David Maddox: True Grit

It has been a bitter winter in Scotland not least for the SNP leader of Fife Council Peter Grant (pictured right).
As the snow and ice have taken a grip on Scotland his council made UK headlines for running out of grit for the roads and being the worst prepared.
Things have got so bad that his own party - in the guise of Central Fife MSP Tricia Marwick - has called for an inquiry.
The press release did not apportion blame, but pointedly it only defended the actions of the Scottish Government.
It is very unusual these days for the SNP to publicly leave one of its own out in the cold as such, but Mr Grant is in many ways yesterday's man as far as SNP ambition goes, despite leading the party to breaking Labour's historic grip on the Kingdom in 2007.
He was the SNP's coming man in 2008 when the expectation that he would win the Glenrothes by-election was so great that two London based nationals ran early editions the day after the result proclaiming his victory.
Unfortunately for him and the Nationalists he not only lost but was thumped by Labour's Lindsay Roy by a massive 6,737 votes.
While Alex Salmond publicly took the blame for the humiliating result behind the scenes fingers were pointed at Grant himself particularly his policies to the elderly as council leader which undid what seemed to be a certain SNP victory.
Now his council's actions - this time its lack of preparedness - are under the spotlight again and it seems that the SNP is not in a mood to forgive.

Chris Mackie: Glasgow North East - the turnout

There is some typically insightful stuff from Mike Smithson at his ever fascinating Political Betting blog this afternoon. Despite near-universal predictions of a depressingly low number of people actually bothering to cast their votes in today's Glasgow North East poll, Mike has a decent stab at arguing that the official turnout could be surprisingly high.

He argues: "Just look what happened a year ago in the last by election where Gordon Brown campaigned. That was held in early November and we saw more than 52% of those on the electoral roll recorded as voting - which wasn’t that far short of the general election figure. "

This, the increased postal vote and the 42 per cent turnout in the Glasgow East poll has led Mike to put his money on the turnout being higher than 38 per cent.

Despite the weather in Glasgow holding up so far, I think this is slightly optimistic. The big issue he fails to tackle is the impact of the expenses scandal and the resultant voter apathy - a problem felt especially keenly in a constituency such as Glasgow North East. This effect will be exacerbated by the absence of any real political fight in the seat since Michael Martin became speaker. Numerous party workers have told us of the logistical problems they have faced during this campaign caused by the lack of any meaningful voter data or polling records on which to base their campaign strategy.

Things have not been helped, frankly, by the vague air of chaos around the whole enterprise caused by the existence of a number of no-hoper candidates all fighting for attention. That is undoubtedly a welcome sight in any democracy, but it has not helped any semblance of a pervasive narrative for the election break through to the media and subsequently, the voters.

The Glenrothes and Glasgow East fight were fascinating contests because they represented a clear referendum on the popularity of the Labour government. This contest has no such backdrop, despite the efforts of the SNP, and that is partly because of the number of competing voices shouting to be heard. There have been snatches of the BNP furore, a smidgen of red-faced socialist outrage and a touch of Tory toffage, but nothing that has dominated the news agenda throughout the campaign.

On the other hand, the increase in the postal vote will help, so it seems likely the doomsday predictions (see below post from David Maddox) will not materialise, I therefore confidently predict a turnout of around the 30 per cent mark and fully expect to be proved hopelessly wrong tomorrow morning.

David Maddox: Dad's Army routs the Nats in new Battle of Stirling

If there is one group that seems to have the beating of Alex Salmond and the SNP it is Scotland's pensioners.
In November, furious over the increased charges on home care by the SNP led Fife Council, pensioners turned out in their thousands to stop the Nationalists from taking the Glenrothes by-election and dealt Mr Salmond is most humiliating defeat since coming to power in Holyrood in 2007. It perhaps did not help that the SNP candidate, Peter Grant, was the council leader responsible for the unpopular policy.
Now another one of the SNP select - Stirling Council leader Graham Houston (recently appointed by his party colleagues in the Scottish Government to a plum post in charge of the Scottish Qualifications Authority) - has also been done in by the grey army.
It appears his administration wanted to close down some care homes which provoked a bit of a stooshie, so much so that the Mr Houston and his colleagues backed down.
But to mark the triumph Stirling own version of Dad's Army -called Stirling's Homes Guard - made a montage of the bungling councillors on a picture of the original sitcom's cast (above) and recorded a song which can be listened to on their website or by clicking on their new words provided below - Who do you think you're kidding, Mr Houston?

Who did you think you were kidding, Mr Houston,

Thinking we were on the run.

We are the folks who have stopped your unfair game,

We are the folks who have made you think again,

So, who did you think you were kidding, Mr Houston,

Trying to close our care homes down.

Provost Wood's been off to Nova Scotia for a jaunt.

But recent bad publicity he surely didnae want. So ...

Chorus

Our man Steven Paterson claimed it was all okay.

A big consultant told him what to do then ran away. So...

Chorus

Houston said if he'd've asked then we'd've said, "Oh, no!"

Instead he pressed full steam ahead until we shouted, "Whoa!"

Chorus

K.P.M.G. what have they to do with all this fuss?

Think sev'ral hundred thousand pounds and then you'll have it sussed. So...

Chorus

Lots of people thought that the decision wisnae fair.

They soon began to protest just to show how much they care. So ...

