The Dam is breaking; senior Nationalist Kenny MacAskill attacks Nicola Sturgeon’s husband as "cheerleader-in-chief" for his wife, the internal fighting has only one conclusion, Peter Murrell needs to resign as Chief Executive, fear is racing through the SNP, many MPs, MSPs and staffers face losing their livelihood unless leadership change happens

Dear All

It would be fair to say that Nicola Sturgeon is a wounded animal at present, the wolves are circling around her, not only is her position unsafe, so is the position of her husband, SNP Chief Executive Peter Murrell.

It seems the ‘stalking horse’ to break the Sturgeon/Murrell monopoly of the party is none other than former Justice Secretary Kenneth MacAskill.

Is MacAskill preparing the way for a former MP to be installed as the new SNP Chief Executive?

Is MacAskill preparing the way for a former MP to sown the seeds for a leadership challenge down the line?

Is the fact that a senior Nationalist speaking out a realisation how much damage the Sturgeon brand as done to the party, it isn’t a secret but Nicola Sturgeon is a bad leader.

MacAskill seems to have a goal in his scathing attack on Sturgeon who is the SNP’s top official, he wants him removed and now, I think he is onto something in his comments that Murrell must be more than “cheerleader-in-chief for his spouse”. As I mentioned yesterday, Nicola Sturgeon’s time is up as leader, her new venture of fighting Brexit is nonsense, she cannot affect change, she has no role; she is powerless.

Brexit will happen and there will be no real input from the SNP, that’s a given!

MacAskill is correct on what went wrong in the SNP in that Murrell has over-promoting his wife, but remove Sturgeon from the equation and replace him with Salmond and you see a pattern. The SNP used the ‘cult of the personality’ which focuses on the leader as some kind of semi divine hero of worship who can do no wrong.   

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult_of_personality

Dictators and despots use this technique in order to promote themselves and silence dissent around them, which is what has happened in the SNP. The SNP is a one man band, everyone else is either a cult member or part of the fringe; the SNP operate as a party within a party. Not only has this backfired with the installation of Sturgeon, but as other commentators beyond MacAskill have stated, it has damaged the independence cause.

The SNP go from one short term gimmick to another, the wider goals have been abandoned, there isn’t talent behind Nicola Sturgeon, although MacAskill likes to kid on that there is.

Is he right to blame SNP chief executive Peter Murrell?

Patently, the answer is yes!

MacAskill said:

“The SNP is bigger and the cause wider than just her [the First Minister]. Focusing on her been both a high-risk and short-term strategy. Others need allowed to blossom.”

Note the use of the word, ‘her’; one can speculate whether this is utter contempt emerging, after the many had built up the party since the change of 2007, the vote going to 50%, it has now been destroyed and sits at 37%.

Further to fall when the election cycle kicks in methinks!

MacAskill like me has become a leading critic of Murrell, his concerns emerged after the SNP lost a third of its MPs in the General Election; mine started when Murrell ignored my complaints and treated me with such utter contempt. Both of us have arrived at the same place but it took MacAskill a considerable time longer to call for Murrell to be replaced.

MacAskill although he talks about the “succession strategy” to replace Murrell, and the need to recruit a deputy with the intention of replacing him in a year, we should think back to Shirley-Anne Somerville after she was kicked out of Holyrood, she was the deputy chief executive before scuttling back to Holyrood. In fact I never saw her job as anything other than give her a pay packet.

MacAskill hits on another problem in his criticism, saying Ms Sturgeon and her husband need to reinvigorate the party’s grassroots campaign. The SNP did run a bad campaign, it was also an arrogant one, in Glasgow; they thought that they had the place sown up after 2015, now they are finding out different.

Every seat held in Glasgow by the SNP is up for grabs, no seat is safe here for anyone, and the fact the vote has dropped dramatically will be a concern for their MPs and staffers who stand a pretty fair chance of ending up on the breadline!

Oh Joy!

It is interesting that MacAskill says that Stories abounded of SNP campaigning errors that would make old stalwarts weep. Although the party got a lot of people joining it, and that increased the number of people who did activism in comparison to others such as Scottish Labour, the numbers weren’t that great. The SNP Cult at its core, ‘users’ of people which is their modus operandi, they hold ordinary members in the main, in contempt.

The general direction of the SNP is backwards now, the idea that activism on the ground can solve the general problem is fantasy, there needs to be a clear out at the top of the SNP to restore confidence.

The complaints and misgivings within the SNP about a husband-and-wife team running the party ever since Ms Sturgeon took over as leader won’t be going away, either Sturgeon goes as leader or Murrell has to be replaced, there is a crisis of confidence. And the crisis is real, there will be another election; there always is but at present heavy losses seem to be more or less unstoppable. The more senior SNP who lose their seats, the more infighting will take place, it has already started.

Finally, it doesn’t stop with the replacement of Murrell; that only buys unpopular Nicola Sturgeon time, her direction of travel is out the door as well; Murrell is just a sandbag to take the political bullets.

The SNP have to start planning for a post Sturgeon era!

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

“Cuckoo in the nest”, unpopular Nicola Sturgeon is like a rotting vile cancer festering away in the political body of the Scottish National Party, the longer she remains as leader the more seats the SNP will lose at Holyrood and Westminster, she is responsible for the SNP’s worst general election reversal in almost 40 years

Dear All

Scotland’s unpopular SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon is saying that she is postponing a second independence vote until after Brexit. Firstly, she can say what she likes but what she can’t do is guarantee that vote will take place because Nicola Sturgeon doesn’t have that authority.

In order for a second independence vote to be allowed, there needs to be a Section 30 order granted at Westminster by the Conservative Government. When Theresa May slapped down Sturgeon’s request for a second indyref by saying ‘not now’, the ball was kicked right into the long grass for about 5 years minimum.

It is highly unlikely that there will be a vote until 2021 and with the Unionist parties making an impact at Westminster and reducing the SNP to 35 seats, Holyrood isn’t looking like there will be an SNP majority, or even an SNP/Green majority.

We could be looking at a hung parliament at Holyrood!

Of course, the Scottish Conservatives are of the mindset that they could win the parliament next time round, this is more wishful thinking at present than based on cold hard facts. The Conservatives in Scotland had a great revival and outstanding wins it has to be said, but that doesn’t mean, the road to Holyrood is a canter for them. You could see their vision as more hope than reality based, this is due to resources or to be more pointed lack of resources.

The Conservatives don’t have a big enough and experienced activist base to realistically mount that challenge. In the recent election, the Conservatives used overkill to win the East Renfrewshire seat. Paul Masterton, the winner got 21,496 votes to take the seat, the SNP managed 16, 784, and Labour trailed in third place with 14, 346. The percentage gain was plus 18 for the Conservatives but the ratio of votes to activists wasn’t impressive. It was a good campaign, well organised operationally, people were very positive but I suspect that the East Renfrewshire Conservatives after the joy of the win would be sitting down to ask themselves some serious questions.

If you read the blog on a regular basis, you will know that I have often mentioned the fact that the SNP is lacking in substance, it isn’t a secret, there is a lack of substance and of course talent as well. Nicola Sturgeon has harmed the SNP by putting “short-term PR gains” ahead of its long-term strategic goals, the same mindset was used under the Salmond era where ‘showmanship’ was seen as the band aid to cover the cracks and failures. But failure has a way of coming back to haunt you, you can’t fool, the people all of the time, and now that many people have seen through Nicola Sturgeon like a sheet of glass, they aren’t impressed, so much so that they are walking away and taking their votes to put them somewhere else.

