A (New) Year's a long time in politics

Earlier this year Dundee SNP councillor Jimmy Black promised that he would do this best to ensure the city had a Hogmanay party this year - the lack of an official New Year's Eve celebration has been a source of disgruntlement for several years.

However, even with a Nationalist administration ensconced in the city since the spring of this year, there will still be no party come 31 December.

Ah, but Councillor Black has responded to a letter in the Evening Telegraph saying that there's no provision for a Hogmanay celebration this year because the budget was set by the previous Labour-led alliance.

Er, but wasn't that the budget which was unanimously passed by all councillors and the then Labour finance convenor said he was "delighted that members around the table today have set aside party political differences ".

It's often said that a week's a long time in politics, but it seems that in Dundee electors have to wait at least a year for things to happen.

But with administration leader Ken Guild warning of job losses because of budget cuts in the forthcoming handful of years, it'll be interesting to see where the money for a Hogmanay party comes from, if at all.

The class-based impact of minimum pricing

At yesterday's FMQs Alex Salmond (unwittingly?) confirmed the class-based nature of the SNP's minimum pricing for alcohol policy. Making a point relating to an apparently, ahem, unproductive meeting with executives at Pernod Ricard, the first minister said:

It's certainly correct that Pernod Ricard are not advocating our minimum pricing policy, but it's also true they're not wanting to peddle cheap booze either.

In support of this perspective the first minister had quoted from a company booklet on promoting "moderation and responsibility" rather than "excessive or inappropriate" alcohol consumption.

[The company] intends to pursue premium brands, hence promote the reasonable enjoyment of high quality products.

Thus in effect Pernod Ricard are promoting a high price strategy via marketing and branding, which is all very well, but clearly it will be those who can't afford to pay premium prices who will be penalised. Those consuming fine wines, champagne and premium malts will be unaffected, but those who can't afford booze in this price range - but who still drink moderately and responsibly - will either be out of pocket or will have to forgo at least some of their tipple.

Incidentally, Pernod Ricard's strategy is also consistent with what I said yesterday about the basic business impetus toward dominating the market, whether by fair means or foul, although the development of brands and consequent premium pricing is less insidious than other types of market rigging such as price-fixing.

But, as with minimum pricing and the licensed trade's perspective, brand development is primarily intended to generate profit, and any public welfare benefits are secondary to this.

However, such benefits as outlined by Mr Salmond for political purposes are useful for the commercial sector for marketing purposes, and indeed marketing is a major facet of brand development.

Therefore developing the premium brand is doubly beneficial for a company like Pernod Ricard and could create a cycle of increasing profitability - the premium pricing allows a public health message to be used for marketing purposes, which further develops the brand, thus facilitating higher pricing, and so on.

Adam Smith wasn't a publican

The Times reports that the Scottish Government's minimum pricing proposal for alcohol has run into further trouble in addition to a recent European law decision on tobacco pricing which casts doubt upon the legality of the SNP's plans. Now it seems that Jackie Baillie, Labour's recently appointed shadow health spokesperson, is strongly opposed to move. She is reportedly unconvinced by the evidence of the health benefits and concerned at the possible impact on jobs.

However, Angus Macleod's report says that a lack of support for minimum pricing from the Labour Opposition would be unpopular with groups like police, health professionals and publicans, who are all strongly in favour of the proposal.

But should the support of publicans for the SNP's plans be regarded as compelling evidence?

Probably not. There's always a tendency with businesses to rig the market in their favour, for example by monopolising or dominating their particular market, or getting together with rivals to control the market in a cartel, most obviously by way of price-fixing. Thus Adam Smith famously said:

People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.

Which is why in the normal course of events competition law prevents business entities from abusing the market in such a manner.

Thus it's hardly surprising that some in the licensed trade support minimum pricing, since it would effectively amount to a legal cartel. And while the political rationale for the policy would be to address the alcohol problem, the business rationale would be to remove price competition - those in favour would be those whose current prices will be least affected by minimum pricing, but their lower-pricing rivals would become less competitive.

A few years ago several Scottish licensing boards imposed minimum pricing on their local trades, and this was unsurprisingly supported by publicans serving the pricier end of the market, while those who competed on the basis of price discounting challenged the policy in court, claiming that it was illegal under licensing law.

They won, and the policy was abandoned, but the SNP proposal is essentially similar, thus once again it's hardly a revelation that it has the support of some in the licensed trade.

But it's just like the argument that pubs should be afforded a level playing field with supermarkets, which is about as rational as a restaurant claiming that Tesco ready meals are unfairly priced. Their objection is primarily on economic/competition grounds, not regarding health, crime or the public interest generally.

Is Jim McGovern toast?

While Iain Macwhirter's critique of Professor Tom Gallagher's 'blood and soil' thesis on Scottish nationalism is rebutted with a letter from the latter in this morning's Herald, it seems unlikely that the opposing concept of 'civic nationalism' holds much sway with Labour's Dundee West MP Jim McGovern.

Responding to last week's controversial appearance by British National Party leader Nick Griffin on the BBC's Question Time, the Courier reports that Mr McGovern has played down the possibility of a rise in BNP support in Dundee. He's quoted as saying:

I don't think there is a great deal of appetite for nationalism - either Scottish or British - in Dundee.

I'm always minded of a quote from Charles de Gaulle. He said, "Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first; nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first."

Leaving aside the alluded conflation of BNP and SNP nationalism, Mr McGovern seems to have forgotten that Dundee's recent appetite for the latter has seen Stewart Hosie take the Dundee East Westminster seat from Labour in 2005, the election of SNP MSPs in both the city's constituencies in the 2007 Holyrood elections and the advent of an SNP-controlled city council administration earlier this year. So much for a lack of appetite.

Indeed, presumably Mr McGovern is a little worried that this hunger for Scottish Nationalism will result in him losing his seat in the forthcoming Westminster contest - the blogosphere's resident psephologists certainly seem to rate the SNP's chances in Dundee West highly.

