Scotland’s future
Merry Christmas
North Ayrshire - the consequence of British Unionist government policies
Does the British State spy on the SNP? You better believe it does.
Why Katy looks safe
Racist propaganda
Debating independence
We will remember them
Last week I watched the best football match I’ve seen in years
Stone of Destiny
Back to the future with Labour lies
Playing for Scotland
North Ayrshire Council’s Icelandic investments
The power to end poverty lies in our hands
North Ayrshire needs jobs
Sectarianism - Scotland’s shame
Capitalism has failed
A fair tax
The British flag
Why Scotland fans booed God Save the Queen
Workers are entirely justified in taking strike action
Who cares?
Realities behind the Beijing Olympics
Out-Torying the Tories
The earthquake has hit
Thatcher
Glasgow East Westminster by-election
Not all young people are neds
the3towns.com – one year on
Gordon Brown's first year as prime minister
Royalty and the British establishment
Tinkering with a symptom won't cure the problem
Football loyalty
Not in the public interest
It's been an interesting year
It's independence or the Tories
So much for local government and housing associations being open and accountable
Senior Council officials should be told to shape up or ship out
Wendy, you're doing a great job
Lack of openness presents challenge to democracy
So, rules have to be obeyed?
The biggest ever rip-off of public funds
Our Council
Scotland Week
Scottish – not British
Still not in my name
Political cowards
ICI's Three Towns legacy
Admit you got it wrong and save the wardens
The real Tartan Tories
Closure of Ardrossan pubs show how politics affects us all
Scotland victory over anti-English sentiment
John who?
No competition for North Ayrshire Council's £380m contract

....OPINION......OPINION......OPINION......OPINION......OPINION......OPINION..

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the3towns.com December 27 2008

Scotland's future

The passing of the old year and the birth of a new one is traditionally a time when we reflect on what has happened in the past twelve months and look forward to, hopefully, a healthy and prosperous time ahead.

Of course, this New Year sees us tipping head-long into the deepest economic recession since the 1930s, with little hope of any prosperity emerging in 2009. Businesses, large and small, appear to be struggling to survive, with many citing the recently re-capitalised banks as causing significant problems by continuing to restrict lending and by imposing charges for absolutely everything, such as sending a letter to advise of a charge being applied - a charge on a charge.

Businesses are not alone in facing the negative impact of recession. Every one of us is affected, and most of us will also feel the icy blast blowing from uncaring banks if we should transgress against their small-print rules and regulations, such as going over our agreed overdraft limit. Despite the fact these very same banks would no longer exist if they hadn’t been bailed out by public money - our money - they miss no opportunity to hit us for even more. Banks are supposed to be assisting to facilitate the climb out of recession - that, apparently, was the deal to which they agreed when the UK Labour Government gave them billions of our pounds - but their actions are actually causing further hardship for individuals and businesses.

For most of us, the credit crunch and the deepening recession will be the abiding memory of 2008. However, there have been more positive aspects to the past twelve months.

In Scotland, we have seen the first full year of an SNP Government - and the sky didn’t fall in. Remember all those dire warnings issued by British Unionist political parties? Remember how we were told that if we were daft enough to elect an SNP Government the country would become an economic basket case. Well, they were right - the country is an economic basket case, but the cause of the credit crunch and the recession had nothing to do with the SNP Government in Edinburgh and everything to do with the free-market economic policies followed by Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling in the Labour Government in London.

Scotland is being dragged down by its membership of the British Union, while independent Norway - a country that discovered North Sea oil deposits at the same time as Scotland - is not in recession and has behind it a £200 billion Futures Fund, financed by revenues accruing from its oil fields. Meanwhile, Scotland’s so-far recovered oil wealth has been squandered by successive British governments.

While Gordon Brown, in a very funny Freudian slip, told us how he had saved the world, the reality is that for at least the next two years things will be very difficult for all of us. The Labour Government tells us we are all in this together and we must tighten our belts to see us through the recession. Don’t you just love them?

We are all in this together because of the actions of pro-capitalist British political parties, but this dire situation need not have happened. From 1979 Margaret Thatcher embarked on a policy agenda that allowed the free market to operate unfettered. Financiers and banks were allowed free reign, so-called ‘uneconomic’ manufacturing companies were allowed to go to the wall, people became an expendable commodity - and, we were told, there was no such thing as society. We were to fend for ourselves and, if we failed, it was our fault and to hell with us!

Thatcherism was, of course, enthusiastically embraced by Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and the New Labour Project. How disappointed so many people have been with New Labour. So many people actually believed the election of a Labour Government would mean the end of the capitalist smash-and-grab on industry and commerce, but they were to be deeply disappointed.

The reality is that the wealth gap between rich and poor has got bigger under New Labour, and it is Gordon Brown, the so-called ‘Iron Chancellor’, who has led the country to the brink of collapse.

So, looking forward, what is the alternative? There has to be a Westminster General Election by May 2010, which means there is the potential for changing government. In reality, though, kicking out New Labour and electing the Tories would make no difference. David Cameron’s New Tories would continue to embrace the New Labour policies that they, themselves, adopted from the old Tories. It would be more of the same and the very real danger that the economic lessons of the current recession would fail to be learned.

Of course, in Scotland, we have alternatives that don’t exist in England. We can vote to re-take control of our own destiny, with real changes in policy and social direction. In Scotland we can vote to re-take our political independence and, by doing so, to take control of our abundant resources and take responsibility for how we manage our own economy and our own future.

Remember, the sky didn’t fall in when Scotland voted for devolution, despite the fact we had been assured it would. Remember, also, that the same sky remained firmly in place after the election of an SNP Government - again, despite the fact we were told it would collapse around our ears.

British Unionist scaremongering has been exposed as just that - stories designed to scare the Scots from re-taking our independence and ploughing our own furrow as a normal independent nation. There is absolutely nothing to fear from re-taking our independence, far from it. The scary option is remaining within the British Union that has all-but brought us to our knees, despite Scotland being the European Union’s biggest producer of oil and having the multi-million pound Scotch Whisky industry contributing yearly to the chancellor of the exchequer’s tax grab.

Independence is not isolation - that is just one more of the British Unionist scare stories. An independent Scotland would be free to form alliances with, and trade with other independent nations across the globe - and the social union within the British Isles would continue. There would be no border guards at Gretna, we would still be able to visit our friends and relations in England, and we would still be able to watch Coronation Street, just ask our Celtic cousins in Ireland.

The ‘Downing Street Downturn’ is expected to last for the next couple of years, but within that timescale we, in Scotland, can begin the process of re-establishing our nation as an independent country and begin to build a brighter future for our children.

Whatever lies ahead for us as individuals in 2009, lets hope that, as Scots, we weather the economic storm and emerge with the strength, determination and confidence to build that better life for all of our brothers and sisters in this nation of ours.

Bliadhna mhath ur.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com December 20 2008

Merry Christmas

 Well, it’s almost Christmas again: where has 2008 gone? Christmas - the festive season, a time to be jolly, the season of goodwill to all mankind. Aye right!

Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to be a Scrooge and give it all ‘bah humbug’: I sincerely hope everyone has a great time at Christmas, even British Unionist politicians (you know, I never before realised how difficult it is to type with your fingers crossed). No, actually, I do mean it, I hope everyone has a great time at Christmas and that Santa brings you what you want.

However, my edge of cynicism stems from the reality of life that tends to intrude irrespective of how hard we might try to blot it out. For example, while most of us are settling down to Christmas dinner with all the trimmings, there will be thousands of people in this country sitting alone, with no-one to talk to, never mind pull a cracker with. Loneliness doesn’t go away at Christmas: in fact, it is compounded.

Then - without wanting to sound too much like the Monty Python sketch where each person tries to out-do the other with stories of how poor they had been as children - there will be people who are not just lonely, but homeless at Christmas. Physically homeless, without a roof over their heads, sleeping under stained blankets or cardboard boxes. They will experience no joy, no festive goodwill - just cold, dirt and the same grinding poverty they experienced every other day.

There will be children who don’t get the presents they asked Santa to bring. It seems their letters never made it to the North Pole - or perhaps, more likely, it was because of that reality thing rearing its head again. Their parents (or parent) just couldn’t stretch the Income Support to cover the cost of an Xbox 360.

There will be families who have struggled to put together the best Christmas they can for their children, bending financial rules and using credit cards that were supposed to be for emergencies. Only to find that when the presents are opened, all that is left is that empty reality again - quickly followed by the pressures to repay the money that was spent. Pressures that can grow so big they can even split the families concerned.

There will be households where Christmas is the last straw for already strained relationships. Official figures show a rise in domestic abuse over the Christmas and New Year period, and divorce lawyers report an upswing in business during the month of January.

Have I depressed you enough yet? Sorry, I didn’t mean to. I just wanted to reflect on the reality that exists behind the tinsel and glitter of Christmas. I just wanted, for a moment, to prick the bubble of consumerism and hype that virtually all of us get caught up in. I just wanted us to think about others less fortunate at a time of year when it is so easy to forget.

Of course, on reflection, you might think, ‘Well, there isn‘t much I can do to change things. There isn’t much I can do to reduce the numbers of homeless or even create a more just society, where wealth is more evenly divided and fewer people live in poverty.’ Actually, you can change things. You can create a fairer society, you can end poverty, you can bring an end to unjust wars, you can even decide to provide fresh water to the children of Africa who, without it, will die in the months and years ahead. How can you do all that? Simply by casting your vote at election time.

Democracy, quite literally, means ‘people power’. In a democracy, we, the people, have the power to shape the society in which we want to live. If we want to spend our taxes on eradicating poverty here in Scotland and across the world, then we can do that. All we have to do is elect politicians who share that goal.

If, however, we can tolerate children dying for want of a drink of clean water, or if we can live with the fact that, right here in Scotland, children cry themselves to sleep at night because they are hungry, then we can vote for political parties that endorse the free-market, capitalist system that has created such situations. In a democracy, we have that power.

For me, Christmas would not be Christmas without watching ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’, the 1946 Frank Capra film that starred James Stewart as George Bailey, the hard-pressed manager of the savings and loan company that had provided the funds for most of the population of Bedford Falls to move out of the slum dwellings owned by the evil Mr Potter.

Over-burdened by financial problems caused by his Uncle Billy misplacing $8,000, George Bailey feels he is a failure and attempts to kill himself by jumping into an icy river on Christmas Eve. Rescued by Clarence, a trainee angel (not yet having secured his wings), George calls out, “I wish I’d never been born.”

The next part of the story shows how so many people’s lives would have been different - and worse - if George Bailey really hadn’t been born.

Eventually, George is restored to life, the people of Bedford Falls rally round and replace the missing money, everyone has a happy Christmas, and Clarence gets his wings. Sorry if I’ve just spoiled the film for you, but the real lesson of Frank Capra’s movie is how each of us as individuals touch and influence so many lives. We are not simply individuals, but also brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, cousins uncles, aunts, friends. By simply living our lives we touch so many others, and what we do can determine whether the people we touch have a better or worse life.

‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ is about society, it’s about people working together to achieve so much more than we ever could as individuals. The choices we make as individuals affect our own lives but also impact on those we touch. As a society, the choices we make impact on our fellow citizens.

The homeless, the poor and the hungry are all there because of the society created by decisions taken by politicians - such as spending billions of pounds on nuclear weapons of mass destruction, rather than on transforming the lives of ordinary people - and those politicians are in power because of decisions taken by us at the ballot box.

We have the power to change not only our own lives but also those of everyone around us. Together, we can change the world.

Please remember those less fortunate at Christmas, and when we next get the chance to exercise our power at the ballot box, let’s do something to help. Let’s change the world.

To paraphrase the late John Lennon…Merry Christmas, war, poverty, and hunger is over - if you want it.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com December 13 2008

North Ayrshire - the consequence of British Unionist government policies

 The latest analysis of life in North Ayrshire, reported in last week’s the3towns.com, is one that gives great cause for concern. However, having said that, the findings should come as no surprise to anyone who lives in the area.

One of the main findings of the Community Health Partnerships Area Profile 2008, was that North Ayrshire has the second-highest unemployment in Scotland, with a significantly higher-than-average percentage of people living in the 15% ‘most deprived’ areas of Scotland, a situation that the report states is “reflected in the education, employment and prosperity indicators, with many of these rating significantly worse than average.”

In a nutshell, North Ayrshire has systemic, structural problems that will only be addressed when we elect politicians - at both national and local level - who are prepared to fundamentally restructure Scottish society. Tinkering with the corrupt and bankrupt capitalist system will do nothing to turn around the problems so clearly identified in areas like North Ayrshire.

Capitalism is a system that works only for the few and at the expense of the many. For capitalists to grow their wealth, they must exploit their workforce. In economic terms, profit is the excess within the utility price after production costs have been deducted, and such profit can only be achieved by paying a worker less than their labour is worth. That is exploitation, and it creates an unequal society where the rich prosper and the majority eke out a daily existence, living hand-to-mouth and having to save or pay exorbitant rates of interest to buy ‘luxury’ items, such as clothes or shoes.

In areas like North Ayrshire, even before we entered the current economic recession, it wasn’t difficult to find evidence of not just a working class, but an underclass. Since the Tory Government of Margaret Thatcher decided to embark on policies that saw human beings as expendable in the pursuit of wealth-generation for the very few, those discarded have lived, not a life but an existence.

Thatcher and her Tory Government did not just take away the jobs from areas like North Ayrshire, they also took away hope and opportunity. Next year will see the 30th anniversary of the election of Margaret Thatcher as prime minister of the United Kingdom. It will also mark the 30th anniversary of the end of the post-war social consensus and the governmental aim of securing full employment.

The consequences of Thatcherite policies are now plain to see in once-prosperous communities that have been transformed into economic and industrial deserts, where second and even third generations of families do not know what it is like to have a long-term and relatively well-paid job. Where people are denied opportunity, and where there is no hope of a better life, there is depression.

If you live in North Ayrshire, look around you. Look at the depressed town centres and housing estates; look into the depressed faces of the people who slowly walk from one place to the next, passing time because they have nothing constructive to do. Look at the waste of the social infrastructure, and more importantly, look at the waste of valuable lives and human skills.

Other consequences of the Thatcherite programme - enthusiastically endorsed by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown in their New Labour Project - are also reflected in the findings of the Community Health Partnerships Area Profile 2008. The North Ayrshire crime rate is “significantly worse” than the Scottish average, as is the number of people requiring hospital treatment following an assault. North Ayrshire male and female life expectancies are “significantly worse” than the Scottish average, with death rates from heart disease and strokes in the under-75s “significantly worse” than the figure for Scotland.

In North Ayrshire, the proportion of the population hospitalised for alcohol-related and attributable causes is “significantly worse” than average, while the number of people hospitalised for drug-related conditions is the fourth-highest of the 40 Community Health Partnerships in Scotland.

Unemployment, high crime rates, violence, alcohol and drug abuse, low educational attainment - these are the results of the Thatcherite/New Labour social experiment based on the premise that there was “no such thing as society”. These are the consequences of the capitalist doctrine that argued our only interest should be self-interest, and to hell with those who could not or, supposedly, would not work.

The situation in which North Ayrshire finds itself was not inevitable. Nor did we reach such a depressed and depressing state as the result of evil spells by bad pixies. Be under no illusion, we got here because of decisions taken by politicians - politicians that, to a certain extent, we elected.

I say ‘to a certain extent’, because, of course, Scotland never did vote for Margaret Thatcher and her Tory Government. However, we cannot escape all blame. At the four General Elections during the 18 years of the Thatcher and Major Governments, Scotland returned a majority of British Unionist Labour MPs, thereby continuing to tie us into the British Union, a consequence of which was that we would have imposed on us whatever government England elected. It was no-one’s fault but ours that we continually voted for British Unionist candidates, which meant that Thatcher could inflict on us her desperately damaging policies.

The same applies today. Within the next 18 months we will have a UK General Election. In Scotland, if we vote for any British Unionist political party - Labour, Tory or Lib Dem - we will be accepting that we get the government England elects. The only way we can be sure to get what Scotland wants, is to vote for pro-independence parties.

Back in the 1980s and 1990s, Labour coined a campaign slogan that said: “For a Tory-free Scotland, vote Labour.” That was achieved, Scotland did kick-out every Tory MP, but because we remained part of the British Union, we still got a Tory Government imposed on us.

The reality is that Scotland can be Tory-free within the British Union or totally-free with independence. The choice is ours, and it must now be an informed choice - all around us we can see the consequences of British Unionist government policies.

Of course, once we have re-established our right to govern ourselves in a normal independent nation, we then have to elect a government that will put people before profit - and that will restore the hope and opportunity to communities that Thatcher and New Labour have all but destroyed.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com December 6 2008

Does the British State spy on the SNP?  You better believe it does.

While the real world tries to fend off the effects of the deepest economic recession since the 1930s, our MPs spent much of last Wednesday discussing an unannounced visit to the Palace of Westminster by officers of the Metropolitan Police.

Last Wednesday was the day the Labour Government announced its legislative plans for the coming parliamentary session, which, to be fair, did include some measures that, hopefully, will help those facing the repossession of their home by the banks we, as taxpayers, have just saved from bankruptcy. Those measures were announced in the Queen’s Speech, which was followed by a debate in the House of Commons.

However, a number of MPs took the opportunity to raise issues of concern, not about the economy or how many of their constituents face losing everything because of the collapse of the capitalist system that every mainstream political party in the UK so enthusiastically endorsed, but about whether or not police officers have the right to search an MPs office while pursuing a line of enquiry in a potential criminal case.

As events developed in the Commons, the Speaker, the man with ultimate responsibility for the administration and security of parliament, spoke about what had happened when police officers turned up to search the office of Tory MP Damian Green in relation to enquiries about information that had been leaked from the Home Office.

The Speaker, Glasgow MP Michael Martin, shirked his responsibilities - responsibilities for which he is handsomely rewarded - and instead blamed one of his deputies for allowing the police to enter parliament, and the police for not saying that they didn’t have a warrant to search Mr Green’s office. What a coward.

Desperate to hang on to the wealth and privileges that come with his elevated office, Speaker Martin was prepared to hang out to dry a House of Commons official whose direct boss he is: what is it they say about a bad tradesman blaming his tools when things go wrong? As for having a go at the police for not admitting they didn’t have a warrant, why did Speaker Martin not think to ask that simple question when his underling telephoned to notify him of the police presence and their intention? The man proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is not up to the job, and if he had any decency he would resign. Chances are he won’t, though. It takes an awful lot to separate a chancer on the make from the source of his lavish lifestyle.

Having said all that, there are valid reasons why MPs should be concerned over the actions of the police. When Government ministers or officials are not being honest with the public, when they say one thing to parliament and another privately, or when they act against the public interest, then it is perfectly legitimate for a civil servant to expose such duplicity by passing information to an opposition MP. That seems to be what has happened in the case of Damian Green.

Mr Green admits he received information leaked from a Home Office source. That is not a crime. As far as I am aware, Mr Green also admits to making such information public - that is far from being a crime. In fact, it is in the public interest.

It is nothing short of a disgrace, and a dangerous precedent, that police officers searched the MPs Commons and Constituency offices, seized computers, his Blackberry and a number of files. MPs, MSPs and councillors must treat with the utmost confidence information given to them by constituents or, indeed, any member of the public. If the police now consider they have the power - and the right - to breach that confidence, then we have moved significantly from being a free and democratic state.

That said, I don’t believe the police are at the cutting edge of what amounts to the erosion of our democratic and human rights. Police in uniform or brandishing Warrant Cards can be seen and can, hopefully, be held to account for their actions. The same cannot be said for the state operatives who do not work in the light of accountability.

We may think that MI5 belongs to spy stories or is engaged in counter-terrorism activities to ensure we can sleep safely at night. No doubt some of that department’s officials are employed on such worthy tasks, but others are not. The role of MI5 is to protect the British State from potential threats within the UK - MI6 has a similar role, but its perceived threats are located outwith the UK.

It is the definition of a ‘threat to the British State’ that causes real concern, because one spy’s threat is another man’s democratic organisation. We now know that agents of the British State have infiltrated and spied on organisations like the National Union of Mineworkers, and have listened into the phone calls of certain Labour MPs (back in the days when Labour was a socialist party, too close to Soviet Moscow for the liking of the right-wing British establishment).

In a Scottish context, what could be more of a threat to the British State than an organisation that freely admits it wants to break-up that very state and secure the re-emergence of an independent Scotland?

In a previous life I was employed as the Whip’s Administrator to the SNP Scottish Parliamentary Group. Throughout that period there were suspicious clicks on our telephone lines, letters that didn’t arrive, office doors open that had been left locked and many other small issues that gave cause for concern. Of course, the secret service has never admitted that it spies on the SNP, the democratically elected government of Scotland, but you better believe it does. From a British perspective, MI5 would not be doing its job properly if it had not infiltrated the SNP, even at a very senior level.

There will almost certainly be one or two SNP MSPs who regularly pass information to agents of the British State - and I know who my money is on.

The SNP and other pro-independence political parties may very well be a threat to the British State, but their aim of securing independence for Scotland is in the interests of the Scottish people. It is wrong, therefore, that public funds are spent spying on and attempting to subvert these organisations.

So, ultimately, MPs are right to be concerned about the police action that saw officers arrest an elected parliamentarian and search his private papers - and Speaker Martin should resign for not standing up to the police when they came calling.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com November 29 2008

Why Katy looks safe

Back in June, the3towns.com reported that Robert Crawford, the SNP candidate for the next Westminster Election in North Ayrshire & Arran, had accepted the position of chief operating officer with the South-East of England Development Agency.

At that time, some SNP activists were quoted as being concerned that Mr Crawford could not perform both roles - being located 500 miles from North Ayrshire, running an organisation that sought to secure investment and business generation in the south-east of England, and also fight a political campaign in North Ayrshire & Arran to unseat a Labour MP with a majority of 11,296.

Now, with speculation that prime minister Gordon Brown could call a Westminster Election for June 2009 - to coincide with elections to the European Parliament, and before the current recession hits its lowest point, which is predicted to be sometime in 2010 - concern amongst SNP members over their missing candidate seems to have resurfaced.

It is understandable that local SNP activists are uneasy over a candidate whose job takes him so far from the constituency. Equally, it can be argued that someone with Robert Crawford’s undoubted talents in the fields of enterprise and regeneration, and who seeks to represent the people of North Ayrshire & Arran, should be applying those talents to benefit people here, in local communities, rather than the comparatively more prosperous south-east of England.

However, there is another aspect of Mr Crawford’s candidacy that should be worrying local SNP activists. That is the recognition factor, or in Robert Crawford’s case, the lack of recognition factor.

Across business and enterprise organisations, Robert Crawford is one of the most respected operators in the country, which is why he was headhunted for the role with the South-East of England Development Agency. Mr Crawford is much-respected by people in senior positions within economic regeneration circles, including government figures, both in Edinburgh and London. He is an intelligent and articulate man, whose roots are local, making him an ideal candidate for the SNP campaign to unseat the incumbent MP, Labour’s Katy Clark - but all of those qualities are being negated by Robert Crawford‘s absence from the constituency. It is also the case that, outwith business circles, very few people in North Ayrshire & Arran have ever heard of Mr Crawford. Certainly, in political terms, his recognition factor is little above zero.

While the SNP candidate has been conspicuous by his absence, the Tory challenger for the North Ayrshire & Arran seat has been making a name for himself.

Philip Lardner is, in political terminology, ‘working the constituency’. As the candidate for the party that finished second behind Katy Clark at the last Westminster Election in 2005, Mr Lardner has been putting himself about, providing photo-opportunities and writing letters to the press on issues of local importance, like the future of nuclear energy-generation at Hunterston; and of lesser importance, such as informing everyone of how he caught the ferry to Arran on a particularly stormy day, and offering his thanks to Cal-Mac personnel for getting him there safely.

Of course, Philip Larder has also featured in the newspapers for his view on the former white supremacist Rhodesian leader Ian Smith, whom he described as “a hero”, and for his membership of the right-wing pressure group the Freedom Association, which, under its original name of the National Association for Freedom, supported the racist apartheid regime in South Africa.

You might not want to vote for Mr Lardner, but the chances are you will have heard of him or will have seen his name somewhere. In political terms, the same is unlikely to be the case for Robert Crawford.

Alex Salmond, Scotland’s First Minister and leader of the SNP, has made the bold claim that his party is looking to win 20 seats at the next Westminster Election. Of course, his opponents have been quick to say he is living in cloud cuckoo land if he actually believes what he claims, but such electoral success may not be beyond the achievable for the current party of government here in Scotland.

Having said that, if the 20 seat prediction is to come true, the SNP would have to be looking at taking constituencies like North Ayrshire & Arran, where they were successful in the equivalent Scottish Parliament seats in 2007. Which brings us back to Robert Crawford and his invisible candidacy.

A candidate should lead an election campaign, but he or she is simply the focal point, there should be many other equally vital members of the election team. Each party activist has a role to play in promoting the party agenda and the candidate, which is why Robert Crawford should not be saddled with all the blame for the SNPs lack of activity on the ground in North Ayrshire & Arran.

While Mr Crawford has to spend Monday-to-Friday in the south-east of England, there is nothing to stop local SNP activists from canvassing and leafleting during that time, raising their candidate’s profile and promoting the message of how their party is best placed to represent the people of North Ayrshire & Arran. Failure to do that will simply lead to the party taking whatever share of the vote it can secure based on national media coverage at the time of the election; which won’t be great, given the UK broadcast media’s history of virtually ignoring the SNP in British elections.

Of course, it may well be the case that the SNP candidate’s lack of profile and the party’s lack of activity could stem from the fact that they don’t actually fancy their chances of overturning Katy Clark’s 11,296 majority.

It can also be argued that the Labour Party hasn’t been on the streets in North Ayrshire & Arran since the Scottish Parliament and North Ayrshire Council elections of May 2007. That is true, but Labour has the incumbency factor on its side, and can rely on much of its work being done for it by newspapers like the Daily Record.

Katy Clark has worked diligently since being elected in 2005 and she has been able to distance herself from many of Labour’s more right-wing policy initiatives. It would, therefore, take a massive campaign-push to unseat her from her position as MP for North Ayrshire & Arran.

On the basis of the SNP’s current lack of activity in the constituency, and the rabid right-wing policies of the Tory candidate, it looks like Ms Clark’s position is safe.

Of course, they say a week is a long time in politics, and even if Gordon Brown was to cut and run for a June 2009 election, that still leaves seven months for the other parties to make the Westminster Election interesting for those of us who live in the constituency of North Ayrshire & Arran.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com November 22 2008

Racist propaganda

 As the Editor of the3towns.com, I last week received a letter from the Chairman of a registered political party…..or as I prefer to call them, scum.

The political party has elected councillors in a number of local authorities in England, but that does not mean they should receive any respect. They are still scum.

The political party is the BNP, the British National Party.

The letter I received came with a brochure titled ‘Racism Cuts Both Ways’, which tried to argue that the media in the UK portrayed racism as “a one-way street, where exclusively white perpetrators pick on defenceless ethnic minorities.” It then listed what we are asked to believe are genuine ‘case studies’, where Asian/Muslim men attacked whites and ‘groomed’ teenage white girls for sex. Notice that the supposed perpetrators of these alleged acts were Muslims. Not Afro-Caribbeans, Chinese or any other ethnic minority. The BNP, in its propaganda designed to stir up racial hatred, has latched onto the totally unwarranted belief amongst some sections of society that, in the wake of the 9/11 attacks in New York and the 2005 tube and bus bombs in London, if someone is a Muslim, then they must be a terrorist. It is ironic that the BNP seeks to blame the British media for an anti-white agenda, when it is right-wing English newspapers that have erroneously portrayed Asians as potential terrorists.

Amongst the BNP propaganda is the line that white people in need of a Council house “often have to wait for years, living in cramped conditions or sleeping on friends’ or relatives’ floors because there are not enough houses to go round. But asylum-seekers who have come through a dozen safe countries to get to Soft Touch Britain don’t have any such problems. Whether they have left behind a mud hut or a warlord’s palace, they are all entitled to top quality housing at British taxpayers’ expense.”

Again, latching onto the agenda of right-wing English newspapers, the BNP repeats the lie that asylum seekers are living a life of luxury in the UK. Firstly, asylum seekers, by definition, have to prove they are seeking asylum, having fled violence or persecution in their own country. If they cannot prove the circumstances that drove them to leave their homeland - the British Government operates one of the most stringent asylum systems in the world - then they are sent back, often to face torture or death at the hands of the government or militia from whom they originally fled.

Asylum seekers are not economic migrants, simply seeking a better living standard for their families. They are persecuted people in fear of their lives, desperate to be given shelter. As a democratic and relatively free nation, we have a responsibility to offer that shelter.

As for asylum seekers being “entitled to top quality housing”: I challenge anyone who actually believes that to be the case, go and live in one of the flats in Glasgow’s Sighthill, where asylum seekers are placed. Try it even for a week, then come back and tell me asylum seekers are living in top quality housing. The flats occupied by asylum seekers have, on many occasions, already been condemned, and in other areas are those that the Council cannot get local people to accept.

Again, the point of the BNP’s propaganda is simply to stir up racial hatred.

According to the BNP, the brochure I received is also being sent to every MP, MSP, councillor and national and local media outlet. It seems, therefore, that the party of the fascist right in the UK is not short of a few bob. Which prompts the question, just who is funding these social and intellectual inadequates?

The BNP, the party of semi-literate skinheads, has, over the last few years, attempted to portray itself as more mainstream and presentable, but its policies give the lie to such attempts. Like the Nazis in 1930s Germany, the BNP picks on minorities and attempts to blame them for all the ills that befall the country, a country the fascists believe belongs exclusively to them.

Although they call themselves the British National Party, be under no illusions, they don’t consider Scots to be the equal of the English. Like in apartheid South Africa, even whites are graded for their supposed ‘purity’, and the most pure are the white English. Having said that, there are some Scots who, sadly, are taken-in by the party’s vile propaganda.

In 2004, after the then Labour councillor for Ardrossan North failed to turn up for any Council meetings in over a year, a local authority by-election was held. It was won by the Tories, mainly due to the exceptionally poor quality of the candidate fielded by Labour, but the BNP also put up a candidate - someone called Paul McKenzie, who lived in Ardrossan at the time. They secured 23 votes. Twenty-three people in the North of Ardrossan voted for a racist, fascist political party.

Now, 23 votes is not a lot by any standard (it was 2.1% of all votes cast that day), but the fact that those people apparently shared the view that whites are different and better to the non-white people within our local community is shameful. It also shows how the British (mainly English) print and broadcast media can affect how people vote. After all, there are relatively few non-white faces who, even erroneously, could be blamed for the problems experienced by Ardrossan.

The BNP’s racist message gains ground in areas of England where there are large minority ethnic populations, and where, mistakenly, the white population feels threatened by what they don’t know about their neighbours. On such insecurities is built support for the modern BNP, which claims to offer ‘solutions’ to problems that exist only in its collectively warped mind.

Amongst those of us who hold socialist views, there is a line of argument that we should not share a platform with the racist BNP - so as not to give them the oxygen of publicity. While I can fully understand the logic of that argument, I believe it is better to confront the BNP and expose them for what they are - the dregs of humanity. The BNP, irrespective of whether it dresses itself in a shiny suit or high-leg Docs and jeans, is a racist organisation populated by people who seek to blame others for their own inadequacies.

The letter I received from the BNP concludes “I hope you will read this brochure” - I did - “and use your influence to help society face up to the dangers of anti-majority racism.”

There is no anti-majority racism. The only racism I have seen in political literature in this country has been that directed by the BNP at non-white minorities. As such, I will definitely use what influence I have to expose the dangers to our society of a racist organisation masquerading as a legitimate political party.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com November 15 2008

Debating independence

Last Sunday I briefly came out of political retirement to address the Beith 1320 Speakers Club, and I really enjoyed it. It’s been some time now since I took part in a public discussion on politics and I found that I had actually missed it.

The Beith 1320 Speakers Club, under the chairmanship of John Johnstone - a resident of Beith but originally a Barrmill boy - is now firmly established as one of Scotland’s foremost speaking and debating clubs.

Originally formed as the Beith 1320 SNP Speakers Club, it transformed into a broader-based, non-party affiliated club following the resignation from the SNP of the club chairman and committee members. The resignations came in 2004 and followed some guy calling on then SNP leader John Swinney to stand down and for Alex Salmond to return as National Convener. One of the good things to come from that episode was that the Beith 1320 Speakers Club was able to then offer a public platform to all political parties, and individuals, who support the restoration of Scotland’s independence. Of course, another good point to emerge from the 2004 ‘rebellion’ in SNP ranks was that Swinney was eventually forced to resign, Alex Salmond did return, and the rest, as they say, is history.

