The polls are closed, and we’ll know the results of the Scottish parliament elections, and whether or not Westminister has a different shitey voting system (SO EXCITING!) by Friday morning. SSY teams will be bringing you amazing liveblogging from the Glasgow and North East counts, with extra reporting from SSY’s secret underground complex. But this won’t be your normal boring Guardian liveblog - have a look at last years to get an idea of what to expect. This year, expect us to call for the deaths of EVEN MORE bastards! If we haven’t all gone crazy by the end of the counting, enjoy the liveblog!
As the Lib Dems prepare for their first election – a by-election in Oldham – since they jumped in bed wi the Tories, it’s looking likely that not only will they not be able to win the seat, but they will be crushed at the polls. Even David Cameron has felt some sympathy for the poor Lib Dems and says the Tories aren’t really trying to win the by-election – a bit like when your dad gives in to your shit tackles when you’re wee to let you win.
In fact Labour will almost certainly win back this seat, and with a much increased majority. There doesn’t appear to be any dent at all in Labour’s support, despite the fact that “Red” Ed Miliband picked the racist chancer Phil Woolas to be his Shadow Immigration Minister while he was under investigation by the courts.
Even worse for the Lib Dems is that their vote in Oldham – which will collapse – will be far higher than the national average that the Lib Dems are currently polling at, a measly 7%. Since selling his soul to the Tories Nick Clegg has transformed from a messiah figure to the most hated man in Britain.
In fact the collapse in the Lib Dems vote has been so massive, even the Taliban in Afghanistan currently have more support than the Lib Dems – despite Mullah Omar’s controversial stances on gay marriage, stem cell research, international jihad and the flying of kites. Approximately 9% of the Afghan public support the Taliban taking over again – and more worryingly for Nato – 27% of Afghans support attacks on Nato soldiers occupying the country.
That’s a massive section of public support, and it’s even worse when the insurgents are fighting from impenetrable mountain territory basically doing the same thing they’ve done on and off for the past couple of hundred years – repel any and all attempts to invade and occupy them.
Both polls should be wake up calls to the people who run the UK; in Afghanistan the occupation of the country by the British and American military is actually helping build support for arguably the most mental and repressive group o folk on the planet – while at the same time the second party of Government in the UK has less support than these same crazies because of their sellouts.
"We want to look over those proposals for PR again Mr Duncan Smith"
And remember Lib Dems this is before you actually put a million folk on the dole and cut public services worse than Thatcher. Wi these kind of poll ratings though the Condem coalition is very weak and with enough resolve the anti-cuts movement can force out the Government before we see the Lib Dems vote collapse even further – which is admittedly a bit of a shame.
According to THIS article on DigitalSpy.co.uk, Daniel Radcliffe, A.K.A Harry Potter reveals that he has ‘lost faith’ in the Liberal Democrats in the wake of the tuition fees disaster caused by the coalition government.
It’s the fault of people like Radcliffe and other cunts in the public eye is that they can vote in whatever government they fucking want and they’ll be fine. It’s all the impressionable young folk who suffer when they realise that this seemingly ‘alt-y’ and ‘radical’ decisions to vote in a party who can talk the talk… but essentially can’t walk the walk.
The Liberal Democrats have not “let people down” but have spat in the faces of those who put their faith in them. The Lib Dems were deceptive in that they aimed their propaganda at young people, presenting themselves as THE party to be voting for in teenage/young rebellion. They in face, were planning all along to simply get in no matter what. They knew from the start that they’re gladly get on their knees for the Tories.
And a few things I’d like to say about Radcliffe himself. He was quoted in THIS article saying the following:
“If all the people who liked them voted for them you could change politics overnight and we could have a proper three-party system,” he explained.
Okay, spot the kid who hasn’t got a clue.
Yeah, that’s him. With the lightning bolt scar and the ugly glasses.
HEL-LOOOO? There’s MORE THAN three parties, Daniel – and what’s more, none of them are anywhere near proper. Don’t get me started on how much I cringed at “change politics”. Seriously, you don’t “change politics” by voting for a different shade of shite, ya muppet.
And see to be honest, see if you’ve spent your life quickly amassing enough money to build a castle out of bricks made of paper mache £100 notes, then you don’t have a place to speak for real, hard-working people.
My message to all students is that you really should stop listening to vapid starlets as they vomit their scripted opinions out at you. (Cause they’ve probably been paid to say it…)
And Daniel? You might be The Chosen One in the wizarding world, but here in the muggle world?
