grenfelltower and everyone cheered.
link to twitter.com
Sorry, should read being kept secret
Also see labour banging on about education at fmqs yet one of there back benches can’t accept the snp won the election when Nicola threw that fact at them despite the disaster if that’s the case whys labour not crying foul at the torys if they won the election they should be raging that mays not rightfully the prime minster then labour need to go back to school
I agree with the comments about another snap election to get more SNP MPs out.
It’s what I was trying to say on twitter.
BBCS is in full get Nicola Sturgeon mode. They wouldn’t be able to keep that going forever but another election in August – god help us
So in other words the SNP vote collapsed. Had we got another 2% to get their arses out to vote we would be on 40 plus Mp’s. Many young folk don’t bother voting in Scotland. We lost the spirit of 2015 when Nicola was filling the Hydro 3 nights!
Maybe voter apathy. I.E they all expected something to change and nothing did. It’s been an empty 2 years for the SNP.
If the swing was from SNP to the tories is due to Brexit, then the percentages make sense.
The SNP vote (prior to GE) 47%. If 30% of SNP supporters want out of the EU, then the 32% who voted for Brexit in Scotland, represents circa 42% of that vote i.e. 42% of Brexit voters are/were SNP voters.
Me again,my last posts done before I saw this.
Aberdeen Council
The council, now led by a Conservative-Labour coalition, said it was looking for new applications for redundancy or early retirement to balance the books and “reshape and modernise services”.
Does this mean that the last council Lab were wasting money and could not run the council properly.
O/T
Start date announced for negotiations with European Commission
link to gov.uk
Anyone fancy a job
link to commonspace.scot
Roof played the orange card.Labour played the Corbyn card even though the blairite scottish branch hate him and the SNP took a lot of the votes for granted.
Vote tactical to hit the snp, labour yoons end up letting the Tories in.
Tactically, daft. Since Westminster is in charge at macro level, the non Tory yoons yoonionism is self defeating. Eejits. Even Turkies would not vote likevthat
Thanks Nana, so talks start Monday. UK should keep this in mind.
Monday’s child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s child is full of grace,
Wednesday’s child is full of woe,
Thursday’s child has to go,
Friday’s child is out on their arse.
Just after the election in Scotland was underway, I posted on here, that the SNP would need a powerful message, or the media would just ignore them. Sadly the message was wishy washy and the media generally ignored them, and I do not think anybody has considered how much of a part that played in the result. It became Jeremy or Theresa. And Ruth.
At the 2015 election, their was incredible interest in what the SNP might campaign on, and what they might do. Every news report across the UK. It was fresh and gave the media a story to chase. At this most recent election, we had ‘stronger for Scotland’ or something, i can’t even remember (and I’m in the SNP). It was a nothing message for an election. Kind of ‘vote for us, just, because.’. It was rubbish.
Now to be fair, it was called at short notice, so could be excused. If another election is called, we need a hard strong message. It needs to scare the willies off the English journos – to give them something to chase. A strong message will also have the advantage that it will force Ruth Davidson’s hand. if the SNP message was weak, she could run again with ‘stopping the SNP ndyref’ for the fourth time, but if the SNP come out all guns blazing, what can Ruth do?
Attack is the best form of defence. The SNP should be on that right now, as we speak.
With the right message, the SNP could easily take back seats they have lost, but they really need to sharpen their media act. Go for the jugular. And they really could learn a thing from N.Ireland parties (on all sides) who have recently shown they tolerate zero cr*p from English based journalists, not even for one second. That is how it needs to be. We need good media savvy folks from the SNP virtually living in TV studios.
Oh, and if NS is tackled on devolved issues again, she needs to make it clear how absurd it is, when they have nothing to do with Westminster. Repeat that over and over again ‘that is a devolved matter, and irrelevant to this election’ and do not back down, ever. Eventually, even Glenn Campbell will start to look foolish. These people deserve ridicule. Then legitimately cite the failures of Labour and the Tories in running the NHS and Education in England or Wales, and the Labour run NHS in Wales, btw, is truly shocking.
On the front foot attacking, not on the back foot defending.
Oh, and if Angus and Alex are free, put them in charge of the campaign.
There is an old maxim which states ” The enemy of my enemy is my friend” This is exactly what happened during this election.
Unionists and SNP anti EU voters basically colluded albeit for their own reasons ,to produce this result.
Thing is though how did we manage to get a 62% majority to remain in the EU?
Who were they?
The SNP vote was down 476,867
Total votes cast was down 260,770
LibDems votes were down 40,614
I think a large percentage of non-voters this time were people who voted SNP last time.
Many SNP voters voted Labour.
Many in Labour support independence. Others are Unionist.
I’m guessing many former Labour Unionists also backed the Tories. Labour took socialist votes from the SNP and lost unionist votes to the Tories, so ended up with roughly the same total votes as before : up 10,000 approx.
No doubt some SNP voters also backed the Tories as they are perhaps anti-Eu anti-immigration or they think the local SNP politican has been rubbish and voting Tory was the best way of kicking them out.
But BBC Scotland say the Scottish Conservatives won! A lot of it is maybe SNP Remain vote complacency, in direct correlation to the higher English turnout.
It is hard to keep up enthusiasm for English GE’s that have almost nothing to do with Scotland now. It felt like the SNP campaign was in the same sort of mindset. That’s the SNP’s big challenge now.
Blair MacDougal must really be wondering why he’s made it even worse for SLab too, which is nice. Oh well, back to stay at home dading it.
OT
Notice some of our resident trolls are also having a break. Is senile Dave and Rock one in the same?
I have to agree with what Robert Louis says at 4.53. Makes good sense
@robert Louis
Wow. I remember you posting about that before – ie we need a strong message. So true. And we didn’t. From personal experience I can say that a lot of previous snp working class either stayed home or switched to Tory or labour. Depending on how big brexit mattered to them. And in the north east anti immigrant feeling is higher than is comfortable. I think the tories have reached peak hard unionist though.
The snp needs to firm up its message. Come out fighting. Listen to its activists – particularly the new ones who feel a bit left behind or alienated. They need to get out there and have real conversations with people and voters. . And listen. And then convey their message. What’s the usp of the snp?
Independence.
Labour in Scotland said ‘vote Tory to beat the SNP’. End up short of a majority for Corbyn. Tories gain 13 seats. Take a bow Dugdale. If I was Corbyn, I’d sack the whole lot of them, or at the very least tell them to f***in grow up.
Who voted who, who switched sides, who didn’t vote.
Does not matter a jot.
Theresa May wants power for the sake of power, she did not call the election to spite the SNP, she did it to win a big majority.
One week after the election and its all going pear shaped and we haven’t even started Brexit talks.
May will be forced into an election but she will try and set the date on her terms – look out for a frenzied media attack on Labour and Corbyn.
The SNP meanwhile cannot sit on its hands, they really do need to start producing radical policies to counter Corbyns appeal.
The Tories will lose votes in Scotland but they are likely to go to Labour.
so come on Nicola, start putting together a raft of policies to counter a Labour comeback.
@Hamish100
Rocks on the backshift usually starts work around 21:00. Sensible is taking the Revs advice and having a break.
Perhaps a tiny wee blue book by Wings laying out the facts;-
On the EU structure and how it operates, and the entitlements that will be lost with a total withdrawal.
The pros and cons of Brexit.
The proposal by the SNP government to hold a referendum once the Brexit negotiations are concluded, and before brevet is enacted.
By Ruth Davidson’s deception and supported by the BBC and media, I reckon many people were duped into believing an Indy referendum was imminent and so voted against the SNP. I can think of no other reason why so many moved to the Tories.
” On the ball ” Robert Louis @0453 pm attack is the best form of defence. We really need to come out with ” all guns blazing” if there is another election . We require to be on the front foot from ” the off” . This would be nothing short of a London led unionist two fold attack on Scotland and our fledgling democracy . Both the Britnat Tories and Britnat Labour Party have ” shown their true colours, i.e. Scotland to be subjugated at all costs . This will be a fight for the very existance of our fledgling democracy . The London establishment plan is to ” break” Scottish resistance to Westminster rule and to ” bend the knee” to our imperial masters. Dugdale & Davidson are the ” Trojan horses” of the London establishment.
I thought Nicola more than held her own today at FMQs , ruth got a slap more than once and she didnt like it one little bit, did not like not being the top banana , she was brought back to earth with a resounding bump .
Patrick Harvie can go on and on about banning fracking if he likes at the end of the day there is very little the SNP can do about it the UK government has approved licences , and the SNP has had their hands tied by those nice folk who voted NO in 2014, in case he and the rest in the chamber haven’t noticed their parties helped tie the SNPs hands , so stop trying to get the SNP to fix your f/n problems.
From a couple of days ago, a link was posted stating what Ken Clarke, (I think it was him) had said about the reason the election had been called (at a dinner party he’d attended, recently). Along the lines of to secure a much bigger majority because when Brexit happens the economy is going to go into a big nosedive, therefore next election after Brexit, having gained desired ‘landslide majority’ would see the Tories taking a massive hit, perhaps losing over 50 seats, but the ‘bigger majority’ gained would ensure that they would still be in power ‘post Brexit’.
That this was their reasoning combined with quelling the SNP is not far fetched. They overplayed their hand on both counts. Ergo, ergo…
If any one can find that link, I’d be grateful, cheers in advance 🙂
For those of us who believe in Scotland regaining statehood the UK general election June 2017 was a poor result for the SNP, the Yes movement and the Scottish Greens.
We shouldn’t be surprised. The SNP have failed (persuaded by faint hearts) to capitalise on the massive surge of Scottish popular feeling which flowed in the wake of the lost 2014 referendum. They have accepted Westminster rules of the game and by doing so they will never win. Westminster are past masters at deception, moving the goalposts and worse – delaying tactics. Westminster dosen’t recognise fairness or legality (equal partnership?) although BBC propaganda would have you believe otherwise.