I had spoken at the Beith 1320 Club before, while I was an MSP, and I was certainly in good company. Amongst those who have made the journey to address the North Ayrshire public in Beith are: Nicola Sturgeon MSP, Jim Sillars, Alex Neil MSP, Adam Ingram MSP, Tommy Sheridan, Colin Fox, Alyn Smith MEP, Professor Sir Neil MacCormick, Dorothy-Grace Elder, Murray Ritchie and so many others from all pro-independence parties and none. Whisper it, even John Swinney spoke in Beith while he was still leader of the SNP. I seem to remember he shared a platform with the guy who called for him to stand down. That was a good debate. I enjoyed that one too.

The point of the Beith 1320 Speakers Club is to allow a platform for debate on the issues around independence, such as how we get there, how long it might take, and what an independent Scotland will look like.

Not everyone who supports Scottish independence shares the same political ideology. We certainly all wish to see Scotland re-take her independence, but some of us would rather see an independent Scotland elect a socialist government and present the people with the opportunity to move from being subjects of Her Majesty to citizens of a republic. Others who share the desire for independence would be happy to see an independent Scotland retain the Queen as head of state and to see elected a government of the centre-right.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with such a situation. Within the British Unionist political parties there are just as wide differences in ideology; in fact, their differences are probably wider. After all, there are no right-wing fascist parties that support Scottish independence, but there certainly are within the ranks of those who support the British Union.

It is right that supporters of independence debate the issues that divide us as well as unite us. As was discussed at Beith last week, pro-independence parties, and individuals, will have to reach accommodations if we are to deliver on our shared goal, but that doesn’t mean we all have to support the same pro-independence party.

One member of the Beith audience suggested that maybe it would be a good idea if everyone voted SNP, rather than for any of the other pro-independence parties, which could be seen as splitting the vote.

That suggestion would, you might think, be eminently sensible, but there is a problem. Some people who support independence could not bring themselves to vote for the SNP, which currently sits on the political centre ground, with leanings towards the centre-right in terms of financial policies. It is vitally important, therefore, that those votes are not lost to the independence cause, which is where the Scottish Socialist Party and Solidarity come in. There is even an out-and-out pro-independence party of the right, the Scottish Enterprise Party, so the broad spectrum of political ideologies is covered within the independence movement.

Another member of the audience at last Sunday’s meeting asked if the Labour victory in the Glenrothes Westminster Parliament By-Election meant that support for independence was in decline.

The short answer to that question is ‘no’. In the same way that the SNP victory in the Glasgow East Westminster Parliament By-Election didn’t show that support for the British Union was in decline.

There are a huge number of reasons why individuals vote for certain political parties at certain elections. Some people - a considerable number - actually change who they vote for at different elections, sometimes even on the same day. It is not at all uncommon for people to vote for one political party at Westminster Elections, another at Scottish Parliament Elections, and yet another at Council Elections. Ardrossan showed that factor coming into play at the May 2007 Scottish Parliament and North Ayrshire Council Elections.

The Scottish Office breakdown of the Scottish Parliament vote in Ardrossan showed a tie for first place between Allan Wilson, the Labour Party candidate, and the Independent candidate, whose name escapes me at the moment. The SNP came third at the Scottish Parliament Election in Ardrossan.

However, when we look at the North Ayrshire Council result from the same day, the first candidate to be elected to represent the town was the SNP’s Tony Gurney. People don’t always vote the same way, which is why it is wrong of British Unionist political parties to claim that a vote for them is a vote against independence. We already know that a sizeable percentage of Labour Party members, when questioned, say they would support an independent Scotland.

That is why we won’t know the true level of support for independence until the people are asked a direct question on the subject, with all other political considerations stripped out.

The people of Scotland have never been allowed a say on whether or not they wish to remain within the British Union. Not once since 1707 have British Unionists ever put Scots to the test.

The SNP’s Independence Referendum proposals will finally give the Scottish people the opportunity to say where they stand, and if British Unionist political parties vote down the proposals as they go through the Scottish Parliament, then we can only assume they are scared to hear the verdict of the people of Scotland.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com November 8 2008

We will remember them

“They shall grow not old as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.”

This Sunday, and on November 11 itself, people across the world will take time to remember those who gave their lives in time of war.

Of course, we tend to associate Remembrance Day with the two World Wars, but almost nightly on our television news we are reminded that young men are still laying down their lives in the pursuit of objectives set by politicians safely ensconced far from where the bullets fly and the shells land.

Afghanistan is a war that cannot be won by forces of the ‘coalition of the willing’. Many have tried before to subdue the Afghan tribesmen, with the best result so far achieved being a tactical withdrawal. Even one of the world’s then super-powers, the Soviet Union, eventually withdrew its forces after an unsuccessful attempt to control the country in the ten years between 1979 and 1989. However, in the Soviet Union’s defence, the Afghan tribesmen it faced were being supplied and trained by the world’s other super-power, America. American special forces provided the guns, ammunition and military training to what became the Mudjahaddin and the Taliban, the very forces that now target their guns and missiles on British and American service personnel.

Iraq, quite simply, is an illegal war. Our troops should not have been sent into the country in the first place, and certainly should not still be there five years after the world’s biggest war criminal, George W Bush, stood on the deck of a US aircraft carrier and declared “mission accomplished”.

Bush, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have blood on their hands, the blood of young British and American soldiers and of countless thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians. All three politicians should face trial on charges of war crimes, but they won’t. That’s not how we do things in the liberal free democracy that we have been told our troops are defending and, indeed, are bringing to Iraq. In this country, war criminals retire and make millions of pounds as after dinner speakers and as advisors to multi-national corporations, many of whom have fingers in the very big pies that represent the arms industry and the re-building of infrastructure that has been bombed back to the stone age.

From the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, more names of brave young men have been added to those we will remember at services across the country over the next few days, and the politicians who sent them to their deaths will look very solemn as they lay wreaths to their memory. The politicians may even be genuine in their showing of respect, but it won’t stop them sending more and more young men to the same fate.

A famous slogan was coined during the First World War - ‘A bayonet is a weapon with a worker at each end.’ The author of the saying is not recorded, but it was used by Socialists to highlight how, in the War to End All Wars, it was ordinary working class men on both sides of the conflict who fought and died at the behest of the imperialist warmongers who formed their respective governments.

Nothing much changes. Whenever we see young soldiers being interviewed on television, it is obvious that many of them joined the army to get a job and a trade - prospects that government policies denied them in civilian life - only to find themselves in far off countries with a gun in their hand.

World War II was different. If there ever can be a just war, then surely fighting to defeat fascism qualifies for that catagory. I believe, however, that World War I was not a just war. World War I was about imperialism. World War I was about the economically strong nations of Europe seeking to expand their might and influence, it was about countries seeking control of markets by building empires, from which the capitalist industry owners could make ever bigger fortunes

I had great uncles who fought on the Western Front during the ‘Great War’. Indeed, most of us will have relations who went into the hell that was supposedly going to be over by Christmas 1914, but which dragged on until an armistice was signed on November 11 1918, by which time there were around 40 million casualties and 20 million military and civilian deaths. So many of our relations who went into that war never came home, and even though it is now 90 years since the war ended, it is entirely fitting that we remember them.

As the councillor for Ardrossan North some years ago, I was proud to lay a wreath at the town’s war memorial during the annual Remembrance Day service. The wreath I laid was on behalf of the Council and was supplied by the local authority. It comprised red poppies, but, personally, I did not wear one. I still don’t wear one.

I prefer to wear a white poppy, which is not in any way intended as an insult to those who gave their lives, far from it. Unfortunately, however, it seems that in recent years the wearing of a white poppy has come under attack, mainly from the jingoistic right-wing British media, who attempt to portray it as socially unacceptable. Only this week the right-wing London Evening Standard reported that the London Fire Brigade had been “forced to apologise” after it sent out invitations to its Remembrance Day service on cards that bore the white poppy.

Why should the London Fire Brigade be forced to apologise? Only someone who completely misunderstands what lies behind the white poppy could think that wearing it - or printing it on an invitation card - is reason to merit an apology.

In fact, the white poppy recognises all the war dead, of all wars, and symbolises the hope for an end to wars, so that the list of those brave people we remember at this weekend’s services and on November 11 does not continue to grow as more young lives are lost.

The white poppy was first produced by the Co-operative Women’s Guild in 1933 and has been worn at armistice and remembrance services ever since. Those who misunderstand its meaning and who object to it being worn, should perhaps bear in mind this comment, issued by a spokesperson for the Royal British Legion, the organisation that produces the red poppy - “What you wear is a matter of choice, the Legion doesn't have a problem whether you wear a red one or a white one, both or none at all. It is up to you.”

Surely what matters is that we remember those who gave their lives, and do everything we can to prevent the current generation - and future generations - from having to make the same sacrifice.

* The opening quotation in this article is taken from the poem 'For the Fallen' by Laurence Binyon (1869-1943). The poem was first published in The Times of September 21, 1914.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com November 1 2008

Last week I watched the best football match I've seen in years

Last week I watched the best football match I’ve seen in years. No, not the Kilmarnock V Celtic League Cup game live on STV. Nor was it the Everton V Manchester United match last weekend. It wasn’t even Chelsea taking on Liverpool at Stamford Bridge, where a single Liverpool goal brought to an end Chelsea’s long unbeaten home record.

The game that had it all - 8 goals, near misses, skilful players, hard tackling, personal feuds, debatable refereeing decisions - was a Three Towns local derby. A team from Ardrossan and a team from Saltcoats played out a great game last Thursday evening, and it wasn’t Winton Rovers and Saltcoats Vics.

The game was a schoolboy match between Ardrossan Academy and St Matthew’s Academy, and both schools can be justly proud of the players that wore their colours.

The final result was Ardrossan Academy 6 St Matthew’s Academy 2, but to this neutral observer that was not the most important aspect of the game. Both teams, boys of 16 years-old, showed skill and commitment that put their professional counterparts to shame. It was bitterly cold and the pitch left a lot to be desired, but neither of these factors stopped 22 young players from getting on with the game and performing to the best of their abilities.

Having said that, it was a very local derby - both teams walked from their respective schools to one of the few remaining football pitches at Laighdykes playing field - and, of course, there was the added West of Scotland element of there being a religious divide between the teams, reflecting the Celtic-Rangers phenomenon of Scotland’s top flight football.

The game brought back memories for me - as a youngster I played in a good few Ardrossan Academy V St Andrew’s Academy matches - most of which were won by my side (Ardrossan Academy), except the time the two of us were drawn against each other in the Scottish Cup. Having done the difficult job of putting out the cup favourites in an earlier round (Holy Cross of Hamilton, which comprised a team of Celtic schoolboy signings), Ardrossan fell to a 1-0 defeat at the hands of St Andrew’s. Believe me, that was a sickener. It must have been, I can still remember it some 32 years later.

Games between the two schools were always that bit special. Notwithstanding the close physical proximity of the two schools, the local town rivalry, and the pseudo Celtic-Rangers connotations, the players of both teams knew each other so well. We had played against each other for our respective primary schools, and then for the Academies through each year. Away from school, we even played together for the same youth teams. So we knew each other and how we played - and we really, really wanted to beat the other team.

That determination had clearly travelled across the years and was in evidence at last week’s game - and for all of those reasons such a heavy defeat will have been very hard to take for the St Matthew’s players.

Having said that, and while Ardrossan Academy were certainly the better team on the day, a final scoreline of 6-2 possibly flattered them just a bit.

Both sides had players of skill who will go on to develop and may even play at a professional level. The flow of passing football throughout the game really was a joy to watch, particularly given the lack of basic skills shown so often by highly-paid professionals in Scotland’s senior sides. Certainly, the teachers who coach the two sides should take great credit from the way their teams played.

One other aspect of the game that stood out as a positive, in contrast to the actions of the professional footballers we see on our televisions every week, was how the players reacted to tough tackles - and there were plenty of those. Not once did a player who had been fouled roll about the pitch in apparent agony. There was reaction, certainly, but that was to be expected after someone had just put their studs into your shin. No-one over-reacted. No-one feigned injury. Not once when players bumped into each other did one of them hit the deck as if they had been taken out by a sniper on the roof of one of the schools. These boys played a hard, tough game, and played it like men, unlike the big Jessies of the professional game who go to ground, roarin and greetin, if an opponent as much as looks at them.

I had gone to watch the match because the son of a friend was playing. My friend is currently working in England and his son has recently returned to playing football after a very serious leg break. Being in England, he can’t keep tabs on how his son is doing, so he asked me to go along. I won’t embarrass the boy by naming him here, but by his performance in Thursday’s game, he certainly seems to be on course to recover the level of play that, prior to his leg break, had scouts from professional sides showing an interest.

It was a really good game. I enjoyed watching it, and I couldn’t say that about most of the senior games I’ve seen in recent years. Both sides wanted to win, but wanted to win by playing attractive, attacking football, which made it entertaining and good to watch. Again, credit is due to the teachers who encouraged their teams to play in that manner, rather than attempting to ’get a result’ by stopping the opposition from playing.

For me, a comment made by a St Matthew’s defender summed up the positive attitude in which the game was played. With just fifteen minutes left, and 4-1 down, he shouted to his team mates, “C’mon boys, just three goals, we can still dae it.”

In fact, those last fifteen minutes were played in semi-darkness, and while there were another three goals scored, two of them were past the St Matthew’s goalkeeper, but both sides played and tried until the final whistle.

On the display I saw last Thursday, if I were to choose between watching Ardrossan Academy play St Matthew’s Academy or Celtic play Rangers, the schools would win, easily.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com October 25 2008

Stone of Destiny

If you haven’t yet seen the film Stone of Destiny, go and see it.

The story told in the film may be romanticised and may not be absolutely historically accurate, but it is entertaining and is based on the factual event of 58 years ago that saw the Stone of Destiny returned to Scotland.

On Christmas Day 1950, four Scottish students broke into Westminster Abbey and ’stole’ the Stone of Destiny, the ancient stone on which Scottish Kings had been crowned, until it was stolen in 1296 by English King Edward I and taken to London. The point of Edward and his invading army taking the stone to England was to show the Scots that they were a nation subservient to the English. Edward’s point was that English Kings could show their domination of Scotland simply by parking their backside on the stone that our own Kings had previously used at their coronations.

In short, the act of taking the Stone of Destiny to England was a slap in the face to Scots. It was done to humiliate Scotland. Taking the stone on which our Kings had been crowned was symbolic of Scotland’s loss of independence and its subjugation by England.

Of course, Scotland later re-established her independence under the leadership first of William Wallace and then Robert the Bruce, but eventually lost it again when sold-out by Scottish ‘noblemen’ in 1707.

In all the time since 1296, and throughout the massive changes that affected both Scotland and England in subsequent centuries, the Stone of Destiny lay beneath the English Coronation Chair in Westminster Abbey, a sign of Scotland’s subservient position to England.

By 1950, Scotland had been so successfully subsumed into the English-dominated British Union that many Scottish companies and organisations styled themselves as being North British, rather than Scottish. At the same time, however, a grass roots movement had grown that sought to establish home rule for Scotland. A covenant was established, which called for the creation of a devolved Scottish Assembly, and over the period of 1949 and 1950 around 2 million people signed the Scottish Covenant.

It was in those days of increased awareness of Scotland’s diminished position within the British Union that a Glasgow University student, Ian Hamilton, was inspired to carry out a daring raid on the heart of the British establishment in London. A raid that not only would raise awareness of Scotland’s claim to self determination, but would restore to our country one of its most iconic emblems, the Stone of Destiny.

On Christmas Day 1950, armed only with a crowbar, Ian Hamilton, Kay Matheson, Gavin Vernon and Alan Stuart carried out their raid on Westminster Abbey. They successfully prised the stone from its resting place of 700 years but dropped it as it came free from beneath the Coronation Chair.

The stone broke in two, which Hamilton later said actually made it easier to remove from the Abbey. Kay Matheson took the smaller of the two parts and drove to Scotland, while Hamilton, Vernon and Stuart took the larger part by car to a wood on the outskirts of London, where they buried it and then returned to Scotland.

The reaction of the British authorities when the ‘theft’ from the Abbey was discovered included the closure of the border between Scotland and England, but Matheson had already made it home and the three men did not have the stone with them when the crossed back into Scotland.

News of the stone’s repatriation was greeted with delight in Scotland, but was seen by the British/English establishment as a potential spark for a Scottish uprising against London rule.

Eventually, once the heat had died down, Hamilton and his co-conspirators returned to the wood outside London to retrieve the stone, only to find that some Gypsies had set up camp around where they had buried it. However, being no strangers themselves to the desire for freedom, the Gypsies were happy to help dig up the stone and carry it to Hamilton’s car.

The Stone of Destiny was then returned to Scotland, where it was hidden by Scottish patriots.

Ultimately, in the knowledge that they could not hold on to the stone for ever, the patriots placed it within the ruins of Arbroath Abbey, where the declaration of Scotland’s independence was signed in 1320, and notified the police.

Hamilton, Matheson, Vernon and Stuart were arrested but were never prosecuted. The British establishment feared that to put the four students before the courts could have incited the Scottish uprising against British/English rule, which was their biggest fear at that time.

Now, that is how the film about the Stone of Destiny ends, but that is not quite the whole story.

It is a fact that while the stone was in the hands of the Scottish patriots, it was repaired by a master stone mason. The two parts were once again expertly brought together, and when the police picked it up from Arbroath Abbey it was as it had been before its removal from Westminster.

However, claims have been made that the repair was not the only work carried out by the Scottish patriot stone mason. One story has it that the craftsman actually made a copy of the stone, and that the one returned to the English was not the original. That, so the story goes, remains at home, here in Scotland. In fact, one version of the story has the real Stone of Destiny resting within easy walking distance of the Three Towns.

The other story relating to the Stone of Destiny revolves around questions over whether what Edward I stole in 1296 was actually the stone on which Scottish Kings had been crowned.

Legend has it that the monks of Scone, who looked after the stone, were aware of Edward’s intention and swapped the actual Stone of Destiny with another before the English army arrived. If that story is true, then what the English carted off to London was actually nothing more than a sewer cover, and the real Stone of Destiny has never left Scotland.

I would love to think that the Stone of Destiny currently lies at the spot in North Ayrshire I was shown some years ago, but I can’t help smiling when I think that maybe it is the case that generations of British/English monarchs have been crowned while sitting on what was actually little more than a Scottish toilet seat.

Whatever you believe, the film about the Stone of Destiny is worth seeing - and if, like me, you long for the day when Scotland retakes her independence, I bet you have a lump in your throat when Ian Hamilton’s strict father tells his boy, “Son, I’m so very proud of you.”

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com October 18 2008

Back to the future with Labour lies

Already the influence of Peter Mandelson’s return to the Labour Government seems evident. Once again absurd spin takes precedence over fact and reality in Labour’s public pronouncements.

When New Labour was created - and principle was abandoned in what had previously been the People’s Party - Peter Mandelson was credited with the adoption by the new party of the medium of spin. In fact, what New Labour did went far beyond simply putting a good spin on news stories. New Labour created a completely new tactic in news management: instead of putting out news releases that painted the party in the best possible light, New Labour distorted the reality so that what was actually bad news for the party or the country was portrayed as good news. Facts were turned on their heads and were given completely different meanings. Not for nothing was Mandelson branded ’the prince of darkness’ and likened to the 16th Century Italian Niccolo Machiavelli, whose name was synonymous with ruthless politics, deceit and the pursuit of power by any means.

Thanks to Mandelson, and of course Tony Blair, New Labour’s waging of an unprovoked and illegal war against Iraq was transformed into a just and moral crusade to bring democracy to the people of the country. Despite all available evidence, New Labour told us the war wasn’t about gaining access to Iraq’s massive oil reserves. Instead, we were told our troops had to go in because Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, which could be launched against British interests within 45 minutes.

Facts were turned on their head. Truth became lie and lie became truth.

Virtually everyone now accepts that this country was taken into an illegal war on the basis of lies told by the New Labour Government, and that the Iraq deception is just one example of how the political party created out of the New Labour Project became so associated with spin and deceit. In the eyes of the British public, Tony Blair may have been the frontman for New Labour spin, but the ‘brains’ behind the concept of manipulating truth to suit the party agenda is recognised as Peter Mandelson.

Mandelson was such a stranger to the truth that he twice had to resign from Blair’s cabinet after attempting to spin his way out of a loan scandal and then accusations that he had been involved in fast-tracking a British passport application for a Labour-supporting Indian national. So tainted with the poison of spin and deception is Mandelson that no-one thought he could ever return to government, but desperate times for Gordon Brown necessitated desperate measures, and the prince of darkness has returned.

Ostensibly, Mandelson was brought back by Gordon Brown as a Business Minister, but most people in the know are of the opinion that his real task will be to manage the Labour fightback against the Tories in England and the SNP in Scotland. Incredibly, given his reputation for spin and all its negative connotations, Mandelson was seen by Gordon Brown as just the man for the job of transforming Labour’s public image.

Here in Scotland we have this week seen clear evidence of New Labour’s return to Mandelsonian levels of spin. Once again truth has become lie and lie has become truth in New Labour’s public pronouncements.

All around us lies evidence of the failed capitalist system, and of the British Government’s failure to adequately manage the British economy. It was Gordon Brown, as chancellor of the exchequer, who proclaimed an end to the days of ‘boom and bust’: it was Gordon Brown who praised City of London financial ‘risk takers‘: it was Gordon Brown who encouraged an unprecedented credit boom by allowing a virtually unregulated financial sector: it was Gordon Brown who took the plaudits for Britain’s economic growth, despite the fact it was built on an unsustainable foundation of personal and corporate credit. Gordon Brown’s tenure as chancellor and then prime minister has coincided with the growth of the money-market spiv, and then the biggest ever financial collapse of the country’s banking system, including formerly respected institutions here in Scotland, such as the Royal Bank of Scotland and Halifax Bank of Scotland.

The financial disaster we are currently experiencing has been created while Scotland remains part of the British Union. Government failures have been British Unionist Government failures. Financial market failures have been failures within the markets operating in the British Union and other capitalist economies. Yet New Labour’s spin on the subject is that this shows an independent Scotland couldn’t stand on its own two feet. Truth becomes lie and lie becomes truth.

Despite the fact an independent Scotland would, like Norway, have built a multi-billion pound oil fund to cushion the economy from the inevitable down turns that affect the capitalist system, Gordon Brown says Scotland without England would be an economic basket case - that is the same England that is home to the British Unionist financial market place that almost brought down the two big Scottish banks.

In addition, the British Unionist prime minister criticises small, independent European nations, like Ireland, Iceland and Norway, which First Minister Alex Salmond has previously cited as an ‘arc of prosperity’ around Scotland.

The reality is that Iceland severely over-extended itself while operating the same financial model endorsed by Mr Brown’s own British Unionist Government, but Ireland was the first country to react to the international downturn in the markets and immediately safeguarded all deposits made to Irish banks. Mr Brown’s British Unionist Government has offered no such security to British investors in British banks.

As for Norway, while they have borrowed money during the current crises, as has Britain, the country still has a standard of living and a balance of accounts that Mr Brown’s British Unionist Government can only look at with envy.

Of course, if British Unionist Mr Brown really doubts the benefits of independence to small European nations, he could always ask the people of Ireland if they would like to give up their own independence and, instead, return to being part of the British Union. The answer Mr Brown would get would contain two words, the second of which would be ’off’.

Meanwhile, in the world of New Labour spin, Britain is leading the way out of the current crisis and our saviour is Gordon Brown. In reality, however, Britain has been forced to borrow billions of pounds to bail out banks, inflation continues to rise (now 5.2%) meaning people become poorer as prices rise, and unemployment in Scotland grew by 19,000 in the months from June to August.

That is the reality that New Labour spin is trying to hide. Far from Scotland not being able to afford independence, the reality is that we can’t afford much longer as part of the British Union.

It is British Unionist government policies that have created the problems Scotland currently has, and no amount of British Unionist spin will change that fact.

Independence means having control of our own resources and taking decisions for ourselves, in our own interests. That is what Scotland needs, and as the European Union’s biggest producer of oil, can well afford.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com October 18 2008

Playing for Scotland

Be honest, who amongst us, say this time last month, had heard of Chris Iwelumo?

The Coatbridge-born centre forward with Wolverhampton Wanderers had managed to ply his professional football career without grabbing any major headlines. Until, that is, he was given his Scotland international debut in last Saturday’s World Cup qualifier against Norway.

With the game at 0-0 and Scotland desperate for a goal, the big striker was thrown on to see what he could do. Immediately his size and strength created problems for the Norwegian defence, and the big man certainly got the Tartan Army behind him as he showed the kind of commitment to the cause that the fans love to see.

Then he found himself on the end of an inch-perfect cross and just two-feet out from the gaping Norwegian goal. The keeper had been beaten by the cross, it was an open goal, and as every Scotland fan knows - but struggles to understand - Iwelumo managed to miss.

Honestly, it would have been easier to score than to put the ball past the post from such close range.

Hopefully, Chris Iwelumo will get further chances to prove his real ability for Scotland, but that miss will haunt the rest of his career. It was just so bad, it was, very possibly, the worst ever miss by a professional footballer. Yes, it really was that bad.

Fate can be so cruel. Having played his football with smaller teams, like St Mirren, Iwelumo’s move to Wolves saw him strike a vein of consistency and the back of opponents’ nets on a regular basis. He went into Saturday’s game having scored 8 goals in 6 games for his club. Yet, having worked hard at his game and having earned his chance on the big stage, his contribution will be remembered for a howler of a miss.

What made things worse for Scotland fans was that Irvine-born Rangers striker Kris Boyd - a man who does little else on a football pitch but score goals - was left to watch on the substitutes bench as Iwelumo duffed his open goal and Scotland were held to a draw at home by Norway.

There can be little doubt that Kris Boyd would have taken the chance that presented itself to Iwelumo, and as a consequence, Scotland would have won the match and we would all now be a lot more confident about the team reaching the 2010 World Cup Finals in South Africa.

The fall-out from last Saturday’s game, and the decision of manager George Burley to play Chris Iwelumo (and Hibernian’s Steven Fletcher) ahead of Kris Boyd, culminated in the Rangers striker indicating that he would not play again for Scotland while Burley remained the manager.

That is a pity, because there is no doubt that Kris Boyd is a goalscorer, and every man and his dug knows that, currently, Scotland is not overly blessed in that department. However, having said that, for any Scottish player to walk out on his national team is a disgrace.

It is an honour to play for Scotland, an honour virtually every Scottish man and boy would love to achieve, but never will. Kris Boyd was given the ability that allowed him to live the dream of every Scotland fan, yet simply because the current manager of the national side chose to play other strikers ahead of him, he has turned his back on his country. That is a slap in the face to every Scotsman who ever dreamed of pulling on the dark blue jersey.

George Burley got his tactics wrong on Saturday, particularly in the first half of the game, and he certainly should have used Boyd as we chased the goal that would have given us victory, but he is the man appointed to get our team to the World Cup Finals, and he has to be allowed to manage without players trying to influence his selection by taking the huff if they aren’t picked.

Following the game against Norway, and Kris Boyd’s decision to quit the Scotland squad, George Burley made clear that the main reasons he selected Iwelumo and Fletcher ahead of Boyd were because both players are making regular starts for their club teams - Boyd is not - and they both showed a desire to play during the squad’s pre-match training sessions - apparently Boyd did not.

The right thing for Boyd to have done would have been to redouble his efforts at Rangers, to prove to club manager Walter Smith that he was indispensable to the Ibrox club, which would have had the knock-on effect of virtually guaranteeing his selection for Scotland. Instead, he didn’t have the heart to fight and chose to walk away. An action that seems to confirm George Burley’s opinion that Boyd lacked the commitment to prove himself worthy of inclusion in the team.

Scotland fans fork out a small fortune to follow the team all over the world, often for very little return - I know, I once spent £50 on a ticket to see Scotland play Costa Rica in the 1990 World Cup Finals (we lost 1-0) - but the Tartan Army will continue to spend their hard-earned money and will continue to be the most vocal and loyal fans in the world because they love Scotland and want to see our team do well. If the fans followed the Kris Boyd code of conduct and walked away after a disappointment, there would have been no-one at Hampden for the past fifty years.

Scotland fans are the best in the world, and to be the best takes dedication, commitment, courage and loyalty to the cause. Maybe when Kris Boyd realises how lucky he is to have the opportunity to play for his country, he might embrace the Tartan Army’s dedication, commitment, courage and loyalty to the cause, and maybe then Scotland fans would have him back.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com October 11 2008

North Ayrshire Council's Icelandic investments

 As I write, our local authority, North Ayrshire Council, is awaiting news of what will happen to the £15 million of our money that it deposited with two Icelandic banks that have now been placed in receivership by the government of Iceland.

There are conflicting accounts on what the Council can expect. Some ‘experts’ believe that the money is safe and will be returned to the local authority within a matter of weeks. This theory appears to be supported by the Westminster Government, which, certainly at this stage, does not seem moved to guarantee deposits made into Icelandic banks by local authorities and other public bodies.

However, other ‘experts’ have a different view, one that argues Councils may not get back everything they deposited. According to one financial advisor, public sector investors in Icelandic banks may only receive back 20p-in-pound of what they stuck away for a rainy day. In North Ayrshire Council’s case, that would mean a £750,000 return on a £15 million investment. That would be a disaster and, surely, would be the very worst case scenario.

Clearly, North Ayrshire Council, like every other local authority, has to budget sensibly and has to put away monies for unforeseen contingencies, which, I think we can assume, is what they did with the £15 million they shipped over to Iceland. It is probably the case that the Icelandic £15 million does not represent the entire ‘rainy day’ nest egg accumulated by the Council, which, of course, would be seen as prudent financial management.

Well, it would if the capitalist system wasn’t corrupt, and if the Council had not invested such a large sum of money with banks that lay outwith the scope and regulation of the UK Financial Services Authority.

Because of the decision the Council took to place such a substantial sum of money in foreign banks, we - and they - now have a period of great uncertainty. In Iceland, the government has moved to safeguard only deposits made by Icelandic citizens, organisations and companies.

Here, in the UK, the Labour Government has stated that individual British investors will see their money safeguarded. Gordon Brown has even used anti-terror legislation to freeze UK-based assets of the Icelandic banks that collapsed in the past week. Councils, charities, police authorities and health boards, however, appear to be a different story.

We can question the wisdom of North Ayrshire Council in placing millions of pounds in foreign banks, but the local authority would be justified in asking why it is that a Labour Government has been prepared to splash billions of pounds to safeguard banks and private sector investors, but is reluctant to offer the same level of help to investors from the public sector.

The banks in which North Ayrshire Council invested had triple A ratings, until they collapsed earlier this week. In financial terms they were seen as a safe bet - but in the world of international capitalism, any bet can go spectacularly wrong.

Capitalism is built on greed and exploitation. The founding principle of the capitalist system is the creation of wealth, but not for everyone. In order for the capitalist system to work, the majority of people have to be exploited. In order for capitalists to make profit, workers - the real wealth creators - have to be paid less than their labour is actually worth. It is a corrupt system.

Over the last few weeks we have seen the whole capitalist system brought to its knees. Even in the greatest exponent of the free market system, America, we have seen the government nationalise banks and financial institutions. The same has happened in the UK. public finance - our money - has been used to bail out the failures of the free market economy, who for years have told us that they do things so much better than the public sector. They don’t, and the last weeks have proved that point once and for all.

The UK bail out of failing banks has seen the Labour Government take stakes in the financial organisations, but has stopped short of outright nationalisation. That is a pity, because nationalisation of the country’s banking system is exactly what we need. Such a move would be in the interests of all the people, not just investors.

Banks that were run in the interests of the people, not in the pursuit of mega-million pound profits, could offer reasonable and government-backed returns on investment for individual savers, companies and public bodies. How much less would the four North Ayrshire schools have cost that were built recently using the PPP funding method if the Council could simply have gone to a state owned bank to secure the capital required? How much better would it have been for North Ayrshire Council Tax-payers if the local authority could have borrowed from the state, at a favourably low rate of interest, and could have repaid the money spread over a period of around 60 years?

Compare that proposition with what actually happened - where the Council entered into a deal with private companies backed by off-shore financial speculators, each of which is taking huge profits from the deal. Our money has gone into the pockets of those like the spivs and speculators that have brought down well-established banks, rather than going into the education of our children, and into producing sound public buildings that will actually still be around, and in good condition, by the time the money used to build them has been repaid.

In our own interests we really need to look beyond the smoke and mirrors of the capitalist financial speculators. We don’t need them. What we do need is banks and financial institutions we can trust. We need to transform our society so that people are put before profit.

Nationalised banks, backed by the state funding that has just bailed out the capitalist spivs, could be the solid foundation needed to really regenerate communities the length and breadth of the country.

If there was a national bank, offering maximum security and favourable returns to investors, what reason would local authorities like North Ayrshire Council have for taking risks by putting huge sums of money into foreign banks?

