Galileo - Go Figure

I bought a satnav for the car last week. Nothing fancy, but as well as doing the whole showing you where you are thing, it gives you live traffic reports, speed camera alerts and works as a handsfree kit for your mobile into the bargain. In short, it's everything a parliamentary candidate could possibly want to help stay on route, on time and on the right side of the boys in blue.
Most impressive of all, though, is the accuracy. When GPS first came on the market, the signal was 'fudged' by the US military so that for civilian applications, you would only be able to tell where you were to within 100m or so. Now, thanks to the removal of this restriction and a correction system known as EGNOS, even cheapo units like mine can be accurate to within a couple of metres. While you still wouldn't use it to walk atop a narrow mountain ridge in the fog, as the blurb says, it does make GPS 'suitable for safety critical applications such as flying aircraft or navigating ships through narrow channels'.

Three cheers then, for the EU and the European Space Agency for developing this initiative? Well, yes and no. Not content with improving the existing, free GPS system to a level which would satisfy the most demanding non-military users, they seem intent on ploughing on with the Galileo project - a European Satnav system which would duplicate, in all but a few aspects, that which the self-same European agencies have now enabled GPS to do perfectly well.

Galileo was budgeted at a cost of €4bn (£2.7bn) as recently as May 2007, which, it was claimed, would have needed to come out of the public purse if the project were to go ahead at all. However, in a report published this morning by the House of Commons Transport Committee, the cost is now being put at €7.96bn (£5.5bn) to build and launch, with a total operating cost until 2033 of €14bn (£9.68bn).
Ouch - and all this, remember, for something which will only really do what with a few tweaks, we can already get GPS to do. But there's more - just flicking to page 11 of the report, we can see the Committee's lack of confidence even in this forecast, when they remark that:

"The estimated and outturn costs of the Galileo programme have increased at every stage of its history. We have no reason to believe that even the very substantial costs now estimated for the total programme bear any significant relationship to the likely outturn".

In fact, the report comes as close as anything I've ever seen to telling a Government to bail out of a project:

"The jury is out on the continued rationale for Galileo"; "The evidence provided by the Commission is scant, and gives no real thought to crucial risks and alternative options"; The history of the programme provides a textbook example of how not to run large scale infrastructure projects"; "British taxpayers will be paying around 17% of the cost of Galileo"; "The government must work to ensure that common sense and good governance are reinstated"; The time has come for the government to initiate a reappraisal of other large EU projects to ensure that the Galileo fiasco is not repeated elsewhere, outside the limelight".

And so say all of us. Lets be honest - private involvement in Galileo foundered because the sector thought the revenue forecasts over-optimistic and the risks too high. Even the likely public sector users of the system are showing little enthusiasm, as are the consumers already happy with their accurate to 2 metres GPS handsets.

Expect to hear, as with the EARL project and Edinburgh trams, that so much has already been spent that we have no choice but to continue with the project - the Magnus Magnusson defence of 'I've started so I'll finish', if you will. Well, as our Professor drummed into my accountancy class, sunk costs are exactly that - sunk, and shouldn't be considered when deciding whether or not something represents a worthwhile investment into the future.

The rest of the EU can do what it likes with this vanity project, but not a penny more of Scottish or British taxes should be spent on this folly.

Ya Beauty!

Fantastic news - Glasgow is to host the 2014 Commonwealth Games!

Since most of the facillities are already in place, hopefully we can focus on regeneration and on making these the best games yet. If it has the same effect on young folk as the 1986 games in Edinburgh had on my friends and I, it'll be worth every penny and more of the £288m cost.

Anyway, there'll be a few celebrations tonight, I'll wager. Today, we're all Weegies ;-)

A Friend Writes

Just had this email from a friend regarding this story on the London Olympics:

"£496m for what will, in the end, be a 25,000 seater stadium. I think Mad Vlad's plans for a £50m stand at Tynecastle appear to have been better thought through and costed than this.