The British empire never gave up a colony without a struggle. The nearest example is Ireland which had to resort to war to achieve statehood; and because of division in the north, planted by empire, only gained partial control of their island. 100 years on and a bitter divide remains in Northern Ireland. Eire exists because enough Irish men and women rebelled against the forceful and suffocating control of Westminster. Scots must do likewise if they wish to win. I am not proposing war! Scotland seeks a peaceful path to self determination via democratic politics however this does not mean being subservient to the Westminster stated view that Scotland has been extinguished. Not if we want to win.
I am like many others very tired of the never ending barrage of anti Scottish propaganda dished out by the BBC and the UK msm. It achieves the desired effect because many folk are too busy earning a living and just hear the same repeated lies until they accept them as being facts. There is little sadder than hearing a Scot saying “Scotland is not able to survive on its own”.
The SNP must push back very strongly – rebel against the Westminster establishment – not become a Scottish version of it. The SNP campaign was a poor parallel of the May campaign with no clear message to motivate Yes supporters. My belief is simple: first achieve statehood and only then, within our own independent country, campaign and vote for the kind of government you want. Don’t get caught up in UK left/right party politics if you want to win independence.
This election result should starkly illustrate to the SNP that concentrating on UK issues is not fruitful. Scotland sent 56 MPs to Westminster last year and they worked hard but were voted down at every turn by the overwhelming number of English MPs – and totally ignored re. Brexit. They can achieve virtually nothing in Westminster and that is not democracy for Scotland. Note that Sinn Fein refuse to attend Westminster because they don’t see a benefit (even now with a hung parliament and DUP involvement). Sending MPs to Westminster only encourages Westminster and it sucks us in to a system structured to frustrate us.
Nicola Sturgeon is an excellent FM however her current policy of trying to represent/please everybody including hard line Unionists will not bring us success. Being reasonable with Westminster and their hard line surrogates in Scotland does not work – they are not reasonable – so you cannot “govern for all” unless you compromise/dilute your own principles. We have to be ‘unreasonable’ with Westminster and reject and attack their asserted rules and falsehoods.
The sustained attacks on the Scottish Government from the surrogates (Tory, Lab, LibDem) via BBC and msm are coordinated and unified and therefore effective over time. The SNP is always on the defensive instead of promoting the great future Scotland could have. Voters can be fickle and tribal, however I do still believe that there is a potential majority in Scotland who are willing to embrace independence, therefore I sincerely hope that the FM will not give in to these attacks otherwise Project Fear wins again. The SNP must remember we vote for them to achieve independence (plus competent government as a given) but independence is their raison d’etre.
Westminster is determined to prevent Scotland regaining independence – they fear England is diminished without us and they will work to never allow another referendum. They allowed it in 2014 because the polls told them they would easily triumph. They know now that is not the case and they will block any attempt to repeat the vote. The SNP have fallen into the trap of asking permission. So the SNP must change course and campaign on a different means of regaining statehood, perhaps the Margaret Thatcher one of just winning a Scottish election with independence as the core policy. This is what the Tory, Lab, LibDem surrogates, with some success, are currently doing – campaigning on only one policy which is ‘no second independence referendum’.
kezia today proving once again she is in some kind of dreamland ,she said Nicola was carrying out tory policies and so was in cahoots with the tories, no wonder Nicola had to pause before answering i bet she couldnt believe her ears , Kezia is under the impression no one has noticed her promoting and indeed actively in collusion with tories in many councils , her levels of being able to baffle most of the country seem to have no celing , she just keeps going . OH it’s ok the BBC will call her out , Aye right .
The Guardian UKOK propaganda has gone vote NO and tory def con1. Don’t read if you’re of nervous disposition. I never thought I’d ever see the Graun shysters give a ferocious tory like Ruth D, well, any support, let alone torygraph style worship. This must be how Graun thinks it all ends for Scotland, as a nation state EU member, forever a region of scrounger greater England. As if:D
link to archive.is
heedtracker says:
I am, so I won’t 🙂
Cameron thought he has Scotland sorted and that he would win a Remain in EURef. They would have been aware of the constitutional consequences if Leave won. Clearly the WM gamble of the century.
Sod’s Law and they fcked up. They knew it the day after the result.
Since then, the real focus hasn’t been on Brexit, it has been on the endangered Union.
It has been relentless, peaking in the council then general elections. They need to get the SNP neutered before Brexit reality allows triggering of ScotRef.
The EU will make discussions public so we will get a sense of the outcome sooner than we think IMO. They are in a race.
It’s all hands to the Union pump and that includes the Guardian probably!
Graun’s vote Tory Scotland propaganda is so different from its DO not vote tory England propaganda, weird doesn’t come close.
On one Graun hand Boris Johnson is a dangerous clown,
link to archive.is
On t’other, Ruth Davidson is a tory goddess.
link to archive.is
Divide and conquer, using exactly the same Conservatives, is pretty slick really. Only in UKOK hackdom.
I know some Labour who voted Tory because of Corbyn – communist, IRA sympathiser. I encountered several SNP voting Tory because of not wanting to be in the EU. I encountered no-one voting Labour who was SNP last time, but I did hear of 2 people from someone else.
The weather was awful. The GOTV was not a great success in some areas.
I know for a fact the Orange Lodge got its members to vote in the council elections. A number of Orange candidates were elected. Their appearance drove the turnouts up considerably in May in some wards. And there are multiple reports of an “email”. I assume they pulled the same trick last week.
I would suggest the postals were heavily Tory. The SNP turnout was weakened by weather and by a bad GOTV ( which in part is explained by election fatigue on the membership ).
We shun postals because of the fraud we suspected in 2014, but if we want to spread the GOTV effort over two weeks, and get votes despite the weather, we are unfortunately going to have to take the risk.
We need to get Cat 1 & 2 voters voting by post if we want to contain the Mooth.
YES voters did not to cone out for the election or the SNP. They will come out for another IndyRef. Indy support is going up. People electioned out. Apathy. Voters sick of Westminster, the Tories, Unionists and elections, Unionists targeting seats. They can’t do that every time. Electoral fraud. Fraudulent expenses.
The NE in shock and horror, disbelieve. In mourning. The best politican that the NE and Scotland has ever had. Alex Salmond a world class statesman. A NE hero. Alex Salmond did more for the NE in five years, than the Unionists had down for fifty years. Alex Salmond got all the essential projects off the ground. Vast investment into the NE. The essential AWPR, the Trump Golf Development, the airport expansion and the Bay wind turbine projects. Thanks Alex for all you do for the NE and the world. A World Class Act who put Scotland on the World Map. Thanks and welcome back after a wee well earned break. The backlash will be against the useless lying Unionists. .
The SNP Gov has done more for Scotland in five years than the Unionists did in fifty years. With Independence they will do even better.
galamcennalath says:
15 June, 2017 at 6:15 pm
heedtracker says:
Don’t read if you’re of nervous disposition.
Worth it just for the sheer spectacle of Graun’s job dropping gall, in Scotland. They have no integrity whatsoever when it comes to stamping out, well us.
So here’s Graun tories worships/savages Cons like Ruth D, while monstering her equally tory boss because?
link to archive.is
Wednesday 14 June 2017 06.00 BST Last modified on Thursday 15 June 2017 08.51 BST
Friends don’t let friends go Brexiting without a mandate. But where are Theresa May’s friends? The prime minister staggers towards negotiations with the European Union like a drunkard crossing a car park – bold pace, wobbly gait.”
Here in Scotia, Graun twerps say stuff like,
“Davidson has charm and political instinct on a par with Alex Salmond – and it could take her very far.”
Two countries, two completely different and very conservative displays of tory bullshit artistry, in a quality haha broadsheet, or Schrodinger’s tory press:D
And they are all now frantically praying for soft Brexit, which should annihilate Sturgeon and indyref2, they say.
It must make Farage types laugh their arses off at all of it.
Anyone who wants Independence. Just keep on voting SNP, SNP. Vote for Independence. Really simple. Vote, donate and join campaign and canvass. All those who can. Simple.
The last GE a higher No of YES voters came out and voted for the SNP. It is very rare in the UK for a political Party to get 50% of the vote. Never happened before. 2015. After the Referendum promises broken. 40% is a landslide. THE SNP did really well. Election fatigue for many people. Now voter regret and remorse.
Most blocks in Scotland have stone cladding. Better. The block in London did not have the fire breaks. There was something really wrong.
There is no soft BREXIT. They are well and truly stuffed. An amusing Guardian piece, this time written by a continental, Jean Quatremer, enjoying the sheer schadenfreude of the UK pickle:
link to archive.is
I’m getting some dispute from some people who don’t understand that the “Corbyn bounce” did not happen in Scotland. But it certainly did.
12 weeks ago the Labour vote in Scotland was dropping towards single figures.The Corbyn bounce recovered it to 25% which was enough to gain about six seats from a faltering SNP.
As Stu’s figures underline a punchy,aspirational SNP campaign would have made a lot of difference.
O/T
Are we still on a break?
Thought you might like to watch these videos
Northern Ireland, Conservatives & Dark Money – Adam Ramsay (Part 1)
link to youtube.com
May’s DUP Folly – Adam Ramsay (Part 2)
link to youtube.com
A few comments here about the weak SNP campaign, which I agree with. If its now the RD party then an attack on her principles, or lack of them will need to be included.
She is now being championed as fighting for Scotland, but how can someone who goes to their party conference, declares all her country men (no matter their political views) as thieves and vandals be trusted to stick up for us behind closed doors? Mundel certainly cant.
She needs to be shown up for the gratification hunter and puppet of WM that she is.
Wee tankie cant control her ego and has set herself up on a two legged stool. This is an opportunity too good to miss.
Just seen this on t’internet. It look correct, but then I am no expert on such matters. Article 50 has NOT actually been triggered, despite what Westminster keeps saying.
Very interesting if it is. Perhaps the Scottish Government might like to challenge? Perhaps their are already some folks just waiting for the right moment to do so. 🙂
link to counselmagazine.co.uk
As Stu’s figures underline a punchy,aspirational SNP campaign would have made a lot of difference.”
