Wendy Alexander is set to announce a new challenge to the SNP about the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. Scheduled for 2014, she is to tell Alex Salmond to "bring them on" – arguing that if the SNP is genuine in its enthusiasm for staging the Games in Glasgow, it should legislate for them to take place the year before then, in 2013.
Labour's thinking is that it needs to show "the hollowness of the SNP's commitment to the Commonwealth Games". According to one insider: "If New Delhi can stage the games in 2010, what on earth are we waiting for? If Alex Salmond were really behind Glasgow's games, he could even try to get in ahead of the Indian capital and have the Games next year."
The sudden shift of tactics is understood to have caused tensions with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who fears that if Scottish Labour wants the Glasgow Commonwealth Games to be staged one year earlier than planned, he may come under pressure to bring the London Olympics forward to 2011 - potentially sending costs soaring. His spokesman says is is "not persuaded" of the case for "bringing them on", despite Ms Alexander telling associates she thinks he has agreed.
If the SNP First Minister refuses to bring forward the date of the Commonwealth Games, instead sticking to the existing timetable, sources close to Wendy Alexander say that she will be able to claim that she has called Alex Salmond's bluff, and she will label him "a cowardy custard".
A fifth day of confusion over that Labour U-turn on supporting an independence referendum.
SUNDAY: Wendy Alexander blurts out, on television, that the SNP should "bring it on", having previously said Labour would combine with others to block a referendum.
MONDAY: It becomes clear that she had told no-one within Labour that she was going to do this.
TUESDAY: After MSPs agree to fall into line, it is announced by Duncan McNeil, the group convener, that the party will abstain on any referendum bill that comes before parliament.
She says she might use the option of bringing forward a Labour bill to force the government to speed up its timetable for a referendum - or to vote it down, which would be embarrassing for the SNP. At Westminster, Gordon Brown's spokesman, under sustained pressure in his daily briefing, declines to endorse the new position, saying it is a debate to be had in the Scottish Parliament.
WEDNESDAY: Asked by David Cameron if he agrees with Wendy Alexander there should be a referendum, Gordon Brown denies she has said that. (It is later lamely explained this is because she does not want it "now", leading to a surreal debate on the meaning of the word.) The Prime Minister goes on that the Calman Commission, on extra powers, should be left to report and then a decision will be made on its outcome. He later agrees a common line with Alexander that they are completely in agreement... on the importance of "exposing the shallowness" of the SNP, but avoiding the key issues at question.
David Cameron increases the pressure with a letter highlighting the inconsistency in the Prime Minister's statement. Brown replies that David Cameron fails to understand the referendum process, and says that Tories should be joining Labour in defending the union.
Finance spokesman Iain Gray is sent out to reconcile the irreconcilable in three broadcast interviews. That was a very short straw he drew in cabinet.
TODAY: Malcolm Chisholm joins the struggle to explain in the media how the Prime Minister and Wendy Alexander are in agreement. She then raises the issue at First Minister's questions, saying that the referendum should be called "now" and "next week", leaving no doubt that the Prime Minister was wrong when he told MPs she had said no such thing. The difference between them is now beyond doubt. A copy of a further letter from David Cameron has just dropped on my desk, detailing what Wendy Alexander said at FMQs, and accusing the Prime Minister of "exactly the sort of linguistic gymnastics is making people confused and even angry with your style of leadership". He says the PM has been "completely unclear and potentially misleading in your replies to my questions". In Westminster-speak, that's a serious charge.
Now, there was a point when Wendy Alexander could have said that she was standing up to London Labour, and showing her independence of Downing Street. But that point is now long past. Instead we have spin that is heading towards the dishonest.
The spin has suggested the SNP position has changed and that it is trying to delay a referendum. That is not true. The SNP has consistently said it would have the referendum in 2010 – though its top spokesman took a bit of heat from journalists this afternoon on why it is not taking up the Labour offer. Why not try, for instance, take up Labour's offer of passing a bill as soon as possible, and leave it open for ministers to set the date later on - getting the bill through and still sticking with the 2010 target date?
The spin has suggested that David Cameron asked about Westminster calling and arranging an independence referendum. He didn't.
The spin suggested it would take up to a year to pass a referendum bill, and at least nine months, and that the 2010 date for passing a bill and holding a referendum is therefore unrealistic. That is highly unlikely.
