Nostra culpa
So where are we now on the elections guddle?
At Westminster, David Cameron chose to major on it in questions to the prime minister.
At Holyrood, Alex Salmond shelved his planned statement on his trip to the US in favour of one re the .
At Westminster, the prime minister repeatedly stated 鈥 accurately 鈥 that the Gould report deliberately avoids apportioning blame.
Also at Westminster, attempted to squash the controversy by tendering an apology for any actions taken by the Scotland Office during his tenure which might have contributed to the mess.
At Holyrood, his sister Wendy Alexander wisely stayed silent, leaving her colleague Andy Kerr to offer an apology on behalf of Labour in Scotland.
Contrition appears to be in vogue. Des Browne has already said sorry; the PM did likewise.
However, they are careful to spread culpability 鈥 as was Gould. They are inviting others to say sorry too.
The mood is nostra, not mea, culpa.
Specifically, Andy Kerr suggested that Mr Salmond might care to join the litany of apologies, in his case for the 鈥淎lex Salmond for First Minister鈥 tag on the regional list ballot paper which was criticised by Gould.
Mr Salmond declined.
Which leaves us where?
Firstly, looking backwards, still apportioning blame. Should Douglas Alexander resign?
Don鈥檛 expect it any day soon. He is NOT singled out by Gould.
Further, Gould said the big problem was sticking both Holyrood votes on a single ballot paper.
That was endorsed across the major parties. If it was wrong - and it was - then they were all wrong.
Is it tough for Mr Alexander and other Labour Ministers? Yes.
Should they have been more alert to the problems pointed up in the preparation? Yes.
Is it notably awkward for Labour鈥檚 election co-ordinator (Alexander, D)? Yes, especially now it鈥檚 been highlighted by the Tory leader.
But, secondly, looking forwards. Alex Salmond says he accepts all the Gould recommendations; those aimed at Westminster and those for his Scottish Government to implement (dealing with local government for which Holyrood is responsible.)
That means he accepts council elections on a different date from Holyrood. I think they鈥檒l be shifted to 2012, leaving Holyrood a clear run in 2011. That鈥檒l happen, with cross-party support.
It means he accepts the notion of a Chief Returning Officer for elections in Scotland. Bit more scepticism, there. Some wonder whether that cuts across the Electoral Commission.
It means he accepts redrafting the ballot papers. No more cramming both Holyrood votes on a single sheet. Again, he鈥檒l find no arguments.
The big battle? Should Holyrood be given control of Scottish Parliamentary elections? Gould said yes. Salmond says yes. The LibDems say yes. The Greens say yes. The Tories say maybe, but it鈥檚 not the big priority.
And Labour? The early steer was that UK Ministers might accept that administrative control could be shifted to Holyrood. Now they say no. Not necessary, they say, if councils and Holyrood go to the polls on different days.
But I don鈥檛 detect the same degree of opposition among Labour MSPs.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, they seem relatively open to the notion of endorsing that element of Gould, although they鈥檇 want to study the detail.
Me? On balance, with caveats (anathema in confrontational politics), I think it鈥檒l eventually happen.
With careful safeguards and, probably, with Westminster retaining ultimate legislative control. Why? Read Gould.
If you want one team in charge to avoid confusion, it鈥檚 the 鈥渓ogical鈥 option.
Even in partisan politics, logic tends to be powerful.
I'm 
Comments
Why should Westminster retain ultimate control ? In the USA or Canada the individual states control there own affairs and allow central government to legislate on certain issues.
However in the UK its the other way around ,come on Brian be bold about what Scotland could be.
So Wendy Alexander stays silent over her brother's failures in the May Election.
Surprising that somone who talks over the top of others can't even get a squeak out!
How is the bid going Ms. Alexander?
Olympics?
Commonwealth Games?
Football 2016?
No, her attempt to get more money from the public purse to employ some buddies!
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
Brain, Your blogs are super.