Based on what though? its easy to say but considering the almost over weekend snap GE decision, on the bases of boosting up majority tory England, what do you campaign on, vote SNP to stop tory building on their Brexit majority, is not that great?
All of this is clearly a tory Scotland backlash at Scottish independence and they believe they have won. In England, the English got a look at Mayhen and freaked out.
Robert Graham @ 5.26
It is also worth remembering that the fracking issue was debated in the UK Parliament – Jan 2015. I think it was an SNP amendment to a Bill and they wanted a moratorium. Labour abstained and the motion failed. If they had voted with the SNP they might just have won.
@crazycat 15 June, 2017 at 3:35 pm
Thanks for the headsup.
Why did you have to tell me that, when we just had an election campaign where the SNP spoke a lot of rubbish about a strong voice at WM?
The SNP should have been banging on about how Scotland’s Parliament voted to stay in the Single Market and the UK Govt has rejected Scottish democracy.
For me, that’s a bigger issue and even those who have no great love for EU might have been encouraged to get out and vote SNP because of the UK Govt’s and WM’s insult to Scottish democracy.
Ruth Davidson is a manipulating liar. Getting found out.
The Unionist are a bunch of intellectual pygmies. None of them are fit to polish Alex Salmond boots. One Alex Samond is worth more than 13 unlucky for some Unionists. Alex Salmond is head and shoulders above the lot of them. So is Nicola. She wipes the floor with the lot of them every week.
Some farmers are not telling the truth. The problems with the computer system is universal. In the rest of the UK/EU as well. The SNP put up a fund so the farmers could get their payment if they applied. Some of them decided not to apply. Get money from the bank. Or just wait. The ones who applied got the payment (instalment) before the due date.
The IT computer system costs the Scottish Gov nothing. The EU pays for it. From the central fund. The EU wanted it put in place. It is being installed to stop (widespread) fraud in the EU. Farmers, landowners, small holders making fraudulent claims. It will save €Billions. Once up and running.
The problem is in some (rural) areas there can be poor or slow internet connection. Or people do not want to use computers. Technophobes. Help has to be found. Or someone has to be employed to help. Or people travel to a different location.
There is nothing worse than really slow connection or intermittent difficulties and disruption. Or people who do not want to use computers. There are other forms internet connection. An independent internet connection can be made relatively easy. In some areas, depending on location. People do not know about it. They do not have the necessary information.
For folk talking about the SNP campaign, guess what happens when the press search every issue for a bad take on it, won’t print good news stories or sink with faint praise. And have every other party opposing every policy.
Go on, guess.
Robert Louis says:
15 June, 2017 at 4:53 pm
“”Just after the election in Scotland was underway, I posted on here, that the SNP would need a powerful message, or the media would just ignore them. Sadly the message was wishy washy and the media generally ignored them, and I do not think anybody has considered how much of a part that played in the result. It became Jeremy or Theresa. And Ruth.””
……
It is the normal practice of the MSM to write the SNP out of elections, any elections, no matter what message they are promoting. So this election was no different in that respect.
The 2015 election however was quite different when it came to coverage and this was graphically demonstrated by the report of media coverage by Loughborough University. Someone posted a link to it on a previous thread.
There were several reasons for this increased coverage. In no particular order: Ms Sturgeon was a new face and her performance in the debates and speeches at UCL and LSE made the MMS sit up and take notice.
Then the publicity surrounding the possibility of a hung parliament and the possibility that the SNP would be kingmaker. That generated a lot of publicity which was ramped up by the Tories using the SNP as a threat.
All of the publicity was across the board and not confined to just the Scottish MSM. Finally there was the significant residual political engagement coming straight off the back of the Independence Referendum.
In 2017 that exposure and energy was not there. The former a deliberate act by the MSM the latter the result of a bruising series of elections and EU ref sapped their energy.
They were also unlucky that the message they had was delayed by the Manchester bombing then eventually delivered under the shadow of the London Bridge attack. This really meant a loss of momentum at a crucial point in the election.
They did well under the circumstances and with some R&R they should come back ready to fight again.
One thing they have to do is to be mire aggressive in defending and promoting their record in office which is a lot better than the constant negativity of MSM and Unionists would have you believe.
YES voters did not come out in the Election for the SNP.?They voted elsewhere (wrongly). Or did not vote. Stayed at home. People are electioneered out. Some of them do not support the SNP. (They should) It was a GE. Not a Referendum. The SNP still won handsomely. They are still standing up for Scotland. The SNP Scottish Gov is the best Gov Scotland has ever had. It has only been in full power in Scotland for over six years. Before that it was a minority Gov.
What happened to minimum pricing? The Unionists would not agree to it. It must be ready to implement. ‘Scot’s Law performance of an obligation’.
Legerwood at 723pm,
“One thing they have to do is to be mire aggressive in defending and promoting their record in office which is a lot better than the constant negativity of MSM and Unionists would have you believe”.
I absolutely agree, but the way to handle the moronic questioning about devolved matters during a UK GE is to simply list the catastrophic failures under the Tories and Labour in England and wales respectively. The reason? two fold, 1. attack is better than defence. 2. The Scottish supposed ‘journalists’, especially the BBC go out of their way to make out Scotland is worse, when in reality it outperforms both England and Wales. But voters do not know that. So, it is a way of throwing a unionist attack back in the faces of the BBC propagandists. Do that to them every time at the BBC, and I promise you the nonsense about education or NHS will stop very soon. The BBC do it right now, because they get away with it. It needs tackled head on at the time, all the time.
We need them to get really sharp and on message, at all times. Sometimes their are some members of the Scottish cabinet who do interviews, and (I won’t name names), they are utterly useless at them. NS, AS (an absolute master), Angus, Stewart Hosie and a few exceptional others do well, but the rest are just cannon fodder for the biased media. Like lambs to the slaughter. Lovely people, but no good at serious TV political interviews. No other political party does this, and the SNP need to seriously get to grips with the problem.
I know it is not easy, but it is, you could say part of politics 1.01.
“despite the huge scale of the SNP’s losses.”
Like it or not, the independence cause has suffered a major setback.
The SNP must take the initiative and go on the offensive immediately after the purring queen’s speech.
Nicely nicely has never worked against the British establishment.
Robert Louis @ 8.04
I agree. I am often surprised at how little some SNP politicians seem to know about the SG’s record in office and, it has to be said, quite a lot of SNP supporters. To often they seem to accept the premise that the SG is making a bad job of Education, NHS etc
Time and again this charge appears in below the line comments and in articles without any supporting evidence. Today, for example, Iain McWhirter mentions the SG’s poor record on Education, BHS and the economy without any detail. This the day following some of the best economic and employment stats for some time!
But it is not just commentators on the Unionist side who do it. Bella Caledonia has two articles at the moment which bit accept to a degree the, apparently received wisdom, that Scottish Education is failing under SG. One by Commonweal the other by Garry Hassan. The latter I would expect to take that line but the former did seem to be somewhat adrift when it came to knowing what the SG has done in office.
The SG and the SNP needs to get more clued up about promoting what they have done.
That NHS and Education have problems but not anywhere close to the extent that the detractors would have you believe.
Rev. Stuart Campbell,
“I think folk saw it as primarily a Brexit election (with an indyref crossover), and voted accordingly, plus local factors.”
Dave McEwan Hill (From the ground),
“In most of Scotland that unsatisfactory election result had little to do with Brexit, or with “we don’t want another referendum”. It had nothing to do with the potential merits or otherwise of independence.”
Rock,
“Where it mattered, it was everything to do with Brexit and independence.
The Tories gained seats purely because of pro-Brexit and anti-independence voters.”
If long term SNP activists like Dave McEwan Hill don’t understand the reason for the drop in the SNP vote, we are doomed.
The truth will out in the end.
Especially with Rev Stu on the case = )
The time for an Independence offensive is now.
The Tories are in total disarray with all these disasters in the last few weeks and this tower block catastrophe will be rightly laid at their door.
In Scotland Davidson is cock-ah-hoop at her ‘victory’ but their arrangement with the murderous, Catholic hating, Gay bashing DUP to form a Tory government gives us a great opportunity to destroy Davidson. We should be attacking her relentlessly and attacking Tory mismanagement at all levels at every turn.
Their arrangement with the DUP should give us the opportunity to highlight that Davidson is a vile Tory like all the Toxic Tories as she cares nothing for the poor, the disabled or the infirmed. She seems quickly like her party to be turning ‘Orange’ however her gay Catholic fiancee might not be so keen.
So perk up folks now is the time.
Street Andrew,
“It says a lot about the FPTP voting system that even when the results are posted you can’t be sure what they mean. (except the Tories got away with it again)”
heedtracker,
“Like it or not FPTP is fair.”
Rock,
“With all due respect Ken500, Scotland does not want an undemocratic Westminster like system which gives landslide dictatorships to the likes of Thatcher and Blair, and soon to Saint Theresa of England and Wales, with less than 40% support.
32% of the vote giving roughly 32% of seats is democratic and fair, in my view.”
“osakisushi says:
I’m torn between the SNP not trying, perhaps appearing arrogant in their lack of leafletting here (Argyll).”
I don’t know if everyone is aware that it’s up to each candidates SNP branch to raise the funds for the leaflets which go out to voters and also volunteers who deliver these leaflets. SNP headquarters, does not supply or fund leaflets for the individual candidates, each branch raises the money themselves!
We have just had an EU referendum which nobody in Scotland really wanted, followed by local government elections, and most of the funds raised through local SNP events, certainly in my branch Dundee, had gone on these.
We can’t keep asking members again and again to donate, it’s generally the same generous donors who do. Our “war chest”, as I’m sure others around the country, was empty, and suddenly we had a general election, which absolutely nobody wanted, on our hands!
That’s the simple explanation as to why so few leaflets from the SNP reached people’s homes.
