Scotland

Bad news for David Mundell. The Tories’ sole MP in Scotland (at the moment!) might think himself the obvious choice to be Scottish Secretary, should David Cameron form a government later this year but the party leader seems much less convinced of poor Mr Mundell’s merits, telling the Herald today: “You will have to wait and see what appointments are made if we win an election but, suffice it to say, David has done an excellent job.” So, Cameron’s looking for an alternative. And reasonably so. Mr Mundell is an inoffensive man and that’s not something you can say about all MPs, but few people, I think, truly think that

A reader asks for a comment on the Scottish Budget “debate” at Holyrood. Well, I’m always sometimes happy to oblige: It passed. OK: the Tories and the Greens supported the SNP in return for promises to publish details of government expenditure online and set up an independent budgetary review commission (Tory demands) and bung more money to people wanting to insulate thier lofts (the Greens’ sweetie).  But this was a phoney budget and not just because so much depends upon what happens to the block grant handed down from Westminster. Longer-term questions weren’t even addressed, let alone answered. And, ultimately, a budget that dispenses spending but doesn’t raise money isn’t

Iain Dale says he has absolutely no idea why the Scottish Tories have failed to make as much headway as their Welsh counterparts. A new opinion poll puts the Conservatives on 32% on Wales, only 3% behind Labour, and a massive 11% up on the last general election. However, in Scotland, the Conservative ratings are only marginally up on 2005, Why is this? Why are Welsh Conservatives so much more successful than their counterparts north of Hadrian’s Wall? We’ve ridden these marches here before, but another trip can’t do any harm. The first and most obvious answer is that the SNP is a much stronger beast than Plaid Cymri for

Why do so many people hate politics? Partly because politicians insist upon making everything a matter of wearying, partisan, sillyness. Take this painting for instance. Hardly a masterpiece, not least because the young girl looks as though she knows she’s marching off to doom and that is the consequence of yet another episode of national folly. But, still, it’s just a picture and, in the end, only a Christmas card. But it’s Alex Salmond’s official Christmas card and so, natch, a matter for bickering and seasonal tomfoolery. As the Scotsman, which oddly now seems to consider the Cross of St Andrew a piece of “nationalist iconography” that, presumably, therefore belongs

Ochone, ochone! The plight of the Scottish Tories has been receiving attention again this week. As Pete pointed out, the latest Tartan poll puts the Tories at just 18% north of the Tweed. This means, 12 years on from the 1997 disaster, that, in Iain Martin’s words, “They’re getting absolutely nowhere, slowly.”  True. In 1979, Scottish Conservatives won 22 seats and comprised 6.5% of the UK parliamentary party. It’s fair to say they’ll get nowhere near that next year. But look at this list of some of the seats the Tories won thirty years ago: Aberdeenshire East, Angus South, Argyll, Banff, Galloway, Moray &Nairn, Perth & East Perthshire. Most were

Now that the Conservatives have promised a referendum on any future transfers of power to Brussels and have, in general, become fans of referenda perhaps the party leadership can address the other looming referendum issue: that pertaining to the Act of Union of 1707. Perhaps you can be in favour of a referendum on Lisbon and other EU matters and opposed to a Scottish independence referendum but I confess to finding this combination implausible and unsatisfactory. Furthermore, a referendum is clearly popular: polling suggests that roughly 60% of voters want such a vote and that they want it sooner rather than later. This being so, and in light of recent

So, it seems that dreams of a referendum next year have been dashed. 2010, once the Year of the Referendum, will now be plebiscite-free. No referendum on the Lisbon Treaty and no referendum on the Act of Union either. This my be good news for voters but it’s tough on hacks who’ll need to find something else to write about. But, for a moment, let’s consider some of the implications of this. I’ll leave the Lisbon question to one side for now and reiterate my suspicion that Labour, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats are helping, not hindering Alex Salmond, by agreeing to delay nay referendum until after the next