Scottish Election: Liberal Mind Games in Edinburgh North and Leith
The elections to the Scottish Parliament are approaching, and I’m interested to see what election literatue is pushed through my door. So far I’ve recieved leaflets from The Green Party and this morning a letter from the Scottish Liberal Democrats candidate Mike Crockart arrived. It’s a masterly piece of political writing, with the lovely tag line ‘the election in Edinburgh North and Leith [Wikipedia link] is between Labour and the Lib Dems. The SNP came forth last time and can’t win here.’ The phrase is particularly striking for two reasons.
The first is that it’s identical to the slogan in the leaflet they used in the UK General Election in 2005 when I was in a different constituency. It also seems to be used in pretty much every election leaflet across the country. Are they honestly telling me that no matter where they are in the UK, the Libs are always in second place? It does appear that way.
Which leads me to the second point. The numbers are wrong.
You always compare like with like. So for a Scottish Election, you look at the last Scottish Election as a basis. Which, rather interestingly, has the Lib Dems in a rather rubbish 4th place (Lab 38%, SNP 19%, Conservative 17%, LibDem 16%) rather than the supremely healthy bar graph on their letter (Lab 34%, LibDem 29%, Con 19%, SNP 10%). The numbers used are from the UK General Election of 2005. A contest where we were voting on something completely different, and for an MP with a different set of powers. A Westminster based MP can vote and affect issues such as going to war; the introduction on the National Identity Register, drugs laws; broadcasting; the funding of political parties; data protection; regulation of British Summer Time; treason and a number of others. All areas where I have a strong interest. A Scottish MP can do absolutely nothing about these – apart from negotiating with Westminster to unreserve these powers, or negotiate independence.
(Mind you neither does that mean SNP has my vote yet. The sole tax raising power of the Scottish Parliament is to raise income tax, which they plan to do to repalce the Council Tax, but still want to keep the value of the Council Tax Benefit but have it diverted to the Scottish Treasury).
Let’s also not forget that the LibDems are a party of Government in Scotland through co-alition. They hold a certain amount of responsibility for Scottish decisions made in the last parliamentary session (decisions such as the wasteful Edinburgh Tram System, and expansion to Edinburgh Airport).
I know politics is all about telling people what they want to hear so you can get in power, but I find this campaign trick particularly distasteful. I find it distasteful because they are not the only party who could win. I find it inaccurate given that the consituency for the UK parliament is different geographically to the Scottish parliament. I find it wrong that Leith is presented with the same candidate we rejected at the Westminster Election.
And I find it distasteful because it feels perilously close to lying, but leaving enough weasel words to get out of it when pressed. And would I want that sort of person representing me?
April 19, 2007; Politics;
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- Yesterday’s Scottish Election Was A Disgrace – Disenfranchisment All Round
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4 Responses to “Scottish Election: Liberal Mind Games in Edinburgh North and Leith”
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Well, if you think this is just the Lib Dems who argue this, tell that to Douglas Fraser at The Herald newspaper: (http://election.theherald.co.uk/nominations/regions/display.var.1322230.0.0.php). He says that:
“The LibDems also want Mike Crockart to defeat Labour’s former minister Malcolm Chisholm in Edinburgh North and Leith … In the nearest equivalent Westminster seat in 2005, the LibDems did serious damage to the majority of Labour’s Mark Lazarowicz, with one of the opposition party’s strongest results in Scotland. Having established themselves as main challenger to Labour in the north of the city, they hope Labour will again be weakened by the Iraq war.”
And on the SNP’s chances:
“Even on a cracking good result, the SNP cannot expect to make much headway in the city, which is odd for a nationalist party in its national capital”.
Derek,
Firstly, thanks for your comment.
Let’s be fair though, the Lib Dems think this in every constituency, it’s used as a rallying cry wherever they go, and it seems becasue of this they find the best set of election results (local, UK, Scottish, European) to fit the statement. It would be in their best interest to make sure that The Herald quotes their candidate echoing these statements. The key phrase is ‘nearest equivalent Westminster seat’ which of course has a number of wards replaced for the Scottish polls.
To add to this, today there has been three Lib-Dem leaflets passing through my door; a letter, an orange flyer, and an attempt to look like a newspaper. They all contain the same identiket phrases, pictures and ‘only we can win’ ideology. From having no information about the candidate, I’m now left with a triple-punch of information on him, and it’s had a negative impact on my views of the Lib Dems in this election.
How Do Ewan,
I was interested to read your comments on the LibDems campaigning material here in ENL. From what I`ve seen of their leaflets and letters they seem to be from the LibDem identikit “it’s a two horse race”…”many people have been saying that”.
My personal favourite though is a leaflet they are distributing that says that voting for me (as the SNP candidate) will make Tony Blair happy!
That said I suspect I`m going to be one of the three most biased people against the LIbDems in ENL in this election (along with Iain Whyte and Maclom Chisholm).
The Labour MP for ENL, Mark Lazarowicz has recently blogged on this very issue and makes a similar point to yourself.
(http://marklazarowicz.org.uk/blog/2007/04/libdem-fibs-again.html)
I’m working up an appetite for Lib Dem misrepresentation. Over at ours, in Edinburgh Central, Siobhan Mathers Lib Dem pretender has lopped a big chunk off the Labour column in her little bar chart thus distorting the visual message it projects. How cheap is that! Two horse race – that’ll be Nicol Stephens and (insert your candidate’s name here)
Love, McGellie x
http://www.mcgellie.wordpress.com