Fitaloon at MicroShaft

I listened and watched the Scottish Labour Party Election broadcast on television tonight, not the comic one designed for 2 year olds, but the one that attacks Margaret Thatcher, I looked for a copy on the Labour website but it seems to  have disappeared into a black hole. It ran for 2-3 minutes and never once mentioned anything Labour would do, all it did was lie about the ’80s.  There was no future in it, no forward plans, nothing but scaremongering and attempts to suggest that Tories eat babies.

Contrast that with the video from David Cameron below and these words.

A country is at its best when the bonds between people are strong and when the sense of national purpose is clear. Today the challenges facing Britain are immense. Our economy is overwhelmed by debt, our social fabric is frayed and our political system has betrayed the people. But these problems can be overcome if we pull together and work together. If we remember that we are all in this together.

Some politicians say: ‘give us your vote and we will sort out all your problems’. We say: real change comes not from government alone. Real change comes when the people are inspired and mobilised, when millions of us are fired up to play a part in the nation’s future.

Yes this is ambitious. Yes it is optimistic. But in the end all the Acts of Parliament, all the new measures, all the new policy initiatives, are just politicians’ words without you and your involvement.

How will we deal with the debt crisis unless we understand that we are all in this together? How will we raise responsible children unless every adult plays their part? How will we revitalise communities unless people stop asking ‘who will fix this?’ and start asking ‘what can I do?’ Britain will change for the better when we all elect to take part, to take responsibility – if we all come together. Collective strength will overpower our problems.

Only together can we can get rid of this government and, eventually, its debt. Only
Together can we get the economy moving. Only together can we protect the NHS. Improve our schools. Mend our broken society. Together we can even make politics and politicians work better. And if we can do that, we can do anything. Yes, together we can do anything.

So my invitation today is this: join us, to form a new kind of government for Britain.

The Conservative Party | Policy | The Conservative Manifesto 2010.

Paul Waugh has the current story as told to the fairies by @DavidWrightMP.  My Interpretation is at the bottom

While we’re on the subject, it’s worth pointing out that Wright has put out a statement revealing that his laptop was stolen before Christmas.

“My Twitter account has been hacked into and changed. This is not the first time I have been the victim of a cyber attack: two years ago a fake website was set up purporting to be me and we had to have it taken down and my laptop was stolen before Christmas from the House of Commons. I have demanded that Twitter provide me with the identity of whoever has inputted into my site. I will make a further statement when that information is available and I will be seeking a meeting with Ministers to discuss the
general protection of blog sites.”

Yet Wright also gave a new bit of info on the row when he talked to the Guardian’s Andy Sparrow yesterday.

He claims he originally sent out a Twitter message saying: “IvenevervotedTory because you can put lipstick on a pig but it’s still a pig and they would ruin Britain.”

Subsequently a second version of the message, containing the phrase “scum-sucking”, was sent out under his name, Wright claimed. Then both messages were taken down by some mysterious third party.

Unfortunately, while the second message is in the archive, the original is nowhere to be found. Strange that…

UPDATE: Shadow Treasury minister Greg Hands says:

“It’s bad enough that one of Gordon Brown’s Ministers is using the language of the gutter to score cheap political points at the expense of Tory supporters. Then we discover the taxpayer is footing the bill for Ministers’ smears. It beggars belief.”

So to have his Tweet spoofed, the “criminal” would have,

1. Nicked his portable
2. Decrypted his password (the tweet was sent from a mobile using m.twitter.com as the tweet is sent from “mobile web” which means they would have had to enter logon and password to access the twitter account)
3. Assume he hasn’t changed all passwords after having his portable nicked (This should be a sacking offence in itself)
4. Waited until an appropriate moment. Monitoring all Wright’s Tweets day and night for a suitable one.
5. Seen Wright’s original tweet without the scumbag reference.
6. Immediately deleted the tweet and sent the “faked” one.
7. Ensured original tweet not logged anywhere or seen anywhere by anyone apart from by the “criminal” (unbelievable timing)
8. Somehow got Wright to tweet about the original tweet not long after with the “upset Tories”  Tweet again from “Mobile Web” as described above.
9. Of course it is just about possible someone hooked into his mobile phone and changed the tweet on the fly,  Maybe some Mossad agents on false passports thought this would be a good way of wasting time and money.