And on the subject of appetites, Mr McGovern has come in for some stick locally over his expenses claim at Westminster, having disputed auditor Sir Thomas Legg's order to repay £5,224, but with eyebrows particularly raised over the MP's claim for the purchase of a £106 toaster. A correspondent to the Evening Telegraph asks:

But how would one grace such toast? Butter made from unicorn milk? Scrambled dodo eggs? Or maybe just humble old caviar.

Clearly Jim McGovern doesn't make it into the uber-trougher league, but could his breakfast time culinary excess mean the difference between holding Dundee West and ending up toast?

Smeato set to steal BNP's thunder?

It looks like Nick Griffin's attempt to sanitise the BNP's public image has cut little ice with the party's candidate in the Glasgow North East by-election. In today's Scotland on Sunday a news article entitled 'BNP man's racist vow' states that Charlie Baillie thinks the party should continue to be white-only, because there are too many organisations for "brown, black, yellow and Muslim people". This puts him at odds with leader Griffin, who has vowed to change the party's constitution, which currently falls foul of the relevant law due to discrimination on grounds of race or religion.

And in an analysis of the party's campaign in the by-election, Eddie Barnes uncovers the BNP candidate's stance on the big issue:

Baillie goes on to spell out his hardline and somewhat eccentric take on immigration. "The only people, I will tell you sir, the only people that Britain should take in as refugees, as asylum seekers, are persons from the nearest two countries, which are France and Ireland."

Everyone else should stick with their own neighbours, he declares. So, if someone arrives on these shores from Zimbabwe, having been tortured, and who tells the authorities they will be killed if they are turned away, our response should be to tell him we're full up? "Yes," Baillie says immediately. "They have neighbouring countries where they can go to." The BNP could easily be re-named the NMP – the Not My Problem party. This, it seems, is the "truce" that Griffin had laid out on Thursday night. West and East, North and South should remain apart; Christian from Muslim, rich from poor. "We would give them foreign aid on the condition that they would remain in their own country," adds Baillie – the humane side of the BNP's compact.

Leaving aside the fact that Mr Baillie's views on immigration - as opposed to asylum - aren't really made clear, it's interesting to compare this with another by-election analysis, this time by Allan Brown in the Sunday Times. This takes a wider look at the contest, but is dominated by an examination of the campaign of independent candidate John Smeaton, "the amenable but unlettered folk hero of the 2007 Glasgow airport attack". But perhaps the most interesting passage is this:

Smeaton, as far as many in Glasgow North East seems to be concerned, laid into one of “them”, a foreigner, a Muslim, a sponging, treacherous incomer. In the Alive and Kicking centre this fact alone seems to accord him a gold star: “I collect my pension every Thursday and the post office is queued out with Africans and Asians and God knows who, stuffing their pockets with notes,” says one of the centre’s tea dancers. “This isn’t our country any more. So I applaud John for standing up to those people.” The sentiment is echoed widely and leaves you wondering how he would have fared in Glasgow North East had the terrorists he banjoed been white.

Therefore this particular voter seems to be conflating the issues of immigration, asylum, terrorism and race, and John Smeaton seems to be the winner. Thus if disillusioned voters in the constituency want to send a message to Labour regarding immigration and asylum then Mr Smeaton could provide the conduit for such votes rather than the BNP. Of course, the difference is perhaps that the BNP's candidate is overtly anti-asylum while John Smeaton's position on the matter is unclear, but the latter has apparently been making anti-immigration noises in his Sun column.

However, if the race-oriented issues do feature heavily in Glasgow North East then it seems likely that if the lack of nuance demonstrated in the quote above is typical then John Smeaton will be garner the related votes in view of his 'celebrity' status and the BNP's relatively low profile in Scotland, although last week's Question Time debacle may have went some way to reverse this.

Meanwhile, the wider issue of Scotland and immigration is examined by Jenny Hjul in her Sunday Times column, in which she compares the relative success of the BNP in England compared to north of the border, and concludes:

The white supremacists’ failure to gain a bigger foothold in Scotland may say something about Scottish tolerance. But the far more plausible explanation is the much lower level of immigration here than in England. The deprived communities of Scotland have not responded to the politics of hate, as have their English counterparts, because they have not, on the whole, been exposed to mass immigration.

However, Ms Hjul then goes on to portray immigration as an unalloyed good for Scotland and says it needs to be encouraged, the only problem being that the SNP are getting in the way (quelle surprise!). But having opened her piece by claiming that the "politics of hate" have failed to gain a toehold in Scotland due to limited immigration, she thereafter ignores what effect encouraging immigration would have on this.

Griffin: menace or martyr?

Earlier this week BBC director general Mark Thompson used a Guardian article to justify the corporation's decision to afford the BNP's Nick Griffin an appearance on Question Time. In essence Mr Thompson's rationale was that the BBC had a duty to act impartially, and that with six per cent of the votes and two MEPs elected in this year's European elections the party had earned the right to be heard - and challenged - in debate in a democratic society. Censorship is a matter for government, not the BBC, he said.

But it transpired that rather than fulfilling the corporation's remit to demonstrate political impartiality, the usual Question Time format seemed to have been contrived to show Nick Griffin at his very worst. Of course, to a large extent the stance and reaction of the vast majority of the participants were eminently predictable along the normal lines of the programme, but both the audience and panel seemed more "young, metropolitan and multi-cultural" than usual, chairman David Dimbelby appeared to abandon any pretence of being an impartial arbiter, and all the questions seemed to have a race/immigration angle. And the one that didn't - on Stephen Gately - also provided the opportunity for Griffin to display his very un-BBC homophobia.