The spin has suggested that when the Prime Minister wants to wait until the Calman Commission has reported and will then decide what to do, and when Wendy Alexander wants a referendum as soon as possible, they are in agreement. They are not.
There remains a significant gap in Labour's story. If it does not get the referendum it says it wants, within a year or so (which it seems certain that it won't), will it let the SNP have the referendum on the SNP's preferred timetable, in 2010. It seemed, from what Duncan McNeil said on Tuesday, that it would. It is not clear now, and Labour has twice warned now that it may pick a fight over the wording of the referendum question. There is no blank cheque, we are told.
Someone has been monkeying with the SNP's Wikipedia entry.
"The Scottish National Party (SNP) (Scottish Gaelic: Pŕrtaidh Nŕiseanta na h-Alba) is a centre-left, Social democratic political party which campaigns for the destruction of the 1707 Union which created Great Britain, and the creation of a Scottish state heavily modelled on East Germany (DDR)."
AS I WRITE this blog the First Minister and opposition party leaders are being prepared for the weekly high noon ritual of FMQs. Very often the beauty of this is that something seriously left-field can be introduced, so that the FM cannot possibly be prepared for it. The former Green MSP Shiona Baird developed an expertise in obscure detail that was bound to discomfit Jack McConnell.
A couple of week's ago when Wendy Alexander chose not to go on the Grangemouth crisis it rebounded on her, making her look out of touch with the pressing issue of the day.
Having tried to set a new agenda this week with her call for an early independence referendum, she has little choice but to run with it today. If she chose not to go on the issue it would be interpreted as another u-turn and the SNP are already painting the Labour leader as “eccentric” and prone to changing her mind. As one senior Salmond aide said this week: “What we are saying is contingent on what Wendy Alexander is saying today, Tuesday, but who know what she will say come Thursday?”
So now it's Thursday, Ms Alexander had little choice but to go on what she herself has made issue of the week, and therefore has little chance of springing much of a surprise on the FM, who is on very firm ground given that all he is doing is sticking (for once, Labour may claim?) to a manifesto commitment.
Where is Ms Alexander going on all this? Here “bring it on” language shows that she wants to paint the SNP as lacking the courage of their convictions.
But she is also paving the way to back-track on her new strategy because she wants to contest the wording of the referendum question. This is a huge issue.
The Government's preferred wording as outlined in the White Paper is to ask voters whether they are for or against the following: “I agree that the Scottish Government should negotiate a settlement with the Government of the UK so that Scotland becomes an independent state.”
When opinion pollsters have asked that same question over the last year there has been steady growth in the numbers supporting the proposition, to the point that is now level pegging. But when the resolutely Unionist Daily Telegraph polled on the issue it asked the following question: “If there were a referendum on whether to retain the Scottish Parliament and Executive in more or less their present form or to establish Scotland as a completely separate state outside the Unite Kingdom but inside the European Union, how would you vote?”
The combination of a complex, somewhat convoluted question along with the negative connotations of “a completely separate state outside the UK” talks up the fear factor of Scotland “going it alone” and implying isolation in the international community.
Labour don't like the word independence. The United States and other countries around the world do not celebrate Separation Day. They celebrate Independence Day, which is why the SNP Government want to use a word seen as having positive connotations, and why their Unionist opponents are desperate to avoid that term.
The issue of the wording of the question is Ms Alexander's exit clause from her new pro-referendum strategy.
Now, at last, it's clear - in that the Labour leaderships at Westminster and Holyrood are definitely in complete disarray. Wendy Alexander said on Newsnight Scotland last night that she had the Prime Minister's backing for a snap referendum on independence.
Gordon Brewer: Is Gordon Brown endorsing your decision to call for a referendum?
Wendy Alexander: Yes
Gordon Brewer: And he's told you that?
Wendy Alexander: Yes
Gordon Brewer: So any suggestions that you bounced him into this are wrong?
Wendy Alexander: They're wrong.
But when Gordon Brown was asked in the Commons today whether he supports her calling for an immediate referendum, he denied that is what she had said. He then went on to say the Calman Commission, on enhanced powers for Holyrood within the UK, should run its course and then they should decide how they were going to handle its recommendations.
Two Labour leaders. Two irreconcilable positions.
Her spokesman is currently stalling while they figure out how to react.
Ms Alexander also used her TV interview to signal her get-out clause when it comes to the SNP's 2010 Referendum Bill: "They're not prepared to discuss what the question will be, but I think we will have differences of view as to what the question will be". Could this be a future U-turn, to get out of letting the SNP go ahead with its 2010 plans?