On the other hand, I was hearing of some areas, for example North East Fife, where households were receiving up to TEN leaflets from the Libdems!!
Given that they are a small party, almost bankrupt, who cannot even settle their policing bill with Police Scotland, you really have to wonder where they were getting the money from for their campaign materials! Perhaps they won the lottery and were keeping it quiet, or perhaps some wealthy donor, possibly even from the Tory party, was bankrolling their campaign! NE Fife was a traditional Libdem seat in the past and it was obviously targeted.
Similarly, Pete Wishart’s constituency were bombarded with up to 14 leaflets from the Tories, and we all know they have unlimited funds, and although they don’t have the activists to deliver them, they don’t have to, they pay people to do it, or use the postal service!
As it was, SNP rely on its volunteers to deliver and prepare election materials, in 2015, here in Dundee we were inundated with offers of help from people in and outwith the party, fired up by anger at the Referendum result.
Not so this time, we had a loyal contingent of activists, who turn out every time to help, we even had to send Dundee volunteers through to Perth and North East Fife to boost their team!
I realise we are all suffering from “ballot box fatigue” but it’s unfair to level criticism at the lack of election information materials from SNP, given the circumstances we found ourselves in. I guarantee it was not arrogance, more likely an empty bank account and lack of volunteers!
Next time there’s an election folks, PLEASE VOLUNTEER TO HELP! You don’t have to be a member, supporters are always welcome and we really appreciate the help.
Dan Huil,
“I think many realized that even the 56 SNP MPs we sent to Westminster last time were subject to the inbuild unfairness of the union and Scotland’s voice was ignored by Westminster – as usual.”
Rock (2nd June 2015),
“We are a pathetic people. Even Ghandi or Mandela couldn’t have done much for us.
While their people were ready to sacrifice everything, we are meekly hoping that our 56 MPs outnumbered 10 to 1 at Westminster, and 7 to 4 on the Scottish affairs committee, will bring us independence without any suffering.
If we want to achieve anything, we will need to get out onto the streets, starting with a massive poll tax type boycott of the Pravda GB tax.”
And despite the high stakes, we can’t even bother to go out to vote if the weather is bad.
Rock at 8.26
You are entirely wrong as usual. The election became a binary choice between a Labour Government in London or a Tory one and the SNP offered no other choice. It gave SNP supporters not enough reason to vote SNP and many of them didn’t.
I’m not being hyper critical. As I have conceded I was a happily going along with a Labour vote forecast to drop almost to single figures and us picking up the anti Tory vote. That seemed the best option in an election which offered nothing else for us. Events proved us wrong and surely underlined the lesson that we have to persuade our people to want independence as their primary political motivator or we will always be at the mercy of events we cannot control or affect.
We need a huge examination and investigation of the massive London funded leaflet campaign into unionist target seats in Scotland. The postal charges in many seats for this plot will be in six figures. Local SNP associations were in many cases almost broke and we have to show our people the trampling of Scotland this represents.
Rock, I don’t accept that the cause of Independence has suffered a major setback.
I did vote, but did so as a formulaic routine with no overriding passion. Call it complacency, it was widespread. Frankly it seemed a very dull and irrelevant election, it seemed there was nothing in particular at stake except Theresa’s majority which seemed a foregone conclusion, although I never thought the Tories would recover 13 seats. I assume a great many other thought likewise and didn’t vote.
Call it hubris, call it complacency. Hands up, Guilty of both myself. There will be no such complacency come polling day for ScotRef. Indeed, after a bit of a wake up call, I rather suspect there will be no complacency whatsoever.
I’ll ask you directly the question I posted before; eighteen months from now, whenever the full Brexit deal is known in all its lurid detail, will you be gladdened or saddened that the SNP has fought to bring you the right to choose whether Scotland stays in Europe or gets dragged over precipice with the UK?
Come the day, nobody will remember Theresa’s Election. All eyes will be on Brexit, and nevermind Scotland, the bigger and better half of the whole UK will wish they’d had an SNP government looking after their interests when it mattered.
Rock says:
15 June, 2017 at 8:39 pm
And despite the high stakes, we can’t even bother to go out to vote if the weather is bad.
These are the good time for U Rock huh, get stuck in, undermining, insulting, try to divert, try to start fights, target WoS commenters that wont shut and fcuk off, chip away a moral etc.
Not bad Rock, not bad. At least you put some thought it your very creepy version of rule britannia in Scotland forever Rock. Have to give you that much.
Dave McEwan Hill,
“Rock at 8.26
You are entirely wrong as usual.”
No I am not, you are.
In your own words:
“In most of Scotland that unsatisfactory election result had little to do with Brexit, or with “we don’t want another referendum”. It had nothing to do with the potential merits or otherwise of independence.”
That nonsense has been directly contradicted not only by myself, but the Rev. Stuart Campbell:
Rev. Stuart Campbell,
“I think folk saw it as primarily a Brexit election (with an indyref crossover), and voted accordingly, plus local factors.”
Your only strategy seems to be that the fake “independence supporting” The National is going to win us independence.
@ Thepnr at 4.53
I think you’ve left a word out there 🙂 !
I’m a Thursday’s child, and I have far to go.
heedtracker,
“Like it or not FPTP is fair.”
Do you stand by that comment?
Robert louis @ 6.56pm
Just quickly skimming through and haven’t had a chance to study your link yet but I read about this a couple of months ago.
This guy is a Scottish doctor and he is going to court over this point of law. His argument is that it needs an Act of Parliament to trigger the withdrawal from the EU.
Wasn’t that an argument really early on after the referendum – that we went in as a result of an Act of Parliament and we would need to have another Act in order to come out.
That was roundly pooh-pooed in WM.
Could get interesting.
Talks start on monday. Nicola said she would inform us in the next few days of her considered reaction to the election results and thoughts on indy ref 2.
Perhaps if the negotiations kick off without any devolved/Scottish voices there she will launch the indy campaign?
Dave McEwan Hill,
“We need a huge examination and investigation of the massive London funded leaflet campaign into unionist target seats in Scotland.”
Did the SNP seriously not anticipate that the British establishment would do everything possible to undermine the SNP and a second independence referendum?
“examination and investigation”?
After the horse has bolted?
Stop promoting the fake “independence supporting” The National and wasting time and resources on classes that are highly unlikely to vote for independence.
Rock,
“I can guarantee that we will lose again if we waste resources on trying to convert the selfish middle classes, the British nationalist elderly, the thugs and the English instead of the downtrodden folks in the schemes.
The SNP government has been too generous to the classes which take advantage but vote No, and has not done much for the downtrodden who would not let us down.”
Losing c 10,000 votes per seat is quite sobering though. Any explanation?
[…] interesting analysis by Stu Campbell confirms that Labour’s showing in Scotland was at only marginally better than their 2015 […]
Breeks,
“Come the day, nobody will remember Theresa’s Election. All eyes will be on Brexit, and nevermind Scotland, the bigger and better half of the whole UK will wish they’d had an SNP government looking after their interests when it mattered.”
Too many armchair pundits posting here are too complacent and optimistic as demonstrated by your comment.
Who will be pointing out the good of the SNP government to the people of Scotland, let alone the rest of the UK?
They set the agenda and hammered us relentlessly during the election campaign.
How is that going to get any better in our favour?
Robert Louis
Agree that the achievements of the SNP government are not known to many people who are not perhaps politically aware. Also it is difficult when the MSM ignore anything good in Scotland.
Few people seem to realise that small countries like Denmark, Norway or Sweden are all highly successful and streets ahead of the UK in social matters, but relatively few people travel to these countries from Scotland and there is little in the papers about them. These three are rated as the richest and happiest countries in the world.
A strong campaign emphasising the achievements of the SNP, the success of small countries and rebutting the lies of the Unionist supporters is essential.
‘SNP’s time is running out.’
I have heard this quite a bit but I’m not sure folk understand why.
Is it because they are being ‘found out’ now thy have been in government for a decade?
No it’s not that.
They are in a fiscal trap. I’ll bet you the lay person in the street thinks that the Scottish govt has all the powers necessary to grow its economy.
The fact is , it doesn’t.
The magic money tree across the border is inaccessible to the Scottish govt. people comment on the deficit but we can’t actually influence the deficit UNLESS we control the money supply. Iceland’s deficit disappeared in less than half a decade BECAUSE it increased the money supply.
WE ARE TRAPPED.
The only things scotgov could realistically do is
1) leverage up the quantity of £s via a Scottish national investment bank
2) examine land value tax (probably quite risky)
3) start a parallel currency project – not without cost which I’m sure will be attacked but it might raise awareness that anyone can create currency.
4) undertake an energy audit. What potential sources of energy are at our disposal. I don’t just mean oil. I’m talking heat, power production etc. I’ll bet its massive. Model it it as energy per capita and then compare it to other nations on the planet and then you have your relative wealth. We are easily in the top ten. Then ask how we can be so broke.
Folk talk about ability to produce food in this context but if you have excess energy (none of which is imported) you can easily produce food.
If anyone goes to Iceland they will see on an evening lots of brightly lit greenhouses full of produce – powered by geothermal energy)
Fiat money’s is costless to produce – provided you have a sovereign central bank. Energy is the limiting factor to any economy and is thus the cause of countless wars..
The project currently underway in Westminster is about destroying the SNP, even if it means wrecking Scotland in the process. In the next election thy will continue to confuse the electorate about what’s devolved/reserved. My reply would be that MONEY IS RESERVED, and THAT is a problem. Nonetheless I reckon the scotgov could at least discuss some of the above plans as a means of mitigating austerity. We can’t mitigate forever with a shrinking purse. We need to act.
That’s
having just listened to todays FMQ, Nicola refused to confirm Indyref2 was still on the table.
Is my concern justified that Nicola could drop Indyref2 ?
Graeme
The SNP campaign was utterly lacklustre as they tended to make several crucial errors. Firstly, they let the opposition set the agenda for discussion resulting in what became a totally defensive posture rather than sounding in control.
