Securing the Holyrood Hostages, Scottish Parliament Election 2021 latest Ipsos MORI poll puts SNP on course for Holyrood majority, pro UK party leaders are looking increasingly likely to be all 'list' MSPs at Scotland's 'Hanoi Hilton' in Edinburgh, one person desperate to secure a place 'behind the wire' is Alex Salmond from the Alba Party, latest polling yet again shows that pro UK parties need to step up, the Holyrood voting system is broken, and needs replaced, each MSP should have a constituency made up of two wards, lack of reform makes elections less competitive

Dear All 

It is pretty obviously what Alex Salmond, the leader of the Alba Party is doing in this election. Salmond wants people who support independence and normally vote SNP to switch using the list system. His rationale is that SNP list votes are wasted votes, but this is based on an old 5 year old election of 2016. As we know people can switch their vote and also decide not to vote. Nicola Sturgeon's party is seen as crooked and corrupt, more and more evidence is coming out regarding that. In election time, all news isn't good news, and if the SNP constituency vote is pressurised, then Sturgeon may have need of list seats in a region as a backup. 

In areas were the SNP is strongest, the central belt, it is doubtful that there will be much change. There hasn't been a massive defining issue so far in this election which has broken through to collapse the SNP vote. But that doesn't mean the SNP aren't worried, regardless of worried or not, they don't want any party, whether Alba or Scottish Greens to get independence minded voters. Alex Salmond's target voter cache is pretty much exclusively SNP voters! 

In 2014, the SNP lost the Scottish independence, in a backlash, people voted SNP which gave them 56 seats at the 2015 Westminster election. Have you see an issue or a set of circumstances which so far which will have the effect of collapsing the SNP vote? Have you seen a backlash so far which will cause people to come and vote for pro UK parties? In order to pick off SNP MSPs in a constituency, you need a sole pro UK candidate. Although George Galloway and his All for Unity have been accused of trying to spilt the vote, the same allegation applies to all the pro UK parties. Pro UK parties are standing candidates in areas where they have no chance of winning. 

Let's take Glasgow Pollok, the Scottish Conservatives are standing a person called Sandesh Gulhane as their candidate. Sandesh is a smart guy, he is qualified as a medical doctor, but in Glasgow Pollok, he is a paper candidate. Worse than that, he is a paper candidate who can been seen campaigning in other areas of Glasgow. Just recently, he was campaigning in Carntyne and in Anniesland, Glasgow.  If he was just an activist, you wouldn't think twice about it, but he is a candidate in Glasgow Pollok. The point is, Sandesh Gulhane wouldn't win the seat he is standing in, but those conservatives voters could help the main opposition, Scottish Labour win the seat. 

If a single pro UK candidate stood in Glasgow Pollok, the odds for SNP MSP Humza Yousaf go down drastically. 

You may find if you look at Scottish Conservatives on Twitter, that Sandesh will also be in Newton Mearns at some point. The Scottish Conservatives just like other parties sometimes put paper candidate in an area where they know they have no hope of winning. This is to do with marketing, and saying that no area is a no go area for a party, it isn't to do with winning or unseating an incumbent. In order to win a seat, a political party must do and be serious about  long campaigning coupled with using their elected Councillors as first contact. If you cannot get name recognition of your Councillor in an area, then you are doing something seriously wrong. That is the springboard for launching successful challenges in Holyrood and Westminster elections. 

To return to nationalist politics, despite the pledges of running a 'good' campaign for a #supermajority, the Alba Party just like the SNP are locked in desperate fight for independence voters. The SNP needs to continual to spin the lie that they are campaigning for independence, when in fact they have done nothing for 5 years. In 5 years, the SNP independence campaigning could best be described as a few idiots, like Mhairi Black, Pete Wishart, Keith Brown and other related donkeys turning up at AUOB marches and standing at the front of the march. So, the SNP haven't been campaigning, and haven't been doing government well, so what have they been doing? They have been involved in identity politics, specifically the sexualisation of children in school, and the promotion of lgbt issues.

 

As Scotland goes further into decline, the SNP has created lost generations of kids in the education system. Eventually, those lost kids who grow to be adults and have no careers and jobs will be looking to blame someone, they will blame the SNP. The SNP work at causing division and hatred, but in building hate, they will realise a monster which will turn on them down the line. Nicola Sturgeon has made Scotland into a failed State, not just in  atangible sense by making really bad financial choices, like those two rusting ferry hulks, or buying a failing airport. Sturgeon is merging government, parliament and the Crown Office together so they cease to function independently. Its history repeating itself, you had the Blair years of 'sofa government' where the nation is not run by a Cabinet but run by the leader and the special advisors. Sofa government doesn't work in the long term. 

