SNP Rising Star

Today I had the pleasure of attending my third hustings of the campaign. I know I said previously that there were only two for me to attend, but I got a wee message sent to me a couple of days ago to say that there would be another for me to go to.

However, there is a twist. This particular hustings meeting involved my attendance as part of the audience rather than the panel as they were being held at St Maurice's High School as part of their mock election campaign. So the SNP candidate today was Matthew Hewitt (pictured with myself and Councillor Liz Irvine) and not Jamie Hepburn.

I am glad to say that Matthew aquitted himself very well against his fellow candidates, all of whom were good performers on the day. Their election is being held tomorrow so best of luck to Matthew who has all the makings of a top rate SNP representative of the future.

The Second and Last Hustings

Tonight saw the second and last hustings for the Cumbernauld and Kilsyth constituency after the first set yesterday. Unlike last night the hustings tonight (held in Cumbernauld College) was exclusively for the Scottish Parliament candidates, with the four of us contesting the constituency joined by a representative from the SSP, Solidarity and the Scottish Christian Party.

The event tonight was well attended and many issues of local importance were brought up.

One issue that was raised was the ongoing problems at Cumbernauld Town Centre. Since the Tories allowed this facility to be privatised there have been problems there. Essentially the people of Cumbernauld don't really have a proper town centre, but a decrepit 1960s shopping centre. Have you ever heard of a town centre that is locked at night so that people can't access it? That is the reality that people in Cumbernauld have to face. The town centre does not do justice for a town the size of Cumbernauld. It should be the very civic heart of the town, but at the moment it is far from achieving that purpose.

One lady at the hustings who is involved with a local credit union highlighted the huge problem that local bodies such as that have in getting premises at the town centre, reinforcing the fact that the town doesn't really have a town centre to speak of. My Labour opponent and incumbent MSP Cathie Craigie has recently announced that she intends to establish a trust for the town centre.

How convenient that she makes this announcement on the eve of an election in which she feels under pressure. She has been an MSP for eight years and it has taken her this length of time to act on the issue. We have been surveying local people - as I have mentioned previously on this blog - and fully 96% of people who responded told us that they are concerned by the state of the town centre. If successful on 3rd May I give an assurance to them that I won't wait eight years to act on the town centre, but will get working on the matter within the first eight DAYS of being elected.

Other matters of importance raised were the loss of 400 jobs at the Inland Revenue in Cumbernauld, something to which I am totally opposed. Gordon Brown has made big play of cutting "civil service" jobs. He clearly is lulling people into the idea that Sir Humphrey down in Whitehall is for his jotters when in actual fact it is front line workers, many of whom are on short term contracts with little job security and low pay that face the chop.

We also had the chance to discuss Cumbernauld House's future. This important building has a long history and was most recently used by the D.H. Morris Group which has recently gone under. Many local people now believe that this should be used as a community facility and I agree with them. It was suggested that this could be brought into community ownership with a purchase organised by the Cumbernauld community. That is one solution and if it emerges as the most obvious way to create a community facility out of Cumbernauld House then I will support it, but we can look at other methods too.

The future of the A&E at Monklands was also brought up. I was delighted to be able to point to the fact that the SNP has given a cast iron guarantee - and it is in our manifesto if you want to look - that if we form the administration after the election then we will reverse the dangerous decision to close the A&E at Monklands.

All in all, I have to confess I enjoyed tonight's event. My only disappointment is that we have only had two hustings during the entire campaign.

Alex Salmond visits Kilsyth

Another busy day today. Spent the early part of the afternoon knocking doors in Abronhill with my colleague Councillor Liz Irvine. It was heartening to hear from people that they had received our election address and most seemed to respond well to the issues we had raised in it. I met many people who are going to vote SNP on 3rd May, some for the very first time. Increasingly people are coming to realise that the way to make change happen at this election is by supporting the SNP and that was quite clear from many conversations I had today.

Then it was over to Kilsyth where SNP leader Alex Salmond was paying a visit. We got the chance to meet with a number of folk on Kilsyth Main Street. Again, it is clear that not only are people coming over to our campaign locally, but that the campaign to make Alex Salmond First Minister of Scotland has really captured the public imagination. Most people we spoke to were telling us that they intend to vote SNP at the election.

And this evening we had the first election hustings of this campaign at Cumbernauld Primary. It was a combined hustings for the Cumbernauld and Kilsyth Scottish Parliament campaign and the Cumbernauld North ward for North Lanarkshire Council, so there was a massed rank of about 16 candidates including myself and my SNP colleagues Alan O'Brien and Norman Robinson.

The chairman of tonight's event started off by making that old gag that at one stage he thought he would have to introduce the audience to the panel, but in the end there was a pretty good turnout. That there were so many candidates meant not a lot of time to talk for each individual, but we got through some interesting topics, many of which we have been speaking about already in this campaign. It was a good warm up for tomorrow night's second (and last) hustings of the campaign at Cumbernauld College.