What is going on?

An interesting slant of politics in Scotland.  I was asked to comment on the apparent status of the Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath seat.

What on earth is our focus now in Scotland?  

In my view, Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath cannot be regarded as Labour’s safest seat – Gordon Brown is the reason it had that status.

No other Labour figure left in Scotland matches up to his reputation. 

The same lesson holds now for the other parties – the Conservatives, for example, field Ruth Davidson as their asset – perhaps that is true – but who is their top slot leading light actually standing for Westminster?  And that question also applies to the Liberal Democrats.  Of course, Salmond has been outshone by Nicola as well.

None of this is surprising – even the media seem only to be capable of raising Scottish Parliament and Council issues. 

The whole devolution exercise has caused a schism in politics with a loss of focus here of what matters outside of Scotland; it all plays into the hands of the SNP. 

I do not believe that all of the electorate are taken in by this drift – after all is said and done, the SNP lost the referendum.  All Scottish Parties need to remember that.

EU Benefits Ruling

A "win" on one issue in an EU court is not a restoration of our sovereignty or a "victory" - hooting hurrah for this result is understandable but the next EU legal decision may equally go the "other" way.  They are deciding - we are ruled.

Not just immigration

Cameron putting immigration at the centre of his manifesto is not the winning trick - the EU issue is about all of our sovereignty.

Reflection of Farage/Clegg Debate - and the EUs peacocks.

It seems that Nigel Farage and I are in step in our thinking on the Sevastopol issue - the EU has to be careful not to tread deeply into the Russian sphere of influence. At least Obama and the EU are now tacitly acknowledging that military options must be ruled out.
In his debate with Clegg, Farage is reported to have accused the EU of having blood on its hands over the Ukraine. Clegg on the other hand praised the bloc's influence in Eastern Europe; he is reported to have said "It was the British governments that pioneered the enlargement of the European Union so we'd have more peace, more democracy and more rule of law in our European neck of the woods."

Mr Farage responded by saying "we can all hang our heads in shame. We've given a false series of hopes to a group of people in the west of Ukraine; So 'geed' up were they that they actually toppled their own elected leader. That provoked Mr Putin and I think the European Union frankly does have blood on its hands in the Ukraine and I don't want a European army, navy, air force or a European foreign policy."

I think that the way ahead now surely lies in the EU and the USA recognising Crimea as part of Russia, with Russia withdrawing troops from the Ukrainian border and all parties, the USA, the EU's member states, Ukraine and Russia agreeing on Ukrainian neutrality, recognised and guaranteed by all.

Otherwise, we are set for a Black Sea Freeze, if not a wider Cold War II.

UKIP SUPPORT SURGES IN SCOTLAND - FOURFOLD

UKIP SUPPORT SURGES IN SCOTLAND - FOURFOLD

I welcome the UKIP victories in England's councils they not really a surprise to us - and that is not complacency, it is because we have being experiencing a surge in interest from the grassroots of public opinion since the Corby and Rotherham by elections.

I am having to make time to be able to respond to people asking about us. The rate of enquiries and the level of our rise in the opinion polls outpaces our growth in membership. That is because most people who vote do not belong as paid up subscribers to the parties they support.

Our surge has seen us up by 400% in opinion poll ratings. A year ago, we had a vote at elections of just 2%. Polls last year, after Corby, put up us as high as 8 or 9 per cent. A 400% rise. 

Remarkably, the surge is coming from all parties and from none - people who may not have bothered in the past. The public are fed up with political parties who are arrogant and tell them what to think, want to price evrything, even their beer, to suit a political end.

All we want is a strong and sovereign Britain. Seems that that accords with folk, who know it means leaving the disastrous European Union and sticking together un the UK.  

We want stronger defences back; we want far, far fewer regulations and diktats; we want no wasteful subsidised wind turbines; we want simple effective taxes and fair support of those in need, and we want Britain back.

The surge has led UKIP in Scotland to setting up more branches - Lanarkshire, Orkney and Moray are now in being with a branch forming in the Black Isle as well. 

Next week, we launch in the Borders with Professor Tim Congdon addressing us on the awful costs and heavy financial burden of the EU - 10% of our GDP! That's £147 billion. Ordinary people understand where we are coming from - it's where they come from!