By putting £15 million into two Icelandic banks, the Council were looking to make money. They were speculating with our money. They were acting like capitalists, rather than the representative body of the people of North Ayrshire.

As I write, we just have to hope they haven’t gambled and lost.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com October 4 2008

The power to end poverty lies in our hands

In the week in which further billions of pounds have been made available to shore-up failed banks and financial institutions - and to bail-out the extremely well paid people responsible for the precarious positions of those banks and institutions - here is the statistic that should shame us all: in North Ayrshire, every fourth child is living in poverty.
Actually, I exaggerated that figure. It isn’t 25% of North Ayrshire children that are living in poverty, it’s only 23%. Does that make you feel better? No, of course it doesn’t - or at least it shouldn’t.

One child living in poverty is one too many. For almost every fourth child in North Ayrshire to be in that position is hard-and-fast evidence that we, as a society, have got our priorities wrong.

This week our prime minister said he would “do whatever it takes” to solve the problem. Not the problem of poverty, of course. Our prime minister and his New Labour Government will do whatever it takes, and spend however much is needed, to bail-out the bankrupt capitalist system. They will do that, and they will do it now. Meanwhile, ending child poverty in this relatively rich country remains an aspiration to be achieved by 2020.

In fact, the New Labour Government’s current commitment is not to end child poverty, but to halve it in the UK by 2010. The Campaign to End Child Poverty is this Saturday (October 4) holding a rally in London’s Trafalgar Square, with the aim of keeping the government to that promise. In other words, the campaign wants to make sure there is no slippage in the government’s promise - a promise that, even if achieved, will still leave thousands of young people in this country living below the poverty line for at least another 12 years.

According to the Campaign to End Child Poverty, unless the UK Labour Government is prepared to set aside £3 billion in its next budget, it will fail to keep its promise to halve child poverty in the UK by 2010. How many billions of pounds has the same Labour Government committed over the last couple of weeks to companies and corporations in the City of London, simply to shore-up the prices of stocks and shares?

Of course, successive Westminster Governments - Tory and Labour - have told us that the capitalist system benefits everyone. The more successful the financial markets, the more profitable is the national economy, and the more wealth there is to trickle down to the ordinary man and woman in the street. That’s the theory, but some of us have been arguing for a very long time that, in practice, that theory doesn’t work - and the events of recent weeks have proved that beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Under this Labour Government, the gap between the rich and the poor in society has widened - the rich have got richer, while the poor have got poorer. As Tommy Sheridan once put it, “The Labour Party has gone from being the party of the millions, to the party of the millionaires.”

I can remember taking part in a parliamentary debate on poverty. Opposition MSPs made speeches that referred to statistics showing more people in Scotland were living in poverty than had been the case a generation ago. In response, Labour ministers in the then Scottish Executive cited figures, which they claimed showed the Government had reduced the number of Scots living in absolute poverty. That was the line of defence the then government parties (Labour and the Lib Dems) sought to use in the debate: they drew a distinction between ‘absolute’ and ‘relative’ poverty, and claimed success for moving some people from absolute poverty to just relative poverty.

It made me feel sick to hear very well-paid politicians argue that people existing in relative poverty should apparently be grateful to the Labour/Lib Dem Scottish Executive and the Labour Government in London for the fact that their lives had marginally improved, but that they were still living in poverty.

In my contribution to that parliamentary debate, I made the point that if you are poor you know you’re poor, and it doesn’t matter one bit to you whether you are living in relative or absolute poverty - you are still extremely poor and you still struggle to feed your kids.

I steered clear of statistics in my speech, instead I referred to real people and how being poor impacts on them, and I didn’t have to go to Glasgow or any other inner city location to find the poor. They were, and are, all around us here in North Ayrshire.

I spoke about young women in the Three Towns who often didn’t eat, so that there was enough food for their children. I spoke about the impact poverty has on children, from poor diet, to being set apart from their pals because of the clothes they wore; I spoke about schoolchildren not being able to take part in the activities their pals did, because their own parents couldn’t afford the couple of pounds the activities cost. I spoke about the negative impact poverty has on the education of young people: it’s much more difficult to concentrate on your homework if you have to do it in the only room in the house where there is a heater, and where brothers and sisters are playing, and a television is blaring.

These were not stories made up for effect. These were, and are, the reality of local people.

In that parliamentary debate I also told of the kind-faced man in his sixties who, every Monday, met up with a group of young women in one of Ardrossan’s main streets. He then gave the women a lift to the Post Office. Wasn't that good of him?

Well, actually, no it wasn't good of him. The man wasn't giving the women a lift to the Post Office out of the goodness of his heart. He was a money lender. He held the women’s ‘Monday books’ (Social Security benefit payment books) as collateral against the money they had borrowed from him, at exorbitant rates of repayment, and he took them to the Post Office so that he could get their money before they spent it on food or clothes for their children.

That is the reality of poverty in the Three Towns. It is a story not of ‘relative’ and ‘absolute’, but of grinding hardship and unending pressure. Poverty is a trap. Once you are in it, it is extremely difficult to get out of it.

Of course, it would help if we elected politicians who gave a greater priority to providing a better life for all the citizens and all the children of this country, than they do to spending billions of pounds on nuclear weapons of mass destruction, that we will never use, or multi-billions of pounds on bailing out wealthy bankers.

Its all about priorities. If we wanted to, we could eradicate poverty in this country, and indeed in the world, and we could do it relatively quickly. All it would take is for us to elect politicians who put society before capital, and people before profit.

That power is in our hands. At election time, its up to us how we use it.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com September 27 2008

North Ayrshire needs jobs

So, what did Gordon Brown say in his speech to the Labour Party Conference that would impact on us here in the constituency of North Ayrshire & Arran? In short, the answer to that question is, not a lot.

Since the demise of ICI at Ardeer, Shell and the commercial dock in Ardrossan, along with numerous manufacturing companies spread around the district, North Ayrshire has declined to a position where we have persistently high unemployment and some of the worst areas of deprivation in Scotland.

The area’s demise began under the Tory Governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major, which implemented policies that destroyed traditional heavy industry, and has continued under the Blair and Brown New Labour Governments.

Think back to 1997 when the Major Government was in its death throws. Shiney, happy New Labour told us, in the song by D:ream, that ’things can only get better’. An awful lot of people believed that to be the case, and an awful lot of people have been badly let down.

For those of us in areas like North Ayrshire, things have not got better. If anything, they have continued to worsen.

In the past year or so we have seen the creation of another regeneration company, which, we are told, will lead to the regeneration of the Three Towns, Kilwinning and Irvine. So far, in the Three Towns, we have seen precious few signs of the regeneration the area needs. The Irvine Bay Urban Regeneration Company (IBURC) has embarked on a programme that has seen expensive private housing built on land that formerly was part of the commercial harbour area in Ardrossan. As the3towns.com has previously reported, the new housing is priced way beyond the reach of the average Three Towns’ couple, and that was before the impact of the credit crunch saw mortgages become even harder to secure.

In regeneration terms, it may yet be early days - certainly we have to hope that is the case - because the new expensive, private housing is, so far, the extent of the regeneration company’s efforts. When pressed about what it has done to bring much-needed jobs to the area, IBURC states that it has renovated two shops in Ardrossan’s Princes Street and hopes to expand the nearby yachting marina. It says that, apparently in all seriousness. Two shops, and an aspiration to expand the facility that ultimately killed the commercial port of Ardrossan, formerly one of the area’s biggest employers, and that‘s it. Until IBURC and/or government announces plans for a major job creation programme in North Ayrshire, the current regeneration project will not be taken seriously by local people. As things stand, the regeneration programme being run by IBURC is a cosmetic exercise. It appears that nothing is being done to really regenerate the area.

North Ayrshire needs jobs. Until local people can find secure, well-paid employment, the area will remain depressed and deprived, and no amount of unaffordable private housing will change that fact.

I have long argued that North Ayrshire - and, for that matter, Scotland - needs to get back to creating jobs where, to put it simply, we make things. We need to recreate a manufacturing base. The Tory/New Labour idea that manufacturing jobs could be replaced by service sector employment was always a nonsense. According to Thatcher, Major and their New Labour successors, it didn’t matter that areas like North Ayrshire lost one particular type of work, so long as it was replaced by another.

I can remember in the early 1990s, as a councillor sitting on the Council’s Economic Development Committee, receiving reports that listed jobs lost and jobs created in North Ayrshire. Some months these reports showed more jobs being created than lost, which didn’t accord with what I was seeing in local communities. That being the case, I asked if Council officials could provide a more detailed breakdown of the job figures, for example by sector and gender.

It was only once these more detailed reports began to appear that the true picture emerged of employment trends in North Ayrshire. The jobs being lost were mainly full-time, well-paid manufacturing positions, while the jobs being created were part-time and relatively poorly-paid. There was also a gender split: it was mainly men who were losing their jobs and women who were taking up the part-time, low-paid vacancies.

Since then the situation has worsened. There are now very few full-time, well-paid jobs anywhere in North Ayrshire, either for men or women. The biggest employer, by far, is actually North Ayrshire Council, while the largest private sector employer is British Energy at Hunterston. Other than those two organisations, every other employer is relatively small and employment opportunities are few and far between.

While a Member of the Scottish Parliament, I put forward the proposition that we, as a country, would not be able to return to the days when there were so many manufacturing jobs that people could pick and choose where they worked. However, I offered the opinion that this should not stop us attempting to recreate a strong manufacturing sector.

My idea was that Scotland should choose three or four particular industries in which we could specialise. Education and vocational skills could be targeted towards providing workers in those industries, from craft apprentices, through skilled tradespeople and onto qualified and highly-trained managers. Building a reputation for quality in these areas of industry, it would then be possible for Scotland to export our manufactured products to the world.

One potential area for specialisation that I highlighted at the time was aircraft manufacture. Ayrshire was formerly the home of aircraft manufacture in Scotland, with the Jetstream 31 and 41, and the ATP (Advanced Turbo Prop) all having been built at Prestwick.

The Jetstream was recognised as the best in its class of aircraft, but its manufacturer, British Aerospace Regional Aircraft, could not compete on cost against Bombardier of Quebec and Embraer of Brazil, primarily because those companies received substantial government subsidy. The UK government was barred by European Union subsidy rules from financially backing the Jetstream.

It would require the British Government or a future independent Scottish Government to negotiate a derogation in terms of EU subsidy rules - or preferably for a future independent Scotland to operate from outwith the European Union - but in those circumstances aircraft manufacture could recommence at Prestwick, with great opportunity created for smaller Ayrshire-based manufacturing companies to feed into the production process.

There are other similar areas of manufacturing and production where Scotland could specialise and where high-quality, well paid jobs could be created. All that would be required is the political will.

Unfortunately, no such political will currently exists. Certainly, Gordon Brown offered no hope of any change for areas like North Ayrshire when he addressed the Labour Conference last week.

‘Thing’s can only get better’? Not under New Labour or any other Westminster government they won’t.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com September 20 2008

Sectarianism - Scotland's shame

 Aren’t those wacky, fun-loving Rangers fans just a hoot? What hilarious funsters they are with their witty wee song about the Irish potato famine being over, so the predominantly Roman Catholic supporters of Celtic can ‘go home’ to Ireland, the land of their forefathers.

The song, to the tune of the Beach Boys hit ‘Sloop John B’, goes, ‘Why don’t you go home? Why don’t you go home? The famine’s over, why don’t you go home?’ Hilarious, eh?

In attempting to justify the singing of the song at the most recent Old Firm match, which Rangers won 4-2, a spokesman for the Rangers Supporters Trust was this week quoted saying that it was aimed at “mocking the myths rival fans perpetuate”.

Myths? The word myth can be used simply to refer to a story, but the most commonly understood meaning of the word ’myth’ refers to a story or belief that is probably not true. So let’s look at the ‘myths’ Celtic fans are accused of perpetuating, and to which the Rangers fans refer in their ’famine song’.

It is no myth that Celtic Football Club was formed out of the poor Irish-Catholic immigrant population in the Glasgow of the 1880s. It is also no myth that many members of that immigrant community had ended up in Glasgow after being forced to leave their homeland because of ’the great hunger’ or potato famine of 1845~50. These people came to Scotland looking for the work that would allow them to feed their families. Back home in Ireland, over 1,000,000 men, women and children were dying from hunger. Those are facts, not myths (stories that are probably not true).

If the core of the Celtic support was formed by an immigrant Jewish community, would it be acceptable, not to mention funny, if Rangers fans sang, ’Why don’t you go home? Why don’t you go home? The gassing’s over, why don’t you go home?’

Of course it wouldn’t be acceptable. It would be shocking and almost unimaginably offensive. So why do some people think it is okay to ’wind-up’ those of Irish descent by singing a song that refers to over a million Irish people dying because they were poor and hungry? Well, that’s the Old Firm for you. As Billy Connolly once said, “An Old Firm game is where supporters of Rangers and Celtic go to a football ground and shout abuse at each other for 90 minutes. Then they go home and put the telly on to find out what the score was.”

The sectarianism generated by the Rangers/Protestant - Celtic/Catholic divide has been referred to as ‘Scotland’s shame’, and indeed it is; but that shame runs deeper than just footballing or religious rivalry.

In January 2005, the then First Minister of Scotland, Jack McConnell MSP, launched and headed a Scottish Executive anti-sectarian initiative. Indeed, Mr McConnell recently criticised the current First Minister, Alex Salmond, for what the former Labour leader felt was the SNP Government’s failure to build on his initiative since it came to power in May 2007.

Back in 2005, as the McConnell initiative was being launched, I wrote an article on Scotland’s sectarian shame and how Jack’s plan would fail. Unusually, the article was published in both of Scotland’s quality daily newspapers, the Herald and the Scotsman.

I was reminded of the article this week as the ’famine song’ once again revealed the sore of Scotland’s sectarianism. I’ve copied it below. When reading the article, please remember that it was written almost four years ago, and consider whether anything has changed. Please also bear in mind that the First Minister referred to in the article was Jack McConnell.

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Jack McConnell's new attempt to address and tackle sectarianism in Scotland will fail. It will fail for two main reasons: firstly, the two Glasgow football clubs on either side of the religious divide need the revenue generated by their religion-motivated fans; and secondly, because Jack McConnell and his Scottish Government are unionists and unionists are a significant part of the problem.

For British unionists to continue to dominate and govern Scotland, the status quo has to be maintained; and for the status quo to be maintained, Jack McConnell and unionist politicians have to ensure that the people of Scotland - primarily the working class people of Scotland - continue to be divided. The alternative to that would see the people of Scotland shake off historic indoctrination and come together as the nation of Scotland. That alternative would unite the talents and abilities of all Scots. The alternative - the Scottish alternative - would see this nation's interests as paramount. The Scottish alternative would free Scots from the long-instilled notions that they should either aspire to being British or long to be Irish. The Scottish alternative would see Scots proud to be Scottish and focussed on really making Scotland what Jack McConnell claims it is, 'the best wee nation in the world'. But the Scottish alternative could only come about after Scotland had retaken its place on the world stage as an independent nation. However, to a British unionist like Jack McConnell, an independent Scotland is to be resisted at all costs.

It's said that, in polite company, one should never discuss politics, religion or football. That may well be the case, but if Scotland is to tackle sectarianism, we have to accept that all three subjects are intrinsically linked in our country. That being the case, we have to tackle them head on, and anyone too polite to understand that reality should stop reading now.

Scotland's football is, of course, dominated by Rangers and Celtic. Today, in public, both clubs will agree that sectarianism is a problem and will state that they will do everything they can to help eradicate the problem. In private, however, the clubs know that the religious affiliation of their respective supporters is the fundamental driving force of their allegiance to those clubs and that, as a consequence, to eradicate the sectarianism associated with Rangers and Celtic would require the clubs to publicly denounce the linking of any religious persuasion with their teams. To begin to break the sectarian links, Rangers Football Club would have to take every opportunity to state publicly that, if the reason a person supports Rangers is because they are a Protestant, then Rangers consider that to be unacceptable and don't want the support of that person. Likewise, Celtic Football Club would have to reject any supporter whose principal motivation for supporting Celtic was the fact that he or she was raised as a Roman Catholic.

Such rejection of religion-motivated supporters would be the first step towards Rangers and Celtic really beginning to tackle the sectarianism that blights their clubs, but it won't happen. It won't happen because, if it did, Rangers and Celtic would be rejecting the majority of their supporters. Yes, it is only a minority of supporters of both clubs who are openly sectarian, but the reality is that the majority of the supporters of Rangers and Celtic owe their footballing allegiance to their religious upbringing. That's a fact, and if Rangers and Celtic were to publicly reject anyone whose primary reason for supporting the club was that person's religious background, then Rangers and Celtic could be committing financial suicide.

That's the reality of the situation we face today. Rangers and Celtic - like the First Minister - will talk publicly about tackling sectarianism, but both clubs - directors, officials and supporters alike - know that they can only reject the ties that link the clubs to different religions at a very considerable cost.

The football-based sectarianism of the supporters of Rangers and Celtic is the most visible aspect of the problem that blights Scottish society, but it is only a symptom. The real problem lies much deeper and links us back to politics and British unionist domination of Scotland. Because of our country's religious history and the centuries-long domination of our land by our English neighbour, we have one significant section of the population that considers itself British and another that wishes it was Irish.

We can see the British at Ibrox, with their Union flags, singing Rule Britannia and showing how British they are by wearing England football jerseys. Meanwhile, across the city, the Irish will be at Parkhead, waving the flag of the Irish Republic and signing the Fields of Athenry.

Of course, the previously referred-to religion-based divisions apply to this situation but, again, they represent simply a manifestation of a symptom of the problem. The football-based sectarianism in Scotland is born of the real problem, the divisions and resentments created by the historic British/English domination of its smaller neighbours, Ireland and Scotland.

The First Minister may well believe that he means it when he says he wants to rid Scotland of sectarianism, but as a British unionist politician, can he do that and also maintain British unionist control over Scotland?

Scotland will only genuinely begin to tackle the sectarianism that blights our country when we, ourselves, get over the inferiority that drives sections of our population to aspire to being British/English or Irish. Scotland will remain divided and sectarian until we retake our place as an independent nation and the positive focus of the people of Scotland is concentrated on the benefits of being Scottish.

Jack McConnell is a unionist. Scotland's First Minister believes that our country should be a devolved region of Britain and that our Scottish Parliament should play a subservient role to the British Parliament in London. By definition, then, Scotland's First Minister defends the status quo that drives the aspirant British to fly their Union flags and sing Rule Britannia, and which, in turn, stokes the actions of the would-be Irish in shunning this British control. Why some of the would-be Irish would then vote for unionist political parties, thereby securing continued British control of Scotland, is a logic beyond my comprehension.

For Jack McConnell's initiative to work in tackling sectarianism in Scotland, the First Minister has to recognise that we, as a nation, first have to dismantle the structures that have created the Protestant/British, Catholic/Irish divides in Scotland. To free Scotland of sectarianism, we need to free Scotland of the British state and British media indoctrination that drives our people to want to be something other than Scottish.

A Scottish people united in our Scottishness and working to deliver a better Scotland for all of our people, rather than divided on religious and British/Irish lines is a prerequisite to leaving behind the bitterness that has stoked the flames of sectarianism in this country.

A united Scottish people with the power to transform our nation will only come about when we re-take our independence and raise our children to be proud of being Scottish. Jack McConnell, as a British unionist, will fight to prevent that happening - and his anti-sectarian initiative will fail.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com September 13 2008

Capitalism has failed

Capitalism doesn’t work.

If anyone needed further evidence of the veracity of that statement, they surely got it this week when the American government nationalised the country’s two major mortgage providers, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Never again should we hear the mantra of the free marketeers that private enterprise is much more efficient than the public sector. It just isn’t true.

All around us private enterprise is hitting the buffers, and who is expected to pick up the tab for this failure of the capitalist system? That’s right, the public sector. Or to put it another way, you and me.

Billions of public dollars have been made available to bail-out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac because, we are told, if those two private companies were allowed to fail, the entire American economy could have collapsed, and could have taken with it the economies of just about every western democracy.

Over here, a similar story happened when the Labour Government decided it was a good use of millions of public pounds to prop-up Northern Rock, a private bank. Note the major difference between the actions of the US and UK governments: in the States, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been nationalised, they have been taken into public ownership, but the UK government has made millions of pounds available to Northern Rock while allowing the company to remain in private ownership.

If public funds are made available to rescue failed private businesses, those companies should become the property of the state.

The most glaring of the private enterprise failures bailed-out by the public purse in the UK was British Energy, operators of Britain’s nuclear power facilities, including Hunterston.

Millions-upon-millions of pounds have been poured into British Energy by the UK Labour Government. In fact, had the government not made such funding available, British Energy would have gone out of business. So uneconomic is the production of energy through nuclear generation that it cannot be done without massive public subsidy - and that is before we even consider the billions of pounds of public money that we pay to clean up the nuclear mess. British Energy doesn’t pay for that, we do - and there is still no answer to the question of what we do with the toxic nuclear waste we have already created through nuclear energy generation. Shame on the UK Labour Government - and a majority of North Ayrshire councillors - who want to continue ploughing millions of pounds of public money into the privately-owned nuclear industry, and to bequeath to our children and grandchildren the task of dealing with even more radioactive toxic waste.

In 2004, long before the current economic problems kicked-in, I wrote a pamphlet called ‘Scotland’s Youth - Scotland’s Future’ (published by Beith 1320 Booklets). The point of the pamphlet was to set out my vision of what an independent Scotland should look like if we are to provide the best possible future for all of our citizens.

I remember that, at the time, the main idea from the booklet that the national media latched onto was my suggestion that the public utilities should be renationalised, without compensation being paid to shareholders.

The reason some sections of the pro-private enterprise national media highlighted that aspect of my independence vision was to brand me as one of the ’loony left’. According to the right-wing free-marketeers, anyone who advocated taking private companies back into public ownership was mad. To them, there was a simple rule that was not to be challenged - private ownership was good, public ownership bad. Events have proved that ideology to have been profoundly wrong, and the ‘bad‘ public sector is now having to save the necks of the private enterprise money-men.

Meanwhile, nothing has changed regarding my opinion on the ownership of the public utilities. Of course providers of electricity and gas should be in public ownership. We, the public, need electricity and gas for essential aspects of our lives, such as heating our homes and cooking our food. We should, therefore, own the mechanisms for providing us with that essential energy - and that goes for oil, too.

The people currently calling for a windfall tax on energy companies to help offset price rises are missing the point. Energy companies are private enterprises, which have at their very core the objective of making as much money as they possibly can. It is that greed that drives the capitalist system. What right does government have to penalise private companies for doing what they exist to do?

The answer to prohibitively high energy prices is not to levy additional taxes on private companies, it is to nationalise those organisations, to take them back into public ownership.

Those of us who were politically active in the 1980s will remember how Margaret Thatcher’s Tory Government privatised the public utilities. They sold-off electricity, gas and telecoms to private enterprise. In reality, they virtually gave away the utilities to companies whose owners were donors to, and supporters of, the Tory Party. Then, within a few years, Tory ministers were taking up highly-paid directorships with the private companies that had bought our utilities at knock-down prices.

Those utilities were public assets. They belonged to you and me, and Thatcher had no right to sell them.

As I put it back in 2004, we should take back those public assets, and we certainly should not pay any compensation to shareholders in the private companies that currently run them. Shareholders have made good profit over the time the utilities have been in private ownership - they have made more than enough. In essence, they have profited from stolen goods - stolen from you and me - and if they have a problem with those goods being returned to their rightful owners, then they should take it up with the people who stole them in the first place, Margaret Thatcher and her Tory Government.

Through the privately-owned media, we have been indoctrinated into believing that the private sector was inherently better than the public sector at running everything from local schools to national energy infrastructures. The North Ayrshire PPP for Schools Project and the current energy price rip-off show that is not the case.

Public utilities and services provided to the public should be in the ownership of the public, and should be administered and run on our behalf by publicly-elected representatives. By removing the greed motive of private enterprise, and its need to generate profit, decent wages can be paid to workers employed in the delivery of services to the public, and energy can be delivered at prices people can afford.

All around us we can see the results of the failure of capitalism. It doesn’t have to be that way. Social ownership and provision of services works in our interests.

Capitalism has failed. Its time for socialism.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com September 6 2008

A fair tax

The Scottish Parliament kicked itself back into life this week after the long summer recess.

Now, firstly, let me make quite clear that I’m not having a go at MSPs over the length of that summer recess. MSPs don’t determine its length and, contrary to what the tabloid newspapers would have you believe, recess is not a holiday. Most MSPs will, if they are lucky, manage a couple of weeks away with the family during recess, but the majority of the time away from parliament is spent in local offices, meeting constituents and trying to help resolve the issues they raise.

In fact, most MSPs will get through more work during recess than they can manage when they have to spend the best part of the week in Edinburgh. Of course, in Edinburgh, their workload is very different.

Bringing forward legislation, if your party is in government, or scrutinising proposed laws if you are in opposition. If you think that doesn’t sound like hard work, I challenge you to sit through a Stage 3 debate, where proposed legislation, and any amendments - there can be hundreds - are debated, line by line, and then voted on. It might not be hard manual graft, but it certainly leaves you mentally drained, particularly if you are an Independent without party support.

You see, when you are a member of one of the political parties, you are provided with a sheet that tells you how to vote on every one of the possibly hundreds of amendments. You don’t have to know what you’re voting on; you don’t even have to be in the chamber until the division bell sounds and you have to scuttle back in to vote. Of course, the party members who have responsibility for the portfolio into which the subject being debated falls, they have to know what each and every amendment means, and it is they who provide other members of their party with a ’voting sheet’.

That doesn’t happen when you are an Independent. There are no other members with portfolio responsibility; instead, you have to know what the Bill is about and you have to try to follow the debate on every amendment, so that you know which way to vote when a division is called. Great fun.

Anyway, the first debate for members returning from recess was on the SNP’s Programme for Government. You may have seen or read about the outcome of the debate. First Minister Alex Salmond set out what the SNP Government sees as its priorities for the forthcoming session of parliament. They’re going to be busy.

Mr Salmond announced that his government intends to bring forward no fewer than 15 Bills, including one that would see the scrapping of the hated Council Tax and its replacement by a local income tax, based on a person’s ability to pay. In other words, a fair tax.

Now, obviously, no-one likes to pay tax, but if we have to, and we do, then the tax has to be fair and seen to be fair. We shouldn’t be forced to pay more than we can afford, but neither should we pay less than our fair share.

Under the Council Tax, which is based on the assessed value of the property in which we live, a single pensioner on a very limited fixed income can be hit with a massive tax bill because they continue to live in what was the family home. Just because someone has, for the sake of argument, a detached house in one of our more leafy suburbs, doesn’t mean that they also have a healthy disposable income. That pensioner with only the state pension and maybe a small works pension as income would seriously struggle to pay a tax based, not on their income and what they actually have to spend, but on what someone believes is the value of their home.

The only fair tax is one that is based on a person’s ability to pay. Under a local income tax, just like national income tax, if you don’t have an income, then you don’t pay the tax. If you have a moderate income, you will pay a moderate rate of tax; and if you earn megabucks, then you will be expected to meet your obligations to society by paying a bit more in tax.

Under the SNP’s local income tax, the vast majority of Scots would be better off, but that didn‘t stop right-wing newspapers, like the Daily Mail and the Daily Express, from running front page stories claiming that the SNP was to sock the middle class with Salmond‘s Tartan Tax. The only way a member of the so-called middle class would pay more under a local income tax is if their income was sufficiently high to warrant an increased tax contribution. An income tax does exactly what it says on the tin - it is based on your income: no income - no tax; low income - low tax contribution; middle level income - middle level tax contribution; high level of income - high tax contribution. That is fair.

If we want Council services - and certainly we all moan when those services break down or are withdrawn - then we have to make sure local authorities are properly funded, and the way that we fund those services is through taxation. No-one should be asked to pay more than they can afford, and no-one should be paying less than their fair share.

In parliament, the only obvious supporters of the SNPs proposal is the Liberal Democrats, who also favour a local income tax. However, the SNP has changed its long-standing commitment to have the local income tax set locally, by each local authority. What the SNP’s current local income tax proposes is a centrally-set tax of 3p-in-the-pound, covering all 32 of Scotland’s local councils. The Lib Dems support the former SNP position of a locally-set tax, so there might be no agreement between the two parties.

The Labour Party supports the Council Tax, albeit with a few extra valuation bands added to those that currently exist. Such changes would make very little difference and would still be based, not on a person’s ability to pay, but on the notional value of their property.

Tories, being Tories, don’t care about fairness and would rather the rich got to keep their money, while those of us that are less well off pay more tax to make up for the wealthy shirking their responsibility.

It may be, therefore, that the SNP Government is unable to get its Local Income Tax Bill through parliament. That would be a great shame.

Of course, if it turns out that Labour, the Tories and the Lib Dems band together to defeat the introduction of a fair taxation system that would benefit the vast majority of us, then we will know who does not deserve our vote when the next election comes around.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com August 30 2008

The British flag

Following-on from last week’s article about the anti-Scottish nature of God Save the Queen, I was approached during the week in a local shop by a man who strongly objected to Scottish athletes at the Olympics standing on the medal podium as the British national anthem played and the British Union flag climbed the flagpole.

I explained about Scotland not being a real nation, just a region of Britain, and how that won’t change until we Scots get off our knees and retake our independence.

“Aye”, he said, “but why should Scots athletes not be allowed to fly the saltire rather than the Butcher’s apron?”

It was his use of the description ’Butcher’s apron’ that reminded me of an article I wrote in 2006, after the SNP had apologised for one of its MSPs describing the British flag in those terms.

I dug it out. This is why I thought the SNP was wrong to apologise:


“So, the SNP has apologised after one of its MSPs used the phrase “Butcher’s apron” to describe the British Union flag in a press release.

British Unionist political opponents were said to be outraged at the use of this phrase, with the Tories describing themselves as “appalled” at this “separatist nonsense”. Well, no surprise there, then. No surprise at all – so just why did the SNP apologise?

Apparently, so the Unionist line goes, to describe the British flag in such terms is to insult the thousands of Scots who have served and are serving under the flag in HM Armed Forces, and those Scots – presumably Unionist Scots - who still look fondly on the Union flag and, indeed, the British Union itself. Had the Unionist critics of the phrase not changed it to read “a butcher’s apron” – with the imagery of a blood-soaked rag (although that might actually be not too far from the truth) - rather than ‘the Butcher’s apron’ – as reference to the flag carried into battle by ‘Butcher’ Cumberland at Culloden in 1746 - they might not have been on quite such shaky ground. In addition, had they even attempted to understand the origins of the phrase, rather than rushing out press releases of their own in order that they could be outraged and appalled, then their petty party politics would not have reflected quite so badly on them and would not have exposed those London-based British Unionist parties as seriously ignorant of Scottish history and, in a more contemporary sense, deeply, deeply anti-Scottish.

Notwithstanding the fact that virtually every ‘Scottish’ regiment of the British Army has in its past some shameful ‘battle honour’ from its role in the name of British imperialism and Empire and in subjugating and exploiting the people of developing countries around the globe, a close look at supporters of an independent Scotland will find many ex-service personnel, plenty of whom were driven to their belief in a normal, independent Scotland by their experiences in the British Army. So, not all Scots who have served or who are still serving in the British armed forces will be upset by the historically accurate description of the British Union flag as the Butcher’s apron.

Indeed, isn’t it a strange wee anomaly that recruitment advertisements for ‘Scottish’ regiments of the British Army have, in recent years, relied heavily on images of the Scottish saltire and the slogan ‘Scottish soldier’ to attract young Scots to join up when, at the same time, the British establishment refuse to allow any flag other than the British Union flag to fly above Edinburgh castle and, therefore, above Scotland’s capital city? Also, isn’t that anomaly compounded when we see images of Scottish soldiers in Iraq - putting their lives at risk in the interests of American oil corporations - and flying Scotland’s flag from their vehicles - particularly when we consider that Scotland’s devolved parliament was denied any say in the deployment of ‘Scottish soldiers’ and when the people of Scotland overwhelmingly opposed the illegal war and subsequent occupation of the sovereign nation of Iraq.

So, it would have been extraordinary if the SNP’s British Unionist opponents hadn’t deliberately misrepresented the press release. It would have been extraordinary if the SNP’s British Unionist opponents hadn’t manufactured outrage in order that they could be appalled – particularly in the week when Gordon Brown urged us all to wrap ourselves in the red, white and blue and feel the warmth of the cuddly British State. It would have been extraordinary if the SNP’s British Unionist opponents hadn’t strongly disagreed with any assertion of the benefits to Scotland of retaking our independence, however that argument was phrased. So why did the SNP feel the need to apologise to its opponents, the same British Unionists who loathe the very idea of an independent Scotland, the independent Scotland that the SNP is supposed to have as its core belief?”


