21: Narrowing the Field

Posted on April 14, 2011 by davidsberry

Ever since nominations closed earlier in the month, we have known that only the four ‘main’ parties are contesting East Lothian. This is the narrowest choice that voters have had in decades and many people who favour one of the ‘minor’ parties will have to think who else they might transfer their vote to.

The Greens will find the SNP have excellent environmental credentials while the Pensioner Party will find the best swathe of policies for the elderly too, whereas UKIP adherents may be more comfortable voting eternally Eurosceptic Tory. Socialists, whether SSP or Solidarity, have been unable to consider Labour since Blair but when I see their statements like “We see Scotland as independent, a republic where we are not bombing Libya, not occupying Afghanistan, not threatening the world with nuclear annihilation, not privatising vital public services, not cow-towing to un-elected heads of state, not answerable to anyone but ourselves” I can’t see why they would not vote SNP.

As an aside, I canvassed the SSP’s former candidate here. He boiled with exasperation how ego and intolerance had shredded a fleetingly united left. Despite sounding like the Colosseum scene from Life of Brian, his  dismay was so obviously heartfelt that I was moved to sympathy. As for any BNP adherents, I don’t know how to advise them beyond reconsidering your politics entirely. Certainly the SNP would rather win without your support.

Although media must provide even-handed coverage, that does not apply to blogs like this. That said, just as major parties show mutual respect in the four hustings, why not extend that to minor parties? After all, you never know who may need to work with and—more to the point—it wasn’t so long ago the SNP was a minor party itself.

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Posted on April 13, 2011 by davidsberry | Leave a comment

22: Decidedly Undecided

Posted on April 12, 2011 by davidsberry

Call me a cynic but when MORI or anyone else runs a poll that generates headlines that the Judean People’s Front is 15 points behind, or whatever, I fetch the bulk salt dispenser from the kitchen and wash the results down with lashings of gripe water. Not that they aren’t professionally conducted but 1,000 souls, however well selected, whose opinion results are filtered by flavour-of-the-month political interpretation by the polling agency is too close to examining the entrails of birds for my taste.

When you’ve been on all the doorsteps I have over the last nine months, deploying canvass experience from the dozen elections since 1994, then you get a picture—not of the nation, but of your patch. The Pensioner Party could be about to sweep Glasgow and I wouldn’t know it.

But I do know East Lothian three ways from Sunday and it is in political turmoil. From one end to the other, talk of cuts and job losses has made people nervous for their future. This has broken many bonds that once bound people to a party with a lasting faith they could fix things. It’s easy to over-generalise but the mood is that Tories might fix things but they’ve no chance in Scotland and Lib-Dems have blown the trust of even their core vote by being too fast cosying up to Cameron.

This ought to herd people Labourwards as it blows its rusty-but-trusty anti-Thatcher trumpet to rally the faithful. But they’ve spent so much time denigrating others, they forgot to have ideas of their own. There’s no substance left to rally round. The result is that the Undecided party is winning East Lothian, hands down. Though there’s wobbling in SNP support, its only on the independence question. So many other doorstep responses start with ‘well I used to vote for…” (fill in unionist party name) “but now I’m not sure”.

Such is their disillusionment that this great swathe of once-Lab/Con/LD voters is angry enough to bother voting if someone gives them a good reason. Thankfully, for nine months now the SNP has been talking to thousands of such people and doing just that.

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23: Round 4 (ding!)

Posted on April 12, 2011 by davidsberry

The fourth East Lothian hustings was organised by the Association of Churches in North Berwick and very well hosted by the Abbey Church, with Dunbar’s Rev Lawrence Twaddle in the chair. In keeping with last year’s success, again 80 people showed up and peppered the four candidates with substantial questions. The Tory held his ground but tended to talk entirely nationally, making few local references. He spoke too fast, not close enough to the mike, so he may not have been clearly heard.

The Lib-Dem, while exhibiting disarming sincerity, drifted between disclaiming ‘not be a professional politician’ and quoting policies from a categorised coloured cheat sheet her party had thoughtfully provided. That left the Gray Man and me to duke it out but the format allowed little real confrontation; we wound up mostly agreeing with each other—on the need for jobs, about Scottish Enterprise’s poor performance, on key role of education.

All four performed competently and the audience was politely attentive for the 90 minutes. But I felt I edged it and would have won any straw vote of the audience —a total turnout by the local Labour branch notwithstanding. This is not because I was local or even the top debater but because, whereas the two MSPs kept mouthing party lines from a national perspective (as if this were FMQs) I kept it local, hammering at issues that I have long believed mattered to East Lothian.