Secondly ,they seem to have adopted a position of being evasive about major aspects of policy with regard to indy and the EU.
At least that is how it came across.
You cannot become too conciliatory with those who totally oppose everything you stand for.
I think many interviewees need media training in how to lead discussions rather than be led by them. The populace all over the world is looking for radical change and that includes Scotland. You therefore cannot be seen as “more of the same”.
Be radical, be decisive, be leaders.
Fran on 15 June, 2017 at 6:54 pm:
Yeah! I see Nicola Sturgeon has started hitting back, according to the BBC text service (Scotland). Apparently the First Minister has called the leader of *The tRUTHless Party* a “one trick pony” and she states that *tRUTHless* is left floundering when questioned on any subject other than a independence referendum.
Well done, Nicola, much, much more of that direct no messing approach required. Nicola’s recent words have also got me thinking. If the *tRUTHless* one is a “one trick pony”, which we all know to be true, then does that make her Mayhem’s Little Pony? My Little Pony! Huh! Who knew, eh! Is she a wee white pony? Or, shall we say, a wee white charger? 😉
Rock says:
15 June, 2017 at 9:00 pm
heedtracker,
“Like it or not FPTP is fair.”
Do you stand by that comment?
Atta boy. This is all a tory BBC led savaging of Scottish fledgling democracy, all of them, from BBC Scotland tory shysters, to the creeps at the Record, all are steamrolling over us in Scotland with their relentless NO indyref2 narrative, and nothing else to put it mildly.
Its all we’re going to battered to death with by Pacific Quay roasters especially, right in to the Holyrood debate chamber, with Scotland’s new tory FM Ruth Davidson, a tory sock puppet extraordinaire, sold as a brilliant political genius and fine upstanding British woman, takes rightful command for tory Scotland.
Ultimately, we wont really know if this tory BBC all out war on democracy in Scotland, is actually working for a wee while yet. Corbyn’s jump in popularity was certainly very sudden and against all the odds, all the odds being exact same tory BBC led media reprobates and their equally insane, “get Sturgeon” fury.
All that’s interesting really is that it could be Scottish electorate size that goes with the yoon fury. It may be easier to tory BBC batter the democratic daylights out of 4 million Scots voters than 40 million English. A more subtle tory yoon propaganda mode is just to black out the SNP completely from UK socio political narrative. That might work too, Metro give away newspaper in Glasgow, is one that just never ever mentions the SNP at all, in Scotland. Cant imagine this crew mention them at home in merry olde London, where they’re also based. Its probably doing the same in Edinburgh.
It is however very clear that this kind of BBC media led neo fascist rule by their news in any democracy does need a strong stable leader and Teresa clearly isn’t one. Cometh the hour, cometh the neo fascist Rock
Planet toryboy and the BBC are certainly on the march which could be right over a cliff, with their new First Minster Ruth. Just look at the fake lefty Guardian, booing Teresa, cheering hysterically gorgeous pouting not a tory tory FM Ruth D Scotland.
Maybe that red and blue tory historic fraud The Vow triumph in 2014, really has embolden all kinds of tory nutters out there and to be fair who can blame them.
If you have unlimited election funds, an Electoral Commission rigged to not scope election fund frauds, BBC Scotland owned by shameless con artists, the ability to shape and frame any debate in any living room anywhere, targeting seat after seat in Scotland, election after election, yoon tory power in Scotland at least, must seem assured sooner or later.
Anyway sorry for the ramble and good luck with it all Rock 😀
Capella says:
15 June, 2017 at 9:14 pm
Losing c 10,000 votes per seat is quite sobering though. Any explanation?
What we were voting for exactly? nothing.
Its that simple.
The BBC says Putins phone in was ‘carefully choreographed’. The BBC would never carefully choreograph a phone in of course 😀
Nicola would be mad to take indyref2 off the table.
It would be the greatest exodus since Moses.
Also, there is absolutely no need to do so at the present time and so much is unknown in regard to how much of the 13% drop in share of vote was due to defecting Brexiteers and how much was due to the Corbyn effect and how much was due to indy support not turning out.
If it was the latter, then it is nothing to be concerned about, pro indy voter apathy for Westminster elections is traditional.
If it was Brexiteer defection, a hard Brexit looming will take care of that.
The worse scenario, and unfortunately the one I suspect is the bigger effect, is the return of ‘socialist first’ pro indy support to Labour because of Mr Corbyn. That would be the hardest to reverse.
@ Graeme at 9.23
It is the will of the Scottish Parliament to hold another referendum. One person alone cannot make the decision to drop it; there would have to be another motion/debate and another vote.
(That’s how I understand it, anyway; I could be wrong.)
I won’t bother reading your usual waffle.
Is it beyond you to answer with Yes or No?
heedtracker,
“Like it or not FPTP is fair.”
Do you stand by that comment?
On here the general consensus is that WM makes a mockery of Scottish democracy, no matter what.
The SNP’s message for years was the same: Scotland will never get a fair deal from WM: Labour’s feeble fifty.
At this campaign, the “strong voice” tripe, suggested Scottish MPs could make a difference – if they were SNP.
Was anyone persuaded to switch their vote to the SNP by the campaign? Was anyone persuaded to stick with the SNP because of the campaign?
I wasn’t. I was highly critical before the manifesto was launched. Concerned that the SNP’s response to the election announcement was a sign of things to come.
I warned the SNP were talking such tripe they sounded like they were reading old Donald Dewar election scripts.
I said, but at least occasionally Labour could get into power at WM. The SNP never will.
So, their slogans sounded even more hollow and patronising to the electorate.
As I have been saying, if Nicola has a spine, she should state clearly that there will be an independence referendum before Brexit is completed, with or without Westminster’s permission.
Or admit it once and for all that Scots are not “sovereign”.
The unionists led by the BBC, Scotland’s enemy number one, are on the attack to prevent a referendum.
It is now or never.
link to caltonjock.com
Gerry Adams has met with the Tories and he thinks she is breaking the good Friday agreement. Is the Dup deal dead already.
Meanwhile Tim Farrin hounded out of his job for being Christian. BBC all over him like a rash despite him having no influence on government. Was this a deliberate ploy to remove him. Without him no second Eu referendum and new leader can do a deal with Theresa. Could be some concessions on EU as the price of coalition.
New leader can say she is not bound by previous leaders manifesto. Something sinister is afoot and the MSM are aware of it.
Chic McGregor says:
15 June, 2017 at 9:49 pm
Nicola would be mad to take indyref2 off the table.
I dont think she will exactly but heres an idea. Whats to stop us having a referendum on Scotland staying in the single market as per the SNPs Brexit proposals? Obv we still have to know where Brexit is going first before any referendum and the decision what question to ask would have to wait until then.
Its interesting that they keep going on at us to ‘take it off the table’. Doesnt that suggest that they cant?
It’s about time Nicola said at FMQ , independence will NEVER be of the table, it’s why we exist as a party and only the SNP will choose the time of the next independence referendum.
The fire in London is heartbreaking and the stories are horrific to listen to. I think the true horror of this is remaining unspoken though. Just look at the photos and have a think about it. Looks like the Hamburg firestorm.
This is huge and there might be big repercussions on the way.
Yet another BBC Question Time with no rep from third largest party at Westminster. And the BBC deny they are London establishment centric
The SNP in Westminster can only make a difference if they hold the balance of power. Be interesting to see how much clout the DUP have in the coming months, unless the whole thing falls apart.
We saw over the last two years, establishment parties voting together and leaving the 56 isolated. Remember also that we had 6 MPs in parliament when we had a mandate for indyref1.
I don’t see the issues over indyref2 as being anymore complicated than they were before June 8th.
If single market access is maintained along with free movement then it probably won’t happen unless in the process Scotland Is sold down the river.
As usual damned if she does and damned if she doesn’t, NS is shifting focus on what kind of Brexit we can get. Until that becomes clearer there cannot be much more in the way of discussion over indyref in my view.
The tories and the Scottish press will try to shift the emphasis away from Brexit. That is their job.
I did not grasp the significance of Boris /Caltonjock post, too many numbers ?
@Big Jock
I’m thinking along these lines too. New leader takes lib dems in bed with tories…?
Was this the real cause of Farron’s resignation?
heedtracker,
“Like it or not FPTP is fair.”
Do you stand by that comment?
It could be Rock. Ok, if that self immolation statement of mine is getting up your nose, how about this… it is perhaps, possibly, maybe, fair to say that last week produced a picture of the layout in party political terms across Scotland, at the present moment.
Which is fair, for FPTP. If England was D’Hondt PR like Holyrood, its likely that the results would still be the same.
Here’s yougov’s stats. The socio economic layout is especially interest FTPT v PR wise.
link to yougov.co.uk
Its interesting comparing how many more Scots in that top slot AB group voted SNP than in the C2DE last week.
Its just polling and you only mean harm Rock but its still worth a wee Rock looky.
Maybe Betty from Buck House could offer space in her 775 room folly instead of empty sound bites. After all doesn’t the public own her house?
Theresa I have just realised how you could fix your bent over walk. Put your neck chains on hanging down the back. Wearing them in front is making you look as though you are scanning the ground for fivers after an Orange Lodge Parade
If the Tories won the ‘no referendum’ GE election’ on Friday, why are they still banging on about it?
Answer: They didn’t win.
Nicola is under no obligation to get into this narrative with them as she showed today at FMQ’s. Ergo proving that they the Tories did not win. Scotref is not off the table, why would it be, nothing’s ‘materially’ changed in light of the GE election results, our mandate was secured in March, as crazycat said, unless another vote is held, that mandate still stands.
As others have said, she’s refocusing on Brexit, let’s watch the shitstorm.
Surprise Surprise, the Rock and Heedy talking to themselves.
(Same person).
Through in Capella and Peffers and a few others, they make a great team of Trolls.
