Is the ultimate destination of Tavish Scott's logic that Tavish Scott will have to resign?

While most of us were enjoying our Thursday lunch, blissfully unaware of the existential threat that faced Scotland's democracy, Tavish Scott and his hardy band of realists continued with their grim, reluctant preparations for apocalypse.  For a tantalising period yesterday afternoon it had appeared that the scare might just be over - Tavish's now-legendary speech at Holyrood had, it seemed, single-handedly brought about capitulation from the Chief Evildoer (the politician formerly known as John Swinney).  Although the C. E. had impertinently insisted on choosing his own words, Tavish's attack had been so forensic, so devastating, so Obviously True, it was surely apparent to all right-thinking people that the newly-issued apology could only be intended to conform in full with each and every aspect of canonical Tavishian thought on What An Apology Was Required For.

But today, at First Minister's Questions, it became frighteningly clear that may not be entirely the case.  More in anger than sorrow, Tavish had little choice but to return to a war footing on Behalf Of Scotland.  At his fearsome hair-splitting finest, he demanded to know what the C. E. had actually said sorry for - could it really be that the apology was merely for not being forthcoming enough, rather than for actively misleading parliament?  After all, hadn't Tavish provided damning documentary evidence yesterday that the C. E. had repeatedly talked about making decisions on the Scottish Variable Rate when there was no decision to be made?

But, as the First Minister pointed out, there was just one problem here - the SVR had never, at any point, been implementable within less than ten months.  Including the period when Tavish Scott had been Deputy Finance Minister.  So whenever the former Labour/Lib Dem coalition had talked about making a decision not to use the SVR in the following financial year, that had been - according to the inescapable principles of Tavishian thought - a bit of a porky.

By the look on Tavish's face, we were no longer awaiting apocalypse.  Apocalypse had arrived.

Please don't tell me he's the one that's going to have to resign now?  Life's full of these cruel little ironies...

But does anyone give two hoots, Tavish?

I'm always a tad sceptical when I hear claims that Tavish Scott has "demolished" someone, so I'm grateful to Caron for reproducing his speech on the "SVR scandal" in full so we can all make our own minds up.  It certainly sounds like he was terribly excited by the whole thing, which begs the obvious question - why?  After all, it will be recalled that a few months ago, when pressed about his reasons for silencing debate on whether the Scottish people should be allowed a say on their own constitutional future, he informed us that the country had "moved on" and that no-one gave "two hoots about it" anymore.  Well, he was demonstrably wrong about an independence referendum, the principle of which is clearly supported by an overwhelming majority of the public.  But those words would, ironically, have been more accurate if applied to the minor constitutional matter presently in hand (if it can even be called 'constitutional' given that the tax-varying powers remain fully intact).  It was once thought conceivable that the SVR could be used in the foreseeable future, but now that we've woken up to the downsides of such a decision, the country has indeed "moved on".  And, while I haven't seen an opinion poll on the subject, I'd be - to put it mildly - somewhat surprised to learn that the electorate would have preferred that £7 million of extra cuts to public services had been made in order to symbolically 'upkeep' a power that isn't going to be used.  I'd also be a bit surprised if they thought the unilateral demands from HMRC for extra payment were remotely reasonable in the first place, but given the widely-reported spin from the unionist parties we'll have to see on that one.

John Swinney has of course now apologised, very graciously, for the one aspect of this trifling affair for which the government can be legitimately criticised - not being more open with parliament about the problems they were encountering with HMRC.  That apology leaves some of the apocalyptic conclusions Scott was drawing in his speech looking even more bizarre...

"Mr Salmond expects to pass a Budget. To negotiate with other parties. After this."

Yes, Tavish, I think he probably does expect that.  After this.  More pertinently, I think the Scottish public probably do still expect the opposition parties - yes, after this - to engage constructively on a matter of such national importance as the Budget, and will not look kindly on this most blatant and contrived of excuses for yet another round of immature obstructionism.

Perhaps the subtext of the speech can best be summed up in the following terms - "look, guys, I've found yet another wizard excuse for regarding the SNP as untouchables in coalition negotiations".  No wonder he was excited.  But honestly, Tavish, we got the message months ago - to say the body language has been leaking somewhat is a bit of an understatement.

Getting the numbers straight

Within minutes of John Swinney announcing that he had been compelled by the stance of others to defer legislation for local income tax until after the 2011 election, Professor Richard Kerley suggested on television that the problem had been the failure of the SNP and Liberal Democrats to come to an agreement over the issue of the local variability of the tax rate - if that agreement had been there, a parliamentary majority would have been there, Kerley stated as if it were simple fact. Admittedly, Kerley is the leading expert on local government finance and not on parliamentary arithmetic, but you'd think someone so engaged with this issue would have explored it from all the angles. Either way, he's simply wrong. The SNP and Liberal Democrats between them have 63 seats, while the other parties in combination have 65. As John Swinney pointed out in his speech, without the Greens altering their position radically there was never the slightest prospect of getting the legislation through this side of an election. And, as we've recently learned, those who think that the Greens will back down easily are usually guilty of wishful thinking.

This is not a mere technicality - we saw from Andy Kerr's response that Labour are determined to propagate the fiction that the SNP have backed off the policy because they knew it was wrong, and that they have betrayed the electorate by not fulfilling their manifesto pledge. (Usual muddled message - if in Kerr's fantasy world the fabled "hard-working families" were to be hit by a tax bombshell, are they really meant to feel "betrayed" now that they've been spared such a calamity?) It's vital that this fiction is not allowed to take root, and that the electorate fully understands that not only was the majority in Holyrood not there, but that the Westminster government had used an array of outrageous tactics to make it logistically impossible for a local income tax to go forward even if a majority had been there. The real 'false prospectus' was not the SNP's manifesto pledge, it was the UK government's claim of respect for the devolution settlement.

Inadequacy of funding led to inadequacy of logic

In a letter published in the Scotsman yesterday, Patrick Harvie set out his definitive explanation of the approach he and Robin Harper took to the budget process. As I stated in an earlier post, I have no problem with the Greens' 'no' vote at the second time of asking, and indeed feel that for them to have voted any other way at that stage would have been illogical. But the letter is primarily concerned with the crucial first vote (or the vote that seemed crucial at the time) when the Greens held the balance. Harvie offers a biting analysis of why he felt the package he was offered was inadequate - but in a sense that's an answer to the wrong question. What he has failed to convincingly explain is how his original 'no' vote has left the Greens in any better position now than they would have been with a 'yes' vote or an abstention.

For we all know that the opposite is in fact the case - the £22 million insulation package originally offered by John Swinney has now been watered down to £15 million. Whatever his understandable frustrations with the negotiations process, Harvie will surely eventually come to reflect that letting his irritation get the better of him at a pivotal moment was not smart politics.