The answer I offered to that question back in 2006 was that the SNP was easing itself into a position where it was actually considered to be part of a Scottish establishment. It wanted to portray itself as a respectable party that could be trusted with the reigns of (very limited devolved) power.

Of course, that tactic worked. The SNP left behind it such baggage as those who might refer to the British Union flag as the Butcher’s apron. That is a decision the party was entitled to take, but the description it baulked at is no less accurate because the SNP no longer accepts it.

The term is an accurate reference to a terrible time in the history of Scotland, when British Government forces, marching under the British flag, and under the command of Marshal Wade and the Duke of Cumberland, butchered wounded Highlanders after the Battle of Culloden and then moved through the countryside murdering any Scot, young or old, who they believed had favoured the Jacobite cause.

Cumberland became known as the ‘butcher’ because of the blood-thirsty actions of British troops under his command, and the flag under which those troops marched, the British Union flag, was referred to as the Butcher’s apron in recognition of the Scots blood that was spilt.

Those are historical facts. Perhaps, then, any Scot who willingly accepts the British Union flag as their own, is unaware of its significance in the subjugation of Scotland or is willing to accept our country’s subservient role within the British Union.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com August 23 2008

Why Scotland fans booed God Save the Queen

I had a Mr Angry moment the other night. I was in the middle of painting a room in an empty house and had the radio on for company. As I happily slapped on the paint – I was never meant to be a decorator - I listened to the Real Radio Football Phone-In, presented by Ewan Cameron and Scotland football legend Alan Rough.

By the way, I mean it when I describe Alan Rough as a Scotland legend. During his career, Roughie came in for more than his fair share of stick, mainly from the English media, with most of it unwarranted. Okay, he did stand like a statue as shots from Cubillas (Peru), Zico (Brazil) and Johnny Rep (Netherlands) whizzed past him into the goal, but no-one could have stopped those shots. Alan Rough pulled off some phenomenal saves that kept Scotland in games we otherwise would have lost. Over the years, he certainly earned his place in the Scotland Hall of Fame. As for his co-host, Mr Cameron, a disc-jockey turned sports journalist, that is another matter.

The main topic being discussed on the programme was the behaviour of some Scotland fans at the previous night's international match against Northern Ireland at Hampden. More accurately, Ewan Cameron voiced his opinion that Scotland fans who booed the Northern Irish national anthem were “morons” and had “shamed” Scotland. Roughie simply made the point that he didn't know why the song had been booed, other than the fact it happened also to be the national anthem of England and, he thought, it must be related to them (England) being the old enemy.

As I listened, the phone lines were opened and callers agreed with Ewan Cameron's view – more than one offered the information that they happened to be Rangers fans; but that, of course, had no bearing on their view about the singing, and booing, of God Save the Queen. Aye right.

I was sure that, before long, someone would call in and actually inform Ewan and Roughie of the reason why many Scotland fans would boo God Save the Queen, but the call didn't come. One caller, described as a member of the Tartan Army, was put on air with the introduction from Cameron, “This should be interesting, he's going to tell us why he booed the Northern Irish national anthem.”

At last, I thought, but no: the caller had, indeed, booed God Save the Queen, but he'd done it for no other reason than he wanted to “wind up the opposition”.

Eventually, I couldn't take it any longer and I called the station myself. By that time I had become 'Angry of Ardrossan' and, after ranting at the poor guy who answered the phone, I was put on hold, awaiting Ewan Cameron's summons to speak. Unfortunately, it turned out to be one of those nights and, after holding for a couple of minutes, the battery on my mobile decided to pack in. So, I never got to speak to Ewan and Roughie, and I never got to tell them just why so many Scotland fans would boo the national anthem of Northern Ireland.

The fact is, the act of booing God Save the Queen was not intended to be an insult to the Northern Irish team or the nation itself: neither was it simply because the song is also the national anthem of England, and for that matter Britain (unfortunately still including Scotland). The reason Scotland fans booed God Save the Queen is because it was written specifically as an anti-Scottish song; its purpose was to encourage Marshal Wade and his English forces as they sought to subjugate the Scots in the wake of the 1715 Jacobite uprising.

The most offensive verse reads:

Lord grant that Marshal Wade
May by thy mighty aid victory bring.
May he sedition hush
And like a torrent rush,
Rebellious Scots to crush.
God save the King.

Now, of course, there will be British Unionists who will say, “Yes, but that verse isn't sung anymore”, as if that makes it okay. The verse is there because the song is anti-Scottish, and is actually meant to be.

The other British Unionist line is, “For God's sake, that's all ancient history. Why bring that up?” Well, actually, history is what makes us the nation and people we are today – a nation still trying to find the confidence to re-establish itself as a sovereign state, and a people still subjugated to the extent that we are called “morons” when we voice our objection to an anti-Scottish song being sung at the home of our national football team.

Another line spun by Ewan Cameron was, “Chris Hoy is Scottish and he was happy to represent Britain and stand on the podium in China with God Save the Queen playing.” Actually, while Scotland remains just a region of Britain, rather than a nation in its own right, athletes like Chris Hoy don't have any option other than to represent Britain. As for him being happy with God Save the Queen, that would be entirely up to him. I don't know whether or not Chris Hoy might have been happier with Flower of Scotland playing while he accepted his three gold medals, but neither does Ewan Cameron. That didn't stop him making his comment, though.

Just for the record, the reason God Save the Queen was dropped as Scotland's national anthem at football matches was to bring to an end the totally absurd situation where Scotland fans booed their own national anthem: and the reason Scotland fans booed their own national anthem was because it was, and remains, anti-Scottish.

The Scotland fans who booed God Save the Queen at Hampden last Wednesday shamed no-one. They, rightly, objected to an anti-Scottish song being sung in Scotland. What really is shameful is that people like Ewan Cameron, and to a lesser extent Roughie, broadcasters on a Scottish radio station, are so ignorant of Scottish history that they had no idea why God Save the Queen is offensive to many Scots.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com August 16 2008

Workers are entirely justified in taking strike action

On Wednesday (August 20), unless senior council officials see sense, North Ayrshire Council workers will take strike action in support of a wage claim. Well, most council workers will withdraw their labour on that day, but not all. The handsomely-rewarded senior management - some in receipt of salaries in the region of £90,000-£100,000, paid for by you and me – will be at their desks as normal, and some will attempt to brand the workers as irresponsible for preventing local people from receiving council services for one day.

Just for the record, and before senior managers attempt their distortion of reality, while council workers are on strike, cover will still be provided for 'life and limb' services. What that means is that in certain essential areas workers will continue to provide a service, on a par with public holiday cover. These areas include Residential Care, Home Care, Child Protection, Mental Health, Emergency Planning, Emergency Housing/Building Maintenance and Public Health.

So, while council workers are losing out on a day's pay in order to advance their legitimate call for a realistic wage increase, essential services will still be provided to the public.

As reported in this week's edition of the3towns.com (News section), the Confederation of Scottish Local Authorities (CoSLA), the umbrella body that represents Scotland's 32 local authorities, has offered workers a 2.5% wage increase for each of the next three years. With some local authority employees on an hourly rate of just £5.99, the CoSLA offer would see them better off by 46p after three years. The same increase applied to the salary of North Ayrshire chief executive Ian Snodgrass would net him around £9,000 extra. Most people will be able to recall a specific example of a council worker having helped them in some way, but I wonder how many could point to anything Mr Snodgrass has done to benefit local communities. Of course, it is not actually Mr Snodgrass' role to do what is best for local communities: his job is to do as he is told by the ruling Labour councillors. So long as the policies of the Labour councillors are legal, Mr Snodgrass and his team of senior managers will implement them. In other words, the chief executive is paid in excess of £100,000 per year to do what he is told by the likes of David O'Neill and Peter McNamara. His, then, is a role that is certainly questionable under the criterion of value for money.

For the people who do the real work at North Ayrshire Council, however, Wednesday sees a landmark day in their pursuit of a living wage. Contrary to what right-wing newspapers would have us believe, workers do not take lightly the decision to withdraw their labour. Striking is always the last resort. It is a reluctant recognition that negotiations between union representatives and management have broken down, and in this particular case it is entirely justified.

The latest inflation figure, published this week, shows overall inflation running at 4.4%, with City of London experts predicting it will go even higher. Therefore, CoSLA's wage offer of 2.5% represents a real-terms cut in pay for thousands of workers – and that is a pay cut in each of the next three years, unless inflation were to be brought down to below 2.5%.

The reality of the CoSLA offer is that workers would be made poorer, and that is against a backdrop of food price inflation raging at a level far higher than the overall figure. Some basics, such as bread have seen recent percentage increases running well into double figures.

The council workers who will strike on Wednesday are not looking for massive or unrealistic increases to their take home pay, they are simply looking to, at the very least, keep up with inflation and not be worse off. That is not too much to ask. Yet, according to the City of London experts who predict higher and higher inflation - caused, incidentally, by the capitalist institutions for which they work – if people like council workers receive above inflation pay increases, that will tip the economy into a full-blown recession.

So there you have it. Despite increasing inflation and a downturn in the global economy, created by the dysfunctional capitalist system and overseen in the UK by Prudence Brown and his sidekick Darling, if we go into recession it will be down to ordinary workers looking for a wage that doesn't make them and their families poorer.

There have been many significant and damaging changes to society since New Labour came to power in 1997, two of which are related and are relevant to this subject. The first has been the expansion of the numbers within the working poor, people in employment but who can't make ends meet from the low pay they receive for their labour. Such people may always have been there, but the problem has been exacerbated by the policies of New Labour. Employers who pay the minimum wage – and in some cases below the minimum wage – are subsidised by the tax payer through Tax and Working Family Credits, but even then the take home pay of many workers is still insufficient to meet even basic needs.

The second change relates to the richest members of society. As the poor have got poorer under New Labour, the rich have got richer. According to the Sunday Times, the accumulated wealth of Britain's 1,000 richest residents has quadrupled since New Labour came to power – from £99 billion in 1997 to £422 billion this year.

At the top of Britain's 'Rich List' is a man called Lakshmi Mittal, who reputedly has accumulated a personal fortune of £27.7 billion, up from £19.25 billion last year. Despite spending much of his time at his multi-million pound London home, Mr Mittal holds an Indian passport and records his main address as being in India. That makes him a 'non-domiciled' resident of the UK, which means he does not pay UK tax on any earnings made outside the UK.

Lakshmi Mittal makes his money from mining and steel interests in eastern Europe and in the developing world, where wages are low and health & safety regulations almost non existent. Since 2004, at just one of Mr Mittal's mines in Kazakhstan over 90 miners have died. Last year alone, Mr Mittal pocketed £393 million from mining interests, but did not pay a penny in UK taxes on that sum, despite living in London for much of the year.

One other figure to consider, since 2001 Lakshmi Mittal has donated £4 million to the New Labour Party. The exact same New Labour Party that is represented in North Ayrshire by people like David O'Neill and Peter McNamara, the councillors who pay managers over £100,000 a year and who expect already low-paid workers to take pay cuts for the next three years.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com August 9 2008

Who cares?

The story we report this week of the 85 year-old Saltcoats man who has had his care visits cut by a non-medically trained carer, despite the assessment of a district nurse, and who will now be put into his pyjamas at 5 o'clock, should shame us all.

If we as a community tolerate our elderly citizens being treated like this, then Thatcher was right and there really is no such thing as society.

What happened to treating the elderly with dignity? How dignified do you think it will feel to be sitting in your pyjamas before the early evening news comes on the telly? How dignified or safe is it for a frail man of 85 to be left alone to take his medicine and get himself to bed, even if that means crawling through to the bedroom because he is just too tired to stand up and walk unaided?

There are many committed and hard working people looking after our senior citizens in North Ayrshire, but there appears also to be some who believe that reducing their workload, rather than meeting the care needs of the elderly, is what they should be doing. The only justification for cutting the number of visits a pensioner receives should be a reduction in the person's care needs - meeting targets, reducing costs or simply cutting the amount of work involved should not come into the equation.

I'm very reluctant to criticise workers who turn out, day and night, to perform often challenging roles and who, very often, provide unparalleled care and support to vulnerable people. Without carers the lives of so many people in local communities would be very much worse.

I have personal knowledge of just how much benefit can be added to an individuals life through the work of carers and social services professionals. A Saltcoats-based social worker, Jill Hargan, went well beyond the call of duty in helping my own mother before she died last year. Jill did more than anyone could have expected, and what is more, she wasn't even my mother's social worker.

Jill's job was to look after my dad's care, but she saw the impact his illness had on my mother and, because she cared, she tried to help. She did a great job, in often difficult circumstances, and I am very grateful to her.

However, having said that, and perhaps because I know just how good are some of the people providing caring services in North Ayrshire, it really angers me when I see stupid decisions being taken that lead to a detrimental impact on an elderly person's life.

In the case we report, a district nurse assessed the 85 year-old gentleman and reached the conclusion that his care needs required four daily visits. Just two days later a care worker had decided that the fourth visit wasn't necessary. What's more, the patient agreed with her. You can just hear the conversation: “You can make it to your bed at night, Mr B, can't you?”

“Aye, sure.”

So, not wanting to be a burden on anyone, agreement was reached and in one easy move a visit was cut from his care needs.

Happy with her work, the carer moved on to the next of her charges, forgetting along the way to inform the man's next of kin that no-one would be in that night to assist in getting him ready for bed.

Good as his word, however, the man did make it to his bed. By the time he got there, though, he was so tired he didn't have the energy to remove his clothes and get into his pyjamas.

Fortunately, a neighbour, who is in her 70s, noticed that no carer had been in, so she paid a visit. She found the man lying fully clothed on his bed and, not being able herself to do anything about it, she had to leave him there for the night, throwing a duvet over him before she left.

Equally worrying was the fact that, because the bedtime visit had been cancelled without anyone being told, the gentleman had not received his medication. At least, the neighbour thought he hadn't received his medication, but she wasn't sure. That being the case, she did not want to give him anything, in case she gave him tablets he had already been given earlier. Quite simply, she erred on the side of caution. She should not have been put in that position.

Before leaving that night, the neighbour wrote a comment in the man's care notes, simply recording how she had found him and that she thought he might not have had his medication. When she visited the man the next day, the carer who had carried out the morning visit had entered a further comment in the notes. It basically said that if the neighbour had left out his medicine they would have given it to him.

It is not the responsibility of a woman in her 70s to ensure that her neighbour's medicine is left out, and if anyone employed as a carer thinks that it is, then perhaps it is time they looked for another job, one that they are actually good at.

Incidentally, when the neighbour complained to one carer, she was told she could complain all she liked, nothing would be done. That about says it all.

So, despite the assessment of a district nurse, and despite the elderly gentleman having no relations within 20 miles and a caring neighbour who isn't as young as she once was, the fourth care visit is not to be reinstated. Instead, a refined 85 year-old man will be put into his pyjamas at 5 o'clock, and will be left to sit like that until he decides to try and get through to his bed. That is not care.

Rightly, this matter has been raised with one of the elderly gentleman's local elected representatives. I sincerely hope the matter leads to an investigation and to a conclusion which means that no other senior citizen is treated this way.

Thatcher was wrong. Society does exist and will continue to exist so long as we care about each other.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com August 9 2008

Realities behind the Beijing Olympics

This week sees the opening of the 29th Olympiad in the capital city of what purports to be a communist country. Beijing 2008 is already steeped in controversy, stemming mainly from the scenes of protest that met the Olympic flame as it made its way around the world.

Of course, the people who interrupted the global progress of the flame were not protesting about the Olympic games themselves, but rather were attempting to raise awareness of the appalling human rights record of the host nation, China. In particular, protesters sought to cast a light on China's brutal repression of pro-democracy campaigners in Burma, which remains under the control of a Chinese-backed military regime.

The situation in Burma is appalling for those who seek nothing more than their country's independence and the right to govern themselves in the interests of the people of Burma. A situation that persists because China and Russia consistently veto any moves by the United Nations to bring about progressive change.

In China itself, ordinary citizens fare little better, with most living in abject poverty, eking out an existence from an agricultural system that has changed little over the last hundred years. However, in cities like Beijing and Shanghai, the country's ruling dictatorship has relaxed its totalitarian grip and has allowed the excesses of free-market capitalism to run wild. Modern day China really is a country of extremes. The unimaginable poverty of the countryside sits almost cheek-by-jowl with the neon-lit decadence of modern cities, and it is only the westernised city-living that we will be allowed to see when the focus of the world brings China into the global spotlight over the next couple of weeks.

Protesters and dissidents have already been swept from Beijing streets. Chinese security services and police will deal ruthlessly with anyone or any group, Chinese or otherwise, that seeks to disrupt the Olympic games. If anything, what Beijing 2008 has revealed is the long-standing truth that the modern Olympic games have very little to do with the brotherhood of man and the achievement of physical or sporting excellence, and everything to do with capitalism and the pursuit of not Olympic gold but the real stuff, in the form of massive profits for the multi-national corporations that bankroll the event.

I have first-hand experience of how it is American companies that call the shots at the Olympic games. In 1992 I was part of the BBC team in Barcelona. Mine was a very minor role in the massive organisational and broadcasting feat that brought the games into British homes, but I was not immune from the bully-boy tactics of US broadcasters. When they realised the BBC had actually been allocated a better location from which to report on a particular sport, complaints were made to those in authority and, as I was the person on site at the time, I was told in no uncertain terms to move. Being an Ardrossan boy, I politely declined.

On reflection, I actually might not have been polite, but whatever my exact response, it didn't really matter, because within minutes the representatives of the American broadcasting company returned with a Barcelona police officer. In a show of just how much money talks in the world of the modern Olympics, the police officer unclipped his gun holster and in perfect English told me I was moving. I moved. I didn't for a minute believe that the policeman would have shot me for refusing to move, but the message was clear. The American media calls the shots, if you'll pardon the expression, in terms of the Olympic games and whatever they want, they get.

The same will apply in Beijing. American media corporations and American companies are the main funders of the games – and the main recipients of revenue generated – so the sporting events will take place at times that best suit American TV schedules. Meanwhile, China will set aside its supposed belief in communism and will ignore the Olympian ideal as it further adopts the 'winner-take-all' mentality of the free market.

On a separate but related issue, Scotland's role in the Olympics will be small. We do have excellent athletes competing at the games, but as Scotland is not a real nation – just a devolved region - our sportsmen and sportswomen will be competing for Team GB.

I'll leave for the moment the question of why a union of nations is allowed to compete as if it were one nation, and will, instead, refer to the issue that has made headlines this week; the fact that as Scotland is not a nation recognised by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) our flag, the Saltire, is banned from Olympic venues in Beijing.

An SNP MSP has taken offence at what he perceives to be a sleight on Scotland, and of course he is right, to a degree. The Saltire should not be banned anywhere in the world. It is Scotland's flag and Scots should be proud to fly it wherever they happen to be, particularly when supporting Scottish teams or individuals competing on an international stage.

That said, there are two points that should be made. Firstly, the IOC does not recognise Scotland because we are not, yet, an independent nation. We have the power at the ballot box to rectify that matter.

Secondly, the ban on flags of non-Olympic nations has nothing to do with Scotland. It is the Chinese government's way to ban the flying of the Burmese flag during the games. That the International Olympic Committee has gone along with such a ban disgraces and shames the founding ideals of the Olympic movement, even more so than the total capitulation to the money men of the 'greed is good' multi-national corporations.

Incidentally, with the next Olympic games being held in London, Scots should consider a couple of current financial facts: firstly, over £184 million of National Lottery funding that should have been used to assist good causes in Scotland has been re-directed to help fund the London Olympics. This was done by Gordon Brown's New Labour Government.

Secondly, the same Labour Government has threatened to withhold some £165 million in Barnett consequentials from London Olympic Regeneration spending. This is money that should come to Scotland as our share of increased UK government spending on regenerating the areas of London where the games will take place.

The SNP has promised to hold an Independence Referendum in 2010, which means that Scotland could be an independent nation by the time the 2012 London Olympics are held. Our flag, currently banned from Olympic stadiums, could be carried at the head of Scotland's Olympic team by the time the next games come around.

The choice is ours and, unlike the pro-democracy campaigners in Burma, we don't have to overcome brutal repression to achieve the normal status of an independent nation – we just have to turn up on polling day and vote for it.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com August 2 2008

Out-Torying the Tories

The latest wheeze by yet another Tory Boy within the ranks of New Labour is to force benefits claimants to work for the little money they receive.

The man behind the latest 'workfare' scheme is James Purnell MP, the Westminster Works and Pensions Secretary. Actually, that statement isn't quite true. Mr Purnell is just the elected government minister who announced the scheme: the man whose idea it was is called David Freud. Mr Freud has never been elected by anyone and so has no mandate to transform British society, yet his ideas now form government policy and will affect the lives of millions of people.

David Freud, the great-grandson of psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, has held posts in 'the city', which have seen him rewarded with salaries running into six figures. As a stockbroker his job involved writing research on companies, while at the same time being paid by those companies for providing advice; a practice that was made illegal following the disastrous dot.com crash of the 1990s.

While a city banker working on disastrous projects such as Eurotunnel and Euro-Disney, Mr Freud was known to colleagues as 'fraud squad', due to his promotion of new share issues, which subsequently bombed, costing investors millions of pounds.

Who better, then, for New Labour to recruit as an advisor on social security benefits than a man who once said of his six-figure banker's salary, “If the rest of the country knew what we were being paid, there would be tumbrels on the street and heads carried round on pikes.”

Mr Freud's appointment certainly goes a long way to explaining how New Labour has reached the conclusion that the way to get people off benefits and into work is to stigmatise them and force them into performing menial tasks. The man, like so many New Labour politicians, has no clue what it is like to be unemployed and existing on basic state benefits. Mr Freud and New Labour seem to believe there are hundreds-of-thousands, if not millions, of people in Britain who choose not to work and, instead, 'enjoy' a life of free-loading and watching daytime television. They could not be more wrong.

Of course there will always be a few reprobates who don't fancy the idea of getting out their beds in the morning and having to work for a living. Such people have always existed and always will. However, when considering an unemployment figure of around 2.9 million, they do number just a few. For the overwhelming majority of people currently unemployed, the prospect of a real job paying a decent wage is exactly what they want. They do not want to be or to remain unemployed.

A real job and the dignity of work brings also self-respect. It feels great to know you can earn a living, pay your way, and raise your children. Very few people are happy to sit on the buroo, unable to provide their family with the basics, never mind the luxuries that peer pressure demands of us all in the 21st Century.

The beliefs of David Frued and James Purnell MP are so out of touch with reality because those people have never been in the position of being unemployed and on state benefits. Labour politicians no longer understand what it is like to be an ordinary working class man or women, and the advisors they employ reflect the same socio-economic background as the politicians. We now have middle-class, university-educated Labour MPs and advisors who have never done a day's real work in their lives and, just like the Tories under Margaret Thatcher and John Major, New Labour actually believe that the unemployed are the problem.

In fact, capitalism and the free market are the problems that lead to unemployment and so many wasted lives. Of course, Freud and Purnell could never admit that to be the case. They, and the New Labour Party, are advocates of the free market. They actually pursue policies that allow UK production to be moved abroad, which cuts labour costs and maximises profits for shareholders – and produces unemployment here in Britain. It is politicians like Mr Purnell, and advisors like Mr Freud, that have created the unemployed, and now they sit in their ivory towers, blaming the out-of-work for their fate and advocating policies that would treat the poor like criminals.

Workfare, where the unemployed have to work for their benefits, has existed for years in the USA. Given that New Labour seem to follow everything else America does, is it any wonder that social policy is now also being adopted? How long before we see further moves towards greater reliance on private health insurance in the UK or even more private sector organisations muscling into the NHS to cherry pick delivery of certain profitable services, leaving the taxpayer to pick up the tab for everything else?

According to New Labour, people on benefits for a designated period of time would be expected to carry out community works or lose their social security payments. For me, that raises two obvious questions: firstly, if there is work requiring done in communities, why are people not employed - in real jobs, paying decent wages - to carry out that work? Surely that would reduce the unemployment figures? Of course it would, but it would also require that workers were paid a living wage, rather than just their social security benefits.

Secondly, if someone refuses to be press-ganged into working for benefits – which are an entitlement, and which are set at a level which supposedly provides the minimum a person needs to survive – are we as a society really going to remove those benefits and see people reduced to begging on the streets or stealing?

Even Thatcher stopped short of introducing a 'workfare' scheme in the UK, but New Labour is now out-Torying the Tories.

In a UK context, voters are caught between a rock and a hard place. When the next Westminster Election comes around, do they vote for the Tories or the New Labour Tories? Or what about the Liberal Democrat Tories? Whatever Tory option people might choose, nothing would change. In terms of social policy all three mainstream British parties are way over on the right of the political spectrum.

Thankfully, however, in Scotland we have further options. We already have an SNP Government in Edinburgh and the party looks set for Westminster gains – including, possibly, right here in North Ayrshire. As someone who passionately believes in the right of the people of Scotland to govern ourselves through an independent sovereign parliament, I hope the SNP does secure many more victories and that such progress brings about an independent Scotland in as short a timescale as possible.

Having said that, though, there would be no point in securing independence simply to recreate the British model in Scotland. If we are to avoid mass unemployment and then blaming the unemployed for their predicament, an independent Scotland must be one where we redistribute our nation's wealth to ensure a better life for all of our citizens.

We have the power to reject New Labour's Tory ideology and effect real and beneficial change in Scotland. Every one of us has that power. If we don't use it, we will only have ourselves to blame for whatever London governments go on to inflict on us.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com July 26 2008

The earthquake has hit

It was just after 2:20 on Friday morning when the earthquake predicted by Alex Salmond finally hit. It may only have been by a majority of 365 votes, but the SNP win in the Glasgow East by election was, as new MP John Mason put it, “off the Richter Scale.”

Be under no illusions, this was not just a bad defeat for an increasingly unpopular Labour Party, this was Labour losing its third most safe seat in Scotland. This was Labour losing a seat where they previously had a majority of over 13,000. This really was Labour's heartlands, but even there people have decided they've had enough. Nothing will now save Labour from certain defeat at the next Westminster Election.

Gordon Brown is destined to repeat the fate of former Tory prime minister John Major, well almost. Major at least was victorious in one General Election (1992) before losing to a Labour landslide in 1997. Back then there was nothing the Tories could have done to stop Labour winning. After 18 years of Tory government, people were sick of them and wanted change. The same now applies to New Labour.

People are sick and tired of being let down and lied to, first by Tony Blair and now by Gordon Brown. Nothing can save New Labour. They will be on the receiving end of a Tory landslide come the General Election, not because people want a Tory government, but because they desperately want to see the back of New Labour.

In England, mostly, the party best placed to beat New Labour is the Tories. So that is where anti-Labour votes will go and that will see David Cameron become prime minister. There are, of course, some seats where the Lib Dems will be seen as the main challenger to Labour, and in those constituencies it is Nick Clegg's party that will take out the New Labour candidate.

Here in Scotland, however, things are different. In Scotland, we have already taken out a Labour-led 'Executive' and have replaced it with an SNP Government. The Glasgow East by-election was the first time two parties of government – one Scottish and one British – have clashed, and it was the party of Scotland which triumphed.

Since coming to power last May, the SNP has gone from strength to strength. Far from the Unionist predictions of the sky falling in if there was ever an SNP Government, Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon have led a credible and popular administration which people can see is actually working to improve the lives of the citizens of Scotland. Salmond has predicted there will be 20 SNP MPs at Westminster after the next General Election. Given that the most MPs the party has ever had was 11 back in 1974, some commentators wrote off the prediction as simply Wee Eck on the wind-up. Those commentators may now be reviewing their opinions.

Watching television coverage of the Glasgow East by-election in the early hours of Friday morning I heard a Labour MP say that the popularity of the SNP Scottish Government was down to luck. No credit was being given to a first-time administration which hit the ground running and not only began improving services for the Scottish people, but also started clearing up the mess left by Labour and their Lib Dem partners. It was strange to hear the SNP Government being called lucky, because a number of years ago I remember being in Alex Salmond's company when he was described by an opponent as a lucky politician. “Aye, and do you know what,” replied Salmond, “the harder I work, the luckier I get.”

It isn't down to luck that the SNP finds itself where it is today. It has had to battle against the combined forces of three British Unionist political parties and the massed ranks of the loyal British media. Save for a short period when the Sun advocated Scottish independence – more as a tactical manoeuvre in its tabloid war with the Labour-supporting Daily Record than any ideological revelation – the SNP has had to take its message to the people of Scotland without any editorial support from Scotland's newspapers. Yet, it has managed to get that message across and is continuing to build support.

The main difference between the SNP and Labour – other than one supports Scottish independence and the other would rather the Scots remained on their knees within the British Union – is credibility. The SNP has earned it, and New Labour has lost it, which all makes for a very interesting General Election, whenever Gordon Brown (or his successor) plucks up the courage to go to the people.

Given the dire situation of New Labour, and the likelihood that things are not going to get better, it looks like they will hang onto power until they are dragged kicking and screaming to the polls, which will be sometime in early 2010.

By that time the people of North Ayrshire & Arran will have had Katy Clark as their MP for five years and she will be seeking their support for another term. Will she get it?

Well, personally, I have a lot of respect for Katy Clark. Since being elected she has remained true to the founding principles of the Labour Party, rather than those of the New Labour project. I believe her great, great grandfather Alexander Sloan, a former miner and MP for South Ayrshire (1939-46), would be proud of her – but Katy is a Unionist, and as such, as far as I am concerned, she stands in the way of Scotland re-taking her independence and full control over our own resources, so that they can be used in the interests of the Scottish people.

The best result the SNP has achieved at a Westminster Election in North Ayrshire & Arran (and before constituency reorganisation Cunninghame North) was second place in 2001. Modesty prevents me from naming the SNP candidate at that election. However, in 2005 the party slipped back into third place, behind the Tories, but that was no reflection on the candidate, the now Cllr Tony Gurney.

In 2005 the SNP was only beginning to emerge from the dark days of the Swinney leadership. Things, under Alex Salmond, have changed completely and the party is, I believe, once again the main challenger to Labour in this constituency.

In Glasgow East the swing from Labour to the SNP was 22%. The SNP would require a swing of 14% to take North Ayrshire & Arran.

Politics just got interesting again.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com July 19 2008

Thatcher

Last week I referred to the election of a Tory government led by Margaret Thatcher as the point at which the UK's social consensus was smashed.

I have absolutely no doubt about the veracity of that statement. Thatcher is actually on record stating she is proud of the fact she broke Britain away from what she saw as 'the nanny state'. She thought too much was done for people, and that the UK would function more effectively if individuals were forced to take responsibility for themselves.

According to what became known as Thatcherism, there was no such thing as society. Under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher, Tory governments privatised publicly-owned assets – in fact, they sold them off dirt cheap to their Tory friends, and then accepted highly-paid directorships in the new private companies – and they smashed trades unions, the organisations whose purpose was to give some sort of collective power to individual workers. Thatcher changed the law to ensure that working class members of society would no longer be able to stand up to bosses, irrespective of how unscrupulous those bosses were, or how just the cause of the workers.

I try not to hate people, but in the case of Margaret Thatcher I will make an exception. I loathe and despise the woman and everything for which she stood. The woman is evil. No decent person could have implemented the policies she did. No-one with a shred of humanity could have pursued a course of action that resulted in the destruction of people's lives and of whole communities – and for what? So that she could gloat about beating the miners, despite the fact that to achieve her 'victory' she had to use the police as a private army and had to be prepared to see decent people starved back to work? So that she could kill a bunch of young Argentinian conscripts in order that she could call herself a war leader? So that her best buddy across the Atlantic would see her as a true friend of America in its pursuit of world domination?

Britain during the Thatcher years became a divided society populated by the haves and the have-nots. People were thrown onto the dole so that production costs could be driven down and profits for the Tory-voting bosses could be maximised. In the twisted logic of Thatcherism it was even portrayed as a British success if a UK-based company relocated its manufacturing base to the likes of Indonesia or China, enabling further cost savings by paying the indigenous workers a few pence a day. So what if such action meant even more people being thrown onto the scrapheap back here in Britain? Thatcher simply did not care. Workers were expendable. We were told by her hatchet-man Norman Tebbit that we should stop moaning and get on out bikes to look for work. It's a hell of a cycle ride to Beijing, Norman.

It was flawed political ideology that drove Thatcher. While she believed that her policies were making a leaner, meaner Britain that could 'compete' in global markets, what she actually created was a society where ordinary people were stripped of their dignity and their ability to look after their families. Even those who actually managed to retain their jobs found that their terms and conditions were greatly reduced. Thatcher created a fear of unemployment and workers were forced to accept new contracts, lower wages and the prospect of being paid-off if you rocked the boat or, to put it another way, stood up for your rights.

