The Red Paper on Scotland

The Red Paper on Scotland - about: "The Red Paper - now

The Red Paper on Scotland is edited by Vince Mills, Director of the Trade Union Research Unit at Glasgow Caledonian University. This collection of essays mimics the 1975 original (see below) in that it has assembled socialists from across the spectrum of radical thought – Communist Party, Green Party, Labour Party, Socialist Party and, of course, those from no Party at all. This publication is intended as a source of information that can be used to expose the lies of 21st century neo-liberalism with its policy of war against the poor at home and abroad, as well as a source of alternative ideas that will help us all build the better world envisioned in the Scottish socialist tradition embodied in the 1975 publication and the centuries of struggle that came before it."

willy's famous led zeppelin jacket

Last glimpse of a disappearing World - [Sunday Herald]: "Some of the images, and some of the people, I have grown up with. There’s Willie Burn’s Led Zeppelin embroidered jacket with an oil rig in the background. There’s Mona, as a young child, by a loch, alluring as ever. The big open sky of Lewis, the curling dampness of the shore, the dusting of snow on the moor. It was from Wylie that I learned what Skye would look like, and I was not disappointed when I arrived there."

Torcuil Crichton writing in sunday herald www.sundayherald.com yesterday... unfortunately i dont have a copy or copyright to show the gus wylie photo, but its only one amongst an amazing oeuvre...

quintron! that was fuckin amazing man!

down at optimo in the sub club last night to hear quintron and pussycat. a show like nothing else you'll see - puppetry and swamp-tech jive. these guys should be world stars; and not just q and p but the dancer too, she was hot.

and i spoke to quintron right after the show and said quintron! and he looked up and i said that was fucking amazing man! and he smiled a little bush doctor smile and shook my hand over the radiator grille and headlights of his organ.

Scottish TUC votes for reform

Published in the Morning Star

(Tuesday 06 December 2005)

MALCOLM BURNS in Glasgow

THE Scottish TUC agreed changes yesterday to the structure of its general council which will see fewer members and the end of industrial sections.

A proposal by public-sector UNISON which argued for a 50 - 50 gender balance was defeated, along with moves by former steel union Community and transport union RMT to ensure representation for smaller unions.

The success of the general council's motion will mean a reduction in members from 42 to 36 and replacement of the traditional industrial sectors with two as yet unspecified sections.
These sections, known only as Section A and Section B, each comprise 14 members.

Six seats in each of these sections will be reserved for women.
Representation of black workers, young workers, disabled workers and trades union councils will remain the same at two seats each, with one woman in each of those sections.

The general council will also continue to be elected by the STUC Annual Congress as a whole.

With the support of all the major unions apart from UNISON, the general council's own motion was never likely to fail.

Past president Ann Douglas, moving on behalf of the general council, referred to eight principles which had been involved in putting the proposal together.
These included relevance to new workplace and trade union structures, gender balance and inclusiveness of smaller unions.

UNISON chief Mike Kirby's claim that the consultation outcome had been decided by a "meeting of the heads of the families" resulted in unscripted responses on behalf of the other large unions by Amicus Scottish Secretary John Quigley and PCS offical Eddie Reilly.

Supporting the general council's position, Mr Quigley was forthright: "When Amicus came into being we saw our numbers on the general council reducing, but the bill going up.

"We swallowed that. This year, the existing structure would mean us leaving three seats vacant to an organisation with about 1,500 members.
"It defies logic. If the heads of the families met - well, that's right. If we're trying to find a way forward, that happens and I don't apologise for that."

And miners union NUM offical Nicky Wilson made an appeal for the smaller unions to trust the bigger ones.

"I understand the fears of RMT and Community, but we trust our sister unions and will work with them hand in hand."

However, trust appeared to be in short supply amongst representatives of other small affiliates.

Referring to the eight principles which Ms Douglas had mentioned, Community's Willie Paterson said: "We only need one principle: inclusion not exclusion."

But only seven out of the STUC's 24 local trades union councils were represented.

• Card votes were held on the ruling of STUC president John Keenan in the chair. The amendments by Community and RMT were defeated overwhelmingly. A UNISON amendment was defeated by 828 to 384. The general council motion was carried by 848 to 66, with the large unions Amicus, T&G, GMB, EIS, USDAW and PCS in support and UNISON abstaining.

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New Orleans set to launch free Wi-Fi

from chicago tribune

Growing bored of the carnage … as crime of the century unfolds

Couldn't put this much better meself, once again, mcwhirter...

The road to Inverquhomery

View topic - Phantom streets on the Glasgow A to Z?

sunny stornoway (rainy day women # 1)

so off to sunny SY with the daughter for what are sometimes known as the whisky olympics.

will you be here when i get back next week? will i?

war in a babylon.

Many a Merkel maks a muckle

'Sheer horror' greets Merkel's grand coalition from Guardian Unlimited: Newsblog: "Other SPD activists said they would vote against the deal when it is put to the party at a conference to be held in Karlsruhe in mid-November. If the deal is approved, but only narrowly, there seems little prospect of Germany's new left-right government lasting a full four-year term. Indeed, the real winner from today’s announcement is probably Germany’s new Left party (German).

With the SPD occupying crucial ministries such as finance and labour, the Left party is likely to profit in the long run when disillusionment with the 'grand coalition' sets in, as it inevitably will. This is, after all, what happened last time there was a grand coalition in Germany in the late 1960s. The period yielded the Red Army Faction, a terrorist group, and the best ever result for the neo-Nazi NPD (German) in 1969, with voters drifting off to the radical left and radical right."

how others see others

People's Daily Online -- Comment: Will 'civil war break out' in Iraq?:

Recently, terror attack incidents have increased rapidly in Iraq, taking a toll of deaths counted by hundreds, conflicts among different religious sects have occurred from time to time. Analysts say that the aim of the bloody war provoked by Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi, leader of the Iraq holy war al-Qaeda network, will be realized, a "civil war will occur in Iraq".

Under the circumstance of the worsening security situation and the escalation of violence conflicts in Iraq, the transitional National Assembly of Iraq passed the final draft of the new constitution on September 18 and will hold a national referendum on October 15.

Iraq's bad news comes from streets and suicide attacks have occurred one after another. But according to the revelation of news, the attackers are mostly outsiders under the al-Qaeda network, but this does not mean that a strong organized resistance force has been formed within the Iraqi society. It seems that conflicts occurred among religious sects have not reached the extent of running out of control, it can only show that Iraq is presently in a certain state of disorder and a vacuum of management. The ordinary people of Iraq have long been living in misery and turmoil, their hope for an early restoration of stability to the country originally should be a spiritual foundation for national reconstruction, but because of the originally fairly complicated social, ethnic and religious structures and under the specific environment of being occupied by external forces, it is very hard to carry out the reconstruction work. If the process of reconstruction long remains fruitless and inefficient, if the security of common people living under various conflicts cannot be guaranteed, then, armed organizations delineated according to religious sects and ethnic groups would become the main actors of this society and a civil war would hardly be avoided.

Good news about Iraq remains on paper, this means that the constitution draft had been adopted by the transitional National Assembly. The national referendum scheduled for October 15 will be a "touchstone" testing the development trend of the Iraqi political situation. If the new constitution can be passed in the referendum, it can shed light on two questions: One is the new government possessing a certain kind of socially recognized legality; second is the new government having a certain social organizing capability. According to the new constitution, a federal system is to be introduced to Iraq, its form of government will have the nature of a self-government coalition. The crux of the matter at present is that in the four provinces where the Sunnis are the majority, as long as the new constitution draft was rejected, it would mean that the new constitution is a dead fetus.

Because the federal system stipulated in the new constitution would cause great harm to the interests of the Sunnis, the prospect for the adoption of the new constitution draft through referendum is not optimistic.

