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Who is Labour candidate in Glasgow East going to be?

I've heard Councillor George Ryan and also that both Stephen Purcell and former Labour General Secretary Lesley Quinn have both told Gordon Brown, countless times, to bog off when asked if they would stand.

The SNP have selected some councillor that Kezia doesn’t like (she’s an angry tyke at times) while the SSP have selected former MSP Frances Curran with Solidarity yet to announce but I am going to categorically state that it won’t be Sheridan that they pick.

The Tories launched their campaign today. The party have selected Davena Rankin who I met once and was thoroughly impressed with.

Was a deal done?

The whole Nicol Stephen resignation thing has got me wondering and here are some of my thoughts.

I wonder if after the election Tavish and Nicol sat down and had themselves a little Granita Pact deciding that Nicol should get a year in opposition as leader then if that doesn’t work out then he should step aside.

Saying that, just last year he was unanimously reselected as Lib Dem leader so that’s probably out.

Whilst Nicol has been rather impressive at FMQs, landing some notable blows on Salmond over Trump and Mugabe, he’s failed to garner much media attention for his performances. Political hacks define party leaders by their performances at FMQs yet, despite impressive performances, there have been very few pieces of praise for Nicol Stephen in the press. The man favourite to take over is Shetland MSP Tavish Scott and if a criticism of Nicol Stephen is that he is non-committal the same cannot be said of Tavish.

As well as enjoying dressing up as a Viking, see picture, he is quite an impressive debater and not someone I’d particularly fancy a verbal joust with and also enjoys the bonus of having quite a sizeable majority – something that Nicol himself does not have which merely adds further confusion to the whole announcement.

Nicol Stephen has resigned

to spend time with his family. I guess the favourite to replace him has to be Tavish Scott but Mike Rumbles has already declared himself and I expect a few others - Jeremy Purvis and Ross Finnie - to join the fray.

I think Liam McArthur is the real star of the Lib Dems but may feel he’s too new to the job to stand.

Glasgow East stuff

So the Tories have selected Davena Rankin to be their by-election candidate in Glasgow East with the Nats and Labour yet to choose who they are standing.

I hear that Tommy Sheridan has stated that he won’t be standing for Solidarity in that seat which is bad news for Labour – bad news indeed. However, I don’t see the SNP taking this seat I do see them cutting the Labour majority from the near 13,000 it is at the moment to maybe a couple of thousand or so.

Separated at birth?

One is Labour leadership hopeful Iain Gray and the other is Family Guy character Quagmire, but which one is which?

What a weekend

Christ, you got away for a weekend without having access to the internet and all hell breaks loose!!

Right, where to start…

I awoke on Saturday morning to four texts messages from both friends and journos the jist of which were “Wendy is quitting today.”

My initial thoughts were that of confusion. Why now? I mean, I know the whole suspension thing will hang over her until September but big deal she’s been through worse already in her fairly lousy 9 months as Scottish Labour. To be honest, I also thought she was too arrogant to go but alas, it seems she was not.

So I tuned into her press conference expecting a speech full of grace and humility. Who was I kidding? She blamed everyone but herself for her downfall even ignoring the fact that her campaign team sought money – illegally – for a leadership coronation. How was the money spent? Mini sausage rolls and quiche?!

One Labour source couldn’t hide his glee stating “she was never up to the job” and “it’s ‘buy one get one free’ as it finishes Jackie Baillie as a player!” whilst another source I’m not naming, when asked if it ended Baillie as a player, responded “Fuck, I hope so.” Seems the end is nigh for Wendy and her little group so I guess that includes people like Whitton as well.

SNP Tactical voting has a post here on the runners and riders but leaves out one suggestion muted to me by a Tory MSP..

Foulkes 4 Leader…. I’ll leave Kezia to respond to that…

That’s right, the Lothians Lord himself. Not content with asking parliamentary questions that reveal the SNP spend less on special advisers than Labour and the Lib Dems did or finding out that police numbers will actually go up this year, could the Baron throw his hat into the ring?

What about some of the young turks within Labour. Err….well…. there’s only really one, John Park MSP. I think he’d be a cracking deputy leader and could run a Jon Cruddas-esque campaign promising to reengage with the grass roots…just a thought.

Ultimately though, it seems that the runners and riders are Andy Kerr, Cathy Jamieson, Iain Grey..I mean Gray, and Margaret Curran.

My pick: Andy Kerr as I think he is the only one that could take the battle to Salmond.