Of course, to an extent the BBC and the programme triumphed in their aim to expose the more unpleasant side of the BNP leader over his attempts to sanitise the public image of his party, but on the other hand it's clear that a significant body of moderate opinion considers Mr Griffin to have been deliberately set up for a fall, and rather than exposing his arguments his appearance had the perverse effect of making him look like the victim, to an extent at least, with many politicians claiming that the BBC have allowed him to play the martyr. The scene was perhaps set by the baying mob which attempted to storm the BBC studios before the start of the programme; one participant complained on TV that he'd been treated like an animal by police and security - thus as per usual in these euphemistically termed 'direct action' scenarios - but surely anyone acting like an animal shouldn't be surprised if they're treated as such? And, indeed, the farmyard imagery was extended to the programme itself by one online commentator, who likened the studio scenario to Animal Farm, in which the pigs "had become so much like the humans, both in behaviour and appearance, that those looking through a window from the outside cannot tell man and pig apart".

By the same token, a number of letters in today's Herald make a largely similar point, which in turn perhaps vindicates Griffin's formal complaint to the BBC and his accusations regarding a "Question Time lynch mob". For example:

I think the programme failed, because Mr Griffin was constantly interrupted and never allowed to complete any answer, unconvincing as these may have been. It may even have been counter-productive, with many viewers who strongly oppose the BNP ending up feeling some sympathy for him because of the offensive treatment he received.

The other four members of the panel – a minister of Jewish immigrant stock, an Asian Conservative, a black American actress and a Liberal Democrat – were not exactly a balanced selection, and the supposedly impartial chairman David Dimbleby behaved more like the chief prosecutor cross-examining the accused. He allowed the other members to interrupt Mr Griffin constantly and also challenged him aggressively himself, producing reams of old quotes, most of which Mr Griffin claimed not to have said.

The audience was drawn mostly from West London, where there is no BNP support. Also, it was 99% hostile. Would it have been very different if this Question Time had been broadcast from Burnley or Bradford, rather than London’s Television Centre?

Thus perhaps the real issues were lost in the stage-managed 'good versus evil' scenario, and to an extent this misfired and Griffin/the BNP were paradoxically regarded as not given a fair hearing. Indeed, this morning's media is reporting that a new poll says one in five electors would "seriously consider" voting BNP.

Therefore it's arguable that Mr Griffin's treatment, together with some resonance for his views with the pubic regarding the substantive issue of immigration, have combined to bolster the BNP, while the crude, soundbite-level debate of Question Time misfired both on the BBC and moderate opinion generally. In fact it's interesting to observe how even on the right of the political spectrum contrasting opinions can be found. Of course, the BNP position on immigration does not require repeating, but London mayor Boris Johnson said yesterday:

London is a welcoming, tolerant, cosmopolitan capital which thrives on its diversity. The secret of its long-term success is its ability to attract the best from wherever they are and allow them to be themselves - unleashing their imagination, creativity and enterprise.

Thus perhaps more libertarian than liberal, but another Conservative maybe today reflects the real anxieties of working people. In claiming mainstream politicians have ignored the grievances that allow the likes of Griffin to thrive, Telegraph commentator Charles Moore says:

It threatens their jobs, they believe. Ten years ago, a self-employed painter and decorator in, say, Barking might have earned £120 a day, enough to get a reasonable mortgage and sustain a modestly secure family life. Today, after the Government underestimated the number of Eastern Europeans likely to come here by almost 20 times, he would get £70 or £80. If his ailing father pays regular visits to hospital, he may be denied a bed because so many foreign women are giving birth. If his child has special needs, he may find the local school neglects them because it is desperately trying to teach English to children who do not speak it at home. If his brother is a soldier, he may return from risking his life to be insulted on the streets of his country by people who hate it.

The strongest common characteristic of such BNP supporters is pessimism. They feel they are sinking to the bottom of the pile, and that people from other countries are being privileged over them by the public services. If they complain, they are told they are racist. It is not surprising that they say things like "My country is being taken away from me". They are not completely mistaken.

Thus the rose-tinted view of Boris Johnson and the liberal left audience on Question Time may look plausible when juxtaposed with the ugly stance of Nick Griffin, but away from the idealism and the television stage management real concerns need to be addressed if they are not to be exploited by extremists and bigots.

Economic with the facts

A couple of interesting recent quotes on economics/public finance from two of the SNP's leading figures in Dundee.

In the Courier council leader Ken Guild has warned of significant savings required in Dundee City's Council's budget to avoid council tax increases in the coming years, and has indicated that the city's no compulsory redundancies policy might not be sustainable. Naturally, Mr Guild is heaping the blame on Westminster and the cuts in the amount of money going to the Scottish Government, which in turn impacts on the Holyrood grant to councils. He added:

We have to be realistic and live in the real world. Gordon Brown may be prepared to bankrupt Britain but I will not bankrupt Dundee.

Eh? So if Mr Guild is worried about Britain going bust then presumably he's in favour of public spending being reined in, so surely the Scottish Goverment/Dundee City Council can't be immune. Or perhaps he wants Westminster tax rises instead. But presumably not council tax rises in Dundee!

Meanwhile, one of the Scotsman's weekend reports on the SNP's annual conference quoted Stewart Hosie, the party's Westminster Treasury spokesman, as saying that the small, independent northern European countries dubbed the "arc of insolvency" following the world economic meltdown had now become the "arc of recovery", since their economies were recovering better than the UK.

Mr Hosie also said that "small countries with control over their own economic levers can be very successful, even in an economic crisis".

Thus it was more than a tad ironic that on the same day the Irish Times reported that Ireland - one of the "arc" nations - might have to call in the International Monetary Fund if Government expenditure was not reduced by at least 30 per cent, according to a senior Government minister.

Of course, this may well have been overdone as part of a softening up process in the run up to a crunch Budget in a few weeks time, but spending cuts of this magnitude in the Scottish context would reduce expenditure by billions of pounds rather than the relatively insignificant £500 million that SNP politicians constantly carp about because the size of Scotland's budget depends on the Labour Government in Westminster.

