To Scottish nationalists every vote is about independence, if you admit to it or not. This has been a bad result for the SNP, the independence vote is not far off and they are only bringing in 32% of the popular vote. Would a particular agenda not be a genuine interest in this discussion? After all the SNP have a particular agenda.

 

First of all I'm no Nationalist I've stated it in this thread many times. I do share a view with the Nationalists on Independence though. The main problem I see with this discussion, and is the reason I was prepared to let the thread die, is that many who have merely a passing interest in Scottish politics are not in full possession of the facts.

I don't blame the observer solely as the MSM and the state broadcaster have tended to distort both the facts and numbers re: statistics to suit their line. As I mentioned in my previous post, had you put in a little spade work rather than accept the propaganda, you would find that the SNP returned their best result ever in a council election and this from the position of being in government for the last 6 years. I'm not saying this out of any affinity with the SNP. I'm saying it because it is in fact true.

The propagandists are suggesting that Labour did well. I can assure you they didn't do very well at all sure they gained a couple of seats here and there, IMO due to protest against the Coalition and in particular my Liberals, but over all there has been very little change in Labours position on councils in Scotland when compared with the last council elections in 2007. The normal reportage practice in elections could be seen on the state broadcaster coverage during the overnight count in England and Wales with minute by minute updates contrasted against the previous election highlighting swing.

I raised the issue of Glasgow as reportage has declared the ward a WIN for Labour beating the SNP in the process and as a meter of the Pacific Quay distortions. Labour has held Glasgow council for over 40 years and traditionally invokes the spirit of the Red Clydesiders. The truth of the matter is that in this ward Labour is very much in STASIS, no change from the 2007 council elections, whereas the SNP has gained +7 seats on the council. It is difficult to dispute these figures however BBC Scotland, no doubt prompted by the Labour party as much of their reporting is, has decided that Labour candidates who held seats on Glasgow council and were deselected shortly before the council election should be regarded as NEW Labour gains. Even the more biased observers can see what is going on with such a manoeuvre by Labour and then BBC Scotland in it's reporting. Let's not forget, although you may not be familiar with this information, that there is still a massive police action ongoing in Glasgow with regards to political corruption and organised crime.

You are correct in stating that the SNP have an agenda as do ALL political parties however BBC Scotland whom the notion of Unionist victory arose are required by their own charter to be affiliated to no political agenda. The BBC's figures which most of the MSM have used to support this thesis are not only wrong but are also bordering on impartiality. To imprint the idea of a Labour and by proxy Unionist victory? Two MSM news outlets have reported the correct figures as they stand STV and the Sun. I can accept this massaging of figures from privately owned print media who have their own editorial agenda to drive however I find it very difficult to digest when the perpetrator is what I am now referring to as the 'State broadcaster' (Pravda?), the reasons being mere tautology to reprint at this stage.


EDIT: Adding internal leaked BBC presentation to jounalists highlighting the stance, party line, of some of the Senior BBC political correspondents.

Edited version;




Full presentation.




EDIT 2: Returning with an Article that also highlights the claim above Questions over BBC Scotlands election figure claims


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I believe firmly that it was never about independence, it was having the discussion of Scotland's stance in the world as well as making people like their country a bit better, which would have never came up if the SNP was just left to rot while labour or the conservatives ignored the issue.

The discussion is ultimately about Britain, we need to uplift it from its ancient and broken systems, sure its nostalgic of a greater time, but frankly we all have to move on, we don't run the world any more, no matter how much Parliament thinks it does.

 

Your first edit, I watch both and there is nothing being said or claimed that has not been covered in this thread. The BBC and its staff are doing nothing wrong by reporting or presenting the details of the Scottish independence question. If they are being invited to give a presentation to Westminster on the issue they are not breaking any rules, its not a public broadcast. Its employees are not forbidden to hold political opinion or to voice it, BBC employees give their political analysis on a regular basis on a world wide basis. Should Scotland be any different?

Your Second edit, this is nothing more than muck slinging by Nats. The figures are clear as day and are totally correct.