Most people who were around at the time will never forget the miners strike of 1984/85. Thatcher claimed as victory the fact that miners were forced to go back to work without achieving the goals they had set at the beginning of their industrial action. The reality, however, was that miner's leader Arthur Scargill was exactly right when he warned that Thatcher intended to close UK mines and import coal from the likes of Columbia, where workers are paid a pittance and where health and safety in the mines is virtually non-existent. The death of the British coal industry was no victory, for anyone.

I also have a specific local reason for my intense dislike of Margaret Thatcher and her policies. My Dad was a Docker at Ardrossan. She destroyed the docks industry too.

The port of Ardrossan used to be the throbbing heart of the town. As a registered port, Ardrossan was covered by the National Dock Labour Scheme, which guaranteed Dockers a living wage. Before the Scheme was introduced, Dockers had to turn up every morning at the Dock Gate and if there was work the foreman would pick the men he wanted. If your face didn't fit, you didn't work – and if you didn't work, you didn't get paid. Thatcher scrapped the National Dock Labour Scheme which, initially, saw the return of casual labour and, ultimately, led to the closure of many commercial UK ports, including Ardrossan.

I can remember sitting in a Council meeting, as the councillor for Ardrossan North, and listening to a presentation about how Ardrossan Harbour was going to be transformed from a dirty old dock into a brand new yachting marina, and how that would bring hundreds of jobs to the town.

I actually remembered the days when hundreds of people were employed at the dock, loading and unloading ships from all over the world, and I couldn't see how the employment generated by that commercial port could be replicated by a yachting marina. I was the only councillor who didn't support the marina project. Today, as we witness the second regeneration of the dock area, I'm still waiting to see the hundreds of jobs we were promised with the first.

I felt it just a bit ironic that, in the week I wrote a column noting that Thatcher's election ended Britain's social consensus, it was announced that she was to receive a state funeral when she finally descends into hell.

Apparently it is to cost us taxpayers around £3 million for her send off. That is a disgrace. Not one penny of public money should be spent on the woman who destroyed so many lives. The fact that the London establishment believe this is the right thing to do, simply shows how very out of touch with ordinary people they are.

Having said that, when the blessed day arrives that Thatcher gasps her last, I will raise a glass to her passing, and hope that we never see her like again.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com July 19 2008

Glasgow East Westminster by-election

This week sees the Glasgow East by-election, with political pundits predicting a close thing between Labour and the SNP. Margaret Curran, the Labour candidate, is defending a majority of over 13,000, so if she loses, it really is disaster time for the party and it could very well bring forward the end for prime minister Gordon Brown.

Labour expect to hold the seat, even with the economy on the brink of recession; even with a candidate who, apparently, was fourth or even fifth choice; even with a celebrity backer who actually supports independence (see Gossip); but more importantly, even with Glasgow East having one of the highest levels of deprivation and unemployment in the UK, despite having a Labour MP almost since time began, and despite Labour having been in power at Westminster for 11 years.

For me, it defies logic why anyone would want to vote Labour in normal circumstances, but in constituencies like Glasgow East, where there is so much evidence of Labour failure, it should be a criminal offence to put a cross next to that party's name on a ballot paper. Yet, despite the evidence, thousands of people will do just that on polling day. Despite knowing that Labour has done nothing for them over the years, people will turn out and will vote for them again. Why?

There are two answers to that question. Actually, there are three, but for the purpose of this article we will discount the 'daft' factor. The first answer relates to the legacy of real Labour. Older voters remember when the Labour Party was a socialist party and actually did strive to deliver a better life for working class people. That Labour Party is, of course, long gone, but many people remain indoctrinated into voting Labour – quite simply, they believe that if you are working class you vote Labour. There is no logic to the action, it's just what they do.

There is no way of persuading these electors that the Labour Party they remember is now dead, and that the Labour Party they are voting for has, for the past 11 years, been out-Torying the Tories. So many people in Glasgow East live in poverty, and by voting Labour they will ensure that situation continues.

The second answer to the question of why, is the old line that you have to vote Labour to keep the Tories out.

This dishonest line has been trotted out for years by Labour canvassers. In a variation of it at the 1983, 1987 and 1992 Westminster Elections, Labour activists told voters in Scotland that we had to vote Labour to 'get' the Tories out. In fact, it would not have made one bit of difference if every single elector in Scotland had voted Labour. England voted Tory, and as a smaller part of the British Union, Scotland gets the government England elects.

I remember discussing this subject with Alan McCombes, the thoughtful policy convener of the Scottish Socialist Party. Alan told the story of canvassing for the SSP in one of Easterhouse's sprawling estates. At one door an elderly man said he would like to vote SSP, then commented, “But you have to vote Labour to keep the Tories out, son.” Tories? In Easterhouse? Well that plan certainly worked.

The Labour Party now offers nothing to working class people. Any semblance of socialism has long been exorcised from the Labour body. Having said that, I'm sure there are one or two socialists still in the party, mistakenly believing they can take it back from the New Labour reformers – or as former Labour MP Tony Benn put it, “I suppose there must be a few socialists in the Labour Party, just as there must be a few Christians in the church.”

Of course, voters in Glasgow East, should they wish to vote for a socialist party, will have a choice of two, which is an absurd situation.

The great strength of the Scottish Socialist Party, before the split that followed Tommy Sheridan's court action against the despicable News of the World, was that it had managed to unite the diverse elements of the left in Scotland. Coupled with Tommy's commitment and charismatic leadership, the SSP had made socialism an attractive option. Now, though, we have Solidarity and the SSP vying for the same small section of committed socialist votes, rather than one united party building the vote for socialism and an independent Scottish republic.

With evidence all around us of the failure of capitalism, now is the time for socialists to be working together in delivering an alternative based on the redistribution of wealth and the creation of a fair and equitable society. Unfortunately, there is an awful lot of rebuilding to be done before that can happen.

The only real challenger to Labour in the Glasgow East contest is the SNP. The party's candidate, John Mason, is presently a Glasgow City Councillor and is the only one of nine candidates who actually lives in the constituency. Coupled with the SNP forming the government of Scotland, and riding high in the polls, it is reasonable to expect the party to do well, but a Labour majority of 13,000 is a major challenge to overcome.

Having said that, in 1994, following the death of Labour leader John Smith, the SNP, with my good friend Kay Ullrich as their candidate, reduced a Labour majority from 16,000 to 1,600. That was at a time when the SNP had nothing like the support it has now, and there was a feeling of sympathy for Labour having lost a well-liked leader.

Can the SNP pull off a magnificent victory? The people of Glasgow East will tell us on Thursday.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com July 12 2008

Not every young person is a ned

Last Monday night I attended a celebratory dinner in Glasgow's Rogano restaurant. The reason for the celebration was the graduation of a friend's daughter.

After four years of conscientious study, she secured the vital academic qualification that, hopefully, will allow her to find a well paid and secure job. In turn, such employment should provide the means for her to lead a successful life. That's the theory.

It is to be welcomed that the SNP Scottish Government is moving higher education back to the position of being free. It was a total disgrace that Labour MPs and MSPs began to impose tuition fees and other charges which meant that students were having to pay for their education, and were then to pay again through higher taxation of the better-paid jobs they were expected to secure. It is right that if graduates' jobs pay higher wages then they should contribute more to society through the taxation system, just like the rest of us. That's the deal, but why should they be expected to pay while they are students?

We, the current taxpayers, should fund the higher education system, just as we fund primary and secondary schools. It is to our benefit as a society to see our young people secure the qualifications that provide us with teachers, doctors and other professionals. Once qualified, working and paying their own taxes, our current students then help fund the next generation. That is the way the system worked for generations, until the Thatcherite New Labour Party got a hold of it. Then, those Labour politicians and party advisers who had already received their free education decided to pull up the ladder behind them and make students pay charges while they were studying. They even took away student grants and replaced them with re-payable loans, making students even poorer. It is now not uncommon for a student to leave full time education and embark on their adult working life with a debt of around £12,000.

New Labour has a lot of which they should be ashamed, and the treatment of our students is certainly one such issue.

Our young people are our future. The students and apprentices of today are our doctors, nurses, teachers, plumbers and joiners of tomorrow. It is our role as taxpayers to provide opportunities for our young people, whether that is done through further and higher education or vocational training. I've written before that we must provide the carrot as well as the stick in our dealings with Scotland's youth. Some people are very quick to condemn our youngsters, and certainly there are young people who deserve criticism, but if we do not give hope and opportunity to our children, if we do not provide the carrot, then should we really be that surprised when some rebel against a society that appears to have abandoned them?

There have always been youngsters who go off the rails, but for previous generations society provided opportunity which brought them back. There was work, which brought dignity, self respect and a wage. That was the carrot. If some did not grasp the offered opportunity, then society was well within its rights to apply the stick. Now, however, because of the policies of both Tory and Labour governments at Westminster, we seem only to have the stick and seem overly keen to whack every youngster with it, irrespective of whether or not they deserve it.

Not all young people are neds; not every teenager hangs around street corners drinking Buckie. The vast majority of Scotland's youth are just the same as we were at their age. They want what we wanted: a job, a car, a house, a partner, a family. Our parents' generation paid taxes and elected governments who provided educational and employment opportunities, which allowed most of us to reach out towards our goals. We might not have achieved them all, but at least we were given the chance to build a successful life for ourselves.

Then along came Thatcher and the social consensus was smashed. We were told there was no such thing as society, only individuals and there families: and we were told we had to make our own opportunities – society owed us nothing.

The election of Margaret Thatcher was the beginning of the breakdown in society that has produced the problems we now face. Feral children and anti-social behaviour are a product of Thatcher's total disregard of the common weal. When we thought of ourselves as part of a community, we also accepted that we had a role to play in that community. Our role was to look after our families. We spoke to people in the street, we cared about our neighbours, we did our best to raise our children to be good citizens and to make their own contribution. The communal sum of all the parts produced a society of which we could be proud. That society ensured our senior citizens were well looked after, that decent affordable housing was available, that healthcare was provided from the cradle to the grave, and that our children were given opportunity and hope.

Don't get me wrong, things weren't perfect. It was not a utopian society, but we had respect for each other and a common interest in the world we inhabited. To a large extent that has gone, and as a consequence we now have a society that, in general, doesn't care. The policies of Thatcher and New Labour have produced individuals who believe themselves to be totally disconnected from everyone around them and who couldn't care less for others, never mind show respect to them.

Thankfully, however, the disease of Thatcherism/New Labour has not infected everyone and there are still many citizens who believe in the common good, and who are prepared to contribute to a better community and society.

Evidence of the re-emergence of the decent people in society was to the fore last Monday in Rogano's. A talented and articulate young girl graduated from university and her extended family were with her to celebrate.

Despite the added financial burdens imposed on her and her parents, the support she received has allowed her to go from a council house in Ardrossan to securing a university degree. Despite what we read in tabloid newspapers, Scotland isn't a society of knife-wielding youngsters: we have young people of whom we should be proud, and the bottom line is that we should be accepting our responsibility to provide them with hope, opportunity and a society that cares.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com July 5 2008

the3towns.com - one year on

It's our birthday. This week, the3towns.com is one year old.

It's been a very interesting first year, in which we have been able to cover hundreds of exclusive news stories affecting Ardrossan, Saltcoats and Stevenston. When we started the3towns.com it was with the intention of making sure that local people got to hear about what was going on in – and with – their communities. Without being immodest, I believe we have, so far, achieved that goal.

That doesn't mean we intend to sit back and congratulate ourselves. Far from it. There are many issues still under investigation, and more appearing on a regular basis, which we will continue to pursue and report.

One of the interesting things to happen in the course of the past twelve months was when we received a letter from the legal representatives of a local hard-copy newspaper which also covers the Three Towns. Bizarrely, the newspaper threatened to take legal action against us, claiming we had used some of their content. Aye right!

Inevitably, when two news outlets are partly covering the same area there will be some reporting of the same stories. However, at the3towns.com we are proud to have broken so many exclusive local stories over the past year, stories that the other newspaper in question hasn't even had a sniff at, despite their greater resources. The legal threat received the appropriate response – although I think I'll stick with Andrex, it's much softer.

Probably the most satisfying aspect of the past year has been the continued rise in the number of our readers. We now have thousands of people, from near and far, logging on to get their Three Towns news and gossip – and that is what it is all about. While hard-copy newspapers are seeing continued falls in their readership figures, new media outlets are becoming an increasingly major source of news and information for people in the 21st Century.

Many local newspapers have, unfortunately, become simply vehicles to generate revenue for owners remote from the communities in which the papers are based. News content comes a poor second to attracting advertising income and making a few directors very rich.

Now, obviously, businesses have to make a profit or they go to the wall, but when news is no longer the primary consideration of newspapers there is something wrong and the quality of the product suffers. At the3towns.com, while we are happy to promote businesses serving the Three Towns, local news will always be our core consideration.

Of course, local news outlets are not the only ones suffering from management driven by maximising profits rather than providing the product readers want. There is currently a real problem in the newspaper industry at a national and international level.

In Scotland there is not one Scottish-owned newspaper. Our biggest-selling quality paper, the Herald, is owned by Newsquest which, in turn, is part of the massive Gannet organisation, an American company. As the parent companies have sought to make more and more money for mainly America-based shareholders, the quality of the product provided to readers in Scotland has plummeted substantially in the last few years.

Journalists are losing their jobs at just about every newspaper in the UK, which is described by management as 'cost efficiency savings', but which is actually a very short-sighted move that, in the long run, further diminishes the product. How can a newspaper report news without journalists?

There used to be a pride in the newspaper industry – local and national – related to maintaining the high standards of journalism and production which had been built up by titles over, in many cases, hundreds of years. For most, that is no longer the case.

Journalists are now having more and more work placed on their desk, covering roles formerly carried out by colleagues now laid off as part of 'cost efficiency savings', while trying to ensure their own work doesn't suffer. Wages are being forced down as some unscrupulous managers and owners take on recent journalism graduates on unpaid or low paid 'work experience' contracts. Everything is geared to making money, and lots of it, rather than producing a newspaper that people want to read.

Against that background, the3towns.com will continue to prioritise local news coverage and will report on stories that affect our local towns – irrespective of how much that annoys certain people and organisations. In particular, for far too long the goings-on of North Ayrshire Council and its ruling Labour councillors have escaped the notice of local people simply because they weren't told what was happening. Censorship by omission is still censorship and benefits only those whose actions are against the interests of the people.

For the past year the chief executive and head of communications of North Ayrshire Council have refused to speak to the3towns.com. Notwithstanding the irony of a communications department that refuses to communicate, the Council's excuse for taking their vow of silence doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

The reason North Ayrshire Council gives for refusing to speak to the3towns.com is that they consider we are not a real news outlet. According to the Council, before they would respond to us, as they do with other local papers, we would first have to be a registered newspaper. Now, that may seem a reasonable position to adopt, but only if you were totally ignorant of the law covering registration of newspapers in Scotland.

In this country – unlike in England, Wales and Northern Ireland – there is no legal requirement to register a newspaper. That is a fact of law. Wouldn't you have thought that a head of communications would know the law governing the area in which he is supposed to be an expert?

Well, whether the man actually knows the law or not, it doesn't really matter, because that is just the excuse used by the Council. In fact, we all know the reason North Ayrshire Council doesn't speak to the3towns.com. The local authority doesn't speak to us because we have exposed what they are up to on a number of issues – and they really don't like the people knowing what is going on.

To be honest, we would rather the Council was prepared to put its case, such as it is, when we report stories relating to their activities, but we can't force them. So, instead, we will continue to report the news, and they can continue to stick their heads in the sand.

the3towns.com – local news.....global reach.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com June 28 2008

Gordon Brown's first year as prime minister

This week sees the first anniversary of the coming to power of Gordon Brown, the man who was generally welcomed into the role of prime minister, albeit mainly on the basis that he wasn't Tony Blair.

Labour historians tell us that leading the country was Gordon Brown's destiny. He is, we are advised, a great thinker, tireless worker, and with a moral compass instilled in him by his father, a former Church of Scotland minister. Brown established a power base in his native Scotland (although he does now play down his Scottishness to the point of cringing embarrassment) and then took his 'vision' to England.

Gordon was supposed to be the one who took on the role of Labour leader after the death of John Smith in 1994, but he was outfoxed and out-manoeuvred by Tony Blair, Labour's very own snake-oil peddler. For the next ten years, as Blair won three elections, Brown fretted and scowled in the background, waiting his turn at power.

Finally, when Blair had done just about as much damage as he could, the baton was handed to Brown. Instantly, Labour's stock rose in the polls and speculation had it that if Brown went to the people, he and his party would secure a record fourth term. For weeks on end it looked like there would be a snap Westminster Election, but then Brown bottled it. He backed off and in the intervening period between then and now has shown himself to be one of the worst prime ministers ever to hold the office. In fact, poll ratings in terms of Mr Brown's popularity with the voting public are at record lows and, just this week, Labour were beaten into fifth place in the Henley by-election, out-polled even by the racist BNP.

If a Westminster General Election were held now, the consensus is that Labour would be swept from power by David Cameron's Tory Party, with the SNP making gains in Scotland.

I came across an article which I think makes very interesting reading, here it is:

“Now that the hubbub of the by-election has died down the message from the voters is sticking out a mile. Somehow, somewhere, things have gone drastically wrong for Mr Brown.

“Not just here and there – but spreading through group after group of people in all walks of life. What has happened to sour all those Mr Brown claimed to speak for?

“Does he, for example, still speak for those running a home? No. Retail prices have gone up and people are having to fork out more each week to keep their family.

“Does Mr Brown still speak for pensioners? No. Pensions are being eaten away by the rising cost of living, and the recent rises in electricity and gas prices will leave pensioners feeling the pinch.

“Does he speak for industry? Not by a long chalk. Remember all the promises of a dynamic new Britain? Instead, industry has been bedevilled by burdens as long as your arm. High interest rates, higher insurance contributions, higher petrol tax, higher vehicle duty, all of which has hit sales and profits.

“Does Mr Brown speak for the young professional? No. They were promised there would be no general increase in taxation, but they are now paying more tax than they were at the last election.

“Does he speak for the small shopkeeper? No. Not since the ever-increasing burdens of bigger overheads – business taxes, petrol etc. - began to strike at the shopkeeper's livelihood.

“Does Mr Brown speak for the unemployed? At the last election Labour said, 'We want full employment.' Yet unemployment remains high.

“Does he speak for the decent law-abiding citizen? No. It is now painfully obvious that pussy-footing isn't keeping down crime. People all over the country are appalled at the way things are going.

“Who, then, does Mr Brown speak for? He started out on a tremendous surge of goodwill. 'Let him have a fair crack of the whip,' was the general feeling. But, bit by bit, this goodwill has been frittered away. Now the pent up feelings of voters at recent by-elections have boiled over. And it's a fair assumption that the people there echoed a general feeling in the country.

“The question that springs out of it all is – can the prime minister act with confidence on his present policies if the bulk of the country is no longer behind him? That, in a nutshell, is the dilemma for Labour.”

You may think you have already read that article. Certainly, there have recently been similar ones in many newspapers. In fact, you could well have read the piece copied above, but only if you bought a copy of the Sunday Post on November 5 1967, which is where it was published.

Actually, I changed one word throughout my copying of the article. The comments made were really about Harold Wilson, not Gordon Brown, but isn't it amazing how easily the word Brown slips into the criticisms of Wilson, Labour prime minister from 1964-1970.

Forty years ago Labour was failing the people, despite the energy and up-beat mood of the swinging sixties, just like now when we are all facing increasing bills for just about everything you could imagine: yet a junior Labour minister – Tom Harris, originally from Beith – last week told us all to stop moaning.

One of the by-elections referred to in the 1967 Sunday Post article took place in Hamilton. At that contest the SNP's Winnie Ewing swept to power, beating Labour with a massive 38% swing to the Nationalists. At the following Westminster Election Labour lost to the Tories.

Forty years ago the SNP was surging to victory in Scotland, and the Tories were just waiting for their opportunity to kick-out Labour. Is history in the process of repeating itself?

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com June 28 2008

Royalty and the British establishment


The Letters page of the3towns.com has recently included contributions from people concerned about the North Ayrshire & Arran Tory candidate, Philip Lardner, supporting an ancient Act of the Westminster Parliament which bars Roman Catholics from ascending to the throne of the UK. Other contributors have come back and have defended the Act.

Personally, I couldn't care less who can and cannot be King or Queen of this country. The Act of Settlement, the legislation in question, does discriminate against Catholics – and Scottish Protestants, too, as the monarch of the UK is also head of the Church of England and must, therefore, be of the Anglican faith. As a piece of legislation which is discriminatory, the Act of Settlement should be rescinded; but that shouldn't be the end of it. Where in a modern 21st Century country can there be a place for the retention of an extravagantly cosseted family, whose only claim to the position they hold is accident of birth? Well, that and the fact their ancestors were the biggest murderers and cut-throats of previous centuries?

The idea of a 'royal' family whose members are somehow better than the rest of us is an absurdity, a legacy of medieval beliefs. To believe that another person is by nature your better, and as such should be afforded a much higher status and immense privileges, is, I believe, a form of mass delusion. Individual members of the current British Royal Family are ordinary human beings, no different in their make-up from you and me. They, like us, have their faults – as we have all seen a bit too graphically in recent years. They are ordinary human beings who can't believe their luck that there are still so many people in the UK who are taken in by the so-called special nature of the royal being, and who are prepared to continue funding their massively luxurious lifestyle to the tune of £40 million in the last year alone.

The royals are the cornerstone of the British establishment, which is a vastly different entity to the British Government. The establishment actually runs the country. The government, elected by the people, is allowed to get on with the day-to-day economic and social management of the UK, just as long as they don't go too far or get any 'daft' ideas about implementing proposals that might curtail the establishment's overall power.

Secret Service files now released to public scrutiny show that the British establishment considered the democratically elected Labour Government of Harold Wilson in the 1960s as being too far to the left. Supposed links between 10 Downing Street and the communist Soviet Union had the Whitehall mandarins very worried. They sensed – wrongly as it turns out – that Wilson and his government could be the vanguard of a communist take-over of Britain, which would lead to the overthrow of the monarchy and to central power transferring to the people from the unelected elite at the head of the British establishment.

Clearly, from their narrow and self-serving perspective, the establishment couldn't allow that to happen. Democracy, people power, was not something that was to be allowed in Britain. So, as official records now show, plans were put in place to overthrow the elected government of the UK – initially by the military – and then to be replaced by a new compliant administration that would guarantee the continued privileged position of the elite, and ensure that the Royal Family maintained its role at the pinnacle of a society where supposedly lesser mortals were to know their place – as subjects of Her Majesty, not citizens – and were not to get caught up in 'dangerous lefty notions', such as democracy, fairness and equality.

One of the people who sat in on meetings at which Britain's first military coup was planned, was Earl Mountbatten, the present Queen's uncle and a figure of great influence on Prince Charles.

Eventually, the plan wasn't needed as, against poll predictions, Wilson's Labour Party was defeated by the Tories under Ted Heath. The monarchy, with all its hangers-on and flunkies, and the secretive British establishment were safe to continue ruling over us.

Of course, it isn't just those in Whitehall positions of power who support the Royal Family and the retention of the elite British State. Bizarrely, there are many ordinary people who willingly adopt that position and allow themselves to be second class 'subjects' in their own country.

In political terms it is known as the phenomenon of the working class Tory. In England that concept is explained mainly by the theory of the 'divine right of Kings', whereby the oiks actually believe that royalty and Oxbridge-educated toffs are, indeed, better than them and, as a consequence, should be allowed to rule on their behalf. The reality in Scotland is different.

The working class Tory vote in Scotland is primarily an Orange Protestant vote. Working class joiners, plumbers, welders and so on will vote Tory because they believe the indoctrination of 300 years of British Union. They adhere to loyalty to the Queen, even though Her Majesty doesn't know of their existence and wouldn't be seen dead in their company; and they consider themselves British, despite the fact the English (the real British) couldn't care less about the 'Sweaty Socks' and would rid themselves of us tomorrow if they were given the chance. Of course, the English public, just like the Scots, aren't actually aware of how wealthy an independent Scotland would be with around 90% of the oil receipts from the North Sea.

As a supporter of an independent Scottish republic, I wouldn't claim to understand what motivates supposedly fellow Scots to disown their own country, in favour of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, a union of countries; and to willingly bow to other human beings whom they consider to be their betters.

The British State has stolen Scotland's wealth, and continues to do so on a daily basis. The British State has consistently used young Scots as cannon fodder in imperialist wars against sovereign nations. Scotland has had a very raw deal as part of the British Union, and the sooner we retake the confidence to govern ourselves in a fair and equitable society, the better.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com June 21 2008

Tinkering with a symptom won't cure the problem

Kenny MacAskill, Justice Secretary in the Scottish Government, came in for a degree of criticism when the SNP seemed to be backing away from its manifesto commitment to put 1000 extra police officers on Scotland's streets. I was one of his critics.

To be honest, I'm still not sure we will have 1000 more officers any time soon. While the government has given the okay for funding that will allow a gradual build-up to the 1000 figure, there are still officers retiring and enduring periods of long-term sickness. The result of which is new officers are simply replacing those being lost, with no overall increase in the numbers of police on our streets.

Of course, it can certainly be argued that if the SNP government had not made available additional funding, then the new officers could not have been recruited, and we would be witnessing a decrease in officers on the beat. That is a legitimate point, but it does not represent the additional 1000 police we were promised before last year's Scottish Parliament Election.

To use a judicial metaphor, the jury is still out on whether or not Mr MacAskill will deliver on his pledge, and the jury is composed of us, the electorate. Fail to deliver the 1000 officers, and the SNP Government may well be found guilty at the next election.

There are, of course, myriad other areas of government performance where the SNP are exceeding expectations, and if things carry on as they are – there is no reason to think they will not – even failing on one justice commitment will not be enough for voters to look elsewhere for their next government.

The SNP has built credibility since coming to power and poll after poll shows the Scottish public increasingly trust the Salmond administration to do the right thing for Scotland. Woeful Wendy and her troupe of New Labour clowns simply show how well the SNP are performing.

However, this week saw another potential pit fall for the government, and it again fell into Kenny MacAskill's portfolio area. The problems of underage and excessive drinking by the young are ones which affect communities, families and individuals around Scotland. The Three Towns know only too well the social disorder that can result from abuse of alcohol.

It is, therefore, absolutely correct that Mr MacAskill and the SNP Government should look to tackle these problems – God knows, this isn't a new phenomenon and previous Labour and Tory governments have spectacularly failed to address the issues.

There is just one snag in what the Justice Secretary proposes – it won't work.

Kenny MacAskill wants to ban from buying alcohol at an off-licence anyone under the age of 21. That, we are told, would put an end to the gangs of young people we see on our streets consuming cheap booze until they are out of their heads. No, it won't.

It isn't those aged 18, 19 and 20 who hang around street corners: that problem relates to young teenagers, those under the legal age to drink, those who don't look old enough to get served in pubs.

The government is targeting the wrong section of the community. Even if the argument is that banning 18 to 20 year-olds from off-licenses will stop that age group from buying alcohol for younger people, what is to stop these kids from approaching a 21 year-old to get them their bevvy?

As the SNP proposals stand, every Scot aged between 18 and 20 would be penalised because of the actions of a very few people in their age group who currently buy alcohol for kids, and by those kids who then get smashed and cause anti-social problems.

Those between 18 and 20 are more likely to be in pubs or clubs, enjoying a drink and socialising. Banning them from off-licenses will have no effect on that behaviour nor will it stop younger people getting access to alcohol.

Clearly, there is another problem relating to the 18 to 20 age group drinking too much and causing anti-social problems once the pubs and clubs empty: but, again, current government proposals will not address that issue. So why is Kenny MacAskill advocating an off-licence ban on this age group?

The answer is that the government does genuinely want to tackle the drinking and anti-social behaviour problems that blight our communities. They want so badly to remove the alcohol stain from Scottish society that they will consider banning – and stigmatising – an entire section of that society, but sometimes less is better.

There is no need to ban every adult Scot between the ages of 18 and 20 from buying any form of alcohol from an off-licence. Aren't our young people to be allowed to develop and have a social life, involving moderate consumption of alcohol, outwith the confines of pubs and clubs?

Scotland's alcohol problem is not superficial. In order to tackle abuse – of alcohol or drugs – our government needs to radically transform our society into one which offers hope and opportunity to each of our citizens. Abuse of drugs, of which alcohol is certainly one, often blots out the miserable existence far too many Scottish people endure. If your reality is hell, would you not consider an option that, however temporarily, took you out of that purgatory?

Tinkering with the symptoms of abuse will not provide a cure for the illness. There will always be people who drink to dangerous levels, just as there will always be those who will take other kinds of mind altering substances. However, in 21st Century Scotland more people abuse alcohol and other drugs because they want to escape the world we have created.

If we, as a society, offered our young teenagers the prospect of a decent life, where they could see in their future the opportunity to work, have money, build a successful life, have a family, then maybe they would not be so inclined to feel rejected and worthless. Then maybe they would feel part of this society, a valued member with a constructive role to play.

There has to be a carrot to counter-balance the stick. For those who are given hope and opportunity, but throw it back in society's face, the stick should come down hard. Right now, though, there is just the prospect of the stick for so many of our young people. We have to offer the carrot too.

Until we begin to address the disadvantages and lack of opportunity in Scottish society, then wielding the stick at our young people – guilty or not – will not work.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com  June 14 2008

Football loyalty

The demise of Gretna Football Club has sparked speculation about who will replace them in the the Scottish Football League. Five clubs have applied for the vacant slot: Annan Athletic, Edinburgh City, Preston Athletic, Spartans and Cove Rangers. The successful club will be the one receiving most support from existing Scottish League sides in a vote on July 3.

The reason I mention this is because the speculation reminded me of an earlier time when the league was looking for a new member. It was 1974 and the club that eventually made it into the professional game was Ferranti Thistle, a works side from Edinburgh. Because of Scottish Football League rules, which barred overt sponsorship of teams, Ferranti was forced to change its name. As it played at Meadowbank Stadium in Edinburgh, the team adopted the name of Meadowbank Thistle.

That was the team's status until 1995 when it relocated to the new town of Livingston and became Livingston Football Club, which it remains today.

Now, what has that wee bit of Scottish Football history got to do with us here in North Ayrshire? Well, at the time Ferranti Thistle were allowed into the Scottish League, there was much talk locally of a bid being made to have a North Ayrshire team admitted to the professional ranks. It was argued that with a population of around 130,000 North Ayrshire could sustain a side that would attract substantial support and could, perhaps, progress to the higher echelons of the game.

So far, so good – but this is football, and it wasn't long before the insurmountable problem arose. Instead of creating a new North Ayrshire side, with access to the best talent in the local junior game, those behind the plan finally broke cover and showed their hand. The idea wasn't for a new team, it was for Irvine Meadow to go senior – with the football-supporting public across the rest of North Ayrshire expected to support them. Aye right.

When it became clear that local junior football loyalties would not be broken, the plan fell by the wayside. Loyalty runs deep in footballing terms, even junior football.

There is no way people from the Three Towns would switch from supporting Winton Rovers, Saltcoats Vics or Ardeer Thistle and go to Irvine to cheer on the Meadow against the likes of East Fife or Cowdenbeath. Come to think of it, there is very little chance of Three Towns football supporters cheering the Meadow against anyone.

Football loyalty is a strange thing, because I don't have a problem supporting Kilmarnock. Perhaps this is because Kilmarnock have never been rivals to Winton Rovers. By supporting Killie in the senior game I'm not being asked to switch allegiance, I can support both.

Having said that, there are times when switching allegiance is the right thing to do. I was brought up a 'proddy' in the West of Scotland, so I supported Rangers – I thought it was compulsory. However, once I began to realise the social and political ideologies that lay behind the Rangers phenomenon, I couldn't square that circle.

Notwithstanding the religious element – these were the days when Rangers would not have signed Pele, the best player in the world at the time, because he 'kicked wae the wrang fit' – as a Scottish nationalist I couldn't support a team that flew the British Union flag and sang Rule Britannia. To be even handed, nor would I want to support a team that wallowed in its Irish heritage and sang songs praising a terrorist organisation.

Of course, things have moved on considerably since those days - both Rangers and Celtic have made strenuous efforts to disassociate themselves from the sectarian elements that still form part of their core support – but I think I will stick with an Ayrshire side that doesn't have a schizophrenic problem with its national loyalty. If the bus-loads of Rangers and Celtic fans who pour out of North Ayrshire every weekend during the football season to go and support their favourite Glasgow teams went, instead, to Rugby Park or wherever Kilmarnock were playing, the Ayrshire side would be one of the best supported and financed teams in the league. In such a position, who is to say that Kilmarnock would not be able to break the monopoly on success currently enjoyed by the Old Firm.

It could happen but, sad to say, it isn't likely. Those Old Firm loyalties, whatever the motivation, run deep – and there are many people who support the sides simply because they believe them to be the best.

