Where are all my No-mates?

[HamletsSister]

In despair. Absolutely in despair. Do we have to go through this again? And with such a long lead up to the referendum? Really? What happened to the settled will of the Scottish people?

@statisticallychallenged Will you help me get through this again? (Was Roseformeplease then).

The Labour candidate in my constituency has 41 followers on Twitter. It's not looking good.

Ruthie has tweeted this if it helps.

Nippy can you link to the source? The image is too low res for me to be able to read properly...

This any better?

twitter.com/camusson/status/861696067158638593/photo/1

Interesting result for edinburgh there, I'm guessing snp probably ended up with more seats mainly due to transfers from the greens but it's interesting that the Tory vote share was a sniff higher

Interesting results in Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire, Angus and Perth.

To be fair the snp have starved Aberdeen of cash so it is unsurprising really. Here is the council cuts

Ridiculously high in Aberdeen.

That's interesting. Although the SNP are static overall and claim all the Tory seats have been won from labour, that isn't true. There have been some big swings from the SNP in certain seats, counterbalanced by an increase to the SNP in places such as Glasgow. That leaves the SNP vulnerable in quite a few areas in the general election.

Has anyone seen any analysis of the transfers from independent candidates?

Not sure how relevant transfers from Independents would be North of the Central belt (which is where most of the Independents are). When we were looking yesterday it was very noticeable that there were far fewer candidates there, even in multiple councillor wards.

When we looked at Moray ALL the Con candidates got in on 1st pref. There was no 2nd Con candidate to get a later pref vote and so their later prefs went to a mixture of Independents. In contrast the SNP had 2 candidates in more than half the wards. In one case they got both through on 7th pref because there were lots of different Independents. In another 3 cases they narrowly got 1 through on late prefs and their 2nd candidate lost out to an Independent. Only 3 of their 9 councillors got through on 1st pref. We were using it as a study in STV strategy. If anything, in this case at least, the result flatters the SNP.

On a related note the East Dunbartonshire figures from yesterday look funny. The LibDem and Independents have similar vote share but LibDem got 6 councillors to Independent 1 - I think there may be some incorrect labelling in the metadata.

Not looked at Edinburgh, but for Glasgow and surrounding Independents not really a factor. For Glasgow the analysis of the Green vote would be interesting. I think Patrick Harvie standing in Hillhead will hurt the SNP but is a very smart move for the Greens as they are in danger of starting to lose Leftward votes by looking like SNP poodles.

It could be very relevant in places where independents got 20+% of the vote share.

Sorry, I didn't mean to suggest the 20% Independent vote wasn't relevant - rather that based on the analysis I have seen and my gut feel on why Northerners, like me, are inclined to vote against the herd I don't see the Independent vote helping the SNP in a FPTP GE.

I wonder how the SNP is feeling about electoral reform now (having said in thr past that it supports proportional representation?)

That chart is very interesting indeed - especially Aberdeenshire. That's Alex Salmond's stamping ground isn't it?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-39856284

Just as well Education has been top priority eh?

Particularly liking Swinney's comments.

'We need better understanding of the progress of individual pupils' YES - as a parent, I've got no real idea what dd has learned this year or how she's tracking against where she's supposed to be.

He's not wrong about that but isn't it his job to have sorted this out already?

From that article: "EIS general secretary Larry Flanagan said: "At a time when education budgets have been falling, staff numbers have declined and teachers and pupils have been under severe workload pressures, our schools have continued to perform well.
"If the attainment gap is to be tackled successfully, we need to see an end to the politics of austerity and a renewed political commitment to support our comprehensive system, including tackling the excessive workload which still blights our schools."

Agree Lottery I don't have an issue with what he is saying. But he is saying it as if it's nothing to do with him /them.

Yes, they don't have tax raising powers or anything like that now...

Given that report and the recent pisa report, it is absolutely shocking that there has been no debate on education in the Scottish parliament, yet hours have been spent debating separation from the UK.

Education is devolved. The SNP need to actually make education their priority as they say it is rather than focusing on constitutional issues.

Nolottery does your school not do MALT tests? At our recent parent's evening I was shown tests that both my kids had done which showed in maths they are performing above average for their age. They had also both done reading and comprehension tasks which showed DS was performing at 2 years above his age group and DD was performing as she should.

There was also a scored writing test. Both had done all three tests. DD is in P3, DS is in P5.

Sorry for the derail into my parenting paranoia - they've said they do assessments but I've never had a word said about what the outcome may have been. I'll ask specifically about MALT and perhaps quote Swinney at them :) thanks!

At all primaries in Scotland pupils already sit tests. But they are ones that are standard across council areas rather than the country.
And at my primary the parents are deliberately not told the test results - we often don't even know when they are being/have been taken. It is to stop 'competitive' parents trying to increase their child's score and comparisons at the school gate. To avoid the situation in England with the weeks of revision before etc and league tables and parents fighting to get their DC into the 'best' primaries - leaving the children of parents who don't care or know enough together in the under achieving schools -so they just get worse... I actually quite like it is as it is...
In our 'naice' area more or less all the children are ahead of where they 'should' be when they start secondary...(actually I unusually have just been told a test result - my just turned 10yo has a reading age of 14 or something - but isn't the best reader in the class). And that is good enough for me.
(I do think background and parental involvement in their child's learning plays a massive role in how good a school is anyway)

I do agree that the current levels in reports are too broad - and they seem 'easier' than the previous system. (My average in class DC had developing, consolidating and a secure at level 2 at the end of P5...which is the 'up to P7 level' - my elder DC (if anything brighter than DC2) was one or two levels ahead in the old system at the end of P7) ...it is like they have been dumbed down slightly.
Also when they get into secondary with a broader range of subjects it makes the reports slightly more confusing/harder to understand - ie for one subject they will get a secure and for another they will be developing ...but they are secure at a lower level - so they are doing better in the developing subject....
I think C for E in the Early years needs a major overall - in fact I think the whole child led learning approach is not working for children who come from less supportive backgrounds.
It is all very nice when 'Felix' brings in the guide book from the art gallery he visited at the weekend to use as a focus of learning - or maybe they could use 'Felicity's' experiences on her skiing holiday. Not quite so good when they have a choice of what they saw on Game of Thrones or how far they got in Call of Duty on their playstation or whether dad was pissed or stoned...or both.
We are failing a generation of children - and it makes me really cross. Especially as the SNP spend hours debating independence instead of education...

The main thing I don't like about not having clear information about how they're doing from checkpoint tests and reports is mainly that you have to put an awful lot of trust in the teacher, and there is no independent verification.

I'd like to say I'm above the bragging :)

I didn't mean to brag! My point was that I was given information about reading, writing and maths that gave me comfort that my kids were doing ok relative to other kids across the UK.

I'm just surprised that all parents aren't getting that information. We're not told when the tests are done or how they're doing relative to the rest of the class.

That's exactly what I thought you meant trixy and is useful, it would definitely be reassuring to know this!