The good news if the SNP do get a landslide victory at the polls

[sids]

It wouldn't scare you if you wouldn't consider the possibility to any depth.

I suppose I am scared of drowning, if that's what you're talking about in that enigmatic epiphet.

[Rheghead]

I suppose I am scared of drowning, if that's what you're talking about in that enigmatic epiphet.

People who are irrationally scared of drowning never get to enjoy a cool swim.

[sids]

People who are irrationally scared of drowning never get to enjoy a cool swim.

That's true, but who is irrationally scared of drowning?

[davth]

People who are irrationally scared of drowning never get to enjoy a cool swim.

a swim is one thing
diving off holburn head in the pitch black during a storm is suicide though

[BetterTogether]

It's always the same old same old everyone who didn't vote for independence was either scared,blind or afraid.

But one thing I have noticed through all this, never once do any of the SNPrs produce a single policy or area that th SNP have improved or radically changed for the benefit of the whole population.

The usual round of aged historical tantrums are thrown about, the usual grievance against Westminster, but never ever do you hear them actually admit it's all pipe dreams based on ifs buts and maybes with no cohesive thought out rational ideas behind it.
The reality is the SNP want a more left of central country with benefits and splurge spending to keep everyone happy. Even Nicola Sturgeon admitted during the election run up campaign that their spending programme would mean austerity would rumble on longer.
I tend to agree with Rob that the prime minister will implement the Smith Commision recommendations and I very much doubt he will allow her to try negotiate further and should he decide to grant FFA to Scotland then you can guarantee Scotland wouldn't be in a position to negotiate more than he wants to give them.
Watching Andrew Marr this morning Nicola Sturgeon seems a little delusional insisting she will negotiate a better deal for Scotland from a position of weakness and without the majority of the population behind her.
The conservatives know that The majority of Scotland is pro Union and that some of the people who voted SNP this time wouldn't vote yes in a referendum, that means we now have 56 emasculated MPs in Westminster from a party that has no chance of making alliances with labour or the lib dems. The reality is the SNP have delivered themselves a fatal blow to their credibility as the next five years will start to show how utterly inept they truly are. Their failures will begin to shine through and the people of Scotland will tire of the constant blaming of everyone but themselves.

As for the EU referendum being a trigger for another referendum, well maybe in Nicolas mind it is but she should wait to see how the vote in Scotland goes, if the majority of Scotland vote for out of the EU she has no mandate and if the UK votes to stay in she still doesn't have a mandate. Unless Scotland where to vote out of the EU and the UK vote stays in, but wouldn't the SNP then have a major headache.

[Rheghead]

a swim is one thing
diving off holburn head in the pitch black during a storm is suicide though

Strange that, all Better Together frontline campaigners conceded that Scotland could go it alone but we were just better together. Scaremongering?

[davth]

Strange that, all Better Together frontline campaigners conceded that Scotland could go it alone but we were just better together. Scaremongering?

We could have gone it alone.
It just that it would have resulted in despair.

[Rheghead]

We could have gone it alone.
It just that it would have resulted in despair.

Do we not have despair already? Ugly scenes in London, not since the last tory government have seen such things. Food banks. Zero hours contracts. Prospects of being out of EU. An economy in the doldrums, anti poor, disabled and immigrant rhetoric. Look around you.

[BetterTogether]

Do we not have despair already? Ugly scenes in London, not since the last tory government have seen such things. Food banks. Zero hours contracts. Prospects of being out of EU. An economy in the doldrums, anti poor, disabled and immigrant rhetoric. Look around you.

Ugly scenes in London held by extremist unable to accept the democratic will of the people.

Food banks recently I read an article by a worker from one who says they have to remove the labels to stop those recieving them from reselling the items.

Zero hours contracts great if your a student or require flexible working hours and as it turns out only a small percentage of the population using them, and no one is forced to work under a zero hours contract.

Prospects of being out of the EU but only if demcratically decided by the electorate.We have the fastest growing economy in the western world and unemployment dropping radically on a daily basis.