"Here's my breakdown of how the new design will pan out: A sunken bowl - so the drainage will be rotten. 55,000 temporary seats - just like the wendy house behind the goal at Brockville? A roof that covers 2/3 of spectators - 1/3 not covered?? That's well designed forthe London weather. A curtain wrapped round the ground to offer extra protection i.e. a big bit of canvas. Catering and merchandising will be grouped into self-contained 'pod' structures - otherwise knows as burger vans...

"I hope those grannies in Scotland getting free prescriptions don't take any funding away from this masterpiece of design".

There's no answer to that, really...

How Do I Get In? Pass...

It's the state opening of Parliament today at Westminster, and the place is surrounded with a ring of barriers and heavily armed police. Which obviously meant that it was a good day for me to pick up my security pass for Holyrood on my way out of the house this morning, instead of my security pass for the House of Commons.

D'oh!

The Huntly Hairst

I've just returned from spending the weekend in Huntly at the 'Hairst' - the town's Halloween celebrations. It began for me early on Saturday afternoon, wobbling through the town on a bike; continued with me watching Huntly hammer Fort William 8-1 in the Highland League later in the afternoon; before finishing up the evening in a giant 'strip the willow' in the town square to the sound of the Strathspey Fiddlers.

The bike episode was all part of the Huntly Food Trail, where I was part of a group which included local councillor Joanna Strathdee and the star of the event, TV cook Nell Nelson. Our tour took in the Strathbogie Bakery (tasting shortbread) Forbes Raeburn Butchers (haggis and a dram), Deans (more shortbread), Rizzas (ice cream), and Duncan Taylor & Co (even more whisky - it's a dirty job!). Anyway, it was a great event to promote the town and local business, and I look forward to being there again next year.

I'm back down the road again tomorrow. In the meantime, though, here's a shot of the River Don which I took on my way back south earlier tonight.


You don't really get a sense of it here, but as I came round the corner, it looked as if the river was flowing bright red. I probably just got there 5-10 minutes too late for my camera to be able to take a really stunning picture.

Oops... He Did It Again!

Poor Alex Fergusson. After yesterday's pantomime in the Scottish Parliament, he's now managed to muck up something much more important - by miscalling the draw for the CIS Insurance Cup Semis.

Still, as a Stranraer supporter, he's probably not used to having been involved in the latter stages of too many football tournaments :-)

Oops

An interesting story reaches me regarding yesterday's statement at Holyrood, or rather the lack of one, on the SNP government's decision to end the 'right to buy' for tenants in new social housing. Incensed at the apparent 'leaking' of the announcement before it could be made in Parliament, Presiding Officer Alex Fergusson decided that Cabinet Secretary Nicola Sturgeon would no longer be allowed to make her statement, and that it would instead be taken as read.

While there's no doubt a debate to be had about how much information should be in the public domain before announcements are made to Parliament, whichever way you look at it, this was still a bit embarrassing for the SNP. Tut-tut, slap wrists, go and stand on the naughty step etc. But the best was yet to come.

It later emerged that Labour had issued a press release congratulating the Presiding Officer on taking up THEIR complaint (the implication being that the PO would not have acted without their intervention). But better still, had done so BEFORE the Presiding Officer had even made his ruling public, thus breaking the self-same principle of which they had already accused the SNP of breaking. When challenged on this by the SNPs Alex Neil, the PO apparently did not answer himself, but instead allowed Labour's Jackie Baillie to make a short statement masquerading as a Point of Order, which offered only a heavily qualified apology and threw more mud at the SNP.

Yes, someone on the SNP side probably overstepped the mark somewhere, but when you have the PO declaring that your opponents are, as they say, caught bang to rights (whether they really were or not), it takes a special type of incompetence to then land yourself in it like that. It looks like opposition is a role Labour is still having to learn.