In Iraq, the United States is the main behavior from outside. The US has smashed Iraq's original social domination structure with its strong military power, at the same time it has also stimulated the internal contradictions of the Iraqi society and resistance to the United States. It is a commentator's view that the United States has underestimated the historical and cultural conditions of the Middle East, reckoning that it could recreate a Middle East on strength of its military superiority. But facts show that destroying a society by external military forces is effective, but the result in reconstructing the society is limited, the latter mainly refers to a cultural process. In the course of Iraq's reconstruction, the United States is compelled to bow to the original pattern of the Iraqi society, it relies more often on the Shiites' strength, despite the fact that this is a secret worry in its geopolitical consideration. In Iraq, complicated surrounding geopolitics, the thorny problem of balancing tribal interests, and the tense relations among religious sects--all often pose difficult problems to the United States.

Viewed from the present situation, the United States seems to have been bogged down in the situation of unraveling silk and only to mess it up. Perhaps history has demonstrated that the US has won a military victory in Iraq, at the same time, it has suffered a cultural and geopolitical defeat.

In the historical tunnel of Iraq, people have not yet seen the light of the end. Behind the Iraqi issue are the general pattern and a big game chessboard in regard to the relations between the US and the Islamic world. On this big chessboard, neighboring countries like Iran, Turkey, Syria and Saudi Arabia all exert different degrees of influence on Iraq's development trends.

Coffee at LGBT

working at Big Issue magazine - had coffee here for lunch with suze sean and eliz:
Welcome
...to the LGBT Centre
11 Dixon Street
Glasgow G1 4AL

0141-221-7203

Celebrating equality and diversity in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

Open Monday - Sunday
(11 a.m. - 12 midnight.)

Fully wheelchair accessible with chairlift.

Blair out of step as voters swing behind Iraq withdrawal

So what's new...

"Tony Blair is at now at odds with the public over keeping troops in Iraq according to a Guardian/ICM poll published today which shows that voters want Britain to set a timetable for pulling troops out of the country despite the worsening security situation.

"The poll also shows rapidly rising dissatisfaction with Mr Blair's leadership. Only 41% of voters are persuaded by the prime minister's argument that troops have a duty to remain in the country until things improve. By contrast, a majority of voters, 51%, want the government to set out plans to withdraw troops from Iraq regardless of the situation in the country."

The ethnic cleansing of New Orleans

I wonder what Quintron and Pussycat make of the ethnic cleansing Naomi Klein identifies in their city after the flood...

Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | This is turning into the ethnic cleansing of New Orleans:

"New Orleans is already displaying signs of a demographic shift so dramatic that some evacuees describe it as ethnic cleansing. Before the mayor, Ray Nagin, called for a second evacuation, the people streaming back into dry areas were mostly white, while those with no homes to return to are overwhelmingly black. This, we are assured, is not a conspiracy; it is simple geography - a reflection of the fact that wealth in New Orleans buys altitude. That means that the driest areas are the whitest: the French Quarter is 90% white; the Garden District, 89%; Audubon, 86%; neighbouring Jefferson Parish, where people were also allowed to return, 65%."

quintron in new orleans

I should have blogged this when neil pointed me here last week...

quintron in new orleans: "Me and Miss P snuck in last week using a clean white van, fatigues, and a fake military pass. The city smells like burning hair and rotton meat. Packs of collared Pit Bulls are roaming around everywhere and there are zero people except for National Guard and emergency clean up crews."

letter to Tony Blair

22 September 2005


Tony Blair
10 Downing Street
London
SW1A 2AA

Dear Tony

I am writing to ask you to resign now as leader of the Labour Party, and as Prime Minister.

The war in Iraq has been a very grave mistake and to continue with your policy is wrong. You are identified completely with this policy. It is impossible to see how you could now change, and your position as Prime Minister clearly blocks the way to a better policy, where British and American troops are withdrawn. A new leader of the party and Prime Minister would be better able to put in place the policy of peace, and of British and American disengagement from Iraq which is urgently needed.

I believe your resignation now would have the support of the greater part of the Labour Party and of the people of Britain - and indeed of most nations.

Yours sincerely



Malcolm Burns
Labour Party member no #######

His Wife Was Greatly Distressed

The Bear Who Let It Alone:


In the woods of the Far West there once lived a brown bear who could take it or let it alone. He would go into a bar where they sold mead, a fermented drink made of honey, and he would have just two drinks. Then he would put some money on the bar and say, 'See what the bears in the back room will have,' and he would go home. But finally he took to drinking by himself most of the day. He would reel home at night, kick over the umbrella stand, knock down the bridge lamps, and ram his elbows through the windows. Then he would collapse on the floor and lie there until he went to sleep. His wife was greatly distressed and his children were very frightened.

At length the bear saw the error of his ways and began to reform. In the end he became a famous teetotaler and a persistent temperance lecturer. He would tell everybody that came to his house about the awful effects of drink, and he would boast about how strong and well he had become since he gave up touching the stuff. To demonstrate this, he would stand on his head and on his hands and he would turn cartwheels in the house, kicking over the umbrella stand, knocking down the bridge lamps, and ramming his elbows through the windows. Then he would lie down on the floor, tired by his healthful exercise, and go to sleep. His wife was greatly distressed and his children were very frightened.

Moral: You might as well fall flat on your face as lean over too far backward.

James Thurber

war, lies and fiasci

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | To say we must stay in Iraq to save it from chaos is a lie: "Iraq is a fiasco without parallel in recent British policy."

says Simon Jenkins in today's grauniad

also Ian mcWhirter in The Herald Face it. It’s time we got our army out of Blair’s Vietnam (copy below) and a host of others...

Face it. It’s time we got our army out of Blair’s Vietnam
Iain Macwhirter
The Herald
September 21 2005

Regular readers of this column know that it is not given to gloating at the misfortunes of Messrs Bush and Blair. Heaven forfend. So it gives me no satisfaction whatever that the tide of opinion on Iraq is moving rapidly towards the "troops out" line that has long been advocated in this space.

Until now, such a posture has been regarded as irresponsible, defeatist, unpatriotic. Not any more. Suddenly everyone is talking about when and how we get out of this quagmire. All three main opposition leaders are calling for it explicitly or in terms, by demanding an exit strategy following the latest disturbances in Basra.
Even that redoubtable old war-horse, Max Hastings, the man who beat the Army into Port Stanley in 1982, says he was wrong about keeping the troops in Iraq "until the job is done". "We are waist-deep in the big Muddy", the former Telegraph editor concluded in a newspaper article yesterday. "The only sensible thing is to strike for the shore."

Hastings's decision to swim for it is less to do with ending the suffering of the poor Iraqis, than with avoiding the imminent humiliation of the British Army. The sight of burning British uniforms tumbling out of armoured vehicles besieged by a Basra mob is causing something of a panic in the British military Establishment. Unlike the Americans, we don't do defeat. Certainly not at the hands of petrol-bombing "natives".

When we are reduced to driving tanks into the local police station in pursuit of British soldiers detained by the very Iraqi police force we helped to train, then it really is time to ask what we are doing here. There is widespread acceptance now that Iraq is heading inexorably toward civil war. British troops have no role to play in that civil war and should not be called upon to get in its way. This is not Belfast. The only way to keep our soldiers out of this fight is to take them out before they are taken out themselves. Yet, at the weekend, the government seemed to be talking about sending more troops to Iraq. This is madness.

Ninety-five British soldiers have already died in Iraq. When that figure tops 100, then our war aims will anyway have to be reviewed. You simply cannot allow soldiers to die in such numbers without any clear idea of what they are dying for. They don't even know who the enemy is in Iraq.