Thinking back, the fact Irvine Meadow played in gear that was remarkably similar to Rangers strips may have been another factor in why many in the community of North Ayrshire junior football would not have been prepared to support the side's bid for senior status.

I can actually remember attending an Irvine Meadow versus Winton Rovers game at Meadow Park when I was about ten: my dad had taken me. I think it might have been a cup tie because there was a big crowd. It was at that game I realised just how deep religious bigotry and prejudice runs in the West of Scotland.

What stuck in my mind were the shouts of one particular Meadow supporter. Every so often he would erupt with the call, “Mon the 'dow – intae these Connal-burnin b******s.” 'Connal-burnin' being Irvine for candle-burning.

I was young and naive and had to ask my dad what the link was between the burning of candles and Ardrossan Winton Rovers. The assertion was, of course, that people from Ardrossan were Roman Catholics.

To this day I have never been able to fathom the logic (for want of a better word) that informed the Meadow supporters words or beliefs. I was just glad the Winton stuffed them and he went home unhappy.

The good guys win in the end.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com June 7 2008

Not in the public interest

The latest development in the North Ayrshire Council PPP scandal is the refusal of the Scottish Executive to make public the advice and briefings it gave to ministers who were replying to letters I wrote on the subject: they also refuse to release the material they supplied to the minister who responded to the Members Debate I secured in March 2006.

According to the civil servant who replied to my most recent Freedom of Information request, the public interest is best served by not releasing such information. That means there are people at the core of our government operation in Scotland who actually believe it is better if the people don't know what is going on. Better for whom?

Of course, governments keeping the people in the dark isn't a new concept. Only recently UK government papers were released under the 30 year rule which showed that Scotland would be a very wealthy independent country, with the population enjoying one of the highest standards of living in the world. That was the view of a Labour Government official who was tasked with rubbishing the SNP's calls for independence in the 1970s. Of course, given the report's findings, it didn't see the light of day, until now, and despite knowing the true picture, Labour Government ministers continued to lie and tell us that Scotland was an economic basket case dependent on financial hand-outs from England.

Governments don't work in the interests of the people, unless those interests happen to coincide with those of the particular party in power at the time. Even councils don't tend to put the interests of local people ahead of party political advantage. That is why local authorities tend to spend lots of money on roads and other local projects just as election time approaches. Thankfully, more and more people are beginning to see through such attempts to buy re-election.

At a Scottish government level, I have long held the opinion that there is a problem with some of the civil servants who make up the Scottish Executive. Staff within Executive departments are not part of an independent Scottish civil service. They work for the British civil service and a posting to the Scottish Executive is just another development on their career path, just the same as a posting to another department of government, such as the Home Office or Work and Pensions.

For many people working in Scottish Executive departments there is no great commitment to the Scottish Government or Scotland. Loyalty is to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. They may very well work to the best of their abilities while based in Edinburgh, but ultimately their career will take them back to London and to a role in what they see as the real government.

I consider there is also a problem with an ideology that allows civil servants to believe that keeping the public in the dark about what is actually going on is the right thing to do. The loyalty of public officials should be to the people, not the government or council. If civil servants or council officials know that information is being withheld from the public which, if revealed, would show incompetence or corruption, then those officials have a responsibility to get that information into the public domain. There is even now legislation which offers protection to so-called whistleblowers.

Of course, such courage is seldom shown by people who have mortgages to pay and children to feed. That is how governments and councils normally get away with things. Public officials are scared of losing their jobs, so they keep quiet and they comply with decisions to refuse information to the public.

Consider, again, the implications of the Scottish Executive's latest refusal to release documents relating to the North Ayrshire Council Schools PPP Project. What we are actually being asked to accept is that it is not in the public interest for the public to know information about a publicly-funded, public construction contract to supply public buildings in which the children of the local public will be educated. Apparently, ours is not to question why, ours is simply to pay the bill.

From the beginning of investigations into the North Ayrshire PPP Project it has been abundantly clear that there was something far wrong with what has gone on. Council and government officials have been very reluctant to release information, but we now know why. The information that has been dragged out of them over recent years shows a project that only ever had one credible bid, despite the Council still maintaining it had two.

Further documents show North Ayrshire Council knew that only one bid it received could actually deliver the project – four new schools – but the local authority proceeded and claimed it had genuine competition, when it didn't.

In addition, documents eventually released under Freedom of Information legislation show lie after lie being told in paperwork submitted as part of a bid for the £380 million publicly-funded contract.

Then there is the issue of the police investigation into the North Ayrshire Project. Carried out at the request of myself and Ronnie McNicol (now the Independent councillor for Saltcoats and Stevenston), the police claim to have carried out a thorough enquiry. The only problem with that claim relates to the Irvine Herald being able to print a front page story stating that the police enquiry would be dropped because of a lack of evidence of any wrong doing. The Irvine Herald story was carried less than two weeks after the police investigation was supposedly started.

Of course, the Irvine Herald could just have been taking a flier with their story, perhaps they didn't actually have a credible source for the information they printed. Well, no. That isn't how veteran journalist Lex Brown of the Herald works. In fact, the person who said, less than two weeks into the investigation, that the enquiry would be dropped, was the police officer supposedly leading the enquiry. He told me that himself.

There was no genuine police enquiry into the North Ayrshire Council Schools PPP Project. Just like the Scottish Executive civil servants and North Ayrshire Council officials, senior police officers seem to believe it would not be in the public interest for the public to know what was actually going on.

For the moment, the people desperately trying to prevent the truth from emerging are hoping that they can continue to keep the public in the dark. They won't be successful. They can stall, but eventually the full facts of the North Ayrshire Council Schools PPP Project will emerge, and when they do, there will be nowhere for them to hide.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com May 31 2008

It's been an interesting year

The SNP government has just celebrated the anniversary of its first year in power, and I believe 'celebrated' is the correct word to use.

In the last twelve months the competence of Alex Salmond and his ministers has exposed for ever the unionist lie that the SNP was unfit for government. In fact, this SNP government has showed itself to be much more effective in its first year than the previous Labour/Lib Dem administration was in eight years.

Another unionist myth that has been blown is the one about the SNP being a one-man band. Clearly, Alex Salmond is a politician head and shoulders above any of his contemporaries – at Holyrood or Westminster – but ministerial office has allowed his lieutenants also to show their strengths and abilities.

In Nicola Sturgeon, Alex Salmond and Scotland have a deputy who has already proved that if the First Minister was to fall under the almost proverbial bus, we would have nothing to fear. Nicola is a very competent politician and, actually, a nice person. The 'nippy sweety' bit is just if you annoy her – so, don't annoy her.

Of course, prior to last year's Scottish Parliament Election most people already knew of Nicola Sturgeon. While Alex Salmond was at Westminster, Nicola had very ably led for the SNP at the weekly First Minister's Questions. I witnessed, first hand, her exchanges with the then First Minister Jack McConnell – also an able politician – and I can't remember Ms Sturgeon ever coming off the loser.

That said, most of the Scottish public would probably have struggled to name another SNP politician at that time. However, since coming to government the profile and credibility of people like Kenny McAskill, Fiona Hyslop and Richard Lochhead have increased dramatically. There is another Cabinet Secretary whose name escapes me at the moment. Hang on, it will come to me. Oh yes, Jim Sweeney. No, sorry, that's not right. John Swinburne. No, that was the MSP for the Pensioners' Party. Okay, okay, I'm only joking. It is, of course, my old friend John Swinney. Even John has managed to rebuild a bit of credibility after his disastrous reign as leader of the party. Having said that, though, he still sends me to sleep when he appears on Newsnight.

Each of these Cabinet Secretaries is backed up by ministers who also have shown they can outperform anything the unionist parties have at their disposal. People like Mike Russell, Jim Mather and Adam Ingram have hit the ground running in their government roles and have begun to bring forward a range of initiatives that will benefit the people of Scotland.

So, for its first year report, the SNP Government, I believe, merits an 'A'. Of course, a week is a long time in politics, so three years is an eternity. Between now and the next Scottish Parliament Election in 2011 the SNP must build on its initial success and must deliver on that core manifesto commitment of allowing the Scottish people to vote in a referendum which decides whether or not we want the government to enter into negotiations with Westminster regarding Scotland becoming an independent nation.

As for the performance of Holyrood's opposition parties, probably the best that could be said is, 'must try harder'.

Labour has been in almost total disarray, with Woeful Wendy trying to act tough – 'bring it on', aye right – only to have her legs slapped by the clunking fist of Big Bully Broon.

The Lib Dems have not changed. They were chancers when they propped up the Labour Executive between 1999 and 2007, and they remain chancers today. Personally, I wouldn't trust a Lib Dem as far as I could through them. Not nice people.

The Tories? Well at least you know where you are with the Tories – stuffed! Nice old Aunty Annabel does a good job of masking the true Tory that lurks just beneath the surface. You know, the one that introduced the Poll Tax, decimated Scottish manufacturing industry and considered that unemployment in Scotland was a price worth paying for economic success in the South-East of England.

On a personal level I always got on well with Annabel Goldie; in fact, don't tell anyone but I also got on well with Bill Aitken and Phil Gallie. It was almost as if they were human.

I suppose the Tories would merit a 'C' for trying. At least they accepted the SNP's position as the government and worked with it in trying to advance their own policies.

Of course, there was another election last May. In our part of the world we voted to elect a new North Ayrshire Council – and we did just that. Of the 30 councillors returned last year, 14 were elected for the first time. As a result, some of the Labour deadwood was chopped and dispatched to the Cooncillors Burny-Fire.

We lost people like Margaret Munn and Sam Taylor – not a great loss; while we gained Independents and SNP members who have been like a breath of fresh air to the stale atmosphere of North Ayrshire Council.

First year pass marks certainly go to John Hunter, Ronnie McNicol, Tony Gurney and Willie Gibson. Each of these councillors quickly found their feet in a new environment and have worked tirelessly in the interests of the people who entrusted them with their support. Unfortunately, however, the same cannot be said for the Labour councillors who managed to slither back into office.

The antics of Peter McNamara would be funny if their consequences weren't so serious. Sometimes it really looks like the Labour councillor for Ardrossan & Arran is deliberately trying to alienate local people. He was the man who pushed for a new school to be built on Laighdykes playing field, when it could have been built on any number of sites around North Ayrshire (or even specifically Saltcoats), and he is the man who attended a public meeting, heard speaker after speaker explain why residents of sheltered homes need the support of wardens, then he completely ignored the people and voted to take the wardens away.

Meanwhile, his two Labour colleagues in Saltcoats & Stevenston, David Munn and Alan Munro, have been reduced to writing pathetic political point-scoring letters to the Ardrossan and Saltcoats Herald, in which they attempt to attack the Independent and SNP councillors who are actually doing the work for the towns.

It's been a very interesting year. Both nationally and locally things have changed for the better. Let's see what the next twelve months bring.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com May 24 2008

It's independence or the Tories

In the wake of the Tory victory in the Crewe and Nantwich by-election, David Cameron has pronounced that this marks the end for New Labour. I, for one, will shed no tears if the Tory leader is proved to be correct.

If anything deserved to die it is that hideous creation of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown: New Labour, born of political expediency and personal ambition. A fraud built on a stolen name and on a stolen ideology. The Labour Party was founded by working class people to give parliamentary representation to the majority; New Labour appropriated the name and created a Tory Party MkII. Under New Labour the poor and the working class were abandoned, while people who formerly told the world they were socialists suddenly found themselves more comfortable pandering to big business and accepting donations from multi-national corporations. That the name 'Labour' was used to effect this transformation was nothing short of treacherous, and was an insult to the founding fathers of the movement and to those who fought so hard to establish a political party to represent the needs and aspirations of ordinary working class people.

Of course, and regrettably, the local constituency of Cunninghame North (now North Ayrshire & Arran for Westminster Parliamentary Elections) played a part in the Toryfication of the Labour Party. The former MP for the area, Brian Wilson, was credited with contributing to the wording of a new Clause 4 in the Labour Party constitution.

Clause 4 had been the socialist bedrock of the Labour Party. Drafted in 1917 by Sidney Webb, it was adopted by the Party the following year and came to represent exactly what the 'People's Party' stood for; it read:

"To secure for the workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange, and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service."

What Wilson and his centre-right colleagues in New Labour changed it to was:

“The Labour Party is a democratic socialist party. It believes that by the strength of our common endeavour we achieve more than we achieve alone, so as to create for each of us the means to realise our true potential and for all of us a community in which power, wealth and opportunity are in the hands of the many, not the few, where the rights we enjoy reflect the duties we owe, and where we live together, freely, in a spirit of solidarity, tolerance and respect."

You can just imagine that being written over a glass of chianti, as a focus group of New Labour Young Turks, fresh out of Oxbridge, enthused about embracing the free market, and compared their designer suits.

New Labour was a sell-out of the principles that brought the Labour Party into existence. It was, and remains, a con: only, now, more and more people are seeing through it.

Unfortunately, for the people of England, their best bet for getting rid of New Labour is the Tory Party, the very party on which Blair and Brown modelled their monstrous creation. It definitely seems that the electorate in England has decided it is time for New Labour to go, and that they are prepared to put back into power the party that, for eighteen long years, wreaked havoc on Scotland and parts of the North of England.

Fortunately, in Scotland, we have other options, but that doesn't mean we won't have a Tory government imposed on us by the votes of the people of England. Remember, that is exactly what happened at the General Elections of 1979, 1983, 1987 and 1992. At each of those elections Scotland overwhelmingly rejected the Tory Party, but we still got a Tory government because that is what England wanted and, as part of the British Union, that's the way the electoral system works. Also at each of those elections, Labour told the people of Scotland that we had to vote Labour to keep the Tories out – Scotland did vote Labour, and we still got the Tories. Labour lied. They knew that, because Scotland was a member of the British Union, every single voter in Scotland could vote Labour, but if England voted Tory then we would get a Tory government. In reality, the only thing Scotland could actually do to ensure the Tories would not be able to govern Scotland was to vote for the SNP. As has been proved at three Scottish Parliament Elections, the Tory's place in Scotland is that of a minority party. It was because of Labour's lies that Scotland had a Tory government imposed on it for eighteen years – and those of us who were around then will never forget the damage that was done to our country during that period.

Scotland has the potential to be a very prosperous independent nation, with a standard of living to be envied. We only have to look at Norway to see how things could be.

Norway discovered oil at around the same time as it was discovered in Scottish waters of the North Sea. Norway established a Futures Fund into which a proportion of oil revenue would be placed and would be used for the benefit of the people of the country. Norway's Futures Fund presently stands at around £400 billion – and that's after funding has been used to help build a better society. It is predicted that by 2010 the Norwegian Futures Fund will amount to around £640 billion. Scotland's oil wealth was administered by British Governments in London, both Tory and Labour, and we don't have a Futures Fund.

We already have a pro-independence government at the Scottish Parliament, but we remain part of the British Union. That is why it is vitally important that, whenever Gordon Brown is forced to face the people in an election, those of us in Scotland once again reject all British unionist parties. England is going to vote Tory, so if we vote anything other than SNP (or for one of the other pro-independence parties prepared to work with the SNP) we will get a Tory government.

When the next Westminster Election comes, almost certainly in 2010, it is up to us, the voters of Scotland. If we don't vote for independence, then thanks to voters in England the Tories will once again govern our country. If that happens, we will only have ourselves to blame.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com May 17 2008

So much for local government and housing associations being open and accountable

This week the3towns.com reports on North Ayrshire Council selling to Cunninghame Housing Association three pieces of land in the area of Montgomerie Street in Ardrossan.

The transaction, in itself, is not entirely out of the ordinary, but the fact that none of Ardrossan's four councillors new anything about the sale is something that gives cause for concern, particularly when speculation is rife that existing council houses in Montgomerie Street may be located within an area which could be earmarked for further private residential development. If that turned out to be the case, then, so the story goes, the council houses would be demolished and tenants relocated, with compulsory purchase orders issued to existing owner-occupiers.

The land which North Ayrshire Council sold to Cunninghame Housing Association in June 2007 is divided into three plots and cost the Association a total of £1,250,000. That is a lot of money in anyone's book and, presumably, the land was bought for a specific purpose. Unfortunately, no-one outside of a few senior people at North Ayrshire Council and Cunninghame Housing Association know that purpose – and, so far, they're not telling.

As a Council source who spoke this week to the3towns.com suggested, the land that was sold does not, in itself, represent a major development site; but if it were to be coupled with the land on which Ardrossan Library currently sits, or with the site of the existing Montgomerie Street council houses – or both – then it does, potentially, become a much more desirable proposition for a developer. Of course, the site would also be adjacent to the ongoing 'regeneration' in the Ardrossan Harbour area.

Since the3towns.com revealed the speculation over a possible private development on the site of Montgomerie Street council houses, and the sale of land to Cunninghame Housing Association, at least one Ardrossan councillor has tabled questions to senior Council officials with regard to what, exactly, is going on. Hopefully, answers will be forthcoming. I really wouldn't want to think that the paid officials of the Council might try to keep our councillors in the dark – well, any more than they already have.

Last week, before printing the 'speculation' story, the3towns.com asked North Ayrshire Council to comment. However, as regular readers will know, the local council refuses to speak to us. This week, before printing the 'land sale' story, we asked the chief executive of Cunninghame Housing Association to indicate the purpose to which the association would put the land it had bought from the Council. We got no response.

So much for local government and housing associations being open and accountable. It just makes you wonder why they are so determined to keep things secret from us – and when I say 'us', I don't just mean the3towns.com, it's all of us. Local government and housing associations are supposed to work in the public interest, but that doesn't seem to be the case in North Ayrshire.

While Three Towns' residents are becoming increasingly aware that 'regeneration' actually means clearing sites to allow the construction of private housing that locals can't afford, it seems that decision-making is being taken out of the hands of the councillors we elect to represent us. How can it be that land is sold-off in Ardrossan but the local councillors are told nothing? How many 'regeneration' proposals put forward by the Irvine Bay Urban Regeneration Company (IBURC) have been refused? What consultation with local people or elected councillors took place before IBURC produced its master plan? We hear of consultation meetings being held now, but towns have already been changed for ever, and what guarantees do we have that the voice of the public will be heeded?

Under Labour control since 1980, North Ayrshire Council (Cunninghame District Council from 1980 to 1996) has miserably failed to make this area a better place in which to live. Just about everyone you speak to in local streets will tell you that what our communities need is jobs. Yet employment opportunities are what is spectacularly missing from current 'regeneration' plans. In a 3towns.com interview of a few weeks back, when asked what it would do to bring employment to the Three Towns, a representative of IBURC pointed to the opening of two shops in Ardrossan's Princes Street and referred to an aspiration to expand the Marina at the harbour. That about said it all.

The current 'regeneration' of the Three Towns, Kilwinning and Irvine will leave new housing which, while it might be better than what was there before, still isn't particularly attractive – but the social and economic fabric of local towns will not be regenerated. For the bulk of the local population nothing will have changed. Meanwhile, designers and developers will walk away having swelled their profits, and can look to the next area to be 'regenerated' by public funds.

The people who embark on projects like Irvine Bay need to be held accountable, but the councillors we elect to look after our interests aren't being told the full story. At least, opposition councillors aren't being told the full story; as for Labour councillors, well they are not to be trusted.

Over the years while I was involved in frontline politics I regularly came into contact with a man called Drew Cochrane. Drew is the editor of the Largs & Millport Weekly News; in fact, he is Britain's longest-serving editor, having taken over at the 'wee paper' in 1974.

Drew Cochrane and I never did and never will agree on politics, but I always had great respect for him as a journalist and an editor. Drew has always been prepared to ruffle a few feathers if he thought people or organisations were not operating in the interests of the people – particularly the people of Largs. In particular, the 'high heid yins' at North Ayrshire Council and North Ayrshire Leisure came to loathe and fear Drew as he regularly held them to account when no-one else did. He saw it as his duty as an editor of a local newspaper, and he was right.

In this week's edition of the Largs & Millport Weekly News Drew Cochrane writes, “It is the job of the local newspaper to be adversarial and, unfortunately, in my opinion as a hands on editor since 1974 very few local newspapers even have a voice these days.

“As our readers know well if we didn’t raise objections to daft decisions taken by faceless bureaucrats and uniforms we would be ridden over roughshod even worse than happens.

“(There is an) old newspaper adage....publish and be damned. Print the news and raise hell.”

I couldn't agree more. There are people who are not being open and honest with local residents, but they will, ultimately, be held to account.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com May 10 2007

Senior Council officials should be told to shape up or ship out

At last week's meeting of North Ayrshire Council, SNP councillor Tony Gurney tabled a question which related to a story carried by the3towns.com. In his written question Cllr Gurney referred to the the3towns.com as “a respected local newspaper”. In introducing his question, Tony Gurney repeated his statement.

Clearly, we are grateful for Cllr Gurney's description. However, equally clearly, not everyone in the Council Chamber agreed with the sentiment. One person in particular was caught sneering as the word 'respected' was used to describe the3towns.com. That person was Mr Ian Snodgrass, chief executive of North Ayrshire Council.

To be honest, I wouldn't have expected anything else. It is not likely that Mr Snodgrass would have respect for a newspaper which reports the facts and exposes the truth, often about matters relating to the organisation of which he is chief executive. How could he, when he presides over a body that has desperately tried to keep such news from local people. We need only refer back to the Council's £380m PPP Schools Project for evidence of such action.

Had it not been for local people taking it upon themselves to investigate the Council's actions in the PPP project, the fact that there had only ever been one credible bidder for the multi-million pound contract would never have seen the light of day. The Council still tries to pull the wool over the eyes of the people of North Ayrshire by saying there were two credible bids, even though the local authority's own documents show otherwise. Incidentally, much of the documentation relating to the PPP project was only released after the Scottish Information Commissioner ruled that the Council was wrong to withhold it.

At last week's Council meeting it would have been more professional if Mr Snodgrass had been able to contain himself from such a public reaction to Tony Gurney's description of the3towns.com. Then again, perhaps we should not be surprised at such unprofessional behaviour.

I have made the point before in this column that some senior officials at North Ayrshire Council appear to have got a bit carried away with themselves. From their behaviour it has become clear that they think they are in charge of our local authority. The weakness and incompetence of Labour councillors may have meant that unelected officials have assumed more powers than they should have, but the reality is that North Ayrshire Council is actually the 30 individual councillors we, the people, elect every four years.

Now, obviously, it would be impossible for those 30 councillors to carry out every role and assume every responsibility relating to the functions of the Council. That is why they employ others to carry out the jobs that have been identified as being required to provide services to us, the people of North Ayrshire. One of those identified jobs is chief executive, another is road sweeper. The person employed to perform the role of chief executive is every bit as much an employee of the Council as is the road sweeper. Ultimately, North Ayrshire Council's chief executive, like every other Council employee, is taken on by our 30 councillors to work for us. Any employee who develops grand ideas about their position should be reminded of the facts of local government life, which is where our elected representatives come in again. Mr Snodgrass should not be allowed to labour under any misapprehension about where he fits into the scheme of things at North Ayrshire and, given Labour's unwillingness to stand up to officials, our opposition councillors – the majority at North Ayrshire – should put him right.

One other issue on which Mr Snodgrass has exhibited his less-than-high opinion of the3towns.com is his decision to implement a ban on the Council responding to legitimate requests for answers to questions asked by the newspaper.

Such a ban is petty. the3towns.com prints the facts and if the stories we carry sometimes reflect badly on North Ayrshire Council then that is not the fault of the newspaper. Shooting the messenger won't make the senior management of North Ayrshire Council any more competent, nor will it stop Labour councillors from taking idiotic decisions like scrapping warden cover in local sheltered housing.

Refusing to speak to only one newspaper – apparently because we publish on the web rather than in hard copy – while supplying other local papers with responses to enquiries is nothing less than discrimination. It is also a stupid decision.

Where the3towns.com is sure of the facts we will print the story. Therefore, North Ayrshire Council's refusal to put their side of the story can only be to the detriment of the local authority. Answering the3towns.com would not change the facts of a story, but it would allow the Council to attempt to justify its actions.

Far be it from me to load our opposition councillors with more work, but while they are telling Mr Snodgrass that he is an employee of the Council, and nothing more, perhaps they could also ask him to explain why, apparently at his instruction, North Ayrshire Council is openly practising discrimination.

From my days as a councillor in the nineties, and more recently as an MSP, I am well aware of how so many of the rank-and-file employees of North Ayrshire Council go well beyond the call of duty in trying to provide the best possible services for local people. It continues to be a great pity that these workers are so badly let down by the senior management of the Council. Indeed, it is extremely frustrating for Council workers dealing with the North Ayrshire public to find themselves on the receiving end of complaints about things going wrong. When things go wrong it is usually because of policy decisions taken by Labour councillors or incompetent implementation by senior management.

Democracy means that Labour councillors who let down the public can be kicked-out of office at the next election, but what about the Council officials who think they run the show and who refuse to speak to certain newspapers and to members of the general public? If senior officials are not up to the job then our elected representatives must make clear that they either have to shape up or ship out.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com May 10 2008

Wendy, you're doing a great job

As a passionate believer in Scottish independence, may I ask members of the Labour Party in Scotland to please, please, please keep Wendy Alexander as your leader. I used to say that Margaret Thatcher was the best recruiting sergeant the SNP ever had, but Woeful Wendy is beginning to look every bit as useful to the cause of Scottish political freedom.

Ms Alexander, like her former best pal Gordon Brown, was not elected to leadership of her party; she was anointed. Not because she was the best candidate, but because she was the only candidate. No-one else wanted the job so badly that they were prepared to challenge her – I bet they are now very glad they made that decision. Although, having said that, perhaps Labour in Scotland led by someone else would not be in quite as much trouble as it is under the Alexander stewardship.

The current position of the Labour Party over an independence referendum is farcical. Wendy Alexander, who previously opposed such a referendum, now says we should have one and we should have it yesterday. She has also stated unequivocally that her call for an immediate referendum has the support of her boss, the UK prime minister. Apart from the complete u-turn from what Ms Alexander formerly believed, there is also the wee problem of Gordon Brown having denied supporting her new position. It really is political incompetence on a grand scale.

As far as a referendum on independence goes, the SNP Manifesto for last year's Scottish Parliament Election laid out its timescale for such a public vote: the party said it wanted to form the government in Scotland and to prove itself in that role; at the same time it also wanted to have a national conversation with the people of Scotland on the subject of independence and, after achieving those aims, would introduce legislation for a referendum. The legislation was to be brought forward in early 2010, with the actual vote held later that year. Now, I might be a wee bit biased when it comes to supporting pro-independence or pro-unionist parties, but the SNP position seems eminently sensible to me.

While I was a member of the SNP I was never in the “let's have a referendum” section of the party; but having said that, if the Manifesto commitment was to hold a referendum after certain other goals had been achieved, then the SNP is perfectly right to stick to its promise and to not allow Labour to hijack the process for narrow party political advantage.

Trying to rush the SNP, and Scotland, into an independence referendum might have seemed like a good political tactic to Wendy Alexander and her advisers, but in reality it has shown Labour to be desperate and inept. The people of Scotland know that the SNP wants independence. The people also know that holding a referendum on the subject has been SNP policy for a number of years. Labour's attempt to get in on the act simply shows they have very little to offer of their own, and that the SNP's agenda is what is taking Scotland forward.

Even worse than the idea itself, though, has been Labour's handling of the issue. Wendy Alexander has been made to look very foolish indeed, which, coming so soon after her admission that she broke the law when her Labour leadership campaign solicited and accepted an illegal donation, really does make her position look untenable.

From a Labour perspective Wendy Alexander has become a major liability. However, the SNP must be pinching themselves to make sure they aren't dreaming. After winning their first ever election and forming the government of Scotland, I'm sure Alex Salmond and his team never thought for a minute that the principle party of opposition would disintegrate so spectacularly in such a relatively short space of time. Gordon Brown distancing himself from Ms Alexander's position was surely the icing on the cake.

Wendy says she wants a referendum now, while Gordon says that would be wrong and, in fact, Labour should wait until the Calman Commission has reported before it decides what to do: the commission has been tasked to look at a possible extension of powers devolved to the Scottish parliament, but specifically not independence. Poor Wendy. Even her long-time mentor thinks she is wrong.

Of course, the unintended outcome of this new Labour position on an independence referendum is that there is now a majority in the Scottish Parliament for bringing about such a public vote. Before Wendy's serious miscalculation, only the SNP, the two Greens and Margo MacDonald would have supported a Referendum Bill. Now, though, Labour in Scotland has said it will not stand in the way of the Scottish people having a say on whether or not our nation re-takes its independence. That means Labour in the Scottish Parliament has committed itself to supporting a referendum, even if it comes along to the SNP timescale of 2010, which is exactly what is going to happen.

So, Scotland will have a referendum on our constitutional future. One aspect that is often overlooked in talk of an 'independence referendum' is that the people of Scotland have never been allowed to vote on whether we wanted to remain part of the British Union. In 300 years of union Scots have never endorsed our country's membership.

Of course, Unionists argue that when Scots have voted for either Labour or Conservative at a General Election then that has been an endorsement of union and a rejection of independence. That argument is nonsense: how people vote at a General Election is determined by many factors. Opinion poll after opinion poll has shown there are far more people in Scotland who support independence than there are who put their 'X' in the SNP box at a General Election.

It is also the case that if we accept such unionist logic, then an SNP election victory is sufficient to bring about independence. Unionist parties have never held a referendum on remaining in the British Union after they have won an election, so why should the SNP have to hold an independence referendum after it wins an election?

That position is now almost academic, anyway; Wendy's u-turn has meant there will now be a referendum. In two years time we will all be given the opportunity to take our destiny into our own hands. We will again hear all the unionist scare stories about what a nightmare Scotland would be if we walked into the world as an independent nation. However, the problem the Unionists have is that they told us devolution would result in a nightmare for Scotland, and then that an SNP government would be a disaster. They lied, and now everyone knows they lied.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com May 3 2008

Lack of openness presents challenge to democracy

Last Wednesday SNP councillor Tony Gurney exposed what appears to be a very real challenge to the administration of effective democracy at North Ayrshire Council.

Cllr Gurney had read in the3towns.com about North Ayrshire Council having purchased a number of Toughbook laptop computers, at a cost of £2,200 each, but that, one year after buying them, the local authority had yet to use them. Given that the Council had refused to talk to the3towns.com about our revelations, we were unable to report their position on the matter. However, as a conscientious councillor, Tony Gurney sought to establish whether or not what we had reported was true. Actually, we wouldn't have printed the story if it hadn't been true, but the councillor was right to check for himself.

As Tony Gurney revealed during last week's Council meeting, he asked a senior Council official if the story that appeared in the3towns.com had been accurate. The next day the official replied to Cllr Gurney, saying that the story was not accurate.

Some weeks after our original story appeared, a national Sunday newspaper picked up on the North Ayrshire Toughbooks issue. What the newspaper carried was almost exactly what had been in the the3towns.com article, the one that the senior Council official had told Cllr Gurney was not accurate. This time, however, the Council had chosen to give a comment to the Sunday paper. In that comment a Council spokesperson confirmed that the local authority had purchased 50 Toughbook laptop computers, at a total cost of £110,000, and that one year on they were only just about to use 17 of them for the first time.

Clearly, there was a major discrepancy between what the unnamed Council spokesperson had admitted to the Sunday paper and what the senior Council official had told Tony Gurney. As the councillor explained to last week's meeting, he broached this subject with the Council official and asked why he had not checked the facts before responding to his initial question about the3towns.com Toughbook story. The official responded that he had checked the facts, which were that the story in the3towns.com was not accurate.

The outcome, therefore, was that the Council had admitted that what the3towns.com had reported was, in fact, accurate, but one senior Council official was still telling an elected councillor that it was not.

There is a very serious point to what happened in this matter, and it relates to how paid Council officials treat elected councillors. It would seem that at North Ayrshire Council some senior officials think they work for the Labour administration, rather than for all 30 individual councillors who make up 'the Council'. The result of such a misapprehension is that those officials are not as open and helpful as they should be to opposition councillors. The consequence of which is that those councillors do not always receive sufficient or even accurate information, making even more difficult their job of effectively representing their constituents.

Some senior Council officials don't like councillors who ask too many questions. They much prefer if the councillors just turn-up at meetings to rubber stamp what the officials have decided is good for local communities. In North Ayrshire, over the years, such a situation has prevailed because too many of the Labour councillors who were supposed to be running the Council were just not up to the job. Officials made the decisions and Labour councillors simply endorsed them, pausing only long enough to collect their Special Responsibility Allowances.

Now, however, things are coming to a head because some of the councillors elected last May actually want to do a good job for their constituents and want to make sure the Council works as effectively as possible. That is why Cllr Gurney should have received accurate information from the Council official regarding the purchase of £110,000-worth of laptop computers. How can an opposition councillor hold to account the Labour administration if officials deny to them all the information they need?

