Great news? This will probably encourage the “get rid of Scotland because it votes Labour” tendency.

Labour’s share of the vote actually went up by 4% and by 551 in absolute terms.

xD.

“This will probably encourage the “get rid of Scotland because it votes Labour” tendency”.

Not half as much as an SNP victory. At least the new MP and his party believe in the union, unlike both the Nationalists (out of principle) and the Tories (out of selfish, misguided, destructive electoral opportunism).

Hmm. I’d agree with Ross, but he seems to be implying that the SNP aren’t guilty of “selfish, misguided, destructive electoral opportunism”, rather than using that as a base for their entire existence.

Also, hooray.

A disaster for the SNP? A victory for Brown and evidence of the ‘Brown Bounce’?
Nonsense.

Labour picked up an extra 551 votes after a huge campaign where even the PM broke with tradition and turned up (with his new electoral weapon, of course – his wife)

The SNP picked up an extra 4,478 votes, with a swing of almost 5%

The LibDems vote completely collapsed, pulling in just 20% of the votes they received last time.

The Tories saw their vote almost halved.

UKIP increased it’s vote by 276% ! WOW! Hang on though, that’s still only 440, totally irrelevant, so nobody gives a toss.

Lets see: Labour threw everything at this by-election. campaigned heavily on a couple of local issues )it had nothing to do with banks, recession or prudence) and held on to a safe seat with a substantially reduced majority. Y

Yeah, I see it now. Salmond and his party should just give up, pack up and head for the hills.

Jeez! Give me a break!

I find it mildly reassuring that holding on to a safe seat with a reduced majority, after the Prime Minister turned up to canvas, during his and his party’s best month for, ooh, years – and that’s a “spectacular win”.

Given that just about everyone was predicting a defeat, yes it is a spectacular win

Can Ross tell us what evidence he has to back up the opinion that the Tories do not believe in the Union?

Unity – in fact the “pundits” were forecasting a labour hold.

As usual, see the excellent http://www.politicalbetting.com for all the gen.

(It was the (betting) “punters” who were wrong-footed.)

What is all this about “everyone” predicting an SNP win? It was certainly a strong possibility after the last SNP win but there were few people who didn’t alter their position after the financial crisis took hold and after seeing the enormous efforts Brown and the party made to save this seat.

Objectively, looking at the figures, this is neither a disaster for the SNP nor a reason for Labour to rejoice. Still, political activists always take what they want from the results so it’s pointless discussing it with them.

“This will probably encourage the “get rid of Scotland because it votes Labour” tendency”.

This is exceedingly unfair .Cameron has said he would rather have an imperfect Union than none and Ken Clarke`s recommendations only make small inroads into the currently ridiculous position whereby Scottish votes are worth more than English votes ( because it is a Labour stronghold) . I am unable to see what opportunity there has been for opportunism to work on from a Tory perspective. The cynical gerrymandering is on the Labour side and its transparency is the reason , of course , for Brown`s belated and chortlesome interest in Britishness …um ..and devolution which was resisted by Conservatives .
The problems faced by the SNP are entirely predictably in that English tax payers have been asked to guarantee the Scottish financial sector and without us they would be where Iceland is today( Previously part of the circle of prosperity …now the ring of insolvency)
This left Nationalism with no where to go and it is a worry that this might let Brown in . There is no reason to expect this to read straight across into England though, and the looming problem of relying on double counted Scottish votes is only re- stated . The democratic deficit cannot go on forever, but that is not the same thing as getting rid of Scotland just seeking fair representation for England.

Imagine a Brown administration having lost the poplar English vote by a long way( highly likely ) , relying on a client state with two votes and English taxes paying for all manner of goodies . With the amount of pent up English loathing denied any expression I wonder what such an administration could achieve even in the ghastly event it did scrape home .

Very well put.

“This left Nationalism” = National Socialists?

‘getting rid of Scotland’

I believe up here it’s seen as more a case of ‘getting rid of England’.

“This left Nationalism” = National Socialists?” – Oh, Grow up!