VOTE Scottish Socialist Party - Colin Fox

Manifesto launch

2007-04-16T22:42:00.000+01:00

Last Tuesday was an especially hectic, and productive, day for the Scottish Socialist Party. I started the day at 7.30am by appearing on Radio Scotland's Good Morning Scotland. I then travelled through to Hampden stadium for the launch of our manifesto. We highlighted our flagship policy of Free public Transport as well as unveiling over 400 policies covering all aspects of life here in Scotland. We also launched a special manifesto/elections website - http://www.ssp-election-2007.org.uk/

Later on that evening our first election broadcast was aired and was described by Proclaimer Charlie Reid as a "Brilliant broadcast, modern day Marxism meets Trumpton", the first of two Scottish Socialist Party election broadcasts for the 2007 Scottish Parliament elections 2007. This one is on the SSP's free public transport policy

SSP stand in 31 council seats

2007-04-16T22:33:00.000+01:00

Predictions of the demise of the SSP have once again been proven to be the wishful thinking of those who would like to see the end of Scotland's biggest and best socialist party.
As well as standing on the regional list, the SSP is standing candidates in 31 of the 32 council seats across the Lothians (17 in Edinburgh, 6 in Midlothian and 8 of 9 in West Lothian).
In West Lothian we've decided to stand aside in the Broxburn, Uphall & Winchburgh ward in favour of, former nurse, Ellen Glass of the "stop the downgrade of St John's campaign".

I've also pasted below an article I wrote for the South Edinburgh Echo.

Local Council Elections –SSP [100 words]
The Scottish Socialist Party will be standing candidates in every Council seat in Edinburgh. Our candidates are all local activists.
In Liberton / Gilmerton our candidate will be none other than our sitting MSP and party national convenor Colin Fox. Colin lives in the Inch and has two children at the local primary school. His partner Zillah is a midwife at the new Royal Infirmary. His candidacy shows our commitment to South Edinburgh one area which Colin has served these past four years at Holyrood.
The SSP candidate in Southside /Newington is Scott Simpson who works as a community worker in Craigmillar.
And in Meadows /Morningside we present Helga Janzen a payroll manager from Marchmont involved in a variety of local issues including campaigns for better public transport and protecting local shops.

Scottish Parliament Elections
Colin Fox MSP will once again head the Scottish Socialist Party challenge in the Lothians.
Colin is seeking re-election to Holyrood and is proud to put his record in fighting for the interests of working families this past four years in front of the electorate.
He will be joined by a list of candidates, men and women from across the Lothians bringing a wide variety of skills and experiences together.
The most important issues for the SSP are
;the abolition of the hated Council tax – to be replaced by a local tax based on income/ability to pay
;building 20,000 new council houses across the Lothians to address the appalling difficulties people now have in getting a decent home to live in
;the introduction of free school meals for all pupils to help address the scandalous child poverty which continues to shame Scotland
;free public transport for everyone which we believe is the most innovative and radical measure thus far presented to tackle the issue of climate change,pollution and congestion- offer people a better alternative to the car and they will take it
;and of course our defining policy is our support for an independent socialist Scotland.

The Scottish Socialist Party rewrote the history books when they got 6 MSP’s elected in 2003. We believe we can again do so again.
Over the past 4 years no one has worked harder for working people and the things they value the most than the SSP. We have opposed the hideoauys and barbarous war in Iraq, we have argued for public ownership and public services against the incessant drive towards privatization of this executive.
We have opposed the package of cuts in services at Scottish Parliament and Council level. Colin was for example at the forefront of the successful campaign to keep local schools in Edinburgh open and to keep a full array of health service in palce across the region.
The SSP MSP’s have been the socialist conscience of the Parliament. In championing the rights of the most vulnerable and needy in our society Colin was elected as ‘a workers representative living on a workers wage’. He donates half his £55,000 salary to campaigns committed to improving the lives of ordinary people. He follows the wise advice of those founders of the socialist movement who advised those seeking to represent working people - ‘rise with your class not out of it’.

The Scottish Socialist party list for Holyrood includes people from all over the region each with a wealth of experience and commitment to making the region much more equal and just and fair for ordinary people. Edinburgh is a very rich city and we want to see much more of the great wealth accumulated here going to those who need it the most; to children living below the poverty line, to pensioners struggling to get by on a daily basis on a meager pension, to the needy in a rich city. Yes we want to redistribute the wealth of the city from the rich to the poor.

Hectic campaigning

2007-04-16T22:05:00.000+01:00

I've not had a chance to update my blog as regularly as I would have liked but here's some photos and updates on some of the stuff we've been up to. The picture above was taken for a Friends of the Earth photoshoot of MSPs opposed to nuclear power.

Scots ‘Economically, socially, culturally and politically better off Independent’

2007-04-04T20:29:00.000+01:00

Scottish Socialist Party leader Colin Fox will tell a public meeting in Edinburgh tomorrow night that Scots would be ‘economically, socially, culturally and politically better off’ under Independence.

Responding to polls which suggest a majority of voters want more powers devolved to the Scottish Parliament rather than outright independence, Mr Fox told us.
‘Ironically it is the powers that devolution denies people that they want the most.
-the power to raise all our own revenues, including oil revenues and Corporation Tax,
-the power to keep Scottish soldiers from being sent to fight in a illegal war in Iraq,
-the power to get rid of Trident nuclear weapons based on the Clyde
-the power to reverse the privatisation of our public services.
-the power to lift the low paid out of poverty and raise the minimum wage to £8/ hour,
-the power to pay seniors a decent pension not the pittance they currently receive,
-the power to redistribute the huge wealth of Scotland from the rich to the poor.
These are the powers voters want but we of course we will simply not get them unless we are independent, that’s the rub!

‘I have no doubt that working people would be economically, socially, culturally and politically better off under Independence.

‘There can also be no doubt nowadays that the political centre of gravity of most Scots is to the left of New Labour – and the New SNP for that matter! I therefore urge voters to ensure there is a full socialist presence at Holyrood after May 3rd to insist on the changes they want most.’
ENDS

Public meeting details ;
THE CASE FOR AN INDEPENDENT SOCIALIST SCOTLAND
Speakers Colin Fox MSP and Lloyd Quinan [Former SNP MSP]
Thursday 5th April 7.30pm
St Augustines Church, George IV Bridge, Edinburgh

SNP No More

2007-04-01T19:49:00.000+01:00

Today's Sunday Mail

EXCLUSIVE Proclaimer dumps Alexover business cash
By Brian Lironi, Political Editor
PROCLAIMERS star Charlie Reid has dumped the SNP in protest at their links to big business.
Charlie and twin Craig - at No 1 with Comic Relief single I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles) - were Alex Salmond's biggest celebrity backers after Sir Sean Connery.
The defection to the SSP is a crushing blow for the Nats just a month before the Holyrood election on May 3.
It will stun supporters and spark a new debate about the SNP's controversial funding from anti-gay campaigner and Stagecoach founder Brian Souter.
Charlie, 45, said he had already given the SSP a donation but brother Craig will continue to support Alex Salmond's party.
In an exclusive interview with the Sunday Mail, Charlie, who first shot to fame with Letter From America, said: "I'm changing my allegiance from the SNP to the SSP.
"I still have a lot of respect for people like Alex Salmond, Kenny McAskill and Nicola Sturgeon and I think they will form the government after the election.
"But I think they are placing too much emphasis on courting big business.
"For that reason, I'll be voting for the SSP at the election.
"I think it's important to have a party in the parliament with left wing principles prepared to stand up to big business."
Charlie has already met SSP leader Colin Fox and sent a cheque to boost party coffers. The pair first met in February at a demo to campaign for better sports facilities for kids.
Charlie and Craig are hugely popular figures in SNP circles but Salmond has spent a lot of time and effort wooing big business.
He has received the backing of influential figures including former Royal Bank of Scotland chief Sir George Mathewson - and donations of £100,000 from Sir Tom Farmer and £500,000 from tycoon Souter.
But he has been criticized for taking the money from from Souter, who led the campaign against the repeal of anti-gay law Clause 28.
SSP leader Fox said: "I'm delighted Charlie has now chosen to give his public backing to us."
An SNP spokesman pointed out that they had just enlisted the support of singer Sandi Thom.
He added: "The SNP have growing support among Scotland's arts community, as we do across Scottish society."

http://www.sundaymail.co.uk/news/tm_headline=snp-no-more%26method=full%26objectid=18840090%26siteid=64736-name_page.html

Campaigning in Midlothian

2007-03-27T20:26:00.000+01:00

On saturday morning I met our council candidates for Midlothian at Newtongrange Mining Museum for a photo then we were off to Penicuik to campaign against Trident.

The candidates in the photo above are (l-r): Neil Bennet (Bonnyrigg), Lynn Leitch (Midlothian West), Norman Gilfillan (Penicuik), John Carroll (Midlothian South).

Our other candidates are Murray Court (Midlothian East) & Bob Goupillot (Dalkeith)

Save Meadowbank

2007-03-25T11:53:00.000+01:00

I was invited to Meadowbank stadium last Saturday to address a public meeting organised by campaigners opposed to Council plans to demolish the stadium and build private housing on the site.

Can I first of all say that I have my own very special reasons for keeping this place open.
This is the place where I made my hurdling debut in May 2003 on the night I was elected as an MSP for the Lothians for the SSP.
It was a night /morning I will never forget and this stadium will always have a warm place in my heart. And you know I suspect it has a warm place in all 600 of you too and that’s why you are here and feel so passionate about this issue.

But you know I am no dinosaur, I don’t want to see this place stay as it is, I want to see it improved, I want to see investment in this and indeed all this cities sports and leisure facilities.

I notice that ‘Save Meadowbank Campaign’ has put a leaflet on your seat asking you to get politicians to answer three specific questions. Well let me answer these three questions here and now.
No, I don’t support the demolition of Meadowbank and it used for private housing development.
Yes I do want to see the facilities here refurbished
Yes I do support the widest possible public consultation on the Councils proposals.
And let me go further. I am sick to the back teeth of Councils, Health Boards and others engaging in apparent ‘public consultations’ only to watch them disregard our views completely and do at the end exactly what they intended to do at the beginning. That is a sham, that is not genuine democracy.

The Council, and leader Donald Anderson [who had spoken earlier in the meeting and said that ‘The money just does not exist to refurbish Meadowbank] is forever putting out glossy brochures telling us how successful this city is and how rich it is. But he cannot have it both ways, now telling us today that the money is not there. This is a rich city. Some are having boom times with record profits, labour shortages and soaring house prices. As a socialist I want to see that wealth shared out more evenly, taking from the rich and giving to the poor. And you do not achieve that by closing vital public facilities like this one and building luxury private properties for the few.

Last Friday I had the pleasure of attending the opening of the first Council house in Scotland for 30 years out at Woodburn in Dalkeith. I grew up in a Council house in Motherwell. Council houses are a great idea, but you would have to be over 30 to remember what they were.

It would be one thing if the Council were coming along here today saying they intended to redevelop Meadowbank and provide 21st century facilities on one part of the site and new Council properties for the people of East Edinburgh on the rest but they are not. Their plan means the loss of precious open space in the East of the city and 90% loss of leisure facilities.
I will not support that and you will not support that.

I understand that the Council has extended the deadline for consultations on their plan until 31st March and that no decision will now be taken before the election. I hope everyone here realizes that this represents a climbdown from their original timetable and that must be see as a victory for your campaigning.
This makes this a huge election issue in the elections and you must decide who you trust to protect this centre when they are on the Council.

I want to see money being spent here on this vital local facility. I want Meadowbank stadium to stay open and I want the new facility at Sighthill too.

But let me just finish by saying this, last week the Westminster Parliament debated whether or not to spend £100billion on Trident nuclear weapons. So let’s not insult each others intelligence by claiming
‘There is no money available for improving Meadowbank!’
I simply will not accept that. There is money for Meadowbank, there is money for Council housing, there is money for free school meals and free public transport, for our pensioners, for our youngsters……there is £100billion pounds available by not building more nuclear weapons of mass destruction.
I support the refurbishment of Meadowbank stadium 100% - Thank You

Independance on the never never?

2007-03-12T21:31:00.000Z

SCOTTISH SOCIALIST PARTY
Media Release
FOX ACCUSES SALMOND OF FURTHER 'WATERING DOWN' INDEPENDENCE COMMITTMENT

SSP National Convenor Colin Fox MSP has written to SNP leader Alex Salmond following comments attributed to SNP financier Sir Tom Farmer, that the nationalists intend to water down their commitment to a referendum on independence in order to placate possible Holyrood coalition partners the Lib Dems.
Colin was responding to Sunday newspapers reports that Salmond intends to put the independence referendum on hold for many years if he becomes First Minister after May's elections. 'If these reports are true and Alex Salmond intends to concede arguments to the Lib Dems and big business then independence supporters across the country will be having a 'Kwik-Fit'! the SNP leadership has postponed again and again its plans for an independence referendum and now it is relegated still further.
'Colin said: "In dancing to the tune of the business community like this, always the most luke warm supporters of independence - just as they were with devolution - Alex Salmond risks losing the support of the most passionate advocates of self determination."
"The SSP are clear that an independence referendum is an early priority after May and our MSP s will introduce just such a Bill to bring it about."
"Whilst the SNP are wavering, looking for coalition partners and relegating independence to the third division, voters will certainly recognise that it is the Scottish Socialist Party who are this country's firmest supporters of independence and I urge them to use their list votes accordingly."
"A strong group of SSP members in the next parliament can play a critical role in making sure that independence isn't kicked into the long grass."

1st Council house in quarter of a century

2007-03-12T21:15:00.000Z

I'm pictured here with Midlothian Councillor Derek Milligan the Housing Convenor, outside the first Council house built in Scotland in 25 years at 1 Bill Russell Grove, Woodburn, Dalkeith today.

The house is the first of 1,000 new Council houses to built in Midlothian. This terrific initiative is one which I have welcomed from the start and the Council were grateful to acknowledge my support.

I was taken round the house by the new tenants and it is a lovely big four bedroomed property which the council built at a cost of £80,000 but which local estate agents have said would sell at £180,000.

I have warmly welcomed Midlothian Councils £105m investment. I don’t see why Edinburgh City Council for example which is far richer cannot do something similar for tenants in the city.

Edinburgh Nursery scandal

2007-03-08T11:18:00.000Z

Moves are afoot inside Edinburgh city Council to axe 200 full time nursery places across the city.

Last Thursday I asked, current Council leader, Ewan Aitken – who was previously the Education convenor and head of the Children & Families department – to assure me he has no plans to cut these essential services. He responded 2 days ago by saying he would reply with urgency!

The council, in the January ‘07 edition of Working Capital, highlight a recent study by Women onto Work which shows that 65% of women in Edinburgh see childcare as the number one barrier to getting into work. Losing 200 nursery places will have a devastating effect on women and their families in the city.

Nursery nurses in Edinburgh fought a long, hard strike a few years back for decent pay and conditions, and this is how they are repaid, by making their jobs redundant, moving them on to posts they don’t want and losing their skills in the process.

I've recently lodged the following questions in the Scottish Parliament

S2W-32239 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 6 March 2007) : To ask the Scottish Executive whether there are any plans to reduce the number of full-time nursery places available for three and four-year-olds in south and south-east Edinburgh.

Due for Answer 20 March 2007

S2W-32238 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 6 March 2007) : To ask the Scottish Executive what the public sector provision is of full-time and part-time nursery places for three and four-year-olds in south Edinburgh.

Due for Answer 20 March 2007

SSP Conference

2007-03-05T16:34:00.000Z

Our Conference on saturday was great, here's my speech and some pictures of me with SSP List and Council candidates.

SSP Conference Speech – Feb 2007
Introduction
Thank you.
I’m Colin Fox, the national convenor of the SSP. I thought I’d better introduce myself to you, because according to last nights BBC ‘Politics Scotland ‘show nobody knows me. So consider yourself party of an elite club if you do.
I don’t know if this is often said about the Langside Halls, but we are in a far better place than we were 6months ago, at last conference.

Welcome and thank SSP members across Scotland for continuing support and for responding in the best way possible to the terrible events of last year, by rolling up your sleeves, rebuilding SSP branches and preparing candidates for the forthcoming Holyrood and Council elections.

I especially want to welcome the dozens of new SSP members for whom this is their first conference, you are playing a very important part in replenishing this great party of ours.

And I want to congratulate you all for delivering 250,000 newspapers door to door around Scotland these past 6 weeks and proving that not only that the is SSP back in business but its in a street near you.
250,000 newspapers [John Knox anecdote.’Colin, got one of your newspapers through door last night, your people -Arapaho’ It was me.!’]

On another occasion in Gilmerton a guy comes out just as I’m pulling my hand out of his letterbox.
Says I to break the awkwardness realising he recognises me
‘Do you think Tony Blair delivers his own leaflets?’
‘Listen son if Tony Blair came into this scheme he wouldnae be able to deliver one leaflet – B***#**#!”

Proud to be here and to stand alongside each and everyone of you in, still, the biggest and best and most successful socialist party in Scotland.

1 SCOTLAND NEEDS THE SSP
Philosophers have remarked - If God didn’t exist then it would be necessary to invent one. So too the SSP.
[SSP’s most successful recruitment poster shows ‘Thatcher becoming Blair’. We have ordered one final rerun from the printers before we get it amended to show Gordon Browns ugly mug]
Tony Blair hovers over the Holyrood election campaign. Poor Jack McConnell is gutted. He would have given his eye teeth to be fighting this election after Blair had gone.
Poor wee Jack. He knows Blair is a liability for Labour and he knows he’s in for ‘a doing’ because of that.
Ironic that the man who led Labour to three historic election victories has become such a liability.
Mind you in the ‘half finished’ Scottish Parliament Blair dominates the place all the time. He is its sugar daddy - the Daddy Warbucks to wee Jack’s orphan ‘Annie’!
He hands out the pocket money. We aren’t allowed to hold all our own money that would be a full Parliament.

Blairism pre-dominant these last 4 years. I’ve never been one for name calling in politics. Tony Benn insists politics should be about policies and not personalities. I agree. But you could say Jack McConnell is an ape.
I am not saying he has a hairy back you understand!!!!!
It’s just that he loyally apes everything Blair does.
Blair supports Trident Two, so wee Jack McConnell says ‘I support Trident Too’!
Blair supports 20 more nuclear power stations, Jack says ‘I support 20 more nuclear power stations too’.
Blair supports the illegal and barbarous war in Iraq, Jack McConnell supports it too.
Blair supports rendition flights, so does Jack. Blair supports dawn raids, so does Jack.
Blair builds private hospitals, schools, prisons etc, so does Jack
Blair says we cannot afford pensions, Jack McConnell says likewise.
Blair widens the grotesque inequalities and so does Jack McConnell.

If ever you needed reminding just why Scotland needs the SSP today take a look at Tony Blair - the greatest recruiting sergeant the SSP has.

Scotland needs the SSP. Look at the stories in this weeks papers.
-On Tuesday Halifax Bank of Scotland announced record profits £5.5bn.
This is the bank remember who swindled 40,000 Fairpak customers out of £40m before Christmas.
Who else demands they reimburse the Fairpak customers like Suzy Hall?
-And on Thursday the Royal Bank of Scotland disclosed record profits of £9.7bn. They declared a 25% dividend to shareholders. And who do you think their shareholders are?
The single parents who ran out and bought up the £5shares out of their benefits and who stand to collect a nice wee nest egg?
Or the pensioners who used the winter fuel allowance last year instead of keeping warm rushed down to their nearest friendly stockbroker and said ‘buy, buy, buy’.
Or maybe the disabled and chronically ill who were sick of living below the poverty line and skipped paying £6.75 for their prescription medicines and walked into the nearest Royal Bank branch and declared ‘gie’s ma share!’
Or perhaps the Scottish children who sit bottom of the 21 countries in the Unicef Report Card 7 ‘Child poverty in perspective’?
Or even the 900,000 Scots according to yesterdays Child PovertyAction Group report living below the poverty line – 240,000 of how are children.
Will any of these groups of needy people get the RBOS dividends?

