Christine Whyte

When Prince took the charts by storm with ‘1999’, he probably didn’t realise that there would be more reasons to party than just the advent of a new Millennium. In Scotland, colonial shackles were partially removed with the founding of the Scottish Parliament. Donald Dewar led a new government, which finally represented the true voting patterns of the Scottish electorate. This year will see the third elections of the devolved parliament. The Lib-Lab coalition is looking like a herd of vulnerable lambs as Salmond’s Scottish National Party’s (SNP) wolves circle.

The election has come at an exciting time, as the dust from ‘Sheridan versus News International’ starts to settle and Solidarity (Sheridan’s new party) is now up and running. This split in the socialist vote is manna from heaven for a struggling New Labour party. The Scottish Socialist Party was a formidable player in Scottish politics. thanks to the devovled parliament’s list system which allows some measure of proportional representation. But now, with their founder and most popular member having indulged in mud-slinging with a right-wing Murdoch rag the SSP has lost a lot of the trust and respect it had gathered in its exemplary parliamentary and community work. The resulting name-calling (the word ‘scab hadn’t been bandied about that much since the General Strike) has caused a political hissy fit of biblical proportions and Sheridan’s new party, Solidarity should take quite a few votes off the established leftists.

This split in the vote will only result in fewer radical MSPs in the Parliament next session and New Labour are working hard to make best use of this advantage. Convenient leaks of multi-billion pound defence contracts going to Clyde and Rosyth and flying visits by top brass to tin-pot parochial radio stations all suggest a party on the defensive.

And Scotland could be the election to give them a real kicking while theu’re down (as we say in Glasgow). Not only is Scotland forced to play host to the UK’s nuclear armamments, Scottish regiments play a disproportionate role in a war we don’t want, Scottish communities suffer under increasing liberalisation of the economy and Scottish unions and activists are stymied by London policy makers. But Scotland holds an ace up its sleeve - the Labour leadership. What will Brown do with an SNP majority in Holyrood? You can imagine his befuddled expression. Labour are currently conducting a vicious, smear campaign on the SNP, making preposterous claims about the cost of independence, personal attacks on Salmond and frankly pathetic cartoons to appeal to the ‘yoof’.

In Scotland, we can send a message to Labour they won’t forget in a hurry. On May 3, say no to war, no to Trident, no to imperialism. And yes to the SNP.