Frogs, Gods and Politicians

There is a story by Aesop that goes like this.

Once there was a pond which a colony of frogs lived in.They had enough food and were pretty happy, but they got bored. They decided that what they needed was a bit of glamour,so they prayed to the frog god for a king. The frog god threw down a log into the pond and the frogs were happy with it for a while, but they got bored with it because it didn't do anything.So they prayed to the frog god again. This time he sent down a stork, who promptly set about eating up all the frogs in the pond.

I thought of this story this morning when I heard about Wendy Alexander and the fuss about the £950 which may or may not have been donated illegally. Jim Dyer has reported the matter to the Procurator Fiscal to decide. Regardless of the legal technicalities,the ghouls in Scottish political community are gearing up for yet another leadership blood fest a la Henry McLeish and David McLetchie. Do I like this?
No. Why not? Because a) the amount of money involved is small and it is really about a legal technicality and b) nobody has asked who we are going to get in Wendy's place if she goes.

Take Henry McLeish. Henry McLeish was one of the few heavyweights that Labour had in the Scottish party. He also had a social conscience, which is why he pushed forward personal care for the elderly. This was actually his undoing. Westminster did not want him to do this, because it would put pressure on England to follow suit. Shortly after he defied them, the whole fuss about his constituency office and who it was hired to, blew up. I wouldn't mind betting that most of you cannot remember the details of this and care less. Nonetheless, he was removed from office and we lost a fine politician as a result.

Now it's Wendy's turn. She's only been in four months as leader and peoples' chief objections to her seem to be a) that they don't like what she looks like and b)they don't like her voice. Believe me, there are far worse things to dislike in a leader than their looks and their voice.

Which brings me to Andy Kerr. For those of you who have forgotten, Andy Kerr was the Health Minister last session. Andy Kerr was the one pushing through all the hospital closures (including Monklands). For the past couple of months in the new session, he has been claiming that the abandonment of this closure plan will endanger lives. If Wendy goes, he will be the most likely candidate for Labour leader. It will be very bad for health if this happens.

All politicians are not the same. This is something I learned over the course of the Monklands campaign. Some were very helpful. Some were very unhelpful and it did not depend on which party they belonged to. It actually depended on them as a person, how they behaved to us.

The worst thing that I saw was the party political system at work. It is not the best that are picked as candidates. Those who get picked tend to be a grade below the office bearers of the association and are groomed to be totally dependent on the party. Their campaign is generally arranged for them by others esp the fund raising. If they step out of line at all, they are severely punished. There is one politician I know, whose party members did not speak to them for two years, because of an abstention on a vote in Holyrood. This is the brutal reality of party politics in Scotland and the bullying underlying it. And that is why in the whole campaign, I stuck to issues. I did not want to get caught up in personalities or the general blood letting that passes for politics in this country.

I am sure the press will have a field day or week, with this story. No doubt Wendy Alexander will resign. If Andy Kerr manages to side step the issue about £1000 gift from McDonalds (and he will manage it), he will be next Labour leader. Then it's on with the show.

I wish we had politicians in the opposition mature enough to say to the Labour party,'Do your blood letting yourselves.'

I wish we had a press mature enough to say, 'This is not a story worth the paper it's written on.'

But most of all, I wish we had an electorate mature enough to say, 'A pox on all your houses.'