No, that’s just not going to happen, not one chance in 9.7billion!
The dividends go where they always go, to those who already have the money. Our banks are owned by the wealthiest 1% of society.

But on the same day the Banks declared record profits ‘the banks’ manager’ Gordon Brown told 1million NHS staff and their families to expect a pay cut next year. Pay rises of 1 or 2% when inflation and the RPI is more than double that - a cut in living standards for workers.

And what will the unions do? Surely not just loyally pay millions to Labour in dues as usual?
I appeal to trades union members everywhere but particularly in the public sector where the vast majority now are to be found, think seriously here. ‘Why vote Labour when attack your living standards? Why continue to pay the fist that slaps you?’
New Labour does not deserve the support of trade’s unionists.

No wonder a growing number of unions are disaffiliating from Labour.

If ever the people of Scotland needed reminding of the need to maximise the vote for the SSP on May 7th consider New Labours record and expect more of the same.

BLAIRS Legacy –IRAQ. And his parting gift? –TRIDENT
He is a warmonger who shows no sign of remorse and spends £100bn on nuclear weapons of mass destruction designed to terrorise the world.
TONY BLAIR, THE WORST PRIME MINISTER LABOUR HAS EVER HAD.
And whilst we are on Trident please don’t let anyone ever tell me
‘WE DON’T HAVE THE MONEY
for free school meals,
for free prescriptions,
for free public transport,
for a decent pension for our senior citizens,
for hospitals and schools
- Not when there is £100bn available for Trident!

New Labour will continue their assault on working people!
Hands up who remembers Gordon Brown opposing the strategy of Blair in Iraq, on Trident, on privatisation.
Hands up who thinks that our public services are safe in the hands of Gordon Brown or Jack McConnell- built more private hospitals, schools, prisons, than Thatcher.

2 WHAT’s SO SPECIAL ABOUT THE SSP?
There is a line in the film ‘The Colour of Money’ I like, where the John Travolta/Bill Clinton character is told ‘any idiot can burn down a barn’.
In other words it’s easy to criticise New Labours record as they defend the class interests of the rich and powerful. What has the SSP to offer?
First of all we fill the huge vacuum on the left of Scottish politics;
Labour has abandoned any commitment to socialism, to public ownership and public services or redistribution of wealth.
They have abandoned the peace movement to side with the world’s warmongers and militarists.

SSP was founded because millions of people were disenfranchised, having nothing in common with New Labour, had no one to vote for, no one to whom they could turn and put their hopes in for the future.
That constituency of people remains and is very very sizeable indeed.

Let’s remind ourselves of the SSP’s record
Founded in 1998, we united the left. In 2003 we MSP’s were
-elected to challenge New Labour and represent the anti war movement and we did.
-elected to represent the interests of working people, trades unionists and the poor and we did
No one has been on more picket lines and protest marches and union lobbies and supported union cause than us.
-elected as workers representatives taking only workers wages – and we have done.

3 THE NATURE OF OUR CAMPAIGN IN 2007
Alan has outlined the Manifesto already and so let me say only this - an independent socialist Scotland remains our goal, but day to day improvements for working people is the measure of our short term achievements. And we can point to many many achievements already.
Perhaps most noticeably yesterday when Jack McConnell announced 80,000 more children are to get free school meals.
Let’s be absolutely clear this concession would not have been made without the pressure brought to bear by our Bill.
So too the breakfast clubs, the water fountains and the free fruit, all concessions to the arguments we have championed.

The same can be said about the prescription charges Bill.
We won the arguments and forced concessions even though the Bill itself was voted down.

Council tax. On Feb 1st 2006 when the SSP Bill to replace the Council tax with our income based alternative was finally put to the vote in the Parliament the SNP and the Lib Dems, despite both being in favour of replacing the tax , voted against it. Why?
Because although it was possible to have their amendments discussed later they voted against. They did not want to see the SSP Bill succeed. The fact is neither party in 8 years have presented a Bill of their own.
Remember February Fools Day 2006 – the day both the Libs and SNP made fools of themselves and voted to keep the Council tax when it was possible to defeat it. It shows when push comes to shove they cannot be relied upon to defend the interests of working people.

We need to raise funds to fight the election fully; to raise deposits , pay for 3.5million leaflets, for 2 PPB’s, lamposters, hire open top buses, leaflets in Polish and Urdu for example.
I know candidates will speak at hundreds of hustings arranged across the country as well as the hundreds of SSP public meetings.
We will also fight like fury to get our fair share of media exposure and then watch as we are blanked as usual.

What we fight for in these elections - An Independent Socialist Scotland.
We are passionate about independence for Scotland and we see it as a democratic right to decide our own destiny. A right which will see the vast majority of Scots better off. It is not for us a dry academic lecture about the 300 year old act of union rather part of the national liberation struggle.
The polls may tell us its level pegging for independence and the status quo but behind the figures lies a demographic time bomb because support for Independence is far far higher among the young and among the working class…
It seems to me the SNP presents lukewarm support for independence, probably trying not to scare away disillusioned Labour voters. Well we are passionate about Independence and do not ever play it down.

And I believe the Cameron effect will galvanise the debate. Ask yourself what change to the dynamic occurs if in two yeas time Cameron is elected PM at Westminster and Holyrood proves to be incapable of defending our interests from his onslaught…

*Free Public Transport policy is ‘bold and imaginative’ addition to our key list of policies. It stands head and shoulders above any other suggested solution to climate change dangers.
It would mean that people across Scotland would have a real alternative, a much more attractive alternative to using their car.
It’s the same approach we had in Edinburgh with the congestion charges referendum, we said give people a better alternative to the car and they’ll take it. A collective solution to a collective problem. And to those who say £500m a year to provide free public transport for everyone across Scotland is too much, Sir Nicholas Stern has already answered you
‘The cost of doing nothing is the dearest of all’
TODAY I ISSUE A CHALLENGE TO ALL PARTIES IN THE ELECTIONS –COME AND DEBATE THE ISSUE OF CLIMATE CHANGE WITH THE SSP AND I CHALLENGE EACH OF THEM TO PRODUCE A MORE LIKELY AND PROGRESSIVE SOLUTION TO THIS MOST FUNDAMENTAL OF QUESTIONS.
Our policy defines the SSP’s approach perfectly; we examine the problem we face with climate change and we recognise the need for both a collective and progressive solution.

4 WHAT SUPPORT DO WE HAVE?
The polls, are they right or are they wrong? Both.
On the one hand they register a solid base of support for the SSP. And the one on Monday in the Scotsman predicted we’d get 2 MSP’s returned.
On the other hand they habitually underestimate the support for the SSP because we are active below their radar lines; their methods of polling do not register our base; telephone and conducted in street and not schemes.
I get people coming up to me all the time to say what sense of relief they have that the SSP has survived the monstrous attack made on us last year and grateful that they will get the chance to vote SSP again and again.

In particular I want to mention 4 people who have spoken to me recently and offered warm support for the SSP’s continued growth;
* Award winning film director Ken Loach – [see his greetings separately]
*And screenwriter Paul Laverty – [ditto]
*Charlie Reid of the Proclaimers, happy to let you know he is SSP voter.
*Suzy Hall Fairpak campaigner now a regular attender at SSP branch meetings in Edinburgh South.
*Alex Brownridge, CWU leader in Edinburgh victimised by Royal Mail happy to be known as SSP supporter.

There is not the slightest doubt in my mind that the Political ‘centre of gravity’ of the Scottish people is far to the left of both New Labour and the SNP. Our job is to mobilise and marshal that opinion.

What do the latest polls tell us? Latest polls have SSP on 2-4% each has a margin of error – 2%. Possible the SSP could have between 2-8 MSP’s

5 MAY 4th WILL FOLLOW MAY 3rd AS USUAL
SSP has achieved miracles and survived nightmares…..
I have no doubt that the SSP will continue to be instrumental in building a united left movement, a mass party for socialism, mass party of the left in Scotland. I will be part of that movement like many hundreds of SSP activists.
BRING ON THE ELECTION, I LOOK FORWARD TO IT, TAKING OUR MESSAGE TO THE PEOPLE WITH PRIDE AND CONFIDENCE - The ideas of socialism are more relevant today than they have ever been’. ENDS

Ken Loach Conference Greetings

2007-03-05T15:22:00.001Z

After recent troubles it is good to see that the Scottish Socialist Party is back and in good heart."The need for a party of the left is as great now as when the SSP was formed."The demands of big business and the giant corporations dominate our politics; whether it is the war for oil and economic and political control, or the remorseless privatising of our public services."As I write it is the probation service which is being opened to the private profiteers."Good luck to the conference. I am sure it will value thoughtful analysis and comradely discussion above windy rhetoric!"And I’m sure it will provide the leadership that the left so desperately needs.”
Yours in solidarity,
Ken Loach

Paul Laverty, Conference greetings

2007-03-05T15:03:00.000Z

There is something half tragic half comic about celebrities, either the fat fish or "mini me" half knowns with delusions of grandeur, being asked to support one party or another as if their opinion was any more important thanany other citizen. But since daily life is full of nonsense and contradictions here goes why I hope with all my heart New Labour gets stuffed, and the SSP, (despite infuriating breach on the left once again) gets healthy support in the forthcoming elections. Just two short reasons amongst hundreds; 1) a little girl in a lilac dress. She was pulled from the rubble by her Grandfather on one of the first days of coalition bombing of Baghdad. Her left leg dangled by a single sinew, one of the hundreds of thousands victims without a name. Not one apology; more lies upon lies, and now this morally bankrupt labour party can only muster 12 members who were prepared to support an open debate in Parliament on how this tragedy unfolded. Shame on them. Reason 2. At same time as UNICEF report our children have worst quality of life in western world, new labour now plan to spend billions on new range of nuclear weapons. Both of the above are symptomatic of a political culture where ordinary people are expendable. Frederick Douglass, one time black slave who escaped to found a campaigning newspaper the Northern Star wrote "Power concedes nothing without demand. Itnever did and it never will." More than ever we still need a strong party on the left prepared to challenge the political elite who try to spin tragedy into success. Good luck to the SSP and keep plugging away like Frederick Douglass. Amen.
Paul Laverty.
2nd March 07.

SSP Manifesto launch

2007-03-03T15:40:00.000Z

I've spent today in the Langside halls, in Glasgow, with delegates from across Scotland putting the finishing touches to our manifesto.

I'll post more details in the next few days, but we've had a very successful day.

Polish Surgery

2007-02-28T17:57:00.000Z

I’ve met many of Edinburgh’s 7,000 Polish workers in recent months, including bus drivers, factory workers and carers. Many believe they are not being afforded the same rights as everyone else. Following representations from various quarters in this important community I have agreed to hold this surgery. Health carer Grzegorz Rybak (pictured with me above) has agreed to help me and to provide translation services.

There are around 7,000 Polish workers in the Lothians and I believe there is evidence some unscrupulous employers are exploiting their lack of knowledge of the minimum wage legislation for example to short change them.

I also understand there are particular problems with housing and with council tax. One bus driver I spoke for example told me five of his friends have to share a tiny flat in Bathgate.

The surgery will take place on March 8th at 19.30 in the CWU offices, 15 Brunswick Street, Edinburgh

Czwartek, 8 marca, godz. 19:30, klub CWU, Brunswick

Street 15 (przezcznica Leith Walk) Edynburg

Polish leaflet

2007-02-28T17:53:00.000Z

Theft!

2007-02-27T13:13:00.000Z

I walked in to the Clerk Street Office on Monday morning and thought I may have needed to report a theft! As you can see from the picture our bulletins seem to have disappeared over night, then I realised that hard working SSP members from across the Lothians had been delivering them.

Future of our Post Offices rally

2007-02-27T12:48:00.000Z

Last Wednesday I attended a rally organised by the Communication Workers Union, and other, on the future of our Post Offices. My remarks are printed below

Can I first of all say that I am delighted to be here with you as the national Convenor of the Scottish Socialist Party as the SSP shares common cause with you.
Let me at the outset put my cards on the table, as I believe in being honest. I am in favour of modernising the Post Office, I am in favour of real changes in the post office network, improving the service to the public and getting value for money for the taxpayer.
And it is because I see the post office as a vital public service catering to the needs of both the population and the government , I want to see it improved and extended.
But the governments proposals to close 2,500 local post offices and lay off 2,000 workers are not going to improve the service to the public nor provide value for money for the taxpayer.
As a socialist I am more motivated by providing for peoples needs than making vast profits.
I shiver when I hear the government say it wants to make the post office network more ‘profitable’. The post office is not a bank, no post office in the work makes money. It is there to provide a service to the public and paid for out of our taxes.
1,500 post offices have closed since 1980’s and we all know this has not meant a better service . It has resticted access rather than widened it.
The government points out that there are 4million fewer customers using the post office each week than 2 years ago. Why is that I wonder?
Could it have anything to do with the thousands of branches that have been closed? Could it be that having privatised the collection of the tv licence to Capita that customers have gone ?
And by the way let me tell you that Capita is a company set up to take advantage and no small profit from the PFI contracts from government. That’s right is has taken advantage of the massive increase in privatization of our public services by this government and made a fortune. And so grateful have they been to the government that the owner of Capita donated £1m to Labour last year and received a knighthood in return. Profitability? I call that corruption!

The Driving Licence Agency has taken its work away from the post office and you now get giros’ and pensions paid directly into bank accounts.
These are the reasons there are 4m fewer customers at the post office counters.
And by the way the 2-3million people denied a bank account are not the only ones who have reason to resent the banks. Do you know that the big clearing banks intend to charge anyone who pays in less than £20,000 per annum a £10 per month charge to operate their current account.
The post office is not a bank and nor should it seek to emulate them.

My vision of the post office is for a shop window for government services, one which is locally accessible and comprehensive and free to everyone to use.

I will not support any cuts in vital local services. I will not support the incessant privatization of public services. As a socialist the needs of ordainary people will always come before the profits of the few.

And can I finally thank the Communications Workers Union for organizing today’s successful lobby and assure you that I have a very good and continuing close working relationship with the CWU Scotland NO2 branch based here in Edinburgh, which has been at the forefront of every progressive cause both within and outwith the postal service for a generation or more and I know that will be fully appreciated back in London.

Prescription charges swindle

2007-02-27T12:41:00.000Z

Last Thursday I asked a question in the Scottish Parliament regarding the Executive review of Prescription Charges. Here's my questions, the answer I got and a subsequent article in the Evening News.

My initial question was
To ask the Scottish Executive what the latest position is on the review of NHS prescription charges for patients with long term conditions and on what date it expects to present the outcome of the review.

HIS REPLY – Soon!

Supplementary
Frankly Minister that answer is a disgrace
4 years ago the Executive promised to review prescription charges accepting the current exemption arrangements were not fit for purpose.

13months ago you asked Parliament to reject my Bill to abolish charges promising instead to bring forward proposals yourselves to exempt many long term conditions.

On Nov 10th in a Parliamentary answer to me the Minister promised to publish proposals ‘by the end of the year.’

And yet here we are barely a month away from the dissolution of Parliament and still you have produced nothing – not a word, not one exemption, nothing!

Isn’t it the case that all medical opinion over the last 40 years warned you, just as I did, against trying to ‘play god’ by choosing which debilitating conditions were more deserving than others.

And isn’t this Executive attempting to play fast and loose with this Parliament, run down the clock and renege on every single promise made to patients on the issue over the past 4 years.

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=296102007

Lothians Voice bulletins

2007-02-22T13:32:00.000Z

We've now delivered 40,000 of our original 50,000 bulletins across the Lothians. Housholds across the Lothians have received our paper from Roslyn, Penicuik & Rosewell through, Inch, Burdiehouse, Stenhouse, Bingham, Musselburgh, Abbeyhill, Dumbiedykes and Oxgangs to Broxburn and Bathgate

Craig murray - Rector of Dundee University

2007-02-20T08:50:00.000Z

S2M-5605 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Congratulations to Craig Murray, New Rector of the University of Dundee— That the Parliament congratulates the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, on his election as the new rector of the University of Dundee; believes that Craig Murray’s election further shames Tony Blair, the British government and, in particular, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and that Craig was dismissed for refusing to cover up British complicity in horrific human rights abuses carried out by the Karimov regime in Tashkent; congratulates the students and staff at Dundee on having elected a man who has been at the forefront of exposing Britain’s double standards on the so-called “war on terror” and “war on drugs”, and wishes Craig Murray every success in his new post.

Supported by: Donald Gorrie

Lodged on 19 February 2007; current

FOX CHALLENGES LOTHIAN MPs TO ‘COME CLEAN’ ON TRIDENT

2007-02-19T10:32:00.000Z

Scottish Socialist Party National Convener Colin Fox today challenged all the Lothian’s MP’s to ‘come clean on Trident’ and explain whether they will vote to replace the Trident nuclear weapons system in the crucial Commons vote due next month.

The Lothian’s MSP pointed to newspaper adverts taken out by Greenpeace which identified 27 Scottish Labour MP’s at Westminster who have yet to reveal where they stand on the issue. Fox believes it is time the public knew which way these elected representatives intend to vote
‘I agree with Greenpeace, whose ship Arctic Sunrise I visited this week in Leith docks, who say it is time the 4 Lothian’s Labour MP’s – Nigel Griffiths, Alastair Darling, Davie Hamilton and Anne Moffat came clean and told us where they stand on this most important of issues.
Do they stand with those of us who believe these weapons to be immoral, illegal and a terrible waste of money - £100bn by the last estimate? Or do they stand with Tony Blair and his government of warmongers?
Seventy five per cent of Scots are against Trident and against replacing the current ‘nuclear weapons of mass destruction’ based on the Clyde with even more deadly versions.
I too challenge Lothian’s Labour members, many of whom I know used to carry CND membership cards, to join me on Princes Street today [Saturday] and to explain to the public where they stand on Trident. Are they going to vote with the Tories, defy the wishes of the Scottish electorate and spend billions on these evil weapons? Or are they going to defy the government and carry out the wishes of their electorate?’

UK Child Poverty Shame

2007-02-15T14:23:00.000Z

S2M-5592 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Unicef Report on Child Poverty Shames UK— That the Parliament is ashamed to find that, according to UNICEF’s Report Card 7, Child Poverty in Perspective: An Overview of Child Well-being in Rich Countries,the United Kingdom has come last in a comparative examination of children’s well-being in 21 countries; believes that this report on child poverty, deprivation, quality of life, safety, health and behaviour is a terrible indictment of the failure of government policy in Britain; notes that, while other countries have made real progress on many fronts, the British government has fared particularly badly; notes that the countries of Scandinavia have fared far better and generally occupy the top places in the study because of their policies to redistribute wealth and the higher political priority given by their governments to children’s needs, and concludes that, if Britain is to be rid of this particular badge of shame, then improving children’s well-being in Britain must now become an urgent priority.

Lodged on 14 February 2007; current

Arctic Sunrise

2007-02-15T11:31:00.000Z

Last week I visited the Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise when it was docked at Leith.