Jim Sillars, the former SNP deputy leader is basically saying what I have said in the past, Sturgeon should stop “grandstanding” and doing the PR gimmicks. After the 56 SNP MPs were elected in 2015, there was a chance of taking a new approach towards Westminster but grudge and grievance won the day because the SNP don’t and won’t work consensually with others.

The SNP leadership which includes the cult members don’t know how to work with people, they are poor leaders. The upshot of their petty and nasty attitude is that they have lost any opportunity to get round the table and work consensually to secure more powers for Holyrood.

If there is a price for stupidity the SNP leadership are fully paid up and taking double rations. Nicola Sturgeon was wrong to back the Remain campaign in Brexit, wrong to demand separate deal for Scotland, wrong to demand access to the single market, in fact you would be hard pushed to find anything this vacuous inept woman has gotten right. Back when I was a guest on the Gordon Brewer Big Debate, I floated the idea of the devolved governments getting a role in Brexit, this idea was based on everyone getting onboard with the concept of unity and we are leaving.

Nicola Sturgeon by her stupidity killed that idea stone dead, as Sillars said the UK would be “daft” to give the SNP government a seat in Brexit talks, as it had shown itself to be a “potential cuckoo in the nest”.

Remember my earlier post on Sturgeon the grass?

Everyone eventually comes around to the George Laird view.

What is laughable is that Nicola Sturgeon still hasn’t woken up to the fact, there needs to be a change of leader for the SNP to move forward. Nicola Sturgeon is the cuckoo in the nest at the SNP, whether she wants to believe it or not. Scotland has moved passed the SNP as seen by the SNP’s worst general election reversal in almost 40 years.

Nicola Sturgeon is finding out that since Alex Salmond stepped down that she isn’t a leader of men, the Salmond legacy of building up the vote has been eroded by her failures in government, not just on vision but also to deliver a better Scotland.

Let’s face a shitty baby box, are you impressed?

The idea of a second referendum has led to a backlash against her referendum plan, she has made herself toxic. The classic example of why Sturgeon has no future as SNP leader can be summed up by Jim Sillars:

He wrote:

“Making Scotland Brussels’ insider friend may have pleased many of my fellow party members, but meant that when hard confidential negotiations get underway, the UK Government would be daft to invite a potential Brussels cuckoo in the next. A short term tactic which played well in Brussels, fell flat in London, which is where Scotland really needs leverage. Sadly, short term PR gains leading to longer term strategic losses have been a marked feature of the Sturgeon leadership. Indyref2 was the classic example.”

Although there are lots of key issues flagged up, the important one to home into is that “strategic losses have been a marked feature of the Sturgeon leadership”.

George Laird right again!

The threaten by the SNP over Brexit legislation by withholding a legislative consent motion (LCM) at Holyrood would also be “a serious mistake” but doing the wrong thing is nothing new to Nicola Sturgeon who seems driven by cheap stunts in order to make her appear likeable.

The fact is that Nicola Sturgeon is a rather nasty horrible person, the comedy show that painted her as a ‘horrible cow’ certainly made many a Scot laugh but the humour is that the writers have grasped the essence of a career built round being an angry wee Nat. When you see a happy Nicola Sturgeon for the cameras behind the mask is a despicable wee individual, not a people person, the eyes don’t lie.

Go online and look at her pictures, eyes brimming with hate as she looks into countless cameras at Holyrood.

The SNP lost 21 of the 56 seats it won in 2015 and its vote share fell from 50 to 37 per cent, Sturgeon and her nasty wee clique has destroyed all the previous work, in Glasgow, every seat held by the SNP at Westminster is a marginal now. The shine has come off the Nationalists and some people sitting on less than a hundred votes will be hope for a 5 year parliament to attempt to turn round the ‘problem’ that Sturgeon created.

One thing that the SNP have to wrap their heads around is that just as Salmond was toast on the morning of the 19^th September, so was Nicola Sturgeon on the morning of the 9^th June 2017.

Finally, the myth that Nicola Sturgeon is some kind of superwoman and politician is exactly that, hyped up by the press and gimmicks, Sturgeon is sticking by her rationale for a second referendum, saying Brexit, in whatever form, would be deeply damaging to Scotland. If I was an MP and MSP in the Scottish National Party, I would want to know where the ‘men in grey suits’ are because Sturgeon is about to cost the SNP many seats at future elections.

There comes a time when you have got to go, Nicola Sturgeon has reached that point!

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

Bad News for unpopular Nicola Sturgeon: DUP backs deal to support minority Conservative government, in local news, George Laird was described as the ‘engine’ in the Labour campaign that defeat and humiliated SNP Candidate Anne McLaughlin, so far Provan SNP re-election campaign has raised £60 and has 3 supporters, SNP use humour to claim Provan SNP have “exceptional activists”, not exceptional enough to win the seat tho!

Dear All

It seems the pressure is off for what is termed in Scotland as a ‘wee while’, yes, after a bit of huffing and puffing, the DUP has decided that it is in the national interest of the UK and them to back a deal to support minority Conservative government. I never really expected anything less, someone somewhere was going to prop up the government and the fact, the DUP were pretty much onboard straight away after the results came in shows that a bit of hasty preplanning might have been done.

The DUP and Conservatives deal did cause some outrage by some people in the SNP and elsewhere relating to the DUP stance on certain issues but tough!!!!!

Although politics is a serious business, there is an element of fun in it; I got sent something funny which I would like to draw your attention to, it is from the SNP.

http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/help-the-snp-take-back-glasgow-north-east

As many people know, I am a pretty good campaigner; I am the kind of guy who helps get many people over the finish line to win an election.

In 2011, while I was in the SNP, I helped 3 people get elected for Holyrood. John Mason, James Dornan and did quite a lot of work selling unpopular Nicola Sturgeon to the people of Govanhill. In those days, I was under the mistaken belief that Nicola Sturgeon wanted to make a difference. The difference that Nicola Sturgeon and her ‘team’ of social justice warriors made in Govanhill was to stand back and let the place descend into a shithole.

The fourth campaign was the Pollok campaign for the SNP for Chris Stephens, not one of life’s greatest thinkers it has to be said.

Anyway, that was 2011.

It took a while but in 2017, I managed to get back to doing four campaigns, two for Labour and two for the Conservatives. But I would like to focus on the Glasgow North East campaign in light of the link above. It seems that on election night at the Glasgow Count, Anne McLaughlin was allegedly crying in the café, she lost her seat that night to a far better candidate called Paul Sweeney.

How do I know that Paul Sweeney was a far better candidate?

I know Anne McLaughlin, and even did her Inverclyde campaign, most people cannot tell you when they campaigned for someone, but one of the things which I do when I am in a political party is record my activism. So, on Wednesday 15th June and Friday 24^th June, I went to assist her in her attempt to get elected. She didn’t win the seat that time, she lost to a guy called Iain MacKenzie, personally, I didn’t think he was much cop but he was the Labour Council leader. During my time in the SNP, I saw Anne McLaughlin at the major by-elections around the Glasgow area, as I was pretty prominent as an activist within the SNP.