Chorus

They wrote to the Observer and our paper did them proud

By showing that the folks of Stirling never will be cowed. So ...

Chorus

On the telly, in the press, boy, they were everywhere.

They had the town's administration tearing out their hair. So ...

Chorus

Houston said it was the right decision all along.

How could he and his cronies get it so completely wrong? So...

Chorus

On nineteenth March in just four weeks we got a chance to see

Our care homes saved by people power and true democracy. So ...

Who did you think you were kidding, Mr Houston,

Thinking we were on the run.

We are the folks who have stopped your unfair game,

We are the folks who have made you think again,

So, who did you think you were kidding, Mr Houston,

Trying to close our care homes down.

Trying to close our care homes down.

Trying to close our care homes down.

Words - The Band of Stirling's Homes Guard

Performed by The Band of Stirling's Homes Guard

David Maddox: So it's all alright then... (Glenrothes that is)

When it emerged last month that all the documents with the records of who voted in the Glenrothes by-election last November there were dark mutterings from the Nationalists about possible dodgy goings on and that a cloud would hang over the result.

From some corners there were even suggestions the by-election won by Labour's Lindsay Roy (pictured) should be run again.

You may remember that having expected to win the SNP was roundly thrashed by Labour by almost 7,000 votes.

But a report has come out this afternoon from the Electoral Commission saying that it was "a very well run election."

Andy O’Neill, Head of the Electoral Commission in Scotland, said: “All stages of the election – from registration of electors to the counting of votes – went smoothly despite many challenges faced by the electoral administrators responsible for running the poll. Fife Council also ran an extensive campaign to get people registered to vote, even though there were only seven working days between the writ being moved and the deadline for registering.”

He was particularly pleased with new safeguards for postal voting, which apparently worked well, including applicants having to provide a signature and date-of-birth for the first time.

He added: “We’re concerned at the loss of these documents and welcome assurances from the Scottish Courts Service that they are investigating the matter fully. Access to the marked register is important to ensuring transparency and every step should be taken to ensure this does not happen again."

So that's that then. Shame Glenrothes will have a harder time getting rid of the cloud over its reputation after it was branded Britain's ugliest town.

David Maddox: The Scottish X Files

It did not take the conspiracy theorists long to pop up when it emerged that the marked voter register for the Glenrothes by-election had mysteriously disappeared from Sheriff's Court in Kirkcaldy, as can be seen from the comments after today's piece in the Scotsman.
Perhaps we should call in Scully and Mulder (pictured top right) from the X Files to see if Gordon Brown has made a secret pact with aliens to get them to cast an extra 7,000 votes and then spirit away the register just to keep the Union intact. But let us not pretend that conspiracy theories are limited to the fevered imaginations of cybernats.
Labour at the moment believe that there is a conspiracy going on currently to sway voters in another election. I speak, of course, of the fascinating twists and turns in the campaign that is the election for the new Rector of Edinburgh University.
The three candidates are George Galloway, the Scottish exile, former Big Brother cat and some time Respect MP for Bethnal Green in London; Lord George Foulkes, Baron of Cumnock, MSP for the Lothians, former minister and First Lord of the Twittery; and Ian McWhirter columnist and commentater on Scottish politics who has promised to visit the Scottish Parliament on occasions.
The two latter candidates are believed to be the frontrunners. Lord George is Labour's candidate and the non-party political Mr McWhirter has been backed by the Tories, SNP, Greens and Lib Dems.
The election is coming to its climax with staff and students due to vote online on Wednesday February 12 and Thursday February 13.
But, Lord Foulkes' campaign team have cried foul over a prominant article about him which appeared in a West coast weekly publication (The Sunday Herald) claiming that he had been referred by ana anonymous academic to the Scottish Parliamentary Standards Commissioner Jim Dyer for having a consultancy arrangement with the law firm Eversheds.
MSPs cannot have consultancies, but Lords can, and Lord Foulkes has always claimed that his arrangement was only connected to his work in the Lords.
What the article failed to mention was that the same complaint had been made last year by an SNP student activist (Andrew Harlick) and Lord Foulkes was cleared in quick time by Mr Dyer because there was no evidence against him. Lord Foulkes has claimed that the Sunday publication knew this before printing the article, but chose not to mention it. Added to that apparently he has not been referred because the referal was done by e-mail, which technically makes it inadmissable. But these complaints can be put down to editorial judgement and technicalities.
The article was then rewritten as the front page piece in the student paper by a student called Liz Rawlings. On the face of it nothing wrong with that considering it was the best Edinburgh University story around at the moment.
But here is where the conspiracy clicks in, the puff of smoke over the grassy knoll, the mysterious Fiat speeding away from the mangled car wreck in the Paris tunnel: The Sunday publication is the same one that Mr McWhirter writes a column for and Ms Rawlings has a picture of her with SNP leader and First Minister Alex Salmond taken in his office in the Scottish Parliament on the front page of her Facebook (she's the one on the left in the picture).
Perhaps not surprisingly, Lord Foulkes's campaign team spot a conspiracy to undermine their candidate's chances and have made allegations of dirty tricks.

Like all good conspiracy theories it has a ring of truth to it and circumstantial evidence. But why would anybody go to such lengths to decide the result of a Rectoral election? Maybe it was those darn tricksy aliens again.