While the facts will become clearer when Ireland's budget is announced in December, we should certainly not look to the SNP for a candid appraisal of the figures.

Meanwhile, the news from Iceland seems equally bleak.

(Hat tips to the Grumpy Spindoctor and Polaris for the news on Ireland and Iceland.)

Reality bites for Dundee councillor

A bit of a storm in a teacup in Dundee, where a councillor has attracted some adverse publicity over the parking of her family's two cars in the garden of her council house in the city's Linlathen estate. It seems that council consent is required to drive a car over the kerb, but Councillor Christina Roberts has been using the makeshift parking space without receiving the necessary permission. Local activist and former councillor Allan Petrie raised the issue, and it has been taken on board by the Labour group on the council, with opposition leader Kevin Keenan calling on Mrs Roberts to "do the honourable thing". (No prizes, then, for guessing Councillor Roberts' party affiliation.)

However, the councillor is unrepentant, but she is unfortunately the deputy housing convenor, therefore there are predictable accusations of double standards in articles and letters in the local press.

But perhaps of more interest is Mrs Roberts' rationale for the parking and her subsequent refusal to move the cars, pending a response from the council. She says they would stay where they are because it's the "safest place for them", and:

I’ve had about a thousand pounds’ of damage to my car already. My husband’s bonnet and roof has had about two or three thousand pounds’ damage. When they’re in the street, kids run over the top of them because they think it’s a great game.

Which is interesting, because when Tayside Police are telling us what a good job they're doing in reducing vandalism and the like there's never a peep of dissent from councillors, and indeed Mrs Roberts is a member of the police board.

But, of course, with an SNP-controlled Dundee City Council and an SNP Government in Holyrood and a thousand extra police on the beat and an end to the criminalisation of children and the abandonment of youth justice approaches "lacking in human warmth" and all that, vandalism and this kind of thing will soon be a thing of the past. Won't it?

(Photo from Evening Telegraph)

'Controlled environment' revisited

As per my post from last month, I'm afraid I can't share Strathclyde Chief Constable Stephen House's rose-tinted view of the "controlled environment" of pubs and nightclubs, as he outlined in a recent Herald article.

As I mentioned last time round, the SNP in Tayside recently chose to highlight the level of violence "in or around licensed premises" in Dundee and Perth, which rather contradicts Mr House's stance on encouraging people to return to pubs and clubs rather than consume cheap drink at home, this being one of the drivers behind the Scottish Government's plans for minimum alcohol prices.

Also, a recent visit by Dundee SNP MSPs to witness the city's pub and club scene at first hand saw the press quote a police officer as highlighting, "a club full of 15, 16 or 17-year olds tanked up on drink or drugs."

However, Mr House does say that licensed premises can refuse to serve people who have had too much to drink, but while the chief constable posits the reality that this option is effectively discretionary, it's noteworthy that the law actually states that licensees "shall" refuse rather than merely "can".

Of course, the chief constable does seem to think that violence in pubs and clubs rather than in a domestic environment is the lesser of two evils, but perhaps this demonstrates the limited ambition of the powers that be.

By the same token, the SNP's minimum pricing strategy seems to be based on the premise that people will be getting drunk merely less often, which they would then hail as a success with a blizzard of statistics dubiously quantifying the percentage benefits in relation to crime, health and financial cost.

But perhaps the point is that the alcohol problem is merely an exacerbatory factor in a society lacking in law enforcement and social control.

The Scottish Government's crude managerialism, combined with our rights/welfare based justice system, will probably result in only limited improvements to the problem, with people just finding it a bit more difficult to attain their aspiration to get "blootered".

Meanwhile, licensed trade representative Patrick Browne is right to highlight the Scottish Government's lack of emphasis on individual responsibility in its approach to the country's alcohol problem, but is wrong to absolve from blame the "vast majority of pubs and retailers" and instead emphasise a "small handful of bad operators who knowingly break the law".

As anyone who has witnessed pub and club closing time on a regular basis will be aware, many licensed premises must be regularly flouting the law by selling alcohol to the intoxicated. Of course, it's become commonplace to heap the blame on cheap off-sales and so-called "front-loading", but this hardly excuses licensees from their responsibilities - it should be irrelevant where or how revellers got into the state of inebriation beforehand.

Indeed, Mr Browne welcomes the recently introduced licensing law reforms - which he claims will cost the industry £60 million to implement - but this seems to contradict his comments regarding the trade being largely above reproach; he would hardly welcome such a burden if the only problem was the attitude of individual drinkers.

In making his case Mr Browne also highlights a recent reduction in the number of offences of drunkenness, but these figures surely represent merely a negligible proportion of total incidents, thus any reduction is statistically meaningless.

But to that extent this underlines what Mr Browne says about the lack of individual accountability and in turn this again points to the underlying problem of a welfare/rights-based criminal justice system with a concomitant lack of social control.

Alcohol is merely an aggravating factor in a society lacking rules and boundaries.

(The former part of the above was sent as an unpublished letter to the Herald. The latter part was published as a letter to the Sunday Herald, 12 October 2009 [not online])

Scottish Unionist is dead. Long live the New Union!

No doubt all regular bloggers go through a crisis of confidence now and again, they wonder if it's all worth the effort, or at times simply can't be bothered. Of course, popularity provides a motivational impetus, and in a MacBlogosphere dominated by partisan politics Scottish Unionist was recently the highest placed non-aligned blog in the Scottish section of Iain Dale's Total Politics poll, and also managed a highly creditable seventh place in the overall UK non-aligned section.

Thus Scottish Unionist's decision to unplug his blogging keyboard is perhaps a bit more of a surprise than the exit of most former bloggers, and therefore deserves further comment. He alludes that his internet activities were taking too great a toll on his personal and family life, and also says emailed abuse and threats were affecting his "overall wellbeing".