I never found Anne McLaughlin to be nasty and I got on reasonably well with her, so, it was interesting for me to join the Labour Campaign that Paul Sweeney ran to over turn the 8 May 2015 result, a 39.3% record breaking swing to the SNP. Of course, Anne McLaughlin never ran across me during the campaign, I was doing what I always do, selling the candidate on the doorstep, something which I am pretty good at. In fact, Paul Sweeney was told by a former Bearden Labour Councillor that I was “brilliant” on the doorstep.

The last time, I was active in Glasgow North East was during David Kerr’s SNP campaign in 2009, he lost to Willie Bain. My first day on that campaign was Sunday 14th June. Bain was to win the seat in the by-election, and the next election in 2010. 2015, he was to be swept out by the SNP tsunami. In 2015, due to serious problems, I wasn’t campaigning, didn’t do a stroke for anyone which due to the nature of my problems, politics was the less of my concerns.

Anne McLaughlin was swept in on the Nationalists surge coming off the back of angry indyref voters wanting to make a protest vote against Labour. I have to say, I wasn’t bothered when Willie Bain got slotted. Scottish Labour needed a clear out, they weren’t going to do it, so the punters did it instead! This happy set of circumstances paved the way for Paul Sweeney to stand, if there was a challenge for Labour in Glasgow, then overturning a 39.3% record breaking swing is right up there.

Of course, I like a challenge myself, and although there was some disbelief in me saying ‘this is the seat that Labour can take back’, the Labour team started to come round to my way of thinking. I didn’t have a doubt that Paul Sweeney could win it but it was hell of a close.

242 votes!

So, in the tradition of this blog, George Laird right again.

In so far as my understanding, it seems post Anne McLaughlin’s humiliating defeat at the election, I have become aware that the SNP have been terribly upset that I helped put three of their MPs back onto the scrapheap. The pain in Glasgow being particularly harsh and painful, have you ever had that type of pain? Imagine an African elephant standing on your nuts and you will get the idea. At the count, I walked passed Anne McLaughlin as she tried to be stoic but you could tell for her the party is over.

I see that on the crowdfunder page, it states:

“Anne has been inundated with hundreds of messages from distraught constituents and community activists who can't believe she has not been re-elected”. All I can say to these people is that they must be shit at politics because either they are daft or they don’t pay attention to what is doing on around them.  

I didn’t get any personal pleasure out of putting Anne McLaughlin out on the street as I have done with some other people, but she did lose to a better candidate, Paul Sweeney will be a fine MP for Glasgow North East.

Finally, with the DUP and Conservative deal in place and all sides being all "lovey dovey" over it, it seems that Anne McLaughlin will be waiting a considerably long time for an election, if she has any problem, she should contact Labour MP Paul Sweeney for help, the usual things, potholes, street lighting, and of course DWP issues, maybe Nicola Sturgeon is good for a tenner, Anne has recently become unemployed! 

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

Predator Dino, compositing clip using a green screen dino to enhance a scene from Predators movie

Dear All

A simple clip using a clip from Predator movie and a green screen dino T-Rex, levels adjustment, keying, shrink the matte etc etc, turned out not bad.

George

Labour MP Paul Sweeney - Nothing is impossible!

Dear All

Now, that the campaigning is done for a bit, I thought I would get back to do some studying of CGI, this video is a track test using mocha which does planar tracking. planar tracking tracks surfaces which is different from other types of tracking such as 2d and 3d.

I found a clip which I used to track as an experiment and then replaced the head of the actor with newly elected MP, Paul Sweeney.

I had to do some additional work but it turned out not too bad, obviously I am still learning but the end result was something which I am pleased with.

How you like it.

Paul Sweeney defeated SNP Candidate Anne McLaughlin by 242 votes, and overturned one of the largest vote swings in the City of Glasgow.

Yours sincerely

George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

Finsbury Park terror attack: Angry crowd seize suspect

 

Dear All

Some time ago, I blogged on the rise of domestic terrorism in my posts on the migrant crisis, it has now arrived in the UK.

This example committed in London was someone hellbent on evil, luckily he was arrested but not before he murdered innocent people.

Isis knows for their terrorist strategy to work, they need  indigenous people to commit to acts of terror, that way, they will bring the terrorism of the Middle East into a European battlefield.

Yours sincerely

George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

Indecent proposal: Scotland’s unpopular SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon demands a seat at Brexit talks, having outed herself as ‘grass’ who can’t be trusted, is anyone bonkers enough to allow her to join the UK Brexit Team, Sturgeon also outed herself as unwilling to be a team player, it seems ‘daft arse’ is destine to be benched during the talks, more failure from a discredit SNP leader who history and people have passed by

Dear All

In the wake of the bitterness defeat since 1979, Nicola Sturgeon is trying desperately to regain the momentum after losing 21 seats at the General Election. The scale of the defeat is epic because the SNP cult thinking they were the new establishment thought that they had seats for life. In Glasgow, Glasgow North East was to fall by 242 votes to Paul Sweeney, the new MP for Scottish Labour and two other seats Glasgow East and Glasgow South West were in danger to the tune of 75 and 60 votes respectively.

The other piece of good news is that people aren’t donating to the SNP, and with the loss of 21 seats, the SNP has lost a ton of money. It seems that Nicola Sturgeon is toxic and stinks to high heaven with her own members and the voters. The image of Sturgeon, the nice caring benevolent leader has been seen as the sham, it is. A recent ‘lift’ video to raise her popularity wasn’t exactly a success as it looked like Sturgeon was passing the torch of First Minister to Conservative leader Ruth Davidson.

During the election, Nicola Sturgeon outed herself as a ‘grass’, a grass is someone who sticks someone in to attempt to save their own hide. In housing schemes, a grass is seen as a despicable person lowly person of dubious morals.

If you managed to catch me on the Gordon Brewer show on BBC Radio, you will have heard me saying that the devolved administrations should have a role in Brexit. Gordon Brewer said that was mighty big of me, but there is a slight problem, all the devolved administrations would have to accept Brexit and support the Westminster Government. The problem is that Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP don’t support Brexit and their actions speak volumes, and as there are multiple issues regarding trust not just at the negotiations but also in private, there seems no way that Sturgeon can get a seat at the Brexit table.

I find it funny that Nicola Sturgeon should make a fool of herself by urging the UK Government to take a more inclusive approach to negotiations by demanding a at the table during the Brexit discussions, she says it is "troubling". Denying Nicola Sturgeon isn’t "troubling" at all, Brexit must go ahead and Sturgeon has shown she isn’t a team player, dropping her is good man management.

Sturgeon is openly trying to sabotage Brexit by demanding that the UK remains in the single market which isn’t going to happen, the single market is EU membership without the rebate which is a complete non starter for the majority who voted Leave. Her argument is that if we aren’t in the single market it would put jobs, investment and living standards "on the line". You might ask ‘where is the proof’? After all making such a big statement must by its very nature have such proof easily to hand, but in this case, there isn’t any.

Nicola Sturgeon fought against Brexit and lost!

Her discredit pitch was made at  the University of Strathclyde's Advanced Forming Research Centre, Ms Sturgeon said:

"I think it is really troubling that these formal negotiations are getting under way today led by a UK Government that has no mandate, no credibility, no authority and no clear idea even amongst its own ranks of what it's trying to achieve”.

After asking for a seat, ‘daft arse’ proceeds to insult the UK Government because she knows that she isn’t getting a seat at the Brexit talks. What is happening in the UK and in Scotland is this, people have moved passed the SNP, they are a party going nowhere, they are stuck politically which means to unblock the impasse they need a new leader.