Unite the Clubs March

2007-02-14T23:07:00.000Z

Today I had the pleasure of joining 2500 young footballers, their coaches and parents in a march through Edinburgh demanding new and improved facilities at football pitches across the city.
The march was excellent, colourful, noisy, good humoured and even the weather was good.
When we arrived at the Parliament I had the opportunity to speak to Craig and Charlie of the Proclaimers and they told me how important this issue is for them.

It is an important issue for me as well, on the one hand we constantly talk of the need to promote exercise amongst youngsters yet we ask them to change in dank, horrible facilities when they play football. We should be doing everything in our power to ensure children get every opportunity to play sport – providing them with top class playing pitches, equipment and all weather training facilities.
As a nation, us Scots, dream of one day lifting the World Cup (I remember Argentina ‘78!) and it has to be said that if we don’t get it right at grassroots level then it will always remain a dream.
The coaches and parents who give up their free time to run the thousands of clubs across Scotland do a great job and they should be applauded, but their job isn’t made easier with constantly waterlogged pitches leading to fixture congestion later in the season meaning players are expected to play two or even three games in a week.

Finally I have to say well done to Les Trotter and the others on the Unite The Clubs Forum who worked so hard to organise such a successful event today. Let’s hope the pressure has worked, and I’ll continue to support the campaign until every pitch has been upgraded.

Justice for Farepak customers

2007-02-13T13:40:00.000Z

S2W-31625 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 2 February 2007) : To ask the Scottish Executive whether the Accountant in Bankruptcy has the power to consider what remedies are available to Farepak customers in Scotland in receipt of benefits under the Social Security Administration Act 1992 with regard to recovering monies lost and, if so, what action the Accountant in Bankruptcy has taken in this respect.

Due for Answer 16 February 2007

The financial benefits of not replacing Trident?

2007-02-13T13:39:00.000Z

S2W-31435 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 26 January 2007) : To ask the Scottish Executive how devolved services may benefit from any monies which become available should a decision be taken not to replace Trident nuclear weapons.

Answered by Tom McCabe:
The responsibilities of the Ministry of Defence are reserved to the UK Government and so no Barnett consequentials come to the Scottish Executive as a result of allocating resources to defence.
Only if the UK government reallocated resources to another UK Department, to be spent on functions with a devolved comparator, would any additional resources come to Scotland. It would be misleading to suggest that there would be any automatic additional resources available to the Scottish Executive.

Scottish Stop the War Conference

2007-02-11T19:50:00.000Z

Yesterday I spoke at the Scottish Stop the War Conference in Glasgow, this is a copy of the speech I delivered. I was also lucky enough to meet Craig Murray (picture below) the former British ambassador to Uzbekistan who was dismissed by the government after he exposed the awful human rights abuses of the central Asian state which is US’s ally on the ‘war on terror.’

Scottish Stop The War Conference – Feb 2007 [10mins]

Introduction
Bring you the fraternal greetings of the Scottish Socialist Party.

I am grateful for the invitation to join you today and believe I can humbly say that no party has done more to oppose the illegal invasion, war and continuing occupation of Iraq by British and American forces than the SSP.
Ours has since day one been and remains a consistent and unrelenting anti imperialist position.

Our Opponents Pronouncements
It is always an interesting starting point to look at the point of view of your opponents in order to measure up our achievements.

Last November I was involved in a prolonged piece of correspondence in the letters pages of the Scottish Sunday newspapers with Scots Labour loyalists Brian Wilson, the Former Cabinet Minster, David Cairns MP, Des Browne then the newly installed defence secretary and his departmental colleague Adam Ingram MP.

They had pronounced in the wake of defiance of MOD policy by Military Chiefs of Staff, and escalating carnage in Iraq that
‘We [Britain and US] are bringing peace, stability and democracy to Iraq.’

You could have fooled me. Not much evidence of all three on ground in Iraq.
Peace? Where. Stability? Where. Democracy? Where.

Attacking those of us here who have called for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of British troops from Iraq, Wilson accused us of having
‘little regard for people in Iraq whose lives depend on the presence of British troops.’
Troops whom Wilson claimed without obvious blushing, had ‘arrived three years ago to liberate the people of Basra’!
I mean you could not make this up.
We are the ones who apparently have little regard for innocent Iraqis and they are the ones who invaded and murdered in order to liberate them.

And all this whilst even Wilson was forced to concede that
‘Today Basra is largely run by religious parties and their militias who have infiltrated the police and are backed by Iranian insurgents to run the proliferating political assassination squads and criminal gangs.’
He goes on
‘The evidence of improvements in the provision of daily necessities like foodstuffs, water supplies, adequate housing and electricity is not easily seen.’[ Nov 2006]
And remember this was supposed to be the ‘safe south’ around Basra.
What on earth would he be forced to say about Baghdad?

All of which hugely underplays the carnage and mayhem that is part and parcel of daily life in the greater Baghdad area where most Iraqi’s live.

It is worth reminding ourselves
What the Invasion of Iraq was For?
I] Because Saddam Husseins regime was responsible for 9/11
Ii] Because S H regime was harbouring and backing Bin Laden
Iii] Because S H had WMDS
Iv] Because S H was a threat to his neighbours, UK , USA
V] Regime Change- yes but not job of Bush and Blair

All complete and calculated lies.

SSP took the view then and maintains that the illegal invasion, war and continuing occupation of a sovereign nation was for US imperial interests in the 21st century.
Those interests pursued to ensure US economic and political power underpinned by worlds only military superpower as a warning to the world.

Oil
And of course underpinning all their interests, their interest in oil and its continuous supply to the western world.

21st century US economic imperialism demands taking more out that puts in.
Seizure Of IRAQI OIL Riches
US Plans to privatise Iraqi oil fields and are well under way.
Iraqi Parliement will vote through Bills to that end in April. Paul Bremmer the US envoy has put US companies in place to receive that oil.

Oil Privatisation Opposed
But the plans are being opposed by the Iraqi unions.
The SSP is in contact with these Iraqi unions /political groups, indeed we have continued our links with the Iraqi Union Solidarity Campaign’ and have material here this weekend if people want to take that away with them.

All Events Overshadowed by the
Bloodthirsty Communal and Sectarian Civil War
Or as Labour loyalists like to refer to it as ‘Peace, stability and Democracy’.

EXTENT OF THE CARNAGE HERE
UN estimates the killing running at 100 per day. This the equivalent of 36,500 per year of ten times 9/11!
Yet To the demand we here have made for the immediate unconditional withdrawal of UK Troops it is claimed ‘there would be a bloody civil war’!
No wonder we are angry.

How much blame for this massacring bloodlust is US/UK occupation responsible?
The current situation is out of control;
Iraqi government is a puppet of US, utterly ineffective and moreover only there because backed by the US military. Do not have the support of the Iraqi population.

So the insurgency –so called – feeds off the hostility of the wider population to the Iraqi government.
The insurgency of the former Ba’athists and Sunni militias on the one hand faces the Iranian backed Shia rebels of the Maghdi Army on the other.

Foreign military occupation is therefore a catalyst for the violence and not a force for unification or pacification or liberation.

Troop Withdrawal
The situation on the ground according to US military command is desperate.
Even in the safe south of Basra the British military command has not been able to venture out of its Basra Palace command HQ in 6 months other than on military protected sorties back and forth to the UK.
They are well aware that the so called battle for ‘hearts and minds’ has been lost.

It is in these dire circumstances, which led to the utterly unprecedented interviews in the Daily Mail last November by the General Command, effectively to go public and countermand MOD policy in Iraq and demand an immediate plan for a phased withdrawal must be seen.

So what has happened to the phased withdrawal?
Last November MOD forced to promise the number of UK troops in Iraq, then at 7200, would be reduced to 3500 by February.
However like their US allies have actually sent more. Bush announced that 30,000 more US troops be sent.
In other words they are headlong into a disastrous and ‘catastrophic failure of policy’ and cannot easily get out of it.
To withdraw would be to lose huge credibility and admit defeat and to stay is to make that defeat all the more certain and all the more humiliating.
CLASH – ‘’SHOULD I STAY OR SHOULD I GO NOW?
If I stay there could be trouble, if I stay it will be double.’’

Tony Blair’s Legacy
Has the hands of 130 UK troops on his hands and 3,000 US troops and 660,000 innocent Iraqis. Iraq will haunt him the rest of his life.
His political legacy Iraq: lies, death, and a catastrophic failure of policy.
The worst leader Labour has ever had…paradox as first to lead them to three election victories.

Trident TWO his parting gift.

The longer UK forces remain in Iraq the greater their defeat, the greater the bloodshed and the greater the ignominious retreat forced on American imperialism. In that sense another Vietnam on the way.

FOX ADDRESSES SCOTTISH STOP THE WAR CONFERENCE

2007-02-11T19:47:00.000Z

Scottish Socialist Party National Convenor Colin Fox will be one of the keynote speakers at the Scottish Stop The War Conference in Glasgow this weekend.
The Lothians MSP will tell his audience in Glasgow University that it is now time for Britain to end it’s ‘catastrophic‘involvement in the Iraq war.

He will tell the conference
‘The carnage and civil war in Iraq shows no sign of ending. Indeed its brutality worsens every day. The misery which ordinary Iraqis face involves power cuts and shortage and a constant threat of violence and death. Figures from the United Nations show that 100 Iraqis are murdered every day. These numbers being killed are equivalent to the 9/11 outrage happening every three months.
It is time Tony Blair accepted the fact that he is, together with George Bush, responsible for this catastrophe. His decision to send British troops to fight in an illegal war represents a catastrophic failure of policy which is having unimaginably tragic consequences for everyone.
The presence of British and American troops is unquestionably exacerbating a brutal civil war. The Iraqi insurgency is driven by the fact that there are foreign armies occupying their country. And the Iraqi government which the Americans installed does not enjoy the support of the people.
It is my view that this situation can only be resolved in the long term by the immediate withdrawal of British and American troops. Their presence is resented by Iraqi’s and plays no valuable purpose.’

Lothians Voice

2007-02-09T20:51:00.000Z

The Lothians Voice bulletins are flying out now, this is me in the Inch. The other picture is of the ever diminishing pile of leaflets.

End Bridge Tolls

2007-02-09T20:47:00.000Z

A motion to abolish tolls on the Forth & Tay bridges was narrowly defeated in the Parliament yesterday. This is my contribution to the debate.

Forth And Tay Road Bridge Tolls
[Debate Feb 2007 on Motion that the Parliament believes tolls on both Forth and Tay bridge shows be scrapped.]

The Scottish Socialist Party is opposed to tolls on our bridges and motorways and trunk roads etc and therefore support the motion in front of us today for 3 key reasons.

First – To my mind it is the governments responsibility to build, maintain, and operate our roads, motorways, bridges etc in the public sector. These are part of the infrastructure of our country of our economy and should therefore be owned and controlled by government on behalf of us all.
Tolls are a regressive form of taxation which hit poor people hardest.

Second – The situation where tolls have been abolished on all other bridges in Scotland –like recently the Skye and Erskine - or were never levied in the first place means there is an obvious unfairness applying to the Forth and Tay only.

The Executive told us that the tolls on both Skye and Erskine were abolished because they clearly had a poor effect on the local economies in those areas. Skye tourism and economy in general and Erskine particularly industry and commerce.
I supported their case.
But I think the same case applies to Fife and Tayside most especially obvious in the wake of the latest disgraceful decisions by Solectron in Dunfermline- the latest in a long line of Fife closures – and NCR in Dundee.
It seems to me what is good for the goose is good for the gander and the tolls are an economic disincentive to the Fife and Tayside economies .

The third issue to focus on is the need to address climate change , CO2 emissions, pollution and congestion

Toll collection causes traffic snarl ups and congestion on the bridge and adds to the deterioration of the bridge. I have seen as I’m sure we all have the tail backs up to Kirkliston and along the A8000 for miles and also the tailbacks into Dundee City centre which is caused by the tolls themselves.

I respect the work of Transform Scotland very much but I feel they have gone over the top in their briefing for this debate in suggesting that those opposed to tolls ‘undermine the nations attempts to reduce climate change emissions.’
Furthermore by their logic we would still have a £7 toll on the Skye bridge and tolls in Erskine.

I favour far more effective ways to tackle climate change.
SSP support free public transport provision as the way to address climate change, pollution , congestion etc.
The Scottish Executive have introduced free bus travel for seniors and free ferry travel for youngsters etc. I welcome those steps in the right direction.
As members may know the Belgian town of Hasselt has introduced a completely free public transport system and saw passenger numbers leap 870% and have dramatically reduced emissions, pollutionand congestion as a result. That’s the way to do ii.

Transform Scotland and the Greens need to think more about persuading people to do the right thing not just punishment and penalty.

They say abolishing tolls would worsen congestion – b y acting as an incentive to use the car. Forth Estuary Transport Authority believe toll abolition could increase traffic volumes by 15% southbound and 20% northbound. This is an important issue to consider. They say
‘Action should be taken to remove traffic flows from the Forth Road Bridge’ yes, but not by increasing the tolls.
More charges with no alternatives provided represents the Luddite and backward approach.
This is precisely the approach so overwhelmingly rejected in Edinburgh’s congestion charging scheme.

Honesty needed in this debate
Remember the Dunfermline West by election last year and the Liberals voting two ways at once on the matter – calling for tolls to be scrapped in the by-election , voting via there rep on the Bridge management body for tolls to increase. And in this debate today they have still not made up their minds calling for ‘abolition to be considered’ in future months.

SSP will support the motion at 5pm.

My first Podcast

2007-02-08T20:55:00.000Z

I recently recorded my first ever podcast, for the Sunday Times. They asked me to discuss the 300th anniversary of the act of union and the case for an independant socialist Scotland.

You can read my "script" below and view the podcast via the Sunday Times website in the coming weeks.

Hi , I’m Colin Fox. I’m the National Convenor of the Scottish Socialist Party and I’ve been asked to speak to you on the 300th anniversary of the act of union, about the case for an Independent Socialist Scotland

ITS ‘AYE BEEN’
There is a saying in the Scottish Borders -‘its aye been’.
It’s a phrase signifying a certain resignation, a sense that things always stay the same and it’s quite useless trying to change them.
It seems ironic then sitting in the Scottish Parliament because there were those who said throughout the 80’s and 90’s we would never have our own Scottish Parliament and never be able to make our own decisions.

This anniversary of the union offers us a chance to look at the present day political arrangements and consider how we can improve them.

DEMOCRACY and SOCIAL PROGRESS
The case for independence it seems to me is based on two fundamental pillars –democracy and social progress.
I believe Scotland as a sovereign nation is entitled to exercise democratic control of our economy and I am confident we are quite capable of running our own affairs. Dozens of countries big and small have gained their independence in my lifetime.
This period of reflection on the union then for me is not an abstract historic or dry constitutional debate. I believe Scotland would be much better off economically, culturally and politically if we were making our own decisions.

And you know I sense a very different kind of debate today on Independence from that which first raged around me as a 15 year old schoolboy in Motherwell in the late 70’s when ‘Its oor oil’ was unveiled as the slogan of the time.
Defenders of the union argued then that Scotland was too poor to stand on our own two feet. Of course the discovery of North Sea oil changed all that. And nowadays the argument has shifted considerably. Even unionists now accept that Scotland is a rich country. They now concede that we could go it alone but we are better off under the union, allegedly subsidized by England and safe from instability and violent threats inherent in the modern world.

A DEMOCRATIC SCOTLAND - SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC
I scoffed at those who told me when I returned after 8 years in London that ‘Scotland is essentially a socialist country’, but I would concede that our political centre of gravity is certainly social democratic by instinct, left of centre politically. The evidence of this all around us. Today Scottish public opinion is well to the left of New Labour.
Opposition to Trident is stark, privatization is despised, there is much greater support for public ownership here, a stronger sense of community, greater support for redistribution of wealth, we are much less monarchist and more internationalist in outlook , than the dominant South East of England.
Furthermore I have no doubt whatsoever that an Independent Scotland would not have sent our troops to IRAQ.
Neither do I believe Scots would spend billions promoting British and American imperial aspirations. Not when the option to spend the money on our much needed social services was posed instead.
Nor would Scots spend up to £75billions on more nuclear weapons of mass destruction, labeling our small country amongst the ‘notorious nuclear nine’: the 9 countries of the world armed with nuclear weapons.
All this is important in defining modern Scotland.

For me Independence is a democratic question. Support for Independence is growing and growing. I see support amongst the young and amongst the working classes as a whole twice as strong as in other groups. And the hideous but very real prospect of a Cameron /Tory victory at the next Westminster elections will I believe accelerate the momentum towards Independence considerably.
Remember how the ‘democratic deficit’ which developed under Thatcher and Major led inexorably to the creation of a Scottish Parliament? Well multiply that force ten fold and see the irresistible force really push aside the immovable object. !!!!!!!

I fully acknowledge that the case for independence must arouse and uplift Scots, enough for them to appreciate fully that it must fought for. Our opponents are not merely the unionist Tories of New Labour but the British ruling classes who see in the United Kingdom a power which they do not want to lose.

I want an Independent Socialist Scotland because I want to see all our revenues used for the best egalitarian interests of the people of Scotland, a planning of production, distribution and exchange based on need not profit.
A Scotland independent of the Bank of England yes but independent of the Royal Bank of Scotland too.

INTERNATIONALIST
Since I started with a phrase from the Borders let me finish with another which I love for all the wrong messages it sends out.
They say ‘A day out of Hawick is a day wasted.’
My vision of an independent socialist Scotland has little truck with such narrow nationalism. I see a Scotland which is outward looking, forward looking, ambitious, welcoming and internationalist, one that is better known for its fun loving, friendly ‘tartan army’ than its warmongering armies decked in tartan.

Pair team up to blast Blair's nuclear policy

2007-02-06T19:31:00.000Z

I recently sent this press release to the Evening News, which was carried today!

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=195952007

Update - I just noticed that my good friend, Ron, had a letter published in the evening News tonight as well
http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/letters.cfm?id=195402007

Former MP and MSP Join Forces in ‘New Nuclear Labour’ Protest
Former MP Ron Brown will join forces with his Scottish Socialist Party colleague Colin Fox MSP in blasting government plans for more nuclear power stations and nuclear missiles at a public meeting in the city Thursday [8th Feb] night.

The MP for Leith from 1979-1992 Ron Brown has long opposed government plans for nuclear power generation. He told us
‘The nuclear option being promoted by Tony Blair and his big business cronies is unacceptable for a number of reasons.
First it leaves behind dangerous waste, toxic contaminants lethal to human life for 1,000 years to come. It is therefore not only the most expensive way to generate electricity it is also far and away the most dangerous. Has Tony Blair forgotten about Three Mile Island and Chernobyl? I find it incredible that on the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, where perhaps as many as 100,000 people may have perished, and Tony Blair proposes to build 20 new nuclear reactors. I would far rather the £50bn set aside for such schemes went into new renewable technologies and projects such as hydro electric, clean coal generation, wind, wave and solar power. Having worked on hydro electric schemes myself I believe Scotland can lead the world again in this technology. As an Amicus trades union member I share the SSP’s non nuclear vision and believe only this party stands up for socialism, trades union values and democracy.’

