The Flag in the Wind
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CAMPAIGNING FOR SCOTLAND
(Owned, Edited and Printed in Scotland since November 1926)
Compiled by Jim Lynch
[3 November 2000]

BYE BYE ELECTION

The pace of politics is hotting up. The Labour Party has selected a Glasgow Councillor, Bill Butler, to fight the Anniesland seat for the Scottish Parliament. Mr Butler, married to Patricia Ferguson, Labour MSP for Glasgow Maryhill and Deputy Presiding Officer of the Parliament, fought of a strong challenge from Donnie Munro, former lead singer with Runrig, and Ian Smart a Cumbernauld lawyer. The chairman of the local constituency party, John Robertson, will fight the Westminster seat. The SNP choice for the Holyrood seat is Tom Chalmers, a solicitor and a member of the SNP National Executive; community worker Grant Thoms is our Westminster candidate. Ms Judith Fryer is the Lib Dem candidate; she is press officer for Strathclyde University, and is married to Noel Dolan, adviser to first Alex Salmond and now John Swinney. Their Westminster candidate is Chris McGinty, a businessman. The SSP will field Rose Kane for Holyrood and Charlie McCarthy for Westminster.

And now, what is going on at Falkirk West? We speculated last week that Labour might seek a rapprochement with Dennis Canavan, now that Donald Dewar is no longer there, and so it came to pass.... Latest word is that Mr Canavan has had a meeting with Margaret McDonaugh to discuss options; one is what they do about the Labour rule book that says five years must pass before an expelled member can be re-admitted, and the other is what do they do about Ken Livingstone?

The prospect of a by election in Falkirk West with the SNP breathing down their necks will concentrate their minds wonderfully; too bad that David Kerr of the SNP has had to give up his job as a BBC editor for nothing, but that might be show business.

S (FOR SHAMBOLIC) Q A

The latest act in the farce that is the Scottish Education system came this week, when it was admitted that 196 appeals had not yet been processed, despite promises and assurances; what seems even more farcical is that this was kept from Bill Morton, the Chief Executive. Bearing in mind the high profile that this issue has had, we find that difficult to believe. In his valedictory appearance before the parliamentary inquiry, Sam Galbraith rejected the idea of a watchdog to oversee the exams system, perhaps being unaware that this proposal was first mooted by the First Minister, Henry McLeish, admittedly before he was First Minister; well, Mr Galbraith seemed to be unaware of a lot of things this summer.

As has been his wont during the inquiry, Mr Galbraith denied any responsibility or culpability, and stonewalled his way through the hearing; the nearest approach to drawing blood was when Nicola Sturgeon, SNP, asked him, "If you are not culpable and there was really, really nothing else you could have done, why are you no longer Education Minister?" Mr Galbraith said "I don’t think I need to answer that", thus continuing with his normal practice.

THE VELVET GLOVE SHUFFLE

Well, the First Minister has carried out his first reshuffle, and has surprised many; it was anticipated that Sarah Boyack would be fired, but she survived with a final written warning, keeping Transport, but losing Environment. Mr Galbraith, who never admits to doing any wrong, has been taken away from Education, and handed Environment; he might think he is out of the frying pan, but on his desk is a large file marked "Lingerbay" and he will have to deal with that. Jack McConnell has been given Education, and his first days in office resounded to SQuAcks, as the chickens continued coming home to roost; Frank McAveety retires to the back benches, because he didn’t get his bet on in time

All in all, just a few tweaks here and there, because after all a full blooded reshuffle would have had all of the Cabinet in new jobs, and too many changes would only provide opportunities for the SNP; however the carrots and sticks are there, and we’ll see what kind of fist they make of it.

SOMETHING FISHY?

We do not know if Mr McLeish overlooked someone; he remembered to sack John Home Robertson, who quietly acquiesced in the transfer of 6000 square miles of Scottish fishing waters to England, but he seems to have forgotten to appoint a Fisheries Minister in his place. We have heard a rumour that the post has been given as an add-on to Rhona Brankin, but so far we have seen no confirmation; then again, we haven’t seen the East Fife Mail this week.

In any event, Richard Lochhead, SNP Shadow Fisheries Minister, is more than a little upset; as vital European negotations are due on 17 November. We think this is another cunning New Labour trick; you cannot hold a Minister to account if he/she does not exist.

THE WRONG NAME

What a fuss over betting on the Speaker of the House of Commons; Robin Cook used to do a racing column, Alex Salmond does a racing column, the saintly Queen Mother bets on horses, so what is so sacrosanct about the post of Speaker for the House of Commons? Is this just another bit of English snobbery because a Scottish MP got the job, or because he was a Labour MP, even in some circles, because he was a Catholic? Whatever the reason, it is out of all proportion, and it is not as if it was done in an underhand fashion. (Careful, you are defending a Labour MP!)

We know that this week MPs , and members of the House of Lords, had their own Westminster Dog of the Year competition; it is organised by the National Canine Defence League and the Kennel Club, and gives MPs the chance to show off their four legged friends. Apparently, the award is based on the dog’s "personality and good deeds," and not on pedigree; the voting will not be as drawn out as the process to elect a Speaker, but the very existence of this award leads us to believe that if Mr Martin’s name had been Bob, rather than Michael, he would have been elected on the first ballot.