Only a small minority accept that uncontrolled immigration is good for the country, placing controls over who comes in the country is a common sense thing to do.

Disabled rhetoric once again spin bandied about by the militant left to scare people with no factual basis.

Seems the only people doing the scaremongering are the militant left and those afraid of allowing the electorate a democratic choice .

Seems to me the despair is from SNP voters who fail to realise they are being led by the nose by an all spin no substance party politik whose MPs have all signed an agreement not to speak out against members of the party or party politic regardless of what's happening.

That means all SNP MPs put party before electorate , so much for a free fair society, democracy isn't for the SNP by the sounds of it.

[BetterTogether]

We must also remember this was a general election and for the past rather long boring weeks we've heard an awful lot how the SNP where going to lock the Tories out of power, having nailed their flag firmly to the mast and with all the pied piper from Irvine ,Nicola Sturgeons fancy spin what they infact have succeeded in doing is once again FAILING in quite a spectacular fashion.

The befuddled and somewhat confused cabal of quasi messianic followers listened intently to her play her pipes and danced her merry wee tune all the way down to the voting booth, duly they crossed their box in the hope of blocking those wicked Tories out of power, but alas the pied piper of the SNP had got her sums wrong, and despite delivering 56 of her trusted legion of minions to the demons lair only to find out despite having their tails all tied together they where powerless to stand in the face of a Tory Majority all her huff and puff had done nothing to blow their house down as they now had a house of brick and stone.

Two crushing defeats in 8 months is a fine track record.

How many more disappointments will SNP voters have to face before they realise the Pied Piper from Irvine is no more than a fairytale character and may tell a very jolly tale but non of its real. Maybe if she clicks her heels together three times and wishes it might all change.

[rob murray]

It's always the same old same old everyone who didn't vote for independence was either scared,blind or afraid.

But one thing I have noticed through all this, never once do any of the SNPrs produce a single policy or area that th SNP have improved or radically changed for the benefit of the whole population.

The usual round of aged historical tantrums are thrown about, the usual grievance against Westminster, but never ever do you hear them actually admit it's all pipe dreams based on ifs buts and maybes with no cohesive thought out rational ideas behind it.
The reality is the SNP want a more left of central country with benefits and splurge spending to keep everyone happy. Even Nicola Sturgeon admitted during the election run up campaign that their spending programme would mean austerity would rumble on longer.
I tend to agree with Rob that the prime minister will implement the Smith Commision recommendations and I very much doubt he will allow her to try negotiate further and should he decide to grant FFA to Scotland then you can guarantee Scotland wouldn't be in a position to negotiate more than he wants to give them.
Watching Andrew Marr this morning Nicola Sturgeon seems a little delusional insisting she will negotiate a better deal for Scotland from a position of weakness and without the majority of the population behind her.
The conservatives know that The majority of Scotland is pro Union and that some of the people who voted SNP this time wouldn't vote yes in a referendum, that means we now have 56 emasculated MPs in Westminster from a party that has no chance of making alliances with labour or the lib dems. The reality is the SNP have delivered themselves a fatal blow to their credibility as the next five years will start to show how utterly inept they truly are. Their failures will begin to shine through and the people of Scotland will tire of the constant blaming of everyone but themselves.

As for the EU referendum being a trigger for another referendum, well maybe in Nicolas mind it is but she should wait to see how the vote in Scotland goes, if the majority of Scotland vote for out of the EU she has no mandate and if the UK votes to stay in she still doesn't have a mandate. Unless Scotland where to vote out of the EU and the UK vote stays in, but wouldn't the SNP then have a major headache.