UPDATE: The Official Report is now online. Jackie Baillie's histrionic self-justification needn't detain us, but I do want to draw your attention to David McLetchie's acid put-down of the Presiding Officer. Given what we now know about Ms Baillie's own discourtesy to Parliament and Fergusson's apparent reluctance to censure her for her troubles, it was a barb which he thoroughly deserved to receive.


Alex Neil (Central Scotland) (SNP): On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Can I draw your attention to a press release that was issued this afternoon by Labour in the Scottish Parliament? It was issued at nine minutes past one o'clock and was about your decision not to allow Nicola Sturgeon to make her statement on housing.

The press release states:

"Following representations from Labour's Business Manager Jackie Baillie MSP, the Presiding Officer has decided to cancel the Health Secretary's statement to Parliament."

Is it right, Presiding Officer, that the Labour Party should issue advance notice in that way, before you have had the opportunity to impart your decision to the full Parliament? Is it in order for anyone in this Parliament to try to give the impression that your decision is based on their representations rather than on your own independent powers of judgment?

The Presiding Officer (Alex Fergusson): Ms Baillie has indicated that she would like to respond to that. I think it is appropriate that she should do so.

Jackie Baillie (Dumbarton) (Lab): Thank you, Presiding Officer. I am sure that the chamber agrees that I would not—[Interruption.]

The Presiding Officer: Order. Please allow Ms Baillie the courtesy of listening to her response.

Jackie Baillie: I hope that the chamber agrees that I would not at any point want to be discourteous to the Parliament or, indeed, to the Presiding Officer. If that has been interpreted as being the case, it is a matter of personal regret. I would take full responsibility for the inadvertent release of a press statement in my name. I wish to make it absolutely clear to the chamber that, in line with the standing orders of the Parliament, the ultimate decision on whether the statement was heard was for the Presiding Officer, and for him alone.

I hope that members and you, Presiding Officer, recognise that I would not abuse this Parliament, unlike some others in the chamber. Frankly, despite Alex Neil's best attempt at smoke and mirrors, there is no getting away from the central reason behind your ruling today, Presiding Officer. That view is shared by all the parties in the chamber, bar one.

The Scottish National Party Government has been found out today. It has no regard for this chamber. It appears to have quite deliberately

Col 2892

released information into the public domain before coming to the chamber. That, as you pointed out today, Presiding Officer, is indeed wholly unacceptable.

David McLetchie (Edinburgh Pentlands) (Con): Further to the point of order, Presiding Officer. I wonder whether, given that your statement was leaked in advance, you should have made it at all.

The Presiding Officer: I think it is best if this matter is left and we move on, but I will say just one thing: any suggestion that the ruling that I made earlier was in any way influenced by any other party is very wide of the mark. I think that we should move on to other business.

The Most Expensive Weekend Of The Year

Has just started for me. Yes, folks, it's SNP conference time again, and the orgy of argument, agreement, eating out and drinking till all the hours discussing who's up and who's down, is now underway.

I flew up from London yesterday afternoon, arriving in Aviemore just in time to see Aberdeen lose to Panathanaikos. Anyway, things improved thereafter, as familiar face after familiar face burst through the door of the Cairngorm Hotel as the night wore on, turning it into a kind of 'This Is Your Life' occasion. Of course, for lots of us footsoldiers, the Conference is a big event in our lives. Quite apart from the politics, it's a chance to let your hair down a bit and catch up with the folk whom you haven't seen for months or even years.

There's over 1,000 delegates registered to attend this year, which has made getting a seat in the auditorium difficult. There's a couple of debates I want to speak in tomorrow, but before I can, I'll need to get hold of some of the Gordon Constituency representatives so that I can get registered as one of their delegates. There's also the North East reception tomorrow evening, at which myself and Banff & Buchan candidate Eilidh Whiteford are going to be saying a few words. An hour or two back at the hotel to gather my thoughts may be in order.