Of course, the latter issue in particular is highly regrettable. SU's debating style and tone always seemed civil and fair-minded, thus it seems it was the effectiveness of his arguments that engendered such vehemence and anger in his opponents, and it appears this had an even uglier side away from the public gaze; those who deride SU as being thin-skinned and claim that we all get involved in online spats are probably either being disingenuous or perhaps don't have things like a job, family and home to worry about.

I can certainly identify with SU in this regard, although not in the blogging context per se. What's the point in putting your head above the parapet, particularly if in doing so you're only ever likely to generate animosity, and there's little in the way of upside other than personal catharsis?

Thus it's unfortunate that the more unsavoury side of the MacBlogosphere has seen off one of its most effective exponents; a master of his brief, a civilised approach and meticulous presentation. And while SU's protagonists will gleefully celebrate taking his scalp, it does nothing for the cause of Nationalism or the MacBlogosphere generally.

Moreover, the above is not merely to make a partisan or anti-Nationalist point; perhaps the reason many of the more effective and respectful of the pro-independence contributors to blogs and message boards - such as 'Indy', 'Observer', 'Andrew BOD' and 'DougtheDug' - don't have their own blogs, despite clearly spending considerable time posting comments elsewhere - is not dissimilar to SU's rationale for calling it a day.

On a slightly lighter note, perhaps SU really gave up because he saw his job as done: with the SNP's revamped vision of keeping "the Queen, the Bank of England, the pound sterling, British military bases, Her Majesty’s embassies, a unitary NHS and a host of other common UK institutions", a Herald commentator suggests that rather than independence the Nationalists (sic!) are setting course for a "New Unionism":

It is still the aspiration of the SNP leadership, but the nearer they get to making it a reality, the less independent Scotland seems to become. It seems highly unlikely that Scotland will ever be a fully independent country, like Norway or Iceland, with its own currency. Perhaps this is why Alex Salmond is so keen on holding a multi-option referendum on independence when the opinion polls indicate that he would lose. It would mean the SNP could stop talking about independence and get on with the business of governing within the framework of the UK. To paraphrase Herbert Morrison, independence is whatever an SNP government does.

Arc of 'recovery' or 'fantasy' in Inverness?

While the 'arc of prosperity' - the small, independent and economically successful European countries such as Norway, Iceland and Ireland on which the Nationalists wished to model an independent Scotland - became the 'arc of insolvency' with the world economic meltdown, the SNP's Treasury spokesman Stewart Hosie has perhaps attempted the political equivalent of turning water into wine by rebranding it the 'arc of recovery' and claiming that Scotland's economy has been "dragged down" by London. But the Scotsman points to the economic disasters from which the arc countries are trying to extricate themselves as not saying much for 'recovery', and that the worst decisions in British banking in a century were made in Scotland and that the UK Treasury bailed out the consequently collapsed banks. The newspaper dubs the SNP's perspective the 'arc of fantasy'.

On another aspect of the economy, the Times reports a conference split on whether an independent Scotland should hold a referendum on euro membership. Indeed, a couple of delegates have perhaps highlighted the SNP's paradoxical position of desiring independence from London while wishing to join the euro and thus hand monetary policy to the European Central Bank in Frankfurt:

This party stands for the sovereignty of the Scottish people and what this resolution says is that without asking the agreement of the Scottish people we would hand over fiscal sovereignty to the European Central Bank. (Gerry Fisher, Dollar)

I suggest Scotland follow Norway's example and have its own currency. It is not proven that we should be part of any currency union, sterling or the euro. (Norman Macleod, Glasgow Kelvin)

Meanwhile, Kenny MacAskill used his conference speech to reiterate that his decision to release the Lockerbie bomber wasn't based on political, economic or diplomatic grounds. But while a rather contrived looking story in today's Scotsman says that families of the victims are furious at Mr MacAskill 'taunting' his political opponents over the release, it's certainly pertinent to ask why the justice secretary is using a speech to the SNP conference to once again defend his decision to release Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds, while at the same time attacking the stance of his political adversaries on the supposedly quasi-judicial process.

Enough of all that trivia, however, because according to Alex Salmond independence is "closer than ever before" and we're now in an "irreversible process". Indeed, in an interview on the BBC's Daily Politics programme the first minister lambasted the "British Brainwashing Corporation" and sarcastically ridiculed its "impartiality", comparing "perhaps hundreds" of polls showing a "massive majority" in favour of an independence referendum with the BBC's "incredibly scientific analysis", which obtained a significantly more negative result.

Yes, but the straw poll referred to by Mr Salmond actually asked whether Scotland should either be independent or part of the Union rather than anything about a referendum per se, which is a fundamentally different question, as all opinion poll watchers should know.

So who's doing the brainwashing, and which is the more scientific approach?

Overreaction, hyperbole and Twits

It seems that SNP MP Pete Wishart is the latest politician to be accused of being a bit indiscreet in his habits with Twitter.

During this week's PMQs, where Gordon Brown started proceedings by reading a list of the 37 servicemen and women who lost their lives during the summer recess, Mr Wishart apparently tweeted:

• "Thought it would have been a more interesting PMQs first day back. Yawn... !"
• "Broon's Alcy Ada's back. Either an international terrorist organisation or a female Glaswegian drunk."
• "Legg seems like a real attention seeker and is stringing his moment of glory out as long as possible."

The final tweet refers to Sir Thomas Legg, who performed the official audit into MPs' expenses and indeed ordered Mr Wishart to pay back £1,600 of his own claims.

The Sun also claims that the timings on Mr Wishart's tweets were later changed to make it look like he made the comments hours before PMQs.

So it looks like the former Runrig keyboard player has been a bit silly, but what is perhaps sillier still - and, sadly, par for the course - is the hyperbole and overreaction from Mr Wishart's political opponents:

Labour MP Ian Davidson said: "If Pete Wishart finds it boring when the Prime Minister reads out a list of those who fell during the summer, he displays a disturbing level of immaturity. The dead deserve our respect. They died serving our country."