Where we agree is that people are soon gonna discover that 56 SNP MP's wont change anything, nor do they have the clout to influence, as for committee participation, big deal, ultimately the Tories arithmetically call the shots, and you can be assured they will have a savage whip system ensuring dissenters toe the lie. Sturgeon can take what she is given, all she is doing is posturing playing up to the 50% that voted snp truth is it’s clear that the only ways the figures will get better for an FFA Scotland are

If oil recovers dramatically. Which it might but will take a couple of years to get back to $100 a barrel. But surely now every Scottish voter “gets” how volatile oil revenue is, understands that a decision to leap for fiscal freedom in a good oil year is likely to bite us in the arse come the next oil slump If we dramatically reduce public spending in Scotland beyond the levels of UK wide cuts (remember: its the deficit difference to the rest of the UK that counts here). Frankly that clearly won’t happen unless it’s forced on us through Barnett cut. If we increase tax rates dramatically such that we raise an additional £8bn or so from onshore taxes. The current onshore tax take in Scotland is £50bn so that would be a 16% increase If we manage to buck the trend of the last 15 years (at least) and start generating economic growth over and above that of the rest of the UK so that our tax take increases without having to increase tax rates. The sum is the same as the one above; this would require 16% growth over and above that achieved by the rest of the UK to close the FFA gap

Even assuming a following wind and some combination of all of the above happening it’s hard to see how things could particularly rosy for the Independence case even by 2020.

[BetterTogether]

We both approach the same issues from vastly different political perspective Rob I'd say to some extent we are probably diametrically opposed on many issues, but on this one point we seem to be in total agreement.

[rob murray]

We both approach the same issues from vastly different political perspective Rob I'd say to some extent we are probably diametrically opposed on many issues, but on this one point we seem to be in total agreement.

Yes, politically we are different shades but united in the strategic political analysis, whats your take on caithness /suth / north ross voting SNP ?

[BetterTogether]

There's no great surprise that the SNP have been votes in this area I haven't looked at previous election results but if I where to take a guess it would probably show a collapse in labour voters and a smaller swing from liberal democrats.

The problem really lay in people who listen intently to all the SNP propaganda but fail to see their record on delivery is fairly catastrophic to put it mildly.

In reality the other parties lost the election labour have lost their traditional core vote because they have stopped listening to working class people and have centred their policies on the desires of a metropolitan elite, the lib dems lost because of the coalition with the conservatives and the sense of betrayal felt by their voters.

Many voters for SNP only voted due to this being not an independence issue, no doubt a lot would feel betrayed should the SNP decide to have another roll of the dice with independence so soon after the referendum.
It's really a question of how long the game of blame laying and grievance can last before people start to see their is no real meat on the bones of the SNPs manifesto.

What Nicola Sturgeon is attempting to do is play a dangerous game which at some stage will result in the usual mock outrage at the Conservatives not listening to the democratic wishes of the people for some reason or other that is purely contrived from their tangled convoluted web of grievance against anyone who disagrees with them.

Although tonight I have heard from a conservative with reasonably good connections to party central that there is an attitude of letting Nicola Sturgeon have FFA as soon as possible then watch her hang herself and her party in fairly short order, the common belief being the black hole in finances being sufficiently large that the austerity forced upon Scotland through the actions of the SNP should be sufficient to ensure they loose the majority of their electoral base and become another defunct political force tossed on the scrap heap of history by their own short sighted goals.

[cazmanian_minx]

Previous figures (from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caithne..._constituency) )

1997

Liberal Democrat	Robert Maclennan	10,381	35.6	N/A
Labour	James Hendry	8,122	27.8	N/A
SNP	Euan Harper	6,710	23.0	N/A
Conservative	Tom Miers	3,148	10.8	N/A
Referendum Party	Carolyn Ryder	369	1.3	N/A
Scottish Green	John Martin	230	0.8	N/A
UKIP	Martin Carr	212	0.7	N/A
Majority			2,259	7.7	N/A
Turnout			29,172	70.2

2001

Liberal Democrat	John Thurso	9,041	36.4	+0.8
Labour	Michael Meighan	6,297	25.3	−2.5
SNP	John MacAdam	5,273	21.2	−1.8
Conservative	Robert Rowantree	3,513	14.1	+3.3
Scottish Socialist	Karn Mabon	544	2.2	N/A
Independent	Gordon Campbell	199	0.8	N/A
Majority			2,744	11.1
Turnout			24,867	60.2	−9.8