This episode does not spell the end for Wendy Alexander's leadership yet, but when her colleagues decide it is time for her to go, her handling of this U-turn will be powerful ammunition with which to despatch her.
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The odds are shifting the way of Scottish independence. One high street bookies has cut the odds on independence by 2012 from 200/1 to 150/1. That still looks like quite a good legacy for the grandkids.
Scottish independence by 2012 have been shortened from 66/1 to 50/1 by 2017 - Alex Salmond's target date. For those who like to take the longer view they are at 14/1, down from 20/1 for independence within 50 years.
The way things are moving, those odds look quite attractive. And the bookies' assessment of the way Gordon Brown will leave the Labour leadership before he gets the chance to fight the next election are heading towards odds-on.
The commentariat has been struggling to find an adequate description for the awfulness of last week's English and Welsh local election results for Labour. For its originality, colour and, er, style I've decided the award should go to the ever-readable Matthew Parris: "It's over. There was nothing constructive in the voters' message. These elections were not an invitation to change. They were a big two-fingered salute, a raspberry, a pressing of the de-trousered national buttocks to the window of the polling station".
Writing on Friday, Parris, a former Tory MP, also offered a list of 30 cliches he expected to hear over the following days from Labour MPs trying to get over the loss; wake-up call, message from the electorate, take it on the chin, listen to voters, learn lessons, heed concerns, need for change, get back in touch, sharpen up the act, show contrition, find a new narrative, feel their pain, show humility, understand more, blitz of initiatives, sense of purpose, simpler messages, sharpen the argument, clearer sense of rcdirection, relaunch, refocus, rediscover, redefine, repair, refresh, reshuffle, rethink, renew, begin fightback, still two years left.
On that measure, Labour has had a hugely successful few days. In the space of one interview yesterday, the Prime Minister himself tried out about half of them.
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You could argue there's not much read-across from England's three-party politics to how last week's results could play in Scotland. But what about Wales? Plaid Cymru, like the SNP, is in power and offers a vehicle for anti-Labour protest votes. And what happened? Well, Labour took "a kick up the backside", according to Welsh Secretary Paul Murphy. But it was not Plaid Cymru that did best out of this. Tories picked up around half the seats Labour lost. LibDems picked up where they were already building strengths; Cardiff, Newport and Swansea. Plaid Cymru came out ahead but lost control of the one council it had controlled, Gwynedd. Even the party president and the council leader lost their seats. One of their problems was a 'save our schools' party, and independents didn't do badly at all in what First Minister Rhodri Morgan described as an anti-politician mood. Beneficiaries of that include former Welsh Secretary Ron Davies, who parted company with Labour after a "moment of madness". His wife, Lynne Hughes, became a Plaid Cymru member of the same council.
One of the lessons learned by Paul Murphy, who has been delegated by Gordon Brown to handle relations with the devolved administrations, is that there's been too much talk about the constitution in Wales and not enough about prices at the supermarket checkout and petrol forecourt. If that's true, you have to wonder why Wendy Alexander marked the first year of SNP government yesterday with an acrobatic U-turn with half-twist over an independence referendum?
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Stanley Johnson, father of the foppish, Etonian new mayor of London, was asked on BBC News24 about his son's credentials in governing. "He's got good Greek and Latin," he replied. "And if you've got good Greek and Latin, you can do a lot of things, and that certainly includes running a city like London".
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Talking of Tories, Alex Salmond is not inviting Margaret Thatcher to tea at Bute House. He would like to make clear that he is not up for basking in her aura, as Gordon Brown did at Downing Street, ahead of saying that he rather admires the former Prime Minister for her strength and determination. This was the first anniversary message to readers of the Daily Telegraph. The Morning Star has not interviewed him recently, but given the opportunity, he'd probably sing the praises of Fidel Castro's health policy.
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Time to catch up with quite a lot of polling action:
As exclusively revealed in The Herald, TNS System Three polled between 26 and 29 April and found the biggest lead ever for the SNP
Holyrood constituency
SNP 45
Labour 31
Tory 12
LibDem 11
Holyrood constituency
SNP 41
Labour 29
Tory 12
LibDem12
Others 6
Westminster
Labour 39
SNP 31
Tory 17
LibDem 10
According to YouGov in the Daily Telegraph last week,
Holyrood constituency
SNP 36
Labour 31
LibDem 15
Tories 13
Holyrood regional
SNP 37
Labour 28
LibDem 13
Tory 13
Westminster
Labour 34
SNP 30
Tories 17
LibDems 14
Doing a good job?