Alex Salmond in this election wants revenge, and why not, the SNP and their servant class tried to stitch him up, then they tried to jail him for multiple sexual offences. He was found to be innocent, and well we all know the bad blood since the criminal trial. Salmond has been the victim of an ongoing smear campaign, orchestrated behind the scene using SNP proxies, like Rape Crisis Scotland. And of course by Nicola Sturgeon who joined in herself questioning his suitability to return to public office. Apparently despite being cleared in a court of law isn't good enough for Nicola Sturgeon. Salmond is playing a clever game, he isn't going to fight her on her ground over the alleged sexual allegations. Salmond knows how to play the game, he is moving onto his ground where Sturgeon is weakness. And that is accusing  Nicola Sturgeon of failing to press forward the case for Scottish independence. This is the perfect vehicle for Alex Salmond. He wants to take away and win over independence voters, and importantly keep them from the SNP. You see, if you pay attention, you know Salmond cannot take out Sturgeon in this election, but he can lay the ground work for next year's council elections and the main event, 2024, the Westminster election. I would put a small wager on Salmond standing Westminster candidates in every single constituency in Scotland. 

Of course, Salmond has a mountain to climb personally, a new poll put his approval rating at -55%, given the media is shutting avenues for him to get election coverage, this is to be expected. Much like other parties in this election, the very latest polling doesn't look good for the Alba Party. Salmond's party is the new kid on the block, he needs a boost, but being denied access to the leaders debates, he will struggle. Ipsos MORI’s Scottish Political Monitor, run in partnership with STV News, found that 53 per cent of Scots planned to vote for Nicola Sturgeon’s party on the constituency ballot. The survey, conducted between March 29 and April 4, showed the Scottish Conservatives in a distant second place in the constituency race. Part of the rest for this is a shortage of activists and an aggressive policy agenda,  they are down three points to 20 per cent. Scottish Labour gained three points, sitting on 18 per cent, let's face it, that doesn't translate to a Sarwar bounce. 

You can see now why Alex Salmond is attacking Sturgeon on independence, he has to erode her support. The pro UK party news is as equally depressing, the Scottish Conservatives will have a job hanging onto be the official opposition, and Scottish Labour sitting on 18 per cent that is just pretty awful. There will further polling which will come thick and fast, but over the long term, there is a message for all the political parties. Failing to have a single pro UK candidate in a constituency means losing all round to the SNP because we are living in a polarised political situation. In order to remove the SNP, you would need several elections of a single pro UK candidate at both Westminster and Holyrood elections, and you would need a pro UK Holyrood government to dramatically change the lives of Scots for the better.  

People vote for the SNP for numerous reasons, some because they believe in independence, some because they are part of the identity culture politics, and some people because of the SNP election bribes. There is one group which stands above all else, do you know how that happy bunch of campers are? This single group is the disaffected former Labour voters who changed to SNP because they were repeated failed by Scottish Labour Party elected politicians. These were the middle class people who when they were MPs and MSPs, failed to serve the communities they were elected too. The working class  people got so fuck off with them, that they threw them out of office, and replaced with trash from the SNP. The mindset of the voters who done this could be explained this way, 'yes, the SNP is trash, but I am not going to give you a wage, so you can sit and do fuck all for me'. 

The Scottish Labour Party has never turned a microscope on themselves to address the issue of the failing politicians who don't provide value to a community. Because they could care, they have no mechanism to address this problem, if you are a constituent and your MP or MSP wouldn't take up your case, you have no recourse to the Labour Party. Even if everything you say is right, they just don't give a fuck, when too many people got fuck over, like a virus it poisoned the 'voter well' in a constituency. You might say, oh that's a bit harsh, and where is the evidence, well I would say, don't just look at the latest polling, support for Scottish Labour has been around 17% to 23% mark for some considerable time, and there is no evidence they are willing to address their internal issues or reach out and fix the legacy they created by falling to serve constituents. 

Scottish Labour is sitting on 18 per cent, they are a major UK national political party! 

Finally, if this snapshot of the election polling remains unchanged, then the SNP are still going to be the government of Scotland. One way to fix the voting system is to remove the list system so each MSP covers two wards, this would mean that candidates would have to work to get elected. It would also make the elections more competitive for both larger and smaller parties and independents. The issue of rigged the system has to be addressed, and under the present setup, this broken system means there is no change of Scotland moving out of failed State territory anytime soon. This is why the Scotland Act needs redesigned at Westminster, the parties in Scotland all have their leaders top of their various lists, this has created a 'stockholm syndrome' to occur. Add in polarisation of the voting in Scotland means the current system of election isn't fit for purpose. That is why I will keep proposing the list system is scrapped and a new system replacing it as soon as possible where each MSP candidate fights for two wards making up their constituency.

Yours sincerely 

George Laird                                                                                                                                The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University