The New Fat Scotland 'Thanks for all the Fish' Thread.

Tromking

Shakethedisease wrote: »

Ruth Davidson will crash and burn at Holyrood with so much of the spotlight now turned upon her. Repeating 'no referendum, no referendum' isn't going to be enough for five years. Adam Tomkins is a formidable character that being said. But Davidson thus far in Scottish politics, has had a pretty free and clear run with little in the way of scrutiny or having to justify Conservative policies. Photo ops and hiding the fact that she's a Tory have served well. But it definitely won't now.

You really don't like Tories do you?
As usual you talk of being the victim of Westminster rather than the SNP being the master of your destiny in an increasingly powerful Holyrood. Get past the grievance mindset Shakey, its becoming a bit hackneyed now.
I don't see Ruth having too much trouble especially as her Westminster Tory colleagues have just rubber stamped a continuance of Barnett which insulates Scotland from much of austerity we 'enjoy' in England.
In comparison to England you've plenty of spare cash, its not the English Tories fault you spend it on things like tuition fees for middle class students.

elantan

Sapphire wrote: »

I've always wondered. Is that a picture of Rutger Hauer (sp.?) next to your name? A fine choice if it is (great in Blade Runner), though he is Scandinavian I believe, not Scottish.

It sure is Rutger ... a very sexy man


That was a picture from Ladyhawke

I do like loads of things that are not Scottish ... probably even more things than are Scottish to be fair

Shakethedisease

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Yes I think they very much are....

Even Swinney's majority was cut from 7000 to just 1400.... A roughly 700 vote swing would have seen him ousted. That was unthinkable last year.

Turnout was much higher than in 2011 in his area. The vote numbers for Swinney/Cunningham were just about the same as last time.

Ruth has a pretty good chance of detoxifying the Tory brand over the next 5 years. She's likeable, charismatic, progressive (for a Tory), and more to the point comes across as meaning what she says. Her stance on Indy has remained unapologetically firm and without a doubt she has to be the best Tory leader in decades for regaining the middle ground of Scottish politics. And she's now even directly elected.

She is likeable. But imo only because she's been given a free ride. There's very little chance of her detoxifying the Conservative brand. On the contrary, she's now more likely to be the 'face' of every single Conservative policy that's coming from Westminster over the next five years and she will be asked to defend every single one of them. Something she's never had to do before. The media until now have passed over Ruth ( unless she was sitting grinning in a tank or giggling astride a buffalo ) in order to concentrate on Scottish Labour v's the SNP. That's going to change now.

Without a doubt the Greens standing a rare constituency candidate in her constituency rather than the list split the SNP/Green/left vote. But that's politics for you.

That creates an interesting and very real dilemma for the SNP - they may well have to swing right to defend vast swathes of rural Scotland from the Tories before the next election - but that opens the door to Labour in the central belt (assuming Labour can employ a proctologist to find it's head before then).

Interesting times....

I doubt the SNP will be swinging left or right from where they are now. Turnout was higher in those areas, I guess they'll just have to concentrate in getting the vote out better next time, but it's a way off yet. All the media coverage stating that the SNP had the constituency vote in the bag no doubt had an effect in terms of SNP turnout.

Well, yes, but the others left her an open goal there and now the ball is in the back of the net.

Sturgeon could have defused that whole issue by ruling out another indyref until 2021 at the earliest. The Greens tried to dance around the issue but needed the 45 to vote for them en-masse in the list. Labour veered left and had some mixed messages on indy to try and regain the socialist heartlands and failed. You can't out-SNP the SNP so that policy was always doomed.

Sturgeon will never rule out another referendum, nor even the possibility of one at an opportune moment. She'll go for it as soon as it looks likely to be won. Terrified unionists circling the wagons in fear of another one isn't going to make any difference to that really. Even if the Greens abstain ( there's little chance of them ever voting outright against another referendum )* the SNP still outnumber all the other parties put together. 63/60. (<--- from James Kelly/Scotgoespop ).

Forget the 45/55 split for a moment - polling suggests something like 70% of Scots don't want another Indyref for at least 5 years - so the anti-referendum position was always going to be fertile hunting ground for Ruth this time around. The other leaders could have just pointed to those polls and declared a 5 year moratorium on indyref talk as respecting the will of the Scottish people. They didn't and IMO have paid some element of a price accordingly.

Another Conservative win in 2020 will have another referendum first and foremost on the agenda for 2021 a full 6 years after the last one. This time most likely with Labour support. Like I said imo there's a ceiling on this as far as Conservative support goes at 22%. But it's Labour voters ( now it's yourself who has to forget about Tories in terms of possible Yes voters) ..Labour also sitting at 22% ... who'll take it over the line. And next time they'll probably be encouraged to do exactly that.

JOHN NICOLSON M.P. ‏@MrJohnNicolson May 6 The @BBCWorldatOne reports "senior Labour figures" saying it's time "to revisit the party's stance on independence." #SP16

Lose Labour voters from the No side next time round, and you lose the Union. Absolutely no question.

Still, plenty of stuff to keep us occupied until any future referendum or not. Very interesting times ahead like you say.