You’re an arsehole.
Colin Firth was one of many high profile supporters that came out to back the Lib Dems prior to the election earlier this year.
He has now confirmed that his no longer supports the party, saying:
I think it is profoundly disillusioning if you are a student who registered to vote simply because of what the Liberal Democrat were promising, and many, many did and simply because of what the Liberal Democrats had to say about tuition fees and things. It is one of the reasons I went in that direction.
As well as saying that the Liberal Democrats and their kowtowing to the Tories and the cuts agenda “made it difficult for us who thought progressive politics would be the way forward.”
And he’s right – it has been very difficult for people who invested all their hopes and dreams into a political party posing as progressive.
What we can learn from the recent behaviour of the Lib Dems (as well as the SNP in the Scottish Parliament, and Obama in the USA) is that politicians with progressive promises have never, and will never, make real change. They are too invested in our political system and the capitalist regime it props up, and is propped up by.
If we want things like free education, free healthcare, progressive taxation, free school meals, an end to nuclear weapons and all the other things we’ve been promised by politicians who promptly changed their minds after election over the years, we need to stop investing our hopes in our votes, and start taking action to make real change. System change.
Some of you may remember earlier this year, SSY members chased Nick Clegg out of Glasgow when he turned up in our local community centre.
We had found out about Clegg’s public meeting literally half an hour before it began, and were most perplexed about how he managed to fill the Woodside Halls with people despite not publicising the meeting at all… but we shrugged it off and carried on furiously making placards.
We can now reveal that not only had the Lib Dems “bussed in activists from across the country – and across the border…” they also paid companies to ‘recruit’ audience members, spending £9000 on finding gullible chumps to make Cleggy look good at the meeting in Glasgow, as well as four further meetings in England.
The list of ways in which the Lib Dems have duped the public just keeps getting longer and longer…
SSY apologises for the sweary word in the title, but the above quote was taken from a panicky (hard to say which one tbh) Polis at the demo against tuition fees today arguing wi fellow officers over who was responsible for the titanic fuck up that was the vague attempt at maintaining control over streets in Glasgow.
And what a fuck up; hundreds of school, college and university students had more or less total control of the entire city centre. The demonstration was free at will to blockade/shut down 3 different vodafones, 2 banks and break out of no less than FIVE kettles over a period of roughly 3-4 hours. This is despite the Polis presence going from a few confused officers to 5 riot vans and a helicopter, a bit like in GTA when you keep going on a continuous rampage and they send the swat team and the army after you.
When the Polis got reinforcements, they tried to force folk into a kettle to “Join your colleagues” – I’m not daft, I’m not walking into a kettle – a couple of teenage girls who were taking pictures of the demo didn’t want to go in and were violently pushed and manhandled by the cops. Fortunately they got their story taken from the Herald, so lets hope there’s an embarrassing story waiting for some of Strathy’s finest tommorow.
Today’s demo stands as an example that Millbank wasn’t a one off, and that there’s nothing the French or Greek can do that we can’t do as well. Seeing these demonstrations it’s clear the Lib Dems will need nothing less than a full scale military escort the next time they want to court student votes on campuses, that is if they even bother next time.
Unfortunately despite today’s massive protests, the numbers on the streets were unable to terrify enough Libdem MP’s into openly rebelling agains the Coalition’s plan. Tuition fees have been introduced into England on 323 votes to 302 – 21 Libdems voted against the proposal, while 8 abstained. If these MP’s had any bottle they would have kept to their pledge and voted against. Obviously they think that abstaining will spare them from losing their seats. Think again.
Tuition fees may have been increased in England, but they have not been introduced Scotland or Wales. What we’ve had a is very effective dress rehearsal for fighting any attempt (which is likely) to introduce tuition fees into Scottish education, and making it clear to the next Holyrood administration the political consequences of doing so. It’s also politicised thousands of young people – who would have imagined this time last year that hundreds of school kids would give the Polis some exercise bolting down Argyle Street to try to shutdown tax evaders Vodafone?
We didn’t succeed in stopping tuition fees from being increased, but student protests have cut down the government’s majority from 84 to only 21 – if this is the kind of blood that students alone can draw, what happens when the coalition tries to put a million workers on the dole? This coalition is over its head and today shows we have a far better chance of destroying it than we previously imagined.
Camilla is shocked at the terrible revolting students.