Anyway, there's more nonsense planned for this evening. A good dinner needs to be had (there's an extra hour to be had in the pub tonight, after all), and then I think it'll be back to the pub to chew over the day's events. I'm also told that there's a picture of myself and Alan Cochrane of the Daily Telegraph in conversation from last night, for which captions are now being solicited. The best one to date has been: 'At last, Cochrane meets someone more right-wing than he is'.

It did come from my good friend and Convener of our Trade Union Group, Chris Stephens, so these things are all relative... :-)

"Partisan Interest Above The Public Interest"

So, it's now official. Douglas Alexander has contrived to make a mess of 1) an election which did take place and 2) an election which didn't take place. Is there no beginning to this man's talents?

And as Secretary of State for International Development, he's also now the figurehead for this initiative. Heaven help us all.

Huntly, Harleys and the Perils of a Dual Mandate

I was at Harlaw Park in Inverurie on Saturday, home of the Locos, to watch the SFA Challenge Cup Final between Huntly and Deveronvale. My mission for the afternoon was to escort the First Minister, and to make sure that everything ran smoothly for him. Luckily, Locos had organised everything perfectly down to the very last detail, so all I had to do in the end was sit down and watch the game.

It did highlight the peril for Alex Salmond of having a dual Holyrood/Westminster mandate, though. Huntly is in his Gordon Constituency for Holyrood, but Deveronvale play out of his Banff and Buchan Westminster seat! I had no such qualms, though – Huntly play in the constituency I hope to represent after the next election, so as far as I was concerned, with no disrespect to the Vale, it was Huntly all the way.

And in the end, it was Huntly who triumphed after what was at times a hard fought but clean game. They took the lead early on, and to be honest seldom looked like losing it. They were first to just about every ball and just looked altogether more up for it throughout the game than did Deveronvale. Their spirit was epitomised with just minutes remaining by their striker, Keith Reid, who fearlessly went head to head with a centre-back twice his size for an aerial ball.

He came off worst in the clash of heads that followed and was unconscious by the time he hit the deck. We all started to fear the worst when he complained of neck pains after coming round. However, the news from the hospital later that evening seemed to be that apart from it having been a nasty clatter, there was no lasting damage done. I hope he gets to join the celebrations with his teammates sooner rather than later!

I spent Saturday night out in Huntly with local SNP Councillor Joanna Strathdee and her partner, Mike, watching the Rugby World Cup. To blow the cobwebs away the next day, we went out on their Harley Davidsons for a quick blast round the area. Sadly, I was a pillion passenger, since I've never quite got round to getting my full bike license. One of these days, though :-)

Anyway, I was back on the redeye on Monday morning for a full day’s work, then went off to Brixton Academy at night with my mate Rich and his girlfriend Nicola to see The Bloodhound Gang and Bowling For Soup. I’ve also been offered tickets to go and see Runrig tonight at Shepherd’s Bush Empire. Tough choice - concert or hot bath and collapsing in front of the telly? Normally, Runrig would win out of the park, but unless I go home first, I’d have to go in a suit. And it’s going to be a heavy week anyway, what with the whisky olympics SNP Conference being held in Aviemore…

Social events. Like busses, sometimes.

Tech Problems

The more observant may have noticed that I changed the domain name for this blog a couple of weeks or so ago. I annexed richardthomson.com as my own little bit of cyberspace a few years ago, and after Blogger introduced a feature to let you use your own domain, that's what I decided to do with it.

Unfortunately, at some point on Friday/over the weekend, the domain seemed to crash. I haven't had time to investigate properly yet (I suspect the host – everything that goes wrong with it is nearly always their fault), so in the meantime, the old scotsandindependent.blogspot.com url is back up and running.

