"Happy Christmas"

In the end, it was clinical and decisive show of attacking power, which saw the challenger sent home with their tail between their legs and left the home fans cheering for more.

I refer, of course, to Aberdeen's 4-0 victory over FC Copenhagen, which sees them in the latter stages of a European competition for the first time in over 20 years.

A "Happy Christmas" to one and all, then!

UPDATE: Highlights of the game are now available here.

A Letter to the Press and Journal

The Editor
Press and Journal
Lang Stracht
Mastrick
Aberdeen AB15 6DF

17 December 2007

Sir,

I am astounded at the idiocy being shown by Scottish Lib Dem Leader, Nicol Stephen MSP, over the proposed Trump development.

This is a project which enjoys overwhelming public support, and which has the potential to bring much good to the North East. It is a project on which Nicol Stephen himself has said he would like to see progress. Why, then, apart from as a desperate bid to seem relevant and score cheap points off the SNP government, is he now calling for an enquiry which would delay the project planning process, perhaps fatally?

It’s been clear since May that senior Lib Dem noses in Edinburgh have been put out of joint following their return to the backbenches. However, with his silly anti-SNP posturing, Stephen is playing fast and loose with the future prosperity of the North East. Lib Dem voters must be wondering just how their party has managed to fall so far from grace and relevance in such a short space of time.

Stephen accused First Minister Alex Salmond of acting with ‘cleverness’ at Holyrood last week. On recent evidence, that’s not a tag voters will be attaching to the Scottish Lib Dem leader any time soon.

Yours sincerely,

Richard Thomson
SNP Westminster Candidate
Gordon Parliamentary Constituency

Trumped Up

A rich investor; an upscale development; the chance to immerse oneself in bureacratic procedure; the opportunity to snipe at people simply trying to do their best... Frankly, I'm hard pushed to think of a mix which could more effectively bring out the parochial, petty minded and vindictive worst in some Scots politicians. And the proposed Trump development at Menie really does seem to have it all.

Journalist Kenny Farquarson hit the nail on the head in last week's Scotland on Sunday, when he pointed out that if Trump were a Swedish tycoon famed for his Renaissance art collection, it wouldn't have caused half this much fuss. However, what's starting to bother me is the way that those who claim to support the project are now trying to turn this into an issue with which to try to smear the government.


Some facts. Local opinion is strongly in favour; the Formartine area committee of Aberdeenshire Council was in favour, as indeed is the full council. However, due to the decision of its planning committee, Aberdeenshire Council found itself prevented by standing orders from resurrecting the application. As such, you would think there might be widespread support amongst those claiming to be in favour of the project, for the government decision to 'call in' the application.

I've seen at first hand the way that Alex Salmond has prefaced his comments on the development, with a statement that as First Minister, he is debarred from making any public statement which could be construed as being either in favour or against the development. As the local MSP, though, he is bound to meet with interested parties both for and against the development. A difficult tightrope to walk, but one which he has managed to negotiate with absolute probity.

However, that hasn't stopped the suggestion. 'A government car was used to transport the First Minister to meet Trump representatives!' - yes, but this is within the rules. 'A government adviser was present at the meeting!'- er, no, it was his constituency office manager. 'John Swinney went to a function at a Trump resort, just before he called the appplication in!' - yes, he attended a GlobalScot function to promote Scottish/US business links, at which no members of the Trump organisation were present.


When the smoke clears, though, all we seem to be left with is the cheap innuendo of nonentities like Richard Baker MSP. On Scotland at Ten last night, after claiming that questions remained unanswered in this affair, he was then singluarly unable under challenge from Alex Neil MSP to say what those unanswered questions might be, or even what rules he believed may have been broken. Good to see that Baker's lost none of the political skills he picked up in his time as President of NUS Scotland. However, I can't let this pass without reference to Lib Dem leader Nicol Stephen, and his slur yesterday on the Scottish Government's Chief Planner.

Stephen chose to suggest in Parliament yesterday that there was some impropriety in the fact that the planner had met with representatives of the Trump organisation to explain how matters might develop in the event that the decision was called in, and in the fact that they were present during the early stages of a phone call between the Chief Planner and the Chief Exec of Aberdeenshire Council. The Chief Planner has no right of reply to such allegations, so the prompt confirmation from Aberdeenshire Council that the Trump representatives had been asked to leave the room before any substantive discussion took place will have come as a welcome relief I am sure.

