BNP

Did you Vote?

In Renfrewshire our electoral slogan is 'No Vote, No Voice'. I have repeated this quite a few times at work over the last week or so to those in my work who advised that they did not vote in last week's European Elections. When I voted around 8pm last week only 94 people had bothered to come out to vote at my polling place?!?

Part of the reason I get so upset by the whole not voting thing is that when I was young we had a real life suffragette living upstairs, in the warm weather she would come down into the communal garden and sit and tell us stories of when she was young. It really does make you realise how far we have come when you think about it, in my life time I knew a woman who was unable to vote because she was a woman. I used to think my mum and dad must hate this cause she is telling us about throwing toffee hammers through windows and chaining herself to railings, in reality my parents were incredibly proud to be her neighbour and her friend.

Don't get me wrong I understand the controversy over expenses and I understand why people are upset by this, my understanding however stops when I think that people think that voting BNP is somehow a reasonable alternative? It stops when I think about the gains made by the Conservatives and the SNP despite being caught in the mire as much as the Labour Party? I know we are the party of Government but surely it would take the collective will of Parliament to change a system such as the expenses and none of the main parties did very much to try and bring about this change.

The leader of the SNP is caught up in the expenses scandal, the Conservatives are in it up to their eyeballs as are the Liberals so in that regard you can see why people would be reluctant to vote for a major political party, but please vote for someone, spoil your paper make a protest instead of staying at home.

If you don't vote, you have no voice, so don't complain about Europe or the Political system if you didn't vote, you have no right to complain if you don't take part in the process.

PR THE RESULTS

NOT QUITE THIS WEEKS POLL

OK so it lastest quite a while more than one week, a couple of months to be more precise but I have noticed an interesting trend in the results of late. When I first posed the question regarding the nature of proportional representation and whether or not it gives a disproportionate amount of power to smaller parties the results were vastly different from those I am about to announce. At the beginning it was almost equal, and the no's even had it by a slight margin, but you will see now that the results are pretty conclusive...

The Question: Proportional Representation gives a disproportionate amount of power to smaller parties

The Answers ...

Totally Agree: 72% (144 votes)

Agree: 0% (0 Votes)

Don't Know: 0% (0 Votes)

Disagree: 6% (12 Votes)

Totally Disagree: 22% (43 Votes)

Now before anyone starts on about me doctoring the figures by voting loads of times myself, I set up the poll so that you (including me) can only vote once in a year! This stopped the usual suspects (you know who you are) from trying to skew the results to the response that suited their agenda.

It happens that this was my opinion, that proportional representation is disproportionately favourable to the smaller 'King Maker' parties like the Greens in Holyrood or the Liberals in Renfrewshire Council, their agenda is foisted onto a public that didn't vote for it, and in some cases the parties didn't even stand enough candidates to win the election (Greens nationally and the Liberals on Renfrewshire Council) and so were always intending on being the King Makers so to speak. I can't help but wonder if the reason the voting patterns for this poll changed so dramatically over time, was that those getting involved noticed something either nationally or locally which drew them to this conclusion? It would be interesting to know.

For now thanks for dropping by,and thanks for voting, I will get another poll up and running pretty soon.

SSP CAN'T COUNT

HOW MANY CANDIDATES?

It turns out that the SSP either can't count or don't mind misleading the electorate online, if you click on the title above 'SSP CAN'T COUNT' You will see proof that they are suggesting that they are standing a candidate in EVERY Council ward in among other places our very own Renfrewshire. Now there are 11 wards in the new make up of Renfrewshire Council but, it seems that the SSP think that 8 is the same as 11 as the former is the number of Council candidates they are standing, exactly the same number of candidates Solidarity are standing locally as well!

Also on a similar note it is worth pointing out that although the Liberals are suggesting they want to change the Council they should be pointing out that they are only standing one more candidate than the Conservatives, with them standing 12 and the Conservatives are standing 11, maybe they should be more honest and tell their electorate what they intend to do with the members they get in? Who exactly would they go into coalition with? Or are they just saying what they like because they have no intention on implementing it.

MORE ON THE LIB DEMS

NO MISQUOTES HERE

It turns out that my opposition for Paisley East and Ralston are reading this site, so to them I say welcome, glad to see Susie is enjoying it hence her comment that the last two posts on here are 'nonsense' (Direct quote from her this evening). Despite her assertion that we have never met (another mistake by the candidate) she did recognise me hence the side comment to her friend at the beginning about not being misquoted despite my never having quoted her here!? (yeah,sorry Susie I heard you!)

So to all thanks for your visits and feel free to comment as well, but remember no anonymous posters will be published and no foul language, thanks!

STILL ON ST MIRREN AND THE LIBERALS

The Paisley Daily Express today is carrying an article on the anger of St Mirren fans to the Lib Dem plans to block the St Mirren training facility at Penilee...

'Seething St Mirren fans are urging Buddies to give the Lib-Dems the boot at the ballot box. Supporters are angry that the Liberals are trying to delay a multi-million pound project which would transform the crumbling Penilee pavilion into a super sports complex.' Paisley Daily Express (Andy Newport) 27th March 2007

It seems that the blackandwhitearmy.com website - a site for St Mirren's fans- has erupted into fury over the Lib Dems, it quotes one fan as saying ...