At a national level such problems are generally avoided by the creation of different departments of the civil service. The civil servants who work for the Scottish Government do not also work for the Scottish Parliament. Even within some local authorities there are officials who work solely with specific political groupings of councillors. The reason for this is to prevent what seems to have been happening at North Ayrshire. A councillor seeking information from an official should be given that information – fully and accurately - irrespective of whether the councillor is from the political party that forms the administration of the council or is a member of the opposition. Anything less than that is tantamount to political interference on the part of the official.

Ultimately, the story carried by the3towns.com about North Ayrshire Council buying very expensive laptop computers was accurate: the Council finally admitted as much, but for some reason Cllr Tony Gurney was told otherwise by a senior paid employee of the Council. Quite simply, that just should not happen.

Tony Gurney was right to pursue the matter and to ask that the Labour Leader of the Council investigates how the wrong information was given to him. That is the very least that should happen. Meanwhile, the Council official involved should be asking himself whether his actions in this matter were in the interests of North Ayrshire Council or just the party that currently forms the administration.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com April 26 2008

So rules have to be obeyed?

A couple of years ago, while I was an MSP, a constituent approached me about the possibility of him receiving financial assistance to attend a job interview. Such assistance is available but his application had been turned down by the Jobcentre.

I took the man's details and made enquiries. The response I received from the manager of the Jobcentre in Saltcoats indicated that the reason my constituent had been turned down for assistance was because his job interview was actually in the Republic of Ireland – assistance is only offered for interviews within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Now, that decision seems fairly logical. If assistance was made available to attend job interviews outwith the UK, then how many applications do you think would be received for bar jobs in Ibiza?

Having said that, my constituent's application for assistance didn't relate to a bar job in some far flung holiday hotspot; his interview was for a position on an environmental project, a role for which he was academically qualified – and the interview was to be held in a town which was three miles inside the Irish Republic.

I put my constituent's case again to the Jobcentre but, while the manager was sympathetic, there was nothing they could do. The regulations covering the provision of financial assistance to attend a job interview were explicit – only interviews held within the UK qualified for consideration. It was not even permissible for my constituent's travel costs to be met as far as the border of the Irish Republic, with him picking up the tab for the next three miles. The interview itself had to be within the UK. That was the rule.

Now, there may be some people reading this who think, 'It doesn't cost that much to jump on a ferry or a cheap flight to Ireland, surely he could have got the money from somewhere or someone, if the job was that important to him?' If you are working and have an income, then such a reaction is understandable. However, if you have been unemployed for some time and your only income is basic state benefits, travelling to Irvine, never mind Ireland, is frequently beyond your means.

My constituent was an educated man whose expertise lay in the fields of environment and wildlife. Opportunities in the UK had been few and far between. So, rather than sit back and feel sorry for himself, he had broadened his job search and had applied for the vacancy in the Republic of Ireland.

He was qualified for the job, he really wanted it, but he didn't have the money to get to Ireland. Had an individual not stepped in to make the travel money available to my constituent, he would not have been able to attend the interview and would not have got the job. Probably, he would still be unemployed and we, the taxpayer, would still be funding the benefit that kept him alive while his talent and skills were wasted.

What annoys me most about this matter is that the inflexibility of current benefit rules meant that a young man was being denied a great opportunity. It was no thanks to the British State that he finally made it to his interview and got himself off benefits and into the workplace.

I don't hold the local Jobcentre to blame for that situation, staff at Saltcoats were genuinely sympathetic, but the rules did not permit them to make available any financial assistance. The job was in the Irish Republic, not the UK, and the rules don't even allow for a person to travel to the nearest place within the UK and to fund the rest of the trip themselves. Of course, had my constituent's interview been in Stornoway or Plymouth – much further from North Ayrshire than the Irish border – he would have received assistance in meeting the cost of getting there.

I suppose this issue is one where a bit of leeway within the rules would have allowed common sense to prevail. Managers of Jobcentres are not daft, surely they are capable of being allowed to make decisions based on the facts of individual cases? Would it really have caused British civil society to crumble if my constituent had been allowed to claim assistance to the border of the Irish Republic?

Rules are rules, though, and we are told that, if we don't follow the rules, then we have anarchy. The reason my former constituent's plight came back to me this week was because of media reports about rules not being followed, yet the rule-breaking was condoned and supported by those who are supposed to ensure they are upheld.

It's just a pity my former constituent wasn't a prince. If he had been, then he would not have to bother looking for a job in the first place – any job he wanted would be given to him – but if he did have to attend an interview, then he could just use a multi-million pound military helicopter.

Apparently it is now acceptable for barely-trained RAF pilots to use publicly-funded aircraft to pick up relatives and to jaunt around the country attending stag nights, not to mention showing off to the girlfriend by landing in her back garden.

Of course, it isn't actually acceptable for young RAF pilots to behave in such a way, it was only tolerated because the pilot was Prince William. In Britain there has always been one law for the rich and another for the rest of us – but that doesn't make it right. It seems that if we break the rules it isn't anarchy we get, it's monarchy.

Change is long overdue. Wouldn't it be much better if we created a society where all of our young citizens are given hope and opportunity, and are allowed to know the dignity of work and the benefit of community, rather than one where privilege for the few is maintained and accepted?

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com April 19 2008

The biggest ever rip-off of public funds

What a shocker! The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has discovered that construction companies have been rigging bids in order to ensure that multi-million pound publicly-funded contracts go to certain firms. Anyone who ever worked in the construction industry could have told them that.

Still, it is good to see action finally being taken against such major fraudsters. It is not before time that these companies were held to account. After all, the inflated prices being paid for construction of schools and hospitals is coming out of the pockets of taxpayers, it is our money.

The OFT investigation related only to contracts carried out in England, but the same will almost certainly apply here in Scotland too. Once the spotlight is turned north of the border, I firmly believe the findings will not differ greatly from those already unearthed.

The incentive for major construction companies to rig the bidding process for publicly-funded contracts is massive. New schools and hospitals built using the Public Private Partnership (PPP) model are costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of pounds. The profits being made by contractors and investors almost beggars belief. There are some people becoming very rich indeed from constructing schools and hospitals that are of very poor quality.

That was always going to be the outcome of Tory and Labour governments throwing vast amounts of money at the private sector. We were told private companies did things better than the public sector. We were told that private companies operated more efficiently and could produce quality at lower costs. That was absolute garbage.

The public sector comparator, against which bids from the private and public sectors were evaluated, was rigged to make sure the public sector bid came out looking more expensive, and now we know that was just the start of the rigging.

Private companies are not motivated to provide the best possible facilities for the money available. That's not how capitalism and the market economy works. Private companies are motivated to make as much profit as possible from the money available. Which is why they so desperately wanted the multi-million pound public sector building contracts – so desperately they were prepared to rig tenders and share out the contracts – and why private equity investors were so keen to back them – the projected profits were absolutely massive.

PPP has been the biggest ever rip-off of public funds. Billions of pounds of taxpayers money has been syphoned out of budgets that were meant to provide services and facilities for ordinary people, and has found its way into the already bulging bank accounts of financial speculators and fat-cat company directors.

It is clear why the Tories initially set up the PPP system - to reward those in big business whose donations financed the Tory Party – but why did New Labour go along with it when they assumed power in 1997?

In opposition, Labour had vehemently opposed PPP (or PFI, Private Finance Initiative, as it was originally called) but once in government it was just another Tory policy warmly embraced by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. The message to big business was clear, 'Don't worry boys, under Labour your get rich quick scheme can continue', and so the public purse was plundered ever deeper.

Let me ask you a question: have you ever heard of a man called Sir Adrian Montague? You might have, Sir Adrian has a finger in many financial pies. Presently, he is chairman of British Energy plc (operators of Hunterston 'B' nuclear power station, and the company that not so long ago had to be bailed out by a £650m injection from public funds). Sir Adrian is also chairman of Michael Page International plc and the Waterways Trust. In addition, he is a past chairman of London Crossrail and Friends Provident. Then there is his directorships of London First and Skanska AB, not to mention his membership of the board of CellMark Inc.

Clearly, then, Sir Adrian is a busy man. Not so busy, though, that he can't also fit in being chairman of a company called Infrastructure Investors Ltd, which is a general partner in a company called I2Bidco. Hope you're keeping up with this.

Last year I2Bidco paid £156.2m for full control of a company called PFI Infrastructure Co. PFI Infrastructure Co was a partner in a company called PPP Services (North Ayrshire) Ltd, in fact it owned 30% of the company. So, after all of that, Sir Adrian Montague is chairman of a company that, ultimately, owns 30% of the firm that has the contract to maintain the four North Ayrshire schools built under the Council's PPP Project. Did you know that part of the North Ayrshire contract had already been sold on? Did you know that North Ayrshire Council has absolutely no say on who owns the contract that requires our local authority to pay £10m every year for the next 30 years, in order to maintain just four schools?

Oh, almost forgot to mention, between 1997 and 2000 Sir Adrian Montague was paid £160,000 a year as head of Gordon Brown's Treasury Task Force on PFI. That is the Task Force which reported back to the then Chancellor of the Exchequer with the view that PFI/PPP was the best thing since sliced bread.

PPP is a rip-off. Major financial institutions, construction companies and legal firms have willingly grabbed the public money that was on offer and have made off with billions of pounds that should have been going into public resources and infrastructure, but that is only one side of the rip-off. On the other side are the politicians, civil servants and council officials who allowed this to happen.

It isn't just the activities of construction companies we need to be looking at; everyone involved in PPP, on both sides of deals, should be held accountable for their actions. Certainly, those who allowed the £380m North Ayrshire Schools PPP Project to proceed with only one credible bid will, ultimately, not escape full scrutiny. It is only a matter of time. 

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com April 12 2008

Our Council

There is something far wrong with North Ayrshire Council. Now, given the recent history of the local authority, that statement might not come as a great surprise.

Any council that can agree to a £380m project to build and maintain four schools, when there was only ever one credible bid for the contract, is one where competence is a stranger. North Ayrshire's PPP Project should not have been allowed to proceed, but the organisations tasked with scrutinising the deal were packed with pro-PPP advocates, and the lack of any competition was tolerated. However, the paperwork which proves that lies and cover-up were endemic in the North Ayrshire Schools PPP Project remains safely under lock and key and, eventually, will be used to hold to account those in senior elected and non-elected positions within the Council and elsewhere.

There is a common misconception that North Ayrshire Council is that huge office block next to the Mall in Irvine, or maybe even the hundreds of people that work there: some people believe that the Council is the wee lassie on the front desk at the local Housing Office, which is why she gets the abuse for soaring rents and poor maintenance of houses. In fact, North Ayrshire Council is the 30 people we elect every four years, the councillors.

Those 30 people are the Council. By electing them, we consent to them representing us and taking decisions on our behalf. It is the 30 councillors who then employ people, on our behalf, to provide services to us. Every employee of North Ayrshire Council is paid to deliver the services our Council (the 30 councillors) have decided we need in North Ayrshire.

Some of the senior managers at North Ayrshire Council may believe otherwise, but that is the reality of local government within an elected democracy. People like Ian Snodgrass (chief executive) and Ian Mackay (assistant chief executive) are not North Ayrshire Council, they are employees of North Ayrshire Council (the 30 councillors elected to act on behalf of us, the people of North Ayrshire).

Ultimately, responsibility for every action taken by North Ayrshire Council rests with the 30 councillors. Officials, like Mr Snodgrass and Mr Mackay, are simply tasked with carrying out the policy decisions of the Council; in no circumstances should they be taking the decisions.

Unfortunately, at North Ayrshire, the situation over many years has been that the majority of the 30 councillors have been representatives of the Labour Party and have been either too stupid or too weak to actually run the Council themselves. The Labour Council majority has sat back and allowed paid officials to exert greater influence over policy and direction than should have been the case.

Way back in the mists of time, when I was the councillor for Ardrossan North, I remember asking questions of the Labour convener of the Leisure Committee. The questions were on policy regarding access to local leisure facilities, but the convener didn't even attempt to answer them - to be honest, he didn't have a clue what I was talking about – so he simply turned to the paid official sitting by his side and said, “Right son, over to you.”

For so long that has been the reality of North Ayrshire Council - Labour councillors taking extra money in the shape of Special Responsibility Allowances for running the Council when, in fact, senior managers have been performing that task.

There is a clear member-officer dichotomy in local government: members (the councillors) set policy, while officers (the paid officials and staff) carry out that policy. At North Ayrshire, however, that clear separation of responsibilities has become increasingly blurred.

Of course, it has to be said that it might not have been such a bad thing that officials exerted such influence over Labour councillors: think how bad things would be if the Labour 'Brains Trust' had been left to get on with things themselves.

Having said that, there is no escaping the fact that Labour councillors, as the ruling party and now the Executive, are responsible for the actions of the Council (our Council). Ultimately, it was Labour councillors who agreed and signed a £380m contract for the construction and maintenance of four new schools – a contract which obliges our Council to pay £10m a year, every year for the next 30 years, to a private maintenance contractor – before any money can be spent on services to local people. Legally, the PPP bill must be paid first – and if that means no wardens for sheltered housing, then too bad for our elderly citizens.

It is also Labour councillors who shoulder responsibility for the actions of our Council in awarding a lighting maintenance contract to a company whose bid was £60,000 more than its rival. A decision which, as reported in the News section of the3towns.com, now sees our Council being sued in the Court of Session for a sum reported to be in the region of £800,000 – which represents the other company's claimed legal costs and loss of profit.

Since last May's Council Election, things have slowly begun to change. There is now an effective opposition on North Ayrshire Council, which is beginning to hold to account not just the Labour Executive, but also the senior management of the Council. The largest opposition group, the SNP, has amongst its members some very competent people and, crucially, is motivated to stop the years of Labour decisions impacting negatively on local people.

In addition, local Independent councillors, John Hunter and Ronnie McNicol, have done exactly what they promised when they put themselves forward for election. They cut their teeth as community activists in trying to save Laighdykes Playing Field, and they promised that, if elected, they would always put first the interests of local communities. In holding the Labour Executive to account, that is what they are doing.

Things are beginning to get better, but there is a long way still to go. North Ayrshire Council will not be in a position to function properly in our interests until incompetent Labour councillors are removed from power, and senior managers rediscover the reality that they work for us, the people, and answer to our representatives, the Council.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com April 5 2008

Scotland Week

Tartan Day has become Scotland Week in the United States. Born out of the 1998 Senate resolution which established America's Tartan Day as April 6, the festivities now take up a full week and showcase Scotland to the American people.

Of course, given that politicians are involved – the First Minister, the European and External Affairs Minister, the Presiding Officer and four MSPs are presently in the States – some will automatically assume it is a jolly, paid for by us, the taxpayers of Scotland. That would explain why it has grown from one day to a full week – more time for MSPs to spend public funds scooting about Washington and New York.

While that, undoubtedly, is what some people feel, it is wrong. I should declare an interest here, I was part of the Scottish Parliament delegation that attended Tartan Week (as it was then) in 2005. It was a fantastic experience, but it was anything but a jolly.

In that week, the five MSPs in the delegation visited New York, Boston, Washington, Quebec and then back to New York again. We had meetings with the New York Police Department (in relation to how the city managed to massively reduce its crime rate), the New York Court system (looking at the Court Innovation System introduced in the city which offers great help to offenders, but stiff sentences to those who don't take the help), the City Council (on how they deal with non-emergency services); we attended a Boston symposium on Life Sciences (where Scottish universities presented evidence of their great work in this area); we attended a meeting of the Quebec National Assembly, where that parliamentary body passed its own Tartan Day resolution, then we had cross-parliamentary talks with Quebec government and opposition MPs on the subjects of anti-social behaviour and inward investment. We then went back to New York where we attended the Tartan Day Parade up Sixth Avenue, the Scotland 10K Run in Central Park (won by a Scotsman, incidentally), the Scotland Village in Grand Central Station, and an art exhibition showcasing historical and contemporary Scottish painting.

It was a very busy week, but very worthwhile. Notwithstanding the official meetings already mentioned, the MSPs in the delegation were also expected to attend social functions where members of the Scottish diaspora were in attendance. Such gatherings occurred everywhere we went – New York, Boston and Quebec – and the friendliness and knowledge of Scotland shown by descendants of Scots in all of these places was amazing.

Part of our job while there was to sell Scotland – at every level. In official meetings and at social gatherings we met with individuals and representatives of companies who, potentially, because of their Scottish family connections, were possible business investors to Scotland. That was one level, another was talking directly to ordinary Americans, particularly in New York, where we were expected to help man a Scottish Parliament stall within the Scottish Village at Grand Central Station.

That task I really enjoyed because the Village was located in the Vanderbilt Hall, which meant that thousands of New Yorkers passed it every day as they entered or left the city's busiest train station. Those who had time to stop,and there were many, were fascinated with the stalls which represented so many different aspects of Scottish life.

There were stalls extolling Scottish foods, Scottish businesses, Scottish history and heritage, Scottish clothes – including traditional and contemporary kilts – but the biggest attraction was a sword. Americans flocked to see William Wallace's sword, flown over from Stirling specially for Tartan Week.

The sword was displayed within a glass case and was under 24-hour armed guard. I spoke with the guards and it turned out they were off-duty New York cops, earning a bit extra on the side. The most often heard comment by people viewing the sword was, “That William Wallace must have been at least 8 feet tall to swing that thing.” The sword stands about 5 feet tall.

The questions asked by ordinary Americans were varied and interesting, ranging from whether or not the Loch Ness monster actually existed (of course it does) to what Scots thought of George Bush (very difficult not to swear in responding to that one). On one occasion, just before the Tartan Day Parade itself, one man approached me while I was wearing the kilt and asked if Scotsmen wore 'that stuff' all the time. I replied, “Yes, all the time. Except when we go to weddings, then we wear a suit.” Ach well, I'm sure it was what he wanted to hear.

The point to all of this is that Scotland Week has become a very successful way of building social and business connections which are of benefit to our nation. The MSPs who are currently in the States will have very little free time and will be working to the best of their abilities to advance Scotland's cause. It is not a jolly.

Just in passing, and in case we forget, the reason April 6 was chosen by the American's for Tartan Day is because that date commemorates the signing of the Declaration of Arbroath in 1320. The Declaration of Arbroath enshrined Scotland's right to exist as an independent nation, and was used as a model for America's own Declaration of Independence in 1776.

Many local people are aware that one of the signatories to the American Declaration of Independence was a former Beith minister called John Witherspoon. However, lesser known facts are that almost half of the signatories to the American Declaration of Independence were of Scottish descent, while 9 Governors of the original 13 States were Scots.

Even 232 years ago Scots were establishing independence and building what became the most successful economy in the world – and they try to tell us we couldn't govern ourselves. 

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com March 22 2008

Scottish - not British

Last week a Labour peer brought forward the idea that children should swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen. This was to be done by school pupils reaching the age of sixteen and, we were told, would help to affirm their Britishness, as they moved from child to adult.

A slightly different version of Labour's indoctrination of our young people advocated that the American classroom model should be adopted. That's where children are forced, every morning, to stand with hand on heart and salute the flag, while singing the national anthem.

The Labour peer who came up with these ideas was Lord Goldsmith, the same man who tied himself in knots in order to reach the conclusion that the UK's invasion of Iraq was legal. At least his latest ideas are just daft, rather than criminal.

Clearly, everyone has a different sense of who and what they are, and that's fine. However, recent evidence from poll after poll tells us that more and more Scots consider themselves either 'Scottish not British' or 'Scottish then British'. Personally, I'm Scottish. I'm Scottish and no-one will ever make me British.

I accept I live on an island called Great Britain, but my nationality is Scottish. The political construct that is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has never been, is not, and never will be a nation. It is a union of nations. Supporters of the British Union claiming their nationality as British is like advocates of the European Union proclaiming their nationality as European.

I'm Scottish, I'm proud to be Scottish, and Unionist Tame Jocks, like Gordon Brown, will never persuade me otherwise.

I was a member of the SNP for 27 years and I still passionately believe in an independent Scotland. I want to see Scotland re-take her independence because without the full powers that only come with independence, we will be unable to radically re-structure our society in such a way that we can use our wealth to the benefit of every citizen of our country.

Seeing the Saltire replace the British Union flag above Edinburgh Castle would be nice, but, for me, that isn't what independence is about. Independence is about assuming responsibility for ourselves, as Scots, and taking decisions in the interests of the people of Scotland: governing ourselves at home and representing ourselves in Europe and around the globe.

As a people, the Scots should not consider themselves better than any other, but neither should we feel in any way inferior. We should have the same rights and responsibilities as our brothers and sisters in nations around the world, and that includes standing on our own two feet and forging our own national and global direction.

Support for Scottish independence remains higher amongst younger Scots: a fact that can be explained, in part, by the older generation still remembering how the nations of Britain stood together to fight fascism in World War II. Clearly, the bond of comradeship that grew between Scots, English, Welsh and Northern Irish during those war years is something that is cherished, and rightly so. Independence would not threaten that bond.

Contrary to the scare stories put about by British Unionist political parties, and their friends in the media, the social union between Scots, English, Welsh and Northern Irish would continue – it is only the political union that would end. There would be no guard posts at the border, we would still be able to visit our relatives in England, and we would still be able to watch Coronation Street. The only thing that would change is that we would have control of our own resources and we would implement political policies designed to benefit Scotland.

Scots have nothing to fear from independence, and much to gain. We have had 300 years of the British establishment lying to us; we have had 300 years of indoctrination – we've been told we are too wee, too poor and too stupid to govern ourselves and that we are subsidised by England. In fact, the two biggest contributors to the Westminster exchequer are the North Sea oil and Scotch Whisky industries. Without taking what should rightly be accruing to Scotland, Britain would be bankrupt.

Of course, if we were to accept the Unionist propaganda, which tells us that Scotland is an economic basket case, unable to function without handouts from England, then that prompts the question, just who has been running Scotland for the last 300 years?

Then there is the issue of swearing an oath of allegiance to the Queen. Again, if you, personally, consider yourself to be a loyal subject of Her Majesty, then feel free to swear allegiance. However, if, like me, you are a republican, why should you be forced to lie about your allegiance?

I've come across this situation once before, when I was being sworn-in as a Member of the Scottish Parliament. Despite having been democratically elected by the people of West of Scotland, I would not have been allowed to take my seat in parliament if I had not first sworn allegiance to 'Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, her heirs and successors'.

No allegiance to the Queen, no seat in parliament – that's what passes for democracy in 21st Century Scotland within the British Union.

The parliamentary swearing-in ceremony is a farce. Before taking the oath, I made a statement, which said, “My loyalty is not to a British monarch but to the people of Scotland. Therefore, I take this oath under protest.”

In order to take the seat to which I had been elected by the people, I had to lie and say I would be loyal to the Queen. That is just stupid and, for obvious reasons, it isn't something Members of the Northern Ireland Assembly have to do.
On the day I was sworn-in as an MSP, another 11 SNP MSPs made similar statements to mine, as did the 6 SSP members and Independent Dennis Canavan. My favourite pre-swearing comment came from the SSP's Carolyn Leckie, who said, “Why should I be loyal to Mrs Windsor? I don't even know the wummin.”

Like the British Union itself, New Labour's plans to force us to be British are doomed to failure. 

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com March 22 2008

 Still not in my name

On Saturday, February 15 2003, along with my son, Graham, and 100,000 others I walked two miles from Glasgow Green to the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre (SECC). It was a cold, crisp morning bathed in sunshine, ideal for a walk.

Of course, this wasn't a meeting of some massive urban rambling club, it was 100,000 people totally determined to get the message across to British Prime Minister Tony Blair that, if he sent UK troops to invade the sovereign nation of Iraq, he would be acting illegally and his actions would not be in our name.

The march through Glasgow coincided with others across the globe that weekend: London saw 1,000,000 people hit the streets to oppose Blair's warmongering, while in Rome it is estimated 3,000,000 protested. There were anti-war demonstrations in American cities and in just about every country in the world. Only China reported no demonstrations.

The Glasgow march was timed so that everyone would arrive at the SECC just as Tony Blair was getting to his feet inside the building to address the Scottish Conference of the Labour Party. Incredibly, however, the Labour Party sought to prevent a stage and PA system from being set up in the car park of the SECC. The party of government actually wanted to prevent people from having the right to freedom of speech, quite simply because the people opposed the actions of that party. Fortunately, Labour's move was defeated, and the protest outside the SECC went ahead as planned.

Speaker after speaker denounced Labour's plans to wage war on a country that was no threat to us. The illegality of Tony Blair's proposed actions was explained, while pleas were made to allow time for the United Nations weapons inspectors to do their job. The message was clear, Blair might be able to force his party into supporting his desire for war, but the people were against him. The people saw no valid reason for UK troops to be part of an American-led war, which had nothing to do with weapons of mass destruction or Saddam Hussein being a dictator (he was a dictator when the US and Britain supported him), and everything to do with America getting its hands on Iraq's massive oil reserves.

These messages bellowed from the PA system in the SECC car park. Labour delegates inside the hall could not fail to hear, but Tony Blair did not listen. I don't just mean he thought he new better and dismissed the arguments of the anti-war movement. He actually did not listen. He didn't hear because he wasn't there. The Labour Party changed the running order of its Scottish Conference so that Blair could be in and out of the SECC, and Glasgow, before the march reached the car park.

The UK's big brave prime minister, who was so desperate to get British people into a war, had bottled it and had run away. In an act of incredible political cowardice, Tony Blair had no stomach for being confronted with people who knew what the outcome would be if he went ahead and joined America in its invasion of Iraq.

Of course, Labour, with the support of the Tories, subsequently voted at Westminster to send young British men and women into a war that America had planned, in detail, long before the attacks on New York's twin towers, and even before George W Bush was elected to the White House.

As forecast by anti-war protesters, there never were weapons of mass destruction, Iraq was not a threat to the US or UK, there was no al Qaeda presence in Iraq (but there is now), and religious civil war would be the outcome of removing Saddam.

Bush and Blair didn't care. The hawkish neo-cons that surround the American president, every American president, wanted Iraq's oil, they wanted to impose America's will on the middle east, and they wanted to try-out their new military hardware (remember 'Shock and Awe').

There was always going to be an American invasion of Iraq, but Britain didn't have to be involved. The prime minister of the United Kingdom – and his party, including the current prime minister Gordon Brown – chose to join America in illegal aggression against another country.

Those actions have badly damaged Britain's international credibility and reputation, and have led to the needless deaths of young British service personnel and hundreds-of-thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians.

In the week that sees the fifth anniversary of the first strikes against Iraq, we should remember the 100,000 people who marched through Glasgow to tell the UK prime minister he was wrong, and we should remember Tony Blair, the coward who wouldn't face them.

Five years later, Iraq is in the midst of a bloody, chaotic civil war; innocent people are dying on the streets every day; US and UK military personnel and Iraqi politicians only feel safe in heavily-protected 'Green Zones', but America got Iraq's oil. Mission accomplished.

(c) the3towns.com

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 the3towns.com March 8 2008

Political cowards

 Last Wednesday a packed public gallery witnessed what passes for democracy at North Ayrshire Council.

The gallery of the Council Chamber was full, in fact some people were turned away and didn't get to see the proceedings of the Council meeting, at which the SNP opposition had tabled a motion that sought to save warden cover in North Ayrshire's sheltered housing complexes.

The ruling Labour Executive had previously sneaked into the Council budget a move which would mean wardens being removed from sheltered housing. Since that plan became public there had been outrage amongst local people. Residents of sheltered housing were understandably concerned about being left alone, without support; family and friends of residents know how much wardens do, over and above their official duties, and fear the impact their removal would have on the well being of their loved ones; the general public has spoken-out in defence of wardens, because they know that elderly, vulnerable people need the support of a caring human being, rather than having to press a button and speak to a faceless voice at the end of an Alert emergency line. In all, very few people have voiced any kind of support for Labour's proposals.

That fact was evident again at the Council meeting. Row after row of elderly sheltered housing residents, their carers and concerned members of the public waited patiently through Council proceedings for the SNP's motion on saving the wardens to be heard. It was finally called as the last item of business.

However, before the most important current issue affecting vulnerable North Ayrshire residents could be debated, there was a technical matter that had to be dealt with. Because Labour's plans to axe warden cover had been a decision taken by the Council as recently as last month, it could not be debated without Council Standing Orders first being suspended – Standing Orders prevent such Council decisions being debated and voted on again within such a short space of time. Suspending Standing Orders is not an uncommon matter, it happened on a number of occasions at the Scottish Parliament during my time as an MSP.

So, before the SNP could present their case for retaining warden cover, and Labour could attempt to justify their plan to remove them from sheltered housing, Standing Orders had to be suspended. SNP Group Leader Cllr Alan Hill presented an eloquent case for the full Council to allow the wardens issue to be debated. However, despite the SNP motion giving Labour councillors the opportunity to defend their action and to set out why they believed it would actually benefit elderly residents of the area, they objected to Standing Orders being suspended and pushed the matter to a vote.

With the support of the two Lib Dem councillors and Independent Margie Currie, Labour won the vote 15-13 and the people in the public gallery, and the general public of North Ayrshire, were denied even an explanation of why Labour councillors want to remove wardens from sheltered housing units.

Labour's councillors were scared to even debate the issue. Opposition SNP and Tory councillors, along with local Independents John Hunter and Ronnie McNicol, are against removing the wardens; the people in the public gallery are against removing wardens; the overwhelming majority of the general public of North Ayrshire are against removing wardens – yet 12 Labour councillors, 2 Lib Dems and 1 Independent can force their removal and can even refuse to debate the matter. So much for democracy (from the Greek, 'demo cratis', meaning people power).

To remove desperately needed support from elderly people is criminal, and North Ayrshire's Labour and Lib Dem councillors, and Margie Currie, stand accused. However, to even refuse to debate the issue is nothing short of cowardice.

What do Labour and their Lib Dem lackeys have to hide: and as for Arran-based Margie Currie, she would be better walking around with a placard reading, 'People of Ardrossan – please make sure I don't get re-elected'. Mrs Currie, who is supposed to be an Independent and is supposed to represent Ardrossan & Arran, has now voted with Labour against Ardrossan receiving money from the operators of the Ardrossan windfarm and to remove wardens from sheltered housing units in the town.

The councillors who voted to prevent the matter from even being debated are a disgrace to the people who put them into office. If they believe their policy of axing warden cover is correct, they could have voted to suspend Standing Orders and put their case. They could then have voted to support their plan at the end of the debate. Why did they vote to not even have the debate?

How many times are North Ayrshire's Labour councillors going to go against the wishes of the people? We've had the only playing fields serving Saltcoats and Ardrossan used for a construction project; we've had the garden tidy scheme scrapped; we've had schools merged; and now we have elderly people worried sick about what is going to happen to them when Labour takes away their wardens.

This isn't Labour taking hard decisions, it is Labour taking daft decisions. Previously, they got away with such actions because the flawed First-Past-The-Post electoral system gave them a majority which their actual votes received did not merit. After the last Council election, under the Single Transferable Vote system, Labour remained the largest single party, but without a majority. The combined votes of the opposition – SNP, Tory, Lib Dem and Independents – were greater than Labour's, meaning that, for the first time, the ruling party could really be held to account.

Sadly, that prospect has been denied to the people of North Ayrshire by two inexperienced Lib Dem councillors and one Independent who seems to be in the pocket of Labour.

Constructive and effective opposition doesn't necessarily mean voting against everything Labour proposes, but when they want to deprive elderly people of their main source of support and human contact, then surely the people can expect Labour to, at the very least, be forced to debate and attempt to justify their actions. We all know why Labour was scared to debate the issue, but what motivated the Lib Dems and Margie Currie to join with the cowards?

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com March 1 2008

The Three Towns ICI legacy 

Last year I met up with a very good friend of mine, Ronnie McCrimmond. We hadn't seen each other for a good few years, although we did keep in touch at Christmas and by e-mail if anything major happened in our lives.

The main reason we hadn't seen each other for a while was that, like most of my school-days friends, Ronnie had moved away from North Ayrshire as he progressed in his career.

We had gone through school together, primary and secondary, and started our apprenticeships at ICI on the same day. However, we didn't leave on the same day. I couldn't get out of the factory quickly enough, while Ronnie stayed and went from strength to strength within the global organisation that is Imperial Chemical Industries.

As ICI wound down its Ardeer operation, those staff that were retained had to move with the company. Ronnie went all over the world, eventually managing plants in different continents. Today, he is in charge of a major ICI subsidiary in the United States of America. Not bad for a wee boy from a council house in Ardrossan.

Ronnie had the intelligence to move from 'the tools', as a mechanical fitter, to university and an engineering degree. He got to where he is today through his own academic endeavours and sheer hard work. Not everyone could have taken on and achieved what Ronnie McCrimmond has, but I'm sure he would be the first to admit that ICI, as a company, encouraged him to develop himself to his maximum potential.