The government’s plans for nuclear weapons have also come under fire. Lothian’s MSP Colin Fox is appalled at plans to develop Trident Two.
‘Tony Blair is dead set on spending £25bn of our money on more nuclear ‘weapons of mass destruction’. This Prime Minister warns the rest of the world not to develop nuclear weapons and signs up to the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, then he turns around and threatens the rest of the world with ‘mutually assured destruction’. He must be stopped. Does he ever stop to think what instability he causes around the world? The man with warmongering, belligerent form bar none, after his invasion of Iraq, now threatens the world with his own second generation of nuclear missiles.
The Scottish Socialist Party is steadfastly opposed to the development of Trident. I can think of a thousand better ways to spend £25billion pounds; on our health, education or social services. I am confident voters will reject New ‘Nuclear’ Labour.’

The public meeting will take place in the Communications Workers Union premises at 15 Brunswick Street, Leith on Thursday 8th Feb at 7.30pm.

Simclar fightback

2007-02-06T19:24:00.000Z

No doubt you'll have heard about the Simclar workers, who occupied their factory over the weekend in opposition to closure of the plant.

On Saturday night, along with scores of other SSP members, I showed my support and solidarity with the workforce.

We'll be showing this support again on Thursday when they lobby the Scottish Parliament at 12 noon!

S2M-5473 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Welsh Assembly Abolishes Prescription Charges

2007-02-02T12:19:00.001Z

That the Parliament congratulates the National Assembly for Wales for taking the decision this week to abolish completely NHS prescription charges for every patient in Wales from April 2007; agrees with the Welsh Minister for Health and Social Services, Dr Brian Gibbons AM, that the measure will reduce patient inequality and particularly benefit those patients with chronic illnesses or on low incomes and “enable those people who need medication to get it to improve their health and ultimately their quality of life”, and believes that Scotland should follow the terrific example set in Wales and also abolish the charges.

Supported by: Ms Rosemary Byrne, Frances Curran, Rosie Kane, Carolyn Leckie, Campbell Martin, Eleanor Scott, Tommy Sheridan, Chris Ballance, John Swinburne

Lodged on 24 January 2007; current

S2M-5472 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Prescription Charges Review

2007-02-02T12:16:00.000Z

That the Parliament notes that it is now exactly one year since the Stage 1 debate on the Abolition of NHS Prescription Charges (Scotland) Bill and since when the Scottish Executive promised to come forward with proposals to increase the list of long-term conditions exempt from payment; further notes that Deputy Minister for Health and Community Care, Lewis Macdonald MSP, has stated that he acknowledged that “the current charge and exemption arrangements are no longer fit for purpose and that changes are necessary” and that “we will review the exemption arrangements for people with chronic conditions” but that no changes have been brought forward by the Executive in a year despite giving repeated assurances in parliamentary answers that a decision was imminent; believes that no promised proposal has emerged because all medical experts have warned the Executive not to try to list the many different chronic conditions in an order of those that are more “deserving” or “painful”; considers that this is precisely what would be needed in order to distinguish between those conditions which are to be exempt from charges and which are not; notes that in 40 years medical opinion has veered away from such an approach because it was simply not possible on medical grounds to make such a judgement; believes that the Executive has failed to keep a promise it made to the Parliament and has dashed the hopes of thousands of chronically ill patients, and reiterates its belief that the fairest and most sensible way forward is to follow the example of the Welsh Assembly and abolish the £6.75 prescription charge for every patient.

Lodged on 24 January 2007; current

Follow this link to read my letter in the Linlithgow Gazette

http://www.linlithgowtoday.co.uk/mk4custompages/custompage.aspx?SectionID=3433

SSP boosts shoe making industry

2007-01-31T19:59:00.000Z

Our leafletting campaign has really stepped up a gear in the past week, party members have leafletted Morrison Circus, Moredun, parts of Leith and Rosewell. Meanwhile we are leafletting the Inch and Broxburn later this week as well as Penicuik.

As you can see from the picture we are well on the way to distributing 50,000 bulletins across the Lothian Region as well as going through a fair amount of shoe leather!

SSP launches My Space site

2007-01-31T11:15:00.000Z

Last week saw the birth of the SSPs new My Space website. In all honesty I don't know what a My Space is but it certainly looks great and we have 150 friends linked to it already! check it out for yourself at:

http://www.myspace.com/votessp

Unite the Clubs

2007-01-30T21:20:00.000Z

The issue of facilities for young footballers across Edinburgh, and the Lothians, has recently been highlighted.

Parents and coaches in Edinburgh have formed "Unite the Clubs" to campaign for improved facilities at public pitches across the city. I've already asked questions in the Scottish Parliament about this issue and will be supporting their march in Edinburgh on 14th February.

I'd also encourage as many people as possible to visit their website http://www.unitetheclubs.co.uk/

And to sign their online petitions to the Scottish Parliament http://www.gopetition.com/online/10970.html

and Edinburgh Council

http://www.gopetition.com/online/10971.html

Saying No to Trident

2007-01-30T21:07:00.000Z

This is a copy of an article I recently sent to the South Edinburgh Echo

Look around South Edinburgh. Look at all the things that need improving here.
Think what we could do if we had the money to build new Council housing affordable to everyone, for all the necessary improvements to our local NHS, for our schools, our social services and leisure facilities, for free travel on the buses for everyone, for more community workers and community policemen, and all available today. It would be great wouldn’t it? It would dramatically improve the quality of life for everyone in South Edinburgh.

Once you’ve thought about that, think about this. Tens of billions of pounds, which we could spend on all these areas of our lives, across Britain, Tony Blair intends to spend instead on a second generation of nuclear missiles.

And across Britain people are pressing Westminster not to vote for a second generation of nuclear weapons of mass destruction. And I am on their side.
To me Britain’s Trident nuclear submarine fleet, part of our ‘WMD’s, as well as being lethal to humankind are also immoral and illegal. For all their sophistication theses missiles are incapable of distinguishing between enemy soldiers on the one hand and an innocent civilian population on the other. And that makes them illegal under International law [see International Court of Justice opinion 8 July 1996].

Further international obligations under the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty which Britain has signed demands the 8 nuclear weapons holding countries [USA, Russia, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and the UK *] stop developing new weapons and all other countries in the world not to start to develop any.
Britain’s plans to build a second generation of missiles therefore make a mockery of our international non proliferation treaty obligations.

The sight of Labour politicians desperately trying to make the case for Trident in recent weeks is a remarkable spectacle. Almost to a man and woman they argued against nuclear weapons when they wanted to get elected. Jack McConnell, David Hamilton, Nigel Griffiths all nuclear disarmers once but now warmongers and militarists.
‘Trident provides a deterrent in an uncertain world’ they now repeat ad nauseam – when was the world anything other than uncertain- ‘so we need these weapons to protect our security and ‘Britain’s vital interests’.
But hold on, who is it that is threatening to invade us or breach our sovereignty? If it is Al Quaida then these weapons are useless against them because that enemy cannot be identified geographically and discriminately. And surely the more apt question in the world today is who protects the world from us?
It is hard to find a period in history which compares with this where Britain has such an appalling international reputation after the catastrophic failure of policy in Iraq.
Having gone along with George Bush in a madcap illegal invasion of a sovereign country we have earned pariah status in much of the world. Britain now has an appalling reputation as a warmonger and not a peace loving nation. Britain and US military families continue to pay an awful price for Bush and Blair’s reckless decision to invade and occupy another country, against the wishes of both the international community and the Iraqi people themselves.

Spending £25billion or more on British weapons of mass destruction to further threaten the world with nuclear annihilation will do nothing to calm international anxieties about Britain’s belligerence nor make the world a safer place for any of us.

I believe developing a second generation of nuclear weapons is a betrayal of future generations keen to live in peace with other nations and I urge Nigel Griffiths my Edinburgh South Westminster representative to vote against developing these evil weapons.
ENDS

[* Although North Korea test fired nuclear missiles late last year it is not considered a nuclear nation as far as the NNPT is concerned]

New Sick Kids parking charges

2007-01-26T15:34:00.000Z

S2M-5414# Mike Pringle: Fair Parking for the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh—That the Parliament welcomes the plan to build a new hospital for sick children alongside the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh at Little France in south Edinburgh;
notes that parking costs only 70p per hour and is free in the evening and at weekends near the current Royal Hospital for Sick Children site in Sciennes but that parking at the Royal Infirmary is almost £1.20 per hour, up to a maximum of £10 per day, and that this applies for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week,
and believes that bus services to the Little France area should be improved from all parts of the city and that NHS Lothian should guarantee that parking at any new hospital will not cost any more than the current site and that the mistakes that were made in respect of fixing parking charges at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh are not made in planning the new sick children’s hospital.

Introduction
One year ago today this Parliament held the Stage one debate on my Bill to Abolish NHS Prescription Charges.
Today we debate the case for other charges for accessing our health service – car parking charges for visitors patients and staff.

I believe in principle that access to our NHS should be universally free.

I note in the briefing which SPICE helpfully provided for this debate that
1 The decision on whether or not to have car parking charges is a matter for local NHS boards
2 Car parking charges should not be introduced as a means of generating income

However the Executive somewhat spoil/compromise the clarity of that directive by allowing income generating schemes if it is to
-cover the costs of providing parking facilities,
-cover the cost of providing new car parking facilities
-better manage existing car parking facilities, in other words acts as a disincentive to unauthorised users.

Facts
Three quarter of hospitals in UK now charge for parking
Charges in RIE cause people to avoid paying £10 per day and park in the adjacent schemes in the Inch and in Moredun causing difficulties for many residents in those areas
Charges act as a disincentive to staff coming to work in the NHS
Staff who are there every day and who work in one of the ‘low pay industries ‘ unfortunately. It filled me with horror to hear that low paid NHS staff at the new RIE were being charged £10 per dauy to park their carr at work. NO wonder they were parking instead in my scheme in the Inch to save £50 /week.

Sick Kids Hospital to Little France
I welcome the plans for a new Sick Kids Hospital in Edinburgh.
I‘also welcome it being at Little France. In fact when I hear that it is now nearer me in the Inch than Kenny McAskill and Mike Pringle in Sciennes I suggest the hospital is clearly moving to the left.
Whilst I welcome all that I certainly do not believe it should be a PFI project.
The RIE PFI has been a disaster for patients in the Lothians. I note the recent study by Professor Allyson Pollock
-the £228m cost of PFI RIE hospital will cost NHS £1bn over four times as much over the 30 years of contract
-profits made by the RBOS , Balfour Beatty , Morrison Construction and ‘Infrastructure Investors’ all comes out of NHS and into pockets of big businesses/shareholders when it oufght to be going into front line patient care
-LHB has the biggest proportion of its income going to PFI projects of by any Board in Scotland, and by a distance.

Pay Tribute to the Staff at the Sick Kids
In any debate in this Parliament about the Edinburgh Sick Kids I would always want top pay tribute to the tremendous care they provide for ouy youngsters.
They looked after my two young kids superbly when I had cause to visit.

Must also add that the latest stats show that perhaps as many as one in five youngsters admitted show signs of malnourishment, for me an appalling figure and cause enough to highlight the need for free school meals for all of them.

The motion in front of us tonight for me begs the question whether we should have car parking charges at the new site at all, not just whether they should be at the level they are at the existing Sciennes site on the Meadows.
I have to say that Mike Pringle could easily and rationally argue that since the new site is not in the middle of a residential area but on the outskirts of town and not under pressure from other road users that it should better utilise the chance to abolish the charges altogether in line with the essence of the Executives earlier views about not using the car parking charges as a way to generate more income.

Better Bus Services to Little France
I do agree with him on the need for better bus services out to Little France for the new sick kids, especially as we know that a great proportion of the youngsters who will unfortunately fall ill will come from families and backgrounds which are unlikely to have a car or access to one.
The bus is therefore an even more vital service for them taking kids there and for visiting their youngsters day after day.

Conclusion
I call on Lothian Health Board to scrap car parking charges at the new Sick Kids out at Little France and all the charges at our other hospitals for that matter.
ENDS

Trident debate in the Evening News

2007-01-24T16:50:00.000Z

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/edinburgh.cfm?id=125112007

New Council Houses - what a good idea!

2007-01-24T16:13:00.000Z

I had a letter published in the Evening News today, you can read it by following this link

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/letters.cfm?id=124192007

CELEBRATING ROBERT BURNS THE RADICAL

2007-01-24T09:38:00.000Z

I'll be leading a tribute to ‘Robert Burns the radical’ at the SSPs annual ‘Alternative Burns Supper’ on Friday 26th in the Canons Gait on the High Street.

We recognize in Robert Burns someone who was passionate about independence, a true radical who spoke out in favour of the French revolution and the American revolution and was a member of the Scots reform movement. Here was a man advocating workers representatives in Parliament a hundred and fifty years before Keir Hardie, demanding universal suffrage way before the suffragists, and fighting for the abolition of slavery and celebrating Scots hero’s like Wallace and Thomas Muir the leader of the United Scotsmen.

Burns is for me a hugely inspiring figure. He championed our own Scots culture when the ruling classes here considered it couthy, backward and rude. He was a figure the establishment truly feared and he has through his work retained his potency today. He was a close friend and collaborator of Scotlands great blacklisted painter Alexander Naysmith.

Robert Burns is rightly celebrated the world over and his attraction is that he was truly a poet of the common man and a genius to boot.
The SSP has proudly marked the anniversary of his birth for a decade now by debunking the myths and explaining who Robert Burns really was, what he really stood for and what he left us. I believe we owe him that much.
In the Canons Gait tomorrow night we will sing and dance and eat and drink to one true working class hero. He’s one of us.

Tickets £7 and £4unwaged – haggis neeps and tatties included.

PPP/PFI shame

2007-01-24T09:35:00.000Z

S2O-11504 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will review its policy on PFI projects, in light of the findings by Edinburgh University¿s Centre for International Public Health that payments from NHS boards across Scotland to private financiers will increase from the current £107 million to £510 million per year by 2011.

Answered by Mr Tom McCabe (21 December 2006): Public Private Partnerships are an important part of the Executive’s mixed economy approach to the modernisation and investment agenda to grow the Scottish economy and provide better public services.
Payments by public bodies to private sector PPP consortia are for services provided over the length of the contract - these include capital construction, lifecycle maintenance and facilities management, and not just the upfront construction cost of the asset. I do not recognise the £510 million figure to which you refer.

Free School Meals Hypocrisy

2007-01-24T09:28:00.000Z

I have to congratulate Jim Devine MP and Michael Connarty MP for the stand they have taken in support of the principle of free nutritious school meals. I couldn’t agree more with the motion they signed in the House of Commons condemning the Liberal Democrats for cancelling the successful scheme they’ve ran in Hull for the past 3 years.

If only Mary Mulligan and Bristow Muldoon had shown the same social conscience then perhaps our bill to introduce free school meals across Scotland wouldn’t have been derailed by the labour led Executive.

It seems that the opinion of the Labour party is that it is ok for children in England to receive free school meals but for some reason it isn’t ok in Scotland – the word hypocrisy springs to mind.

Perhaps, for the Labour Party, the three words attached to the free school meals bill, Scottish socialist party, were the problem. Only the SSP is committed to delivering Free Nutritious School Meals for all our children.

The motion signed by Jim Devine MP & Michael Connarty MP read:
"That this House… believes that a more nutritious diet for schoolchildren has a central role in combating this public health problem; applauds Hull City Council's three-year pilot scheme, combining increased investment in healthier school food ingredients with the abolition of charges for primary school meals…"

BA Cabin Crew strike

2007-01-23T09:12:00.000Z

S2M-5443 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : British Airways Cabin Crew Strike Vote— That the Parliament notes with concern the threatened strike action by British Airways (BA) cabin crew over new company demands on sickness leave that they believe force them to work despite being ill; believes that the strength of feeling in the workforce was amply demonstrated by a union ballot last week which saw 96% vote in favour of strike action on the issue; regrets that the latest talks between the Transport and General Workers’ Union and the company have broken down, but calls on BA to take up the union’s offer of further talks aimed at avoiding a damaging dispute and reaching an agreement on changes to the current sickness leave arrangements.

Lodged on 22 January 2007; current

RMT Signal workers dispute motion in the Scottish Parliament

2007-01-23T09:08:00.000Z

S2M-5430 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : RMT Union Signal Workers' Dispute— That the Parliament notes the decision of RMT signal workers in Scotland who are employed by Network Rail to ballot for strike action over the company’s failure to implement a 35-hour working week agreement; believes that, although the agreement is being implemented across the rest of Britain, management in Scotland has reneged on its side of the deal and is attempting to enforce longer working hours and take rest day entitlements away from employees who often work in arduous conditions; extends its full support to RMT union members, and hopes that the strike can be averted by management’s return to the negotiating table and that a satisfactory outcome can therefore be reached on the issue.

Supported by: Chris Ballance, Ms Rosemary Byrne, Frances Curran, Rosie Kane, Carolyn Leckie, Campbell Martin, Tommy Sheridan, John Swinburne, Dr Jean Turner

Lodged on 18 January 2007; current

NCR public meeting a huge success

2007-01-20T21:23:00.000Z

Coverage from the Dundee Courier of our public meeting in Dundee last week.

On track to deliver first 50,000

2007-01-19T16:39:00.000Z

We're well on track to delivering the first 50,000 Lothians Voices. I was out in Moredun with other SSP members last night and on Tuesday, meanwhile party members in our East & Musselburgh branch began leafletting Musselburgh. We also have plans in place to start deliveries in West Lothian, Midlothian and other parts of Edinburgh next week.

Trident, Law & Prescription Charges

2007-01-18T19:13:00.000Z

S2W-31128 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 17 January 2007) : To ask the Scottish Executive how many police officers from each constabulary have so far been sent to cover the year-long “Faslane 365” protest at the Faslane naval base.

Answered by Cathy Jamieson (30 January 2007): Only officers from Strathclyde Police and the Ministry of Defence Police have been involved in policing the Faslane 365 protest.

S2W-30912 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 10 January 2007) : To ask the Scottish Executive what its precise timetable is for the commencement of outstanding sections 25 to 29 of the Law Reform Miscellaneous Provisions (Scotland) Act 1990.

Answered by Johann Lamont (23 January 2007): Sections 25-29 of the Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1990 provides for rights of audience and rights to conduct litigation to be granted to members of professional or other bodies which meet the criteria described in the legislation. The commencement of these sections is expected to take place in March 2007, in tandem with section 61 of the Legal Profession and Legal Aid (Scotland) Bill 2006, which contains a provision to remove a defect related to the provisions on rights to conduct litigation.

S2W-30911 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 10 January 2007) : To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-29323 by Lewis Macdonald on 10 November 2006 in which the minister stated that he hoped to publish the review of NHS prescription charges and exemption arrangements before the end of the year, what the reason is for the delay and when the Executive now expects to publish the review.

Answered by Lewis Macdonald (24 January 2007): We are carefully considering the results of our consultation on NHS prescription charges and exemption arrangements in Scotland. Changes to the current arrangements may have complex financial and social consequences. We intend to publish a report on the consultation together with our decisions on the way forward in the near future.

S2M-5412 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Condemn Sacking of 650 by NCR Dundee

2007-01-18T19:07:00.000Z

That the Parliament condemns the decision by NCR in Dundee to sack 650 of its workers; recognises that assurances given to the workers’ union just last year that jobs were safe have turned out to be worthless; believes that the announcement by NCR is not just a severe blow to Dundee but has ominous implications for workers’ job prospects throughout the manufacturing sector in Scotland; further believes that the NCR decision again highlights the need for greater protection of jobs in Scotland, which can be destroyed on a whim as employers uproot and head east for cheap labour reserves, and offers its full support to Amicus and the entire workforce in efforts they make to save the jobs and secure a future for all workers affected by this dreadful news.

