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CAMPAIGNING FOR
SCOTLAND
(Owned, Edited and Printed in Scotland since November 1926)
Compiled by Jim Lynch
[8 December 2000]
THE SILVER LINING
 Well they say every cloud has a silver lining, and the cloudy System Three Opinion Poll for Holyrood is no exception. The SNP has dropped again, continuing the decline that started with the death of Donald Dewar, and went on with Gordon Brown’s Budget forecast; however, we are still ahead of where we were at the time of the Election, and a good campaign in Falkirk West will help us along. The voters will take a wee while to get used to John Swinney, who is not as flamboyant as Alex Salmond, and while we do not expect John to frighten the voters, in the long term he will frighten the other political parties.
The LibDems have lost a bit as well, and the Tories gained; it could be that some LibDem voters have decided that they might as well vote straight Labour (An oxymoron if there ever was one ) and others have reverted to official Tory.
|
LABOUR |
SNP |
LIB
DEM |
TORY |
OTHER |
|
1st |
2nd |
1st |
2nd |
1st |
2nd |
1st |
2nd |
1st |
2nd |
| Election |
39 |
34 |
29 |
27 |
14 |
12 |
16 |
15 |
3 |
11 |
| Jan |
42 |
34 |
31 |
31 |
10 |
14 |
11 |
9 |
6 |
12 |
| Feb |
37 |
32 |
36 |
33 |
9 |
13 |
12 |
11 |
6 |
11 |
| Mar |
33 |
29 |
37 |
34 |
11 |
15 |
14 |
11 |
6 |
11 |
| Apr |
34 |
30 |
35 |
31 |
10 |
14 |
14 |
13 |
8 |
13 |
| May |
40 |
31 |
30 |
33 |
10 |
13 |
13 |
11 |
8 |
13 |
| Jun |
33 |
27 |
36 |
35 |
12 |
16 |
12 |
11 |
6 |
12 |
| Jul |
37 |
33 |
35 |
30 |
10 |
12 |
11 |
11 |
6 |
14 |
| Aug |
34 |
29 |
36 |
32 |
9 |
12 |
13 |
13 |
8 |
13 |
| Sep |
28 |
25 |
42 |
38 |
14 |
15 |
10 |
11 |
6 |
10 |
| Oct |
39 |
30 |
35 |
31 |
11 |
17 |
10 |
10 |
5 |
11 |
| Nov |
41 |
35 |
32 |
30 |
10 |
13 |
12 |
12 |
6 |
10 |
It would be untrue to deny that we are disappointed; it would also be untrue to say that we are surprised. There are better times coming.
FALKIRK WEST BY ELECTION
We are not surprised at the attempt by Labour, aided and abetted by their media cronies, to airbrush Dennis Canavan from the Falkirk West By Election. They are hoping the Falkirk electorate will forget that the man they faithfully supported for 25 years as the official Labour MP was contemptously dismissed by New Labour as just "Not good enough". So the electorate misjudged Dennis Canavan all these years, and New Labour put them right; an unconscious pun that!
SNP activists are not going to have much time to do Christmas shopping, as the New Labour Scrooges decided to have the contest 4 days before Christmas .They want it out of the way and they hope the electors will be too busy with festivities to vote. Like Anniesland, Labour will keep their candidate under wraps; we wonder why? David Kerr, the SNP candidate has christened the Labour candidate Major Gaffe, after he displayed major ignorance about the Queen’s Speech, but we might prefer to call him Lord Lucan Joyce.
The SNP site is giving excellent coverage to Falkirk West, and this can be accessed by clicking on SNP.
QUEEN OF THE SCOTSMAN
While the kings and queens of Scotland existed they were not called thus, but were known as King of Scots, or Queen of Scots. The Scotsman newspaper has a large feature on the Queen’s Speech, showing how unhappy she looks at the Bill to ban hunting, but in general giving a puff to the monarchy. While listening to the Queen’s Speech yesterday, I was struck by the words "My Government will....." What meaningless flummery; it is not her Government, she did not vote, indeed cannot vote, and does not and cannot instruct the Government on anything.
And the Scotsman made no mention at all of the Falkirk By Election; perhaps with its natural antipathy to all things West it believes Falkirk West is away over there and not within 20 miles of Edinburgh.
