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