Supported by: Frances Curran, Rosie Kane, Carolyn Leckie, Ms Rosemary Byrne, Kate Maclean, Tommy Sheridan

Lodged on 12 January 2007; current

SSP hits the campaign trail

2007-01-17T16:04:00.000Z

Guess what I'll be doing over the next few weeks!!!!

As part of our election campaigning, the SSP has had 250,000 bulleting printed which we will deliver door to door across Scotland.

In the Lothians this equates to 50,000 copies, or 5ft square as you can see from the photo, which will be delivered in Edinburgh, West Lothian & Midlothian.

I'll keep you updated on how we are getting on and will post more photos as the pile gets smaller, a kind of reverse Blue Peter totaliser if you like.

If you look at the previous post you can see the Lothians version of the bulletin.

Lothians Voice

2007-01-17T15:49:00.000Z

Do we need a replacement for Trident?

2007-01-17T12:30:00.000Z

The debate over the replacement of the Trident weapons of mass destruction is raging on across the country, even if the Labour government is immune to debate,
The Edinburgh South branch of the SSP is organising a public debate on the issue in Moredun.

Public Meeting

Thursday 25th January - 7.30pm

Goodtrees Neighbourhood Centre

Moredun, Edinburgh

speakers

Colin Fox MSP

Nigel Griffiths MP (invited)

Anniversary of the Union - another unwanted birthday!

2007-01-16T16:02:00.000Z

The Scotsman recently asked me for my views on the 300th aniversary of the act of union. The article can be found by following this link:

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=79772007

or you can read the full version here.

TIME FOR A MODERN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN SCOTLAND

The 300th anniversary of the Treaty of Union allows us to take stock ofScotland's relationship with the 'United Kingdom'. The Scottish SocialistParty view is that the union should now be ended and replaced by anindependent, democratic, republic.The Union was born of bribery, the threat of military force and the nakedself interest of the merchant classes who lost their shirts on theirreckless Darien adventure. It was imposed by a privileged minority againstthe fury of the common people who burned copies of the Treaty in public.Far from the glorious golden age, the myth so beloved of unionists, 1707 setScotland in the role of junior partner in the bloodstained British Empire.Undoubtedly some Scots grew rich trading and supplying the sinews of military might. But for the average Scot it meant military service orgrinding poverty in the growing industrial slums.These evils were only alleviated by the growing working class movement at home and the liberation movements-starting with the Irish-abroad.Then as now what Burns called "the parcel of rogues in a nation" took the London shilling and from 'North Britain' loyally served the empire.The same representatives of the merchants and banking classes earnestlyproclaim Scotland's so called 'union dividend' and attempt to convince usthat without the UK Osama Bin Laden would be in Burntisland and we would allbe in abject poverty.The truth of course, is entirely different. The union is holding Scotlandback economically and politically, held hostage to another social agendaaltogether. Should the Tories win the next Westminster election thatdichotomy will be shown to be starker still.Scotland also urgently needs the break with British militarism, to close thetrident bases and strike out in a new direction.Just as at the enlightement Scotland can be a beacon of hope to the world offering economic security and ecological sustainability at home and peace and friendship to the world.

NCR jobs betrayal

2007-01-15T09:33:00.000Z

SSP Public meeting

Wed 17th Jan - 7.30pm

Queens Hotel, Dundee

speakers - Colin Fox MSP, Richie Venton (SSP TU organiser)

This announcement is a sickening blow to 650 NCR employees and their families. I am sure they are livid at the company who just a year ago assured them their jobs were safe. To add insult to injury I understand they heard news of their sacking by video link from America. NCR bosses have apparently described the decision to sack the workers as a 'step in the right direction. Well it's not 'a step in the right direction', it's a step towards the dole in a city with higher than average unemployment already. Once again Scots workers are being dumped and their jobs exported to low wage economies abroad for the benefit of the bosses. Virtually no private sector job in Scotland can be considered safe nowadays."I note that already all the bosses parties- New Labour, Tories , Lib Dems and the SNP can only wring their hands and blame market forces. The brutal truth is that we need to get tough with companies who treat workers in this shabby way. Scots workers have some of the weakest job protection laws in Europe thanks to New Labour's love affair with big business and it time that was changed. I have today been in touch with Amicus shop stewards and offered them my full support. Like them the SSP believes we should not just roll over and accept this decision. I will meet union officials on Wednesday in Dundee and will be speaking at a public meeting the Scottish Socialist Party has arranged on the issue.

Custodial Sentances Bill

2007-01-14T10:46:00.000Z

Labour's Custodial Sentances Bill was debated in the Parliament last week.
Labour intends to send another 1,100 people to jail, despite the fact that our prisons are already holding record numbers and are bursting at the seems.
All progressive opinion thinks, like us that this Bill is a crock.

These are the notes from my contribution to the debate.

Custodial Sentences and Weapons Scotland Bill
Introduction
The policy objectives of this Bill are laudable, I certainly want to see
‘a clearer, more understandable system for managing offenders while in custody and on licence in the community, taking account of public safety by managing risk and to have victims interests at its heart’
- the problem is these objectives are just not going to be fulfilled by this Bill.

That View is Widely Held
SCCCJ – ‘Regrets very much that the SE is choosing a path that, far from achieveing its objectives would incur huge costs and would have serious negative consequences for the criminal justice system and the safety of Scottish Communities.’
SACRO – ‘The bill aims to make sentencing system clearer, but will not achieve that end and will lead to resources being absorbed when they could be spent more effectively elsewhere in the system.’
CJA’s – ‘We concur with the ambition of the Bill but are concerned that, as described, the Bills purpose will not be fulfilled and may serve to further undermine rather than promote public confidence and understanding.’
J2 Committee Report itself - ‘Committee supports the policy objectives of the Bill, but calls into question whether the measures in the Bill , as currently constituted, can achieve the stated objectives.’

*Impact on the prison population
Things started to go wrong for me with this Bill when despite Ministers and officials saying ‘Nothing in the Bill requires judges to change their sentencing practice’, virtually every witness we heard from suggested they will.
And when SPS’s Rachael Gwynon told us ‘these measures will increase the daily prison population by 700-1,100.’ the alarm bells started ringing everywhere.
A prison population already at record levels and chronically overcrowded to be increased by 20%? HMIP has highlighted again and again his growing apprehension about a return to the 1980’s disruption and riots in our prisons.

Despite the view across the board that short term sentences in custody are wholly ineffective and a hugely expensive failure as far as reducing re-offending is concerned, here we have a Bill determined to take us further up that dead end.
CJA’s - ‘ The Bill would overwhelm the SPS , local authorities and independent providers. It has ineffectiveness built into it.’

Greater Clarity in Sentencing.
‘Transparent sentencing regime will improve public confidence in the CJ system’ says the policy memorandum to the Bill – indeed, but, again, this Bill does not provide it.

Andrew Coyle, Professor of Prison Studies at Kings College London in his evidence said quote [ p180 of evidence]
‘The aim of the Bill ‘to achieve greater clarity in sentencing is admirable. However it is not immediately apparent that the Bill will achieve its aim. Even when approaching it in a positive manner one needs a calculator and a great deal of patience to unravel the arithmetic of what a prison sentence will mean in the future.’
If Professor Andrew Coyle, with his credentials in Criminal Justice cannot fathom out the sentence, what hope is there for the rest of us?

And what ever can he mean? [see Sheriffs Association evidence],
‘The Sheriffs Association does not consider that the Bill will achieve the objective of delivering clarity and transparency in sentencing. Although the custody part of the sentence will be announced at the public sentencing hearing, it will not be possible to predict or state what period will actually be spent in prison or what conditions of licence during the community part of the sentence will be.’
And they even go on, in an unusually humourous vein for them, to ridicule the Bills proposals with an example of an offender found guilty of assault to severe disfigurement - See p 219 of evidence [read it out]

Further aspect of the Bill also open to public ridicule - the ‘anomaly’ that those sentenced to 30 days will spend less time in jail than those sentenced to 15, will have tabloid editors begging for more!
Because those on 15 days or less must serve 100% behind bars whereas sentemnces over 15 days spend 50% in jail. [no rationale why 15days]

50% to 75% of sentence now served in Custody
Either the Bill will make no difference whatsoever and offenders will continue by and large to serve 50% of their sentence in custody, or worse, despite the aim being to reduce re-offending, people will spend longer behind bars increasing that part of their sentence which does not work and spend less in the community which does and is, we are told, the whole emphasis of the Bill.

End to automatic unconditional early release of prisoners
Ministers–driven by publics understandable confusion about how six months means three months and a year equals 6 months, and their irritation at people who commit more crimes while out on licence.
But the truth is, that will continue with this bill
First, 50% [or 75%]of sentence still served in custody and 50% [or 25%] now as ‘community sentence’.
Secondly, prisoners still likely to be committing crimes when out on licence; especially since ‘supervision’ of short sentences [category where re-offending rates at its highest] based on no more than a promise of ‘good behaviour’!

I Welcome ‘Community based’ sentences
Because we know it has a far better chance of success than custody. Context ; for first time on record their were more community disposals in Scotland last year than custodial disposals

Paradox is that all the experts welcome community sentences but judges, eager to feed the publics apparent appetite for longer sentences will on previous experience in all likelihood cut back on that part of sentence which does any good. - BONKERS
Overwhelming evidence suggests we should scrap short sentences in custody. They don’t work and costly failures.
ADSW/COSLA p292 evidence
‘When people who have been in jail for a few weeks or months come out , they just want to forget it all –block it out. Therefore programmes delivered in the community have far more meaning to people.’
Its about time Executive showed the political courage to face down ignorance and hysteria.

Unrealistic Expectations Given to Public
Much of the evidence we received at Committee felt Bill was in danger of reducing public confidence and protection by putting resources in all the wrong places.
Risk Management resources - SPS currently risk assesses 3,000 prisoners /year; Bill proposed that is increased to 12,000
CJSW supervises 600 offenders per year; Bill suggest 3,800
-Supervison resources needed
Either no real supervision at all –be of good behaviour - obvious risk- or we direct thin resources to all the wrong targets.
Resources should be centred on high risk
-Support resources needed
Need a holistic approach – housing, relationships, alcohol, drugs, benefits, stability of community setting vs break up of all those factors by taking out of community and into custody!
See evidence from Professor Roger Houchin [p192]
‘The most profound shortcomings in the Bill concern the very limited consideration it gives to the community part of the sentence. It places all the obligations on the offender but makes only the scantest reference to the duties of authorities to enable the offender access to opportunities support in services of housing, employment, education and training, counselling , health care and financial management commensurate with aiding their full rehabilitation.’

Cost And Efficacy
Costs implications huge and criticism that spent in wrong areas.
SPS – 2 new prisons for 1,100 more daily population - £200m
SPS- more prison staff pro rata -£6m - writing risk assessment reports for people who should not be serving custody sentences.
CJSW – 10% more qualified social workers , which if you can even get them - £7.25m - but applied less than effectively.
Training for the existing staff in new reporting etc £11m

Conclusion
Unusual in my experience that a Stage One report has so many criticisms and questions still to be answered by the SE.
In my view much of this Bill unravelled during the evidence taking session….SCCCJ, CJA, Risk Assessment, Voluntary Sector, SPS, Sheriffs.

I am convinced that Bill would result in judges increasing the sentences to be served in custody; more people going to jail for longer – precisely the opposite advice we were repeatedly given as to what works.

For these reasons SSP will not support the Bill.

Bring back our buses

2007-01-11T18:20:00.000Z

The issue of bus services is becoming more and more accute across the country and in my home city of Edinburgh in particular. Yesterday I managed to secure a debate in the Scottish Parliament about this very issue.
There are links below to the video and transcript of the debate from the Parliament website as well as some articles from the Evening News. I've also included my speaking notes.

Edinburgh Evening News 27th Dec http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/edinburgh.cfm?id=1918862006

Edinburgh Evening News 10th Jan http://news.scotsman.com/edinburgh.cfm?id=49842007

Scottish Parliament Transcript http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/business/officialReports/meetingsParliament/or-07/sor0110-02.htm#Col30912

Scottish Parliament Video

http://www.holyrood.tv/library.asp?title=Members

‘BRING BACK OUR BUSES’ [7mins] Wed 10th Jan 2007
Introduction
Thank members for joining me for this debate which I think raises 3 important issues in particular.
One is the impact that cutting bus services and increasing fares has on public transport provision in Edinburgh and the Lothians,
Second is the role greater public transport provision can play in reducing social exclusion, global warming, pollution levels and road accidents.
And thirdly that free public transport across Scotland is now firmly on the agenda.

I want to start by acknowledging the service that First Bus and LRT especially provide for the people of the Lothians. I stood alongside both sets of drivers on their picket lines last year in support of their pay claim.
I am proud that Edinburgh retains one of the few publicly owned bus companies in the UK.

But both co’s must acknowledge that cuts to vital community bus routes in recent months have damaged their reputation and ability to deliver a universal service;
No 12 Jewell to Portobello cut, No 13 route via Blackhall curtailed,
No 18 to ERI from the Gyle curtailed
[Edinburgh pensioner Irene Paterson gathered 3,500 signatures for her petition keep the service via Hunters Tryst going]
No 20 in West Edinburgh curtailed,
No 38 from North Edinburgh to the ERI curtailed,
No 60 Dumbiedykes into town curtailed,
No 67 Ratho to Wester Hailes cut.
Getting from one part of the city to another without going through centre is increasingly difficult.
Fare Increases
Neither cuts in services nor fare increases lead to greater passenger no’s.
As the South Queensferry Bus Users Group has demonstrated, the £3.60 First Bus fare to Edinburgh, up 44% in 6 months, is not going to encourage more people to leave their car at home or even travel at all.
Only 1 in 3 families in the poorest areas of town has a car.

Likewise the inflation busting fares increases announced by the train operating companies over Christmas again will not encourage people to travel by train. Britain already has the highest fares in Western Europe.
Since 1990 bus fares;70% of all public transport journeys by bus; up 24%

‘Service’ to Communities
Public transport has to be seen as a service, one vital to the economy and to communities they serve - not as a money making industry.
Buses often offer a vital lifeline for vulnerable people and isolated communities with few alternatives to fall back on… cars, taxi’s etc.

Since few routes outside the lucrative mass transit of the big cities make money it is understood that we need to subsidise public transport.
The question is to what extent and to what end? Not to fatten the profits of private bus companies

I applaud South Queensferry Users Group and the Bring Back Our Buses campaign and support their arguments for route development.
I applaud the efforts of those Community Councils who argue that it is necessary our transport system be universally inclusive.

This Debate in wider context
Mrs Thatcher once sneered that if you were still travelling by bus when you were 40 you were a failure. Well the spokeswoman for the ‘Chelsea tractor’ brigade spectacularly failed to understand the issues.
Fortunately others saw it better and passenger numbers are again rising after a decade of decline.
LRT passenger numbers are up 25% in 6 years and they have ordered 42 new buses –with the very latest ‘Euro 4’ low emission diesel engines

Public transport is rightly considered the primary way to reduce traffic volumes, reducing CO2 and NO emissions.
Compared to cars they reduce these emissions / passenger mile by 88%.

Everyone is facing up to public transport being the best option.
I see that all the main parties in the city are now arguing for more money to be put into our bus services;
Labour – Ewan Aitken ‘£1m more for the buses if Labour gets re-elected’ Liberals, SNP and even Tories all agree.

Just as well because Ian Craig, Managing Director of LRT has highlighted the need for more money if the services demanded by the public are to be delivered.

Making Public Transport Free - Affordable to All
The SSP is committed to introduce free public transport for all in Scotland, to provide a better alternative to the car and offers genuine social inclusion - travel for all.

-Executive has introduced free public transport for senior citizens, welcome but many pensioners often don’t have a local bus to get on
- Minister announced on Monday 16-19 year old discounted travel and two free ferry journeys for youngsters on the islands...again quite right.
-Kenny McAskill’s interesting proposal to have everyone travel free on Edinburgh’s buses rather than develop the Tram system
- Euan Robsons call for carers to be allowed to travel free – when with their loved one/client – an eminently sensible idea.
But all too little on their own to make a lasting difference.

Scotland has a higher use of public transport per head than UK, we would therefore benefit proportionately more from free travel.
Those on low incomes rely on public transport far more would save between £400-£500 per month.
But wider benefits still accrue since;
-57% of companies believe traffic jams greatly disrupt their businesses.
- Road accidents cost the Scottish economy £1.4bn annually.
- 4 out of 5 designated Air management Areas failed to meet their targets for reducing air pollution
- Reduce Scotland’s dependence on oil – cars.

Scotland would lead the world in providing free public transport.
It has however been implemented in selective areas already.

Hasselt in Belgium
Town popn: 69,000- with a car ownership of one car per 2.12 residents experiencing dreadful congestion in the 1990’s decided in 2000 to introduce a free fares scheme
-passenger journeys rose 870% and they turned the problem around.
Danish govt. now studying the experience to repeat it there, so too in
Melbourne - supporters of a state wide free travel scheme in Victoria.
Matthew Parris – Abandonned Thatcherite attitude in light of experience ‘I was wrong to oppose Ken Livingstones fares campaign in the 1980’s.’ Cheap fares have to be the way forward.’
Visit Scotland published a report highlighting the case for free public transport for all in Scotland.’ [Tomorrow’s World May 2006]

So How Do we Do it?
First Step is to allow Local authorities to again regulate the bus routes, timetables and fares in consultation with local communities and groups like BBOB’s and South Queensferry Users Group – real democracy in action at the grassroots.
Prior to 1986 bus services were regulated and licensed this way.
Deregulation saw first aggressive price wars over route domination and then cuts to services as the profit motive usurped public service.
Public cross subsidy fosters genuine co-operative development of routes.

Cost?
Annual transport revenues in Scotland [last years figures] £593m.
+ Set up costs and cost of extra buses, staff etc needed £700m.
Total cost therefore £1.3 billion – yes it is a lot of money, but
i. Surely no-one will now argue money is not there, not after that £25bn Trident announcement!
Ii ‘Doing Nothing is Most expensive option’.- Sir Nicholas Sterns review on impact of global warming.
Iii The cost savings to health service from reduced road accidents and pollution, from business and wider economy savings. Could be offset against this cost.

I believe this approach to be a radical and socially just contribution to the huge issues of poverty, health and climate change now facing us. ENDS

Faslane 365

2007-01-09T10:28:00.001Z

I attended the Faslane 365 blockade yesterday with my parliamentary colleagues, Frances, Carolyn and Rosie. I've copied my speech below and will add links to the various news stories about the event.

‘Faslane 365’ Jan 8th 2007

Intro* May I begin by congratulating ‘Faslane 365’ for organising today and this year long protest.

*Proud as the National Convenor of SSP to be with you today. As you know the SSP are proud supporters of the disarmament movement and have been here many times before. You know you can trust the SSP on Trident.
NO party done more to keep the issue in the public eye and to mobilise opinion.We consider these weapons to be immoral, illegal and a colossal waste of money.We would rather see it spent on peace, on health, education and social services instead.

The Govt’s Case*

This is such a profound political issue that I fear any party which has MSP’s, MP’s and MEP’s both for and against nuclear weapons is not a principled party at all but merely an accommodation.Equally it is dishonest in my view to hide behind the excuse that this is a Westminster issue – this is not a Westminster issue, this is an issue for all humanity. And this is certainly an issue for the Holyrood Parliament, one which it is morally and politically obliged to take a stand on.

* Tony Blair and Jack McConnell like to lecture us, and with not a little pompously, about how they are courageous enough to take ‘difficult decisions’ - usually a euphemism in my experience for doing the opposite of what they were elected to do. Replacing Trident is just such an example.I say to all MSP’s, stand by your principles. You cannot easily claim to be in favour of peace and international goodwill and then hold the threat of nuclear annihilation over humankind.

