Shall we have a Scotsnet general election thread?

[JennyLake]

This WILL be interesting. Even if it doesn’t rid us of the SNP from Holyrood, it will provide a good barometer of public opinion on the recent exploits of the SNP.

Farewell Blackman and Black!

I am absolutely livid about this. They reject the Standards Committee recommendation? So what's the point of them? It would appear there are absolutely zero checks and balances in place.

Genuinely raging!

There has been no reduction in child poverty in Scotland. That’s according to the Scottish government own figures.

I am a teacher and for me the biggest issue is the lack of exclusions for violent pupils. I'm not sure if those high in the government understand what's going on but something needs to change.

Also , I've just been told the deportations to Rawanda have been paused until after the GE? Another huge reason why the Tories must be removed. I work with fantastic young people who have been through huge trauma and then been re traumatised by the UK government over this.

The SNP are having a nightmare of a day. Mathieson, Murrell and investigations continuing into the finances fiasco. Oh and they’re skint so crowdfunding for the election campaign 😀.
In the last GE there was less than 400 votes between SNP, Conservatives and Labour in that order in my constituency. I’ve got no allegiance to any party so will vote for whoever is likely to defeat the SNP.

I wish I felt my vote would count but living in an SNP stronghold it probably won't.
Not sure what effect boundary changes will have, but I fear more of the same in my area.

Don't be so sure.
Latest YouGov poll shows labour have a 10 point lead in Scotland

Swinney’s position on MM is totally indefensible
My main political concern is to stay part of the UK and my vote will go wherever is the best place to achieve that aim

Agree. The extra tenners and baby boxes are nice and I'm sure help a bit but they do nothing to address root cause. They ultimately just increase size of the state and contribute towards people counting on handouts.

Raising standards of education and housing are needed. And really fundamentally, to achieve that, growth in the economy is required (which is totally stagnating UK-wide).

This "can only be the FREEEDUMM!!! Indi at all costs lot" thing amuses me.

If your yardstick is performance, then tell me why anyone would vote Labour given their even poorer performance in Wales, and the Tories' shambolic running of the UK speaks for itself, so surely the only people voting Tory or Labour must be "union at all costs" types.

Or is it actually just that this is a banal trope endlessly parroted by those who lack the wit to come up with anything more cogent by themselves.

Now that Nicoliar's 'husband' Peter Murrell's charge of embezzlement has been submitted to the Prosecution service I am wondering if this will have any effect on those thinking of voting SNP. Who knows if it will eventually go to trial but aware, under Scottish law, we cannot discuss.

And.....today's revelation about Michael Matheson's punishment. Seemingly his suspension from parliament of 54 days equals £11,000 {same as his claim).......I have no words except cannot believe he is paid that amount for less than 2 months. The people in his Falkirk constituency should have a say.

It is now all unravelling for the Scottish Nasty Party.

I was Labour through and through until the disgraceful character assassination of Jeremy Corbyn in order to make way for Starmer.

I resigned my membership then, hate Starmer and hate what he's done to the Labour Party, but I'll be voting Labour in the GE as it's the best chance of getting rid of the Tories UK wide and the SNP here.

It'd be a cold day in hell before I'd vote Tory, and even then I wouldn't.

The MM thing is odd. Swinney lost a lot of his credibility today for backing him. What did he gain from it?

Agree that growing the economy is key. Kate Forbes was saying this the other day, the first time anyone in the SNP has said this for many years. If she wasn’t so loathed within her own party she’d be a candidate for leading the SNP to success.

So he inappropriately allowed his family to use his work laptop and (based on the fact that he claimed he didn't know how the bill was run up) presumably gave them his password. He then tried to put the bill on his expenses - which is attempted fraud. Ignorance (if one believes his denial of understanding how the charges were run up - which either shows stupidity regarding very well publicised roaming charges or failure to supervise his children on the internet) is no excuse and he should step down from parliament. Swinney defending him is frankly embarrassing.

What tools does a teacher have to placate a violent pupil? Restorative chats is about it? And that has been binned by Fife Council.

It's the same situation in my constituency, but I don't see Labour getting it back - I'm hearing too many older voters talking about voting Tory for the first time.

Very glad I can vote for Neale Hanvey. He won't get back in but I want to support him.

Depends on the HT and council but some strive to keep violent pupils in their school as it attracts praise from higher up ( or, for example, when inspected). It's really really sad.

It was, and AFAIK still is Scottish Parliament IT policy to use work issued laptops and iPads as Wifi hotspots when abroad. It's not an "attempted fraud", as Matheson himself asked SP IT to investigate the bill and clarify how, precisely, it came about before he submitted it as a standard working expense, and only did so after IT expressly instructed him to do so. I agree with you that to obfuscate the truth after it was known to him is an egregious act of stupidity, especially since the SIM being used was outdated and was supposed to have been replaced by that point, so yes, it is entirely his fault, and it is perfectly appropriate that he pays the expense from his own pocket.

What has become ridiculous is the insistence that Matheson somehow set out to "defraud" expenses, or that this was somehow a "grift". It's clear he made an extremely poor choice in an attempt to cover up his complicity, and for that he needs to be punished, but I do not accept that the sanction suggested by the committee is appropriate, given that it's on a par with the previous harshest sanction meted out to an MSP, and that was for sexually impropriety.

Perhaps a month suspension is appropriate for the offence, but then it's clear that there is a fundamental problem with regard to the strictures available if an "offence" of this nature is considered as serious as sexual misconduct. For that reason, John Swinney is absolutely correct to refuse to sanction it, because it's clear the furore surrounding this has been amplified by committee members determined to play petty politics with it.

Michael Matheson paid the 11k, eventually, and is facing suspension and loss of income. This has generated no end of fizzing and wailing, yet Michelle Donelan's Libel bill was over three times this amount, paid from public purse, and not a peep. The wailing and gnashing from Unionist politicians over this, while completely ignoring and refusing to acknowledge far more egregious cases of misconduct, theft, and criminality from members of their own parties just beggars belief, and Swinney is absolutely correct to tell them to get fucked.

It's clear he made an extremely poor choice in an attempt to cover up his complicity

But that’s your fraud though Trying to cover up the facts once you have ascertained the truth in order to dodge an £11k bill. No one in their right mind believes the ‘wanting to protect his kids’ nonsense.

Why?!

🤞 hope so. I've not given up on them yet. They could be better but they're still way more progressive and less corrupt than Labour and the Tories

Who do you think would be a good alternative?

Agreed. I'd like to see more Greens as well, but most of the country seems to disagree with me 😅

I'm £300 per month better off thanks to the SNP (Scottish Child Payment). It's still a struggle when the kids need bigger shoes, when it's their birthdays, Christmas etc. and I still need to use the food bank at times, but it's a help.
My part-time degree course is paid for by SAAS (Part-Time Fee Grant). Without it I wouldn't be able to afford to study.
Those are only a couple of the many ways the SNP has helped my children and I. If we lived in England, I'd struggle a lot more and my kids would do without a lot more.
The SNP consistently stand up for vulnerable people and stand up against the moral bankruptcy of Westminster. Watching the SNP MPs speak in parliament makes me proud.
I dread an increase in Tories or Red Tories in Scotland.

Why are so many people so obsessed with other people's genitalia? People know themselves better than anyone else knows them.. when they tell you who they are, why wouldn't you believe them? What difference does it make to you what gender someone is? They're not doing you any harm. It's bizarre to be so hateful.