Tory MP David Mundell said he was "shocked and staggered".

On Mr Wishart's comments regarding Gordon Brown's al-Qaida pronunciation, Labour MSP Margaret Curran said: "This is insulting not only to the women of Glasgow, but to all Glaswegians."

Labour MP Anne Begg branded Mr Wishart's comments on Sir Thomas Legg "shocking".

But Pete Wishart has responded in kind, saying that claims he had mocked the war dead were "scurrilous and absolute nonsense" and an "appalling allegation".

An SNP spokesman said the suggestion that the MP was disrespectful to forces families is "deeply hurtful and wrong".

It seems highly unlikely that Mr Wishart's comments were other than a bit thoughtless. So why not accuse him of being a bit of a numpty and allow him to apologise for any offence caused.

Instead we have what amounts to largely self-righteous and synthetic political posturing which surely no one but the partisan takes at all seriously.

Taxi fare confusion and conflict

(This was sent as a letter to Scotland on Sunday following a news story in last weekend's edition. It's a bit 'anoraky' for a political blog, and that is why the paper probably won't publish it, but perhaps better a couple of readers on here than none at all. Or perhaps a 'couple' is being over-optimistic!)

Your recent article ‘Warning of taxi wars after fare cut ruling’ (News, 11 October) provides some insight into the unsatisfactory nature of fare regulation in the sector.

An overarching issue is the mishmash of fare structures across the country, with each local authority setting its own official tariff. Then there’s the fact that discounting from the set rate is not illegal, and the extent of this practice varies from area to area.

And while there’s widespread public confusion about the difference between taxis and private hire cars, the legislation allows the latter’s fitting of a meter to be optional, compounding the problem.

But if a private hire vehicle does fit a meter then the legislation links this to the officially set tariff - which always applies to taxis - but the Edinburgh ruling means that this link will be broken. Moreover, since the council in Edinburgh thought that preventing private hire cars setting their meters at below the official tariff would be legally indefensible, there now seems nothing to stop taxis doing the same, while it seems that hitherto local authorities have generally rejected requests to do so on the basis of the problems that would result.

Of course, it’s arguable that if fare discounting is widespread then that’s evidence of a lack of rigour in the fare setting process. Indeed, as far as the taxi/private hire scenario in Edinburgh is concerned, it should be obvious that the cost structures for the two trades are different, hence the scope for price discounting.

Thus perhaps this all points towards the need for root and branch reform and, in particular, a more economically rigorous tariff-setting process.

But in the last few years we’ve seen a Scottish Executive consultation that concentrated solely on procedural issues, an OFT ‘market investigation’ which merely encouraged divisive fare discounting and more recent Scottish Government ‘good practice guidance’ that made a similar recommendation to local authorities, the only blessing being that all three exercises have had minimal impact.

Police officers or health visitors?

In a recent Telegraph column Mary Riddell quotes a senior Strathclyde police officer as saying that he would rather have "1,000 more health visitors than 1,000 more cops", in order to stop children ever getting involved in crime and anti-social behaviour.

But back in the days when cops actually policed instead of acting as an adjunct of the social work department, children were generally adequately deterred from embarking down that route, or police officers would quickly nip their actions in the bud if they strayed off the straight and narrow.

Now police are either hidebound by human rights and paperwork, or engaged in 'multi-agency' toing and froing with their 'partners' elsewhere in the bureaucracy, rather than able to actually deal directly with errant youngsters.

I wonder if Fiona Pilkington - who killed herself and her disabled daughter after years of torment from youths - would have preferred direct police involvement and enforcement instead of neglect and buck-passing between various branches of officialdom?

The public sector zeitgeist thinks that the rights/welfare-based approach to law and order is the solution, but its creeping dominance of the justice system has surely been the problem.

Meanwhile, on the subject of the Fiona Pilkington tragedy, a recent letter published in the Independent suggests one reason why no one listened to the family:

Following some previous horrific case of child abuse the Government put in place partnerships, where all agencies were to take responsibility for cases like that of Fiona Pilkington. As all are supposed to take responsibility, no one takes responsibility. Each partner puts a great deal of thought and effort into defining the limits of its role and responsibilities within the partnership, and is assiduous in analysing any problem and demonstrating quite clearly that it is (just) outside its remit. They are usually so, so sorry about this.

The letter is also sceptical about the official response:

Just as I am not surprised by the Pilkington case, neither will I be surprised by the report produced by the "scrutiny" of what went wrong. It will be a wonderful report, describing in detail what happened, but not allocating blame, because how can you apportion blame when all concerned have acted strictly within their own agency terms of reference?

Which indeed is just a more diplomatic way of expressing the criticisms I made recently regarding the Pilkington case (and the Brandon Muir case previously):

And, of course, as with Brandon Muir in Dundee, this kind of pompously termed multi-agency approach can clearly result merely in institutional buck-passing due to the diffusion of responsibility and communications breakdown, exacerbated, of course, by fawning politicians who hide with officialdom behind a pretence of accountability.

But my comment about "fawning politicians" was perhaps a bit ironic given that the author of the Independent letter is a councillor, and a Lib Dem one to boot. Whatever next?!!

'Teflon Tories', or is Cameron the Conservatives' Kinnock?

The road to a Tory government appears not to have any turnoffs, or so says no less a blogger than Will Patterson, in concluding a typically compelling and thorough piece entitled 'The Rise of the Teflon Tories'.

But on a recent edition of the STV's Politics Now programme Bill Miller, professor of politics at the University of Glasgow, suggested that David Cameron could be the Tory Party's Neil Kinnock. The then Labour leader - not to mention most of the country - thought he had the 1992 general election in the bag, only for the Conservatives to secure a decisive victory on the day. For a considerable period before the election Labour had held a substantial lead in the opinion polls, and victory looked almost certain. But the Sun's infamous 'If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights' headline - recently back in the news due to the newspaper's decision to withdraw its support from Labour - set the scene for a disastrous vote for Labour and the return of a Tory Government.

