Labour set to be minority party in Scotland and England

A poll in today's Times suggests that the SNP are "heading for victory" in May 3rd's Scottish Parliamentary elections.  Alex Salmond's party would have the largest number of MSPs but would fall short of an overall majority.  The Times' Angus MacLeod and Phillip Webster write:

"If the SNP leader Alex Salmond becomes First Minister, Mr Brown would face taunts that he would be a Scot in power in England whose writ did not run on issues such as health, education and transport in Scotland. And Mr Brown, if he becomes Prime Minister, would also be swiftly reminded that the Conservatives secured narrowly more votes in England than Labour at the last general election – leaving him open to claims that he has a mandate in neither country."

***
On ConservativeHome next week, in two exclusive articles, Murdo Fraser MSP and William Graham AM will present the case for voting Conservative in Scotland and Wales on 3rd May.

Comments

[malcolm]

I really hope no Conservatives north of the border vote for the SNP to get Labour out, Scotland is a place where I see absolutely no good guys apart from us of course!

[Tory T]

The Conservatives should get a decent vote. It should be ex Labour who vote SNP. It matters hugely, for the reasons Tim describes but also because it takes away their activist base, and will suck the heart from them. If Labour can't rely on Scotland whom can it rely on?

[Scotty]

Malcolm & Tory T, I think that there will be more than a few loyal tories putting a peg over their nose and voting for the best placed party to unseat Labour in some constituencies.
They will give their list vote to the conservatives but will not "waste" their FPTP vote if they perceive that it will keep Labour in first place.
What the polls don't always pick up is the tactical voting and those that will stay at home vote which IMHO could turn a bad election for Labour into a disaster!
Be under no illusions about the strength of feeling in some area's towards Labour, the electorate is more sophisticated and the 97' GE showed that when people are angry towards a party they can be unforgiving in the polling booth.

[Michael McGowan]

Surely Malcolm, the immediate priority is to ensure that the Labour Party is resoundingly defeated in the country it has taken for granted for so long, especially as the Brown Ascendancy is imminent? If that requires a tactical vote, then needs must....Rebuilding the Tory vote north of the Border is a much longer-term project.

[Jonathan Mackie]

Tory T, I'm not so sure. The SNP are adept at presenting themselves as tartan tories in constituencies normally conservative (Perth and Kinross, North Tayside, Angus etc) and to the left of Labour in the west of Scotland (Jim Sillars in Govan for example).

It is really only the north and lowlands where they play the nationalist card.

What is worrying is that PR has been introduced for the local elections. This will bring the SNP into parts of the country which have traditionally been strongholds of ours. Broughty Ferry in Dundee for one. That will give them legitimacy and a foothold to foster their agenda.

PR has been the underlying disaster for Scotland and the Union. By giving the SNP a representation at Holyrood beyond their wildest dreams in a first past the post election, has helped fund their campaigns and given them legitimacy in parts of the county they had no success.

As a Scot living in England, I view it all from afar with disquiet. Labour however are reaping what they sowed and it is to the detriment of our country. Pretty much like everything else they have touched over the last 10 years.

[Blunketts theatrical agent]

Who said democracy was dead, I have never seen a party so deserving of obliteration as this bunch. I want to know who COULD vote for them. It may be a secret ballot but look down the street and anyone throwing out mirrors will be the culprit.

I advocate "Tonys Law" whereby all NuLab sympathisers should be on a register so local people know if one is living in their community. What if one is out on a Nulab cuckoo iniative and talks to your children? its not fair. Parents have a right to know that a NuLab voter is in their street and they can take appropriate action to safegurd children, old people and the weakest in society.

Even teh liberal press seem to be getting the joke that its over for them.

[No Dentists Anywhere]

Scotty

I agree 100%. Its only the politicians who dont understand the feeling of ordinary voters, hell could freeze over disproving climate chaneg and they still will not vote for them.

They propogated the "nasty Tory" label that hurt so much, we need an appropriate moniker for them.

[malcolm]

If I thought the SNP were in anyway better than Labour I would agree with you Michael but I really don't. Jonathan Mackie is right,the SNP in general and Salmond in particular make the Lib-Dems look the models of consistency and principle!

[IRJMilne]

I agree with Malcolm and the other anti-SNP people. An SNP victory would be worse than a Labour one because of the threat posed to the union - though the only hope would be that they'd screw up and wreck their electoral chances next time around.

[Michael McGowan]

Malcolm, I am sure you are right about the SNP but the centre-right has much to gain from a chancer like Salmond and Labour's thuggish Tartan Gauleiters fighting it out for the foreseeable future like ferrets in a sack. Let's hope there are no survivors. As for the Union, it has long outlived its usefulness.....other than as a mechanism for Labour to gerrymander the Constitution.

[Gospel of Enoch]

Folks who dislike the MSPs could always vote UKIP, who are pledged to abolish them...

