Glenrothes

Two (unrelated!) matters!

Following a recent letter in the “Evening Telegraph” which called into question the City Council’s commitment to improving Dundee’s roads, many thanks to the Tele for printing my response (as City Council Planning & Transport Convener) in last night’s edition (See http://www.eveningtelegraph.co.uk/output/2008/09/30/letters.shtm) :
Work ongoing to improve roads

I refer to the comments by Road User about Dundee.

Far from “nothing much has been done” to improve the city’s roads’ condition, Dundee City Council has already committed an additional £1 million capital funding this financial year for improvements and a further £1 million each year is committed for the following two years — 2009/10 and 2010/11.

Additionally, initiatives such as the new Rapid Rhino repairs process will, over time, make a significant improvement to repair quality across Dundee.

With over 330 miles of roads in the city to maintain, I do not underestimate the challenge of the task but the city council is making every effort to meet that challenge. — Councillor Fraser Macpherson, Convener of Planning and Transport, Dundee City Council.

On an unrelated matter, the final result of the “Dunfermline Press” online poll on voting intentions for the forthcoming Glenrothes by-election was :

Which party do you think will win the forthcoming Westminster by-election in Glenrothes?

Poll Ends: Wednesday, 1st October, 2008 12:30, this poll is now closed, results were:
Conservative 1.3%

Labour 17.3%

Liberal Democrat 43.3%

SNP 38.0%

Any other 0.2%


So a Labour/Nationalist two horse race?! All to play for!

Dunfermline Press …

OK, it is not often I mention the above newspaper on the blog – readership in Dundee rather small, I suspect – although the Dunfermline Press has, to its great credit, shown good interest in the local television campaign.

However, it is for an entirely different matter that I mention that newspaper today – its about the online poll it has been conducting about the forthcoming Glenrothes parliamentary by-election. Results thus far :
Which party do you think will win the forthcoming Westminster by-election in Glenrothes?
Poll Ends: Wednesday, 1st October, 2008 12:30, the results so far are:
Conservative 1.8%

Labour 21.3%

Liberal Democrat 32.7%

SNP 43.9%

Any other 0.3%

There’s been a lot of spin that its a Labour/SNP two horse race and STV failed in their duty of impartial, fair coverage of the by-election in last week’s ‘Politics Now’ programme by only featuring the SNP and Labour candidates (that said, their performances were so dire, it probably helped the LibDem and Tory candidates more than them!) If the above online poll is anything to go by – just like Dunfermline and West Fife before it – reality on the ground is rather different from media spin.
Labour is in free-fall – it will be an extremely interesting contest.