The Sunnis have long been hostile, but even the Shia Muslims seem to be losing patience at the British presence. The nationalist leader, Moqtada al Sadr's militants appear to have taken over sections of the local police. Many have detected Iranian involvement in the recent disturbances, which is intensely worrying.
From the start, this war has been conducted without any clear war aims, political objectives, civil contingency planning or exit strategy. We long ago stopped looking for WMD; we're certainly not defeating terrorism; the country is in ruins; and our continued military presence is a focus for instability.

Certainly, we should do our best to leave Iraq in as good order as possible. The last service we can do for the country is to try to ensure that the constitutional ballot on October 15 is as democratic as possible. But immediately thereafter we should announce a timetable for withdrawal. The last thing we want to see is the last British soldier being bundled into a helicopter as we escape in disarray from Basra, pursued by the crackle of AK 47s. We should never have been there in the first place. The best thing we can do now is remove ourselves with as much dignity as we can muster.

As Colonel Tim Collins put it at the weekend: "One cannot help but wonder what it was all about." This is the same Colonel Tim "Nails" Collins, commander of the First Battalion Royal Irish Regiment, who sent his men into battle in March 2003 with those stirring words about going to Iraq "to liberate, not to conquer". About being "ferocious in battle, but magnanimous in victory". About zipping up British dead "in their sleeping bags" and sending them back home. He now believes he was duped by the politicians: "I made certain assumptions that my goodwill and altruistic motivations went to the top. Clearly, I was naive." He goes on to demand and explanation of "where we are going, and why".

Like Max Hastings, Collins is expressing the view held by many in the British military who realise that Iraq has been a disaster and that things are going to get worse. His demand for an explanation of what we are doing there is thinly disguised code for saying that we shouldn't be there at all.
It is remarkable for a former field commander to deliver such a public condemnation of his commander-in-chief effectively, (if not constitutionally), Tony Blair. But it is more all the more extraordinary when the soldiers he sent into battle are still in there fighting and dying. These are the people everyone seems to forget about – the poor bloody infantry. Eying their sleeping bags with some apprehension as Iraq goes up in flames.

The idea that in some way the Brits had "sorted" the south is no longer sustainable. We cannot strike poses as the helmet-less liberators, patroling the streets with cockades high, when we are having to resort to heavy armour. There was always a dose of mythology about the conduct of the war in the British theatre. As we saw at Camp Breadbasket, we were almost as bad as the Americans when it came to mistreating the locals.

However, it was generally thought that Britain had gone further towards winning the "hearts and minds" (that awful phrase from the Vietnam era) than in the north where the Americans' idea of enlisting popular support is to raze towns like Falluja and kill everything in it that moves.

The British had also supposedly advanced the "Iraqi-isation" (another hateful Vietnam-era neologism), of the police and security forces. But as the New York Times journalist, Steven Vincent pointed out in a remarkable article two months ago, this had been at the cost of allowing Muslim extremists to infiltrate many police stations. He paid for that story with his life. Vincent was assassinated in Basra shortly after it was published.

It's time to face reality. When Sir Menzies Campbell, the deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats calls for a "strategy for withdrawal", and the Tory leader Michael Howard calls for "an honest assessment of the difficulties", they both insist they don't want to "cut and run". But sometimes cutting and running is all you have left.
As the Labour ex-spin doctor, Lance Price, makes clear in his memoirs, the prime minister rather likes the idea of being a war leader. He would take withdrawal as a personal defeat. Which of course it would be. However, British soldiers should not be required to give their lives in order to feed the vanity of an arrogant politician.

This is Blair's Vietnam, not theirs.

"Tensions have been running high in Basra"

The caption is "Tensions have been running high in Basra"

dept of stating the obvious - are these not legs on fire on that armoured car?

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | British troops arrested in Basra

rock and roll

Keith gets the breakfast

Some hope

Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | I'm a hopeaholic. There's nothing George Bush can do about it: "I hope that men break out of the masculine prison that: a) justifies males dominating females; b) separates men from the full circle of their human qualities; and c) cons the many men at the bottom into endangering their lives to protect the few men at the top."

gloria steinem in grauniad

check out equalitynow.org as well:

Aaaargh look what they did to the red dude

Madasafish Blog - Lionel the fish

and they've called it lionel... fook me!

Holy places

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Glittering sea is the most precious treasure for many in regained land:

"Hundreds bypassed the dubious treasures of the settlements and headed for what they considered the real jewel. But the charge to the sea also brought tragedy. Three teenagers drowned after running in with no idea how to swim."

meanwhile the synagogue trap set by the Israelis with dismal calculation was walked into willingly by Palestinians:

"The departing Israelis pasted notices on the synagogue walls proclaiming them to be a "Holy Place" after Ariel Sharon's government refused to demolish them on religious grounds and said the Palestinians would be judged by how they treated the buildings. Yesterday, Israel described the attempts to burn down or bulldoze synagogues in four former Gaza settlements as "barbaric"."

each action a counter in the desperate game...

a message from mcluhan

Terror is the normal state of any oral society, for in it everything affects everything all the time.

Marshall McLuhan, Gutenberg Galaxy, (1962)

Bush: one of the worst disasters to hit the U.S.

Searching for failure? Try George W. Bush | The Register: so we feel we can run this story - and the truly marvellous pic below (thanks to the anonymous reader who forwarded) - with complete impunity:



Bush according to Sky News
Sky News caption department: we salute you. ®"

Power to the victims of New Orleans

How cool is Naomi Klein:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,1566199,00.html

"...the people I met in Sri Lanka have grown tired of waiting for the promised relief. Some survivors are now calling for a people's planning commission for post-tsunami recovery. They say the relief agencies should answer to them; it's their money, after all.

The idea could take hold in the United States, and it must. Because there is only one thing that can compensate the victims of this most human of natural disasters, and that is what has been denied them throughout: power...."

Orange turns to grey...

And this is how they do it in some other places...

BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Putin calls for calm over Ukraine: "'Separate blocs that emerged within the team began playing their own games behind closed doors, which was rather unpleasant,' Mr Yushchenko told journalists.

'This involved digging out compromising material, making photos, blackmail and so forth and so on.'

He added: 'Interpersonal conflicts have grown into conflicts between teams and begun affecting state affairs.'"

just a shot away

Aljazeera.Net - Palestinian group retracts killing claim

hmmm, how politics is done in some other cases. 20 shots in the head for alleged corrupt cousin of martyr; claim by armed faction; then withdrawal of claim. bloody murky.

:-( a bad day

BBC NEWS | Scotland | STUC suspends general secretary: "The general secretary of the Scottish Trades Union Congress has been suspended from his post in the organisation, it has emerged.

The STUC said the move had been taken to exercise a 'duty of care' towards Bill Speirs, who it is understood has been unwell after suffering stress."

the herald has a fuller but not happier story:

STUC chief suspended on full pay after weeks of sick leave

STUC chief suspended on full pay after weeks of sick leave

TOM GORDON and ALAN MacDERMID

September 08 2005

THE leader of Scotland's trade union movement was yesterday suspended on full pay, with its general council citing a duty of care to him and also to other staff as the reason for the move.
Bill Speirs, who has been general secretary of the Scottish Trades Union Congress for the past seven years, and a leading figure in the Labour movement for more than 25, last night claimed his colleagues had failed to inform him of the highly unusual suspension before The Herald contacted him.
The 53-year-old said he was subsequently told: "It is not a disciplinary matter, rather a question of duty of care."
Speaking at his terraced home in the south side of Glasgow, Mr Speirs said he had been off work ill for the past three weeks. He said: "I have been under a good deal of stress lately because of the pressure of work, and I am hoping to have some kind of stress management programme in place when I get back.
"The workload has increased tremendously over the past few years because of the increased membership, demands on the political side arising from devolution, and the STUC's move to a new headquarters . . . I have had 117 evening meetings in the past year."
According to colleagues, Mr Speirs has occasionally been off work with health problems throughout this year, and made a phased return during the summer. But he had not recovered, and general council members said they were forced into the extreme measure of suspending an unwell employee with great regret.
A statement by John Keenan, chairman of the STUC general council, said the administration and general purposes committee had met yesterday and had the authority to deal with such cases. He said that "as a consequence of its obligation . . . to exercise a duty of care to the general secretary, the organisation itself and the STUC staff, it was decided to suspend the general secretary, Bill Speirs, on full pay".
Mr Keenan said the decision was reported to the general council at its scheduled meeting later yesterday morning, and the senior union representatives who run the STUC rubber-stamped it at that meeting.
A general council member spoke about the concern "for a considerable time" over Mr Speirs's ill-health. "There's hardly anybody on the general council who would not call themselves a friend of Bill Speirs," said the official.
"But things have reached a stage where every attempt to try and assist him has failed. It's hellish for him. There's no-one in the STUC, either staff or official, who is not sick at heart."