Wrong Korea Move

Oh dear. No sooner had Alex Salmond suggested that the Scottish Government should seek observer status in the nuclear non-proliferation treaty talks scheduled for next spring, and Pavlov's dog, AKA David Cairns, started yapping:

"Another week, another conflict. Alex Salmond prefers posturing on the world stage to delivering on bread-and-butter issues. He should be funding 1,000 extra police officers and sorting out the mess over free personal care. Instead he seeks to cavort across the world stage with his discredited looney left policies."

Yes, David. Nuclear disarmament will be the same 'discredited, looney left policy' to which your party membership commits itself every time it gets the chance; which is supported by a majority of your party's Scottish MPs and MSPs; which is supported by a majority of Scots and which is also supported by the Catholic Church. You know, the church in which you were once ordained as a priest...

But I wonder who the 'Scottish Office source' could be, who offered the following asinine comment: "For Alex Salmond to seek an alliance with Iran and South Korea is an unpardonable folly".

Yes, yes. I know they meant North Korea. But it seems that in this instance, the knee jerked so violently that the Labour source who didn't want to be named managed to injure themself instead of the SNP. I've heard of people making wrong Korea moves, but honestly... :-)

A Patsy – And Everyone Kens It

It’s not been a good week for the Lib Dems, but spare a thought for their Orkney and Shetland MP, Alasdair Carmichael. On Monday afternoon, his party leader Menzies Campbell decided to call it quits. Later that evening, Carmichael was to be found snarling and spluttering his way through a Newsnight Scotland interview, lashing out left right and centre at those whom he deemed responsible for the end of Ming’s Dynasty.

His repeated shouting down of presenter Glenn Campbell was inexplicable. However, most extraordinary of all was his attack on fellow interviewee, Scottish Editor of The Times, Magnus Linklater, whom he accused personally of undermining Campbell on the grounds of age – an utterly risible suggestion given Linklater’s own vintage, well-known Lib Dem sympathies and long-standing personal friendship with, er, Menzies Campbell!

However, there’s another story involving Carmichael, this time relating to Foot and Mouth which emerged only late last night. As such, it is not covered very extensively in today’s papers, so please bear with me, while I set out the background:

On 10 October, given the plight of Scotland’s ‘light lambs’ following the foot and mouth movement restrictions, the Lib Dems were urging Scottish Ministers to ‘stand up for Scottish farmers’. When First Minister Alex Salmond did exactly that, revealing that an £8.1m compensation package intended for Scottish farmers had been withdrawn by Westminster over the weekend, the Lib Dems then complained that the SNP government was ‘grandstanding’, and that by publicising Westminster’s change of heart, what they were doing could only ‘harm government links’.

You can see how the Lib Dems were hoping that this story would pan out: ‘Typical SNP, always picking fights with Westminster for their own partisan ends… only the Lib Dems can be trusted to….. blah, blah, blah’. So to try and reinforce the point, Carmichael decided to arrange and put himself at the head of a cross-party and farmers’ delegation to Hilary Benn and DEFRA, which would ‘repair the damage done by the SNP in Edinburgh, and bring about an early resolution of this critical issue, which will benefit Scotland’s crofters and farmers’.

His initiative was greeted enthusiastically by a Labour Party feeling the heat over the SNP’s refusal to cover up a blatant attempt at electoral bribery. In particular, it was embraced by Scottish Secretary Des Browne, who went out of his way to reciprocate the love-in at Scottish Questions yesterday. It was all set up - the SNP would be made to look like constitutional wreckers, while the Lib Dems would be allowed to pose as an effective voice of reason, and would come away with some beads and knives for their trouble.

What a shame, then, that no-one told Agriculture Minister Hilary Benn, who according to James Withers, the Deputy Chief Exec of the National Farmers Union Scotland, told the delegation that the problem facing farmers north of the border was "not big enough" to merit any compensation, and effectively “washed his hands” of the problem. As one MP allegedly put it to Benn during the meeting, “As a unionist, you’re not leaving me with much”. But really, what more did they expect?

