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The Megrahi Report – Winners and Losers

Feb 7

Posted by Jeff in Media | 26 Comments

The rolling news coverage regarding the report on the release of the Lockerbie bomber has resulted in some winners and losers, as follows:

Gordon Brown – Big loser
A bad day for Brown as he is forced to stagger out of the shadows to attempt to clear his name. By focussing on only one aspect of the story, the lack of contact between the UK and Scottish Governments on the matter, the former Prime Minister as good as confirms his guilt at facilitating a deal.

Iain Gray – Small loser
For all his “if I were First Minister” fire and brimstone at the time of the decision, the leader of the Labour group in Holyrood is now in a difficult position and will presumably be unable to just sit quietly throughout this latest chapter in the Megrahi affair in the short term, let alone during the election campaign. Gray really needs to come out and strongly disassociate himself from the actions taken by his party when in Government, not an approach that he is used to taking. Gray runs the risk of looking weak and opportunistic by strongly condemning the SNP for following the legal process in releasing Megrahi while not condemning his own party for facilitating that decision.

Guido Fawkes – Embarrassing loser
Paul Staines’ team jumped the gun on the Megrahi story last night, unable to resist the merest whiff of a suggestion that the SNP might have been involved in a quid pro quo deal (which it wasn’t). A verbatim posting of a Scottish Conservative press release, a premature dismissal of a response from Kevin Pringle and a simply bizarre suggestion that Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill may resign next week has left Guido (or perhaps Tory Bear/Harry Cole?) looking more than a tad foolish.

Alex Salmond – Clear winner
The SNP in general will be feeling rather pleased with itself today, they have obtained no more detractors than they already had and will have won some sympathy given the ‘organised hypocrisy’ that has taken place, as Alex Salmond has called it. Some positive headlines for itself and negative headlines for Labour regarding Megrahi will go some way to relax that destabilising electoral factor that I was discussing a couple of days ago.

David Cameron – Big winner
From a report from the highly respected Gus O’Donnell, the Prime Minister has been served up an easy opportunity to sympathise with the Americans, remind everyone that the SNP made this supposedly “very bad decision” and, crucially, reinforce the message that Labour were fully immersed in the process leading up to a decision that was deeply unpopular south of the border and fairly unpopular up in Scotland. This is as close as you get to an open goal in Politics these days and Cameron took full advantage with a highly visible, albeit highly risible, Press Conference that is sure to make the TV headlines this evening and front pages tomorrow morning. Who needs Andy Coulson when media management is this easy?

It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt

Feb 6

Posted by James in Economy, Governance, Holyrood, Parties | 43 Comments

The media pundits and the blogocracy have got their regular metaphor of choice for the Budget. It’s high-stakes poker, and you can see why. John Swinney publishes a draft Budget/deals, then each party decides how to respond/play their hand. Infamously, in 2009 the SNP thought we weren’t committed to the insulation scheme being universal/were bluffing, and when the cards were shown/buttons pressed, it turned out we weren’t. Pocket rockets.

The analogies continue this time, although I can’t work out what the poker equivalent is for the Tories siding early with the SNP and supporting what’s effectively an Osbornomics cuts Budget: suggestions welcome. Equally, by voting against such an ideological Budget at Stage One the Greens have apparently folded early. It doesn’t feel like that to me.

It’s a flawed and misleading metaphor, and its time has passed. Perhaps in previous years, with the overall pot rising, that might have been a justifiable way to see the new minority-Parliament Budget process. But not now.

Now the decision before Parliament is whether or not to sanction about £1.3bn worth of cuts. Even if, like the SNP and the other opposition parties, you’re not prepared to take a serious look at raising revenue (despite the options we’ve already proposed: 1, 2, 3 etc), that’s what a Yes or an Abstain means. There’s a lot of ink spilt about this being a centre-left country, but the reality is that they’re four of a kind on the revenue vs cuts issue.

But it’s not about the men and Margo around the table. As per my comment elsewhere, the parties are not playing a petty game to determine who gets a good headline, or they should not be. It’s a year of Scotland’s public services, services relied on by the vulnerable, the ill, the homeless, the working poor and the unemployed. These are the most crucial set of decisions made in Scottish politics. John’s chosen a Tory budget, and that’s the real reason the Tories were in the bag before it began. They’re not playing a good hand, they’re recognising one of their own. A pair, if you like.