Shakethedisease

Tromking wrote: »

You really don't like Tories do you?
As usual you talk of being the victim of Westminster rather than the SNP being the master of your destiny in an increasingly powerful Holyrood. Get past the grievance mindset Shakey, its becoming a bit hackneyed now.
I don't see Ruth having too much trouble especially as her Westminster Tory colleagues have just rubber stamped a continuance of Barnett which insulates Scotland from much of austerity we 'enjoy' in England.
In comparison to England you've plenty of spare cash, its not the English Tories fault you spend it on things like tuition fees for middle class students.

No am not that keen on the Tories. Along with about half the UK, why single me out. And Ruth will have plenty of trouble. Can't wait to see her trying to sell prescription charges, tuition fees and Barnett formula cuts etc to us all via Holyrood.

First, on assuming official opposition status, Davidson is now herself a target in a way nobody could bother to make her previously. Being opposition leader means more than shouting and pointing. It means devising an alternative programme for government and fully costing it. It means leading debate not piggybacking on Labour. It means being answerable for every howler and misstep of her own government in London – a whole swamp of sticky stuff in which to get enmeshed.

This in itself will begin to turn the rest of the parliament against her because there is no one who defends Cameron in the rest of the chamber. Given the hammering suffered by the Liberals and the evisceration of Labour, it would be suicidal for them to continue on their one-trick pony act of constant attack on an SNP which is now in a position of having to negotiate.

http://newsnet.scot/commentary/tory-dilemma-attacking-snp-whilst-defend-cameron-westminster/

Good luck with that. :cool:

ruggedtoast

Shakethedisease wrote: »

I'd agree with pretty much in all of what you've said above. Scottish politics hasn't moved on from constitutional lines since 2014. No voters are congregating round whoever is best placed to keep the SNP out. And Dugdale's policy shifts especially on tax cost Scottish Labour dearly. The old Tory heartlands are back in play once again with SNP support moving west to the central belt.

Interesting times ahead. And weirdly, as someone pointed out on twitter, Davidson herself is now identifying herself more closely to a second independence referendum and constitutional matters than anyone else at the moment. Against obviously, but she's certainly been on the one shouting loudest about it in the last few months.

Oh Shakey just give it up. You are never going to get independence from the SNP. Not independence from anything that actually oppresses you.

Thats why the Indy movement is so misguided. You think you are all being held down by the English, whereas England is as much under the sway of neoliberalism as everyone else.

Do yourself a favour and vote Corbyn in 2020. Its your only chance for actual change. Not Tartan Tory Nicola and her oil banker 1% mate Alex.

Open your eyes. All of you.

Shakethedisease

ruggedtoast wrote: »

Oh Shakey just give it up. You are never going to get independence from the SNP. Not independence from anything that actually oppresses you.

Thats why the Indy movement is so misguided. You think you are all being held down by the English, whereas England is as much under the sway of neoliberalism as everyone else.

Do yourself a favour and vote Corbyn in 2020. Its your only chance for actual change. Not Tartan Tory Nicola and her oil banker 1% mate Alex.

Open your eyes. All of you.

Corbyn's party need to get behind him first. He can promise the world... but half his MP's won't vote with him on anything and don't we all know it.

Most SNP's and Greens I know like him, as do I. But he needs to take his party with him otherwise there's no point. I'm afraid that's with eyes fully open.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Shakethedisease wrote: »

Turnout was much higher than in 2011 in his area. The vote numbers for Swinney/Cunningham were just about the same as last time. .

Swinney lost 12% of the vote share compared to last time.

Conservative Murdo Fraser gained 12% compared to last time.

Spin it anyway you like but the SNP saw a significant shift against them in the rural and Northern areas.

Here's a map showing change in SNP vote share by constituency - Red is in decline....




And here's one for the Tories.... Green is an increase - they only lost share in 3 constituencies and had double digit gains across huge parts of Scotland.

HornetSaver

Shakethedisease wrote: »

Interesting times ahead. And weirdly, as someone pointed out on twitter, Davidson herself is now identifying herself more closely to a second independence referendum and constitutional matters than anyone else at the moment. Against obviously, but she's certainly been on the one shouting loudest about it in the last few months.

I would do the same in her shoes.

If we have Brexit, independence is inevitable and the sooner the issue is put to bed the better.

If we don't have Brexit, the sooner the referendum is called the more chance the unionists have of winning. The ideal situation for Davidson would of course be no referendum and no threat of one, but a failed second referendum would set the independence cause back relative to where it is right now.

HornetSaver

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Labour veered left and had some mixed messages on indy to try and regain the socialist heartlands and failed. You can't out-SNP the SNP so that policy was always doomed.

It was always going to make Labour's result worse than it would otherwise have been.

Dugdale's self styled "five year strategy" does actually make a lot of sense - spend a third of your time telling the SNP to use the powers they actually have, a third of your time saying they're doing a bad job when they oblige, a third of your time trying to demonstrate that the SNP are veering "to the right", and let the Tories try to undermine any SNP attempts not to act the way you hope they will.

It won't succeed, because the SNP have nationalism sewn up, the Tories have economically motivated unionism sewn up, the Greens are not a wasted vote due to the electoral system, and the Lib Dems have a long, proud history of naked opportunism, and more seriously of building up personal votes. But it's still as sound a strategy as Labour really have at the moment.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Labour only really have one viable pathway back from the wilderness.

They need to get a credible leader with gravitas and then swing back to the centre ground, fighting the SNP and Tories from a solidly Unionist, mainstream, centre left, policy position.

No more idiocy of appealing to the hard left, flirting with Indy, or tax rises.