Curry king... oh dear

BBC NEWS | Scotland | By-election campaigns under way:

"'Curry king'

...

Meanwhile, millionaire businessman Charan Gill has been ruled out as a Labour candidate in the Cathcart by-election which is being held on the same day.

The founder of the Ashoka restaurant chain, known as the 'curry king', will not stand in the election which was called following the resignation of Lord Watson.

'Very disappointed'

The MSP stood down after he admitted setting fire to curtains at the Prestonfield Hotel.

Mr Gill, 50, who is understood to have had the backing of First Minister Jack McConnell, is a long-term supporter of the Labour Party but only joined this week.

Labour's National Executive Party is understood to have ruled he could not stand.

Mr Gill's interest in the Glasgow seat provoked a backlash among local activists who felt the Labour hierarchy was trying to parachute in a rookie candidate.

He said he was 'very disappointed'.

The four names on the Labour shortlist are three city councillors Charles Gordon, Archie Graham and Irene Graham - together with Manjinder Singh, a business analyst with Scottish Power.

The party will make its final selection on Friday."

i'm not like everybody else...

Guardian Unlimited | Columnists | It isn't philistinism to give students value for money: "nine out of 10 16- to 18-year-olds regard themselves as 'unconventional'"

reports a delighted polly toynbee in today's gruaniad

any old millionaire...

‘I wanted something different and politics interested me’
The Herald

TOM GORDON, Scottish Political Correspondent
September 06 2005

CHARAN Gill, the millionaire entrepreneur who could become Scotland's first Asian MSP, last night defended his lack of political experience as he prepared to enter a bruising selection battle for Labour's candidacy in Glasgow Cathcart.
In an interview with The Herald soon after he picked up his application form to join the party, Mr Gill said he did not want to antagonise activists in the seat which has been left vacant by the resignation of Mike Watson. It was confirmed yesterday the by-election would be on September 29, in line with Labour's wishes, making for one of the shortest campaigns on record.
Mr Gill's lack of a party card has already raised hackles among time-served hopefuls and threatens to split Labour in a seat where the SNP needs an 11% swing for victory. One Labour councillor said Mr Gill's entry was "carpet bagging of the worst order".
However, Mr Gill said: "I'm not out to upset people. I will play straight and at the end of the day, if party members think I'm not the right choice, or they choose me, that's fine."
Mr Gill, 50, who arrived from the Punjab in 1963 and recently sold his Ashoka restaurant chain for £8m, said his family had always been "Labour people", although his focus in life until now had been on his businesses. After selling up in March, he "wanted to do something a bit different and politics was always something that interested me".
Jack McConnell, first minister, had also encouraged him to think of a political future, he said. "I was not thinking of going straight into politics because if I had I would have joined a party.
"I wanted to do something that was fulfilling and worthwhile. When the opportunity came along I thought I would recognise it. That's the way my life has always been."
Labour HQ will compile a shortlist of around five candidates tomorrow, and party members in Cathcart will choose among them on Friday.
If he wins the selection against heavyweights such as Charles Gordon, the ex-Glasgow council leader and Bill Miller, the ex-MEP, Mr Gill will then have to avoid making enemies in the executive.
Asked about cabinet ambitions, he was coy at first, then said: "I think every person should have ambition. If you don't have ambition you will never get anywhere in life. If you start off as a waiter, you want to be a manager or own your own business."
Mr Gill may also have to live down remarks made in 2001 when he discounted the idea of being a politician because he "didn't like to be answerable" to people. He told the Sunday Herald: "I hate being questioned about something I've done. If I was running the NHS, I'd hate people saying it was bad service or too many people on the waiting list." He said his character had changed since then."Life teaches you a lot of things," he said
The SNP and Tories accused Labour of panic over Cathcart when George Reid, presiding officer, announced the date after soundings with party leaders. It is understood Labour pressed for September 29 to coincide with the Livingston by-election to replace the late Robin Cook. Having both polls on the same day, at the end of Labour's annual conference, could help the party.
Alex Salmond, SNP leader, said the reduced timescale meant his party would now abandon its usual system of letting local party members pick a candidate. The national executive committee was likely to pick a name this week – a move which could prove as divisive for the SNP as Mr Gill's entry into the race for Labour.

ugly building which makes at least a little sense

Where I often drop in for a pint...

ugly building

bbc_scotland_glasgow.jpg (JPEG Image, 700x411 pixels)

whacking creationism - get out of this classroom!!!!

Guardian Unlimited | Life | One side can be wrong

Richard Dawkins - I too sometimes find the hardline genetic determinism a bit dry - here gives a proper whacking to the beknighted and devious creationists trying to hijack american public education....

...Among the controversies that students of evolution commonly face, these are genuinely challenging and of great educational value: neutralism versus selectionism in molecular evolution; adaptationism; group selection; punctuated equilibrium; cladism; "evo-devo"; the "Cambrian Explosion"; mass extinctions; interspecies competition; sympatric speciation; sexual selection; the evolution of sex itself; evolutionary psychology; Darwinian medicine and so on. The point is that all these controversies, and many more, provide fodder for fascinating and lively argument, not just in essays but for student discussions late at night.

Intelligent design is not an argument of the same character as these controversies. It is not a scientific argument at all, but a religious one. It might be worth discussing in a class on the history of ideas, in a philosophy class on popular logical fallacies, or in a comparative religion class on origin myths from around the world. But it no more belongs in a biology class than alchemy belongs in a chemistry class, phlogiston in a physics class or the stork theory in a sex education class. In those cases, the demand for equal time for "both theories" would be ludicrous. Similarly, in a class on 20th-century European history, who would demand equal time for the theory that the Holocaust never happened?...

When the levee breaks, mama, you got to move

The Neglected Levees of New Orleans: A Victim of Iraq War Spending

"It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to
handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the
price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can't be finished,
and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security
issue for us."
-- Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish,
Louisiana; New Orleans Times-Picayune, June 8, 2004.

Today the New Orleans Times-Picayune wrote: "No one can say they didn't see
it coming. For years before Hurricane Katrina roared ashore Monday morning,
devastating the Gulf Coast, officials from Louisiana, Mississippi and
Alabama have been warning about their vulnerability to the storms..." See:
<http://www.nola.com>,
<http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1125468020104100.xml&coll=1>

WILL BUNCH, (215) 854-2957, bunchw@phillynews.com,
http://www.editorandpublisher.com
Will Bunch is a senior writer at the Philadelphia Daily News. The
article states: "Did New Orleans Catastrophe Have to Happen?
'Times-Picayune' Had Repeatedly Raised Federal Spending Issues" for Editor
& Publisher. He wrote: "After 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA
[Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project] dropped to a trickle. The
Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war
in Iraq, as well as homeland security -- coming at the same time as federal
tax cuts -- was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the
Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a
reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars." Bunch is
continuing to write on his blog: <http://www.pnionline.com/dnblog/attytood>.
The New Orleans Times-Picayune ran a five-part series in 2002 titled
"Washing Away" about the threat of a major hurricane. The series is
available at: <http://www.nola.com/hurricane/?/washingaway>.

