“All politics is local”

 

 

This insight is usually attributed to the legendary US politician Thomas “Tip” O’Neill. Until last weekend’s highly successful Spring Conference I had never really associated it with the SNP. Indeed in the period of exponential SNP organisational growth following the Hamilton by-election the jury was very much out on whether participation in local government helped or hindered the independence cause.

 

These doubts now seem largely discounted. Possibly the most impressive part of the Conference, outside the set speeches, was the review of SNP progress in local government. The emergence of the party as the largest force in local councils, allied to the general reinvention of local democracy, has created a revolution almost as important as the installation of an SNP Government in Holyrood.

 

Suddenly, after a 50-year decline, local government is exciting. Fresh ideas, a can-do approach and a flood-tide of predominantly young and articulate councillors has replaced the “ancien régime”. Even the other parties are affected, strikingly so in the case of Labour councillors untainted by Westminster aspirations.

 

It would have been easy, even understandable, for the new SNP Government to be wary of this new self-confidence at local government level. To its immense credit the new Government has embraced and empowered local authorities, making local councillors full partners in the national reawakening.

It’s looking good!

 

 

Broon becomes Mugabe’s secret weapon

 

Gordon Brown needs to be taken aside by his advisers and told to shut up about Africa in general and Zimbabwe in particular. His blundering outbursts on the subject of the Zimbabwe election results have made a fraught situation many times worse and may have scuppered all hopes of a peaceful resolution of the electoral impasse.

 

Mugabe can hardly believe his luck. Just when it seemed that he would have to negotiate his way to a face-saving retiral from office, under extreme pressure from other African leaders and members of his own party, salvation arrives in the form of a blustering and arrogant intervention by the former colonial power. Having achieved power as a result of his contribution to the independence struggle nothing could be more calculated to restore Mugabe’s support within Zimbabwe than the sight of Gordon Brown hijacking a UN meeting to declare that the presidential poll has been “stolen” and that he finds the situation “unacceptable”. How does he know and why does he think that his personal “acceptance” is mandatory?

 

It is frequently observed that Broon hasn’t really come to terms with the 21^st century: on this showing he hasn’t even entered the 20^th century.  Moreover he is not really in a position to lecture anyone about democracy, having become Prime Minister without even an internal party election, with his own Electoral Commission discredited and his chief bag-carrier accused of having tried to rig the Scottish Election results. Who does he think he is?

 

I hold no brief for Mugabe but he is no Pol Pot and the crimes of which he is accused are not remotely in same league as the slaughter, sanctioned by Brown and Blair, in Iraq.
 

 

 

An Open Letter to Wendy Alexander

 

Dear Wendy

 

Despite the fact that I have been critical of you in the past I nevertheless felt a pang of sympathy when you famously relapsed into a “no more questions” stance during your weekly opportunity to monster the First Minister. It was an obvious “What am I doing here?” moment, a sudden realisation that not only are you going nowhere but that the hole you are digging is becoming dangerously deep.

 

Since you are not entirely daft, at least in comparison with most of your MSP and MP colleagues, I can only hazard the guess that most of your misfortunes stem from the pitiful quality of your advisers. There is an emerging pattern, too pronounced to be merely a product of chance, of disastrous input  from your series of short-lived spin-doctors, the nadir being reached with the wee nyaff who had to be sacked for his foul and sexist abuse of your political opponents. With their advice you have indulged in an orgy of negativity which has made you a figure of fun. “Bwoken pwomitheth” has become a catchphrase worthy of a TV comedy series.

 

Unfortunately the problem is not limited to spin doctors. After complaining about lack of resources to employ staff you squandered the money at your disposal by appointing the absurd Arthur Midwinter (aka “Comical Artie”) as your economic adviser. On the advice of my legal advisers I will go no further than assert that Artie, far from being “Scotland’s leading economist” (as he was once billed), has now admitted that he is not an economist at all. And it shows!