2005

Liberal Democrat	John Thurso	13,957	50.5	+11.9
Labour	Alan Jamieson	5,789	20.9	−3.4
SNP	Karen Shirron	3,686	13.3	−7.0
Conservative	Angus Ross	2,835	10.2	−3.3
Independent	Gordon Campbell	848	3.1	+2.3
Scottish Socialist	Luke Ivory	548	2.0	−0.2
Majority			8,168	29.5
Turnout			27,663	59.1	−2.0

2010

Liberal Democrat	John Thurso	11,907	41.4	−9.1
Labour	John Mackay	7,081	24.6	+3.7
SNP	Jean Urquhart	5,516	19.2	+5.8
Conservative	Alastair Graham	3,744	13.0	+2.8
Independent	Gordon Campbell	520	1.8	−1.3
Majority			4,826	16.8
Turnout			28,768	60.9	+1.5

2015

SNP	Paul Monaghan [3]	15,831	46.3	+27.1
Liberal Democrat	John Thurso [4]	11,987	35.1	-6.3
Labour	John Erskine [5]	3,061	9.0	-15.7
Conservative	Alastair Graham[citation needed]	2,326	6.8	-6.2
UKIP	Annie Murray [6]	981	2.9	N/A
Majority			3,844	11.2	-5.6
Turnout			34,186	71.9	+11.0

(Tables have gone a bit squiffy, shunt the majority and turnout figures left a bit in your imagination!)

[rob murray]

There's no great surprise that the SNP have been votes in this area I haven't looked at previous election results but if I where to take a guess it would probably show a collapse in labour voters and a smaller swing from liberal democrats.

The problem really lay in people who listen intently to all the SNP propaganda but fail to see their record on delivery is fairly catastrophic to put it mildly.

In reality the other parties lost the election labour have lost their traditional core vote because they have stopped listening to working class people and have centred their policies on the desires of a metropolitan elite, the lib dems lost because of the coalition with the conservatives and the sense of betrayal felt by their voters.

Many voters for SNP only voted due to this being not an independence issue, no doubt a lot would feel betrayed should the SNP decide to have another roll of the dice with independence so soon after the referendum.
It's really a question of how long the game of blame laying and grievance can last before people start to see their is no real meat on the bones of the SNPs manifesto.

What Nicola Sturgeon is attempting to do is play a dangerous game which at some stage will result in the usual mock outrage at the Conservatives not listening to the democratic wishes of the people for some reason or other that is purely contrived from their tangled convoluted web of grievance against anyone who disagrees with them.

Although tonight I have heard from a conservative with reasonably good connections to party central that there is an attitude of letting Nicola Sturgeon have FFA as soon as possible then watch her hang herself and her party in fairly short order, the common belief being the black hole in finances being sufficiently large that the austerity forced upon Scotland through the actions of the SNP should be sufficient to ensure they loose the majority of their electoral base and become another defunct political force tossed on the scrap heap of history by their own short sighted goals.

Strategically all Cameron need do is lump FFA on them asap, the immediate austerity cuts that the SNP will have to implement will open up the eyes of the glory hunter /braveheart brigade voters, who will turn on the SNP next year in the scottish election, as FFA will push in immediate cuts, there is no avoiding this situation, arguments that the SNP are entitled to chair a couple of Westminster committees and get access to more finances based on their intake, is a red herring, if say there were 80 seats in Scotland then access to more finance etc can lead to gaining more seats ( money is a heavy hitter in campaigning ) but we have a fixed representation of 59 seats so big deal. Truth is timing is out, if say it was 2020 and the Scottish economy was on a sound setting then mouth off /make demands that will force the Westmister majority government to so some kind of deal, run with FFA but this is 2015 and every sane economic report /commentator see's an economy bumping along on 3 wheels. In Irish terms its 1916, to early and to weak.

[squidge]

56 out of 59 a failure?