Mullan launches attack on SSP

Mullan launches attack on SSP
ROBBIE DINWOODIE, Chief Scottish Political Correspondent August 24 2005
from The Herald
http://www.theherald.co.uk/politics/45576.html

PETER Mullan, the actor, has launched a withering attack on the Scottish Socialist party.
The star, a high-profile supporter of the SSP, has claimed the party's treatment in forcing out Tommy Sheridan as convener was "disgraceful and disgusting".
In a TV interview, he added: "Their treatment of Tommy has as good as destroyed them for now."
The actor claimed that saying Mr Sheridan had resigned for family reasons, then leaking the fact that he had effectively been sacked, "smacked of Blairite tactics, of them playing politics. I was enraged."
He also castigated its MSPs' antics in the Holyrood chamber, when four brought business to a halt in the parliament before the summer recess, as "looking like the lunatics had taken over the bleeding asylum".
Mullan added: "Behave yourselves and start acting like grown-ups, because it's grown-ups who have voted for you. If you think growing up means selling out, you have personality issues and have yet to grow up and leave the student union.
"The parliament is a big enough joke . . . as it is, but you are the ones who stood up to get voted into it, so don't suddenly try and deny its protocol."
The SSP last night insisted it would go ahead with a legal battle over the punishment meted out to the four MSPs.
With no legal papers served and suggestions that the SSP was unable to finance a legal battle, it was widely believed yesterday that the party was about to drop its action.
However, a spokesman said: "There are many complex issues involved and cost is one.
"We have discussed that but, as things stand, we are still going ahead with our legal action."
Four of the party's six MSPs will be banned from the parliament when business resumes in two weeks, and the loss of pay will extend to the allowances used to pay their staff.

Clarke may be sound-ish on jazz and Iraq - but what about BAT?

Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | Smoke and mirrors: "Let us begin by examining BAT's contribution to public health. Smoking, according to the World Health Organisation, 'is currently responsible for the death of one in 10 adults worldwide ... Half the people that smoke today - that is about 650 million people - will eventually be killed by tobacco.' BAT sells one-sixth of the world's cigarettes. Were responsibility to be divided according to market share, we could accuse it of causing the deaths of 100 million people."

Glasgow Show 2005

Glasgow Show 2005 with The Drifters, even!

scorching day and lots of kid-type fun on the green

...
eliz back with catriona mairi

1pm out with suze and kids
bus to glasgow show at glasgow green
rally cars
bouncing for kids
janice and christine and christine of twinkles
j & c now working in wise group near glasgow green
eliz on bungee ropes, cm to ferris wheel
hoopla at park dept tent then cows, dog and ducks
then clydesdales
elaine smith and van
motor bike display

6pm
home on 16 bus

Cycling trip...

Clyde walkway cycle route in East end of Glasgow

2pm
cycled out clyde walkway aiming for cambuslang heron sculpture but didn't see it

lots else though - met a woman cyclist in st peters cemetery, she said you go on a little cambuslang and there's a morrisons

4.30 reached a business park just before cambuslang and decided to return to meet mike in doublet

back via north street and woodlands road to doublet

Forrest spams

weird spam probably virus email - deleted - from " forrest"

Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2005 20:15:01 -0800
From: Forrest < forrest @ myself.com >
To: Forrest < forrest @ mysterian.com >
Subject: [No Subject]
Part(s):1 unnamed text/html 0.05 KB Download
2 The_taxation.rar application/octet-stream 24.20 KB Download

Another Time, Another Place (1983)

Another Time, Another Place (1983)

gft another time, another place 6.15
strange - i must have only seen this once when it came out but i could remember almost every frame... great film

GFT - http://www.gft.org.uk/

Tabloid dregs

When you finish drinking something unpleasant enough already and then you find a bit of it's precipitated leftovers in your mouth...

a story of humiliation and degradation, it's almost enough to make you sorry for bobby parker and what's wrong with being a binman anyway...

The Daily Record - NEWS - News Feed - SEX PEST UNION BOSS IS BINMAN

By Janice Burns

A SEX pest union boss has a new job - as a council binman.

Former £50,000-a-year GMB Scottish secretary Robert Parker, whose behaviour cost the union £600,000 before he quit in disgrace, is now earning just £14,000 a year.

Parker, who pestered his personal assistant for an affair, groped her and exposed himself to her is working as a waste awareness officer, sifting through rubbish bins.

The 47-year-old high-flier, once tipped to become GMB general secretary, has 'hit rock-bottom', according to one source close to him.

Cook-ites?

reading news online martin kettle said cook was not as good as eulogised
only cookites may have been chris smith and brian wilson - interesting way of looking at them

Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | A man who saw politics as the art of the impossible: "This week many people are saying that Cook represented that lost soul. And so, in certain ways, he did. But he was never Labour's lost leader, save possibly in Scotland, and it's an indulgence to imagine that he was. A Cook government would not have been a pretty sight. For one thing, there never were many Cookites beyond Robin himself - Chris Smith and Brian Wilson excepted, perhaps. Maybe Cook died believing that he had a frontbench future in a Brown government. I wonder if that really would have happened. Now we shall never know."

The responsibility we share for Islamist shock and awe

Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | The responsibility we share for Islamist shock and awe: "Suicide bombings seem worst of all. We feel unable to do anything to make ourselves safer. It's no good being vigilant for 'suspicious' packages because the bomber carries his cargo on his back and, even if you think you've spotted it, he can still blow everybody up. Even a police officer can only shoot for the head, and risk killing an innocent person, as happened at Stockwell tube station. That innocent, particularly if you have a darkish skin, could be you.

And a home-grown suicide bomber, dreaming of 72 virgins for himself and 'a painful doom' (in the Qur'an's words) for his victims, seems an unpleasantly self-absorbed figure. What does he hope to achieve? He issues no statement, no programme, no final words to secure his place in the history books. It seems to be pure nihilism.

Yet a bomber needs support: he needs to find like-minded fellow bombers, people to supply explosives and detonators, people to organise his operation. The bombers may be 'bastards', to use the term favoured by red-top newspaper writers, but from what does their bastardy spring? Perhaps it is just another version of the mindset that makes white thugs in Liverpool sink an axe into the head of a black 18-year-old. Or perhaps it is another internet phenomenon, whereby a man who gets his kicks out of exploding deadly bombs can find soulmates, just as a German cannibal can find someone who wants to be eaten. But I think there is more to it; the attacks are 'explicable' (which is not the same as 'justifiable') in the sense that Dominic Grieve, the shadow attorney general, used the word on Wednesday.

A section of the Islamic world believes the west is waging war on it, that this war has intensified with the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq, and that it could intensify further with an invasion of Iran. It's no use saying the 2001 attack preceded those invasions. As far as many Muslims are concerned, it went on for most of the 20th century. Arabs were expelled from Israel in the 1940s; Israel occupied the West Bank from 1967; the first Gulf war took place in 1991 and, to Bin Laden's rage, led to US troops polluting sacred Saudi soil. The US has propped up corrupt, secular, pro-western tyrannies throughout the Islamic world - and then blamed and even bombed Muslims for their failure to embrace democracy."

A tale of Stornoway life or a pile of 'tosh'?

A tale of Stornoway life or a pile of 'tosh'?
PHIL MILLER ARTS CORRESPONDENT
The Herald. Glasgow

The Stornoway Way, by Kevin MacNeil, was launched last night and has already had a clutch of glowing reviews.

