How Scotland fares in tomorrow's strikes

Scotland is facing the biggest public sector shut down in a generation on Thursday as thousands of workers take strike action over Coalition government cuts to their pensions.

There are close on 30,000 members of the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) in Scotland and many of them will join 750,000 public servants across the UK on strike in a row over pay, pension and jobs.

Staff in government departments and public agencies in every part of Scotland will walk out with their counterparts in England and Wales in the fight to protect their pensions and jobs against cuts.

One of the biggest picket lines in Scotland is expected at the Faslane nuclear base on the Clyde where civilian security staff are due to strike in large numbers.

Glasgow’s George Square will host the biggest trade union rally in years while in London all police leave has been cancelled as the city braces itself for mass protest action against the government.

The 24 hour walkout by public servants across the UK, joined by teachers in England and Wales, is expected to cause major disruption.

International airline passengers have been warned to expect delays at Scotland’s major airports at Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Prestwick when immigration and passport staff leave their posts.

Benefit offices and tax offices across Scotland will shut and court services could be hit where clerks to the court go on strike.

The Scottish government itself is preparing for paralysis as over 7000 staff in finance, administration, and ministerial drivers and security staff could walk off the job.

There will be pickets outside government headquarters at St Andrews House and Victoria Quay in Edinburgh, forcing Ministers to break the strike if they cross the lines.

There will also be picket lines at many prisons where prison officer and ancillary staff are members of the PCS union.

There will pickets at the Scottish parliament and Edinburgh castle, where members of Historic Scotland staff are striking. The Museum of Scotland staff will walk out and the National Galleries in Edinburgh could close due to staff shortages.

But the effects of the strike will be visible across Scotland. The Scottish Public Pensions Agency, at Tweedbank in Galashiels will be on strike; Forestry Commission staff, hit by massive job cuts announcement in Edinburgh, will be out.

The Students Awards Agency, in South Gyle in Edinburgh will be affected and the Student Loans company in Glasgow too.

The Accounts and Bankruptcy Agency Kilwinning in Ayrshire is expected to be 100 per cent solid behind the strike

The biggest, and perhaps most symbolic, picket line in the whole country will be at Faslane where government security guards are due to strike, forcing the military to take on civilian roles.

"I have never seen a build up to a strike like this," one of the trade union organiser told me.

Some 48 per cent of the public are sympathetic to the aims of strike action but there is a sustained media and government campaign to divide the trade unionists from other sections of the population.

Debtocracy, alternative view of Greek tragedy

Greece's parliament has just approved a five-year austerity plan with 155 votes in favour and 138 votes against. This will open the door to the next stage of the EU bail out, but the Greek tragedy is far from over.

The MPs voted through the package in the face of a general strike and a two days of rioting on the the streets of Athens.

Tomorrow they will focus on raising taxes to secure some 14bn euros over the next five years and introducing 14bn euros in public spending cuts.

To meet EU demands, Greece must sell 50bn euros-worth of public assets by 2014, almost 20 per cent of GDP. Public sector pay is being cut 15 per cent. It kind of puts Britain's economic situation in the shade and makes comparisons between tomorrow's public sector strikes in the UK and the pain being inflicted on the Greek public pretty spurious.

The UK media have Greece typified by early retirement, tax dodging and corruption. For an alternative view of how this is all impacting on ordinary people here's a link to the English language version of the Debtocracy documentary which has swept Greece in recent weeks.

Hail Margo, Queen of Scottish columnists

I didn't know Margo MacDonald was on the blogosphere, but there she is posting her Edinburgh Evening News columns onto her Mxrgo website.

(Does that not put her Labour contemporary Brian Wilson to shame, his Free Press columns remain in the inky darkness despite repeated appeals. Someone is on the case, I hear)

Anyway, there's Margo on the SNP defence policy, on the Greek crisis, assisted suicide and much else beside. A voice worth listening to.

Scotland doesn't do elected monarchs but if it did then I reckon Margo Macdonald would be the Queen by next week. Until that day dawns we'll have to read her edicts online.

Inverclyde by-election gets all , er, cuddly

I have to admit I'm baffled by the relevance of the teddy bear in this photo but it must be a vote winner or the most successful election-winning machine on the planet wouldn't have put it on an SNP leaflet.

No one is taking a punt on the outcome of the Greenock and Inverclyde by election this Thursday either. Labour are feeling "frisky", one of their people told me today, and reckon they have the SNP on the run.

With a Westminster majority of over 14,000 they should have the SNP grizzlies chased into the Paisley Braes by now but these are changed days in Scotland.

Duncan MacNeil (big brown bear) scrapped home for Labour with a 511 majority at the Scottish elections so anything could happen.

The SNP (Care Bear Bunch) are playing down their chances in the hope of an upset in another Labour heartland that will continue their May momentum.