LORD PRIVY SEAL
While on the subject of constitutional flummery, Oliver Brown said "The Lord Privy Seal is so called because he is neither a Lord, a privy nor a seal".
WHO ARE THE FRAUDSTERS?
In the aforementioned Thoughts of Tony Blair, sorry, the Queen’s Speech. much emphasis was placed on benefit cheats, and measures to catch and punish them, on the basis of two strikes and you’re out; this means that if someone is caught defrauding the Welfare State twice within three years their benefits will be reduced or withdrawn. Whether this includes people who inadvertently cheat the system due to its complexities is not yet clear. Information may be obtained from banks, building societies, the Inland Revenue, insurance companies and other agencies.
Against that scenario, 90% of old people’s houses in the public sector are in need of repair, and Age Concern says that eight thousand of them are unfit for human habitation; perhaps the local authorities should consider whether they are guilty of fraudulent practices against the most vulnerable in our society. Then again, in a society where the government tells us not to give to beggars we should not expect charity and justice to flourish.
WHO VOTES WHERE
Some interesting statistics published by the Scottish Parliament website:
The Tories have voted 109 times with the SNP, 94 times with Labour and 90 with the LibDems.
The SNP have voted 109 times with the Tories (See last sentence) 65 times with Labour (Well we are the Official Opposition) .
Tommy Sheridan of the Scottish Socialist Party voted 62 times with the Tories and 49 with Labour, and Dennis Canavan has voted 107 times with the Tories and 86 with Labour.
Dennis Canavan has voted 185 times with the SNP.
We can understand Tommy Sheridan’s disgust with Labour; his Bill to abolish Warrant Sales was passed with the help of Labour rebels, but the Executive keeps delaying its implementation "Until alternative methods are in place". With New Labour this could be Debtors’ prison.
DAM CHEEK
Balfour Beatty the builders have asked for £200 million in export credit guarantees to help them build a dam on the River Tigris in Turkey. The project will drown the homes of 80000 people , and the builders, in a Swiss based consortium, stand to make a lot of money; a House of Commons Select Committee visited the site and they are not recommending that Balfour Beatty get the money, which would be used to pay for a resettlement programme for those whose homes will be taken away from them.
Among the many strings to the Balfour Beatty bow is their position as main contractors to Railtrack; it is estimated that they have left 20000 tons of old rails and rubble after repair work at the side of the railway lines, and that this is the ammunitions used by vandals to sabotage the tracks. Constant requests for them to clear this up are ignored.
THE 1820 RISING
In 1994, the Scots Independent published a booklet "The 1820 Rising; The Radical War", by James Halliday, with a foreword by Peter D Wright, SI Executive Chairman, and illustrations by Jeff Fallow. The booklet, though subsequently reprinted in 1996, is now out of print. Thanks to Electric Scotland, it is now available on the web, and can be accessed by
clicking here:
FOOT IN MOUTH NOTES
Princess Anne, an admittedly hard working Royal, was awarded Scotland’s highest public honour; she was appointed a Lady of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle, in recognition of her charitable work and affection for Scotland.
In her acceptance speech, the Princess said "Thanks, mammy".
The Scottish Churches Industrial Mission has attacked the Government’s plans to privatise air traffic control.
It would seem that while the Churches mission is to help people get to Heaven, they have no wish to send them there prematurely.
Nice to see the Scotsman Diary giving a mention to the Oliver Brown Award; they suggested the award for " the person who has done most in the past year to advance the cause of Scotland’s self respect" be given to Ford Kiernan, of "Chewin the Fat".
It does not say which journalist was head butted by Mr Kiernan.
Nice also to see that the Scotsman picked up that the Beano Book was outselling Harry Potter, as we commented last week.
In Labour circles, Dennis the Menace is presumed to have the surname
Canavan.
Our piece on St Andrew’s Day last week has produced some echoes; five local schools in Renfrewshire had been gifted flagpoles and Saltires on the suggestion of the local community councils. This was to celebrate the new Scottish Parliament and the Millennium.
COSLA, dominated by New Labour, has decreed that the Saltire can only be flown on the Appropriate Day, ie, St Andrew’s Day, but that the schools can fly the Union Jack any day they like.
New Labour appear to be chortling because the SNP is reviewing its policies, saying this was proof that it had no credible policies.
When Henry McLeish ordered his Ministers to review all their policies, New Labour hailed this as clear forward thinking.
