2018-01-22 18:47
Given the poor 2017 that the SNP had, with criticism mounting of their performance in government, accusations of putting the constitutional question ahead of everything else and being the on… Read More
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Dispatches From Paisley Blog
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My take on news & politics from the front line of schemie culture. Just watch for the flying bottles of buckie on your way out!
2018-01-15 12:00
First of all, can I wish you a belated Happy New Year and hope that 2018 is a better year for you than 2017.In 2017, we had 41 posts, the most posts in a year since 2011. It was a year… Read More
2017-12-31 09:00
At the start of May this year, many of the Anglo-centric punderati were lauding the rise of the French politician Emanuel Macron, and his election as French President. With very little to ze… Read More
2017-12-11 22:57
Thursday, 6:30pm, The Library Bar: It is the day that the next UK City of Culture is announced, with Paisley up against Coventry, Sunderland, Stoke-On-Trent and Swansea for the honour of suc… Read More
2017-11-13 13:00
When someone becomes an ex-leader, there are normally two ways things can go. There is the back seat driver route, favoured by Thatcher and Blair. Most leaders though tend to follow the line… Read More
2017-11-06 13:00
Nothing perhaps tells us more about the reduced circumstances of ‘Scottish’ Labour than the fact that the current leadership election is firmly background noise to other, bigger… Read More
2017-10-02 18:17
A couple of weeks ago, the Independent’s John Rentoul tweeted that he thought that of the two main Party leaders, May would last longer than Corbyn. Rather surprisingly, I can see circ… Read More
2017-09-26 16:09
You know that there are phrases which reveal something about a persons thinking – a laziness even when some sort of conventional wisdom is dispensed by several commentators at the one… Read More
2017-09-19 13:00
18th... 19th September. I’m sure I should be blogging about something, hmmmm.I’m certainly not going to write about Independence, there is nothing else that can be said at the mo… Read More
2017-09-11 12:00
We seem to be going through a phase at the moment where we are seeing all sorts of nostalgia for 1997. A couple of weeks ago we saw various reminiscences of the most famous drink driving car… Read More
2017-09-04 12:00
In among all of the heartfelt tributes to Dugdale, even from her political enemies, there were two observations missing. It is perhaps true that the leadership was foisted upon the young Dug… Read More
2017-08-30 12:00
Of all the things which lost the last Independence Referendum for the SNP, the thing near the top of the list would have been the SNP’s failure to win the economic argument. Anyt… Read More
2017-08-21 12:00
Of all the reaction’s I had received from last month’s record breaking post, the most thought provoking was one from Ergasiophobe who wondered if the infighting which infects los… Read More
2017-07-31 19:37
One of the ongoing debates in Scottish politics is what happened to the 476,867 voters who voted SNP two years ago and didn’t on June 8th, with consequences feeding into the narrative… Read More
2017-07-08 11:00
Guest blogpost time again. This post is from the grand fromage of Paisley.org, general promoter of all things Buddie and candidate in the recent council elections, Brian McGuire. … Read More
2017-06-26 12:00
If May’s Conservative party are the big losers from the General Election, then what are we to make then of the party who lost more seats, net, than the Tories and unlike the Tories los… Read More
2017-06-22 18:09
For a change of tack, I thought it would be good to hear about the recent General Election from an insiders point of view. So first up, we have a guest post from Lauren Gilmour from Sc… Read More
2017-06-14 12:00
The tagline for many a left wing and Scottish Nationalist campaign against the Conservatives was “Let June be the end of May”. While that didn’t quite happen on the 3… Read More
2017-06-11 08:00
About 10 minutes to 6 on Friday Morning, Labour held on to the seat of Southampton Test. This result made it mathematically impossible for the Conservatives to win an outright majority… Read More
2017-06-07 19:00
So now, the end is near in this strangest of election campaigns. Called six weeks ago but with the air of being conducted in a mad dash – thanks in no small part to the two acts… Read More
2017-06-07 07:00
In an election campaign where time is now very much of the essence (thanks, Wahabists! Mind and enjoy the silence from your so called god now) I’ve had to roll the last two elect… Read More
2017-06-06 11:00
The general narrative of this election has been the apparent surge in popularity of Labour’s leader Jeremy Corbyn. His run of out of his skin performances on debates and one on o… Read More
2017-06-05 11:00
One of the long standing jokes of electioneering is the Lib Dem’s persistent use of bar graph’s to show that, in their view, “only they can win here”. Normally… Read More
2017-05-31 23:22
With the enforced mid campaign break, all the hustings events are now begining to pile up. Earlier saw the last big set piece debate (though I think there might be one "Scottish" debat… Read More
