Poll of Polls Shows SNP Lead

The company Weber Shandwick have set up a website called Scotland Votes (http://www.scotlandvotes.com/) for the election. They have compiled what they are calling the "poll of polls" by averaging the support for each party in the last six published opinion polls. The figures indicate that the SNP has a five point lead in constituency voting intentions and a six point lead in regional voting intentions. All this translates into good reading for those of us campaigning for an SNP victory on 3rd May.


As I have said before though, to read too much into the opinion polls could allow complacency to set into our campaign. So the work goes on as before. I came home shattered tonight after distributing our election leaflet across the Seafar and Ravenswood area of Cumbernauld and tomorrow I plan to be as shattered again.

Labour's Council Tax Damp Squib

I am watching Cathy Jamieson on telly as I type. I find the hypocrisy of the Labour Party quite astonishing. They consistently attack the SNP for being light on detail yet have announced an entirely vacuous policy this very day.

Earlier in the day they announced their radical (sarcasm doesn't necessarily come through on typed format, so for avoidance of doubt that was it) proposal for local taxation. They have announced that they will create two new bandings for council tax in their manifesto launched today.

What Cathy couldn't say when pressed, is at what value of property will people (a) pay less on the new bottom band or (b) pay more on the new top band. This absence of detail is quite startling. As they always say, the devil is in the detail.

Clearly the Labour Party are reacting to the fact that the SNP has got off to a much quicker start in the debate on local taxation and are trying to be seen to act on this area. They have ridiculed the SNP local income tax policy despite the fact that it is transparent and fair. We desire fairness in taxation and taxing people on what they can afford to pay (i.e. their income) is clearly fairer than taxing them on something much vaguer, that being the supposed value of the property in which they reside.

The total and utter lack of detail in the Labour policy on council tax, as well as the fact that it fundamentally fails to make local taxation fairer (it is impossible to make the council tax fairer, thus the Labour Party will never square that particular circle) will surely find this announcement falling on deaf ears. This policy is neither fair or innovative. It is rather a damp squib.

It's Time to Win Back Our Schools and Hospitals

The SNP has long called for the replacement of the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) scheme used by the Labour government to fund public projects. Our argument was lent some additional weight by the recent publication of a report undertaken by the respected Allyson Pollock of Edinburgh University that appeared in the Public Money and Management Journal. Professor Pollock states in the study that government claims that PFI delivers projects more quickly and more efficiently than other methods of borrowing are "either non-existent or false" and that comparisons are "rigged in favour of PFI and that Treasury policy is not evidence based". Government claims that PFI represents best value for money are therefore utter baloney.

This is particularly pertinent for people in Cumbernauld and Kilsyth, whose local authority and local health board are big on PFI. North Lanarkshire's schools modernisation project cost £280.7 million. Meantime the cost to the taxpayer of NHS Lanarkshire's projects to build the Hairmyres and Wishaw General hospitals will be almost £1,200 million over the coming years, despite these two schemes only costing around £260million to build. This means that Cumbernauld and Kilsyth residents, in common with those across Scotland, are paying through the nose for PFI to line the pockets of private businesses.

Polling data compiled for the BBC also indicates that the number one priority for the electorate in the Scottish Parliament election is building and running schools and hospitals through public bodies. The public are wakening up to the PFI con. People wouldn't accept it if they paid up a mortgage and didn't own their house at the end of it, yet we are meant to accept this type of arrangement for our schools and hospitals.

The SNP plans to introduce a not for profit trust to finance future projects. This means that millions of pounds of taxpayers money will no longer find its way into private hands and will be much better value for money. This also chimes with the message people are sending out to pollsters, and that is that our schools and hospitals should be built and run through public bodies. The SNP will respond to that concern and deliver just that.

Alex Salmond Visits Cumbernauld

Attendance at a reception for a friend's wedding meant that I was unable to get posting on the blog until today, but yesterday was hugely busy.

In the morning my wife Julie and I joined Councillor Neil MacCallum to visit the Beild Sheltered Housing complex in the Seafar area of Cumbernauld. This is a wonderful facility and my second time there. I managed to visit it along with Nicola Sturgeon when I was candidate for the area in the 2005 general election and was impressed then. I was impressed by the place again.

The staff there seem utterly dedicated to the residents who were amongst the friendliest people I have met in while. They were interested to hear about the campaign and I was interested to hear from them. One couple recalled that I had visited before and even remembered what school I had attended! So I was amongst old friends.

Sadly not all of Scotland's pensioners live in such circumstances as those at the Beild complex. It is a national disgrace that one in five of pensioners lives in poverty at this time. You can tell a lot about a society by the way in which it treats its older citizens, so this statistic makes for sad reading. That is why it's time for the SNP policy of a non means-tested Citizens Pension of £120 per week linked to earnings and to cast the means-tested pension credit, which far too many poorer pensioners fail to claim, to the dustbin of history along with pittance pensions under the Tories and then Labour.

