Oh, what a beautiful morning for Scotland and the hopes of its people!

Good news all around today on the polls, although the results clearly stick in the craw of some. The responses range from the objective through the rueful to those still in denial.

No nationalist or fair-minded democrat could quarrel with Scotland on Sunday.

Front page headline - Salmond in poll position as SNP surge, sub-header Labour losing ground in battle for Holyrood. Its Insight section gives excellent three-page coverage with graphical analysis of the polls.

(The fourth page is devoted to an essay on David Hume by Richard Bath, which regrettably tries to paint a picture of the SNP - in one paragraph [para8] and one quote from Professor Moss of Glasgow University - that is entirely wrong in its analysis.)

The editorial comment is headed Salmond turns the tide, and Kenny Farquarson's excellent piece Will hope or fear decide the election? contains  comments that can only gladden the hearts of SNP supporters, even though it closes with a note of caution.

“The SNP lead in our exclusive YouGov poll today is a testament to an exemplary, pitch-perfect manifesto launch by one of the most impressive political machines in the UK , never mind Scotland.”

“The SNP is playing a blinder, and deserves its lead in the polls. The campaign is slick, upbeat and positive.”

Forgive me for picking quotes, Kenny!

The Sunday Times carries the fascinating headline Scots deal may break coalition, revealing that Ed Miliband told colleagues that a Lib-Lab coalition in Scotland could bring down the Coalition, confirming my blog analysis of his Scottish conference speech that he wasn’t trying to help Scottish Labour to get elected on May 5th, but trying to fight the next UK general election using the puppet Scottish Labour group as a tool for his own Westminster ambitions.

It also reveal yet again that the UK parties and media are only interested in Scotland when they occasionally and belatedly recognise that it is their Achilles Heel when it comes to maintaining their hegemony and lunatic foreign policy.

All of this predictably has bypassed the Sunday Post, who are engaged, under Campbell Gunn’s byline, in a thinly disguised attempt to prop up Iain Gray’s feeble campaign and image. At least they didn’t trot out Lorraine Davidson to do it for them.

Meanwhile, back at the Royal Stud Farm, the Queen is contemplating gifting Strathearn, no less, to William and Kate “to cement the relationship between the Monarchy and Scotland”. Auld habits die hard. Any Scots - including apparently Roseanna Cunningham - who welcome this are clearly on their knees already and tugging their forelock (and what else besides) as the mud from the Royal horses splashes in their faces.

The new Sunday Herald thinks Tavish Scott is the big story, then follows with page after page of negativism about the SNP, including a sad little piece on party manifestos by Ian Bell. It does, however, give full coverage to Cardinal O’Brien’s admirable attack on Trident and WMD’s in Scottish waters  while managing to ignore the elephant in the room - the fact that the SNP are the only significant party in Scotland and the UK that is totally opposed to nuclear weapons, WMDs and nuclear power.

The Sunday Herald prefers to present Partick Harvie and his Green Party of two, and CND, - which sadly has been totally ineffectual for half a century in opposing nuclear weapons - as the bulwarks against nuclear power.

Well, as champions of the UK (pro-nuclear) and of Labour (pro nuclear), the Sunday Herald would say that, wouldn’t they? They mustn’t support the only organisation that can actually deliver a nuclear-free Scotland, the SNP - if they get re-elected and ultimately secure an independent Scotland they will undoubtedly do it.

The Cuts – impact on Scotland’s finances

The biggest UK spending cuts since World War Two - £81 billion over four years. Guiding principles (according to George Osborne) – fairness, reform and growth.

My view – too fast, too soon, directed at the wrong targets, and leading to unfairness, hardship and possibly economic collapse: driven, not by economics or rational thought, but an atavistic Tory instinct to destroy the public sector.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS): “With the exception of 2% of the richest households, it is a budget that hits the poor and families worst …”

£3.3 billion will be cut from Scotland’s current £29.2 billion budget for 2010-2011 in the period up to 2014-2015. (£13.8 billion in 1999 to the current level).

Bear in mind that this is against the fact that Scotland’s budget has been rising steadily over the years - in common with every other area of the UK - because of inflation and increasing pressure on resources, a significant proportion of it directly due the problems relating to the abuse of alcohol – pressures on medical services, attendance at work and the police, pressure that the Scottish Government has been ruthlessly and cynically blocked from addressing by The Three Stooges – Gray, Goldie  and Scott – and their politically-motivated hostility to minimum pricing for alcohol.

Who is doing this to Scotland? The Tories and the LibDems, in their expedient, power-hungry and now notorious coalition, the ConLibs – the LibDems conned by the Tories into becoming their fall guys for the destruction of a caring society, fronted by George Osborne’s hapless puppet, Danny Alexander – a Scot.

Who was responsible for the economic shambles that led to this? Labour, under the Blair, Brown, Mandelson gang, later metamorphosed into the Brown, Darling, Murphy gang. An Englishman, three Scots and a half-Scot, Blair, never quite sure what nationality he was, someone whom a prestigious Scottish college, Fettes, probably wishes it could airbrush out of their distinguished alumni – or maybe they don’t …

Labour, now protesting the economic vandalism for which they created the raison d'être, pleads a global financial meltdown as their excuse, suffering collective amnesia over the fact that the UK economy, under their disastrous 13-year stewardship, was uniquely unprepared to meet the global threat.

SNP close the gap on Labour

The undernoted is a straight lift from the SNP site. It boosted my morale – I hope it will do the same for those who have not already read it. Polls do usually lift after a party conference, but let’s be confident that this lift is the beginning of an accelerating trend leading to victory in May 2011.

SNP.org   2010-10-21

The SNP has significantly closed the gap on Labour following the launch of the party's 2011 election campaign at its annual conference last weekend.

In a Yougov poll, published in the Scotsman, of 1,405 people across Scotland taken  between the 18th and 20th October, just after SNP conference, the party saw its share of the Holyrood vote increase by 5 points across both constituency and regional vote.

Labour’s vote has flat-lined and the LibDems vote crumbled to its lowest level in over nine years, as people across Scotland chose to work together with the SNP to make Scotland better.

The SNP is polling at a higher level than at the same time prior to the 2007 election. 

Since September the SNP vote has increased to 34% of the constituency vote and 31% of the regional vote – a 5% increase in both cases.

The poll puts the SNP on 34% in the constituency vote, against 40% for Labour, 14% for the Conservatives and 8% for the Lib Dems. 

On the regional vote, the SNP has increased to 31% against 36% for Labour, 15 for the conservatives and 8 for the Lib Dems.

 SNP Campaign Co-ordinator and Moray MP Angus Robertson, commenting on the poll, said:

"The SNP has fired the starting gun on the election campaign and these results show voters across Scotland are choosing to be part of better as we close the gap on Labour.

“Voters will not allow Labour to escape from their responsibility for the economic mess and the cuts coming Scotland’s way and it is clear the LibDems are paying a heavy price for backing the Tories.

“The SNP is the only party offering an alternative with the financial powers to manage Scotland’s economy and a fair deal for Scotland’s households by balancing government efficiencies, pay restraint and management cuts with a focus on frontline services , freezing council tax and abolishing prescription charges.

“And as we work towards the election next year we will continue to hear the priorities of the people of Scotland, their concerns, and ideas for the future as we work together people and politicians to make Scotland better.

“With Scotland’s only credible candidate for First Minister people are putting their trust in Alex Salmond and the SNP team to protect the things Scotland holds dear in the face of Labour, Conservative and Lib Dem cuts.”