Thursday 5 June 2008

While The Cats Away ...


Mr Smith must ask what has happened to Scottish Labour Leader Wendy Alexander over the last couple of weeks? She seems to have disappeared which is perhaps part of her latest relaunch strategy to try and make everyone forget the issues which have plagued her since she was not elected in the first place. But in Wendy's "absence" it would appear her Labour colleagues are battling about the issue of allowances for those of them representing "constituencies" and those of them representing "regions."

" LABOUR MSPs are engulfed in a civil war over plans to change their allowances so that constituency members receive more than those elected from the party list. MSPs are due to vote on whether to accept the findings of a report by a committee chaired by Sir Alan Langlands which recommended that constituency MSPs should get £62,000 a year for office and staff, but list MSPs just £45,000."

One of the main critics of the change is Lord "three jobs" Foulkes, coincidentally a Labour "regional" MSP, therefore with more to lose than most Labour MSPs, and who it is hard to think of as the "voice of reason" on this or any other issue. But it just reinforces how much the concerns of representatives of the Peoples' Party have changed since they lost power last May with their main concern now apparently being their own allowances and not the best interests of the people themselves.

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