Stretching the believable is one way of describing this. Most other would involve pigs in the form of porkies.

Paul Waugh | Blogs | Evening Standard.

The Tories and the SNP have a reasonable relationship now in Scotland and with the Referendum having to be shelved fore the moment the Tories  have a chance to build on this relationship as they move into Government.

David Cameron has been addressing the Tory Conference in Perth and has promised.

“That will signal the beginning of a new relationship, a fresh start, based on mutual respect,” he will say, adding: “It will be good for Scotland, good for Britain and good for the Union.”

Mr Cameron will also say he takes seriously the recommendations of the Calman Commission – which called for more powers for the Scottish Parliament – and wants to make devolution stronger.

“Not just because it is a weapon against the Nationalists’ obsession with independence – but because devolution should be central to our whole political approach,” he will say.

“Today we are the party that passionately believes that local is best, the party that knows that the more power people have, the more responsible they become, the more fulfilled they are – we are the party of decentralisation.”

Please, this is the way to go in Scotland.

BBC News – David Cameron promises ‘fresh start’ with SNP.

Scottish Tories will fail to recover from the wipeout of 1997 unless the whole party makes its position clear on issues north of the Border,

writes Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph.

And the thing is he is right. There are really two schools of Tories in Scotland, the true Unionists who want little to do with devolution and the rest, like me,  who like the idea of a bit of self-government.

The balancing act that needs to be done to keep these two groups together is very tricky. It remains to be seen which group “wins” in Scotland, I’m easy with devolution as it stands as I think it brings us a better understanding of the particular problems and issues that face Scotland rather than having a London centric view imposed on us. It also allows us to be more a master of our own Destiny which is important to any nation of people.

Alan sums it up neatly at the end

There is no doubt that the professor is correct in his assessment of the Scottish party’s view of devolution, or at least — in the opinion of this observer — the confused messages the Tories are sending to the voters on the issue.

Whereas Welsh Tories cast off their doubts about the constitutional change immediately, a significant section of the Scottish party remained suspicious of its alleged benefits. This became more pronounced as they saw the election of an SNP administration, committed to breaking up the United Kingdom, in 2007. In this, they were supported by this column.

“So far, but no farther,” has been the attitude of this grouping, in sharp contrast to the view of Miss Goldie. She has tried to lead from the front in espousing a much more pro-devolutionist stance and has supported enthusiastically the granting of extra powers to the Scottish Parliament.

But she has been thwarted by a sizeable body of opinion in both her parliamentary and voluntary parties. The result has been, at least in relation to Calman, Mr Cameron’s “wait and see” compromise.

Their policy on devolution aside, the Scottish Tories have failed to make much of a dent in the two-horse race between Labour and the SNP over the past 13 years.

This is in spite of vast sums spent — principally by Central Office in London — on trying to resuscitate the Scottish party. Mr Cameron is desperate to make a decent showing north of the Border, in order to avoid the accusation, should he win

the general election but no extra Scottish seats, that he has no mandate to govern there.

To this end, the Tories are targeting 11 seats. The truth is that a much more modest gain — of two or three seats — would be seen as a success.

There is some anecdotal evidence to suggest that Cameron’s leadership of the Conservative party is proving popular in Scotland.

But he has an enormous mountain still to climb, beginning with his speech tomorrow. It will have to contain more than the odd jibe against Alex Salmond.

The Tories in Scotland need to build upon the shoots of a Tory revival in Scotland and they can only do this by being united. Until this happens we won’t achieve the amount of seats we should and will only take the 3-4 mentioned above. We also need to be prepared for the changes that will happen if the SNP ever get their Referendum, because succeed or fail it will change, for a long time, the political setup in Scotland

via David Cameron must get his party in tune to give Scottish Tories any chance of success – Telegraph.

Really Ready for Change

An ICM poll for the News of the World has the Tories on 45% Labour on 26 % and the also ran Lib Dems on 18%, so the Tories are polling more than Labour and the Lib Dems combined. This should give the Tories about a 180 seat majority in Parliament.

It is also as high as the Tories have ever scored with ICM, they have twice been on 45% before but have never exceeded it.

Conservatives 19 points ahead of Labour – poll | Top News | Reuters.