Wiped off the Map of Scotland, Scottish Labour is targeting major resources at just three seats in Scotland according to party sources, there seems to be a lack of ambition that out of 59 seats only 3 seem viable, Glasgow isn’t selected for help which comes as no surprise, the activist base has been effectively destroyed by neglect

Dear All

Targeting resources is nothing new, some political parties struggle to find resources, which is why I talk about what I term the ‘political economy’, basically this is made up by three things, people, money and resources.

In Scotland, the Scottish Labour Party is said to be targeting just 3 seats in Scotland. The seats are Edinburgh South, East Renfrewshire and East Lothian, you might be tempted to say that the Labour Party was lacking in ambition, especially when you consider that there are 59 seats up for grabs.

If the Labour Party was some lesser mainstream party you might think, short of cash, done the sums, maybe worked the area, could be a possibility. The Edinburgh South seat is Ian Murray, last time; he was successful so perhaps his claim for resources could be done on merit.

As to the East Renfrewshire, this is a classic three way fight, the SNP took it off Jim Murphy, by all accounts he put the work in the area but he was wiped out in 2015 along with the rest of Scottish Labour’s MPs. The ‘good’ went out with the ‘bad’ because Scottish Labour has done too much damage to their party to remain viable.

The SNP’s Kirsten Oswald has a majority of 3,718 but the real contender according to polling is the Scottish Conservatives. This is a seat that they are targeting and given Jackson Carlaw won the Holyrood seat, and given the collapse of Scottish Labour, it seems that East Renfrewshire is a tricky proposition for the Labour Party. One thing about the Labour candidate Blair MacDougall is that he in my opinion is an administrator, and not a campaigner. Although, he was the former Better Together chief, the organisation wasn’t running as people hoped. You may remember the spin doctor statement when ex Labour MP Frank Roy was appointed to lead the Remain Campaign in Scotland, citing he could ‘talk all day about the mistakes in that campaign’.

Personally speaking if I was to pick a campaign to get the most viable pro UK politician into Westminster at East Renfrewshire, I would have to go with the Scottish Conservatives. It isn’t just that their support is on the rise, it is more to do with Scottish Labour effectively doing nothing for months on end. A by-product of the nasty spat that was the Labour leadership contest and the closure of Labour branches and CLPs for basically six months.

A decision which was utterly stupid!

One of the seats where Scottish Labour can also ‘forget it’ is Perth and North Perthshire currently held by Pete Wishart, his direct challenger is Ian Duncan Conservative MEP, Ian stands a decent chance, this is based on his record at the European Parliament, also the Perth area is a happy hunting ground for Conservatives in terms of voters. This seat is one of the seats in Scotland that I have an interest in, although I have nothing personal against Pete Wishart, he maybe out. If you are into campaigning, then Perth and North Perthshire like East Renfrewshire would be an interesting campaign to go into for a laugh.

It is said that the Moray seat held by SNP depute leader Angus Robertson, as I mentioned, if he gets slotted this would be marvellous for Scotland, this as I mentioned could be the ‘Portillo’ moment of the night. In this seat, it is a straight fight between the SNP and the Conservatives.

At the present moment, the numbers of seats parties will end up with is anyone’s guess, but the news for Scottish Labour remains the same, it is said that they are going to get wiped out yet again. Electoral Calculus, the political forecasting website, has predicted Labour will experience a complete wipe-out in Scotland.

If that happens, the sustainability of Kezia Dugdale as continuing as leader will become a matter of internal and external discussion. How many wipe outs will Kezia Dugdale lead Scottish Labour to and then accept that the party simply isn’t in a fit state to campaign? Jim Murphy famously said when leader that he had ‘fixed’ the Labour Party in Scotland, this surprised me as I thought he hadn’t a clue what he was talking.

Scottish Labour isn’t fixed at all.

If things pan out then the SNP could win 46 seats, the Tories might get anywhere between 7 and 11 seats, the Liberal Democrats securing two, up one. One thing I came across today in Pollok was a sign in someone’s window, which said ‘No Labour Party propaganda, no Tory propaganda; no Liberal Democrats propaganda’, the sign was printed off, not hand written in big type!

Finally, I have to say that I am surprised that in Glasgow which was considered a Labour heartland and where Scottish Labour has an HQ in Bath Street, there appears that no one was able to make a case for securing extra resources for at least one of the seven seats in the City. Do you think that anyone down there has the intelligence to divert the entire Glasgow Labour activist base into one seat?

Asking everyone nicely of course!

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University