Fitaloon at MicroShaft

On Alastair Campbell’s blog we have this piece he has written for the Sunday Mail here in Scotland. It was entitled “Here goes with the Smoked Salmond”, but is instead another of his huge chippie articles on the Tories and his favourite old Trout Margaret Thatcher.

Campbell first explains how Scots can help David Cameron win and that is as follows

And for Scots, there are at least two ways of helping bring it about, and deliver as leader of the UK the most untried, untested, under-scrutinised Prime Minister in history. The most obvious is by voting Tory. Another is by voting SNP.

Thanks for that tip Alastair, but we already know and want that.  Anyway we can get rid of Labour as a party of power in Scotland is a good way, God help me but I might even vote Lib Dem (joke!) if  I thought it would help keep Labour out!

But then Alastair comes onto his real thoughts  for why Salmond might want David Cameron in power

So why would Salmond prefer Cameron? Because when it comes to the argument for independence, it will be easier made against a very English, very right-wing, very elitist leader of a very English, very right-wing, very elitist government which has shown precious little interest in Scotland. Indeed, so far as Scotland’s relations with the Tories are concerned they are still defined as much by Thatcher as by Cameron.

It’s resurrection time, time to pull out the ghost of the old trout  Thatcher as a warning to all us recalcitrant Scots who might dare to oppose him and vote SNP or the devil herself Thatcher disguised somehow as David Cameron. It’s time for him to point out how those nasty Tories are all upper-class English Twits who are not  fit to lace his so working class boots.

Campbell can’t resist having a poke at Salmond

As with Cameron, Salmond does the style stuff better than the substance stuff.

Unfortunately from Campbell this is praise of the highest order!

Nowhere in the article does it have a positive reason for voting Labour. All in all a very bad  attempt to help his poor belaboured party in Scotland.

Here Goes with the Smoked Salmond

Alex Salmond Posturing

I see that Parliament’s standards commissioner has asked Alex Salmond to explain why he claimed £790 towards the legal costs of trying to impeach then PM Tony Blair.

In 2004 Scottish and Welsh nationalist MPs tried to impeach Mr Blair accusing him of misleading Parliament over Iraq.

Labour MSP Lord Foulkes complained to John Lyon that public money should not be used for “party political” purposes. This is what I said back on the 19th June:

I see that the nice Mr Salmond and his SNP party has been stealing from us, the taxpayers of this country, by trying to have that nice Mr Blair impeached. Whilst this might have been a “good cause” at the time, I don’t see why the taxpayer should fund this sort of party political posturing. I assume that this money will be repaid.

Apparently  a spokesman for Mr Salmond – Scotland’s first minister – said he and other MPs involved had been

“Extremely proud of the action they took  and that the vast majority” of people believed the war to be “illegal and immoral”.

Well once you have a majority government Mr Salmond then you can do this, until then stop the party politics on OUR money.

BBC NEWS | Politics | Salmond queried over legal fees.

Scottish Parliament

It was supposed to be a celebration of 10 years of Holyrood, instead we had the sight of  empty seats as nearly half of the SNP’s MSP’s failed to turn up for what should have been their celebration. As the Times puts it.

What a lamentable affair. A day that should have been rich in ceremony, and joyful in celebration turned into a limp and vacuous occasion, with more than a third of the MSPs whose role we were meant to be applauding, simply absent. The tenth anniversary of the Scottish Parliament, snubbed by its own members, turned into an ill-mannered comment on the democracy they represent.

Quite what the Queen made of it was hard to see. Her voice was distinctly croaky, her expression inscrutable. She peered through her spectacles at the empty seats wondering, just possibly, whether she had got the date right. The Duke of Edinburgh looked round him with cheerful resignation, as if to say: you chumps have made a bit of cock-up, haven’t you?

The Queen added a touch of reality to the proceedings by saying

“Your challenge … is to ensure that [the Parliament] continues to reflect the priorities and aspirations of all Scotland’s people (her emphasis) and to retain the public’s confidence and trust.”

Maybe a slight dig there at Alex Salmond and how many people really want Independence.

Alex Salmond also made a speech, according to the Times

To add insult to injury, Alex Salmond, in his speech, had the temerity to mock Westminster. He suggested that the Queen might find some “words of encouragement for another parliament elsewhere” – a bad joke at the best of times. Any suggestion that Holyrood enjoys some moral superiority over the House of Commons was wiped out yesterday. Over the Queen’s face, as Mr Salmond made his comment, there passed the merest shadow of a grimace. Some of of us felt something far worse.

All in all it sounds like a very poor celebration.

Want to know why the MSP’s couldn’t attend have a look here for the full details.

Makes for interesting reading on what our MSP’s are up to. By the way I’m interpreting Constituency Business as “Couldn’t be arsed to turn-up”.