So, despite all the posturing and politicking, Carmichael too has been told to get lost by Westminster. The difference is that Carmichael and his party, through their naivety and willingness to grandstand against the Edinburgh Government, have shown that when it comes to a choice between standing up for farmers, or standing up for Labour, their priorities certainly aren’t with the farmers.

So – leaderless, directionless, guileless… the charge sheet just keeps growing. Meanwhile, Scotland is kept waiting for Westminster to face up to its constitutional responsibility to offer compensation. Having walked away from government in Edinburgh and Cardiff, after the events of the last week it seems that the Lib Dems are walking towards irrelevance at Westminster as well. Really, what purpose do they serve any more?

Menzies Campbell Statement

Rumours sweeping Westminster that there's to be a statement in the hour about Menzies Campbell's future as Lib Dem Leader. More soon.

UPDATE 18.35: He's gone. And the press conference is being led by Simon Hughes and Vince Cable, who is to act as interim leader. The process for electing a new leader will be announced tomorrow.

Both have just exited stage left, refusing to answer questions of "Did you wield the dagger?". Given Campbell's role in Charles Kennedy's eventual departure as Lib Dem leader, it reinforces the proverb that 'you can build a throne of bayonets, but you can't sit on it for long'.

Scotland v Ukraine - first two goals

Had to be done :-)

Scotland - Ukraine 3:1 McFadden goal

Again, had to be done :-)

"Sit down, and behave yourself, Sit down..."

I went out to watch the Scotland-Ukraine game yesterday in the Rob Roy. After getting drenched by other people's spilled drinks twice inside the first ten minutes, we decided to adjourn to the bar across the road for the second half. It was packed as well, but you could at least get served and move your arms. But when goal number three went in, this place erupted as well.

Fair to say the landlady wasn't best pleased. However, karma was restored when one guy standing on the seats and ignoring the landlady's requests to get down, was subject to a collective musical admonishment from the rest of the pub of "Sit down, and behave yourself!". Result? One shame-faced fan, newly positioned on his rear end, and one landlady now beaming from ear to ear.

There's been a few other people who could have benefited from similar injunctions this week. No sooner had the Comprehensive Spending Review been announced, before Labour figures were out and about spinning that this was a remarkable financial settlement for Scotland, but that the SNP wouldn't be able to meet their spending commitments. Labour good, SNP bad. Four legs good etc ad nauseum.

I'd have thought that they might have confined themselves to boasting of their own financial prowess, rather than trying to slate anyone else. However, it all fell to bits for them as the Scottish Government was able to show that the £7.2bn figure over 3 years being trumpeted by, amongst others, Scottish Secretary Des Brown, didn't take account of inflation; was calculated from a spending baseline reduced in advance (thus making any spending increases look bigger than they actually were); and relied on the old Labour trick of double and triple counting money (year 1, plus year 1 plus year 2, plus year 1 plus year 2 plus year 3 - great, eh?).

Next up, it was Hilary Benn and DEFRA. Despite being a mainly English department, animal welfare is a reserved issue, meaning that when there's compensation to be paid out as a result of the restrictions from foot and mouth disease, it's DEFRA that has to foot the bill. No ifs, no buts - that's how it works and that's how it is in the Scotland Act.

Due to the movement restrictions and the current export ban, there are tens of thousands of sheep, in particular the 'light lambs' bred for export to southern Europe, now facing starvation due to lack of fodder. Because the grazing and climatic conditions are different in Scotland to most of England, a herculean effort was made to try and convince English Ministers and officials that unless action was taken, sheep would be left starving to death on the hillsides.

Scottish Agriculture Minister Richard Lochhead tried to contact Hilary Benn at least 3 times last week, but not once were his calls returned. Strange, you might think, when in a draft statement from Friday to be delivered to the Commons on Monday, Benn was planning to announce an £8.1m package for Scottish farmers which had been agreed by the Treasury. However, by the time the statement was made, the compensation scheme was announced for England only, with the devolved administrations being told to fund, at least initially, their own disposal schemes.

