On the 31st July 2023, I did a blog post called ‘political death looms in Rutherglen’, my contention was that the by-election on paper seemed to be a ‘shoo in’ for the Labour Party. The Labour Party traditionally pulls in a sizeable vote in this constituency, and here is a link to wiki to see this information. Fast forward 3 months later, and indeed the result confirm my theory that the shoo in result was to be correct. The defeat of the SNP wasn’t a mystery, the Labour Party worked the area solidly for six months; this means they were highly active in the two phases of the campaign, the long campaign and the short campaign. Their activists worked to win the seat for the Labour Party, was seeded entirely in the long campaign as the party managed to garner 17,845 votes. The SNP vote on the other hand went from 23,775 to 8,399, a total collapse of support in a tale of two campaigns of contrast. The Labour Party threw people, money and resources at Rutherglen, the three key elements that make up the “political economy”, they “outspent” the SNP in every critical area. The SNP who historically were very good at by-election were reduced to using their “payroll vote” as ordinary political activists have deserted the party.
Down below, I will put up the numbers of the voters for each candidate and here is a link to my earlier post.
https://thelairdreport.blogspot.com/2023/07/political-death-looms-in-rutherglen-snp.html
By-elections traditionally are a vehicle to give the government in power a bloody nose, and the SNP certainly got one in a huge 20 per cent swing to Scottish Labour. The SNP is as I have said an lgbt controlled party which at present is fronted by a Muslim, Humza Yousaf. Yousaf is a Sturgeon proxy, in Rutherglen one thing missing, very noticeably was Nicola Sturgeon. Although Yousaf is the leader on paper, his position isn’t secure, he isn’t popular with the public despite a Sturgeonesque makeover to make him appear acceptable. Humza Yousaf looks more like a caretaker leader each day, caretaking for Nicola Sturgeon return. Nicola Sturgeon knows that if Humza Yousaf falls her prospects for survival in a Kate Forbes’ SNP world are reduced considerably. In the previous election contest for SNP leader allegations of a possible rigged contest circulated on social media as everything seemed geared towards a Humza Yousaf win. Despite this, the win by Yousaf with the entire Sturgeon lgbt machine wasn’t decisive for him, the worst candidate won, and was seen to have won.
Michael Shanks from Scottish Labour overwhelmingly won the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election due to a huge run in time along with other advantages. In 2024, he seems a clear favourite to retain the seat; it is unlikely that a continuation of a Humza Yousaf leadership will recover circa 15,000 lost votes. Today for the SNP is a day of excuses, the reality is the SNP is as I said over a decade ago, was turned into a rat ship. Alex Salmond was asleep at the wheel as a sub organization was built up all around him, the LGBT wing who waited to Salmond stepped down than acted as Nicola Sturgeon’s gatekeepers. As I also pointed out, four groups make up the SNP, LGBT, Muslim, Sein Fein Lite and the Rich, little is known about the Rich who remain in the background and away from the day to day operations of the party. The other three groups vie for power, expect to see more Muslim candidates because the ‘diversity’ campaign by Humza Yousaf will be coming down the pipeline. When Yousaf did his anti white people in top jobs speech, you must have known that diversity meant Scottish Muslims and Muslims of Pakistani descent, not Poles, Chinese, Norwegians or East Europeans. The diversity campaign blog is for another day; today is mostly about Rutherglen and Hamilton West.
If Michael Shanks is smart, he will get himself setup, office etc, and his first order of business is to restart his election campaign to be in place before xmas 2023, work out the kinks, he won’t have the manpower afforded him in the by-election. Shanks needs to cement his victory, as some people know I did Paul Sweeney’s campaign in 2017, this overturned the biggest SNP majority in the city of Glasgow, two years later, he lost the seat. I worked on both campaigns, although in the second campaign I started late and had to leave early for health reasons. What I saw in the second campaign was problems in how the campaign was being run, but there was more to this loss than just the events in the short campaign. Although I passed on my thoughts on campaigning, the Labour Party isn’t a vehicle that accepts new ideas readily, and the lack of ability to adapt ruined Paul Sweeney’s chances in 2019, couple with the SNP who actually did some work to recover lost ground. Although I give advice, I accept not all people are willing to take it onboard, and losing is never a good time to remind them I told you so. But that is politics, you play your cards your way, and sometimes you get beat, Paul Sweeney didn’t deserved to lost, but the essential ground work wasn’t done to cement his victory, a lesson painfully learned. I went to get him elected in 2021; he sits as a list MSP in Holyrood for the Glasgow region.
One
aspect of the campaign of note was the result for the Conservatives; they lost
their deposit, with Thomas Kerr finishing on 1,192. From what I could tell and
from what I learned from members inside the party, the party leadership didn’t
rally their membership effectively to come out as activists, they didn’t put
the work in during the long campaign, and managed to lose circa 7,000 votes.