[Yet Another Anon]

The term minority party means little, no party has got more than 50% of the vote in England, Scotland, Wales or Ulster for a very long time, even in England in 1987 the Conservatives didn't manage to get more than half the votes and even in 1997 in Scotland and Wales - Labour didn't get 50% of the vote; the Conservatives did it in Scotland in 1959 but so far as I can see that seems to have been the last time it happened in any of the nations of the Union. The Conservative vote in England in 2005 was only higher than Labour's vote because of how far the Labour vote had fallen, the Conservative vote was only slightly up on 2001 both in percentage and absolute terms and still way lower in total votes than that of 1997 - if Labour had got the same number of votes in 2005 as it had in 2001 and the Conservatives had got their 2005 vote the Conservatives would only have gained a few seats and Labour would have got a majority of about 150 with the main reduction having been through the reduction in the number of Scottish seats.

[D Roberts]

even in 1997 in Scotland and Wales - Labour didn't get 50% of the vote; the Conservatives did it in Scotland in 1959 but Yetanotheranon wrote: so far as I can see that seems to have been the last time it happened in any of the nations of the Union.

This is WRONG WRONG WRONG. and a myth which is propergated by all who do not understand the Union or Scotland. If you combined Conservatives/Progressives/ Unionsts/ Liberal Unionists in 1959 then you can get over 50% - in other words all the anti Labour vote.

[Yet Another Anon]

Re message by D. Roberts at 12:21, If by the Liberal Unionists you mean the National Liberal Party then by that stage that was effectively Conservative anyway and took the Conservative Whip. The relationship between the Conservatives and National Liberals were closer than that between Liberal and SDP in the Alliance and almost as close as the relationship between Labour and the Co-operative Party which since 1918 has always been included as part of the Labour vote.

The 1959 General Election has nothing to do with not understanding the Union or Scotland - in fact I largely grew up in Fife and am a quarter Scottish with ancestry on the Scottish side all from the Scottish mainland since at least the 17th century mostly from Argyll, Glen Lyon and Rannoch. Rural Scotland used to be rocksolid Conservative and much of Edinburgh, Stirling, Aberdeen and even many parts of Glasgow were rocksolid Conservative & Unionist especially among Protestants - nationally in the 1950s the Conservative vote was very close to 50%

[Yet Another Anon]

And by 1959 the Scottish Unionist Party was also effectively a sub group of the Conservative Party, as the Conservative Party technically has always been a party of Independents technically with each association even now theoretically independent and more so in the past then using your argument you could argue that techically the Conservative Party had never had the largest vote of any of the parties in the UK because technically it had a seperate party in each constituency, on the basis of this argument every Conservative government there has ever been has been a Coalition government, but in practice at a national level even then it operated as as a single grouping including the Ulster Unionists, National Liberals and Scottish Unionists.

[Grant Thoms aka Tartan Hero]

Can I put this to you then? How will you feel if the Tories are required to give tacit support (I.e. not vote down) a minority Lib/Lab coalition? Is that better than an SNP-led majority coalition which will for once put the Independence question to the people of Scotland instead of shying away. If the Union is so loved, surely the Nats will be quashed just at Flodden, once and for all? Remind which ex-NATO Gen Sec and Labour peer said, "Devolution will kill the SNP stone dead!"?

[Grant Thoms aka Tartan Hero]

Oops I forget to remind Jonathan Mackie that Broughty Ferry had an SNP councillor (Ken Guild) up until 2003, not to mention the lovely suburb being part of former SNP Leader Gordon Wilson's seat from 1974 to 1987.

[Jonathan Mackie]

Ooops Grant - I must have missed out on my old fella's 40 odd years representing the area on first Dundee Corporation, then Tayside Region and then Dundee City.

The illustrious Ken Guild, twice defeated and finally took the hint, did fleetingly represent the centre of Broughty Ferry, but it is risible to assume that makes it a hotbed of nationalism.

Gordon Wilson. Now that is a blast from the past. The Ferry certainly was part of Dundee East, but then so is Whitfield and Fintry, doesn't really tell you anything about any of those areas.

First decent Labour candidate in John McAllion beat Wilson then SNP leader hands down.

Might be worth a bit of historical accuracy before you post.

[Jonathan Mackie]

It always is hilarious to hear Scot Nationalists use historical events to represent their case.

Flodden!!!!! In 1513!! That is almost 500 years ago. When Scotland declared war on England and lost due to tactically naivety. Pretty much presents a good case for independence that.

What are you citing next Grant? St Columba's march?

[Yet Another Anon]

Remind which ex-NATO Gen Sec and Labour peer said, "Devolution will kill the SNP stone dead!"?
Former Labour Defence Secretary George Robertson. It wasn't just him, Donald Dewar and Tony Blair also said it.