It was a poker post on the first class Burdz Eye View that got me thinking about this. She’s not alone – the CalMerc followed with one the next day, and I’m sure I’ve used the metaphor myself before. Here’s the Herald in 2008, and there’s a story missing here which suggests the Sun actually posted Budget coverage to poker.thesun.co.uk

It’s compellingly simple. John, Andy, Derek, Jeremy, Patrick and Margo are the players. The aim of the game for the opposition parties, the argument goes, is to walk away with a good headline and a nice wee pot while the banker runs the game. It’s not even how it works – by the time there’s a full house in the Chamber the decisions have (generally) been taken as a result of a series of bilaterals. If you’re determined to find a games analogy, it’s more like Bohnanza, except it’s always the Minister’s turn.

The more the media and the bloggers treat it as a game, any game, the less seriously the real-life impacts of these cuts on communities across Scotland get taken. There are no points of principle at stake in poker – it’s just about your hand, how you play it and what you can take from the others. There’s a principle here, though – do we believe in public services or do we want lower taxes?

It all comes down to the Lib Dems now, they say. The Greens should step straight in and get a good deal, I’m told. Sure, we could no doubt negotiate for a little here or there, but it’d be set against those thousands of job losses, the thousands of vulnerable Scots who rely on local services currently under threat so John Swinney and the Tories can work together. If the SNP would rather try again (that’s perhaps the most important article on this year’s Budget) and find a centre-left consensus and look beyond the retailers levy to limit the cuts, we’ll be happy to talk, but any left party that backed this particular Budget in these circumstances would be a busted flush, pure and simple.

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Wikileaks – Megrahi revisited

Feb 5

Posted by Jeff in Holyrood | 22 Comments

There are arguably two main factors that will, and already have, destabilised the SNP’s push for a second term at Holyrood.

These are:
(1) The perception that the SNP failed to address the financial crisis with the appropriate rhetoric, language and policies.
(2) The release of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbasset Al-Megrahi.

The party has noone to blame for the former electoral liability with Salmond’s ‘spivs and speculators’ line still painfully cringeworthy, particularly when set against the pragmatic backroom manoeuvres from Gordon Brown that assisted HBOS being bought over by Lloyds and saving Scottish (and UK) jobs.

For the latter, the SNP still has a battle on its hands and, as the latest Wikileaks revelation on the matter shows, it is around other backroom manoeuvres from then Prime Minister Gordon Brown that a public discussion over Megrahi, and scrutiny into the events leading up to the release, remains outstanding.

The Sunday Telegraph has revealed tonight that “Britain helped Libya secure Megrahi release” and that the Middle East and North Africa Minister assured the Libyans that the Prime Minister did not want Megrahi to die in prison. Even the fact that UK Government Minister provided legal advice to Libya regarding how Megrahi could be released on compassionate grounds is highly concerning in light of the furious reaction that we witnessed after Kenny MacAskill made his decision.

I remain of the view that any civilised society does not keep dying people incarcerated but that view was probably in the minority amongst the Scottish public, a fact that Iain Gray exploited at the time with his assurance that “if I had been First Minister, Megrahi would not have been released”. An easy hit from the Labour leader at the time, but how that statement sits against evidence that seems to point to Labour helping Megrahi be released from prison deserves consideration.

Anyone who disagrees with MacAskill’s decision are of course still welcome to do so and perhaps it was the wrong decision. However, who is more to blame, the person who was legally obligated to come to that decision or individuals who tried to move events in that direction?

The whole furore regarding Megrahi got very old very quickly, and I’m sure it would do again if the same press hysteria was to reemerge. However, if one party is being hung out to dry while another party that facilitated the decision that caused the outrage is getting away with it scot free, then perhaps the whole issue needs to be revisited and any blame or disappointment be apportioned more appropriately across a highly judgemental Scottish electorate.

BBC Question Time comes to you soon, and for ever more, from Glasgow

Feb 3

Posted by Jeff in Culture | 28 Comments

The Editor of Question Time, hand-picked by host David Dimbleby, has decided to resign from his post in objection to the moving of the production of the show from London to Glasgow. Noone likes to see people lose their jobs under any circumstance but I have to say that I have little sympathy for Ed Havard’s arguments.