How unkind of David Kerr, SNP candidate in the Falkirk West By Election to point out that Brian Wilson is careering round the world at
taxpayers’ expense; Mr Wilson, in the month of October, spent 3 days in Denmark and Sweden, 5 days in Slovenia, Croatia and Greece, 2 days in Canada and 4 days in Cuba. Mr Wilson accuses the SNP attack as "Pathetic", a useful word when there is no logical defence.
We believe it was unkind, for Mr Wilson has to fill in his time somehow.
Still no word from the House of Commons Committee on Standards and Privileges on the case of Dr John Reid and his alleged misuse of the Parliamentary Allowance.
The Commissioner, Ms Elizabeth Filkin, reported that he had breached the rules, and his parliamentary pals are trying to find how to make him not guilty.
DATES
IN HISTORY
8 December 1174
Treaty of Falaise, after William I had been captured by the English, he
agreed to accept Henry II as his feudal overlord.
9 December 1913
Birth of Robert D. McIntyre, elected as first-ever Scottish National Party
MP in the Motherwell and Wishaw by-election 1 April 1945. Recognised as
the "Father of the modern SNP", he was Party Chairman 1948-56
and Provost of Stirling 1967-75.
10 December 1747
Death of Duncan Forbes of Culloden, Lord President of the Court of
Session, who was largely responsible for the failure of the Jacobite
Rising 1745-6 and tried to mitigate the subsequent repressive measures.
THE
REBELS CEILIDH SONG BOOK
UIST
TRAMPING SONG
(As sung by Margaret Kellock)
Come along, come along,
let us foot it out together;
Come along, come along, be it fair or stormy weather,
With the hills of home before us
And the purple of the heather,
Let us sing in happy chorus,
Come along, come along !
So gaily sings the lark,
And the sky's all awake
With the promise of the day,
As the road we gladly take,
So it's heel and toe and forward,
Bidding farewell to the town,
For the welcome that awaits us
Ere the sun goes down.
Thugainn leam, thugainn
leam,
O hi ri, 's o ho ro,
Thugainn leam, thugainn leam,
O hi ri, 's o ho ro;
Thugainn leamsa thar na mara
Null do dh'Uidhist bheag nam beannachd
'S gheibh sinn mil ann agus bainne,
'S thugainn leam, thugainn leam.
It's the call of the sea
and shore,
It's the tang of bog and peat,
And the scent of brier and myrtle
That puts magic in our feet;
So it's on we go rejoicing,
Over bracken, over stile,
And it's soon we will be footing,
Out the last long mile.
Thugainn leam...
See the Songbook
in our features section
A
KIST O FERLIES
A Keek at the Guid Scots Tung
By Peter D Wright
(Note: All
words underlined in this section are RealAudio links)
See
Scots Language in our Features Section
THE
MONTHLY PRIZE CROSSWORD
Each month the Scots
Independent Newspaper offers a prize crossword and we're now offering this
online in the Flag in the Wind as well. Should you complete
the crossword by the deadline you can fax it over to the SI and the first
correct one opened on the closing date will win a £10.00 book token.
SI Prize Crossword No. 12
[Clicking on the picture will bring
up a life size version which you can copy to your desktop or print out]
AND
AS WE CONTINUE.........
If you read our first issue of The Flag
in the Wind you will know that this is a weekly Internet commentary on
the Scottish political scene; if you desire further erudition click on
Archives.
THE
SCOTTISH NATIONAL PARTY
The Scots Independent Newspaper is
independent of the Scottish National Party, but we support the Party
in its drive for Independence; while space precludes us commenting on
all the issues raised by the 35 MSPs, 6 MPS and 2 MEPs, also the Party
Office Bearers, we have provided a link to the SNP Website.
THE FLAG
IN THE WIND
The above was the title of a book written
in the early Fifties by John MacDonald MacCormick, one of the founder
members of the Scottish National Party in 1934. The sub-title was
"The Story of the National Movement in Scotland". His comment in
the book said "It is perhaps in the symbols which men use that their
deepest sentiments are most readily expressed. Flags as well as straws
show which way the wind is blowing". A
fuller account appears under Features.
WE WOULD
WELCOME YOUR FEEDBACK
The Flag in the Wind would
welcome your feedback on what you think of this weekly service. Happy to
receive any comments or suggestions. Simply email webmaster@scotsindependent.org
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