Brian, Enjoy your blogs lots, but surely these 'pseudo apologies' raise even more questions? It seems those in power are unable to see the short falls pointed out by this report.
Not that any party is blameless, but some are in a lot deeper than others and it seems the 'Electoral Commission' got off very lightly. They did point out some problems and surely they had the last word on acceptable 'descriptions'.
When the country ie Scotland wants to take responsibility for running more of its own affairs and surely elections are one of those, it also accepts responsibility for its mistakes. I've heard too often about the 'cringe' of blaming others, and when wanting to move forward, the cringers appear to be saying 'no'. What is wrong? There is a long way to go before there is peace - sorry!
In Your otherwise excellent blog ,You missed a very important point.That is that this fiasco came about in large part because The Labour Party saught to arange the Elections to maximise their Party-Political advantage.
The Labour Party may have abandoned the last vestiges of socialist policies,but not the Stalinist dislike of unpredictable elections where the "right" candidate might lose.I find it significant that both Labour's UK and Scottish Leader were elected unopposed.Even the Chinese Communist Party alows the occaisional election.
My apologies, but this was the only forum I could find to complain about the Holyrood Live programme on 大象传媒2 today.
It appears that the presenters must have their say! All that this viewer wanted was to hear the statement that Alex Salmond was making to the Scottish parliament, in live mode, not recorded. If necessary the ancillaries could and should be presented before or after the live debate, not during it. We were also deprived of hearing the statement on the 大象传媒 Parliament programme.
I also think the 大象传媒 presenters should try to avoid gimmicks when giving their spiel (Viz. the boxing one by David someone-or-other). It was very distracting and I found myself concentrating more on the flailing arms and the boxing gloves rather than what he was trying to get across.
Brian,
I agree that the prime objective is to avoid a similar fiasco in future elections.
However, I have some intuitive misgivings about the Gould report.
a) having Parliamentary and local elections on separate days could reduce turnout. (I urge everyone to at least go to the polling station and write 'No-one worth supporting', if that is how they feel. Otherwise they have no grounds for any complaint about the outcome and the consequences.)
b) the order of the candidates on the ballot paper. Accepting that there is a bias in favour of the first appearing candidates, is this bias significant?
To me it looks like corruption pure and simple but is anyone really surprised that Labour would stoop so low? The whole Labour movement is like a cancer in Scotland, rotten to the core.
Mis-Representation of the People Act
For those of you in the know, the above should read, Representation of the People Act, and it is criminal not to obey the rules.
Ron Gould鈥檚 Report tells it all. He has said that Ministers were remiss in their actions, in trying to give political advantage to their Party, and putting the good of the Party above the electorate. Even then they failed miserably, which is a sign of sheer incompetence.
Mr Ron Gould had the evidence to make these allegations, but has chosen to confine his comments to his own remit, which was specifically not to blame anyone personally, which he did very well, and just to give constructive criticism to the Government. We can all read between the lines, and know who is to blame for this debacle, and insult to Scottish democracy.
Politicians will try to outdo their competitors, but the above Act makes it illegal to mis-represent the people, Therefore Douglas Alexander as the person in charge of the election on 3rd May should take responsibility and resign, or face charges under the Act.
We look forward to further developments, especially Mr Alexander being questioned by Parliament.
Let Democracy Rule.
The only thing worse than the ballot mess is that Scotland is now run by a party that does not represent the majority of the Scots people.
The SNP is like every other nationalist party in Europe, arrogant, intolerant and scapegoating. It is also without popular legitimacy.
An overwhelming majority of Scots support the union. The solution is not a separate election bureacracy for Scotland but uniform ballot standards and polling rules for all of the UK, where millions of Scots also vote in English elections.
Britain needs a uniform election code. Scotlands needs a government that represents the people. We have neither.
Entirely untrue that "The Labour Party saught (sic) to arange (sic)the Elections to maximise their Party-Political advantage."
The change to a single ballot paper was supported by all main parties; and acted - entirely predictably - to the advantage of the SNP, by squeezing the smaller partiesout and leaving more top-up seats for the SNP to win.