Labour could do this and Labour could do that
Labour’s never done shit even when they did win which they’ve no chance of ever doing for a very long time
Even with the worst campaign in living memory, with the worst Prime ministerial candidate in living memory the Tories still won and it would not have made one jot of a difference if Labour had taken all the SNP seats from them
England is a right leaning Tory country, they’ve convinced themselves they’re responsible for debt in some stupid mindless way
plus the fact some folk in Scotland have short memories when it comes to what Labour are and always have been
They’re Tory toerags and always will be
Take a look at the evidence Scotland is a centre left leaning country, go too far left and you’re not wanted, too far right same thing
If all you want to do is support a winner well that’s easy be a Tory, they win whenever they want
Why would anybody in Scotland really care what England votes it doesn’t matter because we get stuck with whatever they decide anyway Tories Tories Tories the occasional monkey on a stick Labour and what difference does it make to us, Feck all it’s still shit
Independence is the only way forward and always has been
there just seems to be some folk cling to the past waiting for something that never really happened but those folk think it just maybe might if you say your prayers every night and be good maybe Labour will get in and if they do maybe they’ll change to being really really good this time because Labour are the party of ordinary folk, they are they really really are
They’re Feckin not and never have been!
Donald Dewar was as Scottish Labour suck up Tory as you could get by the way
Tomorrow’s National front page:
Throw
Are DUP going to be used by the Tories to start EU negotiations on Tories terms. For the deal to later fall apart and in steps the new Lib leader to save face.
Win win for both. Looks like Libs have averted a crisis, whilst they can argue broad terms were already in the pot. In other words the Libs can drop all the manifesto commitments as it’s an emergency!
@Rock
Why don’t you bash your own party for never winning anything and just talking tripe all the time instead of bashing the party whom without, Scotland doesn’t get Independence or anything else for that matter
Let’s hear it Rock start bashing the, what’s your party again?
Peoples popular front of Judea? or the other one Radical Independence party R.I.P
Night after night moaning on at everyone else, everybody else is wrong
Why don’t you tell us all about your successes and how you can change the world with whatever ground breaking ideas you have that would change the universe if only somebody would listen to you
That’s me done I’m off for the weekend training in our lovely country
Good to hear Nicola stiffen her rhetoric last 2 days.
Keep the gloves off from now on Nicola and wind up the pressure on T’ruthless – she is a balloon and will burst
@ Stoker
hahaha
BBC Scotland Tells Lies says:
15 June, 2017 at 10:33 pm
Surprise Surprise, the Rock and Heedy talking to themselves.
(Same person).
Yes I am the same person:D
Beeb gimps are a hoot, off reservation that is. Only interesting issue about BBC Scotland merciless blitz on our poor young Scottish democracy is, just how much more swivel eyed yoon loony you can all get BBC Tells Lies?
Tories red and blue love you though and that’s what its all about, hoy!
‘While the US has taken only 100 days to see through Trump’s “alternative reality” (though perhaps not through Trump himself), almost nobody in Britain is even questioning the alternative reality of Brexit…
no major British companies have tried to protect their interests by campaigning to reverse the Brexit decision. None has even publicly pointed out that the referendum gave Prime Minister Theresa May no mandate to rule out membership of the European single market and customs union after Britain leaves the EU…
The costs of Brexit are economic and less clear to everyone. For example the depreciation immediately after Brexit was very visible, but you needed some knowledge of economics to know that this would mean lower living standards for everyone living in the UK…
This gets translated into how each are handled in the media. The New York Times and the Washington Post are in the front line against Trump, while if you want information on how Brexit is damaging the economy you will find plenty of it in the Financial Times. But that negative news does not normally make it into the broadcast media, because the broadcast media has decided that the Brexit debate is over. The reason it has done that, the real reason why the UK appears to have given in to Brexit, is the Labour party…
In contrast to the Democrats, who have been unified in their opposition to Trump, Labour have accepted hard Brexit. It would be unfair to dump the whole responsibility for Labour’s Brexit U-turn on Jeremy Corbyn. Many Labour MPs pushed in the same direction because they thought it would gain them votes: austerity appeasement all over again. I think a strong leader who believed in EU membership could have overcome that, but Corbyn’s preferences were different’
link to socialeurope.eu
Of course someone did have another approach to a hard Brexit. With a strong leader, the government of that minor entity at the north of Britain spent a considerable amount of time and effort providing an alternative plan which was ignored by WM. Brexit is going to be extremely damaging to all economic and social fronts not to mention the UK’s international standing. UKOK is floridly delusional about its ability to go it alone in a globalised world.
Scotland is being dragged around by this shambolic, dysfunctional, incoherent political set up. Time to extract ourselves with dignity and goodwill to the citizens of England who also deserve better.
@ Big Jock
I share your suspicions about the LibDems, especially over a “deferred” deal, but they did say this earlier:
link to twitter.com
Brilliant front page on The National tomorrow:
Good for you, Dennis. Well said, that man!
link to twitter.com
The EU is a divisive issue whether unionist or independist.
Many of us remember in 2014 how the EU never spoke up for Scottish independence. EU or Single Market membership should purely be judged on economic benefits vs any minuses.
There’s no love lost for it, even for those who favoured remaining.
I voted Remain, but only cos I saw the EU as a check on unlimited WM power ( and the hope Scotland would vote Remain and England would vote Leave, to trigger the SNP manifesto clause on Indyref2).
Economic chaos as a result of Brexit are predictions of the future. Many don’t believe political predictions. Seeing in believing.
Instead of just warning of future economic calamity that may befall Scotland if we are dragged out the EU / Single Market.
Why hasn’t the SNP focused more on the fact Scotland voted remain in the UK referendum AND the Scottish Parliament voted to remain in the Single Market.
Pro-Indy Leavers aren’t motivated by messages about fighting to remain in the EU, but for those voters if it’s emphasised that the Brexit process – even if you support it – was done in such a way that Scottish democracy was again trashed by WM in this “union of equals”.
That’s a very important principle that could motivate some Leavers to vote SNP – as the WM rejection of Scottish democracy may be a higher motivation factor for some than their antipathy towards the EU.
The SNP should not pretend voting SNP or in fact any Scottish MPs makes a positive difference. They should be continually highlighting how Scottish democrat decisions are walked over by WM.
They could even say they will stop attending WM until WM starts respecting Scottish Sovereignty.
Rape clause Ruthie had: stop indyref2.
We could have: Respect Scottish Sovereignty or prepare for Scottish independence.
I think the reality of the result was most likely small swings between parties with some exceptions(1). The SNP vote missing from 2015, by and large stayed at home. There was no real Corbyn bounce in Scotland for Labour, Ms Dugdale is electoral poison.
The unionists mostly got their vote out as this was pushed as a referendum about not having having another indy referendum. This is a worry for them as that was well short of 2 million votes this time.
The Independence vote stayed at home as they were uninspired by anyones campaigning: unionists trying to stop an indy referendum; The SNP claiming the election had nothing to do with an indyref referendum. Not exactly messages to get indy supporters out of their seats.
(1)Swings to Tory primarily in NE but also in some other areas were brexit led, only the Tories were pro-brexit as far as anyone could tell their policies in this election.
For anyone whose spirits may be flagging a little:
link to scotgoespop.blogspot.co.uk
Meg merrilees @ 11.39
Totally agree. Right behind Dennis Canavan. Gaun yersel. With you all the way. Hail Alba.
What we were voting for exactly? nothing.
That’s true. I still voted but it’s possible a lot of people felt disengaged. Except “voter disengagement” is one of the objectives of the dark money Cambridge Analytica outfit. Those wonderful people who brought us BREXIT and Donald Trump.
After the victory there is always a curious lack of direction.
May as well post the whole thing from Scotgoespop blog, just for some perspective ye ken:
The SNP performed BETTER last week than in most recent elections
Someone suggested on an earlier thread that the SNP’s performance last week was “by far the worst in seven years”. That’s completely and utterly untrue, and it’s perhaps another sign of how the relentless media propaganda campaign is starting to mess with people’s heads. Here is how the SNP’s 36.9% of the popular vote at the general election actually compares with the other elections that have been held over the last seven years…
SNP vote shares in each election :
2010 UK general election : 19.9%
2011 Scottish Parliament election : 45.4% (constituency), 44.0% (list)
2012 Local elections : 32.3%
2014 European election : 29.0%
2015 UK general election : 50.0%
2016 Scottish Parliament election : 46.5% (constituency), 41.7% (list)
2017 Local elections : 32.3%
2017 UK general election : 36.9%
As you can see, the SNP’s performance last Thursday was actually significantly better than in no fewer than four of the other seven elections that have taken place since 2010. It was also better than in any set of local elections in history (the 32.3% in both 2012 and 2017 is the high watermark to date), and better than in any European election in history (32.6% in 1994 is the all-time high). It was better than the 32.9% of the constituency vote and 31.0% of the list vote achieved when the party won its first Holyrood election in 2007. And it was far better than the vote share achieved in any UK general election prior to 2015 – the previous record had been just 30.4% in October 1974.
When you bear in mind that UK general elections tend to be the toughest contests that the SNP faces (due to voters becoming transfixed with the Tory v Labour battle for power in London), hopefully you can see how 37% of the vote last week and a comfortable 8.3% lead over the second-placed party was an extremely creditable performance. It may have been below pre-election expectations, but it wasn’t below-par in any other sense.
The City of Edinburgh Council is to be run by a coalition of SNP and Labour councillors.
Group leaders Adam McVey, for the SNP, and Cammy Day, for Labour, will sign a formal agreement on Friday.
link to archive.is
OT My thoughts.
In the UK there is no democracy, only the illusion of one. You don’t get the Government you want, you get the Government your rulers want you to get.
Is that the Tories? No, although that is their Government of choice since the Tories represent the most efficient conduit for robbing you, the plebs, to keep the ‘right’ people hunky dory.
It is neo-feudalism. In fact it is not even ‘neo’ because it has never really been absent in the UK. (c) Bob Peffers.
Potted history.
The socialist menace has threatened this hegemony a couple of times.