Of course, that Friday everyone was expecting a general election, but by the Monday, Gordon Brown had called the whole thing off. A coincidence? Well, I'm more inclined than most to give people the benefit of the doubt, since cock-up is usually a lot more prevalent in most organisations than conspiracy. But here, the Westminster government has been caught bang to rights, and their squeals of indignation at being rumbled are as ridiculous as they are unjustified.

We've got junior nobodies in Westminster jumping up and down, fulminating about 'breaches of confidence', and 'playing politics'. We've even had some silly suggestions that the Scotland Office will henceforth vet all government documents 'to make sure Alex Salmond can't make mischief with them', and a lot of hand-wringing nonsense about how bad relations now are between the Scottish Government and Scotland Office, which of course is all the fault of the SNP.

Well, the 'vetting' initiative will last about a week, if it even starts at all, simply because neither ministers nor officials have the time, or the appetite to wade through everything on its way to Edinburgh. And even if they did, the outrage that would come back on them when important information reaches Scottish Ministers and officials late, would destroy any vestage of credibility which they might seek to salvage from this week.

The difference we have seen over the past week is that while Jack McConnell's Executive would simply have gone along with the exaggerated spin about funds available form the CSR and kept quiet about the 'now you see it, now you don't' foot and mouth compensation, the SNP government has no such qualms. Those informal, internal Labour networks which allowed information to be shared and conflicts 'resolved' are now no longer there. Good - on the evidence of the last few months, it seems that their only purpose was to keep everyone thinking that Scottish interests were being served well, even (and especially) when they were not.

That's a huge step forward in my view, and one which only goes to show 1) how timid the previous government was in its dealings with Westminster departments 2) the subordinate nature of the relationship and 3) the need for more formalised lines of communication if devolved government is to work as well as it can. On reflection, a collective chant to Alasdair Darling, Des Browne and Hilary Benn to "Sit down, and behave yourselves" might actually be a bit too mild. How about "Same old Labour, always cheating" instead?

P.S. Wendy Alexander's been very quiet this week, don't you think?

A Gordon For Me...

After a week of keeping things under wraps, in finest Gerry McNee fashion, I can now exclusively reveal that I've been selected as the SNP Westminster candidate for Gordon. Of course, Gordon just happens to be the seat held at Holyrood by a certain Alex Salmond. So no pressure, then :-)

Needless to say, I'm delighted. Although I was born in Edinburgh, my family on my mother's side are all from Aberdeenshire, and my grandparents still farm near Strichen. Although that's a wee bit further up, there's still a nice sense of symmetry in a member of the family heading back north, which runs against the grain of recent years.


I was in Inverurie on Friday night for a double celebration - the opening of Alex Salmond's new constituency office, and my formal unveiling as the SNP candidate. We managed to fill the local Catholic Church Hall, and in a display of political ecumenicalism, the hall was packed with well-wishers, of all parties and none and from all parts of the constituency. It was made all the more vibrant and successful by the large number of under-20s who made it along too, although the presence of the superb local band 'Rock and Reel' may have been a contributory factor there :-)

Anyway, it's back to London this week to sort out some affairs, and for the Comprehensive Spending Review and Pre Budget Report, both brought forward for the election that is now not to be. After stoking expectation of an election, Brown and his representatives on earth have left themselves looking utterly ridiculous, handing in the process the Conservatives in England a credibility which they probably didn't deserve. After all, if your reason for contemplating an election is because you think you'll win, there's only one possible conclusion to draw when you then pull back from the brink.

Once again, it seems that where our Prime Minister is concerned, his indecision is final. Anyway, whichever comes first - Brown regaining his bottle or his running out of time in office, on the strength of this weekend's efforts, I know our team in Gordon will be up for it.