The SNP need a new leader, Nicola Sturgeon’s time is over politically, her hanging on is about transition to whoever comes next, not about leadership or direction.

Sturgeon added:

"We need to see a different approach to these negotiations if they are not going to end up being damaging to our economy. We need a more inclusive approach that involves voices from every part of the UK, including the Scottish Government, and we need an approach that has a common-sense objective. In my view, that common-sense objective should be keeping the UK in the single market because leaving the EU shouldn't mean jeopardising hundreds of thousands of jobs, shouldn't mean jeopardising investment and it shouldn't mean putting living standards on the line. That's what leaving the single market will do."

Naw!!!!!!!!!

Scottish independence support has collapsed to 27%, the people don’t want a second independence referendum and Sturgeon has put any attempt back years, minimum 2021 and probably more like 10 years assuming that the SNP get their act together which post Sturgeon is doubtful.

After Nicola Sturgeon goes the SNP will be in a state of decline, lets face it would you be able to pick a ‘rising star’ out of such dross?

Finally, the idea that Nicola Sturgeon is now a Brexiteer is laughable, and no one is laughing, no one in their right mind will be giving her a seat the Brexit talks because despite her claims on the single market, there is a bigger picture to consider.

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

A Nat in Denial: angry wee Nat Nicola Sturgeon hits out at ‘in denial’ claims after losing 21 SNP MPs at General Election, Sturgeon’s takes to twitter to lambaste the ‘Yoon Media’, guess we are back to a deeply damaged and wounded Nicola being the ‘horrible cow’ of old, Sturgeon squandered Salmond’s voter legacy built in 2012, the worst electoral reverse for an SNP leader since 1979

Dear All

Many commentators have said that Alex Salmond had become a parody of himself, in the past as First Minister; he seemed to be able to do no wrong. After losing in 2014, Salmond ended up as a bit of a crank who couldn’t keep his mouth shut. Out of the limelight as First Minister, the direction of travel was downwards. First, shipped off to Westminster to give unpopular Nicola Sturgeon a clear run of being out of his shadow, the clock was ticking towards defeat.

When Alex Salmond and a host of others lost their seats, the look on the faces of the SNP at the Glasgow count was priceless, in two short years, historic victory had turned very sour. Glasgow was thought to be secure, but the reality on the night turned out to be different. One seat was to fall and two others were less than 100 votes away from collapse. The majority of the work however was done by the SNP in their inept management of the government and the campaigns.

It seemed the idea was that a ‘message’ wasn’t needed just say SNP to the punters and they will come out and vote. As Professor John Curtice, the election guru said, and I agree, independence isn’t enough for SNP voters.

People are sick to death of referendums, and as the polling shows, they are sick to death of Nicola Sturgeon. To see Nicola Sturgeon walk into the Glasgow count, put on the fake smile for the cameras was equally priceless, especially since I had helped crack Glasgow to get Paul Sweeney into public office. Although he and others doubted the task, it was the biggest SNP swing in the last election, I thought different. I knew the area since I was ‘Campaign Rooms Manager’ (promoted) for the SNP in 2009, David Kerr’s by-election. David was a good candidate but in the wrong seat, totally, that campaign was well run but the work needed by the CLP in the area was really poor over years.

Nicola Sturgeon has squandered the goodwill that Alex Salmond managed to build up with his ‘jolly fat man’ routine, 2015 wasn’t Sturgeon’s victory, it was all done on the back of Salmond and 2012 onwards. Since the independence referendum, Nicola Sturgeon has run an inept government. A government which has failed to address issues, failing to lead, and constantly making bad decisions, everything Sturgeon touches turns to disaster, I have said this before in the past, still true now!

Nicola Sturgeon was portrayed in a comedy as a ‘horrible cow’, so how did the writers probably in London tap into what the women of Govan and Govanhill think? It is easy to explain, the mask that Nicola Sturgeon puts up slips on a regular basis, the eyes don’t lie. There is an angry wee Nat sitting in the office of First Minister who is full of grievance and bile.

It is amusing to see Nicola Sturgeon reacting angrily to claims she is “in denial” about the impact of the general election result. The reality is that her plans for a second independence referendum have been severely damaged. Brexit will come and go in due course, Sturgeon wouldn’t get a seat at the Brexit talks and there will not be a second independence referendum in this Westminster Parliament. This Parliament is thought by some to be going the distance, the full five years.

To show how rattled Sturgeon is the latest series of breakfast time Tweets are a hoot, she has a bunker mentality, lashing out and being in denial, she failed to discuss how Brexit affects the independence bid with the Scottish Cabinet on Tuesday. Her take is that she would “not be dictated to by demands for quick headlines”. This is from a woman who jumps from one short term vision to another like stepping stones in a river. The press paint Sturgeon as some kind of superwoman, the fact is the image is just a façade like the SNP crafted ‘caring’ image.

Sturgeon lost a third of her MPs amid a Unionist backlash against a second referendum which really angered people, enough is enough, and she kicked the hornet’s nest, obviously there would be a reaction. Nicola Sturgeon said she got into politics because of Thatcher, how ironic is it that by her own stupidity that she was partly responsible for the return of Conservatives in Scotland, 13 MPs in fact.

The opposition have been quick off the mark to claim Sturgeon is in denial and failing to face reality about the voters' verdict on her core policy. And with the effectively snubbed her cabinet in favour of talking to a tiny cabal of closer advisers shows the ‘big tent’ SNP is very much smaller than some people think. The cabal is said to have included deputy First Minister John Swinney, Brexit minister Michael Russell, and special adviser Ewan Crawford, not exactly a gathering of mensa.

It seems that finance and constitution secretary Derek Mackay, who helped run the SNP’s election campaign wasn’t invited to the top-level discussions on the constitution. Derek Mackay is a clown, so I suspect that there were no plans for entertainment being laid on. The SNP leadership is a clique, I wrote about this many years ago, and if you are a member then you can easily see this if you are in the party. The clique lives in their own little bubble, and they don’t listen which explains the lack of depth in SNP thinking.

Shortly after 8am on Wednesday, Ms Sturgeon took to Twitter to attack the media, that would be the ‘Yoon Media’, One thing ‘daft arse’ should have learned in politics is that you don’t attack the messenger, but there she is making a fool of herself.

She wrote:

“Most of media speculation about #ScotRef is nonsense. I'll set out way forward in due course after talking to people across @theSNP.

“I'll take decisions in best interests, not just of @theSNP, but of Scotland...and not be dictated to by demands for quick headlines!

“In meantime, @scotgov will focus on trying to influence Brexit talks - a Tory led hard Brexit is simply not acceptable post #GE2017.”

Influence the Brexit talks?

Has Sturgeon bought a loudhailer, is she going to stand outside and hope they hear her through an open window?

The SNP lost 21 of the 56 seats it won in 2015, its vote collapsed from 50 to 37 per cent, the worst electoral reverse for an SNP leader since 1979.

How did the success of 2015 turn so quickly for Nicola Sturgeon?

Failure to deliver!