What the Conservatives in the Glasgow region need is new leadership, a new
engagement strategy with members and a new campaign model to get ordinary
members active. You don’t win seats during the short campaign; you need to work
an area 10 months minimum, during the year. To go from 8,054 to 1,192 is to be blunt ridiculous.
It has been voted that Conservatives voters switched to the Labour Party to
rout the SNP and get rid of them, but I seriously doubt that to be true to any
significant number.
14 people stood in the by-election, a huge number each paying a £500 deposit; only two candidates get their money back. By-elections can be incredible fun, but more than that, they are a very useful learning tool for activists to gain practical experience and also learn from others. I am a big fan of by-elections, the more you do; the better and sharper you are, when meeting people. The wooden spoon of the evening went to Garry Cooke who amassed 6 votes, but in reality there can be only one winner, like showbiz, politics can be a tough gig. Learn to live with disappointment because at sometime, you will experience it politically. Politics isn’t about the best candidate winning, it’s about who tells the best story.
This by-election was caused by a petition to remove Margaret Ferrier after she broke Covid rules. Since Nicola Sturgeon was trying to appear tough on covid rule breakers, she flung Ferrier under the bus for political reasons. The decision to do so is telling about Nicola Sturgeon, she is a vicious horrible nasty individual. Just as Sturgeon got rid of Ferrier who won Rutherglen and Hamilton West for the SNP in 2019, it seems that the weight of destiny may see the SNP into the reality that it has to get rid of Nicola Sturgeon. Nicola Sturgeon is still under police investigation since her arrest as is her husband and the SNP treasurer. £600k of indyref 2 funds is gone, and someone or others has to be held to account. You can’t walk back from missing money, or use a bullshit excuse to get off the hook. Of course, we must have a link to Rishi Sunak’s epic quip on Nicola Sturgeon, she done a lot of harm to Scotland and its people, that is historical fact, but this is worth a laugh.
The turn-out was particularly low in this by-election, and the news reports with ordinary people showed why, they are sick of the political class who are making their lives bad to worse. Only just 30,531 people could be bothered to vote;, only 37.19 per cent of the eligible electorate is the damning indictment of this election. I personally favour compulsory voting because it would force the political class to up their game considerably. Although voter ID was required in this election, ironically this is being used as one of the excuses why the SNP lost. The National (SNP pravda) is actively looking for people turned away from polling stations for having no ID to explain away SNP defeat. Do you think 15,000 former SNP voters were turned away from polling stations? A more viable reason is that the Scottish National Party has become the party of the crook, the party of the deviant, the party of the nonce and the leading anti woman party in Scotland.
Basically the SNP is a stinking cesspool of low grade humanity.
Finally, I noticed on twitter that Iona fyfe was having a dig at the Scottish Family Party for gaining 319 votes as if that is some sort of judgement on the party, and its candidate Niall Fraser. The Scottish Family Party pretty much stood on a single issue, their result was 1.05% of the vote. The party seems happy, they are trying to establish a brand, but perhaps they may make a wider policy platform to have more appeal in future contests. Iona Fyfe who is referred to as #Bignose by some on social media isn’t a fan, I assume it is maybe because she is woke and buys into this trans debate nonsense that a man can become a woman. Iona Fyfe has her critics, as this tweet makes an opinion on her lifestyle. Fyfe has been hanging around the SNP leadership for possible personal advancement, just in case the singing career doesn’t pan out, as the old saying goes, opinions vary! Although the win was solid for Scottish Labour, a single by-election of this type isn’t tablets of stone of future success, but I would say, Michael Shanks has a better than decent chance of retaining the seat in 2024, I doubt the SNP can recover in Rutherglen and Hamilton West to make a real challenge at the next election. Here is the full result, enjoy, large field but no Alba candidate, they obviously think their united for indy candidate strategy is still something worth pursuing, it isn’t.
RUTHERGLEN
AND HAMILTON WEST RESULT IN FULL
Michael
Shanks (Lab) 17,845 (58.55%, +24.08%)
Katy
Loudon (SNP) 8,399 (27.56%, -16.64%)
Thomas
Kerr (C) 1,192 (3.91%, -11.06%)
Gloria
Adebo (LD) 895 (2.94%, -2.25%)
Cameron
Eadie (Green) 601 (1.97%)
David
Stark (Reform) 403 (1.32%)
Niall
Fraser (Scot Family) 319 (1.05%)
Bill
Bonnar (SSP) 271 (0.89%)
Colette
Walker (IFS) 207 (0.68%)
Christopher
Sermanni (TUSC) 178 (0.58%)
Andrew
Daly (Ind) 81 (0.27%)
Ewan
Hoyle (Volt) 46 (0.15%)
Emperor
of India Prince Ankit Love (ND) 34 (0.11%)
Garry
Cooke (ND) 6 (0.02%)