ICI was that type of company. Ultimately, the products it produced at Ardeer may have despoiled square miles of countryside but, in the main, those who worked for the company were relatively well paid and were encouraged to 'better themselves' by pursuing academic and vocational qualifications.

Ronnie McCrimmond wasn't alone in taking advantage of the ICI ethos. Hundreds of local men and women left school at 16 for a job in the factory, and many were afforded the opportunity to increase their career prospects and earning potential by attending further education colleges and, if the showed particular promise, university.

Of course, some factory workers were content simply to do their jobs in the production of chemicals and explosives. It was dangerous and back-breaking work in often filthy conditions, but the workforce turned up, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, to deliver the products that made ICI one of the worlds most successful companies.

Memories of my time at Ardeer are disappearing into the mists of time – it's 28 years since I left – but I do distinctly remember an older woman down 'the Dets' asking me how long I had worked at the factory. I replied two years, to which she said, “I've been here forty years, son.”

“Forty years”, I said, “do you think you'll like it?” Cheek was something that wasn't tolerated from youngsters in the factory, and that was the first time I had ever been kicked in the shin by an old woman.

It was some place. As far as I was concerned, the hardest workers in the factory were the girls in the Dets. To see them coiling wire with both hands, going in opposite directions, was a blur of activity. Of course, the more they coiled the more they were paid.

Factory women were also well known for their complete control of the English language, and some others as well. If you upset them, you soon found yourself on the receiving end of swear words that would make a navvy blush.

That was the factory, though. It was hard work and it could be rough, but the work got done and the staff were well paid, compared with the smaller employers in the area. ICI also benefited from the hard work of locals. The company regularly posted massive profits, although it was widely accepted that it could probably have doubled those figures if just about every member of staff wasn't an expert in getting 'pruch' out the gate. That's pronounced pruch, as in loch, but if you ever worked at ICI, or even knew someone who did, you will already be well aware of the word.

So much went out the gate that driving through the bottom-end of Stevenston was often like a scene from the People's Republic of China. Everyone wore ICI overalls, and boots with bright red toe caps. In fact, I once left work and drove to the ICI garage at the top of Lundholm Road. In those days an attendant poured the petrol for you, and the guy that served me was actually wearing my overalls. I could tell by the number embroidered into them.

So, while it was there, the factory certainly had its plus points for local people and communities, but it wasn't all good news.

Many people detested the factory because of the 'stuff' that was pumped out of chimneys and vents. Workers went to early graves, either from the result of explosions or prolonged exposure to certain chemicals, although I believe the company still disputes that cause.

Then, when ICI decided to pull out of Ardeer, there was no-one to take its place. From employing thousands of local people, the number of workers was reduced to a skeleton force.

Another friend of mine found very interesting government papers while he was researching his doctorate at university. He was investigating inward investment to North Ayrshire, and unearthed proof that successive British governments, Labour and Tory, had actively encouraged potential inward investors to North Ayrshire to take their work, and jobs, to neighbouring areas, such as Inverclyde, Renfrewshire or Lanarkshire.

The reason government discouraged companies from setting up here was that ICI had told them they would take everyone who wanted a job and, to be fair, for many years they did. However, because of that policy, there were no other major employers in the area of the Three Towns, certainly none that could compare to ICI. When ICI went from North Ayrshire they left behind a huge employment vacuum, which has still to be filled.

There can be no doubt that many individuals benefited from the encouragement and patronage of ICI, and that many families enjoyed a decent standard of living because of the wages it paid, but, overall, the Three Towns area is now a poorer place for its involvement with ICI. 

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com February 23 2008

Admit you got it wrong and save the wardens

The Labour councillors who want to scrap warden cover in North Ayrshire's sheltered housing complexes have got it wrong.

They are either completely out of touch with reality or they simply do not care about the well being of the elderly residents of local homes.

Let's give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they are not completely devoid of humanity. Let's suppose they do care. Why, then, would our caring elected representatives wish to reduce the care that vulnerable people currently receive?

From what I have been told, the answer to that question is that some Labour councillors did not want to support the removal of warden cover, but they were not given a choice. Labour, and the Liberal Democrats who supported them, imposed a whip on the vote which included proposals to scrap the warden service.

Imposing a whip meant that all Labour councillors – and the two Lib Dems (who whipped whom?) - had to support the plan. Even if they thought it was the worst idea they had ever heard, they still had to support it.

Of course, that isn't strictly true. Those who opposed the plan within Labour and the Lib Dems could have faced down their party whip and voted with their conscience. They didn't. They all put party before people.

Unfortunately, that is and virtually always has been the reality of party politics. Every party does it. If an elected representative, at local or national level, wants to advance their political career then refusing to follow the party whip is not a good move. That is why Labour councillors voted to scrap the warden service, even those who were bright enough to know it was a bad idea.

Of course, that suggests that the people in power within Labour at North Ayrshire Council, the ones who came up with the idea of removing wardens, are amongst the intellectually challenged. Does anyone want to argue that point?

Last Friday North Ayrshire's Elderly Forums organised a meeting to discuss the Council's plans to remove wardens from sheltered housing. As reported in last week's the3towns.com, the meeting was held in Saltcoats Town Hall and there was standing room only. You just don't normally get such a turn out at public meetings these days. This meeting was different, though. The subject of this meeting was something that people really care about and which united the general public.

The meeting lasted two hours and speaker after speaker made clear exactly why the Labour plan was wrong, and why wardens are an essential part of sheltered housing living. One member of the public pointed out that if wardens were removed, then the housing was no longer sheltered. The definition of sheltered housing does state that such complexes have a manager or warden on site, but the Labour councillor at the meeting dismissed this idea. He gave no reason for his dismissal, he just dismissed it. Maybe that is what passes for democracy within New Labour, but it cut no ice with the public in Saltcoats Town Hall.

The Labour representative, Cllr Peter McNamara, gave the impression of someone who just wanted the meeting to be over, and who could blame him. His position was indefensible and the people didn't hold back from telling him as much.

The councillor's performance was what we have come to expect from New Labour. The party has been in power too long, at local and British level, and has become extremely arrogant. Cllr McNamara dismissed every argument put forward for retention of wardens in sheltered housing, despite the fact the people making the case were actually those who used and provided the service. He had no evidence to suggest his party's plans would improve things, he just thought he knew better.

The one good thing that came out of Cllr McNamara's performance at the meeting was that there are now many, many more local people who know what he and Labour are like, and who will never again vote for the party.

The public also heard from opposition councillors who had voted to retain the wardens: North Ayrshire Provost Cllr Bobby Rae (SNP), Cllr Willie Gibson (SNP), Cllr Ronnie McNicol (Independent), Cllr John Hunter (Independent) and Cllr Robert Barr (Tory). Like members of the audience, the opposition councillors made point after point which showed beyond any shadow of a doubt that wardens should be retained in local sheltered housing complexes.

Opposition to Labour's plans was almost unanimous. Almost, but not quite. There was one person in the hall who wanted to scrap the warden service, but that was Peter 'nae mates' McNamara. It was just a pity his fellow Labour councillors were too cowardly to turn up and face the public. They wouldn't have changed anything, but they could at least have taken some of the flak from Cllr McNamara.

Last Friday's meeting was a great example of direct action and people power. Despite North Ayrshire Council's ruling Labour administration presenting the scrapping of warden cover as a done deal, the general public of North Ayrshire did not accept that. The people are against Labour's proposals. The people want wardens retained, and they took the opportunity of making that position transparently clear.

Labour councillors may think they know better than the people, but they don't. They can't even claim to have any public support for their plans, because they didn't ask the public. There has been no consultation on Labour's proposals. Of course, had they asked the public, they would have known long before now that their plans were stupid.

This is a no brainer that even Labour councillors should be able to grasp. Residents of sheltered housing need and want wardens to be retained. The general public of North Ayrshire want wardens to be retained. Fourteen councillors voted for wardens to be retained – sixteen voted to scrap them. Labour only got their plans through Council because two inexperienced Lib Dem councillors and two Independents supported them. The two Independents were West Kilbride's Liz McLardy and Arran's Margie Currie. They have a lot of explaining to do.

The bottom line, however, is that Labour's plans were passed by a majority of two. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the people of North Ayrshire strongly oppose those plans. Labour councillors on North Ayrshire Council should rethink this one. They got it wrong. They should listen to the people.

Save the warden service – you know it makes sense.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com February 16 2008

The real Tartan Tories

Last week I was asked by the BBC to comment on the current closeness between the SNP and the Tories, and whether it was fair for Labour to be resurrecting the 'Tartan Tory' jibe to describe the SNP.

The BBC's questions came on the back of the SNP relying on Tory support to get its first budget through parliament, and suggestions that, if need be, a more formal pact could be introduced involving the two parties. Presumably such a pact would be considered if Labour and the Lib Dems moved a vote of no confidence in the present minority SNP administration. Rather than lose such a vote, and be thrown out of government, the argument goes that the SNP and the Tories might form a coalition, with the SNP having to accept some Tory MSPs into ministerial positions.

Presently, the SNP actually has a policy which prevents formal pacts with Tories. This stems from a Westminster vote in the early 1990s when the SNPs three MPs, including Alex Salmond, voted with the Tories in a crunch division.

At the next meeting of the party's National Council, Margaret Ewing MP, then the Westminster Group Leader, explained that the three MPs had voted with the Tories because they had been promised something or other which, she argued, was in Scotland's interests.

Margaret's explanation cut very little ice with rank and file members at the National Council in Perth. Speaker after speaker - myself included - left the three MPs in no doubt that Tories were not to be trusted and that they, as SNP MPs, were expected to not enter into deals with Thatcher and her right-wing government.

Those of us opposed to deals with Tories carried the day, and that is why the SNP has a constitutional bar on entering into formal pacts with the Conservative and Unionist Party.

However, the party has recently relaxed this position, citing a need to be pragmatic following the outcome of last year's local government elections. In some cases across Scotland it was possible for elected SNP councillors to form joint administrations with Tory councillors and, it was argued, this was a better option than allowing Labour councillors to retake the reigns of power.

So, at least at a local level, there has been some movement towards the SNP working with Tories, but could that really be replicated at national level?

The answer is, it could; but I believe there would still be strong opposition from rank and file members of the SNP.

Scots have long memories. We remember the unfairness of the Poll Tax, and how it was imposed on Scotland a full year before the rest of the so-called United Kingdom.

We remember Thatcher's contempt for Scotland – unemployment in the north being a price worth paying for economic prosperity in the south-east of England – we remember the closure of Scotland's steel industry and the decimation of viable and productive coal mines.

We remember Scotland kicking out the Tories, only for us to have them imposed on us by virtue of the voters of middle England and our membership of the British Union.

In short, we remember how bad things were for Scotland under the Tory governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major. Not that they got any better under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown's New Tories – but I don't think anyone is seriously suggesting an SNP-Labour pact.

Because of those long memories, Scots, I believe, would not look favourably on the SNP if it went into a formal pact with the Tories. The party's current closeness can probably be understood and forgiven by the public who will accept an element of pragmatism is required from a minority government, but a formal pact or coalition – that would be a step too far. The SNP would not easily be forgiven if it was seen as the vehicle that allowed the Tories back into government in Scotland.

Having said that, there are SNP modernisers – young, sharp-suited New Labour wannabes, who weren't born when Thatcher spread her evil over the land – who would have no qualms about deals with Tories; after all, they are, themselves, sympathetic to a right-of centre agenda, and they do have the ear of a number of people now holding government office. However, I don't believe that the SNP Young Turks yet represent anything like a majority within the party; so any formal links with the Tories would almost certainly be rejected by the SNP membership.

Of course, that statement is assuming SNP members would put principle before continued government, and that is not certain. This is politics, after all. Having had a taste of wielding power, would otherwise moderately left-of-centre SNP members be prepared to keep quiet and allow some within, and around, the hierarchy to take the party into a centre-right coalition with Annabel Goldie and Murdo Fraser, if that was the price that had to be paid to remain in government?

Fortunately, that is a question I don't expect SNP members to have to answer any time soon. At the moment, coalition talk is nothing more than political speculation and will remain so for as long as the SNP government continues to operate successfully. The reality is that the SNP doesn't need a formal pact to progress its agenda. Skilful management by Alex Salmond, coupled with incredibly inept opposition, has seen the SNP – even as a minority – govern Scotland much more effectively than the previous Labour/Lib Dem coalition.

Let's not forget that the Labour Party is in its worst position in living memory – with a leader staggering from one crisis to the next, and a lack of talent so pronounced that there is no credible candidate to take over – while the Liberal Democrats remain, well, Liberal Democrats; spineless wonders who try to portray themselves as moderate honest brokers in the dirty game that is politics, while all the time the are back-stabbing everyone and would sell their collective granny if it got them a modicum of power.

With an opposition like that, the SNP could very well enjoy the longest ever honeymoon in government, and without a formal pact with the Tories.

As for Labour calling the SNP 'Tartan Tories': the Nationalists have certainly moved to the right in recent years, but they are still within touching distance of the political centre ground. Unlike New Labour, which has consistently tried to out-Thatcher the Tories.

There are, indeed, Tartan Tories in Scotland, but its not the SNP. You'll find the real Tartan Tories at election time, wearing their Tory blue and Labour red rosettes, and working together to defend their British Union.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com February 9 2008

Closure of Ardrossan pubs show how politics affects us all

I don't often get out much now – it's my age – but last week I found myself meeting up with old friends on two separate occasions.

The first meeting involved getting together with a mate I haven't seen for maybe a year. As we caught up with what has happened in our lives over the last few months, we decided to see what Ardrossan's pubs had to offer. Sadly, the answer was 'not a lot'.

The first shock for us was that Ardrossan now only has three pubs. What happened to the Winton, the Reaper, the Bute (Hot Gossip), the High Tide and Nicol's – not to mention the Docker's Club, the Eglinton, the Celtic Supporter's Club, the Orange Club, the Winton Rovers Club, the Railway Club, the Hunterston Club and the Kilmeny Hotel? If you go back a wee bit further there was also the Central Bar, Jock's Lodge and one or two others. All that is left is the Castlehill Vaults, Charlie's Bar and the Tap Shop.

Now, I'm not arguing for more pubs, I'm simply reflecting on the fact that so many establishments in Ardrossan have disappeared. Why has that happened? Have Ardrossan's drinkers signed the pledge?

Well, some might have, I suppose, but it seems more likely that so many licensed premises have closed their doors because they could no longer make a profit; and they could no longer make a profit because, in recent years, there has been less demand for their products and services. That's a fact, but not because their customers turned their backs on the pub through choice. The lack of demand for what pubs have to offer has been brought about by the economic circumstances of the people who used to drink in them, and by supermarkets bringing down the cost of carry-outs to such an extent that, in some cases, a can of beer is cheaper than a bottle of water.

Ardrossan, like so many similar towns – not least Saltcoats and Stevenston – has lost its public houses as a consequence of local people not having the sort of disposable income they used to have, and which allowed them to socialise on a regular basis – maybe too regularly, in some cases.

While I was a politician I often heard people say, “I'm not interested in politics, it's got nothing to do with me.” Well, here is a classic example of how decisions taken by politicians affect the lives of all of us, whether we like it or acknowledge it.

The economic policies adopted by UK Governments since Margaret Thatcher came to power in 1979 have prioritised profit over people. Does anyone remember a man called Eddie George? In the Eighties he was the Governor of the Bank of England and, infamously, he stated that “unemployment in the north is a price worth paying for economic prosperity in the south east”.

Mr George was simply articulating the belief of the Tory Government. Under Thatcher, entire industries were closed down as companies and corporations moved production abroad, in order that they could pay workers less and, thereby, maximise their profits. People became dispensable. All that mattered was profit, profit and even more profit.

Take a walk down Glasgow Street in Ardrossan or even Princes Street, where work is currently being undertaken to regenerate the approach to the town's harbour area; virtually all you will see is housing, much of it in need of upgrading. Shops have gone, the commercial dock and associated businesses have closed, pubs have shut. The town is regularly nominated for the 'Plook on a Plinth' award, which goes annually to Scotland's most ugly town. Ardrossan is alive, but only just.

That reality is a consequence of decisions taken by politicians, at both national and local level, and is why we should all take a great interest in what MPs, MSPs and councillors do, supposedly in our name.

Of course, Ardrossan now has an Asda superstore. I've already expressed my concerns over the impact such an American-owned store will have on the few remaining locally-owned shops in the town. Arran's Colin Turbet also contributed to the3towns.com an excellent article on the subject at the time the store opened.

Multi-national retail corporations who filter profits back to their home country are not the answer to Ardrossan's problems. Although, to hear certain Labour councillors in their praise for Asda agreeing to come to the town, you would be forgiven for thinking that Ardrossan residents should really have shown their gratitude by lining the streets and throwing rose petals at the feet of Asda representatives as they passed by.

Of course, these were the same Labour councillors who produced a Local Structure Plan which described Ardrossan town centre as “a peripheral shopping area”, best suited to “serving adjacent housing.” This was the Labour plan that stripped Ardrossan of its town centre, and which stated that any company expressing an interest in establishing a retail presence in the Three Towns should be directed to Saltcoats, which was to be promoted and developed as the the shopping centre for the Three Towns. Given the state of Saltcoats town centre today, it is clear that plan failed too.

Uncaring politicians at Westminster, both Tory and Labour, and incompetent Labour councillors in North Ayrshire have a lot to answer for in relation to the present state of Ardrossan, Saltcoats and Stevenston. The Three Towns are an unemployment black spot, with a depressed economy and deprived communities, not because of evil spells made by bad pixies, but because of decisions taken by politicians. That is why we should all be interested in politics – because it has absolutely everything to do with us.

Meanwhile, the second occasion on which I met up with friends last week involved a wee night out. So, where did four people, all originally from Ardrossan, go for a get together? That's right, Largs.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com February 2 2008

Scotland victory over anti-English sentiment

The Scotland international football team has a new manager. Cumnock-born George Burley is the man tasked with taking a promising Scotland team to the 2010 World Cup finals in South Africa.

Personally, I believe this is a good appointment for our national team. George Burley is known to be a thoughtful man who has achieved relative success with a number of teams in Scotland and England. Prior to his appointment, he was managing Southampton – but most people will remember him for his short stay at Hearts, when he gave the Gorgie side their best start to a season in living memory, before falling out with Mad Vlad Romanov, the club owner.

There were questions being asked last week about the way the Scottish Football Association handled the appointment of a new team manager: apparently two contenders – Graeme Souness and Mark McGhee – found out about Burley's appointment through hearing it on TV news bulletins. Having said that, I think Burley was the right choice, and I think he has already secured his first victory.

In putting together his back room staff, George Burley made clear he wanted as his assistant the former England captain Terry Butcher. In certain quarters this news sparked outrage. 'How can an Englishman be Scotland's assistant coach?', it was asked. It was as if Burley had said he wanted Osama bin Laden, George Bush, Tony Blair or some other lying war criminal.

Some Scotland supporters, in knee-jerk reactions, showed a nasty anti-English side to the Scottish footballing psyche. Real Radio, the Glasgow-based station which airs a very successful Football Phone-in programme, indicated that the appointment of Terry Butcher had produced the biggest mailbag they had ever received (letters, phone calls, e-mails and texts), and that around 75% of respondents were against the former Rangers captain being given the job as George Burley's assistant.

Maybe I'm being unfair. Maybe those opposed to Butcher's appointment base their opposition on the man not being of the right footballing calibre for the job. So, let's look at Butcher's calibre.

Terry Butcher, as a player, captained the most successful, ever, Ipswich Town team – lifting the UEFA cup in 1981.

When Graeme Souness swept into Ibrox and started the Rangers revolution of the eighties, he signed Terry Butcher as his defensive rock and built the team around him. While captain of Rangers, Butcher won three league championship medals and two Scottish Cup medals in four years.

Butcher also won 77 England caps, captaining his country and playing in three World Cup finals tournaments – Spain 1982, Mexico 1986 and Italy 1990.

As a manager - with Coventry City, Sunderland and Motherwell - Terry Butcher proved himself competent in running football teams with very limited resources.

Apart from cold football statistics, anyone who ever saw Terry Butcher play knows the man was totally committed to his team - whether that was Ipswich, Rangers or England – and knows also that Butcher captained every team he played for because he was able to inspire those around him.

In any objective assessment of Terry Butcher's qualities and skills, there can be no doubt the man has the track record to be an asset to the Scotland international set up. George Burley knows that – he played alongside Butcher at Ipswich – and that is why he wanted him as his assistant.

So, unfortunately, it would seem that the opposition amongst Scotland fans to Butcher's appointment is based on matters outside of football. It seems some Scotland fans don't want Terry Butcher because he is English. I find that extremely sad.

Within a section of Scottish society there is a dislike of the English. That is a fact. Let's be clear, however, the anti-English section of our society is not entirely populated by so-called rabid Scottish nationalists. In my personal experience, I have heard much more offensive anti-Englishness from Scots who vote for British Unionist political parties than from supporters of independence.

A very good friend of mine, the former Labour and SNP MP Jim Sillars, once labelled this section of Scottish society as '90 minute nationalists'. They go to Hampden and scream abuse at the English, then, when they are given the opportunity to vote, they vote for Labour or the Tories or the Lib Dems and make sure that England continues to govern Scotland through the Westminster Parliament.

In fact, most people who are active in the SNP have long ago realised that Scotland's plight is not the fault of the English. It is the fault of Scots who vote for English-dominated political parties: parties that, inevitably, put first the interests of the majority – in England.

Not long after I was expelled from the SNP, a journalist on one of Scotland's biggest-selling Sunday newspapers called me up looking for a quote about anti-English sentiment in the SNP. I was delighted to be able to tell him that, in my 27 years as an SNP member, I could not recall a single incident of anti-Englishness. My experience of the SNP was a party driven, not by anti-anything, but by being pro-Scotland.

I strongly suspect that the majority of those Scots currently voicing opposition to Terry Butcher's appointment as assistant manager of the Scotland national football team were quite happy to vote for Tony Blair to be manager of Scotland, the nation. Their position is hypocritical and is born of ignorance.

Of course, everyone is entitled to their opinion, but when an opinion is ill-informed it is actually nothing more than a prejudice. The current opposition to Terry Butcher is the result of prejudice.

I firmly believe Terry Butcher will be an asset to the Scotland international set up, and I look forward to seeing the man who played 77 times for England as he wears the Lion Rampant of Scotland.

Incidentally, do any of the Scots opposed to Butcher's appointment remember the name of the England assistant manager between 1996 and 1999? His name was John Gorman and he was assistant to Glen Hoddle. John Gorman was born in Winchburgh, West Lothian. For the avoidance of doubt, that's in Scotland.

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com January 12 2008

John who?

The news has been confirmed and our nation must come to terms with the reality, however difficult that may be. We must accept our collective loss and try to move on.

“What news”, you ask, “what loss?” Well, it has now been officially confirmed that John Purvis will retire in 2009.

Now, other than in the Purvis household in St Andrews, the reaction to that piece of news will almost certainly be, “John who?”

It's a reasonable question. In fact, since 1999 John Purvis has been one of seven Members of the European Parliament tasked with representing Scotland – the entire nation.

Mr Purvis is a Conservative and is actually serving his second stint as an MEP, having previously represented Mid-Scotland and Fife between 1979 and 1984. With no intended disrespect to Mr Purvis as an individual, it is safe to say he hasn't exactly set the heather on fire during his two spells in Brussels, yet he was awarded an OBE in 1990, for his “political services”.

Did you know Mr Purvis was one of your MEPs? Do you know the names of the other six? Chances are the answer to both of those questions was “no”.

I was involved in frontline politics for many years, I was active in SNP campaigns for European Elections, so I can probably claim a wee bit more knowledge on the subject of MEPs than your average member of the general public, but I'm afraid I could normally only name the other six – Mr Purvis was always “the Tory one that isn't Struan Stevenson.”

The political make-up of Scotland's seven MEPs is: 2 SNP, 2 Labour, 2 Tory and 1 Lib Dem. Our MEPs are elected by proportional representation and the current batch are: SNP – Ian Hudghton and Alyn Smith; Labour – Catherine Stihler and David Martin; Tory – Struan Stevenson and John Purvis; Lib Dem – Elspeth Attwool.

The last European Parliament Election was in 2004, when all of the above were re-elected, except for Alyn Smith, who replaced the SNP's retiring MEP Professor Sir Neil McCormick. So, given that we re-elected them, we must be happy with their performance on our behalf. No?

Probably, the reality would be closer to us not knowing who they are and to never having given a passing thought to MEPs or the European Parliament. Yet we handsomely reward these people for whatever it is MEPs do.

British Members of the European Parliament are paid the same salary as members of the Westminster Parliament, currently £60,675. In addition, MEPs, like all elected representatives, receive allowances to assist them in carrying out their roles and representing their constituents. Annually, MEPs are given £125,387 to pay for their staff, and £31, 929 to meet the running costs of their offices. That's a lot of money in anyone's book, but it should be emphasised that this is not funding that MEPs keep for themselves. It goes to make sure they have offices and staff to whom we, as constituents, can go for assistance.

Having said that, though, when was the last time you contacted your MEP? When was the last occasion something bothered you and you thought, “Right, I'm going to take that up with my Member of the European Parliament”?

Since the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999, the bulk of issues of concern to the general public fall within the remit of MSPs – housing, policing, health care, transport – yet MSPs are paid much less than MPs and MEPs, and allowances granted to run Scottish Parliament constituency offices and to pay staff don't come close to those paid to our representatives based in London and Brussels.

Katy Clark, the MP representing the Three Towns, has her constituency office in Kilbirnie and holds Surgeries around the area. The MSP who represents Ardrossan and Saltcoats at Holyrood, Kenneth Gibson, has his office in Dalry and, again, holds regular Surgeries around the constituency. In Scottish Parliament terms, Stevenston falls into the Cunninghame South constituency, which is represented by Irene Oldfather: her office is in Irvine.

These constituency office contacts may not be as close to the Three Towns as the previously were – Allan Wilson and I both had our Scottish Parliament offices in Saltcoats – but they are within relatively easy reach and make it fairly easy to make contact and meet with these elected representatives. What of our MEPs, though; where would we have to go to meet with them?

The SNP's Ian Hudghton has his office in Dundee, and Alyn Smith is in Edinburgh; Labour's Catherine Stihler is in Dunfermline, and David Martin is in Edinburgh; Tory Struan Stevenson is also in Edinburgh, while John Purvis is in St Andrews. The closest MEP office to the Three Towns is that of Lib Dem Elspeth Attwool, in Glasgow. Mrs Attwool also has a holiday home on the Isle of Arran. So, at least she should know where the Three Towns are, even if she only passes through on her way to the ferry.

In reality, it would be impossible for seven people to have constituency offices that effectively covered an entire nation, especially with a population as disparate as Scotland's. However, the existing location of MEPs offices seems to have more to do with party political interest than with serving the people of Scotland. Three in Edinburgh, two in Fife and one just up the road in Dundee. Only Mrs Attwool ventures far enough west to find our largest city. Of those offices on the East coast, all are located within areas that vote strongly for the party of each individual MEP, except that of Alyn Smith. Mr Smith rents a room in the SNP's national headquarters.

Whatever we feel about the European Union – personally I believe we would be better outside it (ask the Norwegians) – the situation surely cannot continue where, annually, we pay out in salary and allowances £1,525,937 for seven people we don't know – and that's before we take into account travel expenses and the £180 per day 'Away From Home' allowance.

At the age of 69, John Purvis could have retired four years ago. Are we all grateful he decided to soldier on for us?

(c) the3towns.com

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the3towns.com January 5 2008

No competition for North Ayrshire Council's £380m contract

the3towns.com this week carries a story relating to the status of a company called Comprehensive Estate Services Ltd (CES). As reported, CES was one of only two bidders for North Ayrshire Council's £380m Schools PPP Project.

Like all public procurement projects, North Ayrshire's had to comply with European Union procurement regulations, which, amongst many other things, state that all projects must be able to show there was 'genuine competition' for the contract. With only two bids, genuine competition could only have been secured if both bids were of similar strength. They weren't.

The bid that secured the contract to build and maintain four new schools in North Ayrshire came from a German construction company called Hochtief. In previous editions the3towns.com has revealed that Hochtief has a long and, at times, dark history – it was the construction company that built Hitler's Berlin bunker, the Nazi's national rally centre in Nuremberg, and 'parts' of the Auschwitz extermination camp.

For its North Ayrshire bid, Hochtief worked in association with financiers Quayle Munro, German bank Nord LB, and Ayrshire-based construction firms Barr and Dawn. All companies involved in the Hochtief-led consortium have provable track records in their respective fields.

However, the standing of those companies goes for nothing if the bid submitted by them did not have genuine competition from the only other bid received, that from Comprehensive Estate Services Ltd.

So, let's look at CES. Comprehensive Estate Services Ltd has no record of ever trading. The company's registered headquarters is the office of an accountant in the High Street of a small town in Fife. The accountant, Colin Thomson, suggests anyone looking for CES should make direct contact with the company, rather than contacting him. That sounds reasonable enough, except that the only contact details available for Comprehensive Estate Services Ltd are those of Mr Thomson's office in Fife.

Some time ago, while investigating this matter as an MSP, I asked North Ayrshire Council to give me the contact details they had for CES. I assumed that, as Comprehensive Estate Services was apparently a contender for the Council's £380m Schools PPP contract, the local authority would have direct and regular contact with them. I was wrong. What North Ayrshire Council finally supplied to me was the old address for CES, an Edinburgh address the company had moved from some months earlier.

A bit later, under Freedom of Information legislation, I then asked North Ayrshire Council supply to me copies of all paperwork submitted by both Comprehensive Estate Services and First Class Consortium (the Hochtief-led partnership). When the Council finally supplied the requested information, the bid submitted by CES was clearly a cobbled together attempt to look like the real thing but, in fact, it was little more than nonsense. In parts it completely misrepresented the financial standing of the company; it listed three people as referees, all of whom later confirmed in writing that they had not agreed to be referees for the company; it listed professionals who, CES claimed, were working with them on their bid – all of the professionals later gave written statements confirming that they had never heard of Comprehensive Estate Services Ltd or the North Ayrshire Council Schools PPP Project.

The Comprehensive Estate Services documentation stated the value of the company was £1million. However, official accounts submitted to Companies House in Edinburgh recorded that only two shares had been issued in the company and that the total value of those shares was £2.00.

Comprehensive Estate Services had not traded prior to submitting its bid to North Ayrshire Council, nor has it traded since. Companies House records show CES to be a 'dormant' company, while its parent company, Americium Developments Ltd, is two months late in submitting its annual accounts. The parent company has the same official address as Comprehensive Estate Services – the accountants in Strathmiglo, Fife – and the same two directors, Richard Nawrot and George Henderson.

George Henderson was struck-off by the professional body covering his area of expertise, while the only previous public appearance of Richard Nawrot – other than as a director of a long list of failed companies – was when he claimed he could secure funding to put a British astronaut in space in the 1980s.

Comprehensive Estate Services was not a credible company, and the bid it submitted was of such poor quality it should have been rejected at the very first stage of consideration. In fact, that was the finding of North Ayrshire Council's own independent advisor on its PPP Project, who at the very first Key Stage Review recorded that the CES bid was not of a standard to merit progression to the next stage.

Despite all of this, North Ayrshire Council maintained that the bid from Comprehensive Estate Services was credible and of good quality. The Council claimed it had two viable bids and that, therefore, it had genuine competition for its Schools PPP contract.

Anyone who cares to look objectively at the two bids submitted to North Ayrshire Council can reach no conclusion other than that the CES bid was allowed to remain because, otherwise, the Council would have had only one bid, and there would have been no competition.

Despite the lies and misrepresentations contained in the paperwork submitted to North Ayrshire Council by Comprehensive Estate Services Ltd, under Scots law the company committed no crime, or so the procurator fiscal concluded. Because the company did not actually get the contract, no crime was committed. Of course, the role of Comprehensive Estate Services wasn't to get the contract, it was to provide the illusion of competition, so that North Ayrshire Council could get on and award its £380million contract to the only viable bid it had received.

The North Ayrshire Council Schools PPP Project will go down in history as one of the worst cases of a local authority riding rough-shod over the wishes of local people, by allowing construction on the only playing fields serving Saltcoats and Ardrossan. However, of equal concern, are the actions of Labour councillors and senior Council officials in their management of the procurement process that led to the award of a multi-million pound publicly-funded contract.

All available evidence points to there only ever having been one viable bid for the Council's Schools PPP Project. That fact means there was no competition and no way to judge whether or not the winning bid provided value for money for the public purse.

One day, those Labour councillors and Council officials will have to answer for their actions. If they thought they had weathered the storm – they were very much mistaken. 

(c) the3towns.com