*I have here the MOD and Foreign Office case for ‘Maintaining the UK’s Nuclear Deterrent’.• ‘It is a fundamental responsibility of Government to provide for the security of the UK and its citizens now and for the future’ it says.And that ‘security’ can only be provided using Trident can it? We don’t have conventional weapons for that? only 4% of the defence budget, that our conventional ‘weapons of mass destruction’ and our continuing ability to illegally invade sovereign nations will not be diminished in any way.
‘The future is uncertain: accurately predicting events over the period 2020-2050 is extremely hard’ the Govt paper goes on. So why spend upwards of £25bn on Trident then if cannot predict it being used?What do we know of the world?

*The USA -The only country in the world ever to have fired nuclear weapons at another nation, is also the country which has a bigger stockpile than all 8 other nuclear states put together.[USA has 32,500 individual nuclear warheads]And has also just invaded/occupied IRAQ and look at the security that has brought the world!

* Looking at the world through the eyes of the 180 countries who don’t have nuclear ‘deterrents’; they see UK, the world fifth biggest military exporter, the country which went into an illegal war alongside the Bush cowboy in Iraq with a constantly deployed nuclear threat able to strike anywhere in the world.Now announces plans to develop a second generation of nuclear WMD’s at a cost which is beyond the GDP of most countries of the world. They must surely wonder -Who protects the world from US and UK Nuclear WMDs?
‘There is a potential risk of state sponsored terrorists armed with nuclear weapons.’ it adds.Fact: there are 9 countries with nuclear weapons – US, Russia, France, China, UK, India, Israel, Pakistan and now North Korea. ‘Currently we know of no state that has both a nuclear capability and the ability and intent to use it against our vital interests.’But Britain has the CAPABILITY, and regards INTENT it admits it would defend ‘OUR VITAL INTERESTS’ the very reason it gave for invading Iraq.Following the disastrous war in Iraq it also has ’FORM’ on acts of aggression.
‘The UK is committed to working towards a safer world in which there is no need for nuclear weapons.’YET UK just announced plans to build second generation of Nuclear weapons at cost £25bn. ‘We have an excellent record in meeting our obligations under the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty.’YET UK just announced plans to build second generation of Nuclear weapons at cost £25bn.

*How dare Tony Blair lecture other countries about not developing nuclear weapons and then turn round and spend perhaps £25bn of our money on WMD’s!
Democracy : Scotland – Nuclear Free. Keep Up the PressureAn Independent Scotland would get rid of Trident. I have not the slightest doubt, because it is plainly the ‘settled will’ of the Scottish people to do so.Tony Blair - ‘There will be a full public debate on Trident 2’. Not so, it is a charade, told decision already made. Yet majority of Scots are opposed.All the more reason we must make it an election issue at Holyrood 2007.Because it is an issue for Holyrood, an issue for humankind.
SSP will continue to be at the forefront of the opposition to Trident today and everyday.

News Links

BBC News - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/glasgow_and_west/6239435.stm

Daily Record - http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/tm_headline=politicians-lifted-at-faslane&method=full&objectid=18424220&siteid=66633-name_page.html

Trident in the Evening News

2007-01-09T10:24:00.000Z

I sent this press release to the Evening News on Saturday, this is the full version and the link below will take you to the published version!

MSP to Join Faslane Anti Nuclear protest
Lothian’s MSP Colin Fox will join a protest outside Faslane Naval Base on Monday [8th Jan] as the opposition to replacing Trident nuclear missiles intensifies.

With the Westminster Parliament due to vote on replacing Britain’s nuclear deterrent next month Fox believes Scottish public opinion is solidly against Trident.
‘I have been campaigning on this issue throughout the country over the past few months and the response illustrates the widespread opposition there is to our ‘nuclear weapons of mass destruction’.
‘Whilst Tony Blair is intent on obtaining even more of these weapons most people consider them obscene. It is clear Labour just cannot be trusted on Trident. It is plainly a pro nuclear party now.
By contrast, I believe these weapons to be both immoral and illegal. They fall foul of international law because they cannot distinguish between enemy combatants on the one hand and innocent civilians on the other.
‘Having read the governments white paper ‘Maintaining the UK’s Nuclear Deterrent’ I do not believe they have made the case for replacing Trident. And I fail to see how Tony Blair can lecture other countries about not developing nuclear ‘WMD’s’ and then turn round and spend upwards of £25bn on a second generation of Trident missiles. It makes a mockery of Britain’s commitment to the nuclear non Proliferation Treaty.’
‘Opinion in Scotland is sharply against Trident and its replacement. I am certain that an Independent Scotland would simply not accept these weapons being based here.
The recent vote at Holyrood revealed many Labour MSP’s hiding behind a cowardly position of ‘It’s a Westminster decision, it’s not for this Parliament. Well I disagree, this is an issue for us all. The electorate are entitled to know where everyone stands. And Monday is about making clear where I stand.’

Monday’s protest is part of a year long effort by Scottish CND called ‘Faslane 365’ which seeks to keep the issue at the forefront of public opinion.
ENDS

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=31142007

A Happy New Year to SSP members and supporters everywhere

2007-01-01T14:09:00.001Z

May I take this opportunity to wish the tens of thousands of SSP members and supporters all the very best for 2007.

Today is traditionally a day for looking forward and consider what the future may bring and I have not the slightest doubt that Scotlands biggest, best and most successful socialist party has a bright future ahead of us.

Our party is again going, like the lion in the car commercial, from strength to strength.

How horrifyingly fitting that the worlds news headlines as the new year begins should be dominated by events in Iraq. The execution and humiliation of Saddam Hussein serves to remind us that Iraq is the political issue which towers above all others in the world today. And that will continue in 2007 as will the SSP's principled opposition to the brutal Shia/Sunni sectarian bloodbath unleashed by Bsuh and Blair.

Our position at the forefront of the anti war movement in Scotland will continue.Only the SSP offers a principled opposition to the war in Iraq based on an anti imperalist, socialist alternative.

We have been involved in many campaigns in recent months as that sense that New Labour do not give a damn about working people sweeps across Scotland. The SSP's suppport for an independent socialist Scotland represents something profoundly important in Scottish politics. We are determined to see the independence movement benefit from polls showing majority support.

We built our party and our reputation by opposing the slaughter in Iraq, by supporting trades unionists and comunities across Scotland in defending their interests and living standards. We have in recent months stepped up that work. We proudly assisted hundreds of thousands of Farepak customers swindled out of their savings. We stood shoulder to shoulder with public sector workers seeking eqaul pay for work of equal value, something long denied them despite legislation promising just that. We have pledged our determination to support working people in the upcoming civil service battles in January.

And we have proudly 'raised the scaret standard high' in the anti nuclear movement – both power generation and ballistic missiles. And we have also launched innovative and imaginative plans to provide everyone with free public transport options.

But it is to those many new members of the SSP who have joined in recent weeks that I especially want to thank.People like Johanna Dind from Edinburgh and Chris Sagan from Bishopbriggs. Such talented new members invigorate the rest of us. As does working with remarkable people like 'Unfairpak' campaigner Suzy Hall. I feel privileged to have worked with them on various issues in recent weeks. I know there will be many hundreds more new members like them in the weeks and months to come as the SSP's campaigning for the 2007 Holyrood and Council elections really gets underway.

We are proud to be the party which defends and articulates the principles of universal benfits and public ownership, of justice and equality for hard working decent honest people. We have a proud proud record and are well aware that 131,000 people entrusted us with their vote in 2003 and look to us still.

We can look forward to 2007 . I wish every SSP member and supporter a peaceful, healthy and prosperous New Year.

Colin Fox

National Convenor

And Now For Somethning Completely Different - Its Musselburgh Races! [30th December 2006]

2007-01-01T12:30:00.000Z

Perhaps the Michael Palins Diaries [1969-1979] I got for christmas were playing on my mind, or perhaps it was just the beer, but Musselburgh races has a definite 'Pythonesque' feel to it today.
Then again it could just be that a 71 year old man winning one of the handicaps is a highly unusual event at a race meeting. He is now officially recognised as the fastest man in Scotland. To add insult to national injury he was English.

And before you think I have taken leave of my senses - a 71 year old man winning at Musselburgh races- I assure you it is true. Let me just explain one or two importants facts.

Scotlands oldest sporting event the 'Powderhall New Year sprint' -first run in 1870- is now run at Musselburgh because the origninal venue, Powderhall, - a greyhound racing circuit in Edinburgh - has closed down. The athletics event today offers a cash prize to the fastest man or woman to cover 110 metres [originally it was 110yards of course] and professional runners come from all over the world to compete.

This years handicap event, run on the grass inside the last furlong, was won by Tony Dobson from Leeds. His success was certainly no fluke. Having won his first round heat and his semi final as the fastests qualifier at 11.60seconds, it was perhaps no surprise that he started 6/4 favourite to lift the £4,000 first prize.
The history books will record that he had a 28metre start to beat all comers. But what is absolutely amazing abhout tis years victor is that he is 71years of age!
What does it say about the pride of Scottish man and womanhood?

Anyone else think they saw this once before, in a Monty Python sketch?

The horses? Well I had two winners - Barracat and Leslingthomas- and two seconds, so I was well pleased. But to tell you the truth, the only name I will remember in the morning will be Tony Dobson, 71, from Leeds. And do you know what? He has promised to come back next year and defend his trophy!!!!!!!!
MERRY CHRISTMAS ; . ))

Fox reacts to Saddam execution

2007-01-01T12:29:00.000Z

On The death of a Tyrant - End the Bloody Occupation of a 'Sovereign' Nation

SSP National Convenor Colin Fox commenting on the execution of Saddam
Hussein today suggested Britain and USA examine their own consciences at
this time.

“As some one who campaigned against the tyranny of Saddam Hussein for
decades I shed few tears for his passing. But this is no time to let the
fact that the British and US governments made it him what he was sink into
silence. Saddam Hussein was their 'muscle in the middle east' for two
decades. They funded him and armed him throughout, in the barbaric war with
Iran and when they turned a blind eye to the massacres of his own people.”

“The statements by Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett in London and from
White House infer that this execution was a matter of internal Iraqi
politics and the independent decision of a 'sovereign nation”

“Unfortunately this smacks of a continuing duplicity from two governments
which illegally invaded this sovereign nation in 2003 and occupy it still.”

"The execution of Saddam Hussien changes none of that. And neither does it
change the horror that is the day to day reality for millions of ordinary
IRAQI's. It is surely something to reflect upon that the Iraqi population
will openly admit they preferred the days of Saddam to the miserable life
and death they face now.”

“The key question facing the world today remains, was the US/UK invasion in
2003 the right way to get rid of Saddam Hussein's tyranny in Iraq. And the
emphatic and inescapable answer is no it wasn't. “

'”Looking at the sectarian carnage in Iraq today, with more people dying
each season than were killed on 9/11, the illegal invasion remains morally
repugnant and Saddams execution even politically irrelevant amidst all
that."

"The sickening sectarian carnage of violence which the US and British
invasion unleashed is the daily reality for thousands of ordinary Iraqis and
will continue and perhaps even be accelerated by Saddam's execution in the
short term."

"The brutal truth is that the war and the occupation launched by Bush and
Blair has spawned a horror against which the execution of Saddam is likely
to be little more than a further bloody footnote."

"The SSP believes the war in IRAQ to be a catastrophic failure of policy by
Bush and Blair and will define them forever more. “

“The longer the illegal US/British occupation continues the greater the
bloodshed for the Iraqi people and the greater the defeat for Britain and
America.”

'Today it is appropriate to repeat again the need for the immediate
withdrawal of all UK and US troops from Iraq and bring this nightmare to an
end"

Merry Xmas and Happy New Year to all

2006-12-23T17:40:00.000Z

Xmas comes early for Jack

2006-12-23T17:29:00.000Z

Last week

Frances, Barbara, Felicity and myself went to Bute House to deliver this Christmas card, signed by hundereds of Edinburgh residents at the local farmers market, supporting free school meals to Jack McConnell. He wasn't in bah humbug!

Trident motion in parliament

2006-12-21T14:21:00.000Z

S2M-5355.1 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Trident— As an amendment to motion S2M-5355 in the name of Nicola Sturgeon (Trident), leave out from “notes” to end and insert “believes Trident nuclear weapons to be both illegal under international law, as they cannot distinguish between enemy combatants on the one hand and innocent civilians on the other, and immoral; calls on the Westminster Parliament to oppose the White Paper on the replacement of the Trident nuclear weapons system and to recognise Britain’s obligations under the nuclear non-proliferation treaties; believes that the £25 billion needed to replace Trident would be better spent on health, education and social services, and calls on all parliamentarians to support the Faslane 365 day of protest on 8 January 2007 for MSPs, MPs and MEPs outside the naval base on the Clyde”.

Lodged on 20 December 2006; current

Trident debate in parliament

2006-12-21T11:50:00.000Z

there was a debate in the parliament today on Trident, here are the notes of the speech I made in the debate you can also find some coverage on the BBC by following this link http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/6198607.stm

Trident 21/12/06
1 I welcome this debate because it is important and the chances of Labour bringing it up in their time, with the huge divisions in its ranks, are zero.

2 This debate should be raging across Britain, the full implications of developing yet more nuclear weapons of mass destruction engaging all civic and democratic institutions because it affects us all.

3 It’s a huge issue for our age; one which puts all humanity at risk,
one where the legality of theses weapons under international law is put under close scrutiny,
one which casts doubt on Britain’s commitment to the nuclear non proliferation treaties it has signed , and
one where enormous sums of money which could be spent on health, education and social services are to go on nuclear bombs.

5 But of course it is precisely these issues, those of international legality and concern for humanity where Tony Blair doesn’t shine.
His legacy, the catastrophic failure of policy in IRAQ stands for evermore round his neck.

6 And neither should we be surprised at him steamrollering this debate. Blair is not comfortable with democracy. He lied to us on Iraq and he lies to us again on this debate.
His cabinet has already decided and his chancellor has already allocated the funds, and his First Minister ahs jumped into line, so his appeal for a full and open debate is another sham.

7 Don’t believe me? Where were members on June 12th this year?
On June 12th I visited Aldermaston Atomic Weapons Establishment part of Scottish CND deputation.
We were taken round the perimeter fence of the base by veteran CND activists- AWE management would not meet us.
Shown where the manufacture of nuclear warheads took place.
Shown where the development of replacement Trident system is already far advanced.

8 In the afternoon we travelled up to Westminster where we met Dr Hans Blix the UN weapons Inspector. He was in London to present his latest report on the nuclear non proliferation treaty and how the countries who had signed up to it were not honouring their commitments.

9 That evening Gordon Brown in his Mansion House speech announced that he had already allocated the £25bn plus needed for replacing Trident.

10 Yesterday Tony Blair had the affrontery to tell us we are, in this epoch, locked into a battle between democracy and extremism.
If that is right then he is certainly not on the side of Democracy? He doesn’t know the meaning of the word.

11 The majority of Scots have expressed their opinion about Trident.
They are opposed to it and believe they make Scotland less safe.

12 An independent Scotland would scrap Trident of that I have no doubt.
Just as, an independent Scotland would not have sent Scottish soldiers to fight an illegal war in Iraq.

13 Britain is one of just 9 countries in the world with nuclear weapons.
Weapons designed to annihilate entire countries, making no distinction between enemy combatants and innocent civilians. That’s what makes them both illegal and immoral.

14 Tony Blair is the extremist who holds the threat of nuclear annihilation over the world. He is a threat to his neighbours, with nuclear missiles he is a threat to every nation. So where are the UN weapons inspectors now?

15 Who protects the world from Kim Jung Blair? He has weapons of mass destruction and has also ‘got form’ attacking and invading other countries! Iraq! Who protects the world from Kim Blair Il!

16 Reminds me of Anacharsis – the Greek philosopher who once said that ‘laws are like cobwebs – strong enough to hold the weak but not able to hold back the strong’!
In other words the NNPT is there to hold back those small nations- North Korea’s defiance not withstanding - but the big nations, as Hans Blix concludes, the powerful nuclear nations, they don’t take a blind bit of notice.

17 ‘THE ULTIMATE INSURANCE’ he calls it. Trident nuclear weapons provide us with– the ‘ultimate insurance’ claims Tony Blair ‘a safeguard against attack.’ The US has 32,000 and it didn’t stop 9/11.
The nature of the threat has rendered these illegal and immoral missile systems obsolete in the so called ‘war on terror’.

18 How dare Tony Blair warn Kim Jong –il of North Korea not to develope nuclear missiles and then turn round and spend £25bn - £75bn of our money on more Trident weapons of mass destruction.
Who insures the world from Blairism?

18 The £25bn - £75bn could be better spent on health, education and social services, not on weapons designed to blow entire nations to smithereens.
*No Labour members who support Trident Two can in future in all conscience stand up in this Chamber without attracting ridicule and dare claim there is no money for free school meals, no money to abolish NHS prescription charges or for free personal care for the elderly
– not when they are prepared to spend billions on Trident 2.

19 There are 9 countries in the world with nuclear weapons – 9!
USA 32,500. Russia 16,000 France 400, UK 240, China 200, India 110 Pakistan 100, Israel 100 and North Korea 4.
Only US has ever used them in war and yet they have more than everyone else put together. Who protects the world from George Bush?

20 Trust in politics has never been in shorter supply.
And you just can’t trust Labour on Trident. Gordon Brown in 1984 said Trident was ‘….unacceptably expensive, economically wasteful and military unsound’ June 19th 1984 and now he’s all for them?
Blair shows the same inconsistency - a maverick warmongering leader to compare with any turnaround of Kim Jung Il!

21 SUPPORT FASLANE 365 – Protest on Jan 8th
Scottish CND have begun a year long protest outside the Faslane Naval base and as part of that exercise they have invited Parliamentarians to join them on Jan 8th. I will be there. I hope all MSP’s here today will join me. ENDS

Former SNP candidate leaves to join SSP

2006-12-19T12:11:00.000Z

Chris Sagan , who was SNP candidate in East Dumbartonshire at last year’s Westminster general election has joined the Scottish Socialist Party.

Chris, who is a teacher in Bishopriggs, said that he was increasingly unhappy at the rightward drift of the SNP and attracted to the SSP by its keynote policies on poverty and independence.

Chris said:

“My main reason for joining the SSP is a positive endorsement of the party as being on the side of the poor. Policies such as Free School Meals and free Public Transport are both just and deliverable and would I believe make major inroads into combating inequality in Scotland.”

“As a life long supporter of independence I fully support the SSP demand for a democratic, Scottish republic with the real powers to change peoples’ lives for the better.”

“I don’t want to spend a lot of time on the SNP other than to say that it seems to be watering down its concern for ordinary people in a bid to cosy up to the business community.”

“That was clearly shown last Monday by the absence of any SNP MSPs from the Farepak protest in Edinburgh—presumably to avoid offending the HBOS ‘fat cats’.”

“Like many Scots, I don’t want to just swap New Labour for New SNP. I have joined the SSP because it calls for an independent, nuclear free, socialist Scotland.”

Welcoming Chris’s decision to join the socialists SSP leader Colin Fox said:

“Chris Sagan is a very important gain for us. He is the latest in a steady stream of people joining the SSP who recognise a party of integrity which is passionate about winning a different kind of Scotland not dominated by big business.”

