Ugh. Not again. Can they not just print this speech off on something like one of those Tibetan prayer wheels? It comes round just as often and it would save us all the hassle of having to listen to it again. Yes, Labour in Scotland has dragged the Federalism Fairy out of her grave again. I’d say that they must be desperate, but that’s pretty much the base state with Labour in Scotland these days.
This time it was Labour’s Scottish branch office manager Ricardo Loofahscratcher who was making the promise of the abolition of the House of Lords and replacing it with a federal upper house in Westminster. That’s because Gordie Broon was off having his formaldehyde refilled and his pulled strings retightened. In his place Rembrant Lunchloser vomited up a word salad of federal, equality, socialist, redistribution, notice me notice oh please please god notice that we still exist. But these days even that former bastion of Labour fanboyery Reporting Scotland is just going through the motions, visiting Remington Lumpsqueezer upon us like you visit an embarrassing old relative who smells of cat pee.
As she was announcing the item, you could see the resignation in the BBC presenter’s eyes. Now go on, the eyes were saying, watch Renton Lacklustre on the tellybox, you know it makes him happy – my boss in BBC news management that is. Christ alone knows what makes Rowland Lagerspiller happy. It sure as hell isn’t his job. Royston Lubemilker gets embarrassed on a daily basis for the Labour party’s Scottish branch office you know. There he is, plodding away at the political coalface all day, telling everyone he’s going to be the next first minister, and no one can even remember his bloody name. I can’t even remember his name and I’m staring at an autocue. C’mon. Humour us. Do it for me, please. I didn’t ask for this. I’m just biding my time until I can get that gig on an afternoon game show. Afternoon game show presenters don’t have to deal with bloody cybernats telling you you’re biased every five minutes. It’s only for a couple of minutes for god’s sake, and then we’ll show you the fitba and tell you how bad the SNP are. OK?
The main point of the speech was purportedly to clear up Labour’s confused position on Brexit as we head into a General Election. As an exercise in futility it wasn’t lacking in pathos, like a small child trying to save its parents’ failing marriage, pleading with them about issues that were far beyond its ability to affect. Rowan Lardlover announced with all the confidence of a man on a mainline railway about to be smashed by a train that Labour would fight the election promising a new deal on Brexit, a better deal, and then the party would offer a referendum and would campaign to remain. That ought to clear everything up. At least I think that’s what he was promising. I can’t really be certain because I was paying him as much attention as the leadership of the Labour party in London does. Which is to say that I was contemplating whether there is any point in redecorating my living room before the post-Brexit apocalypse. This is a damn sight closer to clarity on Brexit than Labour ever manages.
A YouGov poll this week showed Labour in Scotland on less than 10% in the General Election which is coming soon. It was just a subsample so has a larger margin of error than full polls, but YouGov weights its Scottish subsamples correctly. The finding is further evidence to add to other polls which show that Labour is going to be lucky to hang on to the seats it regained in Scotland in the General Election in 2017. It will be goodbye to Paul Sweeney’s ego and its inverse proportionality to his usefulness, goodbye to Hugh the Gaffe Gaffney and his uncanny ability to see a mouth and put his foot in it, goodbye to wossername the Shadow Scottish Secretary of State who has less substance than an actual shadow, and goodbye to the other ones that even Rexford Lobbydosser would struggle to identify.
Still, at least none of them are Ross SNP Gain Thomson, who is in campaigning mode, hoping to keep his overwhelmingly remain voting seat by taking photos of potholes in his Conservative/Labour controlled local authority and posting them on social media. Ross is asking his constituents to contact him if they find a pothole that’s in need of filling, except for the obvious one where his brain ought to be. Anything, but anything, to act as a distraction from Ross’s gushing fanboy support of a Prime Minister who’s been found to be a liar by the highest court in Scotland, and who has been trashing democracy in pursuit of his career.
Ross chose to kick off his lemme fill in your pothole campaign by standing next to a potholed road where there was a very large red road sign saying ROAD CLOSED and a load of traffic cones. This is a clue to those of us with better observational skills than Ross that this potholed road is under repair and won’t be potholed much longer. The roadsign wasn’t even in Gaelic, so you think he might have noticed. But let’s not be unkind. Ross is quite right to be concerned about potholes, because he might fall into one and have nothing to grab onto to break his fall. He is so lacking in self-awareness that he never realised that the biggest issue in that particular street was him. Poor Ross, out of his depth in a pothole.
In any event, filling in potholes is not actually the responsibility of a Member of Parliament, but Ross is practising for after the election, when instead of going round the doors canvassing and taking photos of potholes for his Twitter account, he’ll be going round the doors asking people if they need their driveway asphalted. And to think that Ross was once touted as being destined for high office, although admittedly it was only ever Ross that was doing the touting.
It was pointed out to Ross by SNP MP Philipps Whitford that the entire UK is going to hell in a handcart – or at least it would be if it wasn’t stuck in a 30 mile long queue of lorries along the M4 in Kent – and that perhaps he might better spend his time doing something to protect Scotland from the disasters that his party is inflicting on us all instead of gawking at potholes. There’s a massive big pothole in the British constitution. Maybe Ross should fix that.
So that’s the state of the two largest UK parties in Scotland. Fantasy politics and potholes. Any confidence that Scotland might still have had in British politics died a little bit more this week – and not just just because of Lyin’ Bastert Johnson.
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