LABOUR ARE 'WEE FEARTIES' - SALMOND

First Minister Jack McConnell tonight claimed Scotland had "the best of both worlds" under the present devolved system. He called on politicians to make "the fullest possible use" of Holyrood's existing powers before demanding more. And he declared the improvement of education to be the most important task facing politicians.

Mr McConnell set out his argument for the constitutional status quo in a lecture in Haddington, East Lothian. The lecture was in honour of Labour MP and devolution campaigner John P. Mackintosh, who died in 1978, just before Labour denied Scotland devolution despite a majority vote in favour.

The speech was the usual rubbishing of the SNP's case for independence, coupled with a dubious warning of the perils of letting Scotland sink into a collective "inertia" by continuously debating more powers for Holyrood.

Mr McConnell's lecture came as the SNP claimed that renewed calls for greater fiscal autonomy showed a positive political tide turning towards independence. Former Presiding Officer Lord Steel last night called for greater power for Holyrood to raise the cash it spends.

A think-tank set up by the Tories called last week for Holyrood to get more tax-raising powers and two leading economists today re-stated their case for greater fiscal freedom. But in a TV interview today, Mr McConnell insisted: "My job as First Minister and leader of the Labour Party in Scotland is to say what's right, and not necessarily is the current fad."

In his lecture tonight he argued that the most important task for the third Scottish Parliament was to take the necessary steps to improve Scottish education. "Scotland has the best of both worlds - a democratic home rule Parliament and a union dividend from the UK," he said.
"Government is about priorities. And my first priority must be to act in the interests of Scotland."

"That interest is best served now and in the future by a united national effort to create the best education system in the world."

Mr McConnell came under immediate attack. SNP leader Alex Salmond said his party trusted Scots and a referendum would offer the chance to choose "a new and better relationship with Britain."

Mr Salmond went on: "Labour, on the other hand, run scared of such a debate. They are the wee fearties of Scottish politics. Their unionism is backward looking and inward looking.
"Labour want Scots to believe the incredible proposition that we are the only country in the world that isn't capable of flourishing with independence."

The First Minister has also been arguing the bizarre notion that Scotland receives "a union dividend" in the form of higher public spending and in areas like family connections, business, and the universities and a shared aim of abolishing child poverty by 2020.

"We can put the governance of Scotland in the hands of those who, in their desperation to go it alone, will happily countenance years, even decades, of constitutional upheaval - with all the divisiveness, rancour and strife such upheaval is bound to bring," he said.

"My appeal to Scots everywhere, is to reject the old arguments from those who want a separate Scotland, regardless of the consequences; but also to end talk of subsidies and dependence."

Mr McConnell seemed to happily ignore the fact that by arguing that a 'union dividend' meant higher public spending he was in fact making the same argument that Scotland was subsidised himself! Are family connections anything to do with the British union? Perhaps child poverty could be changed quicker with the normal powers of independence!