Dear All
In May 2012, I was at the BBC Big Indy Debate, I have
written on this before, during the programme, I got to speak, I said that any
credible bid for independence had to have a commitment to Nato and a commitment
to retain Faslane as a nuclear submarine base.
The Scottish Labour Party is without a leader since Johann
Lamont stepped down, three people have put their names in for members to
consider, they are Labour MP Jim Murphy, Neil Findlay and Sarah Boyack.
In reality, it is a two horse race between Murphy and Findlay .
Whoever wins that election cannot simply think that there
can be business as usual, the Labour vote has collapsed in Scotland , not
only that the Labour Party structures appear to be in need of reform, not just
in terms of their practices but also who they allow to run their operations.
Scottish Labour needs a new vision, new direction, new
ideas, fresh talent and a cull to turn around their decline. They have reached
a tipping point where things could turn extremely bad for them, so it is
important who the next leader is.
Neil Findlay who is a Scottish Labour leadership candidate has
promised to oppose Trident.
On that basis alone, he is showing he isn’t the person to be
the leader that Scottish Labour needs in the Holyrood Parliament. Findlay says he
would lobby Ed Miliband not to renew Britain 's nuclear deterrent if
Labour wins the general election.
That would be a complete waste of time, because the Scottish
Labour MPs would be under the control of the House of Commons whips, he also
says he accepts defence should remain reserved to Westminster .
This is student politics, this is rubbish, this isn’t the
way forward for Labour in Scotland .
Findlay doesn’t get it, his task isn’t to woo the party’s
Left wing by promising to oppose the renewal of Trident; his task is to
convince people to come back to voting for the Scottish Labour Party if he wins
the contest.
Neil Findlay by admitting that Miliband would have the final
say rather doesn’t address the real issues for Labour in Scotland , Neil Findlay or Jim Murphy would be
the leader in Scotland
while Ed Miliband isn’t there.
So, the leadership; isn’t leadership but rather middle
management.
The ‘boss’ down the road makes the decisions, the Scottish
leader in effective does housekeeping, also as everyone knows, Scottish Labour
isn’t a separate party to the Labour Party.
No one including Ed Miliband is going to devolve control
over defence to the Scottish Parliament.
Neil Findlay says he is a contender for the leadership, but,
someone should ask him why he is pandering to the nonsense of unpopular Nicola
Sturgeon.
Is she going to save your party?
Who was it that brought PFI in?
It was the Labour Party, short term thinking to try and make
themselves look good, not solving problems but storing up financial disasters
which would come back to haunt them in the future.
Jim Murphy’s campaign has had to move ground to continue to
pledge support for existing measures introduced by the SNP who bought the vote.
He is also calling for cross-party talks on funding for elderly people’s
services, including free personal care, the NHS, pensions and bus passes.
In the early days of her leadership Johann Lamont called for
a public debate about the long-term affordability of populist policies such as
free prescriptions but she never produced any firm recommendations.
Basically what she needed to say was that there would be no free
prescriptions or council tax freezes for rich people, she failed that test and
couldn’t get motivated to do anything about it.
Part of leadership is to have the answers to problems, so it
is highly unlikely that there will be cross party talks on the issues Murphy
mentioned, and still no word about Government or local government reform which
was pushed onto the back burners because no one has a clue how to turn round
the public sector. It is no good taking the railways into the public sector if
the talent isn’t there to run them properly.
There cannot be a return to the 1970’s or 1980’s.
The United Kingdom
is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, all the main
countries such as America , Britain , China ,
France and Russia , are all
nuclear nations. It is highly doubtful any British Government regardless of
party politics will put the seat on the Security Council in jeopardy.
Neil Findlay could be the next leader of the Labour Party in
Scotland ,
but so far he looks likely to implode their vote.
It may have escaped his notice, but the Nationalists have
campaigned on Trident removal at every Westminster
and the public has generally said ‘piss off’.
Only an outright idiot would sign up for Trident removal.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
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