MacNeil, who was born and raised on [Lewis], said he had not intended to cause controversy, but to write a serious work of literature. "Stornoway's the kind of place, " he writes in the book, "where the birds are woken by the sound of drunks singing".

check amazon at:
Amazon.co.uk: Books: The Stornoway Way
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0241143209/qid%3D1125567617/026-1551789-1416437

a Brechtian moment

Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | Cause and consequence: "Tony Blair appears to be on the brink of a Brechtian moment, in which he will need to dissolve the people who have lost his confidence and elect another.

Certainly, if he claims that anyone who believes there is a connection between the government's foreign policy - above all, Iraq - and the July 7 massacre in London is a 'fellow traveller of terrorism', then he has his work cut out. Fully 85% of the public do, according to a Daily Mirror/GMTV poll.

Article continues
The government's refusal to associate cause and consequence, which would be child-like were it not so obviously self-serving, is sustained only by hysterical warnings against the new evil of 'root-causism' from the residual pro-empire liberals."

people know this...

John Pilger in yet another attempt to show the truth as against the strange vacuum which the government has put in place of even argument around the causes of the terror... published in New Statesman and also in Morning Star http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/

t r u t h o u t - John Pilger | Blair Is Unfit to Be Prime Minister: " In all the coverage of the bombing of London, a truth has struggled to be heard. With honourable exceptions, it has been said guardedly, apologetically. Occasionally, a member of the public has broken the silence, as an east Londoner did when he walked in front of a CNN camera crew and reporter in mid-platitude. 'Iraq!' he said. 'We invaded Iraq and what did we expect? Go on, say it.'

Alex Salmond tried to say it on Today on Radio 4. He was told he was speaking 'in poor taste . . . before the bodies are even buried'. George Galloway was lectured on Newsnight (BBC2) that he was being 'crass'. The inimitable Ken Livingstone contradicted his previous statement, which was that the invasion of Iraq would come home to London. With the exception of Galloway, not one so-called anti-war MP spoke out in clear, unequivocal English. The warmongers were allowed to fix the boundaries of public debate; one of the more idiotic, in the Guardian, called Blair 'the world's leading statesman'.

And yet, like the man who interrupted CNN, people understand and know why, just as the majority of Britons oppose the war and believe Blair is a liar. This frightens the British political elite. At a large media party I attended, many of the important guests uttered 'Iraq' and 'Blair' as a kind of catharsis for that which they dared not say professionally and publicly."

violence and equivalence - 2 different takes from grauniad today

Hanif Kureishi, writing about religion and war says:

"We like to believe we are free to speak about everything, but we are reluctant to consider our own deaths, as well as the meaning of murder. Terrible acts of violence in our own neighbourhood - not unlike terrible acts of violence which are "outsourced", usually taking place in the poorest parts of the third world - disrupt the smooth idea of "virtual" war that we have adopted to conquer the consideration of death."

Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | The arduous conversation will continue

This contrasts in its wisdom with the equivalence which Martin Kettle uses to criticise the "useful idiots" who justify domestic violence...

Guardian Unlimited | Columnists | Useful idiots have always apologised for terrorists: "It would be reckless and wrong to say that violence in 1968 was endemic. Yet violence was widespread, not just in the form of American bombing of Vietnam, but in the tactics adopted, and widely celebrated, by significant parts of the counterculture. In the May events, Paris explicitly re-embraced its own tradition of violence. In this country, the prosperous duo of Mick Jagger and Tariq Ali each celebrated not peaceful protest but street fighting. In America, the rhetoric, and even the action, was hotter. 'It's a wonderful feeling to hit a pig,' the student leader Mark Rudd told the Weathermen conference in 1969. 'It must be a really wonderful feeling to kill a pig or blow up a building.'"

Moral panic

The news since Sunday has been unrelenting in whipping up fear and anxiety across Scotland about how these anarchists ae going to kill everyone. The Edinburgh riots were actually - as well eported by Mark ballard the Green MSP - caused and exacerbated by deliberately heavy policing, for little good reason.

My correspondent on the ground in Stirling tells me that despite breathless reporting of riots in the town, there was no sign on violence - but a very heavy police presence.

The police had cordoned off the eco-vilage - the campsite where some protestors were staying - and none of them could get out to go to Gleneagles. Most of them of course are peacable. Just like you really.

Some of them got a bit annoyed and there was an altercation - but hardly a riot.

In the town centre the police had closed the railway station - but again little actual violence to report. Apart from the damage to the truth.

The local radio and some UK tv were reporting riots even though there were none to see - purely because the police had told them they were taking place.

Obviously, what you can't see can be used by the authorities (police and media) in evidence to make you very frightened.

Meanwhile the cops were driving around in Stirling with sirens wailing - but chasing nothing much.

My correspondent says the atmosphere throughout the day has been weird - like Invasion of the Bodysnatchers, she feels as though she's the only one who can see that there isn't much going on. The shopkeepers are boarding up their windows, but no-one is interested in smashing them.

Oh well.

In the same way as the "Edinburgh riots" - where there was little damage and seemingly no casualties - the event has largely been fabricated so that the police keep the initiative, and can justify any actions including pre-emptive action eg closing routes, and photographing all and sundry.

Meanwhile, the BBC website is giving minute by minute accounts of whats "happening" but there's so little to actually see that their 12 - picture gallery of G8 "protests" http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_pictures/4655191.stm starts with a minor face-off at the eco-camp this morning and by image 6 or 7 they're showing Gerhard Schroeder, Paul Martin of Canada and the Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi coming down airliner steps as they arrive in Scotland.

With any luck these guys will protest - hmmm fat chance...

Meanwhile meanwhile, Bob Geldof is slagging eveyone who doesn't do it his way. It's alright for him, he's hot triple-A VIP tickets to meet the bastards within the ring of steel. In some ways you have to admire him - he's certainly operated in a very effective way throughout - sometimes out there, calling on a million to turn up, sometimes infuriatingly praising the peopple who are responsible for the problem because they are speaking to him... the set-up is all set up. The outcome will be hailed as a victory by Blair - a person no-one should trust, because of both his judgment and mendacity - and there will be little that Saint Bob can say to articulate the truth.

The truth being that the G8, the World Bank, the IMF and enforced privatisation won't solve the problem of poverty. Far from it. They are at the root. Even on their own terms. World economic growth has slowed down since the neo-liberal economists have taken over (which happened in the 70s.) The great postwar boom which was actually allowing post colonial countries to develop has stopped and protectionism for the rich means the poor are frozen out.

Ah well, at least we don't actually believe the hype.

malky
x

Monbiot on Africa's new best friends

Guardian Unlimited | Columnists | Africa's new best friends: "Just as Gordon Brown's 'moral crusade' encourages us to forget the armed crusade he financed, the state-sponsored rebranding of the companies working in Africa prompts us to forget what Shell has been doing in Nigeria, what Barclays and Anglo American and De Beers have done in South Africa, and what British American Tobacco has done just about everywhere. From now on, the G8 would like us to believe, these companies will be Africa's best friends. In the name of making poverty history, the G8 has given a new, multi-headed East India Company a mandate to govern the continent.

Without a critique of power, our campaign, so marvellously and so disastrously inclusive, will merely enhance this effort. Debt, unfair terms of trade and poverty are not causes of Africa's problems but symptoms. The cause is power: the ability of the G8 nations and their corporations to run other people's lives."

and again i agree with you George...

A truckload of nonsense

why debt relief on its own is nothing like enough - and why aid/trade conditions promoting "good governance" but which are really promoting wholesale privatisation are damaging the world's poor and benefiting the rich... George Monbiot isn't always right but this is a compelling case to take to blair, brown and the g8

Guardian Unlimited | Columnists | A truckload of nonsense

"...The idea, swallowed by most commentators, that the conditions our governments impose help to prevent corruption is laughable. To qualify for World Bank funding, our model client Uganda was forced to privatise most of its state-owned companies before it had any means of regulating their sale. A sell-off that should have raised $500m for the Ugandan exchequer instead raised $2m. The rest was nicked by government officials. Unchastened, the World Bank insisted that - to qualify for the debt-relief programme the G8 has now extended - the Ugandan government sell off its water supplies, agricultural services and commercial bank, again with minimal regulation.