GUY FAWKES

And speaking of Westminster, this week sees the celebration of Guy Fawkes, who is reputed to be "The only man who went into Parliament with honest intentions".

ALL THE KING’S HORSES

And all the King’s men, couldn’t put the railways together again. The utter chaos, confusion and general incompetence of the railway companies which have emerged in the last few weeks beggars belief. The wonderful Tory scheme, under John Major’s Government, to continue running down the railway system, and then to hawk it off piecemeal to please their friends in the City, is reaching denouement under Labour; travellers may find that gratifying because they are not reaching anywhere. The West Coast Line was to be closed for three days, at the drop of a hat; then it was to be overnight, and now it is slow, slow, slow, slow, slow. The recent severe weather must have come as a godsend to the railway companies; " We can blame the weather for delays, and not our inefficiency or greed, hooray!"

It is now obvious that the speedy sell-off of the railways did not benefit the public purse (us) as much as it should have done. The National Audit Office has said that Railtrack was sold for £1900 million, and that a proper sale could have doubled that; a similar exercise done on the train leasing companies said they did not even reach bargain basement prices. The people who made the money were the City types, lawyers, accountants and merchant bankers who raked in hundreds of millions in fees putting together unworkable operations.

Gerald Corbett, boss of Railtrack, who offered to resign in the wake of the Hatfield crash (He’s going to get sacked anyway) said that British Rail was ripped apart at privatisation, and that this made matters worse, not better. Still, more public money is being pumped in, and it is a fact that for every £1. only 50p is actually spent on the repairs, the remainder goes on invisible overheads; any thought that these clever schemes will save the public purse (us) is disproved by the fact that public spending on the railways will rise from £1.6 billion (Yes billion) this year to £4 billion a year by 2006.

As has been said by us before "Cherchez le Tory ex Cabinet Minister"; the Minister who pushed through railway privatisation in record time was John McGregor, originally from Shotts, although you would never think it. Mr McGregor ignored warnings on safety from British Rail bosses. He was Transport Secretary in 1992-94 ; he is now the back bench MP for Norfolk South, is a Director of Unigate (Now known as Uniq) and has been a Director of Associated British Foods since 1994.

DON’T FRIGHTEN THE HORSES

Or in this instance, the electors. The report on BSE, produced by Lord Phillips, apparently runs to 16 volumes and has cost the public purse (us) £27 million. The main findings are that ministers and civil servants misled the public over the risks posed by BSE. It lists fears of a health scare, poor communications and bureaucratic delays, but does not accuse ministers of deliberately lying to the public. The first incidence of the disease in cattle occurred in Dec 1984, and the link to ruminant meat and bone meal was established in 1987. In March 1988 it was decided to ban this cattle feed, and this came into effect in July of that year; however, the cattle feed was still exported to EU countries, and in 1991 MBM (Meat & Bone Meal) exports to the Third World had risen to 30000 tonnes. John Gummer, a Minister at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, said in 1988 that the UK had "a moral obligation to ensure that importing countries were aware that we did not permit the feeding of these products to ruminants". The Phillips Inquiry was told by a civil servant who was present "At the meeting of 14 April 1988 MacGregor gave no indication that he agreed with Gummer’s suggestion".

The Department of Health , in a letter dated February 1990, claimed that the Government’s behaviour was not "responsible", but government scientists claim they published scientific papers about the risk of BSE, which should have warned countries about the feeding of MBM. It has the all the hallmarks of "Well, it’s not my fault you didn’t read it in the papers" and no moral thought that they permitted companies to continue to produce and sell contaminated food to countries who were perhaps not sophisticated enough to find this out. Mr McGregor was Agriculture Minister 1987-89, and Mr Gummer Agriculture Minister from 1989-93.

We looked at the Web site of Associated British Foods PLC; www.abf.co.uk 

Agricultural Processing and Services

British Sugar is Europe’s most efficient sugar producer; Allied Mills is one of the UK’s biggest flour producers. ABF operates at the heart of the UK agricultural industry: ABN and Fishers are leading suppliers of animal feeds *, while Allied Grain, Fishers and Germains are leaders in grain trading, merchanting,seed production and processing.

* Our emphasis.

A PRINCE CAN MAK A BELTED KNIGHT

Well it was a Queen, but the effect is the same, the third line of the verse has the richt wey o’t (Apologies to Kist o’ Ferlies for straying into their domain); "But an honest man’s aboon his might." This week Lord Ashcroft, Treasure of the Tory party took his seat in the House of Lords; that was after the appropriate committee made him come back to live in England. Also this week, the Barclay brothers were knighted as well; they gave £40 million to charity, but as they are tax exiles they obviously thought it better to give to the poor rather than to the Treasury, who might have allocated the cash to the NHS. Well, one can dream.

The Sir Barclay brothers have now decided that Andrew Neil is not getting the Daily Express; they must feel he can lose so much money at the Scotsman they don’t want to give him a greater challenge.