2017-05-31 09:00
With us now into the final full week of this election campaign, it is strange that the SNP had not been able to unveil their election manifesto until now. It is arguable whether this h… Read More
2017-05-26 12:00
So... where were we before we were so rudely interrupted by the Muslim equivalent of those Christian fundamentalists who kill doctors and bomb abortion clinics in the US.Before the Tor… Read More
2017-05-19 09:00
With the news that the Tories are still averaging in the high 40’s and Labour’s percentages are creeping up, the conclusion that you could make about ITV’s third outing of… Read More
2017-05-15 12:00
Quite possibly the only true thing the leader of Holyrood’s opposition party, Ruth Davidson, has uttered is her belief that we have passed, in her own phrase, “peak Nat”.&n&hell…Read More
2017-05-06 10:00
The last time Scotland voted for councillors, we were all told that the SNP would sweep all before them as they would take councils up and down the land. Only for Labour to retake Renf… Read More
2017-05-03 22:00
There is a sort of hush that descends upon the country as an election campaign ends and the period of political silence draws near. It provides a brief opportunity to take stock on thi… Read More
2017-04-19 12:00
You may remember a piece that I did about four weeks ago saying that May would not be calling an election this year. You may remember me saying that there looked like there was no spac… Read More
2017-03-28 14:00
Refererendum’s eh. We’ve now had quite a few of them where we can pick up traits and rules. Yip they can be divisive, but the most successful ones, and there are only… Read More
2017-03-20 13:00
This time a couple of weeks ago, the Westminster village was full of rumour and speculation concerning debates supposedly happening about whether the Prime Minister should go to the country… Read More
2017-03-14 13:00
Regular readers of this blog will know that the previous referendums this country have organised were announced quite out of the blue and resulted in proposed posts being spiked. That… Read More
2017-03-06 12:00
I had kind of glossed over Sadiq Khan’s speech last week hadn’t I… Ah well, it’s not as if it’s caused any controversy or anything like that…The t… Read More
2017-02-27 16:00
Last week was always going to be a hard, difficult week in the fight for Labour’s life with two key but unnecessary by-elections in England being contested. The results of those… Read More
2017-02-20 13:00
Last week on BBC Parliament, there were a series of one man shows by the Independent & Guardian columnist Steve Richardson. In these talks, on the six big Prime Ministers over the p… Read More
2017-02-15 12:00
Huh, not just Dead Man Walking, but potentially this is the month where there is no going back for Labour. A party of opposition and potential government… gone. Dead… Read More
2017-02-06 16:00
Last week saw a story break about a politician’s attempt to remove a high ranking journalist from his position. The story about the former Prime Minister’s lobbying of Asso… Read More
2017-01-23 12:00
In the second of the posts looking back at the Scottish Political scene since the inception of this blog 10 years ago, we look at the development of the SNP.There have been, in my lifetime… Read More
2017-01-19 21:25
It's 10 years.. pretty much to the moment, since I started this blog. It's is strange to think that it's something I kind of fell into, something that I kinda had to be prompted into doing… Read More
2017-01-17 13:00
This week sees the 10th anniversary of the setting up of this blog. Over the next couple of posts we will be looking at the two big political trends in Scottish & UK politics over… Read More
2017-01-09 12:00
First of all can I wish you all a Happy New Year & let’s hope that 2017 will be a better one that 2016.2016 saw 35 posts in a year which saw the Holyrood elections overshadowed by… Read More
2016-12-31 16:00
So, this time last year. I’d made the point about economic crisis and the links to the fringes of politics gaining traction. I’d listed examples, Daesh, Syrzia, Podemos &am&hell…Read More
2016-12-06 16:00
In recent months, the SNP have apparently been engaging in a listening exercise. There have apparently been events with members of the SNP listening and engaging with non SNP members i… Read More
2016-11-29 16:00
Of all the things that are baffling and disturbing about UK politics at the moment, the root of that is the most baffling and disturbing thing of them all. Just how the hell do UKIP ge… Read More
2016-11-14 13:00
There is a figure who crops up time and time again in our media as a talking head. We all know who he is, he was an advisor for Tony Blair during his final term as Prime Minister but o… Read More
2016-11-07 13:00
For all of the moaning from certain pro-Unionist figures about the supposedly robust nature of the post referendum climate here in Scotland, it was never as poisonous as the current post EU… Read More
2016-10-31 13:00
You know, for all that the Independence referendum was a democratic awakening and a display of grown up politics, there were certain aspects of the debate which left a nasty taste in the mou… Read More
2016-10-25 15:00
