Jim Broadbent is out of this world as Denis he plays a man who is very funny and loves his wife very much. The Film is not a step by step look at Mrs Thatcher from her a couple of events in her childhood the main one being her Father speaking at a public meeting to her downfall, instead it concentrates on “some of” the important parts of her life as seen in flashback by Mrs Thatcher while she talks with her dead husband Denis. There as a couple of points of interest in the film as regard what it portrays as present day. Firstly her “staff” and Family (well her daughter Carole played by Olivia Colman Mark is in South Africa and never appears) both think she is going senile they realize she is talking to Denis and still has all his cloths in the closets as if he were alive. Secondly when asked direct questions about seeing things and having hallucinations she says “no” she also tells Denis on a number of occasions that he is dead. So this does not appear to be a case of senile dementia. There as been some concern by her friends and some fellow Tory MPs from her time that this did not portray her correctly. Personally it did not come over as her being a sad old lady so much as someone who missed the long term love of her life her husband and the flashbacks were a way of remembering him.

As I said this goes through the important parts of her life (or at least some of them) it starts with her first attempt at being elected in 1950 in Dartford which was a safe Labour Seat. She didn’t win but she met Denis and they marry she is then chosen for Finchley in 1959 and gets elected the way this effects her children is touched on. The film gives the idea how Sexist the House of Commons was at that time. It imply s however that she was the only Female MP at the time there were in fact another 24 MPs elected that year 12 Conservative and 13 Labour. You see that Airey Neaves (played by Nicolas Farrell) takes her under his wing and then you see her as Education Secretary (no mention of Milk Snatcher) and there is then an argument within her family when she decides to stand against Ted Heath (Played by John Sessions).

Mrs Thatcher is seen being coached how to speak in a lower octave something she denied the whole time she was in office this was all orchestrated by Gordon Reece (played by Roger Allam) The Next Major event was portrayed with a bit of poetic licence as although the INLA (Irish National Liberation Army) did blow up Airey Neaves she was not there at the time. There is coverage of the Miners Strikes, the Poll Tax riots the bombing of the Grand Hotel and her cabinet telling her the cuts were too deep (sound familiar) and you see the way she speaks to them she belittles Geoffrey Howe (Played by Anthony Head). Well this leads to his resignation and his speech in the house of Commons. This was the pivotal point in her downfall as after that Michael Heseltine (played by Richard E Grant) states he will stand against Mrs Thatcher.

When she does not win the first ballot out right the real knifes come out a number of Cabinet members are seen saying “of course you can count on my vote Margaret but I cant say about my colleagues”. Denis Tells her she will loose (this is another inaccuracy as it was Kenneth Clarke and Malcolm Rifkin who told her this).

Throughout the film as I mentioned Margaret is speaking to the dead Denis and her Housekeeper June (played by Susan Brown) tries to get her to get rid of the Clothes she still has belonging to him. The end sees Margaret emptying the closets herself packing a suitcase for Denis and waving him off into the light.

Overall its a fairly accurate portrayal of her years in power well from my recollection anyway. There is very little politics and more about her relationship with Denis which if the film is to be believed was a love affair. A understanding of the history of the time gives you a better understanding of the film. I would not recommend taking to children without ex-plaining a lot of the history to them first as my daughter found that knowing the history helped. I would recommend seeing it as its not a glorification of her but shows how she was out of touch with even her cabinet at times and that the way she had to act to get ahead was in its self the main thing that lead to her downfall.

I thought I don’t remember this but he makes it sound like a major incident so it must be on his Wikipedia page but NO not one word. I did find the incident online on the BBC website here you don’t hear Mr Salmond you however hear him being named and thus suspended for a week. Not exactly bringing down the Prime Minister. It makes me wonder why someone who is at the pinnacle of his political career as the First Minister of Scotland needs to rewrite History to involve himself in “Thatcher’s Downfall” ?

For those of you who don’t know and not to spoil the plot of “The Iron Lady” Mrs T was brought down from within. Her own “Wets” (name for Tory MP who was slightly right of centre) people like Michael Heseltine who challenged her for leader there was no outright winner. This was a “Major” Blow to Mrs Thatcher she initially stated her name would go forward to the second round and she got told she had support from people like Nicolas Riddle Norman Tebbit and Kenneth Baker as well as Douglas Hurd and John Major. Kenneth Clarke told he didn’t think she could win as did Malcolm Riffkin. Strangely enough Kenneth Clarke is still in the house of Commons and in the Cabinet. Well after being told that rather than be beaten she withdrew her name from the next stage. Douglas Hurd and John Major joined Michael Heseltine in the next round. In the Second round Major failed to get the 50% requirement and got 49.7% after the result was announced both Hurd and Heseltine withdrew and Major won. (not one mention of Alex Salmond anywhere).