'The Liberal Democrats are going around trying to drum up support to stop the St Mirren training complex and youth academy at Penilee going ahead. With an election coming up I thought political parties would do things to attract voters - not put them off. Maybe they should remember that there are an awful lot of St Mirren fans who support the idea of the club having a proper training set-up and who have a vote in the May elections.'

There are a lot of mistruths going round about this particular project and the Lib Dems have put round a leaflet trying to scare the people of the community into organising against it, this tells us all we need to know. Instead of talking up the opportunities this gives the people of Ralston, the East End and Renfrewshire as a whole the Liberals are content to knock back any idea, unless of course they are pretty sure it won't go ahead, this way they can blame everyone else for their ineffectual conduct on the Council, both Jim and I are behind St Mirren, behind the Council and behind this project.

I will leave you with the thoughts of one Paisley Buddie from the aforementioned webpage ...

'Not only should Saints fans all over Renfrewshire not vote for the Lib-Dems we should be getting out there and exposing their underhand tactics as a cheap way of getting votes in Ralston at the expense of St Mirren.'

LIB DEMS WOULD RATHER HAVE A 'PUB' THAN FOOTBALL PARKS

Paisley East and Ralston blog has an interesting article on the current situation with the Liberal Democrats and St Mirren over the Penilee pavilion, worth a look (I would say that being one of the candidates!) I have digested the post here...

The Lib-Dem councillor for Ralston would rather see what amounts to a pub being built at Penilee Playing Fields instead of a football academy for youngsters and a training facility for St Mirren. Jim Sharkey, who is secretary of Ralston Community Council and whose house looks on to the playing fields was speaking after he attended a public meeting called by Lib-Dem Councillor Nan Macgregor who opposes plans to redevelop the derelict playing fields and pavilion.

Mr Sharkey, who will be one of two Labour candidates in Ralston and Paisley East in the council elections in May, said:

"Councillor MacGregor told the public meeting she would rather the playing fields be given over to a local rugby club who had previously proposed building a licensed clubhouse beside the pitches and licensed premises is something the vast majority of people in Ralston don’t want to see there."I have been knocking on doors and the message I have been getting is that people just want something positive to happen to the Penilee Playing Fields as the place has been derelict for years. This is exactly what is being proposed."

COUNCILLOR RAYLEEN KELLY

PAISLEY NORTH COMMUNITY PLANNING FORUM

Despite the awful weather conditions the meeting last night was well attended. Unfortunately the representative from the Renfrewshrie CHP was unable to attend and so this presentation was held over to the next meeting. The presentation by the Police was extremely interesting and sparked a good discussion over the incidents of crime and the perception of crime in the area, they gave an excellent overall explanation of operation triplicate which made the press some weeks ago regarding the seizure of drug dealers in both Renfrewshrie and Inverclyde, questions asked included where the siezed assets of the criminals goes, how many shopkeepers have been charged with serving alcohol to under 18 year olds and whether or not the Police in this area are allowed to use young people as test buyers to see if they are sold alcohol.

The Police advised that the money siezed is put back into community programmes including £10,000 locally for a project called 'shop a dealer' in Ferguslie park and St James wards, it also goes towards public awareness campaigns. With regard to the selling of alcohol to under 18's there is a pilot project in Tayside which is using young people, and the hope is that this will be rolled out throughout Scotland. The bad news is that not many people are charged with serving alcohol to under 18's as it is very difficult at present to check but Police advise that if you are aware of a liscensed premises breaking the law to contact them.

Other items on the agenda included an excellent presentation on the core paths consultation (see here for web link to the consultation document) and feel free to fill it out and send it back to Renfrewshire Council. The item on the Paisley Town Centre short term plan also sparked an interesting discussion and many issues were highlighted which will be taken back to the Director of Environmental Services. All at the meeting agreed that the Christmas Lights were looking great and you could see the investment had been made, they were also pleased to hear that an extra farmers Christmas market had been put on as well.

There was some suggestion by Cllr McGreggor of the Liberal Democrats that all the ideas in the Yellow Book study were in fact rehashes of the Liberal Democrats motions, obviously this is nonsense. I accept that some of the motions that the Liberals have put up recently do mimick the suggestions, the difference is that the Liberals wanted the Council to pay for this, the Yellow Book study is agreed by all partners (including the private sector) and has got everyone on board, it gives common ownership of the project to everyone and calls for £45 Million of private investment!

The suggestion by Cllr McGreggor was niave in the extreme, but no doubt it will appear on an election leaflet in the near future!

The meeting was positive and a good exchange of views was heard, topics such as the recycling, rubbish collection and the local action plans were discussed.

LIBERAL DEMOCRATS

CONFERENCE SEASON

The Liberals were speaking this morning on the BBC and they were interviewing a woman regarding blogging! From the way the woman was speaking you would have thought that the Liberals invented political blogging it was sycophantic to say the least.

My main problem was that the Liberals are suggesting that the Labour Party would censure a member for the content of their blog! I have not heard this before, if you want to know why this is rubbish look at my dads page Cllr Terry Kelly, his is probably the most contentious I have read and yet never been censured. What the Liberals fail to grasp is that the Labour Party have grasped that political blogs stimulate informed and intelligent (some times!) discussion and in my experience would never get involved with your opinion.