Alex Salmond 53
Annabel Goldie 41
Nicol Stephen 27
Gordon Brown 26
Wendy Alexander 21
YouGov also asked about support for different constitutional options, and incurred the displeasure of the First Minister for a fairly loaded question about the SNP preference of Scotland becoming "a completely separate state outside the United Kingdom".
Independence 19
Keeping devolution as it is 34
Devolution with more powers 38
Even when comparing independence with the status quo, support for the SNP's position rises to only 25%.
And Progressive Scottish Opinion, commissed by the Daily Mail, asked 1006 people, reporting on 23 April on a question that only asked about the constituency voting intentions:
SNP 40
Labour 33
Tory 13
LibDem 10
So there is a consistent picture of a comfortable SNP lead for Holyrood, Labour ahead but by much less than in 2005 on Westminster intentions, and the LibDems and Tories battling around the mid-teens for a poor third place. The smaller parties' hope may be that Thursday's results show Tories have begun to break through in parts of northern England which had been as resistant to David Cameron and Conservatism as Scotland has been, while Nick Clegg's poor UK poll showing was far behind the actual LibDem results - nothing spectacular, but modest progress.
NOT SINCE the summer of ‘96 has the Scottish Labour Party been in such disarray over constitutional tactics. In many ways these were the best of times for Labour, with the Tories facing a parliamentary wipe-out North of the Border and Michael Forsyth staging a personal re-enactment of Custer’s last stand.
But still Labour got itself in a terrible fankle. In June of that year Tony Blair, the PM in waiting, announced that when his party came to power, as they would within a year, they would hold a referendum on Scottish devolution. Two questions would be asked, one on the broad principle and the other on whether tax-varying powers should be included.
Two months later his party’s Scottish executive rebelled against Blair and overturned the plans, eventually reaching a compromise in which there would be not a two-question referendum, but two referendums with three questions, the second referendum being being triggered if the tax power was ever to be invoked. Quite a thought, eh? What price Gordon Brown’s abolition of the 10p tax rate having to go to a plebiscite?
Anyway such was the ridicule heaped on the party at that time that George Robertson, shadow Scottish Secretary, was forced to overrule the executive’s decision just a week later. Within six months a ruthless New Labour purge of the executive ensured it would never embarrass the Great Leader again.
But Labour’s summer of ‘96 seems an oasis of calm by comparison with the chaos of ‘08. The first anniversary the SNP coming to power at Holyrood appears to have caused a rush of blood to Wendy Alexander’s head, and with it yesterday’s u-turn on holding a referendum.
Refusing any truck with another referendum on Scotland’s future if independence is an option on the ballot paper has been an article of faith for the Unionist coalition Labour has tried to construct with the Tories and LibDems.
Their chosen vehicle of change, the Scottish Constitutional Commission, was so purged of independent thought that George Reid was blackballed for membership. Gordon Brown didn’t even want it to called a commission. And when it finally convened last week both Westminster and Holyrood both wanted to run the show.
Still, Sir Kenneth Calman came across well on launch day and said he was determined to come up with a set of proposals by summer of next year. But then what? Is there any set of proposals that could conceivably satisfy all six clients? That is to say the three signed up political party groups at both Holyrood and Westminster?
And could anything conceivably come out of that which could be distilled into a White Paper that could serve as a referendum question? As they say about a horse designed by a committee, this all sounds like a bit of a camel and they’re now asking it to complete a steeplechase.
Perhaps the following scenario could just about be possible. I doubt it but let’s imagine a referendum in 2010. Even the uber-Unionists have agreed that the status quo is no longer tenable, but they have Calman’s “devolution-max” plan for fiscal autonomy and more devolved powers to rally around.
You therefore get a referendum ballot paper as follows:
Select one of the following:
“I agree that the Scottish Government should negotiate a settlement with the Government of the UK so that Scotland becomes an independent state.”
OR
“I agree that the powers of the Scottish Parliament should be extended in line with the the Calman Report.”
As I said above, I think there are simply too many hurdles to this. But whichever way you look at it, Wendy Alexander’s referendum u-turn means we are all dancing to Alex Salmond’s jig now.
Politics
