David Cameron has conducted a round of interviews for the Scottish press in advance of the Tory one-day conference in Perth this Friday.Interestingly, Cameron's ire and political fire is reserved seemingly solely for the SNP which must surely be taken as something of a compliment by Alex Salmond. Furthermore, given the direct challenges from the would-be-PM to the First Minister, one has to wonder if there is a hypocrisy at play given Cameron is so keen to see Salmond shut out of upcoming party leaders' debates. I daresay Salmond will, on one level, be quite content with being granted parity with the next Prime Minister however, not that David Mundell conducting these interviews would have had the same impact for the Tories. Cameron understands that he has to put in his share of the effort if his party are to make a breakthrough in Scotland so should be lauded for putting the time in for this latest futile attempt.
The main focus of attention in these interviews is, as always, independence which leaves the SNP with a bit of a quandary over whether it should press on full throttle with independence as the main issue going forward or try to pin its hopes on electoral success in May on another topic.
It is clear that the media and the political opposition are setting the agenda and, to be perfectly honest, slapping the Nationalists around a bit and thoroughly enjoying it. Greece being in financial ruin and Ireland bringing in deep cuts to its budget are not valid reasons for not voting SNP in the upcoming election in my book, despite what Cameron claims.
And I have to say, even if I'm not that sold on independence myself, David Cameron has a real nerve to make some of the points he was making in The Herald in particular:
“This is where they’re taking people for fools because everybody knows there’s a massive budget deficit, everyone knows the whole of the United Kingdom is in debt, everyone knows there’s a problem. If Alex Salmond thinks he can fool people by saying: ‘Oh, if only we were independent, we wouldn’t have any debts, we wouldn’t have any deficit, we wouldn’t have any problems’, people know that’s tosh.”
For a start, I don't think I have ever heard anyone suggest that if the SNP were to become independent then the country wouldn't take its share of the national debt. However, there is a massive deficit because the economy, particularly the Scottish economy, has been run into the ground. You can't very well blame Scottish independence for that. From North Sea oil money drying up without anything to show for it from costly military adventures in Iraq, faced with the same resources, an SNP Government would not have drove Scotland into the same mire that alternate Tory and Labour Governments on behalf of a United Kingdom that continues to reward those same two parties for its profligacy.
In terms of talking points though, David Cameron is avoiding the one that would really press him hard in Scotland and I daresay he'll manage to avoid it all week thanks to a forgiving press. That talking point is Trident.
Far from this election being a referendum on independence I would much rather see it as a referendum on whether we should spend tens of billions on a new wave of nuclear weapons. It wasn't mentioned in The Herald, it wasn't mentioned in the Dundee Courier and it wasn't mentioned in the Scottish Sun. It is surely a debate we need to have before the election comes around as it is our last chance to save a substantial amount of cash and plug some of the black hole that has been created in the past decade.
The SNP is getting dragged from pillar to post on topics not of its choosing and seeing its poll ratings slide as a result but with billions of our money being spent on nuclear weapons that are being housed in Scotland and will never be fired, Alex Salmond shouldn't be afraid to quite literally bring out the A-bomb and leave independence to one side, particularly if he wants to return double digit number of MPs, let alone twenty.
It's not all easy street for Cameron though. When asked by Michael Settle whether he was losing it Cameron laughed and asked 'Does it look like it?' and then said 'No'. One has to think that if you have to answer your own rhetorical questions then you're not exactly 'winning'.
8 comments:
Reminds me of an old West Wing quote:
“People think campaigns are about two competing answers to the same question. They're not. They're a fight over the question itself."
This is where the SNP are losing out. The date may not have been set, but in essence the election campaign has started. They are allowing the pro-Labour media to dictate the agenda. They should get up off their backsides and start campaigning.
Question - Does the SNP have enough resource to be in Government AND run an election campaign?
Time to get the jumpers off and roll up sleeves lads and lassies.
They are picking a fight with the wrong people.
Spot on as far as I'm concerned folks.
Now if someone could talk me through Activate I'll be on my merry way...
I think the SNP are still a little bit naive in terms of media relations/manipulation, which is understandable given that this is their first time in Government (or perhaps the media just choose to make it look this way). It's fortunate that Salmond is near enough unbeatable at FMQs as this makes up for it to a certain extent, but as someone mentioned in a comment to another post, GARL is a perfect example of the SNP being raked over the coals over something they should really be able to bat away with relative ease. Perhaps the next generation of the SNP (e.g. Osama Saeed) will put this right.
Hopefully the populace see the slapping about of the SNP as being akin to a decent kid at school being given a bit of trouble by the school bullies, but trying to turn the other cheek. They need to fight back, though - for instance, on Sunday's Politics Show, perhaps Alex Neil could have found a way to highlight the fact the BBC's apology to him has never been publicised. Or during the Glasgow North-East by-election, David Kerr could have made it clear to people that Labour were campaigning on non-devolved issues. The open goals that the SNP have seemingly presented to Labour of late could mostly have been avoided with a bit more sophisticated media relations.
Didn't Murphy fill fellow unionist Dave in on the "we're going to ignore the SNP" strategy then?
The SNP should make a lot more of telling Scots that Labour would rather see the Tories run Scotland than the SNP. King Doug is quite right about presentation issues.
How can millions of dead Iraqis, nuclear weapons, ID cards and PFI be fine by them but an above board public lunch to raise funds leave the War party aghast?
Re Jeff's piece
I couldn't agree more with the comment by "King Doug" for there is little doubt that the present SNP leadership are letting votes slip away from them by missing numerous open goals left for them by Labour and the Tories.
Sadly its like watching the way Scotland play at international soccer or rugby!
Someone mentioned Osama Saeed in the comments just there, and I couldn't agree more.
Look at his blog and that's exactly the type of thing the SNP should be doing more of...positive reasons to vote SNP, but also concentration on why Scottish Labour is a completely negative force and on why the Labour candidate in question is unsuitable to represent the area at Westminster.
More of the same Osama, and see if you can convince some of your colleagues to go down the same route!
I'd like to see the election as a referendum with the Union, with the SNP asking the scottish electorate, Who would you like to see run the country, a Thatcherite government wearing a red rosette or a Thatherite government wearing a blue one?
One the one hand the Conservitives are getting away with saying nothing at a UK level, and on the other New Labour are getting away with really clever spinning unchecked at a Scottish level.
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