That, as they say on the Main Street, would be a "baw breaker" for Labour, already floored by the Scottish election debacle. SNH would have to set up an urban nature reserve for Scottish Labour politicans to allow them to roam around like they did in the old days.

But if the campaign has been more teddy bears than grizzly bears then it will come down to which camp can get their core vote out on the day.

It may even depend on what the Yogi Bears, the rump Lib Dem support in the constituency, decide to do. Like you, I can bearly wait for the result to see if the recent SNP gains have polarised (oh, yes) voters.

Cameron won't play referendum games with Alex

Back from the Prime Minister's Downing Street press conference which was noteworthy for the way he slapped down his military chiefs who have been squealing about the RAF and the Navy "running hot" to maintain the Libyan bombardment.

He said, rather glibly: "sometimes I open the papers and think you do the fighting, I'll do the talking." I suspect he'll pay for that remark down the road because top brass can turn can do into can't go quite quickly for a PM.

Oh, there was a U-turn too, on prison sentencing in England and Wales today. These have become pretty regular events.

On the Scottish question, and at least one is compulsory on the day the Scotland Bill is going through parliament, Cameron was asked by Mike Settle if he would be tempted to short-circuit, the two question/2014-2015 guessing game that Alex Salmond is playing on the referendum issue.

Cameron gave a pretty full answer, emphasising that we would enable a referendum when the Scottish parliament votes for one, but also serving notice that he did not want to "play games" on independence while the First Minister prepares the ground to maximise support for separation.

He didn't quite rule out a short-circuit by calling a referendum himself (which Westminster could do anytime). But he seemed impatient for Salmond to get on with it and warned him to govern for the wellbeing of Scotland not for the circumstances that will maximise support for a independence vote.

Here's what he said in full:

“What I worry about is that the government of Scotland is going to be too much about how to bring about the right circumstances for his referendum - whether he wants two questions or four or six - rather than trying to the right thing by people in Scotland

“I genuinely believe in a respect agenda. I respect the mandate that Alex Salmond has as First Minister, the governemnt here in Westminster will work with him and talk to him about how to amend the Scotland Bill, about how we can make sure everyone can benefit from the policies of the UK government and two government work well together

What I won’t have an endless situation where this isn’t about the health and wealth and wellbeing of Scotland, and it’s just about trying to get to a referendum situation to satisfy his needs. That s not right at all.

“If the Scottish parliament votes to have a independence referendum that is a vote we have to respect that vote and we have to enable that to happen. I don’t believe in Scottish independence, I believe in the United Kingdom and I want to keep the United Kingdom together. I’m not going to play a game with Alex Salmond about the hows and whens and wherefores.

“I think he should get on delivering good government for the people of Scotland and working with the Westminster government to make sure we join in the endeavour and not play games.”

Edwin Morgan - the "Game Maker"

The SNP, and the rest of Scotland, has been stunned by a £1m donation from the estate of the late poet Edwin Morgan.

Personally, I'm stunned that a poet could become a millionaire, twice over, because he has left another £1m to create a poetry prize for young Scottish writers.

Morgan, who died last year aged 90, was appointed Scots Makar, Scotland's poet laureate, by Jack McConnell in 2004.

The SNP is still in the dark about the donation but if confirmed, and there's no reason to doubt the story, the £1m Morgan legacy will be the biggest single contribution in the history of the party.

It far outstrips anything the Brian Soutar gave Salmond for this year's election campaign.(It is ironic that these two big donations come from either end of the rainbow. I'm glad to see that NUS Scotland is at least protesting the Stagecoach boss's knighthood for services to homophobia).

Anyway, the immediate point is that the Morgan money can go straight into an SNP campaign war chest in the run-up to the 2014 independence referendum.

Meanwhile, Scottish Labour's accounts are about as robust as fistful of Greek government bonds while the party struggles with the existential questions ranging from what it is about to how does it find money to say that.

In modern political campaigning those who spend the most tend to win the most and the Morgan legacy could be a game-making donation to the SNP's independence cause.

Michael Gove, the striker on the strikes

I like Michael Gove, he's witty, polite, erudite, a fellow-hack and a proud Aberdonian to boot.

In fact I like him so much that when we were both young men - and he was a striking journalist at the P&J on the east coast of Scotland and I was a staffer at the radical West Highland Free Press - I used to send regular donations to his cause which became an NUJ crusade.

So, when I heard the Education Secretary on the wireless this morning, I nearly choked on my west London muesli mix. (Ach, we've both come a long way haven't we)

Speaking about the simmering prospect of teaching strikes, Gove the Cove said: "I don’t think a strike helps. I’ve been on strike myself, when I was much younger, it didn't solve anything."

Is that right, Michael? Most reporters remember the P&J strike as a principled stand that delayed by a decade the journalistic deforestation of the Scottish newspaper industry.

We can agree to disagree on that if you like Michael, but what's your address, I'd like my money back.