When do we get an apology for "Alex Salmond for First on the Ballot Paper" ?
One thing I simply don't understand - unlike the perfectly clear voting form. Do none of these people have the guts to blame carelessness, laziness and stupidity on the part of the voter? Yes - nearly 140k didn't understand perfectly clear instructions, explained again for most of them by the very helpful polling station staff.
But 100s of 1000s did - and filled in the form fine. Were they special? Did the machinations of the parties simply not work with them? Or did they just spend a couple of seconds reading and actually following the instructions?
Are politicians simply too scared to blame silly voters for disenfranchising themselves by not bothering to read a set of simple instructions?
Changes are required in the systems of those decision making processes both in Westminster and Holyrood for both Scottish and UK elections; we should not lose sight of the fact that this was yet another example of Scotland being used as a testing ground before a 鈥榩rocess鈥 was applied nationwide.
I feel most of the problem on the ground was caused by two issuing officers, one issuing two papers and one checking the credentials of the voter, if this system had been duplicated with separate issuing officers then the voter would have been dealing with one paper at a time.
The first paper would be required to be completed prior to the issuing of the second paper, each paper would be 鈥榤arked鈥 in custom designed booths each with their own individual guidance for which ever paper is being marked.
Simple logistics and increased staffing could accommodate these changes, the costs will be greater but they will be less than two separate polling days; one cost that could be reduced is that of voter apathy.
Young Alexander appears to be guilty amongst other things of being left holding the parcel when the music stopped; what about West Coast Jack鈥檚 involvement in that fiasco that was the Scottish Elections to Holyrood?
If this was not so important to the UK as a whole what we would have witnessed would have been gross mocking; David Cameron from a position of having done nothing in politics except a major role in Black Wednesday has continued to selectively throw stones.
I haven't had time to read the whole report because I'm in the unfortunate position of having to work for a living. However, I searched the pdf of the document for 'literacy' and didn't find it. The government's own figure is that 800,000 Scots have significant difficulty reading and writing. This seems to have been ignored by those designing the ballots and, disappointingly, by Gould too.
It's a bit rich that the Labour Party tries to pull the SNP into this by citing the "Alex Salmond for First Minister" alias. I quite agree that only the registered name of political parties should appear on ballot papers but this must be applied to ALL political parties. So just who are the offical opposition in Holyrood? Is it "The Labour Party", "Scottish Labour", the "Labour and Co-operative Party" or just plain old "New Labour"? Labour have used each and everyone of these aliases depending on the opposition.
no mention of illiteracy.
no mention of the disgraceful role of the electoral commission.
no mention of which wards had high numbers of "spoiled" ballot papers and which had few "spoiled" ballot papers.
no remit to find out individuals responsible.
now it's time for an independent enquiry.
I am afraid Ron Gould has done every Scottish voter a great disservice by blaming all of the parties involved in the May election. Also his clarification of his report smacks of political interference.
Lets be clear about this the Electoral Commission knew before the election that there were problems with the use of a single ballot paper. Scotland Office ministers were warned of these problems. Yet both groups decided neither to inform the voters of these problems nor go back to the use of two ballot papers.
You would think that any report would highlight this and to bring to task the people involved. Yet Ron Gould failed miserably to do this, and has backtracked further since his report has been released.
Scottish voters have been badly let done not once but twice, and as a result are less likely to vote in the future.
So when the report could be used to have a go at other parties it was fine, but now a clarification has come out it's "bizarre".
This shows the naked political opportunism of the SNP. I'm not saying any of the other parties are "innocent" but this "holier than thou" attitude the SNP strike whenever it suits them really gets me down.
And who does Nicola Sturgeon think she's kidding about sloganising? Of course Alex Salmond wasn't named Alex to put him a the top of the list. But why didn't they put "Salmond for first minister" or "Mr Salmond for first minister" or just "Scottish National Party".