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

General Election Special: B..b...b…beasted, unpopular Nicola Sturgeon loses 21 SNP MPs, how long can Peter Murrell remain Chief Executive of the SNP while the organisation is now purely a vehicle to promote his wife, Anne McLaughlin loses Glasgow North East, George Laird did the Labour campaign in Glasgow North East, and was hailed as “brilliant on the doorstep”

Dear All

The election special, in my time, I have done a number of elections and referendums, the snap election by Theresa May was out of the blue and to be honest, despite the large lead in the polls, I thought it was un-necessary and a mistake. Well, it was a mistake on the English side of the border. In Scotland however, it was a success, a success based on the Scottish Conservatives pro UK stance and also Nicola Sturgeon’s stupidity on attempting to ram another referendum down Scot’s throats.

As Sturgeon couldn’t get the ‘will of the people’ on her side, she decided that this was to be forgotten about and replaced by the ‘will of the parliament’. People don’t like to be ignored and in this election, there was tactical voting and also tactical activism by people such as myself in order to un-seat SNP MPs. What I would like to do is run through the campaigns I did and also throw in some observations about the election and where some things need to go.

The SNP in the shape of Alex Salmond claimed the SNP won the election, from 56 MPs in 2015, in the space of two years, they dropped down to 35 MPs, and many high profile people suffered the consequences of stupidity. The SNP campaign from ‘the message’ down to the ‘ground operation’ lacked focus, direction and drive. It lost in vote share in Glasgow however wasn’t down to some great strategy by the other parties. The lost of vote share since 2015 was down to SNP MPs being poor at their day job and in some cases employing dicks as caseworkers.

The SNP in Glasgow thought that they were the ‘new establishment’ and as such thought they had the City of Glasgow sown up as tight as a duck’s arse in the rainy season.

I am an anti-poverty campaigner and also a pro-poverty campaigner, you might be puzzled by this statement, how can you be both you are thinking? Well, very easy, my pro-poverty work is dumping as many elected SNP members onto the unemployment queue and as some people can tell you, I am relentless in pursuit of that task. So, let’s get to the campaigns that I took part in the next part of the post and my thoughts on how they ran. I am going to start off with the Scottish Conservatives first. In 2011, I did 4 campaigns, John Mason, Chris Stephens, James Dornan and Nicola Sturgeon, 3 out of the 4 campaigns were successful, since then, I haven't done as many in the one election until 2017. This was due to illness and circumstances and opportunity.

The Conservatives in East Renfrewshire ran a campaign which was designated as a key target seat for them, hence they stripped the West of Scotland of activists. They won by getting 21.496 votes. Their campaign was well run, it had direction and purpose; you know when you see people out sticking leaflets through doors in the heavy rain that these people were taking it seriously. The manpower to vote ratio probably wasn’t that great, as I said, it was overkill. I liked the campaign during the time I spent doing it, and was made to feel very welcome. Whether the same manpower resources would be available next time since other Conservatives became MPs in West of Scotland is debateable. The Labour campaign was poor, the candidate, Blair MacDougall as I said to the Conservatives was an ‘admin guy’ not a campaigner and the proof is the third place finish. He got 14,346 votes which when you look the 2015 result achieved by Jim Murphy who managed second place and 19, 295 rather proves my point. Paul Masterson the Conservative candidate won!

Admin guys don’t campaigners make!

The next campaign; is the Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock, after I left the East Renfrewshire campaign, I was contacted by the Conservative election agent Ian Davis, he asked could I come and help out, this was in the closing days of the election. I thought a trip down to Ayr would be a great ‘day out’. So, I jumped the train, and headed down. I was expecting to be just shunted into a team and end up leafleting but to my surprise, I was put with the candidate and election agent for canvassing. I enjoy canvassing as you get the chance to sell the candidate on the doorstep. The reception I got on the doorstep in wee mining villages was great, there was the odd die hard Labour punter and the ‘fuck the government’ people but people were willing to listen. Bill Grant was an ex fireman and former councillor, he knew this area and the history exceptionally well. So, I spent the day talking people into voting Conservative based on Bill Grant’s personal qualities. Bill Grant beat Corri Wilson of the SNP by a 20 point gain, in the circumstances and available people, this was a cracking result. I had one of the best days ever in politics in that campaign, the people were friendly and the team doing the election made me feel very welcome.

After I stood as an independent, I was contacted by Pollok CLP were I was previously a member to ask what I was doing after the election, basically asked if I would help out. I spoke with the organiser and said I would do some time in the campaign and put in 7 sessions as I had commitments to campaign elsewhere. When I told him I was campaigning for the Conservatives, he said that Labour HQ in Bath Street wouldn’t like this, so I said don’t tell them and also ‘fuck Labour HQ in Bath Street’. So, once we got that straight, I got sent texts about where campaigning was taking place, the first day was in Pollok, I turned up early and waited, of course the people arrived late but they are ‘special’. When they saw me, they drove straight pass me without stopping, to park on the other side of the square. When I walked over to meet them, no one spoke to me for a couple minutes, to say I felt unwelcome was an understatement.

Eventually the election agent Cllr John Kane spoke to me, guess what, I was completely under whelmed, I think the idea was to make me feel that as a highly experienced political campaigner that I was just a nobody and that they were the important people.

During the first session, Matt Kerr, the candidate approached me to tell me that if I got talking to someone on a door, I should get him, which I said no problem if he was nearby. I think this was him basically doubting my ability as a campaigner, I have done Pollok for 10 years, know the area, know the people and lived there 44 years. The canvassing session got off to a bad start due to them having too big a team, which made me wonder why they didn’t spilt up into two teams. I had brought a clipboard but after the ‘warm welcome’ I decided to say nothing as it was clear I wasn’t valued as a team member. At the next session, I turned up early as normal, Matt Kerr’s team didn’t; they went somewhere else, the other side of Peat Road because the street name they were supposed to meet at was similar to another on the other side of the road. I waited in the street for 30 minutes before I left. I gave up my entire morning to be at this event for 1 pm, to say I was less than impressed was an understatement. I contacted the organiser and he said come to the 5 pm session. I turned up at 4.45 pm, the candidate turned up at 5.15 pm, and of course no apology for not being at the meeting place at 1 pm earlier. At this point, after making an agreement to do 7 sessions, I wanted to get these sessions over as quickly as possible and leave these people to stew in their own shit.

I ended up going with the organiser, 5 people had turned up, me, the CLP organiser, the candidate, the election organiser who clearly didn’t know what she was doing and Franny, a union guy who I worked with previously on Lamont’s campaign. Me and the organiser went to do the Dalmellington estate, I led the session, gave him a map and we finished the main part in about 1 hr 25 minutes. The next session we finished completely the left side of Crookston Road and made it over to the other side which I had set up so two people could do it in the most time saving way possible.

I had a verbal agreement with the organiser for 7 sessions; I offered to do more on condition that I would get a ticket to the count; however the feedback I got back was that I wouldn’t be getting a ticket to the count under any circumstances, no matter how much work I did. After, my verbal agreement was terminated by the organiser, I walked away; the winning margin by the SNP was 60 votes. So, for the price of a ticket to the count which had zero monetary value, the Labour candidate Matt Kerr fucked himself out of a job with a £74,000 salary plus expenses plus pension contributions for the next 5 years. Matt Kerr only managed to put 888 votes onto the previous result of 2015. The SNP candidate dropped 9005 votes between 2015 and 2017. If I had kept working in the Glasgow South West campaign for Scottish Labour, I would have gotten the additional votes to put Matt Kerr into Westminster but due to stupidity, nastiness and inability to manage people and generally being a dick, he gets nothing. He completely destroyed any goodwill that existed between us. If he stands again, and he wants me in his campaign, he can go fuck himself because I won’t do it just for a “free ticket” to the count next time.