“I am proud to welcome Chris and indeed all the other new members across Scotland to our party and to the fight for an independent, nuclear fee, socialist Scotland which is going from strength to strength, gaining support each week in the polls. I am sure Chris Sagan will be at the heart of our work between now and next year’s Scottish Parliament elections.”

Bring back our buses

2006-12-16T08:19:00.000Z

As a regular user of public transport I know how invaluable getting a bus can be. I'm lucky in that I live on a main route into the city centre where buses are almost ten a penny. I've lodged this motion in the parliament to try and highlight some of the local campaigns to maintain or resurrect bus routes.

S2M-5327 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Bring Back Our Buses Campaign— That the Parliament notes that several vital community bus services in the Edinburgh area have been cut or made virtually unaffordable through fare increases over the last year; applauds the efforts of the South Queensferry Bus Users’ Group in campaigning for affordable fares and of the “Bring Back our Buses” campaign in calling for the retention of frequent services on the 13, 18, 38 routes and the reinstatement of full services on the 67, 20 and 60 routes, which are much used by OAPs and other vulnerable members of excluded communities in Blackhall, Ratho, Dumbiedykes, Wester Hailes and Pilton, and believes that local authorities should be allowed to regulate bus routes and timetables to ensure that marginalised communities are able to access services and amenities.

Lodged on 14 December 2006; current

Fox Scrap Trident Call

2006-12-16T07:43:00.000Z

This is a press release I sent into the Edinburgh Evening News yesterday afternoon. Shortly after sending I saw a poll run by BBC Scotland which shows that a majority of Scottish MPs are opposed to nuclear weapons on the Clyde. Many of these MPs were Labour MPs and much pressure will be put on them in the coming weeks to back Tony Blair's plans to maintain weapons of mass destruction on the Clyde. The will of the Scottish people is clear - MPs are opposed to Trident and the feedback from the streets show that the public are opposed to Trident.
however the democratic deficit that arises from the Westminster system means that we will have these heinous machines of destruction foisted upon us by an unholy alliance of Labour and Tory MPs.
Surely the time has come for the people of Scotland to take control of their own affairs. Son of Trident highlights the fight, not only, for Scottish independance but also for the kind of Scotland we are fighting for! A low waged haven for business where the privateers are in control using the celtic tiger model favoured by the SNP or an independant republic based on principles of public ownership, equality and democracy?

Scottish Socialist Party MSP Colin Fox will press christmas shoppers on Princes Street to write to Tony Blair and protest against Trident nuclear missiles. In particular the MSP is angry at the Prime Ministers decision to deny the country a meaningful say in the Trident debate. Fox believes the Cabinet has already made up its mind on the issue and that instructions have already been given to Ministry of Defence chiefs to spend upwards of £25bn on a second generation of Trident nuclear submarines.
The Lothians MSP told us
"When I visited the Atomic Weapons factory at Aldermaston in Berkshire in June I saw for myself the silo's where these nuclear weapons are manufactured. It was clear to me back then that plans were well advanced to build the new missiles.Contracts with American companies like Lockheed Martin and MacDonnell Douglas were already in place. As it happened, on the same day I visited Aldermaston, Gordon Brown announced that he had allocated the £25bn needed to replace these weapons of mass destruction in his budget settlement.
So I expect shoppers in Edinburgh today to take with a pinch of salt claims by Tony Blair that a full democratic debate will take place on whether or not we replace Trident before the Commons votes on it in late January. Just as he lied to us on Iraq he is lying to us again over our rights to a democratic debate. The decision has already been taken and his so called debate is a sham. This is the man who put the con into consultation".

The Lothians MSP believes public opinion in Scotland is heavily opposed to Trident nuclear weapons which are based at Faslane Naval headquarters on the Clyde.

Free Public Transport for all

2006-12-15T20:05:00.000Z

This is a copy of an article I sent to the South Edinburgh Echo

31, 7, 37, 47, 3, 8, 29 no it’s not my lottery numbers, it’s the buses I get into the city from my end of the Inch.
I hate taking my car into town, its just a nasty, irritating, frustrating experience -driving up Minto Street, along South Clerk Street [past my constituency office] and then onto the Bridges – and just don’t get me started on ‘the joys of parking’!
Of course when you add up all our journeys and the cumulative effect of traffic pollution and congestion, the cost to the Scottish economy of all these hours of gridlock morning and evening is horrendous. Across Scotland the environmental damage from these poisonous gas emissions is enormous. All the experts warn we simply can’t go on like this.

It is time for a radical solution. And the Scottish Socialist Party believe we have found one - free public transport for everyone. Free bus travel, free train travel and free ferry travel.
Think of the likely impact in tackling traffic congestion for a start. There would be a very real incentive to leave your car at home. It would dramatically reduce CO2 emissions.
It would also assist those excluded from participation in everyday travel activities which the better off can afford and it would benefit the wider economy by freeing everyone from the daily grind of traffic gridlock and mindless commuting. Added to that it would significantly reduce road accidents as the number of cars on our roads would be halved.

Many will rightly argue that it is the direction we are moving in anyway. The Scottish Executive’s free public transport scheme for senior citizens has been such a success it is soon to be rolled out further. More and more people are using public transport as the decline of the past twenty five years has been halted and passenger numbers soar.
In Hasselt in Belgium, a city the same size as Edinburgh, the authorities faced much the same problems as here with traffic congestion and pollution. They adopted a free fares policy and the result was that the region saw a dramatic fall in traffic volumes and pollution levels.

There is no doubt in my mind that if we make public transport the most attractive option people will take it. In the early 1980’s Ken Livingstone’s GLC implemented a far reaching public transport policy in London which slashed fares and opened up thousands of new bus routes. The initiative saw the numbers using public transport increase 870%.

Think how much easier journeys in Edinburgh South would become. Consider how do you get to work at the Western General hospital or at BAe on Ferry Road or the Gyle at the moment in your car?

Certainly making public transport free would mean we would need more buses, trains and trams to cope with the demand. That for me is a given and must obviously be added to the cost.
So what about the cost? Most transport experts and academics suggest it would cost about £1bn if you add the current income which would be lost and the cost of extra investment in new buses, trains etc. But against that must be offset the cost of doing nothing, the benefits to the wider economy and of course the quality of life for travelers and also the cost to the NHS of road traffic accidents and deaths.
In the week Tony Blair announces there is anywhere between £25bn and £75bn available for a hugely unpopular second generation of Trident weapons then surely no one is going to argue there I no money around!

I believe the months leading up to the Holyrood elections afford us the opportunity to debate the issues of congestion and pollution in full and debate the likeliest solutions. To me offering free public transport to everyone is the most imaginative and attractive solution and the one most likely to succeed.

Death of Pinochet

2006-12-15T19:57:00.000Z

I shed no tears at news of the death of General Augusto Pinochet this week.
The former President of Chile came to power in 1973 after he overthrew the democratically elected socialist government of Dr Salvador Allende in a brutal repression of democracy. With the backing of the US, Pinochet launched a bloody coup d’etat against the popularly elected government and was responsible for the torture and death of tens of thousands of trades unionists and political activists. To this day many of the bodies have never been found or identified.
Pinochet has never faced justice for his actions. He was hailed as a hero by Thatcher and Reagan, protected by the right internationally and despised by human rights groups and the left to his dying day.

The director Costa Garvas captured the events powerfully in ‘Missing’ a film starring Jack Lemmon and Cissy Spazek. I remember seeing it and being shocked at how the world could stand back and see the ‘Britain of Latin America’ as Chile was then considered – because of its long history of stable parliamentary democracy in a continent well known for coups and military uprising – suffer such interference from US state and economic forces.

Salvador Allende

The events of Chile in 1973 remain a potent warning to democrats the world over.
Today in Latin America left leaders have been elected to power in Venezuala, Bolivia, Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil, Peru and of course Chile itself – not to mention Cuba, where we may be approaching Fidel Castro’s last days.

Scottish Executive hypocrisy on hate crimes

2006-12-14T11:53:00.000Z

S2W-30449 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 7 December 2006) : To ask the Scottish Executive how it reconciles the position taken by the Minister for Justice and the Lord Advocate on the benefit of applying racist and sectarian aggravations in respect of hate crime with its decision not to provide such protection to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and disabled people.

Answered by Johann Lamont (19 December 2006): The Scottish Executive deplores all crime, particularly that motivated by prejudice of any kind. The common law in Scotland allows the courts to take forms of prejudice into account as aggravating factors. We consider that the creation of further statutory aggravations would work against our wider objective of improving consistency in sentencing. We are at present considering carefully how that objective can be achieved, against the background of the recommendations contained in the Sentencing Commission’s recent report on the matter.

S2W-30370 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 5 December 2006) : To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will reconsider its decision not to implement the recommendation in the report of the Working Group on Hate Crime that there should be a statutory aggravation for crimes motivated by malice or ill-will towards people based on their sexual orientation, transgender identity or disability, similar to that of sectarianism and racism.

Answered by Johann Lamont (19 December 2006): I refer the member to the answer to question S2O-11201 on 23 November 2006. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

S2W-30369 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 5 December 2006) : To ask the Scottish Executive what the ministerial decision-making process was that resulted in the Executive deciding not to implement the recommendation in the report of the Working Group on Hate Crime that there should be a statutory aggravation for crimes motivated by malice or ill-will towards people based on their sexual orientation, transgender identity or disability, similar to that of sectarianism and racism.

Answered by Johann Lamont (19 December 2006): This decision was taken following normal procedure in the context of collective Cabinet responsibility, namely, after full and careful consideration by all those ministers with an interest in the matter. The member will also wish to take account of my answer to question S2O-11201 on 23 November 2006. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website the search facility for which can be found at:
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

Latest parliamentary motions

2006-12-14T11:15:00.000Z

S2M-5295 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Nuclear Submarine Workers' Health and Safety at HM Naval Base Faslane— That the Parliament shares the concern of the former Faslane and Rosyth radiation controller, Mr John Connor, that no mandatory secondary monitoring (MSM) takes place on radiation workers leaving nuclear submarines at the naval base; notes that Mr Connor has approached the Health and Safety Executive, the Ministry of Defence and the Westminster Parliamentary Ombudsman regarding his concerns that MSM is implemented in all other nuclear establishments in Britain, but not those at Faslane and Rosyth, and the need to protect all those working on nuclear submarines from radiation sicknesses, and calls on the Defence Select Committee at Westminster to investigate the substance of Mr Connor’s concerns at the earliest possible opportunity and allay the fears of many former employees and their families as well as those currently working at Faslane regarding nuclear safety.

Supported by: Bruce Crawford, Frances Curran, Rosie Kane, Carolyn Leckie, John Swinburne

Lodged on 07 December 2006; current

S2M-5269.3 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Civic Participation - Trade Union Engagement with Scotland's Civic Society— As an amendment to motion S2M-5269 in the name of Ms Margaret Curran (Civic Participation - Trade Union Engagement with Scotland's Civic Society), leave out from "strength" to end and insert "important part that free independent trade unions play in civic Scotland today; welcomes the Scottish Trades Union Congress’s (STUC) role over many years in promoting trade union values and the interests of working people in Scotland on a wide variety of matters such as job protection, pay and conditions, health and safety and equal opportunities; welcomes the STUC's information week at the Parliament, and recognises the just cause of the workers at McKinnon Mills in Coatbridge and public sector workers across Scotland seeking to secure their right to equal pay for work of equal value.”

Lodged on 05 December 2006; 07 December 2006

See S2M-5269

Hugo Chavez drives on with Bolivarian revolution

2006-12-14T09:31:00.000Z

At the beginning of this month the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, won the presidential elections with an increased share of the vote. His support went up from 56% in 1998 to 63%.
This is despite the attempts by the right to paint him as some kind of a rogue leader and his Bolivarian revolution being unpopular and leading to economic destruction.
Chavez’s programme of public ownership and wealth redistribution has been proven to be increasing in popularity not decreasing. There is still a long way to go for the Bolivarian revolution but I’m sure we can take heart that the ideas of socialism can work when given the chance to be put into practice.

SSP fortunes looking up

2006-12-14T08:47:00.000Z

In the past few weeks things have certainly been looking up for the SSP - I've spoken at a series of public meetings across Scotland about our Free School Meals bill. A host of people have joined the party as a result of these meetings, in particular the meeting we held in Lochgelly was very good. 30 people came along to hear what Lorna Bett, the SSP top of the list candidate for Mid Scotland & Fife region, had to say.

As well as these meetings we launched plans for a radical, free public transport policy at the start of December. this was quickly followed by the most recent poll published in the Sunday Herald putting the SSP on 4%.

As I've said before - the best days of the SSP are ahead of us!

The people you meet on Princes Street

2006-12-14T08:38:00.000Z

My friend Gemma came over to the stall against son of Trident last Saturday - perhaps her boyfriend, Hearts star Roman Bednar, (pictured) could arrange a meeting for me with his boss Vladimir Romanov to discuss nuclear submarines!

That self same afternoon I spent a miserable afternoon at Tynecastle watching my beloved Motherwell fall to a 4-1 defeat.

Footage of Farepak protest @ HBoS HQ

2006-12-12T20:18:00.000Z

Colin Fox

Suzy Hall

Fox launches nuclear fight

2006-12-11T15:26:00.000Z

SOCIALIST leader Colin Fox was expected to lead a campaign on Princes Street today against plans to replace Britain's ageing nuclear deterrent.
The Lothians MSP condemned Prime Minister Tony Blair's £25 billion proposal to build new Trident nuclear missiles, unveiled on Monday.
Mr Fox said: "These Trident nuclear missiles are indiscriminate and capable of wiping out whole cities and consequently killing civilians and combatants alike and as such are illegal under international law."

Article from Edinburgh Evening News Sat 9th Dec

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com

Farepak demo tonight

2006-12-11T14:48:00.000Z

I'll be attending the demo outside the HBoS headquarters on the mound tonight at 5.30. I hope that the coverage of this demo will help persuade HBoS to do the right thing by the Farepak customers.

please follow this link for an article in yesterdays Sunday Herald
http://www.sundayherald.com/news/heraldnews/display.var.1066459.0.politicians_snub_hbos_party_over_farepak.php

Letter to trade unionists about HBOS protest

2006-12-07T12:39:00.000Z

5th December 2006
Support ‘Un–Fairpak’ protest outside HBOS HQ December 11th at 5.30pm
As you will be aware, 150,000 customers of Farepak budgeting for Christmas via the company’s savings scheme have lost £45m as a result of the firm’s collapse.It is now clear that Farepak had been accepting deposits long after it became clear they were insolvent. And it has also emerged that the Halifax Bank of Scotland may have been aware a year ago the company was in difficulty. It is believed the bank foreclosed on a loan in October, precipitating Farepak’s collapse and has now taken the £45m for itself.Farepak customers have formed themselves into a protest group called ‘Unfairpak’ and are seeking to recover the £45m and fully compensate the savers, 90% of whom are low paid women workers.‘ Unfairpak’ has pressed the moral and economic case with the Halifax Bank of Scotland that they should release the money but to no avail. The bank has offered just £2m. We do not consider this to be acceptable, frankly it is adding insult to injury.We understand HBOS plans to hold a ‘Christmas Champagne Reception’ for top executives and VIP customers at its headquarters on December 11th. ‘Unfairpak’ intends to mount a peaceful protest at it and we would like you to join us. As the bank spends some of its £4.5bn profits from last year entertaining its guests we intend to focus public attention on what we feel are their social responsibilities. Fat cats sipping expensive champagne or low paid women workers seeking justice at Christmas, where do you stand?We are calling on people across the Lothians to join Farepak customers incensed by HBOS’s actions on the protest at HBOS headquarters at the Mound in Edinburgh at 6pm on Monday 11th December. We believe we can make our point effectively.Please bring your banners and send messages of support to - suzy@unfairpak.co.uk

Yours sincerely
Suzy Hall and Colin Fox MSP

World AIDS Day

2006-12-06T20:14:00.000Z

On Friday I was very pleased to show my support for Oxfam's World Aids day - you can read the Oxfam press release below. Of course the points made so well by students about poverty and inability in the third world to pay for medicines chimes with the campaign to abolish prescription charges here.

Students, Oxfam & Annie Lennox back World AIDS Day

Developing World needs 4.2 million health workers

Scottish students will join Oxfam in Scotland to mark World AIDS Day, [Today, 1st December]. Students and Oxfam campaigners will back Oxfam’s campaign to ensure everyone living with HIV and AIDS has access to the medicines they need.

Oxfam is calling on pharmaceutical companies to supply affordable medicines to all who need them and want governments to pay over £12.7 billion per year for 4.2 million extra health workers.

In order to highlight the plight of HIV and AIDS sufferers students will pose as ‘patients’ in a hospital bed with a text board on the front of the bed with Diagnosis: “Too Poor to Pay". Next to the bed will be a sales rep from "Big Pharma", holding a giant pillbox out of reach of the patient. The pillbox will be labelled “ Profit Pills put profit before People”.

Eurythmics star Annie Lennox, who is backing Oxfam’s campaign, said,

“ Last year, 8,000 people died every single day from AIDS, and there were 14,000 new infections each day. Poor countries are being forced to deal with an unprecedented health crisis without the means to tackle it.

“ Governments can only show how seriously they are taking this crisis by taking immediate action to provide four million extra health workers and to grant those in need access to affordable medicines.”

Adam Ramsay, Co -convenor of Edinburgh University’s People and Planet said,

“ Forty million people in the world are suffering from HIV and AIDS. What is needed is for people in developing countries to be able to get affordable medicines easily.

“ People everywhere who have HIV and AIDS should have the same rights to life enhancing medicines regardless of their social class, nationality or gender. World AIDS Day gives a chance to ram home the message around the HIV and AIDS epidemic.”

John McAllion, campaigner for Oxfam in Scotland added,

“ The record of the pharmaceutical industry in putting profits before patients has been abysmal. They have continually lobbied rich country governments to provide stricter patent protection for their products in trade negotiations, and have put legal pressure on poor countries that dared to use international safeguards to guarantee public access to cheaper generic drugs.

“ Big Pharma companies must accept that people’s lives should always come before their commercial interests. Lives must not be put at risk for the sake of company profits.”

ENDS

Contact: Eileen Clarkson on 0141 285 8859/07770 281419

EDITORS NOTES

1) The event will take place on Fri 1st December 1-2pm outside the main library at Edinburgh University on George Square.
2) Students from Edinburgh University’s People and Planet Group, Oxfam Volunteers and Stop Aids societies are taking part in the ‘Big Pharma’ stunt
3) Also attending are Mark Lazarowicz MP, Gavin Strang MP, John Barratt MP, Colin Fox MSP, Sarah Boyack MSP, Mike Pringle MSP, Margaret Smith MSP and Mark Ballard MSP.
4) 39.6 million men, women and children now live with HIV, 14,000 people are newly infected every day, and 2.9 million people died this year from AID –related illnesses. Two-thirds of people living with HIV are in sub-Saharan Africa. There are now more women than men infected by HIV.
5) Annie Lennox has recorded a 15 and 35 second audio piece for radio/web broadcast which can be downloaded from:
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/press/downloads/annielennox.htm

SSP backs free public transport plan

2006-12-05T13:04:00.000Z

On Sunday our executive committee backed a radical plan to make all Scottish public transport free. in a major attempt to tackle pollution, cut chronic traffic congestion and tackle traffic related ill health. The plan will be put to the party’s national council this weekend and is likely to form a flagship policy of our campaign for next year’s Scottish elections.

Free public transport would be the biggest pro- environment and anti pollution measure ever enacted by any national government.”“It would also boost real incomes and be a major anti poverty and pro social inclusion measure. It would also benefit Scotland's tourism industry.