Post WWI to the General Strike. 60s to 70s under Harold Wilson/Tony Benn. ‘Luckily’ WWII put paid to that.
Some internally generated advance towards a socially advanced nation have been achieved.
However, most of the UK progress towards being a socially civilized nation has been from external pressures – like the EU.
What to do?
Well it was a relatively easy task to convert Labour into just another Tory – elite serving – party.
But fuck it, this EU thing is still sticking its oar in.
OK let’s deal with that. Enter Brexit.
As the realities of Brexit dawn, the rulers realize what a disaster it is.
They realize that borrowing and/or QE will need to be increased greatly to cope with the massive economic shock that Brexit will cause. OK that is short termism, but at least it will buy enough time for them to figure out how best to preserve their glorious elitery.
Their conduit of preference would, as usual, be the Tories. However, would it be possible to sell a paradigm shift like the massive borrowing hike required in Tory guise?
They tried with May but not only was nobody buying it, I do not think many even picked up on the lovingly crafted sound bites.
Plan B. Put Corbyn in, since his policies are largely aligned with what will be required to cope with the shock of Brexit. It will be easy to replace him once the next move for preserving the hegemony has been thought out meanwhile it should bring a halt to the threat of Scottish independence – another threat, by example, to the glorious hegemony.
“Post WWI to the General Strike. 60s to 70s under Harold Wilson/Tony Benn. ‘Luckily’ WWII put paid to that.”
Should of course have been
“Post WWI to the General Strike. ‘Luckily’ WWII put paid to that. 60s to 70s under Harold Wilson/Tony Benn”
K1, are those stats available with actual numbers rather than percentages, it is one of my pet hates using percentages to compare different data sets. You wouldn’t say that 10% of 90 is the same as 10% of 100 but it happens all the time with election results.
Here is an simple example about percentages: is 80% of 10 greater or less than 50% of 16. The answer doesn’t matter as it just shows how data can be hidden behind a layer of abstraction that doesn’t aid clarity.
Just getting on with the day job – Take yer pick folks!
Talking-up Scotland
link to scoop.it
Hi Patrician, that’s cut and paste deirectly from James Kelly’s blog, Scotgoespop, that would be a question I’m sure he be glad to answer btl. The link is just above my post, crazycat posted it. I take your point though, I’m quite certain James has the answer to you specific query.
I know someone from Airdrie who couldn’t wait to proudly tell me that he’d voted Tory, after being Labour for years. Like many others he was voting to send a message to THAT woman, and said he’d have voted for the devil before voting for IRA supporting Corbyn.
In Airdrie, having had the smallest swing in the 2015 landslide, Neil Gray’s hard work should have started two years ago, but he has silently watched as the party locally has shed members by the bucketload. The internal fighting in Airdrie SNP has not been contained and has spread outwards and beyond the confines of the party. At one point they were bragging of a membership of around 1100, yet by the local council elections were reliant on the same few half-dozen faces. Even his campaign launch photo at Airdrie stadium appears to be boosted by a number of faces from Coatbridge. The failure to show any leadership by reversing the flow of members out of the party has had a dramatic effect on the vote, as those members are not only leaving but leaving and taking a bad impression away with them.
Looking at the figures from 2015, almost every other parties votes are up, and in Neil Gray’s case he pulled in a full 9596 votes less than two years ago. That is a truly disastrous performance and it is ironic that the only thing which retained him his seat was the Orange Order voters who wanted to send a message to Nicola Sturgeon by leaving Labour for the Tories; had they been more tactically aware they would have stuck with Labour and would have denied the SNP the seat! It’s now rumoured that there will be another election in October, and if the more bitter Unionists are prepared to switch back (many switched because of Corbyns apparent support for the IRA) then there is every chance Neil Gray will be gone.
Clearly the UKIP vote this time went to the Tories, but that still doesn’t account for the almost 5,500 vote Tory rise. Realistically those votes didn’t come from the SNP. There is the possibility that some 2015 SNP voters went to Labour at the same time that the hard-line British Nationalists shipped out to the Tories, but that still leaves thousands of SNP voters who failed to come back and endorse them on Thursday. Did they think the job was done and that this was now a safe seat or have they been turned away altogether?
So what can be done? SNP HQ could finally act and clear out what has become one of the most toxic branches in British politics (incidentally the loss of Phil Boswell in Coatbridge can be directly attributed to the in-fighting there and the continuing suspension of the SNP branch). The SNP should be getting itself out on the streets and into the community on a regular basis. The political awakening of 2014 has to be reignited, and the SNP has to be again seen as a radical party of the streets, not a sanitised party where, especially in Airdrie, no dissent is allowed and where challenges to the established order are followed by smears and personal attacks.
A question I regularly people is “What has YOUR candidate done to further the cause of independence?” For far too many they appear only when they want you to endorse them personally. They don’t enthuse or inspire, they are never seen on independence marches or rallies and they never, ever speak with passion about their vision of what an independent Scotland could look like.
Neil Gray falls into the latter category and unless he has a radical change of direction in the next few months he will be out at the next election. His seat has already been highlighted by the BBC as a key marginal, which means that he will get the Angus Robertson and Alex Salmond treatment next time: regular reports by the BBC reminding people that this is a key seat and who the most likely rival candidate is, nudge, nudge, wink, wink. I’ll Say no more.
Turns out:
‘Experts warned government against cladding material used on Grenfell’
link to archive.is
———————-
Also cladding panels similar to those used on Grenfell were widely prohibited for use on tall buildings in the US from 2102:
‘Under the US building code, the use of metal composite panels which do not contain a fire-retardant core has been banned since 2012 on buildings above 50 feet tall (15m) in various circumstances including where exterior walls are required to have a fire-resistance rating as well as in restaurants, care homes, hospitals and concert halls.
The manufacturer of the cladding on Grenfell Tower which burned with such destructive effect on Wednesday, Reynobond, produces different versions of the cladding with a plastic or fire-retardant mineral core, and the latter “guarantees higher resistance to fire”, according to its website.But observers of the way the fire spread suspect more flammable plastic filled panels were used.
One architect familiar with the panels said the fire resistant version is only “slightly more expensive and slightly less high performing [as a thermal insulator] than the polymer filled ones”.Last night, the Liberal Democrats called for the type of cladding used on Grenfell tower to be banned in the UK. “The government must urgently bring UK fire safety standards into line with those abroad,” said Tom Brake MP.
A Q&A page on the Reynobond website says, “Question: When do I need fire-resistant (FR) versus polyethylene (PE) Reynobond? “The answer to this, in part, depends on local building codes. However, the International Building Code [used in the US] states that in all cases over 50ft above grade, FR is needed.’
—————————–
Guardian reporter on the business desk covering building industry amongst other sectors:
‘Rob Davies has found out that regulations in England, Wales and Northern Ireland require the external walls of a building merely to adequately “resist the spread of fire” with external facing surfaces of buildings taller than 18m meeting regulations for surface spread of flame.
However, in Scotland any external cladding systems used above 18m must be completely non-combustible.’
link to sto.co.uk
Go to part 3, Fire Performance. To see the difference between the application of the regulations between Scotland and those in England/Wales/Northern Ireland, the above link was embedded in the Rob Davies statement from the Live Guadian updates on Grenfell.
Recall also that in Scotland sprinkler systems have to be fitted in our high flats too.
———————————
This is something that needs to be focused on in the Scotland context. It seems that we are in line with the more stringent industry standards in terms of fire prevention when it comes to the type of panels used in cladding our high flats.
I was heartened to hear the FM address the safety issue in relations to the disaster in London, though she couldn’t go into it because the investigation is still underway, there’s plenty of information in the public domain for anyone concerned living in refurbished council and housing association properties to query their respective lanlords on the type of cladding that has been used on their building’s.
From Colin Dunn’ Twitter:
Rejection? What rejection?
It is obvious that the MSN with a British nationalist agenda is trying to shape the narrative. However, they need to be ignored and the narrative needs to be put back to the fact that Brexit is the main problem affecting ordinary people’s lives.
Brexit is too much of a risk and people in Scotland need to realise that the only way to minimise the risks that it brings by getting behind IndyRef2 as a way to get Scotland on the Brexit negotiating table so that the people of Scotland gets a fair deal.
Anybody who thinks that backing the Tories will achieve this is deluding themselves. Remember, the Tories did not campaign to get the best deal for Scotland out of the Brexit negotiations or for governing at a UK level, they campaigned solely against indyref2. Therefore, they are not breaking any promises by not sticking up for Scotland. By doing this, Scots voting for Tories have put themselves in the same position as those who votes for Labour by being cannon fodder to further the political careers of individual Tory MP’s.
For those who missed them:
Unaccountable and out of control
link to indyref2.scot
Prices for fake news campaigns revealed
link to archive.is
(Oh the irony!)
Fake News and Cyber Propaganda
link to archive.is
Thanks for this Stoker, BBC Scotland presenters are of course completely impartial & no more responsible for management policy than the clerks at the Buroo are for shafting the unemployed.
So somebody assured us yesterday!!!
Any news from the Border dukes on the tenantry coming to their senses at last & voting Tory?
Links
link to grumpyscottishman.wordpress.com
link to commonspace.scot
link to theferret.scot
link to news.gov.scot
Hundreds attend Glasgow protest against May and DUP
link to archive.is
Reverse Brexit: Could Scotland Ignite a UK Debate?
link to scer.scot
link to spiegel.de
link to bloomberg.com
BAE ‘secretly sold mass surveillance technology to repressive regimes’
link to archive.is
link to voxpoliticalonline.com
link to thecanary.co
link to politics.co.uk
Thanks, Brits – Brexit has vaccinated Europe against populism
link to archive.is
link to irishtimes.com
Voting fraud in Northern Ireland has been going on for years, says former Electoral Office chief
link to archive.is
link to skwawkbox.org
Nana: Good Morning, the sun is shining here :-). Thank You for Your much-needed conversation leading Links.
