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If … I am quite fond of the Scots Nats, but then, I am English. The BBC has/had a headline today (which, because of the unique way the BBC is … interpreting web conventions… may disappear without warning) that for a moment made me love them:
SNP planning to cut down cabinet
Wouldn’t that make politics a bit more exciting? Sad to say, it is an administrative detail in Holyrood, not a plot to draw claymores in Whitehall.
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I once heard it suggested that any lawmaker that proposed a new law should be placed on the gallows with a noose around his neck. If the new law was passed by the senate/parliment then he was freed, but if it failed to pass the lever was to be pulled. The idea was that busybody lawmakers wouldn’t propose so many trival, liberty stealing laws if their neck was on the line.
I like the claymore idea better though. C-Span would have better ratings than the Suberbowl!
This was promised/threatened well before the election by the SNP although I expect not too many people outside Scotland noticed it at the time, although the BBC did cover it then too. I wrote about it in mid-March:
http://billcameron.blogspot.com/2007/03/snp-salmond-promises-smaller-government.html
Superficially it sounded attractive but given its SNP source I was somewhat sceptical – a scepticism that is of course quite justified.
Indeed. It was, I understand, a manifesto pledge. But not too many people inside Scotland believed it. And I still reckon they’d have swept it under the carpet if they hadn’t been forced to form a minority administration. After all, how were the “Liberal” “Democrats” to be rewarded, had they accepted the offer of coalition? The Greens can be fobbed off with a committee convenership, but Whatsisname’s lot are used to Cabinet posts.
Not only that, but their headline policy – the “independence” referendum – is dead in the water, thanks to the unionist majority in parliament. Given the visceral hatred that exists between them and Labour, they’ll have trouble pushing through socialistic legislation too (although it won’t be impossible – McConnell, or his successor, won’t want to be seen to be closing schoolsanhospitals). The Tories, however, have said they’ll vote in favour of measures they agree with: this one, and a reduction in corporation tax, for example. The 18 Tory votes give the Nats the 65 they need for a majority, so these measures are easy to enact compared to the ones they’ll have to scrape together Labour and “Liberal” votes for. Hell will freeze over before the SNP enters into a formal arrangement with the hated Thatcher’s party, but it’s looking – unbelievably – a lot like Scotland has ended up with a de facto kinda-sorta SNP-Tory administration.
And the police say they now have enough evidence to charge “Toamy” Sheridan with perjury.
This can’t last.