Labour didn't do to bad given its buggered up the whole UK, its vote is holding up well and could be considered stable. Why is the SNP not bring in a much larger vote?

 

Its all about independence but its being side stepped as the SNP are not too sure if they can pull it off.

 

Everything the SNP do is geared to create the illusion that life will be better under their stewardship as an independent nation...however as the following story will suggest, not everything is quite as it seems:

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/p...uncils-owe-a-record-14billion-86908-23850776/

 

So when is Scotland going to get it's independence? I hope it's sooner rather than later, I'm getting sick of hearing about it now.

 

Cooking the books to match the politics, its all very banana republic in the Scottish government.

 

What a wonderful comment, you should be a politician.

Wasn't a lot of that debt due to labours PFI blunder?

 

Here are the figures published by the BBC.

Council results

SNP 424 +57
LAB 394 +58
CON 115 -16
LD 71-80
OTH 219 -18
NOC 23-4

After 32 of 32 councils declared


Here are the real figures contrasted against 2007 council elections which are also in accordance with the BBC's own guidelines unlike the figures presented above.

A glossary of election terms for Vote 2012

Gain: If a party wins a seat that it did not win at the last general election this is described as a "gain"

Hold: If a party wins a seat that it won at the previous general election this is described as a "hold". ​

The final results of all first preference votes are as follows:


SNP - 502,201 - 32.32% (+4.46% on 2007)
Lab - 487,884 - 31.39% (+3.24%)
Con - 206,856 - 13.31% (-2.26%)
LD - 102,399 - 6.59% (-6.10%)
Grn - 34,252 - 2.20% (+0.16%)
Ind - 184,329 - 11.86% (+0.98%)
Oth - 36,055 - 2.32% (+0.9%)


The final tally for councillors is:


Scottish National Party – 424 (+62)
Labour Party – 394 (+46)
Conservative Party – 115 (-29)
Liberal Democrats – 71 (-95)
Green – 14 (+6)
Ind – 194 (+12)
Oth – 8 (-3)


Are you sure you wouldn't like to review your statment above as to whom it is that appears to be cooking the books?


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/Meh, the SNP gaining council seats isn't a big surprise as they have a home field advantage like Plaid Cymru do, if something goes well in a council area they hold they can claim credit, if it goes badly they can blame London. Its quite hard for Labour to do that as we are still deep in their mess and the Torys/LD's canot as they are currently in power. As for gaining seats they don't hold you can always find an excuse to complain about the party in power weither their doing a good job or not.

 

This is a total non issue, the BBC is cooking nothing, they are just presenting the figures. You may not like how they came to them figures, but they are correct. Are they claiming or presenting the wrong election results?

 

I rarely post statistics in argument simply because half of the recipients have no idea how to interpret the results. I pointed the reader in the general direction of where to look however this was not sufficient hence my posting of the above figures.

I'll interpret these results for you and any other who is interested. What is clear is that these results are entirely consistent and show that the SNP share of the vote is also consistent with the Hollyrood election nationally. The larger parties share of the vote is relatively unchanged barring the LibDems. It also shows, when the vote is broken down to constituent level, that Scots voters in highland areas are voting with the SNP in Hollyrood election years but are swinging to independents during council elections as the trends show they always have since 1999. In short the SNP are doing just as well as they did in the Hollyrood election however the public are being mislead by the reportage initiated by BBC Scotland whom, to explain part of the discrepancy, has Labour gaining +5 seats on the Glasgow council when they in fact lost one seat -1.

Suggesting that Labour gained in this battle is an absolute lie and colours the whole debate there after. Labour managed to hold Glasgow with the loss of -1 seat in addition Labours share of the vote nationally also shows little change. The Liberal Democrat Party was the outright looser indicating reason behind the swing to independent candidates in the highland areas.