The last campaign was the Glasgow North East, the Labour candidate was Paul Sweeney, Paul had invited me along to a few Labour social events in the past which was a nice gesture by him; one was a speech by Danny Alexander which I enjoyed at Glasgow University Union. The other was a wee social gig which I met a few interesting people, anyway, I got in contact and asked if he wanted some help, he replied he would be happy for me to come along. The core team was Paul, Ian, Chris, Callum, Maureen, Margaret, Declan, Patricia and me, some others dropped in doing a day here and a day there but this was main group. I wanted to name them because this group pulled off an extraordinary result. 2015, the SNP took the seat with 21,976 votes, a plus 43.9 point gain. This was seen as a seat that would be hard to take back, I thought differently, and said so to the team and to Alex Rowley, out of all the seats in the City of Glasgow, I said this was the one that would fall. Although many people know me as a political activist, it was really brought home to the candidate when a former Labour Cllr from Bearsden turn round and said to him that she had listened to me on the doorstep and in her opinion, I was “brilliant”. I spent my time in Glasgow North East getting people who were undecided to vote Labour and turning SNP voters to vote Labour. In the end, the winning margin was 242 votes. It was a good campaign, it was up against it all the way, it lacked bodies but the main group were committed. In 2011, I campaigned in Inverclyde for the SNP Candidate Anne McLaughlin, six years later, I campaigned against her and she lost. Paul Sweeney will make an excellent constituency MP for Glasgow North East.

3 wins out of 4 is pretty decent going, my reputation as a campaigner is still secure, heading towards being a campaigning legend!

Finally, the SNP ran a poor campaign, although Kenny MacAskill has said that Sturgeon’s husband needs to be removed as Chief Executive, he should have gone a long time ago, the SNP has been turned into a vehicle to promote his wife and this impacted the result.

Nicola Sturgeon is poison on the doorsteps; just ask 21 ex SNP MPs!

Yours sincerely

George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

Nicola Sturgeon’s personal disaster: heavy losses, big hitters like Alex Salmond and Angus Robertson taken out, and the second referendum is now in serious doubt, 2015, SNP get 56 seats, 2017, SNP get 35 seats, and many others hang by a thread, the SNP cult waking up to the fact that an idiot at Westminster will have consequences

Dear All

This blog post isn’t my election special I want to work on that for Monday but in the meantime, wasn’t the General Election result very interesting?

We have a hung parliament, Theresa May gambled and she lost, in Scotland, the Scottish Tories did very well, this was due to in part by them marshalling their forces to key target seats.

This election in Scotland was a different game to what was played on the other side of the border, mainly due to the SNP holding 56 seats in 2015. Within the space of two years, 56 MPs were reduced to 35 MPs. And among the SNP were some very high profile casualties such as Alex Salmond and Angus Robertson, the depute leader.

You may remember in a previous post I said that nominations for a new deputy leader would be opening up.

The defeat is a defeat for Nicola Sturgeon, she maybe sitting with 35 seats, it is the majority, she declared she is the winner but the underlying trend is there, and it is that people have rejected a second independence referendum. It was stupid to think that after 2014, there would be an appetite for this after continued failure in government.

As I said in another previous post, the only game in town is governance, perhaps Nicola Sturgeon will get that through her thick head. The independence issue had been a factor in the losses but there are other problems, the SNP cult had filled Westminster up with a load of idiots, and the idiots became a problem, not just there but also in Scotland.

To be blunt……. You’re paid to work!

The grievance strategy bombed not just in the House of Commons but also in the minds of people, they want to see dialogue, they want to see co-operation and they want to see real change for their benefit.

The SNP has failed to deliver this on all counts.

Nicola Sturgeon lost 21 seats in Thursday’s vote.

And it could have been much worse, if the other parties had got their act together and had the run in of six months at it.

The Scottish Parliament has since voted in favour of the SNP government’s demands for another referendum, but now that idea is toast; beside that being reserved to Westminster, it is also un-winnable.   

Sturgeon said:

“I’m going to reflect carefully on the result. I’m going to take some time to do that.  Like all politicians I’ve now gone 36 hours or more without sleep. I don’t think these are the conditions to rush to judgements or decisions. I will consider carefully the outcome, listen to what voters were saying. “Undoubtedly the issue of an independence referendum was a factor in this election result, but I think there were other factors in this election result as well. I will reflect on that and come to considered judgements.”

Sturgeon’s focus will also be on that the SNP are down from 50 per cent of the popular vote to 37 per cent. Although the SNP had a very successful go at destroying Labour in Scotland, their strategy was flawed, a by-product was people voting Conservative and them not being effective in government at Holyrood.

Deputy First Minister John Swinney said the loss of seats had been partly down to the constitutional issue.

He added:

“We will take time and care to reflect on the outcome of this result, but we have to acknowledge that the question of a second independence referendum was a significant motivator of votes against the SNP in this election and we have to be attentive to that point.”

The only game in town now is governance which means….. George Laird right again.

Tory leader Ruth Davidson:

“This was an election that was dominated by one issue: Nicola Sturgeon’s decision in March to demand a second referendum on independence. We led the opposition to that referendum. The Scottish people spoke. The SNP’s vote down 13 per cent. Nearly half a million votes gone between 2015 and today. Our vote up 13 per cent. The largest share of the vote for the Scottish Conservatives since 1979. “SNP MPs who lost their seats have paid the price or what was a massive political miscalculation on Nicola Sturgeon’s part.”

The SNP by default, sheer stupidity and lack of a work ethic changed the political map of Scotland thinking that they might take a hit of a few seats but that as the ‘new establishment’ they would be like Scottish Labour and have about 50 seats secure.

That as we have seen by other close results is an illusion!

People don’t want gimmicks, they want results, they don’t want stories, they want facts, and the in the cold light of day, these results show that some people although they scrapped into Parliament on a whisker are on a sticky wicket.

I would think that with the hung parliament, Tories and DUP, we will see no election take place before end of Brexit, after Brexit is concluded and depending on the numbers, Theresa May May might go again, but she needs breathing space. She has to get a good deal, she has to show improvement and she has to fix things for people so that life for those at the bottom is less difficult. That being said, some people think that the Tory/DUP coalition will only go six months, and there is talk by some of an October election, May needs to steady the ship.

The next General Election will be a corker, Jeremy Corbyn’s position is secure, but Labour has a load of problems internally to fix, but the direction of travel was pretty positive.

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

Dear All, I am knackered blog post, either later today or tomorrow

Cutting loose deadwood: Shambolic Shadow Home Sec Diane Abbott is entirely unfit to be Home Sec, in a street in Glasgow, a female Labour activist was put on the spot about Diane Abbott even before the epic meltdown on SKY with Dermot Murnaghan, how can you disagree with a voter who calls her rubbish and a liability

Dear All

One of the things I like when I go on the doorstep campaigning is to run across knowledgeable people who take an interest in politics; I find that a real treat, although I impart information, I certain enjoy when people put me on the spot. In politics, it is impossible to know everything about everything, but if you hold a shadow cabinet position, you are required to keep up to date with current events and reports.

Because in the space of one day, you may find yourself elected to the hot seat of the government portfolio which you are shadowing!

The job of Home Secretary is an important position in British Government, although more glam is given to the PM, the Foreign Sec and of course Chancellor.