Less than six weeks ago, we reported that the Vince Cable, Business Secretary and Lib Dem member of the Tory Cabinet, had cancelled a visit to Oxford because he couldn’t face the wrath of the student protesters waiting to face him there, and confront him about his, and his party’s, role in the government’s attacks on education.
It was the beginning of new wave of protests, the birth of a new student movement – and the moment the anti-Lib Dem backlash stepped up a gear.
Since then, hundreds upon thousands of university, college and school students have ruled the streets in a reign of terror… for the Lib Dems at least.
They’ve been forced to cancel regional party conferences and MP’s surgeries, as it has become increasingly clear that the anger of the student protesters – soon to be priced out of education, and many of whom cast their first vote for the Lib Dems in hope of a better society – is not going to go away.
Whilst they’ve been hiding behind locked doors and closed offices, the Lib Dems are in chaos – with more infighting, backstabbing and lies every day.
Ahead of December 9th’s vote on the tripling of university tuition fees, Nick Clegg is insistent that “Liberal Democrat ministers in government are as one on this, and as a team every single person will vote for this measure on Thursday,” whilst frantically trying to fly allies home (from a climate change conference, no less) to get the extra votes, fearing that Lib Dem MPs will abstain or vote against the government’s proposals. Well known Lib Dems such as former leaders Charles Kennedy and Menzies Campbell are set to vote against the fees increase. The Lib Dem leader of Newcastle City Council has come out in public against the plans, and assured protesters that he will lobby party leader Nick Clegg not to raise tuition fees and email all the party’s MPs voicing opposition to the fees plan. Resignations have been considered, and promised.
Indeed, it has been revealed that Scottish MP Michael Crockart, who (as we reported yesterday) was victim to a hoax in which an imposter posing as him promised to resign over the issue, in fact did promise to resign! He had been holding secret meetings with student representatives from Edinburgh University at which he assured them he would be voting against fee increases and that his opposition to the fees bill would inevitably involve his resignation from the government.
After yesterday’s confusion, and Crockart’s strenuous denial of any resignation promise, the students went public about the meetings, saying:
For months now, Mike Crockart has confirmed to us that he will vote against tuition fee increases but we have kept quiet until now.
He said that he would resign but he wanted to wait and wait until the last minute so that he could input into the internal Lib Dem debate, because he was quite well placed to do that. And then he would resign. We are not worried whether he resigns or not but we do want him to stick to his promise.
If Crockart doesn’t honour his pledge, we will not only be calling for his resignation from his government post, but his resignation as an MP.
Instead of apologising for being a lying bastard, though, all Crockart had to say for himself was that he was “disappointed” in the students for telling anyone what they had been promised by their elected representative.
The Liberal Democrats have come a long way since we decried them as a bunch of boring bastards in their first mention on this blog little over a year ago. A lot has changed since then, and I don’t think any of us could have predicted Nick Clegg’s rise to stardom and what a key role the Lib Dems would come to play in the government.
I’ll tell you what we did predict though. Point 4 on our list of initial reasons the Lib Dems are rubbish:
They’re going back on their promise to abolish tuition fees.
Hate to say I told you so, but seriously, check out the archive of our Lib Dem coverage for some more pre-election analysis and insight into their all round shiteyness.
A lot of the recent anti-Lib Dem rhetoric has labelled them as treacherous traitors who sold their souls for a seat in Cameron’s Cabinet – but they didn’t have them to sell in the first place.
Political parties make progressive promises in order to trick us into thinking we’ve chosen them, and chosen the system that they’re all so heavily invested in. Of course they then drop those promises like the proverbial hot cakes – we’ve seen it with the SNP administration in the Scottish Government, and now with the Lib Dems.
A change in political parties and prime ministers will never solve any of our problems. We can’t be satisfied with changing who runs society – we need to change the way it’s run. We need socialism. And we’re willing to fight for it.
Yes, yes, Conservative MP and Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt was called a cunt on radio today not once but twice and it was hilarious. But that’s not nearly the funniest political madness that’s been on the radio waves today, oh no.
The real Michael Crockart - I think...
Michael Crockart, Lib Dem MP for Edinburgh West and parliamentary private secretary to Scottish Secretary Michael Moore, was interviewed today on Radio 4’s World at One program, where he stated that he was prepared to resign over the tuition fees vote on Thursday.
Apparently, Crockart’s contact telephone number was listed incorrectly in the BBC’s directory of MPs’ contact details – and whatever scallywag answered the phone played along, identifying himself as the MP and then spouting a load of pish live on air in Crockart’s name.