During one of the pre-referendum posts I put out, I’d made the point that post referendum, the political atmosphere would be dominated by the fallout and the acrimony surrounding the v… Read More
2016-10-17 12:00
Normally at the end of Conference season, I do a post outlining the thoughts and key themes of each conference. However there appears to be one overarching theme linking the conference… Read More
2016-09-27 12:00
In the current fluid political climate where everything is up for grabs, the only certainty is conventional wisdom. Usually delivered by sober political commentators in what used to be… Read More
2016-09-20 15:00
Last week’s announcement by David Cameron that he is to step down as MP for Witney saw another bout of retrospection on Cameron’s time in Number 10. Among the reminiscences… Read More
2016-07-11 15:00
In the aftermath of the European Referendum two weeks ago, we have seen the shock and fallout permeate the wider economy. The Pound has fallen against the Dollar to levels not seen sin… Read More
2016-06-27 15:00
One of the most striking things about David Cameron’s emergence as Conservative leader towards the end of 2005 was his willingness to mark himself against and to openly draw parallels… Read More
2016-06-24 08:30
European Union Referendum, 23rd June 2016 – Final Result Leave the EU 17,410,742 51.9% Remain within the EU 16,141,241 48.1% About twenty to five this morning, the… Read More
2016-06-23 21:00
For all that there were an awful lot of references and call-backs to the Independence Referendum a couple of years ago, this European Referendum campaign was no Indyref. Sure we had en… Read More
2016-06-21 15:00
The end of the mourning period for the assassinated Labour MP Jo Cox ended on Sunday with both campaigns hitting the ground – and the television studios – running. One of t… Read More
2016-06-18 10:26
There is an element of elections I enjoy and look forward too. With this referendum though there has been a growing sense of dread as, firstly the Remain campaign had lost the plot, and seco… Read More
2016-06-01 15:00
I don’t know whether this is a symptom of entering Curmudgeon-hood but I’ve noticed more and more going to vote and participating in the phenomenon of ‘voting while holding… Read More
2016-05-23 12:00
You know, until recently I hadn’t realised that I hadn’t blogged about the SNP’s New Labour tendencies. Even though it’s a phrase that I’d used before, po… Read More
2016-05-06 23:01
Just before 9am yesterday morning the last of the list seats were allocated in the North East Scotland Region. This confirmed the final outcome that had always been the highly likely o… Read More
2016-05-06 05:02
We all knew that this would be a historic night for the SNP and would end up with a first full term for Nicola Sturgeon. We also thought that this would be a terrible night for Scottish L… Read More
2016-05-05 21:00
There’s now a wee bit of a tradition on these pages where I put together a sort of guide about when results are estimated to come in and results to look for. For this election I… Read More
2016-05-04 17:00
The Scottish National Party. A Party that prides itself on being strong for Scotland and standing up for Scotland. A party big on “Scottish solutions to Scottish issues&rdq&hell…Read More
2016-05-02 17:00
You know, I had intended to write about the SNP leaflet. But that was before a couple of leaflets arrived that I hadn’t noticed before leaving to enjoy the delights of our Nation… Read More
2016-04-29 20:00
You know, I kinda suspect that our political parties, maybe more so than the electorate, are suffering from election fatigue. This is the strangest Holyrood election campaign that I ca… Read More
2016-04-25 12:00
It is a law of politics that even the shrewdest of political minds will come unstuck when attempting to traverse foreign or unfamiliar political landscapes. Blair, for example, always… Read More
2016-04-11 11:00
Long time readers of this blog will know that one of the things this blog does is to look at and dissect election literature that comes through the door here at Dispatches towers. The… Read More
2016-04-04 12:00
You know, given the SNP’s record in government being not the most convincing record (with their minds and resources concentrated on that referendum), you’d imagine that the next… Read More
2016-03-22 13:00
This week sees the proposed date that, had Scotland voted a different way we would have become an Independent country, if you believe that those negotiations would have been brisk, swift and… Read More
2016-03-18 22:43
One of the jibes thrown by the SNP and their supporters about the upcoming EU Referendum is that this is an internal dispute within the Conservative Party and that it’s unseemly for us… Read More
2016-03-08 13:00
One of the jibes thrown by the SNP and their supporters about the upcoming EU Referendum is that this is an internal dispute within the Conservative Party and that it’s unseemly for us… Read More
2016-03-01 13:00
Ah, the nineties revival. I’d always wondered how it would manifest itself. We’ve had the re-appropriation of Ibiza House anthems as… er… the basi… Read More
2016-02-22 17:00
Almost 18 months ago, we were asked a question about who we were and who should govern us. At the end of June, a similar question will be asked of us if framed differently. Thoug… Read More