Although the tabloid credited itself with engineering a last minute swing away from Labour - 'It's the Sun wot won it' - a more plausible explanation is perhaps that voters didn't really trust the left wing, firebrand Kinnock, and considered John Major's government a safe pair of hands, despite its declining popularity. And the consistently favourable opinion poll results for Labour were rationalised on the basis that many people had become embarrassed to even declare they would support the Conservatives in an election.

Thus could David Cameron ultimately be the Tories' Neil Kinnock and Gordon Brown Labour's John Major? When push comes to shove, voters could well prefer the Labour leader's (relatively) safe pair of hands to the untried marketing man currently leading the Conservatives. And the opinion polls could be overstating support for Cameron's Tories because the public do not want to openly declare their support for Brown's Labour, even if only to pollsters.

Far fetched, perhaps, but in any case six months or so is a long time in politics. Perhaps Brown is indeed a busted flush, but maybe the road to a Tory government does in fact have a turnoff in the form of hung parliament, as Iain Macwhirter argues in today's Sunday Herald.

And that's probably the result Alex Salmond would find most palatable as well, because today's news that the SNP would assist the Tories in a hung parliament in return for concessions seems otherwise unlikely to offer anything but grief for the Nationalists.

Could the Lib Dems call the SNP's bluff?

The SNP's plan for an independence referendum in November 2010 always seemed born more of political swagger than serious intent - lukewarm support for independence seems to be faltering in the wake of the financial crisis and the opposition parties at Holyrood were always set on voting against the Nationalists' proposal.

But the referendum Bill helps distract attention from a threadbare legislative programme at Holyrood, and the Unionist opposition will provide a useful drum for the SNP to bang - denying the Scottish people a say on their future; you know the kind of thing.

However, one of the big political stories in Friday's papers is the news that the Lib Dems are considering the possibility of supporting a poll on independence, and with the help of the Greens - who support the principle of a referendum - the SNP could secure a majority at Holyrood.

Even assuming the Lib Dems did perform a volte-face on the referendum there's no guarantee that they will support a poll next year, but could they call Alex Salmond's bluff and lend support to a vote when the SNP don't really want it?

On the other hand, perhaps it's assumed that a Cameron Tory government in London would scare Scottish voters sufficiently to secure a 'Yes' vote next year, and maybe it's thought that if a Conservative administration had a couple of years to bed in then we would realise that Cameron is a moderate rather than a Thatcher/Tebbit-ite, thus stalling the independence impetus.

Yet David Cameron's and his party's current popularity seems to depend more on dislike of Gordon Brown and Labour rather than great enthusiasm for the Tories or - perhaps more importantly - knowledge of what precisely their government-in-waiting stands for, so who knows how the Cameron effect will play out with Scottish voters.

Whither the Torygraph?

While the Daily Telegraph is known for its conservative (big and small 'c') leanings, it does feature the odd left wing columnist, but its comment page generally features stuff from the right of the political spectrum.

Not necessarily sympathetic to the Tories, though, as is ably demonstrated by a couple of opinion pieces in this morning's edition.

Indeed, Simon Heffer's dislike of the current Conservative leadership seems surpassed only by his contempt for Gordon Brown and new Labour*, and his column today excoriates both for good measure. But of particular interest is his criticism of David Cameron and George Osborne:

My problem with him has always been the economy, and after this week it remains so. Only 18 months ago, when some of us had long seen an accident approaching with our public finances, Dave and his incredible shadow chancellor, George Osborne, were still talking about "sharing the proceeds of growth". This was not just because they were not astute enough to see there wouldn't be any growth: it was also because they thought it was good to increase the size of the state and public spending. Only an economic catastrophe has changed their minds on that. These are not people with a long-standing ideological commitment to low taxation, low spending and the small state, but opportunists of infinite flexibility. When deciding how far we can trust them, we should never forget this.[...]

A deep ignorance of economics within the party, and a fear of departing from gesture politics, cause a reluctance to take seriously the measure needed to revive our private sector: tax cuts.

Worth a read, if only to admire Heffer's sense of political balance: he seems to hate both Labour and the Tories, and also manages a passing dig at Nick Clegg as well!

Meanwhile, former Telegraph and Spectator editor Chic Moore's critical piece is perhaps less predictable, but he doesn't seem overly impressed by David Cameron's promise to appoint General Sir Richard Dannatt to a future Conservative administration, and considers this a "mistake" and "not an isolated error":

So why did Mr Cameron act as he did? The answer, I am afraid, was correctly and embarrassingly stated by the shadow home secretary, Chris Grayling, when he thought that Sir Richard had just been signed up by the other side. It is a gimmick.

The purpose of the gimmick is to show up the Government's unpopularity with the Armed Services. It is the sort of trick at which New Labour always excelled. It works, on the night. "We need people who understand war in Whitehall," Mr Cameron told the clapping throng in Manchester on Thursday. But after that, it is downhill all the way.

Poor Sir Richard is used to command. Like the centurion in the New Testament, he "saith 'come', and he cometh". If he tries that line out on anyone as a junior minister in the House of Lords, he will find that he just buggereth off.

Also well worth a read; clearly, government isn't going to be easy, either for the Tories or Sir Richard!

*Interestingly, Simon Heffer's Wikipedia page states that he was "generally supportive" of new Labour in the mid-1990s which, given his current pespective, perhaps adds a certain irony to his criticisms!

Two prospective MPs in a pod

Not much to choose between the two main Glasgow North East by-election candidates in last night's debate on STV's Politics Noo programme. Both predictably youthful, articulate and sharp-suited, Labour's Willie Bain and the SNP's David Kerr faltered slightly when faced with Bernard Ponsonby's searching and persistent questioning, but in truth there was little between them, although perhaps Mr Bain lost early points given his difficulty in reconciling mandatory jail sentence for knife crime with available prison places.

