AS TIME GOES BY

          Visitors with good memories will recall that I wrote a few weeks back that the Flag had two bites at the cherry when it came to anniversaries, the numeric one, as in 250, and the annual one.  We are not quite there yet, as this is issue 257, but next week we will be 5 years old.

               This week will be a strange one; our publication date is Friday, by which time the General Election will be over,  but this is being written on Tuesday, as we normally publish on Thursday evening.   I did consider leaving the writing until Friday, but as I will be involved on Wednesday and Thursday until late in the evening, and will then sit up half the night watching the results ............ so I will leave any comments on these results until next week.

              There is also the paradox that any influence this Flag might have on the results will be too late to take effect, as most folk will have voted by the time we publish, and I do not imagine that there will be many visitors eagerly awaiting the publication before making their final decision.  Our aim is to inform on a gradual basis, not by finding earth shattering truths.
This week I will be mercifully short!

ONE MINUTE MANIFESTO

        We reproduce below the SNP's One Minute Manifesto;  I do not suppose it was intended to be entitled that, but it is near enough.  I was handing it out in Alloa last Friday, and again in Kinross the following day;  Bruce Crawford MSP said to me at Kinross: "You were telling folk yesterday that you could read it in 20 seconds; what's changed?"  "I timed it this morning" I replied "And it took me 45 seconds, and while some speed readers could make the 20 seconds, one minute sounds better!"

           It is on a fold out sheet, and on the back is "Make Scotland Matter" - Vote SNP, which can double as a car sticker or window poster;  one of our activists, Irene Ledbetter from Alloa,  came up with the idea that when the person approached said that this was not their constituency, instead of handing them a leaflet about Annabelle Ewing, we handed them the One Minute Manifesto, which was universal.  The first person I tried that on was from Newcastle;  for non Scot visitors - that is in England.

CAMPAIGN ONGOING          

          The SNP Campaign is going well;  as per last week's Flag, Alex Salmond is still doing a magnificent job in the TV Studios.   I think that most TV interviewers must shudder at the thought of quizzing Alex;  it is not just his ability to think on his feet that makes him so dangerous, but his encyclopaedic knowledge of virtually any subject mentioned - from the Attorney General's advice to Balamory!

              Alex was on ITV's Scottish 500 Show last Thursday with Malcolm Bruce, Liberal, Peter Duncan, Conservative and Alastair Darling, Labour;  he was able to see them all off.   Peter Duncan was waffling on about how the Iraq War had removed Saddam Hussein, a  hideous tyrant, or words to that effect, and how if it had been up to Alex, he would still be there.  Alex's response "Peter, I was campaigning against Saddam Hussein while the Tories were propping him up."  Ouch!   Alastair  Darling was on the receiving end when he defended Identity Cards;  "Alastair, you were Treasury Secretary when the Child Support Agency and the Inland Revenue got in a shambles with their computer systems;  did nobody tell you?"   Malcolm Bruce tried to distance himself from reality as the knight in shining armour, all in favour, as the Americans say of "Mom and apple pie.", and being generally inoffensive.

              There seems to be a high level of SNP activity across the country, and the SNP MSPs are managing to get out and about;  this is necessary as the Unionist parties are talking about Health and Education and Law and Order, none of which are relevant to this election.   The fact that the Labour Party, and their little helpers, the Liberals, are running down the Scottish Health Service is causing a bit of grief in the ranks of the ungodly, no bad thing.  The Liberals are on a sticky wicket, defending Labour in the Scottish Parliament and attacking them in the General Election, but, Hey - who ever bothered about a two faced politician?    I just remember the old adage "When thieves fall out, honest men come into their own."

ON THE GROUND

          They say lightning never strikes the same place twice, but the sun does;  I know, because I got my bald head burnt yet again, just days after vowing to avoid that.  Another day or two of cringing in the shower until the tenderness wears off; fool!

              I am still spending my time in Ochil and South Perthshire, and at the start I was asked "What brings you here?  Is it old friends, or because it is Winnie's daughter?"   I replied to the effect that it was the nearest winnable seat to me, but on reflection perhaps the old saying "March towards the sound of the guns" might be nearer the mark.  Dr Winnie Ewing, President of the SNP, and mother of Annabelle, the candidate,  was in the constituency on Monday and Tuesday of the final week;  she spent the time out and about in the coffee shops and restaurants, meeting and greeting people, her great strength - she's some campaigner.   Unfortunately I didn't run into her,  as she was in a different part of the constituency, but I've seen her on the TV!.  