They took advantage of the the name to put their party at the top of the list. To suggest anything else is to treat the electorate as fools.
#10 and #18 - I totally agree!
A ballot paper is no place for political slogans of any sort. The "Alex Salmond for First Minister" was merely the most obvious example but the list section was rife with similar. This should be banned outright only the parties official name should appear. To me the SNP are the "Alex Salmod for First Minister" Party from now on, although ASFMP isn't as easy to remember I suppose...
The whole list system is a complex nightmare anyway, surprisingly the council election under STV proceeded smoothly considering its alleged complexity. I have tried to explain the list system to my elderly parents several times but they still can't understand why voting Labour/Labour in a staunchly Labour area is a waste of their second vote. Get rid of it.
Nothing wrong with "Alex Salmond for First Minister" - no-one thought he was leading the Labour Party! Funny that New Labour chose not to run with "Jack McConnell for First Minister" I doubt they did it mindful of clarity on the ballot paper, rather they knew emphasising the personal element they would get stuffed even more than did. Also why are those of that political persuasion convinced that the majority who voted incorrectly "wanted" to vote for them? I dont believe that for a minute - also if it were true and the vast majority of spoilt ballots were by Labour supporters - what does that tell you?
I don't think it is such a big deal how the SNP represented themselves on the ballot paper. The Scottish Office had plenty of time to scrutinise the papers and protest. Heavens above, we have Unionist biased papers, such as the D. Record, Sun and Mirror, ever ready to put the boot into the SNP on behalf of the Labour party. The front pages of aforesaid papers were a disgrace on May 3. Wonder what developing countries round the world would have made of it.
Which is worse; a Scottish government that is misrepresented as 鈥榓rrogant鈥 in its determination to put Scotland鈥檚 interests first, or a Labour executive whose primary raison d鈥檈tre is to act in accordance with Westminster directives?
Not only does blogger #10 (Jon) attempt to baselessly demonise the SNP, but he apparently seeks to imply that their position in government was somehow not legitimised by the results of the May elections.
Evidently there are those who need reminding that the SNP had clear leads across the major polls for months prior to the election. Further, they also registered as the most popular party amongst the readership of every newspaper sold in Scotland, including the heavily Labour-partisan 鈥榬ed-tops鈥.
The previous Labour governing group, of course, did not command a built-in majority of electoral support either 鈥 the difference now being that we have minority government by a party whose aspirational approach is a breath of fresh air to Scottish democracy.
And on the subject of the 鈥榬ed-top鈥 tabloids 鈥 how well is popular democracy represented by the publication of such slanderous, scaremongering filth as appeared on their front pages on polling day, appearing as it did in many prominent locations nationwide throughout the day, including polling stations themselves?
When it comes to rooting out self-interested political propaganda, an enquiry into the manipulative and shameful behaviour of the universally biased tabloids would be a public service indeed!!
Its a pity the SNP dont have the good grace to acknowledge their own role in the election fiasco - arrogance in the extreme to say they have nothing to apologise for. "Alex Salmond for 1st minister" could quite easily have given the impression that you were voting for him - thus maximising the cult of personality and conveniently getting the SNP to the top of the list. The truth is that the only people who could have voted for him were the people of Gordon, so why did his name appear on every ballot paper in the country. Not in the interests of clarity, thats for sure.
too little too late from Douglas Alexander. If he felt it was wrong then he should be apologising to the Scottish people and when it happened, not because he was prompted to by a report which all but named him ("Ministers" not him specifically). He defended the way the election was conducted until the very end instead of suggesting there may have been mistakes.
A bit belatedly - when I first saw the ballot paper I laughed and said to my wife there would be a lot of spoiled papers, as I carefully took my time to make sure I was voting correctly. Never mind blame or apology, it is more concerning the lack of ordinary common sense, nouse,that the body politic shows. Perhaps rather than, or as an addition to, consultation everyday members of the public shoiuld be ushered in as paid consultants to apply the ultimate judgement as to whether something makes sense, or will just be laughable.