It might not seem important, to you, or it might seem a little contrived but the facts of the matter are abundantly clear these results are not happening in a vacuum there are lists of voting figures dating back to the opening of the Scottish parliament indicating trend. BBC Scotland’s interpretation of this particular council election breaks with their own standards and procedural guidelines and are way out of kilter with the actual result to the point of misleading the Scottish licence payer. That’s £320m worth of a lie when Scottish licence fees are calculated incidentally. Regardless of politics or opinions wherever one might stand on the Independence debate how would you feel if you knew for a fact you were being lied to?


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Yes they are.. The results are not as they have presented them look closely at the figures. SNP +57 against SLab +58 when the result is SNP +62 against SLab +46


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If im reading it right the BBC are comparing the election results to before the election, not 2007, I.E the day after the election the were 58 more Labour councillors than there were the day before. Could be wrong though.

 

That's quite close to what they are doing but in saying that it goes against their own guidlines which I linked above. They are taking seats already won by Labour in 2007 as gains when all that has happened is that a fortnight or so before the vote the Labour candidates had either been deselected by Labour or resigned the whip. In order for these to be classed as gains there would need to be a by-election in which Labour lost the seat in order to regain it. Since this didn't happen Labour cannot regain a seat it already holds regardless of who sits in it.

As it is BBC Scotland are claiming that an Independent (Glasgow First) has lost the seat when in actual fact this Independent never held it as NO 'Glasgow First' candidates stood for it in the previous election, because it didn’t exist and was a Labour seat. So BBC Scotland’s figures show a loss for Glasgow first which is impossible since Glasgow first had never won any seats to begin with. Further weirdness arises when we look at BBC Scotland’s SNP figure of +57 which when compared directly with their 2007 results also indicates an inaccurate figure as the true figure in this respect is +62 effectively doubling the SNP's lead from 15 to 30. By putting the spin on that they have BBC Scotland has made a right sorry mess of it for themselves and there's no other way round it I'm afraid.


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I thought I might come back to you on this one. You may not be aware of this but both the Libral and Labour party were founded strongly on the principles of Home Rule, some might disagree with my opinion of this however I would present the occupation of Egypt in 1882 as proof that in spite of the realities of Imperialism and the grand old man's approval he was strongly against foreign entanglements . For those that lean towards the left Keir Hardie and the Labour party were a huge supporter of Home Rule often voting with the Liberals on home rule issues and vice versa.

A Scottish Home Rule Association was founded in 1886. More importantly, by 1885 the Liberal leader, William Gladstone, had become converted to the idea of home rule. Between 1889 and 1914 Scottish home rule was debated 15 times in Parliament, including the introduction of four bills. In 1913 a Home Rule Bill passed its second reading by this time the man at the helm was the ever insightful Loyd George. Scotland would have been an Independent State had it not been for the arrival of the Great War where during that period the bill was shelved, for obvious reasons, soon followed by the 2nd War. In spite of the upheaval of both wars a discrete administrative system was established for Scotland. The post of Secretary for Scotland was formed in 1885 supported by a Scottish Office. It became a cabinet position in 1926. In 1895 a Scottish Grand Committee was established with powers to discuss Scottish legislation and in 1948 the Standing Committee on Scottish Bills was given powers to consider bills relating to Scotland. In 1957 it was renamed the Scottish Grand Committee.

Add to that the rise of the Irish and Welsh home rule parties etc etc and one can clearly see that all this stronger together business is an elaborate hoax concocted by a bunch of trough suppers. It can be seen from this short meander the proposition of home rule is not a new one the difference being that the Westminster government and Lords have been able to stifle the discussion since and after the 2nd war. In fact as recently as Labours George Robertson declared that devolution would kill home rule stone dead that's because Blair's government set up the Scottish parliament in away where they thought the supporters of Home rule (SNP/Liberals) could never win a majority. The truth is the British Empire ceased to exist more than 100 years ago and the carping we hear today is no more than jingoistic nonsense that’s well past it's sell by date.


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Been missing me?

Not had a chance to recap - good effort by quick glance though Weaver.

 

o rly?

lets remove some of the guff shal lwe.

 

Ya rly.

Remove the guff they managed to get magically wrong?

I wouldn't expect to see much issue after that either oddly enough.