(Pic by Andrew Mckay)

I am 1

Hard to believe, I know, but 'Scots and Independent' celebrates its first birthday today. Yes indeedy, together with fellow 'Nat Pack' bloggers Tartan Hero, Davie Hutchison, and Mark McDonald, I've now been ploughing this online furrow for a whole year.


I have to confess, the blog very nearly didn't make it out of the maternity ward. Although I'd been writing for the 'Scots Independent' newspaper and associated 'Flag In The Wind' website for a good few years beforehand, I'd always managed to resist the temptations of blogging, probably because when I'd first had the concept explained to me years before, it had been as an online diary. Which I suppose, in a way it really is, or at least is if you want it to be.

Frankly, it all seemed a bit voyeuristic and self indulgent. So when an SNP press officer badgered me to do a short blog for last year's SNP Conference in Perth, it was my intention to do it as a sort of 'conference diary' type of thing for the duration, before stopping again as quickly as I'd started and getting back to the real world.

But something strange happened. I started to read and leave comments on other blogs. People started to reciprocate. I found that I actually quite enjoyed being able to rattle out a couple of hundred words whenever I felt like it, on whatever I felt like discussing, instead of turning it into 850 words of highly polished prose complete with sub-headings and text-breaks. And so, I kept on going. And despite a bout of writers block for a few days round Christmas, I've managed to keep things going with a post every couple of days or so pretty much ever since.

Although the main theme here is clearly politics, after getting past the 'conference diary' thing, I didn't really have much of an idea of how it should develop, so just left the blog to take on whatever character eventually emerged. That said, blogging as someone who works for politicians has left me treading a fine line sometimes.

I freely admit that I don't always commit to HTML every thought that crosses my mind, and I sometimes have to pull my punches a bit, not least because since I put a name to everything I do, it could therefore be used to damage those who employ me. Accordingly, the catharsis of occasionally being able to really let rip, sadly, can never be mine, at least not here. You'll just have to buy me a pint and wind me up in the pub instead if you want the benefit of more trenchant commentary.

Equally, I didn't want to end up with some sanitised piece of relentlessly on-message nonsense - some intellectual cyber-morgue which had no higher ambition than to simply regurgitate party press releases. For that reason, I've tried to share ideas, thoughts, virals and the like, which either interest or amuse me, while trying not to be too partisan (well OK, maybe just a wee bit!) in the process. While the result has been a bit untidy and eclectic at times, hopefully, like its author strives to, it's managed to be serious when needed, but without ever taking itself too seriously.

Anyway, if the SNP conference hadn't been put back until later this month, the aforementioned 'Nat Pack' could have been supping pints tonight to toast a year of keyboard-bashing. As it is, we'll just have to wait until later in the month. In the meantime, a big thank you to everyone who either links, comments, or reads what appears here. Without your feedback, the blogosphere would be pretty lonely, and not nearly such a fun place to be. Cheers!

SNP & Labour 'Neck And Neck' For Westminster

Thanks to a tip off from a commenter on another post (Cheers, Tom), I've been alerted to the Scottish sample of a Channel 4/YouGov poll which makes for very interesting reading. Usual disclaimers apply re sample sizes, but with the Scottish sample putting Labour on 38%, the Tories on 14%, the Lib Dems on just 9% and the 'others' (it's a UK poll...) on 39%, it can't fail to furrow Brown's brow as he contemplates an election this weekend.

The UK figures don't make much better reading, with Labour on 40, the Tories on 36 and the Lib Dems on 13. Meanwhile, another poll for The Times has Labour on 39 - down 2; The Tories on 36 per cent - up five; and the Lib Dems on 15 per cent- down two.

Fair do's, as dougthedug points out straight after, Scotland might not be crucial to Brown's calculations. But taken with a swing back to the Tories in England over the conference season and seemingly unstoppable momentum building for an election, it looks like the best Brown can hope for is to scrape home on a reduced majority. Ah, well - you reap what you sow :-)