The regular belittling of Scottish issues, typified by a quite disgraceful verbal slapping down of the SNP’s Nicola Sturgeon in a recent episode, not to mention the general London-centric tone of the show, has become quite grating for a while now. So what better way to remind the makers of the show that devolution exists and that local issues count than to have the show produced in Wales, Northern Ireland or Scotland where many Westminster policies do not actually apply.

In many ways the difficulties in pitching Question Time at the right level is intertwined with the West Lothian Question that still plagues Westminster. Discuss Health, Justice and Education issues and millions of licensepayers are getting shortchanged through irrelevant content but discuss strictly Scottish issues and you alienate 90% of your audience. The answer, presumably, would be to ensure that discussion of devolved issues was limited to the same split as across borders within the UK’s population but this is far from the case currently as Question Time’s disallowance of fiscal policy discussion in Glasgow itself testified.

Furthermore, in terms of moving BBC shows away from London, there can be little argument against spreading jobs and economic activity away from the UK’s capital and out to areas where the need is greater. The aim for greater than 50% of BBC spending on network programming being based outside of London is a commendable one and if it means putting a few noses out of joint then so be it.

I have feared for a while that David Dimbleby has gotten too big for his bullock to be honest and if he can’t see that the BBC needs to adapt going forward then a tipping point may be reached. The host of a London-based and London-centric politics show getting in the way of a better balanced economic and regional solution can only mean one thing as far as I am concerned.

Perhaps a change is as good as a rest. Or, then again, one can instead just watch Channel 4’s rival, The Ten O’Clock show (starring the artist formerly known as Tory Bear this evening incidentally).

It’s a shame BBC Question Time has reached this situation though. The programme could provide a great service to help constituent nations of the UK learn about each other a bit more if it adapted its format just a little bit. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens I suppose but Glasgow’s gain and London’s perceived loss will be to the UK’s benefit.

Regressive progression

Feb 1

Posted by Jeff in Holyrood | 11 Comments

Watching the sharp, amiable Douglas McLellan and Better Nation’s very own wonderkid James Mackenzie have a fine elongated debate over the progressiveness (or otherwise) of LVT got me thinking about that word that sprang out of nowhere last year and has been used recklessly with error-strewn abandon by members of all parties. Yes, word of the year 2010 – “progressive”.
 
Douglas states categorically that LVT is regressive while James argues the opposite. Sidestepping the specifics of that particular policy (if possible), can something, in isolation, even be progressive or regressive?
 
As part of an MSc in Statistics, what feels like a lifetime ago, it was made abundantly clear from various dry professors that regression analysis could only be conducted once you have 2 points on a chart. With 2 x-axis numbers and 2 y-axis numbers you can go as daft as you like calculating all sorts of statistical formulae to ascertain whether there is a trend going up the way, down the way or no trend at all. If you have one point on that chart, you can’t even begin to put pencil to paper, finger to keyboard or, my personal favourite, thumb to statistical tables.
 
My point is, one cannot look at Local Income Tax, Land Value Tax or even Council Tax in isolation and judge that it is either progressive or regressive. It is only in comparing two of the policies and judging which direction one is in relation to the other can a conclusion on progressiveness be reached.
 
Say the Government was to charge lower rate taxpayers 10p every time they bought a carton of milk. That sounds rather regressive to me. However, what if higher rate taxpayers were charged £1 and the financial benefit was used to subsidise dairy farmers in the country meaning that milk cost, in total, 11p for lower rate taxpayers and £1.01 for higher rate taxpayers. It suddenly sounds a bit more progressive.
 
That other buzzword, fairness, is a tricky one too. Can a policy in isolation truly be deemed fair?
 
In terms of closing the equality gap between rich and poor, which is really all that ‘fairness’ and ‘progressiveness’ relate to, we are where we are; we have a point on that x-axis and a point on that y-axis based on our income taxes, our NI, our VAT rates, our Council Tax and many other factors that make up the status quo.
 
How progressive policies are in the upcoming election should be compared against this benchmark and compared against each other.
Douglas and James have started a debate based on facts and figures that hopefully Patrick, Tavish and Alex et al will finish.