You can hear the interview here – and please do listen, it’s hilarious. Especially when you consider that not only is the interviewee supposed to be an MP, he’s meant to be a Scottish one.
Apparently, the imposter also issued quotes to the Press Association, which were then carried by the London Evening Standard – despite them reporting about the imposter in the very same article!
Mr Imposter, whoever you may be – a bored receptionist or security guard in the House of Parliament, a wee guy sitting at home who’ll take any opportunity for a prank, or a student protester looking to make fools of the Lib Dem traitors – we salute you!
The inspiring Edinburgh University Occupation has confirmed that his highness Nicholas Cleggerton will be attempting a press conference this afternoon at 3:10 at Our Dynamic Earth, Hollyrood. This should be the climax of what is to be a day of student activism, starting at 1130 at bristo square, involving marches, direct action and hopefully snowballs.
The media will be out in force daring Clegg to show up for his appointment so at all costs anyone who can make it to hollyrood this afternoon should do so, to show our fustration at the appauling regressive and unfair actions undertaken so far by this government.
Good luck to anyone who can make it today, and my apologies for the short notice!
LIAR: nick clegg promises to vote against fee increases.
If last month’s Browne Review was the warning shot, today’s announcement that the government intend to treble the cap on fees for higher education in England to an astounding £9,000 a year, is the declaration of war.
All universities will be able to charge up to £6,000 a year, double the current rate of £3,290. However, if certain conditions are met in relation to admitting students from ‘poorer backgrounds’, the top-level that universities will be able to charge will jump to £9,000. This is nothing more than an attempt to create a two-tier education system, where top universities are able to charge more and price out anyone but the richest. The measure to allow some students from ‘economically disadvantaged’ background is sheer tokenism and will do nothing to redress the already overwhelming inequality in access to higher education.
The vast majority of students will be forced to take out astronomical student loans to cover their fees -- and proposals are afoot to raise the level of interest to well-above inflation. The huge rises in fees are to make up for the, in some cases, total departure by the state in funding for higher education. Indeed, in humanities, arts and social sciences, the teaching budget at English unis is facing a cut of 100% -- the shortfall will be made up by students paying for it.
What’s all the more shocking about this is that if the proposals pass, it will be with the backing of Lib Dem MPs. The same Lib Dem MPs who stood for election on the basis of opposing rises in tuition fees -- 57 of whom even signed an NUS pledge to vote against any rise in the cost of tuition. In fact, they went further than that -- the Lib Dems said that they would scrap tuition fees altogether! But as we’ve come to expect from Clegg and pals, any principles they once pretended to hold went straight out the window when some shiny ministerial cars and cabinet jobs came along.
With the huge rise in fees down south, it wont take long for university principals in Scotland to begin ratcheting up the pressure on the Scottish Government to reintroduce some form of fees in order that they’re ‘not left behind’. But the fees increase in England can be defeated -- last week’s militant demonstration in Oxford showed the level of anger among students at the government’s plans to wreck education as we know it. The campaign needs to be stepped up nationwide, and there’s calls for a national day of action on the 24 November, involving walk-outs, sit-ins and demonstrations. Next week, tens of thousands of students from all over the UK are expected to take to the streets for the join NUS/UCU demo against education cuts in London, in a huge show of force against the attacks on education. The government needs to be made to listen -- and if enough Lib Dem MPs can be forced to abide by their election pledges by voting against, rather than just abstaining, the rise in fees, it will fall.
Okay, spot the kid who hasn’t got a clue.
Colin Firth was one of many high profile supporters that came out to back the Lib Dems prior to the election earlier this year.
SSY apologises for the sweary word in the title, but the above quote was taken from a panicky (hard to say which one tbh) Polis at the demo against tuition fees today arguing wi fellow officers over who was responsible for the titanic fuck up that was the vague attempt at maintaining control over streets in Glasgow.
Less than six weeks ago, we 
Ahead of December 9th’s vote on the tripling of university tuition fees, Nick Clegg is insistent that “Liberal Democrat ministers in government are as one on this, and as a team every single person will vote for this measure on Thursday,” whilst frantically trying to fly allies home (from a climate change conference, no less) to get the extra votes, fearing that Lib Dem MPs will abstain or vote against the government’s proposals. Well known Lib Dems such as former leaders Charles Kennedy and Menzies Campbell are set to vote against the fees increase. The Lib Dem leader of Newcastle City Council has come out in public 
The Liberal Democrats have come a long way since we decried them as a bunch of boring bastards in their first 
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