Diane Abbott has had a series of interviews where is it patently obvious that she doesn’t understand her brief, she is entirely unsuitable to the role, and has no depth of knowledge.

On a doorstep in Glasgow, I was going round with a woman called Robin to chat to voters, so….. we get to this door and the guy behind it answers, and we get chatting, he was sitting on the fence, so I made my pitch. He then turn rounds and says he could never see Diane Abbott as Home Sec, so he asks Robin who came out for the day to campaign for a Labour candidate, what did she think.

It was hilarious because the answer was so obvious that Robin couldn’t say it, where could she take the conservation from that having been put on the spot. So, I answered, I told the guy that he was right, and said:

“Diane Abbott is fucking useless, and I couldn’t see her as Home Secretary either”.

We left the guy still undecided but with doubt, the doubt was did he want to pass up getting someone who could be a constituency MP for him, his family and his area.

As,we left, Robin and me chatted about the encounter, and she didn’t expect to get thrown such a curve ball, but I explained that is what politics is about, someone somewhere is going to ask you the ‘awkward question’. Although the correct answer was Diane Abbott was useless, telling the truth is sometimes like taking the leap of faith. The guy was right, so I reinforced his opinion, but said to him that politics is like football, not all the best players are in the same team.

Diane Abbott should never have been appointed as Shadow Home Sec by Labour, it was a mistake, there are better candidates, and what is required is a person less volatile, steady as the Rock of Gib and knowledgeable, the defence of the United Kingdom is too serious to have someone like her in charge.

Diane Abbott has too much baggage!

The car crash interviews are like gold dust to her political opponents, the Sky News with Dermot Murnaghan was funny, but once you get passed the laughing stage, you have to think, could you trust the safety of the UK in her hands?

My answer is……. Fuck no!

The wake of another toe-curling TV meltdown should lead on thing, Diane Abbott should step down as Shadow Home Sec with immediate effect;, her struggling to give answers about the content of the Harris report shows a lack of depth. Having tried to bluff her way through which was the wrong tactic and lacks dignity, she should have said that although she had read the report, she wasn’t able to recall detail.

Truth in politics is still the gold standard; it would have also moved the interview on to allow Dermot Murnaghan to ask her opinion on specific details, rather than the meltdown we saw. It now appears that Abbott has backed out of a radio interview today after being 'taken ill'. She was due to appear on BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour today for a debate with Home Secretary Amber Rudd.

One can only hope her ‘illness’ included a phone call to Jeremy Corbyn to stand down, however I doubt she will, she is blinded by ego!

I found this picture online of Diane Abbott being ‘unwell’, which seems that her illness must have lifted at less at Oxford Circus Tube station at 8.40am but she also Evening Standard election hustings event tonight. 

Clearly, we have an enigma of ‘TV and Election hustings’ sickness, which is a new one on me.

If you have watched Diane Abbott over the years on shows like This Week, you would get a pretty decent picture of what she is and what she is not, and being a government minister is not what she should be. Being an ally of Jeremy Corbyn isn’t enough, and shouldn’t be enough to secure a ministerial post.

Diane Abbott doesn’t have a clue about the recommendations of a major report into beefing up security in the capital, and she should have, former Metropolitan Police Authority chairman Lord Toby Harris spent a lot of time and effort to prepare a report, not only should she have read it, she also should have met with him and used his expert advice to shape Labour policy.

Diane Abbott was unable to identify a single one of the 127 recommendations when asked about it by Dermot Murnaghan, although it would be unreasonable to expect her to blurt out all 127, you would expect more than one.

The former independent reviewer of terror legislation, Lord Carlile said Ms Abbott's interview was the 'one of the most shocking things I've ever heard in an election'. He added Diane Abbott was 'not fit to be involved in home affairs policy' and the UK should ensure 'people who purport to be in charge of national security know something about it.' 

Diane Abbott has to go, she is a liability and it would be better if she stepped down, or she could be the deciding factor in Labour failing to win government, national security, especially at this time is regarded seriously by the public, Abbott is entirely unfit to hold that post.

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

London Bridge killers; Islamic terrorism hits London yet again, seven innocent people are killed by Muslim extremists who didn’t enjoy their killing spree as they died in a hail of bullets, we have to bring forward in Westminster, an Act of Parliament which allows for an internment and deportation programme, the need is pressing and urgent, threats to national security can never be allowed to roam freely in our country

Dear All

One thing is clear, Islamic terrorists want to turn Europe into a battlefield, they want to kill, to murder, to maim and they want it all to be brutal. There are said to be 3,000 people that the British Services have information on, but these people are able to live among us. Some of these people and others will go on to commit terrorists’ acts; it is a matter of when, not if.

Seven people died and up to 50 were injured when three Muslims terrorists, decided to go on a killing spree, they managed to do all this with very limited resources, using a vehicle and also large knives. Judging by their actions and choice of instruments of terror, I think we can safely conclude that these people weren’t professionally trained which although isn’t a comfort to the victims, is a blessing that things weren’t a lot worse.   

The terrorists mowed down pedestrians and started stabbing people at random once they exited the vehicles, eye witnesses who saw the horror unfold also spoke of seeing victims with their throats cut. The people who did the killings didn’t live long to celebrate their success as armed police responded quickly and took out the terrorists with deadly force. In a situation like this, the priority is to save lives of innocent people, contain the incident and secure the area. Police shot dead the terrorists within eight minutes of initial call, however, the situation was to last a lot longer than that, as emergency services responded.

Thirty-six people remain in hospital at this time, including 21 who are in critical condition following the attack, the death toll may rise but let us hope for the best, and pray that those in hospital survive to go home. Most people haven’t been stabbed, when it happens to you it feels like you have been punched, and generally it happens so fast you don’t feel the pain till later. The real shock is when you see the blood loss which spills out so fast, that the important thing is to stem the flow and lie down as soon as practical. When you lose blood, you feel cold, you can literally feel the coldness travel down you face, lying flat is a good way drop the heart rate so the rate of blood pumped out is slowed. Some knife wounds cause death by cutting an artery that the flow cannot be stopped by just pressing the wound.

We need to look at solutions, we have imported problems into our country, and allowed dangerous people to roam free, we need to act, and the need is in the interest of national security. During the height of the migrant crisis, you will have seen my call for detention camps, some European leaders such as Donald Tusk, came to the same conclusion, because within the migrant population, terrorists came into Europe, we have seen the results.

What we need now is internment.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment

Internment is an option which now must be considered as a way forward, and we also need to deport people back to their home countries, when there is evidence that they represent a potential threat and impose life ban on entering this country, extreme vetting must also be introduced.

In an ideal world such measures wouldn’t be needed, but things are far from ideal, what needs to happen is action because things cannot be put off or the relevant discussion connected with them.

New laws on terrorism will have to be introduced, we have to be more pro-active and there must be cross party support in Westminster, obviously this won’t apply to the SNP, their record speaks for itself.

London has yet again seen murder, and the political class is saying how terrible it is, national campaigning has been stopped but local campaigning continues, but be have to move beyond politicians expressing ‘concern’ and ‘that’s terrible’, virtual signalling isn’t helping proved solutions.

Internment isn’t going to fix the problem, it is just part of a range of solutions which will need to be brought forward, we can expect more attacks, some of which will make the headlines, but we have to attempt to close down options. I said in the pass that the army needed to be brought onto the streets of Europe. Although this isn’t the role which they were designed for, it proves government with people who have been trained in firearms. If we don’t consider this option, we have to expect that the need to a fully armed and expanded police force is necessary and pressing.