 

Yet these “professional” advisers are possibly less toxic than your so-called colleagues. You obviously have a mole problem. Someone very close to you is leaking all kinds of damaging (and very specific) information to the press. Someone close to you (possibly the same individual) is giving you disastrous advice on how to react to these press revelations. Do you, in retrospect, not accept that it would have been better to confess to taking an illegal donation and to insist on being subject to due process of law rather than resorting to an Electoral Commission whitewash and the incredibly arrogant assertion that you have somehow been exonerated? At worst you might have been given a suspended sentence or a spell of community service: instead you have forfeited all credibility.

 

Who advised you on this self-destructive strategy? Jackie? David? Charlie? Who can you trust?

 

At  the (admittedly high) risk of being spurned let me offer you some free but sincere advice. While it will come a surprise to many people, not least the readers of “The Flag in the Wind”, I am not a member of any political party. So my advice while not entirely apolitical is not party political. I am motivated by the belief that Scotland’s Government needs an effective and intelligent opposition if it is to function effectively.

 

The first thing I would urge you to do is to be your own person. At present you are closely associated with the worst Prime Minister since Chamberlain and the kid brother from hell. I assume, perhaps rashly, that you have sufficient political intelligence to foresee the coming shipwreck.   If so you will appreciate the urgency of distancing yourself as far as possible and as soon as possible from these despised and discredited figures.

 

 You have been curiously silent on such issues as the doubling of income tax on the poor and vulnerable, post office closures, nuclear power and nuclear weapons. Do you actually support the Westminster line on these topics? If not, you would do yourself a power of good to make your opposition heard.

 

Next, you have to assert your authority over the Labour Party in Scotland. In particular you must rein in the Scotch Labour MPs. These under-employed and vastly over-paid drones give the impression that they are still in denial not just over the SNP Government but regarding  the very existence of a democratic Parliament. As Leader of the Scottish Labour Party (always assuming such a body exists) you should be able to discipline your B-team. You have considerable powers, up to and including de-selection, to bring them to heel.

 

At the moment your faceless army of Westminster MPs is a comprehensive embarrassment.  By allowing themselves to be used to force through English legislation against the will of the majority of English MPs (as has occurred with student top-up fees and foundation hospitals) they have created English resentment towards the entire Scottish nation.

 

It is you, Wendy, who must rescue these lost boys (and girls). Give them a new role and sense of purpose by making them specifically part of the Scottish Labour Party, committed to its policies and subject to its discipline. How and when they vote in Westminster should be determined by the party back home, not by the London whips. If you could achieve that you could transform not only Scottish but UK politics, always providing that you have a strategy for deploying them.

 

What we have witnessed in recent weeks is a sustained and coordinated campaign by the neo-colonial bully boys of Westminster to sabotage the Scottish Government’s key policies, whether it be the abolition of the hated Council Tax, liberating public sector investment projects from PFI/PPP scams or holding a referendum on independence. The language employed in this campaign (“not a dialogue between equals”, “the Scottish Executive (sic) must defer to the United Kingdom Treasury”) clearly demonstrates that this is a frontal attack not only on the Scottish Government but also on the powers of the Scottish Parliament, on the welfare of the Scottish people and even on the whole principle of popular sovereignty.

 

A responsible opposition should also be a loyal opposition. By all means provide alternative policies scrutinise proposed legislation and argue the case for modifications but there is no need to demolish the whole Scottish Parliament project. And that, for the moment, seems to be your intention.

 

If you want to survive in Scottish politics (and, despite everything, you could have a major role to play) you need to make common cause with the Scottish Government when it is short-changed by Westminster, threatened with confiscation of a large chunk of its income if it dares to introduce a fairer local taxation system and treated with arrogance and condescension by UK ministers and civil servants. If instead of showing solidarity with your fellow Scots you choose to act as “fifth columnists”, cheering on Westminster when it blocks the will of our Parliament and rejoicing when the Scottish electorate are punished financially for having had the audacity to vote SNP, then history will not be kind to you.

 

Wishing you courage

Donald Bain

 

 

Farewell

 

This is my last contribution to “The Flag” for now. Other projects beckon and time is growing short.

 

I hope readers have enjoyed these articles: I certainly have enjoyed writing them. Thanks to Jim Lynch for providing me with the platform and to Tricia Wallace for all her work in converting my raw text into the final polished version.

 

Arrivederci!