36: Alex for President

Posted on March 30, 2011 by davidsberry

Last night, the first of the ‘Presidential’ leaders’ debates on STV was neither decisive nor the kind of riveting television that will spark political interest among the wider public. But press consensus (and not just my opinion) is that Mr Salmond came out the clear winner. In the opening exchanges about the achievements of the SNP administration, he kept it simple, stressing the scrapping of prescription charges, help for pensioners through the council tax freeze and free education.

Labour’s Mr Gray got himself bogged down on jobs and the economy, running through an argument about jobless levels which didn’t carry the same punch as the First Minister’s lines. He then tried to intervene on Mr Salmond which, again, didn’t work well. He looked like he was hectoring while Mr Salmond appeared more calm. It was almost as if, because Labour know how important these debates are in raising the profile and reputation of their leader, that Mr Gray pushed too hard, too early. Though he got better later, the damage was already done and Annabelle Goldie hand-bagged him several times for voting against budgets that gave Labour what they had asked for.

Worse, Mr Gray’s performance will not have made up ground his party is losing on other fronts. Yesterday’s STV poll had the SNP catching up from a 15% disadvantage to be neck-and-neck (37% vs 38%) and today’s Hootsmon poll has the SNP reaching its 40% target while Labour trails them for the first time in years.

But perhaps most damning verdict is in the Spectator, entitled Iain Gray’s Remarkable No-Man Band. If Scottish politics has—for good or ill—become increasingly presidential, then it’s clear who has the inside track to the job.

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37: Vocal for Vocational

Posted on March 28, 2011 by davidsberry

Having served twelve years on an Education Committee and been at more parent councils/boards than I’ve had hot school dinners I know how parents value excellent schools and opportunities they give their children. Laudable stuff, especially when they are themselves engaged. But, despite being the first (and only) member of my family to take a degree, I believe education is off-balance here in Scotland. An over-emphasis on academic tertiary conceals a serious neglect of vocational education. This must stop.

Over the next seven years, employment in Scotland’s creative and cultural industries is predicted to expand by 40%, generating 18,000 new jobs. Employment in those industries responsible for management and development of the built environment – encompassing property, planning, housing, facilities management, cleaning and support services and parking industries – looks set to grow by 30%, creating around 27,000 new jobs. Even the battered Scottish construction industry is predicted to recover to 2007 employment levels by 2014. You don’t need a degree for any of that.

But you do need an apprenticeship. Modern Apprenticeships (MAs) offer people aged over 16 the chance of paid employment combined with the opportunity to train for jobs at different levels. They are an exciting way of gaining skills and nationally recognised qualifications that help kick-start a career without having to study full-time. MAs are available across a wide range of sectors and instill in trainees a range of ‘soft skills’ around communication, teamwork and problem solving, as well as improved numerical and IT skills. In short, your education is geared to prepare you for your job, which is why the Scottish Government is keen to offer 25,000 MA places.

Even though plumbers are now virtually royalty, Scots have yet to shake a Victorian class prejudice that manual work is dirty, underpaid and undesirable. But when you consider Germany’s massive vocational education programme (and the world-class quality engineering it produces) then douce bigotries of Milngavie matrons are seen through and we can encourage hands-on youngsters with deft fingers to help us build our 21st century future.

Supporting the Alliance at the CSPP Manifesto Launch in Edinburgh

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38: New Home; New Hope

Posted on March 28, 2011 by davidsberry

Having been on a number of doorsteps, the ones that I find most discouraging are not the solid Labour or Tory supporters—firstly they are generally polite, secondly they now have a haunted look in their eye and thirdly there aren’t too many of ’em any more. No, the ones that rattle my cage most are in the new affordable homes we’ve been building, especially in the West of the county.

Since 2007, ELC put top effort into addressing the scandal of homelessness and the pitiful under-provision of affordable homes for rent that was the worst among many ugly inheritances from umpteen years of Labour. Visit the new tenants in the East of the county and you find community spirit;, kids playing together; planters and boxes out; a clear enthusiasm for well built homes they had despaired of ever inhabiting. The real giveaway is that almost all have registered to vote, i.e. to engage with life in general.

At the other end of the county, in what was once Labour heartlands, it’s a different story. There is almost no external sign that these equally nice and new houses are even occupied and barely a quarter of the occupants have bothered to register to vote. Not only are they puzzled to find you on their doorstep but many seem to regard their new home as no more than their due and certainly have no idea that, were it not for the SNP, they would still be back in the various desperate circumstances they escaped from.

They seem not so much ungrateful as unaware that it was people registering and then going out to vote SNP in 2007 that made all their nice new homes possible. They ken noo.