2016-02-08 20:40
You know, just when you think that Scottish Labour are going to blunder through this election campaigning on the SNPBad tagline. From nowhere Dugdale has pulled something that shocking… Read More
2016-01-18 13:00
In her excellent column in yesterday’s Sunday Herald, Angela Haggerty highlighted the one eyed tweets of one G A Ponsonby whilst not being aware of his past. If my own memory ser… Read More
2016-01-11 20:29
You may have noticed that the build up to the fifth Holyrood Elections has seriously started early with the First Minister making a speech last week and some policy kite-flying from Scottish… Read More
2016-01-04 12:00
First of all can I wish you a Happy New Year?I posted 37 blogs this year, and as you will see May’s Westminster election utterly dominated the blogging. So without further ado, h… Read More
2015-12-31 15:00
You know, in times of impending war or economic crisis, the political fringes thrive. The 1930’s of course saw the rise of Fascism and the German hard right in the shape of the N… Read More
2015-12-31 15:00
You know, in times of impending war or economic crisis, the political fringes thrive. The 1930’s of course saw the rise of Fascism and the German hard right in the shape of the N… Read More
2015-11-23 19:58
So we’ve now had two months of the so called “new politics” and, well what do you think of it kids?Corbyn & Cameron recreate the Frost Report's Class sketchThe most obv… Read More
2015-11-16 21:00
In our fast 24 hour society, if a problem appears we demand an immediate response and an action to sort the problem out. The obvious problem is that being seen to do something is not t… Read More
2015-10-21 13:00
The last four weeks or so has seen the main parties gathering for the first time since the General Election. There have been some noteworthy items that have come out of the conferences… Read More
2015-09-21 16:00
Friday was of course the first anniversary of that referendum. In the run up to it, we have had all manner of reminiscences about what happened last year. Fine if you are serious… Read More
2015-09-08 21:19
With the general election gone and now a memory, this autumn’s party conferences will feed into the ongoing fallout from the said Westminster Election. That next year sees the bi… Read More
2015-08-31 11:00
I’m not exactly sure of the polling but I’d suspect that there is a majority of people who would quite like there not to be another Independence referendum around the corner.&nbs&hell…Read More
2015-08-17 12:00
I’ve been doing this blog now for over 8 years. As the risk of coming across all ‘it were all fields here when I were a lad’ and all that, I can remember quite… Read More
2015-06-17 23:01
Watching the initial skirmishes of the latest Labour Leadership campaign, you get the impression that both the politicians and the Labour ‘supporters’ in the media can’t qu… Read More
2015-06-16 13:00
Other than viewers in Scotland, there was only one winner out of last months General Election. This much has been clear as Cameron unfurled the first full fat Tory Queen’s Speech… Read More
2015-06-08 11:00
“Labour lost because they tried to ape the Tories. Why would the voters buy into Labour wearing the Tories clothes when the Tories (are) there?” – Natalie McGarry, MP… Read More
2015-05-27 22:00
This is still a thing. Whit!!!The most striking thing about this episode is the sheer ineptitude of Carmichael. Alongside being worse than a doormat in government and being utter… Read More
2015-05-25 11:00
This week sees the first Queens speech of the all singing, all dancing new Conservative government that features a hell of a lot of the old faces from the coalition government. Arguabl… Read More
2015-05-12 20:49
People say that the Tories are ruthless towards their leaders, but the speed that Blairite leaning Labour politicians turned on Milliband is breathtaking to say the least. Mind you, wh… Read More
2015-05-08 19:06
10pm, 7th May & Exit poll announces Tories are largest party on 316 seatsAt about 20 to 1 this afternoon, the Conservatives passed a landmark that they had not passed since the afternoon… Read More
2015-05-08 06:42
You might remember that this was supposed to be the closest election since... well that worked out well didn't it?The big story was set early on with the exit polls pointing to a likel… Read More
2015-05-08 01:10
Exit polls... Pfft...If the exit polls have had the slight air of unbelievability about it, the numbers coming in have proved the exit poll has been more accurate than we would l… Read More
2015-05-07 21:25
Polling stations up and down the land have now closed. The fun now truly begins with the exit poll... Conservitives - 316 Labour - 239 Lib Dems - 10 SNP - 58&nb&hell…Read More
2015-05-07 16:00
Well five years ago, I though that I would try and do a sort of guide which would show when the key seats were due to be announced and why they were key seats. If memory serves, it wasn&rsqu&hell…Read More
2015-05-06 22:00
You know there comes a point where the claim that this is the closest, most exciting election since… well whatever… grates somewhat. Not that it’s been dull… Read More
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