After the visit to the Beild complex the three of us set off to Cumbernauld Village to meet up with Councillor Liz Irvine at the Senior Citizens Lunch Club at the Roadside Hall. We were fed and watered by this fantastic organisation which is run by the members for the members themselves. The food was top quality but I was left disappointed by failing to win a prize in their raffle, although Neil won some Jaffa Cakes and Julie managed to win a can of mushroom soup.

We then dashed off to Cumbernauld Town Centre where over twenty SNP activists were able to engage with the public and distribute literature with balloons and flags for the kids. A really good atmosphere was topped off by the visit of Alex Salmond who was able to meet with many members of the Cumbernauld public. I was struck by just how many wanted to shake his hand and pledge support to the SNP.

We then visited a local small business, Hopscotch, a children's clothes store. There Alex was able to meet with the owner, Frances, and explain the benefits of the SNP "Small Business Bonus" scheme which will see the ending of rates in their entirety for the 120,000 smallest businesses in Scotland, with reduced rates for many thousands more. This policy will ensure that small businesses are better able to keep afloat, something which is absolutely vital given that small to medium enterprises are by far and away the major employer of private sector workers in Scotland. It will also mean a better range of shops and services for people in their local communities.

This is particularly pertinent in the case of Cumbernauld Town Centre which has suffered particularly poorly with many empty lets there at present.

Then to round off the day Alex was interviewed by the local newspaper. So if you live in the area look out for the report of this interview in next week's editions of the Cumbernauld News and Kilsyth Chronicle.

I have a reader!

Whilst out campaigning in the Craigmarloch area of Cumbernauld tonight I received confirmation of the fact that I have at least one reader of my blog. One resident informed me - without prompting - that he had been reading my musings on the world.

This highlights the benefits of this site. It allows me to communicate in another way with people in Cumbernauld and Kilsyth. It is heartening to know at least one person out there is reading.

Thirty Days to Go!

Unbelievably we have now a mere thirty days until the Scottish Parliament election. I was selected by the Cumbernauld and Kilsyth SNP members to be their candidate well over a year ago, but it somehow seems much more recent than that, yet here we are, little more than a month until "D-Day".

This election is perhaps the most important in the history of our country. The 1st May will see the tercentenary of the enactment of the Act of Union which extinguished the burning flame of Scottish independence. Two days after that anniversary we will have the third election to our devolved Scottish Parliament.

The campaign to decide the make up of that body has seen a tremendous amount of effort expended by the Labour government in convincing the Scottish people that they are singularly incapable of self government. They have continued the old unionist myths of Scotland being an economic basket case that cannot afford independence, whilst simultaneously claiming that they have performed wonders stewarding over the Scottish economy. Try squaring that circle!

The fact of the matter is that our country is just like any other. We are entirely capable of governing ourselves and looking out for our own affairs. It is true that with independence we may from time to time stumble. But at least it shall be on a path of our own choosing.

This election can be the one where we start to make real lasting changes for Scotland. We can have a change of government, with a First Minister in Alex Salmond who is ambitious for Scotland and who will stand up for Scotland, and we can demand a chance to decide our own constitutional future and to go for independence.

We will make that decision collectively as a nation in thirty days time. In the interim period I shall be doing my level best to see that we vote for change and to move our country forward.

Two Campaigns for the Price of One

Yesterday was busy. We started off in the morning in Kilsyth town centre where myself and the SNP council candidate for the area David Key went to meet many of the local small business owners and managers to discuss some of the issues affecting their business and to explain the SNP policies that are designed to help them.

Specifically we were able to tell them the SNP plans for business rates which would see all small businesses with a rateable value of £8,000 or less having rates abolished in their entirety (which would mean that 120,000 businesses across Scotland would no longer have rates to pay) whilst those with a value of between £8,000 and £10,000 would qualify for rates relief of 50% and those between £10,000 and £15,000 would get relief of 25%. That is significantly more generous than the present system which, for example, sees businesses with a rateable value of £8,000 to £11,500 qualify for a mere 5% rates relief.

The business owners we spoke to were able to say how welcome our proposals are. They would ensure that their businesses have a greater chance of success, are in a better position to consider expansion, and ensure that staff are kept in employment. This is not to mention the possibility of allowing for a greater breadth of shops and services for people in their communities. That is why the SNP backs small business.

Then in the afternoon it was off to Cumbernauld Town Centre where we were able to campaign for the SNP policy of establishing a local income tax in place of the inequitous council tax system. This scheme would set local taxation at the very reasonable level of 3p in the pound on existing income tax bands and would mean that 90% of people in Scotland would pay less in local taxation. This will be welcome news to hard pressed council tax payers who have been hammered by constant rises in the level of council tax, seeing it increase on average by 60% since Labour came to power.

Most people we spoke to were delighted at the prospect of an end to council tax and the creation of a fairer system based on ability to pay. They know that council tax hits hardest those who can least afford it, like pensioners and the low paid. Under the SNP that will change and people will see a link between what they can afford to pay and what they are asked to pay.

Now all we need to do is win the election and make sure that we can bring in a fair system for Scotland's small businesses and Scotland's tax payers.