You'd think that someone like Nicol Stephen, who's faced his own difficulties with the ministerial code over previous planning issues and who has himself faced accusations of personal financial impropriety in the very recent past, might be a bit more careful before throwing the mud around. Well, apparently not. Were people really suggesting only a year ago that Stephen was a suitable candidate to be First Minister? Good grief...

Anyway, I hope common sense eventually prevails in this frenzy, and that everyone claming to have the best interests at heart of the North East, whether they care for Alex Salmond and the SNP or not, allows the planning procedure to run its course without further distraction. Frankly, this nonsense is doing nothing to improve our image around the world as a place where you can come and and get sound and sober decisions taken promptly by politicians and officials.

Press and Journal Editorial - 14 December

Aberdeen Evening Express Editorial:

END THIS TIRESOME HECKLING

'First Minister Alex Salmond is spot on in his assessment of yesterday's sleaze row as a descent into gutter politics. 'It is tiresome that Nicol Stephen is hijacking attempts to get the Trump bid back on course to score cheap political points. 'As a North-east MSP we expect him to represent the interests of his constituents, not sling mud at the expense of efforts to rescue the Menie proposals. 'Mr Stephen is hardly the one to indulge in such heckling. People in the North-east still haven't forgiven the way he presided over the bypass farce. 'Mistakes have been made, but work is now going on at the highest levels to ensure the Trump proposal is feasible. We expect our MSPs to support that'.

Independence Dealt A Trump Card

Who’d have thunk it? Donald Trump, New York property developer extraordinaire and star of ‘The Apprentice’, has given his views on Scottish Independence to the Sunday Times. Amidst dire warnings from the Chancellor of ‘instability’ leading to a ‘flight of investors’ if anyone other than Labour ends up running Scotland post-May, the man behind a planned US$500m leisure investment in North-East Scotland has signaled that he would feel equally comfortable doing business in an independent Scotland:

“I think Scotland is an amazing place and the people are incredible’, says Trump. ‘ I think if they set their minds to do something, they can do whatever they want. The biggest people in New York are from Scotland. They are a tremendous success. Scotland will always be a success, whether it is independent or not independent.”

Whoops! There goes another rubber tree plant. However, the politics of fear and uncertainty remain to the fore. Edinburgh’s Ian Rankin, author of the Inspector Rebus novels, has spoken out in recent days against independence, on the grounds that he feels the Scots are ‘too chippy’ as a nation to make a go of it. He’s entitled to his view, but I find his ‘we’re not worthy’ argument a very strange one indeed. (That said, he does offer this today).

Scotland and her people, like any country on the planet, are not without their flaws and foibles. But I wonder what sort of ‘purity test’ of the national character, such as it exists, we would have to pass before Rankin would change his mind on this point. I’m assuming he doesn’t intend to include himself amongst those he deems to be too chippy to make a go of it, but amidst the barrage of statistics and claims driving the debate at present, it does seem a rather eccentric contribution to have made.

It’s almost like the ‘subsidised Scot’ argument. They must exist, because Labour and the unionist-minded press never tire of telling us they do. However, confront those making the argument, even amongst voters, and it is never they who are subsidised personally. Oh, no, it’s someone else who’s on the scrounge. They earn every penny and have worked hard for all they've got.

As they probably have, which makes tracking down the subsidised Scot an elusive business indeed. A prime example of the same argument was used on one of the Scotsman message boards today, where one Jeremiah claimed not to understand how the 2.5m Scots in work could ever be able to support the 2.5m Scots not in work (that’s presumably the young and the pensioners as well as the unemployed).

Well, I’ll stick my neck out here and suggest it would happen in much the same way as the 29m Britons in work manage to support the remaining 30m who are not. I’m willing to bet that said punter has never met this fabled subsidised Scot, any more than he or she has ever met their English or Welsh counterpart, who logically must also exist in similar numbers.

I’ll finish with this observation. I went out on Friday night and was quizzed at length by one of the company (an SNP-sceptic) about the current state of political play and on why I thought Scotland should be independent. In the end it was a case of ‘no sale’, but on the grounds that he just didn’t see what independence would do to change things for the better, rather that it was somehow difficult or unviable. A bit like Ian Rankin, but minus the chippiness argument.

That sort of view I can respect. I hadn’t gone out to the pub with the intention of converting anyone, but if I failed on this occasion, it was down to me and me alone – I’ll just have to do better with my pitch next time I get the chance. What puzzles me is why so many capable Scots, Ian Rankin included, seem to set a bar for Scotland that they would never dream of applying to any other nation on the face of the earth?