My local MSP, Mike Rumbles, is apparently on holiday in Italy, though the Dordogne seems to be the favoured hidey-hole of MSP’s taking advantage of cheap prices before the kids are on holiday.

The SNP appear to have 7 MSP’’s who had “no reason” not to be there. An appalling indictment of their commitment to Holyrood.

Strangely it is the Conservatives who have the best attendance record, pehaps this more because of the respect they have for the Queen rather than for any other reason.

Truly a poor show from all our MSP’s on what should have been a celebration day.

Bad jokes and worse manners play to empty seats – Times Online.

Alex Salmond Posturing

I see that the nice Mr Salmond and his SNP party has been stealing from us, the taxpayers of this country, by trying to have that nice Mr Blair impeached. Whilst this might have been a “good cause” at the time, I don’t see why the taxpayer should fund this sort of party political posturing. I assume that this money will be repaid. According to the Telegraph

The Blair impeachment campaign, led by Mr Salmond, was charged at 150 per hour for 35 hours of work, and £6,750 of other costs. With VAT, the total came to £14,100.According to the invoice, Matrix charged the Nationalist MPs for “taking instructions regarding a case to answer against the Prime Minister for impeachment, and reading two lever arch files of documents” they had sent.

They also paid for barristers Rabinder Singh and Professor Conor Gearty to advise him on various matters, and liaise with his office and the media.

But further details of Mr Salmond’s expenses claims, released on Thursday included an invoice totalling £14,100 from Matrix chambers.

His share of the bill, shared out among all the Nationalist MPs involved, was £790. He signs this as being “wholly, exclusively and necessarily incurred on parliamentary duties” which is just plain wrong.  I assume all the SNP and Plaid Cymru MP’s will be doing the necessary to repay this to the ever growing fund of MP’s repaid expenses, which now totals somewhat over £500,000.

Salmond Signs

Alex Salmond billed taxpayer £14,100 to try and impeach Tony Blair – Telegraph.

An interesting exchange in Scottish First Ministers Question Time on Thursday (edited highlights only)

The First Minister: In passing, I congratulate Wendy Alexander on her success in dominating the news agenda in Scotland.

Ms Alexander: I will return to the issue of domestic violence shortly, but let me make an observation. I have asked for the permissibility of the donation to my election campaign to be checked, and we await the outcome of the Electoral Commission’s investigation.

In the meantime, Presiding Officer, given the First Minister’s remarks, let me make a further observation. When my team began compiling the information for our campaign return, we asked the Electoral Commission about the previous major party leadership contest held in Scotland, by the Scottish National Party, in 2004. Following a three-month election campaign—which involved the publication of personal manifestos, websites and campaign literature, and attendance at hustings—Alex Salmond, Roseanna Cunningham and Alex Neil, and the candidates for the deputy leadership, Nicola Sturgeon and Fergus Ewing, did not between them submit a single return or report any donations to the Electoral Commission. I find that an odd state of affairs for a party that is now lecturing us on transparency.

The First Minister:
Wendy Alexander’s elaborate remarks on the leadership contest surely just prove that SNP members spent less on fighting elections than Wendy Alexander managed to spend on not fighting one.
Later On
Alex Neil (Central Scotland) (SNP): On a point of order, Presiding Officer. During her questions to the First Minister, Wendy Alexander said that she had checked with the Electoral Commission and found that I did not spend any money in the SNP leadership contest in 2004. The reason for that is that I was not a candidate for the leadership in 2004. [Interruption.]

The Presiding Officer: Order.

Alex Neil: For the record, I publicly backed Mr Salmond. I have no doubt that that was a major factor contributing to his success.

The Presiding Officer: That is not a point of order, but it is now on the record.

Jackie Baillie (Dumbarton) (Lab): On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Mr Neil is, of course, right. The candidate was Mike Russell. Perhaps we might be forgiven on two counts. First, it is so difficult to tell Mr Neil and Mr Russell apart as they sit together right on the shoulder of the First Minister. Secondly, everyone in the chamber knows that Alex Neil has pretensions to the throne.

However, the key point, Presiding Officer—

The Presiding Officer: Do you have a point of order, Ms Baillie?

Jackie Baillie: Indeed I do. The SNP needs to confirm that, in a three-month election leadership campaign, every candidate was entirely self funded—

The Presiding Officer: This is not a point of order for me, Ms Baillie.

Jackie Baillie:—and that each of those candidates, including Mike Russell—

The Presiding Officer: This is not a point of order for me. I ask you to close.

Jackie Baillie:—received no donations and no support—

The Presiding Officer: That brings us to the end of First Minister’s question time.

Hat tip to Mark McDonald.

The Scottish Parliament – Official Report