             Since the last Flag I have been in Alloa, Kinross, Tillicoultry, Alva, and on Monday this week I got soaked in Tullibody, snarled at by Rottweilers in Crook of Devon, and bamboozled in Powmill, Blairingone and Sauchie.  (I can still remember the old chestnut;  on the road sign for Crook of Devon, some wag wrote "Twinned with Thief of Baghdad".) However as you wander up a country road on a pleasant afternoon looking for a very elusive address, the hurly burly of politics seems remote, but that is why you are there.  The rottweilers? -  I found my way up to a farm, say a quarter of a mile up a muddy track, to find the front door without a letterbox, and so close fitting that I couldn't put the letters under the door.  Two big dogs were frantically attacking the windows, and nobody answered the doorbell;  then I saw a notice on the window "Beware - Rottweilers" - so I left rather hurriedly;  at least it will help keep a rural postie in a job!

            There has not been much sign of the opposition;  I saw the Liberals out in Kinross on the Saturday, and I hear the Labour Party were out on the streets in Alloa, but I haven't come across any going round the houses.   Quite a few SNP window posters, one or two Labour, and one Liberal, but no Tory posters as yet;  perhaps it is the wrong end  of the constituency for them.   However we are not fooled by the absence of the opposition - they are there - lurking in the undergrowth - ready to emerge on polling day.  One of my abiding recollections of attending the counting of votes, whether in Edinburgh, Fife or Dundee, is that somehow Labour has an unlimited supply of poisonous wee wifies;  they were invisible during the campaign, but materialised at the count,  by the score!   This will be no different.

              I forgot to mention the Scottish Socialist Party;  they seem to be standing for the sake of standing, but the only evidence was their leader poncing about in Glasgow wearing a Robin Hood costume.  No one has told them that the pantomime season is over. 

SCOTTISH STANDARD - R.I.P.

Last week I commented that I was surprised at the very quick demise of the Scottish Standard, which had promised to continue until after polling day, which would have been 8 issues, but stopped at 6, which seemed to me a very short trial run.

           The proprietor has now given an interview in Scotland on Sunday, in which he blames the SNP for the failure of the paper, because they did not back it enough.   He claims that the SNP refused to give him access to the SNP members data base;  well I know that if the SNP had supplied information about me to a commercial organisation I would be less than happy about that.  I also think that they would be in breach of the Data Protection Act.

              According to the article, the paper never reached 18,000 which was the original target, but after cost reductions, it could have broken even at 7,000;  however when the last week came in at 5,500, he decided he had had enough, and pulled the plug.  He claims to have spent £500,000, a figure I could not dispute, so it seems a lot of money to throw away for such a short run;  perhaps launching at the start of a General Election campaign when the SNP was running full tilt was a misjudgement - activists would not have a lot of time to devote to promoting a newspaper, even if they were inclined to do so.

             He was also miffed when the SNP staff did not take out a subscription;  perhaps he never thought that £70 for a year's subscription might be quite a lot of money to some people, and SNP Conferences are notorious for various Branches and Constituency Associations trying to part activists from their money.   As the paper only got 36 subscriptions, there should be no difficulty in them refunding the subscribers the unused part of their cash;  it will only be £62.00 a head - a total of £2,232 to be added to the £500,000.

APPRECIATION

FOOT IN THE MOUTH NOTES

         I have received a "handwritten" letter from the Liberal candidate;  he starts "At the end of a hard fought election campaign, I wanted to write and thank you for the support I have received here in Corstorphine."

              The person who delivered it must have been as short sighted as the candidate, as there are two SNP posters in my window.

          It is a well known fact that the New Labour MSP for Govan, millionaire Gordon Jackson, spends most of his time in court, and not in the Scottish Parliament;  a report in the Sunday Times, obtained under the freedom of information legislation, shows that he claimed parliamentary travelling expenses on nine occasions when he was earning £1500 per day in court.

             See the Labour Party, see public funds - they think they belong to them - the way they are going they soon will - nothing left for the public.

              The Ernst & Young Item Club think tank is warning that an exodus of British companies to lower tax regimes in Europe will threaten the Chancellor's spending plans;  after new corporation tax cuts in Germany, Frankfurt looks set to gain a lot of new business.

                And the Unionist parties scoff at the SNP's plan to cut corporation tax to attract companies to Scotland?   They can even get here by road.

                 Lifted from an Observer editorial " The Liberals claim to stand for public transport and against pollution, but they opposed congestion charging in gridlocked Edinburgh and oppose its expansion in London.

                 "Where Liberals have tasted power, they have quickly learned that righteous indignation is a privilege of opposition."

         All of a sudden the Tories in Scotland have started talking up independence;  their leader, Peter Duncan, used the word a lot of times, in fulsome fashion.  When you listen to the small print, he was referring to the independence of the individual, or the community, but definitely not Scotland.

             We well remember independence under the Tories; the richer you were, the more independent you were.