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39: Solo Gig

Posted on March 27, 2011 by davidsberry

One of the blessings of social networking on the internet is the mix of people thrown into contact in a way daily face-to-face life would never do. If you are mostly interested in talking to voters in East Lothian, as I am just now, that might seem a disadvantage but—every now and them—it throws up a gem.

One such gem is Deborah Sprout, a singer/songwriter from New Jersey who is over here to visit friends and give a couple of concerts, the last of which was in Bruntsfield Church. It wasn’t well attended and she herself complained of some ailments and ‘running only at 40%’, so, you might say, what’s the big deal?

Regular readers might recall my banging on a month ago about Joni Mitchell’s interpretation of her own lyrics. Well, Deborah’s been there too. Not only does her voice have a range and clarity that recalls Joni but, because she’s not quite as willowy as Joni, it has a power that our American cousins might call ‘kick ass’.

Poor though I am at judging music at first hearing, I thought that her faster numbers needed more than just her guitar strumming to pace them. But when she got into her specialty of torch ballads, the interplay of minor and seventh chords on Stay With Me or New Year’s Eve counterpointed a pure voice from the heart. And the lyric Goodbye My Dear One soared in a clear upper register in a way Joni would surely have admired.

What does this have to do with politics? For me, everything. I have spent decades voicing my truth in front of people that, mainly, didn’t much care. To watch Deborah swallow any disappointment and still give her all to a handful of listeners was a lesson for me; that your own truth becomes real when you lay it out there—no matter if anyone is listening.

To catch up on what everyone else missed, try her on Facebook (she’s a voracious communicator) or her own website: http://www.deborahsprout.com/deborah-sprout.php

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40 Days to Decide

Posted on March 26, 2011 by davidsberry

Now that we’re officially into the campaign, I’m not sure whether I’m more impressed by the rather prickly response of many people if you try to shift into talking politics or by the wide open attitude they have, should you manage to make that shift.

Almost twenty years ago when I first began street work upon my return home to Scotland, most people were pretty clear about their politics. Their positions were dominated by pro- and anti-Thatcher stances and elections were head-to-head contests between Tory and Labour, with other parties scarcely taken seriously by the media.

But even then, the class basis of voting was eroding. Thatcher had persuaded many ‘working class’ to vote Tory. And in the following decade, Blair persuaded a huge swathe of the ‘middle class’ to vote Labour. But, in so doing, both lost much clarity among their grass roots and other parties like the SNP found increasing numbers choosing them. Professor John Curtice of Strathclyde has made a career out of analysing this effect.

Now, when neither once-dominant party can avoid an undignified struggle for support from the ‘middle ground’, the chickens of party disloyalty are darkening their skies in great flocks, coming home to roost all over the political spectrum. Given that many ex-Tory/Lab, then Lib-Dem voters are also now fizzing over the UK’s Con-Dem coalition, it’s little wonder that the ‘Don’t Know’ party is still streets ahead of any other at this stage.

It’s all to play for.

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41: Alea Jacta Est

Posted on March 25, 2011 by davidsberry

Having baled out of its stilted irrelevance at age 14—my earliest chance—my Latin is pretty ropey but I like the ambiguity of this phrase; normally translated as “the die is cast”—with its overtones of hot metal poured into solid moulds—than the more morally lightweight “the dice have been thrown”. But today, as I handed over ten crisp fifties, the most money I’ve held in my hand since I flogged my Lambretta in nineteen canteen, I was declared the official SNP candidate for the East Lothian constituency. That pleased me.

Anyone that knows me will know why that should feel good: I would be out campaigning for the place anyway; this just gives it structure and a goal. And anyone who’s known me for only five minutes will know that I have a mouth on me that naturally nips the heid of anyone in power, right up to Chief Executives and visiting royalty on behalf of Mrs McGlumpher of Auchenshoogle Avenue, rather than the other way round. For this, I make no apology, other than accepting that my style may still need a little work.

But six years on community council and twelve on the county have done nothing to blunt my enthusiasm for this stunning, richly diverse corner of Scotland that begat me, raised me and gifted me so much. Getting my oar into as influential waters as I can on her behalf is a more noble ambition than I have yet aspired to—and more electrifying than any throw of dice could ever be.

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42: Long Haul

Posted on March 24, 2011 by davidsberry

East Lothian prides itself on its rolling, rural countryside, dotted with farms and villages. But, hidden away there are also some sizable businesses, like Andrew Black, the hauliers based at the old Drem airfield. This is a family business, based entirely in the tiny village of Drem. In fifty years, Andrew, together with his wife Janet and twin sons, has built the operation up to include thirty 44-tonne tractors and over fifty trailers of various sorts.