And here we meet the real problem with the G8's conditionalities. They do not stop at pretending to prevent corruption, but intrude into every aspect of sovereign government. When the finance ministers say "good governance" and "eliminating impediments to private investment", what they mean is commercialisation, privatisation and the liberalisation of trade and capital flows. And what this means is new opportunities for western money..."

Powerful paintings: encouraging future doctors through art

heard this woman on radio 4 midweek programme - dr lizzie burns - intersting iddea and images - maybe i'll get my lizzie to write to her, she's just got a blue peter badge today for persistently sending in drawings...
Powerful paintings: encouraging future doctors through art -- Bagchi and Chaudhury 328 (7440): 107 -- BMJ Career Focus

A game of double bluff

Guardian Unlimited | Columnists | A game of double bluff
by George monbiot - don't always agree with him of course, but this article summarises my own view of blair's motivations and following the french non it's clear that blair is gearing up for a neoliberal assault on "old europe", welfarism, and "the past" (you can see the line in Martin Kettle's usual obsequy in the same issue of the grauniad)

The ultimate postmodern spectacle

here's a para i wish i'd written...
Terry Eagleton writing about Michael Jackson...

It is hardly surprising that he has expressed a wish to live forever, given that death is the final victory of nature over culture. If the US sanitises death, it is because mortality is incompatible with capitalism. Capital accumulation goes on forever, in love with a dream of infinity. The myth of eternal progress is just a horizontalised form of heaven. Socialism, by contrast, is not about reaching for the stars but returning us to earth. It is about building a politics on a recognition of human frailty and finitude. As such, it is a politics which embraces the reality of failure, suffering and death, as opposed to one for which the word "can't" is almost as intolerable as the word "communist".
Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | The ultimate postmodern spectacle

Boo!

Guardian Unlimited | Online | Boo.com spent fast and died young but its legacy shaped internet retailing

Politics should be about ideas not rampant egos - The Herald

Politics should be about ideas not rampant egos - The Herald

Politics should be about ideas not rampant egos
Iain Macwhirter May 11 2005
email author

Jack McConnell may have been gracious about the departure of the Liberal Democrats' leader, Jim Wallace, but many in his party are not sad to see the back of him. It's not just that they didn't rate Wallace as a minister: there has long been resentment among Labour MSPs and MPs at the way the Liberal Democrats claim credit for the achievements of the Scottish Executive while somehow distancing themselves from failures such as the parliament scandal, NHS waiting lists and the sluggish economy – even though Wallace was enterprise minister. This has allowed a party of "amateurs" – as Labour sees them – to become the second party of Scotland in the 2005 election.
Many Labour MSPs would be happy to see Wallace take the Scottish Executive coalition with him into the political wilderness. Some LibDems, such as MSP Mike Rumbles, agree that voters dislike the backstage deals and horse-trading of forming a coalition. Party activists loathe compromising on manifesto promises so electoral enemies can acquire ministerial limos.

It's not as if there isn't another way, say critics of coalition. Look at Wales, where Labour governs as a minority and the LibDems support it only on an issue-by-issue basis. Many Labour MPs would like to scrap Scotland's additional-member electoral system.

But it isn't going to happen. Talk of abandoning the Scottish Executive partnership is likely to remain just that: talk. The truth is the coalition, appearances to the contrary, has been a considerable success, and not just for the LibDems. Both parties have benefited from co-operative government.

As this column has argued, home-rulers of the 1980s would be astonished at what the Scottish Parliament achieved in a short time. Not just big policies such as free personal care, scrapping tuition fees, a ban on smoking and land reform, but minor measures such as improved school meals, free bus passes and freedom of information. Much of this is down to the nature of coalition government which has helped to correct the deficiencies inherent in the party system.

Labourites get angry if you point out how many of the successful measures implemented by the executive started life in LibDem election manifestos. You don't hear McConnell complaining. The presence of the LibDems in government has often been useful to the first minister because it liberates him from his party's tribalism.

The coalition is not just fairer, it allows new ideas to enter government. The Scottish Executive stands as a model for post-sectarian politics, and Westminster will eventually have to adopt something similar. Labour's leader-in-waiting, Gordon Brown, is known to be opposed to electoral reform. But if he thought about it, he'd realise it is essential for his own project to renew and revive British politics.
Fairer voting would restore democratic legitimacy, provide a new centre of political gravity, allow parties to think out of their boxes and marginalise extremism. It would end boom-and-bust politics. It involves taking power away from the centre. However, as Brown discovered with the Bank of England, handing away power can increase the effectiveness of government. Left to its own devices, Labour would probably have done very little with the Scottish Executive. Had it been running a one-party state, most of its energies would have been wasted defending the vast bureaucracy. Measures such as the reform of local government would have been blocked by cooncil godfathers. Ditto personal care. McConnell's smoking ban would probably never have got off the ground had the LibDems not been around because of the electoral consequences.

Critics of electoral reform argue that coalitions are unstable and hand disproportionate influence to minor parties. Britain needs the smack of firm government, according to defenders of the Westminster system, instead of marshmallow administrations where no-one gets what they want and radical change is impossible.
But this is an outmoded ideological approach rooted in the politics of the past century. Britain is no longer a society organised into classes reflected in monolithic parties representing capital and organised labour. Of course, there are still rich and poor, and inequality is greater now than in the 1980s, but this is not how the political system works now.

With the passing of manufacturing, the working class is no longer an organised and potent political force. Managed capitalism is the only game in town. This requires a different kind of politics. It is no longer about seizing the state in the interest of a section of society, but building consensus on moral propositions: equality of opportunity, individual liberty, racial tolerance, collective provision of essential services.

If this formulation sounds familiar, it is because similar sentiments were expressed by Brown in speeches recently. His "progressive consensus" – which Brown has apparently persuaded the prime minister to endorse – is very much this kind of project. Unfortunately, Brown hasn't drawn the logical conclusion: that the constitution needs to change to reflect this.

You cannot build a progressive consensus under an electoral system so manifestly unfair that a party can win an overall majority of 66 on less than 36% of the popular vote. That isn't democracy: it is elective dictatorship. It is hardly surprising that, under such a system, well-meaning politicians end up behaving like dictators. Armed with a 160-seat majority, a politician can do anything – even blunder into a war.

Gordon Brown knows perfectly well that our political system is rotten and discredited and needs radical reform. The public loathe the adversarial Commons style with its petty point-scoring and demeaning sectarian abuse. They want debate, of course, and they want argument, but they want to be treated like adults and see their politicians behave like adults.

Modern issues, such as nuclear power, pensions, climate change – all the difficult issues that get left out of election campaigns – need a new kind of political culture in which ideas can be drawn from outside the party loops; the kind of intelligent politics that has worked in Scotland.

People no longer want closed-mind politicians who dissemble and prevaricate and regard the seizure of power as an end in itself. They want politics that brings the best people together to find solutions to problems, rather than providing a platform for rampant egos mouthing banal slogans or devious dog-whistlers exploiting fear.
The best people don't go into politics anymore because life in the establishment political parties is so unpleasant. Who wants to join brain-dead organisations more concerned with self-preservation than the common good? The Labour/Conservative duopoly is an anachronism. The only way to renew politics is to circumvent these relics by reform. History has handed this task to Gordon Brown.