SSP Policy co-ordinater Alan McCombes said:
“With just ten years to halt global warming we need radical solutions for the gravest crisis facing humanity.“By moving towards a free fare public transport system Scotland can lead the world as it did during the enlightenment.”

Read more about this radical new policy:

The case for free public transport

http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/transport/transport01.html

Funding free public transport

http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/transport/funding.html

Why not public transport?

http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/transport/whynot.html

An idea whose time has come

http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/transport/time.html

A victory for militant trade union strike action

2006-12-04T20:45:00.000Z

A statement on the outcome of Glasgow city council dispute by Richie Venton, SSP national trade union organiser

The planned 3-day strike by UNISON members in Glasgow city council has today been cancelled, after the city council caved in on the very eve of the biggest conflict they faced from trade unionists in several years.The outcome is a substantial victory.The strike was provoked by several factors, but primary amongst these was the cliff-edge pay cuts facing nearly 5,000 workers in March 2009, when the temporary protection of current salaries would have ended. Up to £10,000 a year losses in salary loomed at that point.By balloting for strike action, and refusing to be morally blackmailed by the council and their kept media over the issue of 'life and limb' emergency cover, the union has won a settlement that amounts to idefinite/lifetime protection of current salaries. Either people will be re-trained or their jobs re-designed to guarantee them their current pay by March 2009, or that deadline will be extended indefinitely until such time as these devices kick in. Many workers will be thousands of pounds better off each year as a result of this victory.The only area of some doubt applies to those staff in Culture and Leisure Services, who are threatened by a council plan to hive them off to a charitable Trust, which would only mean the one-year TUPE protection of their current wages - not indefinite protection.In addition to stopping cuts to wages from March 2009 onwards, the threatened strike has also dragged the panic-stricken Labour council back to the negotiating table on all other issues, and there will be trade union representation on a Steering Group to monitor implementation of the deal. No doubt workers will lodge appeals against the grades they have been allocated through the flawed Job Evaluation exercise, and battles will be required to fight off attempts to use new definitions of the working day as a means of dodging overtime rates of pay.But these and other issues - central amongst them in my opinion being resistance to plans to offload Culture and Leisure - can now be taken up by a vastly strengthened trade union, confident after a very substantial victory.Another key lesson in this battle is that the looming May 2007 elections will have concentrated the minds of Labour councillors wonderfully - like hanging does!! They were panic-stricken. Their opening line to union negotiators on Saturday was, "What do you need to avoid this strike?". A stark, simple truth that needs to be re-learnt: strike action works!The Scottish Socialist Party - both within the workforce and outwith it - has played a very positive, substantial part in this workers' struggle against Labour's wage-snatchers. As well as our council worker members helping to lead the UNISON resistance, thousands of SSP Council Workers Voice bulletins have been distributed around virtually every council workplace - first during the ballot, more recently to consolidate the decision to strike - calling for funding off the Scottish Executive to win equal pay without a single penny off the pay of a single worker.Our MSPs and councillors have also taken up the workers' cause, opposing pay cuts as a means of funding so-called equal pay.Some of the details have yet to emerge, but we will also need to be vigilant if the council tries to pay for these concessions through any other forms of cuts to jobs or services - as opposed to demanding extra funds off the Scottish Executive. But a victory is a victory and needs to be recognised, as part of the recovery of workers' confidence.The attention of council workers, the SSP and other trade unionists should now turn to building the UNISON demo in Falkirk on 16 December, against brutal pay cuts from the SNP council, to give a booster to these workers' confidence on the backs of the Glasgow victory.

SSP backs Farepak campaigners 100%

2006-12-04T10:21:00.000Z

The Executive of the Scottish Socialist Party has given Suzy Hall and the Farepak campaigners our 100% backing for their cause after hearing the appalling details of how HBOS has acted in this affair.
Thousands of low paid workers and pensioners have had Christmas 2006 stolen from them.
The SSP is well aware of the rapacious nature of the UK’s banks but our Executive was shocked to be told the details of how the bank has acted in this affair.
The SSP Executive has given the campaigners our 100% backing and will be doing everything we can to mobilise for the lobby of HBOS’s champagne reception on the 11th of December, 5.30pm at the Mound in Edinburgh.

Check the unfairpak website at http://www.unfairpak.co.uk/

Watch the recent debate in the Scottish Parliament at http://www.holyrood.tv/library.asp?title=Members

The debate lasts 1hour 10 minutes (Colin speaks at 37 mins 40 secs)

Socialist Fox on 'power to the people' trip

2006-12-04T10:05:00.000Z

SCOTTISH Socialist leader Colin Fox is to visit Torness nuclear power station on Monday.
The Lothians MSP is expected to meet senior managers and tour the plant.
He said: "I am a convinced opponent of nuclear power but an opponent who wants to conduct the debate about new nuclear capacity and our energy needs on the basis of facts. My visit to Torness is at my own request."
"In particular I want to explore how, in a non-nuclear world, we can harness the experience and skills of the workers who are employed at Torness."
Mr Fox said he hoped to discuss the mechanics of decommissioning nuclear stations and how the skills of the current workforce could be used.
He added: "The Torness site must also have potential, as a coastal location, to play a part in the development of wind and wave power and one thing which I think is urgent is for British Energy to carry out a skills audit of its workforce to assist in slotting them into jobs or further training."
Mr Fox offered to hold a public meeting or debate after his visit.
He said: "Opponents of nuclear power have to set about the serious work of explaining their alternative to both the workers and the public. I for one would be happy, after my visit, to put my case to the people who work in and live near Torness."

Edinburgh Evening News
02/12/06

Stop the War Speech at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire – 2/12/06

2006-12-03T20:38:00.000Z

On Sat 2nd December I was invited to address a Stop the War protest outside RAF Brize Norton.
The base is the main supply station for the British forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is the speech I delivered on behalf of the Scottish Socialist Party.

Thank you for the invitation and warm welcome.
I am both proud to join you here today and to bring you greetings of peace and comradeship from the Scottish Socialist Party.

I congratulate you for drawing attention to Brize Norton, the place from which Britain in effect services its illegal occupation of Iraq.
As we marched round the base this afternoon I noticed, as I am sure you did, the huge transport aircraft taking off for Iraq or Afghanistan. I could not help think of the 120 young men who left this place in just such an aircraft and have not come back. I think of how a young fusilier called Gordon Gentle felt. I also think of the hundreds of other nameless young men who have come back severely injured and traumatised.

As a Member of Parliament I have had to console families in the city of Edinburgh that I represent who have lost sons.

Our appalling losses, because they are appalling, without need or reason, are of course dwarfed by the losses American families have suffered - 3,000 sons who flew out likewise never came back.
But it is above all the poor innocent Iraqi’s who have been butchered most of all – more than 660,000 of them have died who would still be alive were it not for the illegal invasion of their country by alien forces.

The Scottish Socialist Party has opposed this war from day one and every hour since. And we were right. All of us here were right to speak out and we reiterate the demand we have espoused throughout – we call for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all foreign military forces from IRAQ. And to those who say their WILL be civil war I say the blood thirsty civil war in Iraq that claims more than 100 lives a day – a rate 36,500 a year which equals one 9/11 each month – where is the worlds condemnation this time? All this happens because the troops are there, they are plainly not stopping anything!

Much has of course changed in the last three months. MAKE NO MISTAKE. We are witnessing the endgame of the occupation of Iraq, the endgame of a catastrophic failure of policy by Britain and USA.
What are the signs?
- Labour politicians who supported the war are now recanting and asking for forgiveness. Michael Meacher is one of many who says supporting the war in Iraq was the biggest political blunder of his career – we could have told him that and did at the time.
- Generals and majors who just 6 months ago were demanding more troops must be sent in now risk courts martial by publicly condemning MOD military strategy and press for 50% of the troops to be home by May.
- Public opinion has grown inexorably against the government, against the incessant slaughter and pointless strategy. The extent of this was seen last month in the US elections where BUSH got hammered and the first socialist was elected to the Senate.

And let me ask you what is that smell in the air?
It’s the smell of Tony Blair’s legacy. He will soon be gone and good riddance. But how will he be remembered?
As the man whom brought twenty years of the hated Tories to an end? NO
As the first Labour Prime Minister elected with a working majority?
NO
As the first ever Labour Prime Minister elected three times?
NO

He will be remembered as a liar. One who’s every lie was found out.

Tony Blair is responsible for the deaths of those young men who flew out of here to their deaths and for the US deaths too and above all for the 660,000 Iraqis slaughter. Without him things would be oh so different. All those who perished in this catastrophic policy failure stand in stark contrast to outcome, about to retire on a huge pension into a £4m mansion in Belgravia. The millions scattered in his wake will enjoy no such luxury.
Shame on you Tony Blair you will be remembered by us as the worst Prime Minister this country has ever had.

And on Monday he leaves us his parting gift – Britain’s new and deadliest weapons of mass destruction, the second generation of Trident nuclear missiles based on the Clyde near Glasgow.

Only the weak minded among us – Labour MP’s mainly – would accept there is a democratic debate yet to be held.
Let us here today tell Tony Blair- the man who put the ‘con’ in consultation
- We know the decision has already been taken
- -We know Gordon Brown has already earmarked the £75bn
- We know you will have to rely on Tory votes to railroad it through.

Do not insult our intelligence, you are no democrat, you have no democratic credentials - you supported Regime Change Iraq we, true democrats believe regime change in Iraq is the sole and inviolate right of the Iraqi people and nobody else.
Tony Blair is no democrat; he is a warmonger, a war criminal and militarist.

OUR MESSGAE FROM RAF BRIZE NORTON ON THIS WINTERS DAY IS
NO WARS FORM US IMPERIALISM
NO TO TRIDENT

We stand for greater goals, for peace and social progress all mankind.
Thank you.

Fox Targets RAF Base

2006-12-01T16:59:00.000Z

SCOTTISH Socialist leader Colin Fox will tomorrow address a mass protest outside RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire.
The protest has been arranged by the Stop the War coalition to take its message to the base used to fly troops to Iraq

Edinburgh Evening News 01/12/06

Colin meets Santa

2006-11-29T13:35:00.000Z

Colin Fox MSP joined a Santa hit squad from retail union Usdaw to back a bill banning big stores from opening their doors on Christmas day and New Year’s day.
Thousands of Usdaw members wrote to Colin urging him to back the bill which aims to make sure retail staff have a proper work/life balance in the busy festive period.
“I was delighted to support the bill through its first stage at Holyrood because there was clearly very strong support in Edinburgh from shopworkers and shoppers alike,” said Colin. “The Santas came to Holyrood to make Usdaw’s case which was well researched and made the point that closing big stores on those days wouldn’t harm the Scottish economy or our tourist industry.
“I will continue to support this bill as I believe it allows us to keep Hogmanay as a special day in the Scottish calendar and allows shopworkers time to be with their families on New Year’s Day which is where they should be.
“It was particularly pleasing to get so many letters from my constituents asking for my support for this bill because it proves we do listen to well argued cases.”
Usdaw members will continue to lobby MSPs to support the bill but are encouraged by the continued support of Colin.
“Usdaw members in Lothians have lobbied hard for this bill and are delighted to shave secure the support of Colin, says Usdaw general secretary John Hannett. “It proves the simple democratic act of writing their MSP does work especially when we can prove that this bill will shop staff and make sure Hogmanay remains a time for families.
“Colin has listened carefully to the arguments and our member are delighted he/she has decided to support a bill that allows shopworkers some respite during the festive season.”

Colin inspects the Scottish Executive's Public Transport Policy

2006-11-28T10:56:00.000Z

S2W-29895 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 15 November 2006) : To ask the Scottish Executive what plans it has to extend the national concessionary travel scheme to individuals who are not senior citizens.

Answered by Tavish Scott:

The Scotland-wide Free Bus Scheme for Older and Disabled People already fully meets the Partnership Agreement commitment. As the First Minister and I announced on 9 November 2006, a separate concessionary travel scheme for all young people between the ages of 16 and 18 will start in January 2007. We have no current pIans to extend the concessions available under either scheme to any other groups.

Solectron closure questions

2006-11-28T10:53:00.000Z

S2O-11167 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : To ask the Scottish Executive whether the closure of the Solectron factory in Dunfermline could be avoided by learning any lessons from Motorola¿s closure of its Bathgate facility.

Answered by Allan Wilson (23 November 2006): We recognised the need to move up the value chain in electronics - away from high volume manufacturing and into high-value, knowledge-based areas several years ago and we have been working with the electronics industry to offer companies, including Solectron, assistance in doing this.
However, Solectron made the decision to enter into a period of consultation with a view to closing its facility in Dunfermline as the result of a worldwide consolidation of its manufacturing business.

S2W-29672 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 7 November 2006) : To ask the Scottish Executive when it first learned of Solectron’s plans to close its factory in Dunfermline.

Answered by Nicol Stephen (21 November 2006): We were first made aware of possible job losses at the facility on 13 October 2006. We were made formally aware of the company’s intention to close the facility on 27 October 2006.

Independance Convention Pt1

2006-11-28T10:24:00.000Z

Last Year I had the pleasure of addressing the launch of the Scottish Independance convention

Independance convention Pt2

2006-11-28T10:23:00.000Z

Air-brushed into History!

2006-11-27T20:10:00.000Z

Article from the Herald Diary 24/11/06

JUST TO PUT YOU IN THE PICTURE
The Scottish Parliaments annual report has just been published and the front cover makes for interesting reading at least. It shows all 128 MSP’s posing together in a group photograph on the steps leading up from the Garden lobby at Holyrood to the debating chamber.

But look closely and you notice that all is not as it seems. Because the picture was taken earlier this summer when all of the SSP MSP’s were, dare I mention it, tied up elsewhere! Suffice it to say that they had their mug shots taken separately and then airbrushed into the photo later on.

Not quite the experience Trotsky had,eh?

New Labour Fear Trident Debate

2006-11-27T18:41:00.000Z

Below is a letter I sent to the Sunday Herald last weekend

26/11/06

Dear Sir
New Labour Fear Trident Debate
Whilst reading Iain McWhirter’s piece on ‘Why a new Trident can only make the world a more dangerous place’ in last week Sunday Herald, I was interrupted by Northern Ireland Minister Peter Hain speaking to Andrew Marr on TV on the same subject.
Hain amply confirmed for me Iain McWhirter’s opening salvo – no pun intended - that Labour had already decided to replace Trident ahead of any debate. When Hain said ‘Cabinet has not yet had a discussion on the detail of all this’ few could be left in any doubt nonetheless that the principle of replacing these Intercontinental weapons has already been discussed and agreed.

I must confess McWhirters conclusion has been obvious for me from ‘New’, or should that be ‘Nuclear’, Labour since I visited the Aldermaston Weapons Establishment as part of a Scottish CND delegation in June. It was obvious then that preparations were far advanced for the manufacture of the second generation of Trident missiles. Gordon Brown, whom Iain McWhirter unconvincingly suggests is ‘no nuclear enthusiast’, announced that same day, in his Mansion House speech that he would make available the £75bn needed for the next generation of British WMD’s.

Given all that, Labour’s promise of a full and open public debate on this issue is rather lame. There will be no debate on the matter, open or otherwise because New Labour is frightened of the debate. The party which put the ‘con’ in consultation has already agreed to buy these weapons from the US. Clearly their emphasis now is in making the vote itself a formality. Peter Hain warned his Labour colleagues they were ‘all elected on a manifesto committed to defend an independent nuclear deterrent.’

And look at in whose nuclear company New Labour now stands. Only nine nations have developed nuclear weapons; Bush’s America, which has some 16,500 nuclear warheads, Putin’s Russia, who even use them as a deterrent against dissidents, China, Israel, Pakistan, India, France and now Kim Jung Ill’s North Korea. What a rogue’s gallery that is! And in the crazy world of ‘deterrence’ these countries all argue, just like Peter Hain, that they must have them because we already have them.

Compared to the Labour Party’s dishonesty and fear of debate, the Scottish Socialist Party would welcome an open and honest examination of the issue. We are keen for the public to see the chasm that exists between ‘Nuclear Labour’s’ position on all this and ours. Our policy is clear and unequivocal, nuclear weapons are immoral and a colossal waste of money. We would instead spend the £75bn on improving our health record, on greater educational access and opportunity, on our creaking social services, on lifting our youngsters and our seniors out of poverty, and by no means the least, on exporting peace throughout the world not militarism and illegal invasions of sovereign nations.

Colin Fox MSP
National Convenor
Scottish Socialist Party
EDINBURGH

Coming Soon - Is there a Scottish road to socialism?

2006-11-27T18:35:00.000Z

Socialists in Scotland have previously been presented with
parliamentary and British roads to socialism in the past.
Since the devolution referendum of 1997 and the arrival of
the Scottish Parliament in 1999 with its rainbow politics, it
is apt to now ask Is there a Scottish road to socialism?
Notwithstanding recent developments, like the split in the
Scottish Socialist Party and the rise in opinion poll support for
independence, there are longstanding debates about whether
a Scottish road to socialism is possible or desirable. The
various contributors were asked to consider the issues of what
they mean by socialism; how and where can their socialism
be achieved; and what role can Scottish developments play in
the international movement for social justice and socialism.
The contributors were drawn from across the national-unionist
divide and include John McAllion, Robin McAlpine, Vince Mills,
David Purdy, Joe Middleton, Pam Currie, Campbell Martin,
Bill Wilson, Stuart Fairweather, John Foster, Richard Leonard,
Peter McColl, Eric Canning and Neil Davidson.

Is there a Scottish Road to Socialism? is edited by
Colin Fox and Gregor Gall.

Farepak Questions in the Parliament

2006-11-26T20:52:00.000Z

S2W-30006 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 20 November 2006) : To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has considered making representations to the Department of Trade and Industry to examine whether a bond scheme similar to the ABTA scheme for the holiday industry would better protect customers in future, in light of the Farepak collapse.

ANSWER
Answered by Allan Wilson (4 December 2006): I wrote to Ian McCartney, Minister of State at the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) at the beginning of November about Farepak. In his response he indicated that the Office of Fair Trading and the Financial Services Authority are currently working with the DTI to advise him on the regulatory framework surrounding the collapse of Farepak and consider options to address any issues raised. This is to see what might be done to protect customers of such businesses and prevent a similar situation arising in the future. This work will be completed as soon as possible and I have asked to be kept informed.
As I understand matters Farepak was a member of the Hamper Industry Trade Association (HITA). A condition of membership was that each member deposited with HITA a bond to the value of £100,000. This bond was simply a commitment of good intent by each member and was never intended to compensate agents and customers in the event of a situation such as Farepak arising.

S2W-30007 - Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) (Date Lodged 20 November 2006) : To ask the Scottish Executive what support it intends to give the Farepak customers’ protest outside the Halifax Bank of Scotland headquarters on 11 December 2006.

ANSWER
Answered by Allan Wilson (4 December 2006): The Scottish Executive will not be taking any part in the Farepak customers’ protest outside the Halifax Bank of Scotland headquarters on 11 December. It is for individuals to decide if they wish to protest for or against a particular issue or event.

S2M-5169.1 Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP) : Christmas Day and New Year's Day Trading (Scotland) Bill

2006-11-26T20:49:00.000Z

As an amendment to motion S2M-5169 in the name of Karen Whitefield (Christmas Day and New Year's Day Trading (Scotland) Bill), insert at end “and, in so doing, recognises that both days are special and are defined public holidays and should be treated in exactly the same way.”

Lodged on 21 November 2006; 22 November 2006