The demand for action will come from all communities in the United Kingdom, no one is safe, and fear breeds distrust and resentment, the price of diversity is a break down in social cohesion.  

Finally, the three men who went on a murder spree managed to kill seven people and injured many others, they are now dead, they had a hatred of British values, and they achieved nothing. Although we will remember all the victims, these people’s names will be forgotten in time, their evil won’t however in the minds of the British people.

The Internment programme is a Bill which needs to be top priority in the next parliament.

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

SNP squeaky bum time: Top SNP figures in danger of defeat to Tory gains, Angus Robertson and Pete Wishart are in the political crosshairs as they stand a good chance of being picked off, Scotland needs a ‘Portillo’ moment, as parties rush to stick activists and resources in key target seats, this election is the year of ‘tactical activism’

Dear All

There is an old saying, justice will eventually catch up with you; and for the SNP; there is a pressing need for the public to remove some of the SNP duds who have been sent to Westminster.

The SNP’s work record at Westminster is poor!

You could be charitable and say start up problems but the problem goes much deeper that plain ignorance, the SNP are a party who by their very nature cannot work with others. There is an arrogance of superiority which just doesn’t stand the test of scrutiny, cheap gimmicks; clapping, singing and being lazy are all you could pull from the 2015 stint by the Nationalists.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/733983/Nationalist-MPs-league-shame-claim-Labour-party

Voting records don’t lie!

Figures showed many Nationalist MPs claiming far more in expenses than the people they replaced and the kicker is that their work rate is below average.

How is this ‘Stronger for Scotland’, the SNP gimmick to fool people that their MPs are champions working out in the cold light of day?

People were duped!

And it isn’t just the real non-entities who aren’t producing, no, it goes right up to the top of the tree, Westminster leader Angus Robertson and his fellow veterans Stewart Hosie and Pete Wishart did not ask a single written question according to the official records.

This snap election has caught many people on the hop, coming straight after the council election; there aren’t a lot of people kicking about the place to help. It is an open secret, that the Scottish Conservatives in some places such as Glasgow North East and Glasgow North West have effectively got ‘paper candidates’ standing in this election. The Scottish Conservatives are putting a lot of eggs in the East Renfrewshire basket, you can see this by their twitter feed, Conservative candidates who should be pounding the pavements in their own seat, camped out in East Renfrewshire.

Resources are scarce and people are even more valuable than money, although the Conservatives are swimming in cash compared to other parties such as Scottish Labour. In some areas, we are seeing a three way fight but with the ‘paper candidates’ of the Conservatives in Scotland being drafted elsewhere, we get the classic two horse race.

Glasgow North East is a classic two horse race between the SNP and Scottish Labour, the Conservatives although third in 2015, aren’t even close not even the swing can fix this for them, and with Jack Wyillie being AWOL, not even at the hustings, you can tell how where the priorities are. On the Glasgow North East seat, I think that the Conservatives should have given the seat to someone who was willing to make a go of it, they would still have lost but they at least would have put up a fight. Imagine going on stage knowing that you didn’t even try, which is what Jack Wyillie will do on election night. I have met him, and he comes across as a reasonable guy, we even campaigned in the rain together during this election (more on that in my election special).

The resources of the political economy are such that they have to be carefully managed, but sometimes having a big name can cover a lot of cracks. In this election, Scotland has a rare chance to create a ‘Portillo’ moment. When Michael Portillo was done in at a General election many people cheered loudly, losing was in his case the best thing that ever happened to him politically.

I would even say, he became a better person.

Many people, and I include myself would really like to see some of the top SNP figures who are in danger of defeat to Tories get what they deserve and be put out on the bricks. Everyone wants to see SNP’s deputy leader, Angus Robertson as the highest profile casualty of this General Election. I don’t know about you but when a pompous git gets what is coming to them, the World just feels like a better place, you get a little faith back in humanity.

An exclusive poll findings put the Scottish Conservatives on a possible track to get eight seats, this translates to a two-decade high for them, they have failed to win more than a single Scottish seat since Tony Blair’s landslide in 1997. So, they see this election as a real comeback chance, if they can win Westminster seats, they stand a good chance of cracking Holyrood seats, and they have a goal, attempting to take control of Holyrood.

As you know, and as the polling shows, Scottish Labour is struggling badly against the SNP, although there are good candidates, there are also duds standing who don’t deserve the time of day never mind the vote.  

According to the Electoral Calculus projector, Tory seats would be gained at the expense of the SNP which isn’t a revelation, several polls have shown a surge in support for the Tories in Scotland because of their pro Uk stance, after Kezia Dugdale dropped the ball on Unionism, the Conservatives just scooped it up with no problem. If anyone has helped the Scottish Conservatives, it is Kezia Dugdale, she also helped the SNP, but so far hasn’t managed to help her own party.

The Scottish Labour Party hasn’t the money, the activists and the resources, said it before, say it again, they need a new campaign model, and aren’t in a fit state to campaign. That problem needs to be addressed post election or given the way they operate probably not, as long as the leadership have paid elected positions, there is no sense from what I see of urgency.

If constituencies such as Aberdeen South, Aberdeenshire West and Kincardine, Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk, as well as Dumfries and Galloway are seized by the Tories, it will be because they targeted resources at the expense of other areas. In Moray, Angus Robertson is defending a 9,065 majority but polling suggests strongly he will fail to be re-elected. In Perth, Pete Wishart has a real fight as well, Ian Duncan MEP is up against him, he is the Conservative candidate and he also has a good record as an MEP to draw on, and of course, the real test, he is willing to go try hard for the win. You have to like the attitude of someone who is taking this seriously, as he is going, Wishart has been an MP for a long time but this time, he really does face a test.

Rural Scotland is where the Scottish Conservatives are sticking their activists and cash, it could pan out them; eight seats aren’t to be sniffed at. One funny thing, this is from Ruth Davidson, she said that the defeat of Robertson in Moray would be “a real Ed Balls moment for Scotland”. Ruth Davidson should be afraid to embrace that Robertson getting slotted would be a Portillo moment, we all know this kind of defeat is a Portillio moment, use the correct terminology, don’t go all ‘poundland’ with a second hand cheap knock off.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVvWE6V9ulE

This is Michael Portillio’s defeat, you can clearly see, the boy is gutted.

Polling these days is a risky business; we have seen the polling get it spectacularly wrong the BMG polling put the SNP on 38 per cent, the Scottish Conservatives on 25, Labour 16. I don’t think the polling reflects the Labour position as others put them on 25% and neck and neck with the Conservatives.

The fight is still on for the parties, this campaign will probably be known more for the way that Scottish Conservatives and Scottish Labour targeted their resources and activists and how some candidates were either effectively abandoned or transferred to help out in places such as East Renfrewshire.

In this election, I have an interest in several seats, Moray, Perth, Ayr, Glasgow North East and East Renfrewshire for various reasons. Seeing Angus Robertson get stuffed would be a hoot, but one thing to remember, in elections, the best candidate doesn’t always get elected.

The proof lies in the Westminster voting record, and verbal and written questions asked, and as we see with the SNP, they might as well not be there for all the good they have done in the last two years.

Finally, nominations for SNP Deputy leader are possibly about to open up, Angus Robertson if he loses will not be eligible....... as Jean Luc Picard famously uttered:

"Make it so"!

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University