They seemed to have both forgotten that this was not just an opportunity to communicate with the media; it was a job interview for someone who could best listen to, understand and then powerfully articulate the hopes and fears of those in the room. I hope my enthusiasm for that job came across.

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24: The Future’s So Bright…

Posted on April 11, 2011 by davidsberry

…we gotta wear shades! Or, at least that’s what you might have thought this weekend right across the county. It wasn’t just that Dunbar, North Berwick and Gullane were mobbed, with High Street pavements and car parks choked and beaches busy with strollers and pale skin lolling beneath newly dusted-down sunglasses. Elsewhere hummed to the tunes of lawnmowers and the chink of spade and iced tumblers in gardens. Weekends like this, our visitors just have to live with their jealousy.

But those visitors are also the future; they are what has revived North Berwick High Street and spurred hundreds of volunteers to make the place look cared for. This has now spilled over to East Linton and Cockenzie/Port Seton, as well as more obvious destinations, again because the place looks cared for. While we build such desirable communities, the financial boost to make it all work has to come from tourism.

Labour huffs and puffs about jobs and economy. But, with their heads stuck down a 19th © hole, they don’t have a clue. They want Cockenzie Power Station (possibly the ugliest but certainly the most prominent building in Scotland) to stay for another 30+ years. Why? for maybe 50 jobs. If you replaced it with a marina, harbour, boat trips, restaurants, shops, seafood specialties, etc, you’d have over 1,000 jobs, plus perhaps £30m injected into the local economy annually. You would also link wildlife of the lagoons with Longniddry Bents and elevate the John Muir Way to national status and re-invent Prestonpans as a destination by making a long seafront walkway part of it.

Beats me why my opponents are such Luddites and can’t see a more suitable future for such a wonderful place. Maybe they wear dark glasses on all the time; maybe they’re just blind.

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You Heard It Here First

Posted on April 10, 2011 by davidsberry

This Just in: SNP Outflanks Limit to MSP Numbers by also Standing in Enfield South (aka The Glen Croe Massacre)

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25: Sunshine on the Righteous

Posted on April 10, 2011 by davidsberry

Sent home by a friend last night for almost falling asleep as we discussed our day over a glass. In a distance event like an election, you have to pace yourself and I’ve been cutting the sleep short. But on as glorious a day as yesterday, who wouldn’t want to be out and about in East Lothian? The blossom is rampant, the buds are out and great columns of nodding daffodils stand guard everywhere.

Spent the morning at high street stalls where the reception was excellent, even if at North Berwick I seemed to be gleaning more votes for colleagues in Falkirk and Edinburgh than for myself. Dunbar was just as good and morale further boosted by a lonely Labour councillor trying to keep their red flag flying and getting little trade. This burst of summer in early April has everyone in good spirits. As the only party covering the county with councillors, the SNP are now so much part of the social fabric that people of all political stripes stop to chat about much besides politics.

Then, fortified by splendid lunch from Bert at the Castle Inn, it was off to chap in a few hundred letters. This is a joy of the campaign trail—saying hello to people you already know, bolstering the supporters, persuading the switherers and encouraging the first-time voters to do so, even if not for you. On such a glorious day, people are out mowing lawns or tinkering with bikes and much more disposed to chat than during dark winter chill. You enjoy spending more time with each than necessary. Still unused to the light nights, it’s evening before you know it.

As I apologised to my friend to yawn my way home, we agreed we’d take the next glass after the first week of May, when we can stay up late and sort out the wrongs of the world properly, as we usually do.

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26: What Has Been Done for Our Kids?

Posted on April 9, 2011 by davidsberry

In ELC, the SNP has been very conscious of the high value set by residents on the excellent education available in its schools and has set much store in continuing that tradition. In each of the last three budgets, spending on education has been either increased or protected from cuts, which is no small achievement when the £98m spent on education is virtually half of the £208m total budget for the council.

The six secondary schools each continue to control their own £ multi-million spend and each has managed to improve on its exam statistics, as well as (contrary to Labour claims) exhibiting lower youth unemployment rates in March 2011 than in March 2007. However, there continue to be two problems: 1) An unevenness is statistics that can’t be explained by demographic differences and; 2) relatively low priority (and prestige) given to vocational training.

