THE Labour Party must be really desperate. No sooner has the Calman Commission published its report, ducking the issue of how to make the Scottish Parliament fully accountable, than the Labour Party is telling us that it will introduce the committee's recommendations before the next general election.
Barack Obama talks of the audacity of hope, well Gordon Brown peddles the audacity of fear. His fear that Labour will be hammered by the SNP drives his willingness to change our constitution without so much as a public debate about the merits of what
Calman is proposing.
The SNP has seen through Labour's half-hearted attempt to make Holyrood responsible for its actions and challenged Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy and Labour MSP leader Ian Gray to put their proposals to a referendum, alongside a question on independence. It's a fair suggestion. After all, we had a referendum on creating the Parliament in the first place and it was Labour's idea to have a second question on the power to vary income tax by 3p, so why not now?
The answer lies in the general rule that those who propose referenda usually think they will win, or at least advance their cause, while those who object to them usually think they will lose, or at least weaken their cause.
Readers may recall it was only six months ago that Labour leaders were rueful that Wendy Alexander had created the Calman Commission. So why the rush to deliver its recommendations without a moment's thought? Labour needs to change the political menu back to the meat and two veg of policies, not the vile gruel of MPs expenses that the public finds distasteful.
The expenses scandal has hit Labour very hard and it is not going to go away – not this side of a general election at least. There is a reason for this. In fact, there are five reasons.
The first is that there is far more dirty linen still to be hung out to dry. Now that the speaker, Michael Martin, has decided belatedly to publish all the details on the parliamentary website with immediate effect, members of the public will trawl through every MP's claims – their resulting complaints giving the story fresh legs but at a more local level.
Second, with all expenses published, the national media will be looking at new, previously unavailable angles to cover – the top fifty best and worst, the most frugal, the most spendthrift.
The third reason is that the often unbelievable claims have caused some members to announce their unplanned retiral or be deselected by their party – as happened to Livingston's Jim Devine – causing election upheaval.
Fourth, the SNP will, directly or indirectly, use every opportunity to remind the public of the sorry mess so many Labour clowns have gotten themselves into.
The fifth reason is that there is every possibility that some Labour MPs will face prosecution, giving the story a life well into next year.
Many Labour seats now stink of a scandal that has turned the public into a nation of sickened, saddened cynics. The electorate's anger is palpable, and for it a general election cannot come quick enough.
The Calman Commission is no political Dyno-Rod. No amount of political gestures can keep Labour's nemesis out of the news headlines until the election comes.
Sterling celebrationIF this week's UK unemployment figures were sobering – up 232,000 in the three months to April, the second biggest increase since 1981, a twelve-year high of over 2.2 million, and still climbing – then at least we can celebrate the fact that we never joined the Euro currency.
The number of people becoming unemployed in the Eurozone in the same period rose by 1.2 million, the largest fall since records began in 1995. Had we made the mistake of signing up to the single European currency not only would the Euro's inappropriate interest rates have caused an even bigger boom, we would now be experiencing an even greater bust.
Thank goodness William Hague bounced Blair and Brown out of embracing the Euro with his Save The Pound Campaign in 1999.
A pointless ballot A DEAL could be struck this weekend that will give Ireland a whole host of privileges to help entice the Irish electorate to endorse the Lisbon Treaty in a fresh referendum later this year.
This news comes in the same week that Tory shadow business minister and Euro-slave Ken Clarke said the Conservatives would not attempt to have a British referendum on the Lisbon Treaty if it had been endorsed before a UK election.
So, only a week after the European electorate votes overwhelmingly for parties that are against further integration and anything like a United States of Europe, the Euro-elite ignore the poll and carry on regardless.
Was there any point in voting? Maybe it's time to look at MEPs' expenses?