So why does Alex Salmond want to be associated with the downfall of Mrs T ? well the release of the Iron Lady must play a part in this though he doesn’t appear in the film. I not sure who they would have got to play him Robbie Coltrane was mentioned on a Facebook post I saw. I wonder if Mr Salmond is thinking well I need to write myself into a Historical event related to Westminster because if I Run a Referendum and loose it where will I be then. I wonder who among his Cabinet will be given the hot potato of running the referendum campaign ? Answers on a postcard to Alex Salmond MSP, T4.26, The Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh EH99 1SP.

I have been at the Scottish Parliament a couple of times this year and made it to FMQs twice (which was nice) on Both occasions Iain Grey was on excellent form.

I am pleased to say I believe the Labour party in Scotland finish this year we have a new leadership team with Johann Lamont as Leader of the Labour Party in Scotland and Anas Sarwar as Depute. The new leadership will bring the party in Scotland together. I believe the polls will start to pick up for Labour as a clear message is given in Scotland.

The Local Government Elections in May I predict will be the turning point in Scotland politically. I predict that the Liberal Democrats will lose a lot of Council Seats. The question is who will they go to. In the Scottish Parliamentary election they went to the SNP now the question is will that be repeated.

That will all depend on two things. Firstly how the electorate perceive the SNP, how are they dealing with being a majority Government in Scotland. They have come under fire for passing bad legislation the Sectarian Bill and the Minimum Pricing Bill are at least two examples. How these will be perceived come May is the Big Question. The second is how they have been perceived on a local level how have their Councillors performed. The City of Edinburgh and the Trams (Edinburgh is run by the SNP and Liberal Democrats) Fife Council has come under attack for plans to Close Council Run Old Peoples Homes, Aberdeen Council has lurched from one disaster to another. The SNP are talking of having control of Glasgow Council after May, well we will have to wait and see.

I am standing as a Labour and Co-operative Candidate in the Scottish Borders for the ward in which I live Hawick and Denholm it is a 3 Councillor Ward. I am not complacent about winning however I do intend to win. To that end I have set up a website I will be updating it more as the time gets nearer with News and Policy.

So lets see what 2012 brings.

I believe so, the use of words that when I was young where swear words and you did not hear them or not very often anyway. They are used in everyday conversations now. I sometimes wonder if its down to lack of respect, lack of imagination or apathy. I can understand people can swear when they are angry I have done that myself. We must however recognise the situation and environment we use such language in. For instance you would not swear in a every day conversation with your Mother (well I know I wouldn’t) so why do people resort to it ?

As I say to my children, it’s NOT BIG and it’s NOT CLEVER. It is like Godwins Law when you have to resort to swearing to win an argument you have already lost the argument. Swearing and abusive language indicates to me that your verbal skill are low and that because you know this you have to swear or be abusive to stand out and be heard. What I would like to know is why people feel they need to do this as if there are more people like me it does not encourage me to listen, more often than not it makes me angry and turns me against their argument or indeed tell them that the are not doing their argument any good by their choice of language. This has backfired on me in the past and I get abused. Not that I let that bother me it only proves my point.

So do you feel swearing helps your argument ?

Labour needs to Move forward in a safe pair of hands the new leader needs to understand why we lost so many constituency seats in May. They must be willing to reconnect with the electorate. If you have read my Blog before you will know that I am an advocate of more Co-operative policy as being the way forward for the Labour Party. Therefore I fully support Johann Lamont as the Candidate who will move the party forward giving it a new lease of Life and galvanizing the membership to go forward policies that Scotland needs and that the Scottish people will endorse from next year in May 2012 at the Local Elections, in 2013 at the European Elections, in 2015 at the UK General Election and onto 2016 for the return of a Labour Administration in the Scottish Parliament. Having watched the candidates Speak a number of times I believe that Only Johann can put the case to the Scottish people for remaining as part of the United Kingdom. Not an argument about what we can’t do, more about how we are stronger.

Labour must not abandon its policies in a bidding war with the Nationalists for votes. We should not even consider dropping opposition to the Minimum pricing. Johann is the only candidate who is still opposed to the Minimum Pricing Bill. Johann has stated that when Labour opposes it will not be for the sake of opposing therefore when we see consensus we must grasp it. Johann as Co-convenor of the Cross party Group on carers is already working on consensus polices for the benefits of Scotland 650,000 unpaid carers who save the NHS and Social services Millions each year. This is the kind of leader I want I hope you will agree with me and support Johann for leader and if you are not a Labour party member that you will recognise the Change in the party and get behind Labour by voting for Labour Candidates.

The Scottish Government have promised to bring in Minimum pricing during the term of this parliament. This has been a policy that I have never seen as a “Magic Bullet” We have already seen the loop holes in the multi buy legislation. The Minimum price legislation would do nothing to tackle the addiction to drinking that a lot of young people have. All Minimum Pricing will do is cause financial problems and more heartache to family members of alcoholics who will have to find more money to pay for their addiction. Tax increases have never helped reduce the problem so why would this.

In my opinion what we need is a change to the culture of drinking. We should move from Binge Drinking to drinking being a social activity with friends and family. This should be done by education rather than legislation. We need to reintroduce community social clubs like the working men’s clubs but more family orientated than some of them were. The introduction of community run co-operative pubs. Which could link to local charities encouraging the pub as a local meeting place.