These are Blair's last days

george's analysis here spot on and if only the title was true...

my guess is a majority of something like 80 and a ruthless New Labour assault on all enemies directly afterwards... learned nothing and forgotten nothing

Guardian Unlimited Politics | Special Reports | George Galloway: These are Blair's last days

Labour win 'best for Scots workers'

Published in the Morning Star

(Thursday 21 April 2005)

by MALCOLM BURNS in Dundee

STUC general secretary Bill Speirs insisted yesterday that the return of a Labour government is "in the best interests of Scottish workers and their families."

"The STUC opposed the Iraq war. We would also have preferred that the govenment had taken a different approach on some domestic issues," Mr Speirs told congress.

"However, while we have concerns about the details and the direction of some of the government's policies, it is clear that the Conservative manifesto is incompetent, socially unjust and impossible for the trade union movement to support," he said.

Mr Speirs called on all trade unionists to make every effort to vote on May 5.

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www.morningstaronline.co.uk

For peace and socialism - the only socialist daily paper in the English language

STUC campaign highlights safety at work

Published in the Morning Star

(Thursday 21 April 2005)

by MALCOLM BURNS in Dundee

THE STUC launched a campaign in partnership with Thomsons Solicitors yesterday to highlight the health and safety protection provided to workers by trade union membership.

STUC assistant secretary Ian Tasker said: "Between March 2000 and March 2004, some 116 Scottish workers were killed in workplace accidents and 11,455 have suffered serious injuries at work."

Together with Thomsons, the STUC is campaigning for wider recognition of International Workers Memorial Day, when those who have been killed at work are commemorated.

Mr Tasker said: "As we approach International Workers Memorial Day on April 28 it is crucial that we focus on protecting all Scottish workers. The best way to protect your health and safety is to join a union."

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www.morningstaronline.co.uk

For peace and socialism - the only socialist daily paper in the English language

General council to consult on EU constitution

Published in the Morning Star

(Thursday 21 April 2005)

by MALCOLM BURNS in Dundee

THE STUC general council agreed to hold a consultative conference on the EU constitution yesterday.

The decision followed an agreement by Kilmarnock and Loudoun TUC to remit a motion condemning the forced privatisation of industries and services, which the constitution would worsen.

Kimarnock TUC delegate Arthur West said: "It would be churlish not to recognise the government's and particularly Gordon Brown's efforts in relation to third-world debt.

"But a lot of the government's good work is being undone by its encouragement of privatisation in developing countries."

While it was a "head-nipping exercise" to understand the huge draft constitution, he said: "The current version gives the EU commission the sole right to negotiate overseas aid, with a clear bias toward privatisation.

"It would be would be a lack of joined-up thinking on our part if we ignored the EU constitution as a factor in this issue."

PCS member Eddie Reilly called for remission of the motion on behalf of the STUC general council.

He said that they found no difficulty with it in principle, but "the EU constitution is a major issue and it is not to be determined by one line in a motion."

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Palestinians and Israelis speak to congress

Published in the Morning Star

(Thursday 21 April 2005)

by MALCOLM BURNS in Dundee

IN A historic session on Palestine yesterday, representatives of both the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions and the Israeli Histadrut trade union centre addressed congress.

Speaking on behalf of Histadrut, Avi Bitchur said that he understood very well the problems of the Palestinians.

"We have many things in common to talk about around workers' rights, despite politics and despite international relations," he said.

"We want Israelis and Palestinians to live together in economic and social prosperity."

PGFTU speaker Mohammed Amara said that Palestinian workers faced massive problems.

"We have 68 per cent unemployed and 51 per cent of our people are living under poverty," he said.

"You can't imagine how our people are living and all of this was born of the occupation."

Mr Amara, who spent five years in Israeli jails, offered a greeting in Hebrew to the Histadrut delegation.

"This is our choice - justice, peace, equality and security for all," he said, urging the Israeli unions to follow up their commitment to agreements made as long ago as 1995.

STUC general secretary Bill Speirs said: "We regard this positive contact as an indicator of potential for future co-operation and we will do everything in our power to assist our trade union colleagues in working together for workers' rights and for justice, peace and security."

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Reid joins SNP

Published in the Morning Star

(Thursday 21 April 2005)

by MALCOLM BURNS in Dundee

FORMER Clydeside union leader Jimmy Reid told delegates yesterday that he has joined the Scottish National Party.

Mr Reid and SNP leader Alex Salmond visited the STUC congress in Dundee briefly, where Mr Salmond unveiled his new recruit.

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Iraq occupation 'a humanitarian disaster'

Published in the Morning Star

(Thursday 21 April 2005)

by MALCOLM BURNS in Dundee

STUC congress condemned the attack on Iraq yesterday and branded the ongoing occupation as a "humanitarian disaster."

Delegates also called for solidarity with all bona fide trade union organisations in Iraq.

AUT delegate Terry Brotherstone slammed the "Basil Fawlty" nature of the Labour politicians "who have made whole speeches here this week without mentioning the war at all."

He said: "Iraq is not a separate issue for trade unions - the assault on the Iraqi people and the anti-working-class policies pursued at home are causally linked - they come from the same stable of capitalist globalisation."

Fire Brigades Union delegate Linda Shanahan said that the term "end of hostilities" should only be used in inverted commas.

"When I hear politicians talk about the war no-one wanted, as if its all done and dusted and there's no more killing or violence, it makes me really angry," she added.

"Lets get the speediest withdrawal of troops that we can, get medical aid in and build support for trade unions to secure the right to freedom and democracy for all Iraqis."

UNISON delegate Angela Lynes said that her union was proud to be working with Iraqi and Kurdish trade unionists through the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions.

Pointing out that the occupation affects us all, she said: "I doubt if I am the only person in this hall who has friends or relatives in Iraq.

"The occupation must end and our troops must be brought home," she said.

"UN Resolution 1546 provides a process and a timetable for withdrawal - and that must be no later than the end of this year. Perhaps my brother will see his baby born rather than be brought home in a box."

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Delegates condemn free trade

Published in the Morning Star

(Thursday 21 April 2005)

by MALCOLM BURNS in Dundee

THE STUC congress condemned the system of unfair "free trade," deregulation and globalisation that conspires to keep most of the world in grinding poverty yesterday.

Delegates pledged to support the Make Poverty History demonstration in Edinburgh in July plus a peaceful mass protest at Gleneagles during this summer's G8 summit.

Congress called on the G8 countries to cancel all debt incurred by the developing world.

Amicus UNIFI delegate Marie Kiernan said that poverty prevents countries and people from realising their full potential, reminding delegates that it takes somebody's life every three seconds.

"We must fight for the three objectives of Make Poverty History - trade justice, drop the debt, plus more and better aid," she insisted.

Ms Kiernan pointed out that the G7 countries - the G8 minus China - hold half of the votes in the World Bank and the IMF, thus giving them the power to cancel debt.

"However, the IMF and the World Bank have forced developing countries to deregulate and privatise," she noted.

"Three out of four plates of rice eaten in Haiti come from the US. That's good news for rich farmers in the US, but disastrous for Haiti."

Ms Kiernan, who is expecting a baby, said: "We need trade justice, not self interest. Two decades after Live Aid, our generation has an unprecedented opportunity to end world poverty."

She concluded: "When my unborn child is five, I don't want to have to answer why millions are starving. I want to be able to say that in 2005 we changed it."

Community delegate Willie Paterson stressed that the thousands of deaths due to poverty are preventable.

"We could bring the problem of HIV and Aids in sub-Saharan Africa down to manageable proportions if they had drugs which are routinely available in Scotland," he pointed out.

Musicians Union delegate Shaun Dillon urged the cancellation of debt, saying: "Third world nations are kept in a kind of slavery by having this huge debt on their shoulders."

Alf Mackay of teaching union SSTA conceded that it is easy to feel cynical, but he insisted: "If we want to do something about the Third World, pressure has to come from the bottom rather than the top."

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