Together with their rivals David Burns over in Bonnyrigg they have expanded with the growth in business but now face fuel bills of £400 for a round trip to Swindon and difficulty knowing how best to position themselves for the long term. North Midlothian SNP candidate Colin Beattie and I have both contacted our respective hauliers to say not just that we appreciate their difficulties and value the local work they bring but that we’ll fight on to bring tax relief on road fuel. The 5p/litre effective price drop announced in the budget is still not enough in the present economic climate when diesel has soared from 111p to 136p in barely a year. That’s a 22% hike or almost ten times inflation.

That the oil-richest country in Europe need tolerate the highest fuel prices in Europe is inexcusable. In the long haul, the fuel tax regulator championed by the SNP is essential.

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An unexpected discovery amidst last Sunday’s blizzard of inserts in the papers was riches indeed: a reprint of Stanley Baxter’s classic Parliamo Glasgow with such essential phrases as ‘zarra‘ as in ‘zarra besyekindae?‘ or ‘goannae’ as in ‘goannaenodaethat?’. Which made me realise, after standing on countless doorsteps and trying the patience of locals (who’d rather have been watching Corrie instead of standing letting the heat out) that they are just as colourful in their expressions—but are rather more polite than those in Easterhouse.

For example, you soon learn that ‘nahyera’ritepawl‘ although a polite expression, translates directly into ‘I’d rather not speak with you’ or more accurately into ‘feck off’, as does the more pointed ‘whitsapointyouzzurawrasame‘. And you need to stay alert for phrases such as ‘ahvnoevenascoobie‘ or ‘ahuvnygieditonythochtyet‘ which are the hallmarks of the floating voter and—far from signaling hostility—indicate the need for follow-up.

Posted on March 24, 2011 by davidsberry | Leave a comment

43: Purdah, She Wrote

Posted on March 23, 2011 by davidsberry

Well that’s the official start gun for the so-called ‘short’ campaign, launched with the dissolution of wur Pairlimunt when our MSPs clean out their think pods and Eck desists from virtuoso demos on how FMQs should be done. He even managed to mention East Lothian’s new home equity assistance in his very last answer, using it to club Andy Kerr into what has become his habitual sullen look. Why students bothered marching when the SNP have promised no more (back- or front-door) fees was not made clear.

Student march down Canongate against tuition fees, March 2011

I met up with most of our 47-mere-mortals-again at a candidate briefing across the road at Dynamic Earth for as upbeat a launch as you could want. People in as tough a challenge as Bob Doris in inner-city Maryhill & Springburn or Aileen McLeod in the rural sprawl of Galloway have already done a pile of work and are raring to crank it up a notch for the final sprint. And if our opposition’s out there, they’re creeping around ve-e-e-ry quietly.

Newly demobbed and aspiring MSPs at Dynamic Earth

Alex Salmond in full cry motivating the troops

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44: This Is Leadership?

Posted on March 22, 2011 by davidsberry

In the course of their one-day conference, my opponent (who happens to be Labour’s Leader) stood up before those assembled. As his boss Ed Milliband had rather ignored Scotland in his own speech, someone needed to bring the focus back there. The result was something only a diehard Labour supporter could love. Perhaps after weekly drubbings at the hands of the First Minster he was punch drunk but his grasp of facts was even ropier than usual.

“I am proud too of Labour’s MSPs in Holyrood and their fight over the past four years to oppose the SNP there. In and out of that chamber they have stood alongside teachers and parents fighting cuts in their schools, the victims of crime fighting for justice, redundant apprentices fighting for a chance, kinship carers fighting for recognition, and workers fighting for protection at work. Labour, your MSPs have done you proud.”

Whatever planet he and his MSP troops have been on, that galaxy can’t include East Lothian. How can he not know his own patch? ELC has not only raised school budgets but sustained teacher numbers and provided extra teachers for certain P1-P3s. He knows there are extra police (not to mention wardens) in Tranent and Prestonpans and local crime’s down by 26% as a result. He should know kinship carers have had support for the last two years, that a massive capital build programme secured jobs in construction and that no forced redundancy faces ELC workers.

If anyone threatened apprentices, by leading his dismal naysayers to vote against 25,000 new apprenticeships in the Holyrood budget, it was he. Leave aside minimum pricing on alcohol or taxing the supermarkets. After four years practice, he and his 45 MSPs learned saying ‘no’ in unison. But their dearth of ideas is tragic. To paraphrase Star Trek: It’s opposition, Jim, but not as we know it.

As for leadership, read the whole speech. I defy you to find any.

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