Kettle’s on! Peace Always
Thanks Nana, won’t be long now till our friends across the sheugh will be brushing their bowlers in preparation for the “Twelfth.” If there are riots this year Theresa could be flitting on the thirteenth!
Good morning Smallaxe, nice day here right now but all could change.
A few more seeing we are having a break, lol
Aamer Anwar Interveiw about Grenfell Tower/Public Inquiry
link to youtube.com
link to prruk.org
link to opendemocracy.net
link to lbc.co.uk
A bit dreich in Glesga Smallaxe, how is your neebs the duke doin in these turbulent times?
Aye Fred, they are stocking up on supplies.
link to irishnews.com
He’s still wondering where all his deer are disappearing to Fred.
😎
Peace Always
The SNP put in the best performance. It is not the SNP’s fault that Ill informed. Voters voted against their best interest or do not come out and vote at all. It is the ignorant Iill informed voters fault who chose to vote without doing enough research, or people who support Ibdependrnve not voting SNP and being in danger of losing Scotland the best Scottish Gov they have every had. Or there has ever been in Scotland. .
That STV and d’Houdt in Scotland are being used in a way that was never intended to thwart Democracy rather than any effort to enhance it. Create a majorjty of Unionism in a way that was never intended. By unscrupulous Unionist political Parties. That is why it was put in place. In the first place. So cynical unscrupulous Unionist Parties could ignore the voters of the main other party
To keep control against the majority wishes and the public interest. Give an unfair advantage to certain groups. The losers win. Third rate rejects of dubious nature take over governance totally against the major wishes of the electorate. To try and ruin the economy and kill people. By appointment not election. Totally against the notion of any democracy. One person one vote. Not one person 6 votes etc. On a system that the voters do not even understand. No wonder the majority prefer FPTP.
If voters want SNP clear policies, good governance and support Independence, For clear policies and good governance by democratically elected true reflective government. All they need to do is get out and vote SNP, SNP. Vote for Undependence. It is not the SNP’s fault voters ignore the constant warning and advice they are being given. Through ignorance or other self interest causes.
The message went out loud and clear. If voters chose to ignore it. Or do a little research from vast sources. Advice In their face every minute of the campaign. Voters beware. There is already voters’ regret and remorse. If people do not care enough to vote that is up to them. If the electoral system is manipulated by unscrupulous Unionist politicians that is up the the authorities and the political establishment. To take action to change the situation. Or damage democracy all together. The situation will turn voters off even more and create apathy. The voters believing their vote does not count or make any difference. Electoral Law not being inforced but jeopardised. Leading to UK politicians/Parties to be held in even further contempt.
The SNP did well. They could have done better if more people had bothered to turn out, The endless campaigns and uncertainty drained people. Even scares people. This is the intention of some off the unscrupulous cynical political representatives. (Ie crooks and criminals who disobey the Law) Election fraud. Why are they not arrested cautioned, brought to court and charged under UK Law but any offence just swept under the carpet with a fine etc. Or rewarded with ennobled embezzlement if the public purse. The electorate majority support FPTP.
The UK is nearly one of the only western Democrscies where the Law is not enforced. Westminster/Unionist criminals are not cautioned, charged or brought to court. If found guilty jailed and punished, There is no deterrent because they know they will get away with criminal behaviour, The people that make the Law break the Law with impunity. They get away with murder,
The irony of some so called supporters of the SNP, Independence and good governance. Constantly blaming the SNP for ignorant, ill informed action by sone people. Now the remorse and regret of many voters and non voters. They are doing the Unionists dirty work for them by constant unwarranted criticism of the SNP and the members. Airing their dirty washing In public. Things are not perfect all the time but they are doing the very best job they can in dire circumstances brought on and supported by Westminster/Unionism
Major criminal behaviour which goes unreprimanded and unpunished. The UK justice system not acting as a deterrent for major criminal behaviour. The ‘pyscho bastards’ have taken over the establishment by their own admittion. Rather than support the SNP and Independence. So called supporters want to constantly blame them. Cut off their nose to spite their face. The plastic independistas. All talk and no action. Empty barrels. Mucking up their own nest and damaging the environment, the economy, democracy and the people. The Unionists politicians are destroying the economy democracy and the world. Destroying people’s lives and killing innocent vulnerable people withiut retribution and getting away with it.
The SNP gave a strong performance and won. For any who did not give support or vote and now have remorse. That is for them and their conscience. Stop criticising constantly complaining. . Point the criticism to the ones that deserve it. The lying, useless uncaring, criminal Westminster party crooks who have caused the dire untenable, undemocratic unthinkable position in the first place,
FPTP is the only way to go in Scotland to retify the position, instead of outside influences manipulating the events. Let some people take stock and learn from the situation. The strong fight for democracy and Independence still carries on. It is too important to ever go away. No matter what is thrown at it by outside illegitimate forces.
Even the recent unimaginable, terrible tragedies has been caused by criminal unscrupulous Westminster politicians their cronies and cohorts. Will they be brought to book or be out of Office and in jail? Or will the pathetic cycle just be repeated again and again. With false caring and phoney concern. An empty PR cover up job. By secret societies and M15 elements, the Tory Royals being manipulated. All rights of impartiality forgotten. Damage limitation.
Great links Nanna. Thanks
Nana, as always thanks for the links.
The Skwawkbox one is intriguing and one hopes that the SNP are in readiness for such an event , not caught on the hop of a ‘snap’ election which I believe was anything but.
Perhaps the loss of Messrs Salmond and Robertson is a blessing in disguise as they are free to help the independence movement , the policy makers and how to counteract the liars in the media – great minds behind the scenes.
K1 at 12.22
Useful comparisons – and what they show is that no political advantage is forever – or even for very long if you don’t continually reinforce its message.
So we should understand that and understand that two weeks ago was not an election about independence – and that we were singularly ill prepared for a well organised ambush that had been in planning for months.
And that we didn’t do very well at it which is hardly surprising in the circumstances.
But is should have been a useful exercise and we have surely learned a very important lesson. We are not going to independence unless we persuade a majority of our people that they want independence.
BBC Scotland Tells Lies,
“Surprise Surprise, the Rock and Heedy talking to themselves.
(Same person).”
Suerprise, surprise, “BBC Scotland Tells Lies” tells lies.
ScottieDog,
“The SNP in Westminster can only make a difference if they hold the balance of power.”
The SNP can never hold the balance of power at Westminster.
The unionists would rather form a grand coalition.
Corbyn has repeatedly ruled out any deal with the SNP.
The SNP can never achieve anything at Westminster.
With 56 MPs, they missed the golden opportunity of walking out and causing a constitutional crisis leading to independence.
If we ever get it into our head that independence from the British Empire never came easily, we might one day become independent.
Dr Jim,
“@Rock
Why don’t you bash your own party for never winning anything”
It is pompous, clueless armchair pundits like yourself who keep us away from independence.
Rock (11th October 2015, and many, many times since then),
“We won’t get a second referendum for a generation unless the SNP gets a massive share of the vote.
Stick to just one mantra: always vote, and always vote SNP only until after independence.”
On the swings I think Sty has it. As a canvasser for SNP brexit was the issue and some of it was local issues of not liking SNP candidate’s now.
SNP did not focus on successes not take on Tory failures.
So unless they make fall out of brexit key issue along with how well SNP protects us from austerity then ?hey will lose more seats.
They did have a golden opportunity to pull from WM the 56 and govern from Edinburgh as an interim to independence. The SNP need to take the chancentre now, I have said repeatedly on Twitter they should and said inside the party.
I know think the top leaders actually don’t have the bottle to do a straight a walk to Independence.
The best we can get is a long slow power take with us Independent by 2030.
That is assuming North sea oil run out by then.
The next few years are going to be very very volatile and even with all the analsaid here I don’t think we can say what voters will do next time.
SNP needs a hard hitting message and not to put Independnece on back burner.
They need to say few have gone off it. That was my findings at the doors.
The thing is, I absolutely believe the EU could have been an issue in several constituencies, but it simply doesn’t make a lick of sense in West Scotland.
While I’m certain a significant portion of SNP voters have now abandoned the SNP because of Brexit – 10-20%, perhaps – I simply cannot see it being enough to DOUBLE the Tory vote in Inverclyde within the space of 2 years, especially considering that the Labour vote also went up – where did those 1,000-odd extra Labour votes come from if not the SNP?
Is it really any less believable than 10,000+ going SNP, knowing that those 10,000+ are mostly made up of “natural” left-wing Labour voters? I simply don’t share your disbelief here: in fact, I actually find it less believable that SNP voters would throw their vote away on a no-hoper Tory instead of a pro-Brexit Labour candidate, than for a staunch Labour Unionist to vote against Corbyn.
I didn’t campaign nearly as hard in this and the previous election than I did in 2016, but from what I experienced of that campaign, Corbyn was extremely unpopular among the core Labour vote I’ve seen in Inverclyde. I met hundreds of voters swithering because they thought Corbyn was a liability: they swallowed the “Trot IRA Danger to National Security” line entirely. Besides, we already saw one mass exodus 2 years ago from Labour to SNP, is it truly beyond belief that the remnants would undergo their own exodus?
Combine this with the sectarian language boosted to 11 by the Tories coinciding with a massive boost in their vote share & an all-out assault on Corbyn as an “IRA sympathiser.” (Correlation =/= causation, but surely it’s mad that the Tories have don precisely nothing to curb or erase some of their more shocking outbursts?) And, notably, ever since 2015, the Tory vote has been steadily increasing, with a narrative of the Tories being “detoxified” helpfully pushed by the media.
I’m going to have to agree to disagree on this one – although to be frank, I would much rather you were right. I would rather people voted because they thought they were going to free themselves from a corrupt EU, than because they would rather have a Tory than a Labour PM because of the Tories’ hateful sectarian campaign.
Yip.
[…] less impressive when they boasted 40 seats less than three years ago). The fact they did this with virtually no change in their voter base save a truly heroic rallying for Ian Murray is particularly pointed. […]