Such secondary issues are actually best addressed at primary level and the earlier the better. By selecting certain schools and providing extra teaching staff in P1-P3, class sizes as small as 18 allow teachers to spend time with individual pupils to assist with basic numeracy and literacy. East Lothian is also one of eight ‘test sites’ for Support from the Start, which was launched in March 2009 by the Chief Medical Officer for Scotland at  a Musselburgh conference. ELC, NHS and community organisations now work together to improve access to support and services to close our notorious health gap right in the early years of life.

Together, these programmes boost the chance that, throughout their later schooling, increased confidence and ability will allow all children to exploit the chances on offer.

For those early years where pupils are exhibiting emotional difficulties, last year, we introduced Place 2Be. This charity was established in 1994 in response to increasing concern about the extent and depth of emotional and behavioural difficulties displayed in classrooms and playgrounds.

By giving children the chance to explore their problems through talking, creative work and play, we enable them to cope now and make better-informed decisions about their lives and help prevent more serious mental health and behavioural problems in later life. Backed up by more pro-active community policing, our community wardens and better youth facilities, social difficulties are more easily dealt with and the risk of alienation diminished.

 

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27: Parliamo Politico VII

Posted on April 8, 2011 by davidsberry

Let’s Talk Pencil-Pusher: Lesson VII—Vocabulary (Seventh of a series, translating bureaucrat-speak into what it means for folk in East Lothian)

Continue: Usually heard in committee meetings, continuing simply means delaying any decision until the next meeting. It can mean some official’s minor mistake but more often a breakdown in the usually smooth political process.

Homologation: During the summer recess the council does not meet. Decisions must still be made but then ratified or homologated at the next meeting. Look out, though, for this being a fait accompli; once taken, decisions are never reversed.

PPP (Public-Private Partnership): a New Labour trick with private investment that doesn’t show as public debt. It’s poor long-term value: East Lothian’s schools PPP provided £57m of investment. Over 30 years, this will cost EL’s taxpayers £160m.

Quorum: The number of members who must be present to make any meeting competent. Usually 50%+1, this can still mean a ‘bum’s rush’ from a small group.

Redact: to block out sensitive information on documents not normally public. FOI requests can probe deep: the more blocked out, the closer to the truth FOI is getting.

Scrutiny: Each council is expected to run scrutiny panels. ELC now runs an Audit & Governance PRP (chaired by a Tory) and a ‘General Operation’ PRP (chaired by Labour); both now meet in public. Labour did it all in camera with Labour chairs.

Ultra Vires: Latin for ‘beyond the competence’ or, more generally, things outside of a council’s control. This used to be an excuse for lack of action but the Power of General Competence means anything is OK that doesn’t interfere with the law or government.

Vire: Small word, big impact. Once a budget is set, funds allocated cannot be shifted among departments. Viring is a red flag that someone got the budget badly wrong.

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28: Going Down

Posted on April 7, 2011 by davidsberry

I finally get it: Labour is Wile E. Coyote. In every cartoon, he’s so furiously engaged in the chase on his latest Acme gizmo it’s only when he’s out over the canyon floor far below that he realises the support he’s taken for granted is no longer there.

Labour’s inner circle is equally convinced of their cunning—not to mention their moral superiority. Given positive results over the last fifteen years, how could they doubt? This year’s Acme Rocket Sled was launched yesterday in Glasgow, touting “what matters” is jobs and youth employment.

Leave aside that their platform is mainly others’ ideas, against which they’ve voted for years. Their main plank is the Tory bogeyman, who is going to destroy the NHS and bring famine and pestilence to us all. That did work in 2003…but got them their head handed to them in 2007. They tried it again in 2010, when a 3% rise in their vote made them think it worked again. But even if not everyone has noticed it was Labour who dumped us in this recession, they have noticed how powerless Labour is now.

But Labour in Scotland has been in denial since 2007. And they think no-one noticed that they ran a local government/MP/MSP gravy train across the Central Belt for years until it was derailed then. They seriously think that just by grumping at what the SNP has done and holding tight, they will come back into their own again. But Old Labour reliability that underpinned New Labour excess in Scotland is disappearing under their feet. The old miners are no longer with us; their sons have bought their council house, got a job in financial services and moved on. Worse, the principled activists disappeared under Blair; payroll ‘activists’ working for MSPs are now few.

Stand on most doorsteps in East Lothian and ‘Labour’ is not a popular name, even in Tranent and Prestonpans. Labour support has been doing the ‘snaw aff a dyke’ routine for years. But if their activist does chap doors down Appin Drive or Brotherston Way, in the silence all they’ll hear is the faint ‘pop-pop’ of a rocket sled’s motor dying ten metres over the precipice leading to electoral oblivion.

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