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: Warm front from Iceland

The last thing we heard about Iceland was that its banking system had collapsed taking with it many Brits' savings and large chunks of money belonging to UK councils.
Of course, it is hard to forget that our government's (UK version) reaction to this was to freeze Icelandic assets using anti-terror laws against this peaceful country of 320,000 people. You may recall that it did not go well.
So while Iceland has been removed from the SNP list of "how to be a successful small country," Icelanders are also not exactly well disposed to anything British. Or are they?
It seems that even in this time of economic strife the Icelanders have found a spot in their hearts for Britain, in particular our pensioners.
So as I write a ship load of thousands of warm woolly jumpers and other items of clothing is sailing to Hull to help keep Britain's pensioners warm this winter.
After all, they may not know about banking, although nor do we any more, but the Icelanders are international experts on fish and the cold (see picture on the right).
Apparently an appeal was launched by two radio DJs - Heimir Karlsson and Kolbrun Bjornsdottir - after they covered a story featuring Britain's National Pensioners Convention (NPC), and their warning that up to 1 in 12 pensioners may die this winter due to the drop in temperature because they cannot pay their fuel bills (as the Age Concern advert below left highlights). They were even more shocked to hear that 260,000 pensioners died of the cold in Britain over the last decade, which is most of their population.
Clearly under the probably correct impression that we were too poor or too mean to look after our old folk properly the appeal attracted thousands of items. One nine-year-old girl gathered 37 beautiful sweaters and delivered it to them at the radio station.
As Mr Karlsson put it: "I am sure I speak on behalf of every living soul in Iceland when I say that we looked at it with an utter dismay and total disbelief, how badly the government of the United Kingdom treats its old people.
"The elderly deserve to live their last years enjoying the best of care. They deserve to live in warm housing, free from worries over cold and rising gas bills. The Icelandic people heard about how terribly the UK government treats the pensioners, and could not just do nothing about it!"
Touche Mr Brown!