Aye ...right.

Keep on gnashing your teeth and stamping your feet. You might even want to have a full blown tantrum but it won't make any difference. It's still 56 out of 59 MPs. It's still the SNP taking the third place in Westminster. It's still an average 24% swing and its still 95% success rate for our candidates. And yet the view by the political heavyweights of the org we see here is that somehow we were all baffled, bamboozled and befuddled by a wee woman in a helicopter ( paid for by donations from members BTW) into losing our senses. What a load of nonsense

The rest of the UK elected a tory government. Labour failed to offer a decent alternative. From what I see they have no clue how to address that. They need to get their act together or they will be toast in 2016 too. The Tories scraped their seat with a reduced percentage of the vote, although I think Ruth Davidson had a great time but they will need to show Scotland that they have some practical use if they are going to do better in 2016. The LibDems aren't even worth examining.

If theses parties sneer and Sulk as much as is going on here they might as well give up now.

Tomorrow (or today) we have 56 SNP MPs in Westminster and I am delighted. 40% women, doctors, nurses, teachers ordinary folk who aren't moving from uni, to special adviser to Shoe in for a safe seat. That is good for parliament. Bring it on!

[Scout]

56 out of 59 a failure?

Aye ...right.

Keep on gnashing your teeth and stamping your feet. You might even want to have a full blown tantrum but it won't make any difference. It's still 56 out of 59 MPs. It's still the SNP taking the third place in Westminster. It's still an average 24% swing and its still 95% success rate for our candidates. And yet the view by the political heavyweights of the org we see here is that somehow we were all baffled, bamboozled and befuddled by a wee woman in a helicopter ( paid for by donations from members BTW) into losing our senses. What a load of nonsense

The rest of the UK elected a tory government. Labour failed to offer a decent alternative. From what I see they have no clue how to address that. They need to get their act together or they will be toast in 2016 too. The Tories scraped their seat with a reduced percentage of the vote, although I think Ruth Davidson had a great time but they will need to show Scotland that they have some practical use if they are going to do better in 2016. The LibDems aren't even worth examining.

If theses parties sneer and Sulk as much as is going on here they might as well give up now.

Tomorrow (or today) we have 56 SNP MPs in Westminster and I am delighted. 40% women, doctors, nurses, teachers ordinary folk who aren't moving from uni, to special adviser to Shoe in for a safe seat. That is good for parliament. Bring it on!

I agree with you on the SNP victory, however the facts are they keep backtracking on what they say. They have given the people who voted no for independence but voted for SNP this is not for independence, we will have to wait and see on that. Their spending policy very much like Labours which almost brought country to bankruptcy. If people really think SNP will not bring in cuts and higher tax, then you're in for a shock.

[squidge]

All the posts here tell us that they are powerless, useless, lack any sort of influence, won't ba able to DO anything and as they are not forming part of the Government I'm not sure how people think they will be able to bring in taxes and cuts.

I don't think the Tories will give Scotland FFA at all. I might be wrong but I think if they did they would face a serious back bench revolt. FFA would take years to sort out because it's not like independence, where EVERYTHING moves over and it is for the newly independent country to sort out. It's bits and pieces, untangling here, untying there buy keeping this bit and that.

The Independence thing has not changed since the day we started talking about this. There are no plans for a 2nd referendum, there may be hopes, desires and longings but there are no plans. It has been said over and over again, there would need to be a material change for a referendum to be held and it would only happen if we voted for it. Does this election move us further to independence? No.

We might hope it does and in our heart it might feel like it does but practically, politically it absolutely does not.

[BetterTogether]

Well as the SNP was such a resounding victory can someone tell me when they intend to start the coalition, supply and demand arrangement or vote by vote support to lock the Tories out as Wee Nicola Sturgeon used so vociferously during the pre election run up .........oh wait they can't because they FAILED !


Whichever way you cut it 56 seats in Westminster is impressive but wields you very little power.

They played the game to win seats but forgot the bigger picture.