But both tripped up when faced with questions relating to MPs' expenses. Mr Bain was asked whether he would provide free flights to family members - a clear reference to former MP Michael Martin's tenure - while Mr Kerr's question related to whether he would claim expenses for food, with Alex Salmond's well-publicised problems in this regard providing the rationale.

Both said that they wouldn't have made such claims themselves, but lamely excused the actions of their party colleagues on the basis that no rules were broken, that the rules per se were the problem and not the claims, or that the matter was up to each individual MP - sounds familiar!

Thus both candidates to an extent criticised their party colleagues. However, this seems irrelevant or even a virtue in Willie Bain's case given that Michael Martin fell on his sword, but David Kerr's effective censure of Alex Salmond's position seemed to provide a hostage to fortune for their opponents.

Therefore both Labour's Tweedledum and the SNP's Tweedledee lost points, but the latter's was arguably the only real gaffe.

Ireland: another nail in the Scottish independence coffin?

Ireland's "Celtic tiger" economy was once suggested as a model for an independent Scotland's "Celtic lion", with the Nationalists hailing an "arc of prosperity" of small European countries which we could hope to emulate if freed from the shackles of the United Kingdom.

Of course, all this went a bit belly-up with the world financial crisis, and Ireland's economy went into meltdown, with critics of Scottish independence coining the phrase "arc of insolvency" to parody the financial failure of the previously fêted nations.

This, together with the failure of Scottish financial sector behemoths such as RBS and HBOS, was widely perceived to have dented independence aspirations, particularly when doubts were raised that Scotland alone could have bailed out the banks in the manner engineered by the UK Treasury.

So to last weekend's Irish vote on the EU's Lisbon Treaty, with a 'No' vote in a previous referendum changing to a resounding 'Yes' vote in the latest poll, with the country's economic problems being widely suggested as the driver in this transformation of fortunes - the Irish people thought the safe haven of a strengthened Europe preferable to the perils of an uncertain constitutional future.

By the same token, it seems likely that this augurs badly for the SNP's drive towards an independent Scotland - the financial crisis will merely cement doubts in the minds of the Scottish people as regards going it alone, with the known quantity of the UK preferable to the independence shot in the dark, and Ireland's change of stance provides compelling evidence of this cautious mindset.

Alex Salmond and the SNP must be increasingly thankful that the opposition parties haven't called their bluff over the independence referendum!

Minimum pricing and managerialism

A recent letter in the Courier highlighted the absurdity of lowering speed limits which few subsequently adhere to, not to mention the speed cameras that drivers slow down to avoid triggering but speed up again after passing. Meanwhile, other aspects of driving and other errant road users are left unchecked.

This seems to be the product of crude managerialism which says that an x mph drop in speed leads to a y reduction in deaths, but ignores the bigger picture outlined above.

By the same token, other critical correspondence in the Courier relating to the SNP's claim that minimum prices for alcohol will result in quantified health, crime and financial benefits also sheds light on similarly superficial thinking.

My recent post on the folly of that proposal's aim of driving off-sales purchasers towards the "controlled environment" of pubs - when the SNP's own figures show they are anything but - is also pertinent to this argument.

Indeed, a subsequent visit by Dundee SNP MSPs to see the city's night time economy at first hand saw the press quote one police officer as highlighting "a club full of 15, 16 or 17-year olds tanked up on drink or drugs".

Similarly, last year's pilot scheme in Cupar banning off-sales to under-21s was hailed as a success by the SNP, but what wasn't underlined was that the scheme included "additional [police] patrols being deployed to focus on areas where youths often congregate".

In this regard it's perhaps also instructive that during the more recent Dundee visit it was reported that the police presence outside night clubs had been strengthened only in the last month!

But, of course, these other factors don't figure in the propaganda being used to promote the SNP's narrow strategy; in political parlance, it doesn't fit the "narrative".

Perhaps the Scottish Government could commission research to quantify the benefits of more robust policing and enforcement of existing licensing laws.

(An edited version of the above is published in today's Courier.)

Brown being bullied?

In this morning's Times Hugo Rifkind's column is headlined "We are bullying Gordon Brown to mental collapse", and he differentiates between mockery and bullying, concluding that the press, bloggers and indeed the public are moving from the former to the latter.

Of course, this kind of thing has hardly been confined to the recent past in general or to the current prime minister in particular, but the advent of the blogosphere has certainly brought this mindset to the fore, and the mainstream media has arguably followed suit. Or perhaps both are just reflecting the fact that in the X-Factor era scorn and ridicule have become forms of mass light entertainment, as I argued a few months ago in relation to former House of Commons speaker Michael Martin.

But readers will know the kind of thing I mean, on the blogosphere in particular. Illustrate the story with the most unflattering photograph available. Liberally throw the word 'lie' around. Comment unfavourably about the subjects looks, clothes or demeanour. Wait for the similar and supportive comments to flood in to compound the poison and juvenility; indeed, the reaction to this morning's Times lead story about Tony Blair being lined up as the first European president is sure to be an object lesson in this regard. Of course, the MSM is a bit more restrained in this resepect, but the likes of the Daily Telegraph's Simon Heffer aren't that far removed from the more unsavoury end of the blogosphere, while even the more moderate Andrew Marr managed to cause a little controversy with his recent questioning on the prime minister's health.

And, of course, when the pack scents blood it works itself into a greater frenzy, the quarry comes under even more pressure, trips up, and the gleeful hounds move in for the kill, which they hope to celebrate with relish.

Hugo Rifkind suggests that with Gordon Brown there's a sense "we’re not just after a change, or a resignation, but an actual personal collapse", and that eventually we may feel "slightly sick" about this.

Personally I doubt this; if something of this order did happen then the only people feeling sick will be those who have misgivings already. The pack will merely celebrate the kill.