There’s a line being used by mainly Labour tribalists as well as people that weren’t even born, let alone having any idea of Scottish or British political history, that the SNP stabbed Labour in the back and let Margaret Thatcher in.
Here’s just one example from this afternoon of someone not bothering to check that what they’re saying is actually not a lie Labour have dragged out over and over for decades.
The fact is that it’s a lie as pointed out in this excellent Wings Over Scotland piece, and this one that has now been trimmed into a handy graphic.
The fact is that people bleating ‘the SNP gave us Thatcher’ miss a point that not only did the Tories get voted in by the people outside of Scotland, but that the Labour government of that time was falling to bits anyhow. It was a dead duck government along the lines of John Major’s in 1996/1997 that was limping along as much as possible to remain in power.Also, have a look at this here. This is a map of the UK constituencies after the 1979 election, Note the blue in Scotland.
The sad truth is that the people voted the Tories in at the 1979 election and that included a large number of people in Scotland. Of course the next election was different as Thatcherism bit hard but Scotland still returned a lot of Tory votes and even the last election Thatcher fought as Tory leader saw Scotland voting Tory in large parts of the country. It wasn’t until 1997 that the Tories were wiped out in Scotland, though there’s still a large Tory vote that returns MSP’s for Holyrood.
So the idea that 11 SNP MP’s inflicted personally upon the British people Thatcherism is simply ludicrous. History shows the truth that they didn’t but yet people insult the intelligence of many by pushing this insane line that Jim Callaghan failed because the SNP stabbed them in the back. They didn’t.
Perhaps if Labour want to have people turn back to them they can stop lying or living in the past and start presenting a positive socially democratic vision rather than squirm around convincing children that the SNP=bad!
My Little Underground 