A fresh start for Glasgow North East
Welcome to the Steamie's by-election coverage. It's great to be taking part in this new way of covering a by-election, putting my campaign direct to you the voters.
In the next few days I’ll use this blog to tell you about some of the amazing people and inspiring projects I have met and seen in the constituency and the kind of MP I will be if the people in Glasgow North East vote for me.
Five months after Michael Martin resigned we are now into the last seven days of the campaign and it's turning out to be closer than many people thought. Despite the lengthy delay voters haven’t forgotten the expenses scandal that caused the by-election or the five school closures in the constituency that left Labour so scared the vote was delayed for five months.
Those issues have many people, who had always voted Labour, questioning the party they have supported and looking toward the SNP.
I'll be out campaigning today with John Mason MP, in Carntyne where Glasgow East meets Glasgow North East.
John's political earthquake demonstrates the difference an SNP MP can make. When it came to school closures – Labour didn’t dare put forward any closures in John’s constituency but they took people in Glasgow North East for granted.
Residents of Glasgow East had been let down by their MP - with no constituency office and no one to vote for their interests. John has set a new standard for Glasgow MPs - accessible, available and putting his constituents first.
In Glasgow North East constituents have been in the same position - with no office for the local MP in the constituency and decades of being taken for granted by Labour in Westminster and in the City Chambers.
People in Glasgow North East deserve the same level of representation their fellow East Enders have in the neighbouring constituency. This constituency deserves an MP whose priorities will be constituents priorities and that’s what I will deliver if elected next week.
posted by David Kerr at
09:28
5 Comments:
It is also worth noting that of the three proposed school/nursery closures that the Council were forced to back down on, two were in Nicola Sturgeon's constituency. There is no doubt that if you live in Glasgow and want your MP or MSP to stand up for your community it is better to have an SNP member than a Labour one because Labour members just go along with whatever the Council does.
Good post David, hopefully there will be some more head to heads coming up.
As an adopted Glaswegian who has strong family ties elsewhere in Scotland I find his quote to "avoid dishing money out elsewhere" incredibly distasteful and frankly deceitful.
Keep up the good work
Which party is it that you are standing for??
Questions which should be put to Labour candidate Willie Bain.
Do you agree that your predecessor’s MP’s expenses were excessive in that he claimed £75,000 "expenses" to run a second home with NO mortgage... while living FREE in a stately London palace?
Mr Martin – supposed to be in charge of cracking down on the Westminster gravy train - was actually milking the public by claiming the money, even though he and wife Mary lived free during the week in the Speaker's opulent grace-and-favour home in the Palace of Westminster. Unlike most MPs, who have mortgages or rents to pay on constituency homes, he owns his £400,000 detached villa in Glasgow outright.
His expenses claims for his second home, totalled £17,166 in 2007, and £75,324 over the last six years.
Q. Will you undertake not to deceive your officials, unlike your predecessor, Speaker, Michael Martin, whose salary was £138,000, deceived the public over taxpayer-funded taxi journeys taken by his wife Mary - for which she claimed more than £4,000 in expenses?
Journalists were told that she had used the taxis while shopping for food for official functions, but it emerged that the "functions" concerned were actually personal occasions.
Q. Will you refuse Air miles for trips paid for by the tax payers of Glasgow NE and elsewhere, unlike your predecessor Martin who earned more than a million Air Miles on trips to and from Glasgow, despite the fact that MPs are banned from using Air Miles for personal trips?
The trips were funded by the taxpayer - but seven members of Mr Martin's family used many of the air miles.
Well done on the debate last night David you had a passion and a rightous anger that was missing from the others.
In my opinion the Lib Dem candidate started well with some decent questions but she fell to bits when she was individually interrogated.
She seemed to think that getting rid of universal benefits was a great idea but when asked about child benefit she wavered all over the place. In fact child benefit like other universal benefits serve an extremely useful purpose. If the tortuous process of means testing and tax credits become involved then a lot of people lose the benefits they actually need.
Why does it make sense to deny JSA after six months when a person might have worked for over 30 years? Is this really about 'fixing' the unemployment figures? Why should a partner working over 24 hours deny an individual their rights to benefit?
The facts are that the benefits system is in a terrible state, neither Labour or Tories can be trusted to fix it and the Scottish Government needs the powers of independence to sort it out.
If as the lib Dem claimed the National Conversation is a waste of money then what on earth was the rigged Calman commission? At least the NC is willing to debate other options.
You were right David, our chance of self determination on the national stage is indeed priceless and the Lib Dems have yet to give a good reason for blocking asking our people if they support the union or want independence.
For the others the Labour candidate seemed to have improved his presentational skills but still sounded quite vapid.
The Conservative also appeared quite professional but couldn't come up with any justification for Trident or tax cuts for the obscenely rich. It's between Labour and SNP and I suspect the locals would like there to be a real change rather than more of the same.
Electing the Scottish National Party candidate would stop Labour taking the area for granted. I'm sure the people of Glasgow East will have been pleased with John Mason.
In Glenrothes however they might be disappointed to have a Labour man who opposes an enquiry into the Iraq War!
The Labour candidate Willie Bain says the sins of his party in London have nothing to do with him which is sadly a familiar refrain as far as Labour are concerned!
Most of their local candidates distance themselves from their own party, why? Because they can't justify their metamorphosis into Rosy Tories!
Glasgow deserves better.
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