The more you legislate the more people will find ways around the law or will just break it. The prohibition laws of the USA in the 1930 did nothing to combat the problem they were introduced to solve they just made new ones.

The Cyber Nats hunt on the Internet they don’t discuss policy and if you don’t agree with them or date to say anything against their beliefs (for it is a religion not just politics) you will be abused and accused of being a member of “British Labour”. The also hang around the comments pages on online Newspapers. The Scotsman is a Good example they give themselves away their as they have names like “Hairy Haggis” (and that’s just the women). They accuse the Scotsman (A Johnston’s Press Newspaper) of being a Labour supporting paper (conveniently forgetting that one of the MSPs Joan McAlpine writes for the Scotsman) . While hanging on every word from Newsnet Scotland. They are aggressive in the onslaught on any opposition they don’t debate the name call demean and insult. They seem to have a chip on their shoulder about being Scottish rather than being proud of it and realising that harking on about battles long-lost or won do not favours to there cause.

Now Dont get me wrong I am not Talking about all SNP members there are growing numbers of ones who will debate and indeed I have a link on this Blog to Joan McAlpines own Blog.

I am not sure what the outcome of the review of the Scottish Labour Party will bring. I know what I would like it to bring but I will voice that within the confines of party discussions. I do not think there would be any benefit in raising them in my blog. I will however make some broad comments about what Scottish Labour has to do before 2016 and I believe from Iain Grays Speech yesterday at Alex Salmonds Election as First Minister the first step in this was taken. We must oppose the SNP when we need oppose what they are doing and when what they are doing will have a negative effect on the Scottish People. We must support any moves by the SNP where our policies are similar and where Labour party support would help bring benefits to the people of Scotland. In the broadest terms this is where the Labour Party needs to be a party in opposition who can effect change to the party in power but also a party waiting to take power and lead Scotland and who have Scotland’s best interests at heart and not just the aim of separating Scotland from the Union.

Back to the main point of my blog today what went wrong for Scottish Labour, well where do I start. The campaign started with attacks on the Conservatives which left the field open to the SNP to set the agenda which they did. Alex Salmond was never challenged on his policies. Labour were never able to gain any ground after that. The incident with Iain Gray retreating into Subway was a god send to the SNP and the media as they too played their part. The Labour machine never got out of first gear and at some points it seemed like they were in reverse. It was never about the policy as there are a lot of policies where the SNP and Labour are very close. It was down to confidence in the Labour Party. Iain Gray never came over as a man who could attract the electorate to vote labour. Labour spent its time being negative and not putting their policy across. This did not come over well with the electorate.

Labour came out of the election with a net loss of 7 seats and when you look at the votes for each party compared to 2007 Labour were down 0.5 %. While the SNP vote went up 12.5% this was gained mainly from the Lib Dems and some from the Tories. Now I know there are people who will say that they have heard of Traditional Labour Voters voting SNP while I know this is true it would appear that the loss of them was not as major as the Media and some people would make out. The problem was at this election there was the largest number of people who would change parties due to what is happening at Westminster. As we all know the Liberal Democrat Vote collapsed and there was a greater confidence in the SNP than anyone else so the vote went to them. In order to win at Holyrood we need to get the confidence in Labour back. The question is how do we do this ?

Well the answer to that is the subject of another blog.

Well the political map of Scotland looks different from this time last week. Labour Lost 7 Holyrood seats to the SNP and for the first time a party has an overall majority. The parliament was set up so as this should not happen. However it has and we have to live with it. The Liberal Democrats took the biggest hammering of the night being left with only 5 MSPs having previously had 16. The Conservatives lost 2 seats taking them down to 15. The Swing to SNP is not a swing towards the SNP but a vote against the Liberal Democrats and Labour although vote for Labour did not collapse rather Labour did not attract the vote from the former Liberal Democrat vote it went to the SNP. The Labour party now needs to go back and find out from the grass root members why it failed and start the change as soon as possible the change must be done involving the membership and not dictated from above.

Iain Gray’s resignation was not really unexpected his poll ratings had not been high and he didn’t really inspire the public to us. I don’t blame Iain for the result as the SNP have something that the other parties don’t and that is Alex Salmond. He seems to have a large personal following among members of the public. He has been around in politics for quite some time he first became an MP in 1987. He is therefore a very experienced politician and a hard man to combat. I believe he has slipped up on at least 2 things in this election. He has promised to keep Council Tax frozen for the 5 years of the Parliament and he has promised a referendum just before the 2015 election. the interesting point is Referendums are not legally binding, so legally the government can ignore the results. Given that we currently have a Coalition in Westminster parties who belive in the Union It is unlikely that the Westminster Parliament will give up full power to the Scottish Parliament. The Scotland Bill is currently going through both Parliaments and last night on Newsnight (Scotland) Alex Neil MSP (SNP) hinted heavily at the SNP blocking this bill through Holyrood. Which seems very petty to me. We will have to wait and see what happens but personally I think a Referendum would return a NO vote and I think Wee Eck knows this and therefore wont hold one