Interesting news from the political scene up here in Scotland. First Minister Alex Salmond has threatened to resign if his budget doesn’t pass. On first hearing this I was surprised, but as you look at the detail it’s probably unlikely he’ll need to do so. Brian Taylor explains it better than I can, but the […]
I’m not altogether surprised, or disappointed, to see Menzies Campbell has quit as leader of the Liberal Democrats. It was clear to everybody that he was in a tough spot, and the age issue, plus the lack-lustre Commons performances were repeated so frequently by the Westminster media village, it was bound to affect him. Personally though […]
One of the three local councillors here in Pollokshields caught me by surprise recently, by actually taking the time out to thank his electorate for electing him. A nice touch, certainly that I’ve certainly never encountered before, and one I think would be well to see repeated in wards around the country to perhaps in […]
I moved to Scotland about three years ago, but have been coming here on and off over the last 15 years. Since moving here I was keen to learn more about the country’s history, but hadn’t quite found the time in my reading schedule to fit such a book in. Whilst browsing in a […]
Slightly overlooked in all the hoo-ha about the Scottish Parliament election results is Scotland was also voting for local councillors, and it’s been argued before that councillors - not MSP’s or MP’s - have a more direct impact on daily lives. I’d previously commented that there wasn’t much information available about the various candidates. Judging by […]
Something that has puzzled me since it became apparent that rejected ballots were going to be one of the major stories from the recent election, was the lack of solid examples of what form the rejected ballots were taking. As a result, we had politicians weighing in with broad statements. Whilst they or there representatives were, […]
Well the first thought is the same as many people, and mentioned early on when doing my first ‘liveblog’ as the first results came in, and that’s the horrendous number of ‘rejected’ ballots. Whilst a lot has already been said, I’m not sure it’s necessarily fair to say that the two elections on the same day […]
I’m going to be up to the small hours as the election results come in. I’ll be updating some key thoughts along the way, and - perhaps in a first serious use of the service, I’ll also be twittering reasonably extensively on the subject too. 04:00am - Right. That’s me. Counts are taking an age in […]
We went to vote when Frances got back from work, and it was easily one of the busiest polling locations I’ve ever been to, and perhaps the least enjoyable actual voting experiences. I suppose it’s partly because we were going at peak time - everybody coming back from work - but also because it’s a […]
Last but not least, my regional vote (Council and Constituency details here). This is for the additional members to the Scottish parliament, on top of the constituency MSP’s we elect. The idea is that these MSP’s are allocated to ensure that each region has MSP’s from parties in proportion to how they vote. Thus is ALL […]
