But that doesn’t mean there weren’t any stories though. Indeed, it was historic because it is the first time the SNP have got the most votes in Scotland in a UK-wide election. And unlike the 2007 Scottish Parliamentary election, it wasn’t a narrow result either.

Indeed, the fact that Labour got the most votes in only three council areas underlines just how much Scotland has fallen out of love with Labour, something that seemed an impossibility just a few years ago. That bodes very well for the SNP in terms of future FPTP elections, which have always acted to keep SNP representation artificially low.

A couple of weeks ago I teased Jeff about recent opinion polls. In the rest of the UK — in a three-party system — Labour was well and truly in the doldrums, fighting for third in the high teens in opinion polls. But in Scotland’s four-party system, Labour were still a comfortable 2nd in the mid-20s.

In the end though, the SNP delivered a comprehensive drubbing to Labour in the European elections. The gap between the SNP and Labour is now over twice as large as the gap between Labour and the Conservatives. And that’s not as a result of how well the Conservatives are doing — their share of the vote went down.

While the UK-wide picture was largely about Labour losing votes and not much else, Scotland’s results were only partly about the Labour collapse. The SNP gained a lot more than Labour lost, so that can be seen as a sign that the Scottish voters are quite happy with the mid-term Scottish Government.

I’m tempted to suggest that the Lib Dems’ drop in support is partly due to the electorate’s perception of their performance in the Scottish Parliament. That would be me projecting my views on the entire electorate. I had gone off the Lib Dems a bit because of their poor performance in the Scottish Parliament, and it was only after investigating each of the parties that I realised they are probably the only party I could bring myself to vote for. If I hadn’t done that, I probably wouldn’t have voted.

The Greens didn’t come close to getting a Scottish seat, which must be massively disappointing for them. A near miss might have been tolerable, but according to the d’Hondt calculator I used, Scotland would have needed nine seats if the Greens were to take one.

Ukip suffered a noticeable dip in an already low level of support. Mind you, last time they were snapping at the Greens’ heels. This year they were far behind. They remain sixth, but are increasingly irrelevant in Scotland.

Meanwhile the BNP gained, but to a quite distant 7th. The BNP had just 2.5% of the vote, compared to a 6.2% share UK-wide. They were 9th in Scotland in 2004, so they have made a bit of a stride in Scotland. But they only gained around 8,000 extra votes. Much of the BNP’s advance can be attributed to the collapse of the SSP and the disappearance of Operation Christian Vote (which entered as part of the Christian People’s Alliance — a move that didn’t do them much good).

Scotland’s socialist titans continue their journey to obscurity. The SSP scraped together just 10,000 votes — six times fewer than the number of votes they got in 2004. Even the Socialist Labour Party, Arthur Scargill’s vanity project, got over twice as many votes as the SSP. The Socialist Labour Party didn’t even bother to enter the last European election. By beating the SSP so comfortably, they have certainly shown just how irrelevant the SSP have become. Those heady days when the SSP had six MSPs feels like so long ago now.

Tommy Sheridan threw his lot in with No2EU, which got even fewer votes. In fact, No2EU got even fewer votes than mystery man Duncan Robertson. That is no mean feat considering I had a struggle finding out anything about Mr Robertson at all prior to the election.

Right at the bottom of the heap was Jury Team, a candidate with which I sympathised a bit. Perhaps it goes to show that, despite the current crisis of confidence in mainstream politics, people still like the principle of party politics rather than taking a risk on an independent candidate.

The decision to vote

A series of posts

1. A pathetic situation
2. Five disturbing things about democracy
3. How should politics be reformed?: Part 1
4. How the new politics might look: part 2
5. European election leaflets: The main parties
6. European Parliamentary Election literature: small parties
7. A second opinion
8. I decided! And I decided to vote

BNP

Needless to say, the BNP is a pathetic party of mindless xenophobes with moronic policies. Their election leaflet has come in for a ton of criticism too, and rightly so.

My dad picked up on their use of a Spitfire at the very top of the leaflet:

The Spitfire was used in a war against your philosophy, you cretins.

Amusingly enough, the Spitfire pictured on the leaflet was actually used by Polish pilots, not British ones.

On the other side, the following is listed: “TRAFALGAR – THE SOMME – DUNKIRK – D-DAY – THE FALKLANDS”. What is this? Some kind of war-mongering jizzathon?

The leaflet also says you should vote for the BNP: “Because it’s not racist to oppose mass immigration.” Well, maybe it’s not racist. But it is downright moronic and fascistic for these reasons.

There doesn’t appear to be any attempt to tailor this message to a Scottish audience. A paragraph rants about “Lab-Lib-Con” — but there is no mention of the SNP, Scotland’s largest party. And the leaflet contains absolutely no information whatsoever about any of the BNP’s candidates.

Beneath this, is the by now familiar section on “Why We’re All Voting BNP”. You know, the one containing stock photographs which have been used in this way without permission. And the models aren’t even British. The “pensioners” are actually an Italian couple who do not hold the BNP’s views.

Christian Party – Christian Peoples Alliance

I got no leaflet, so I took a quick look at their website. I am not a Christian, so I haven’t spent long looking at the website. Reading their manifestos, their main policies include beginning each meeting of the European Parliament with Christian prayer and enforcing “an EU-wide day of rest” every Sunday.

A bit like the Greens, they also want the economic system to be controlled more, but are vague on how to go about it. Apparently limits will be placed on “complex instruments”. All-in-all, they actually seem very similar to the Greens, but with a God bit in the middle. Not a party for me, but they don’t seem quite as nutty as I first feared.

Duncan Robertson (independent)

It’s a complete mystery. Does anyone know who this person is?

Jury Team

No leaflet again, so I took a look at the website. There is not much there policy-wise apart from a general hatred of party politics. Understandable given recent events, although I am not totally against political parties as I outlined in the previous posts about how to reform politics in the UK.

There is something quite refreshing about Jury Team though, which is that the candidates are apparently totally independent of any kind of party control. Jury Team’s number 1 candidate in Scotland, Alan Wallace, has a blog which is an interesting read. He seems like a measured chap and in the (admittedly rather little) research I have done, there has been nothing that has offended me in the slightest.

There really is very little information policy-wise though. Indeed, Alan Wallace’s blog goes out of its way to point out that it doesn’t really matter what the policies are — what counts is that he will be open and transparent. It’s very well saying that, and I don’t doubt it. But it would be better if there was a little more information on exactly what I might be voting for if I place my cross next to “Jury Team”.

No2EU – Yes to Democracy

Cheese-a-rama. Where have I seen this before? Does anyone really think that the current rise in unemployment has been caused by the EU?

The message from Bob Crow makes No2EU sound a bit like UKIP, but with added socialism thrown in for good measure. Loon-tastic. Like most frustrated socialist parties, they seem to long for a way of life that hasn’t been seen since… well, 1972.

My dad noted that the party’s logo is quite odd. The way it’s written looks like “no²eu”. I wonder what the rationale behind turning the word “to” into a number 2 then the squared symbol is!

Amusingly, this Scottish leaflet invites voters to an “Eve of poll rally — Euston, London”. I’m sure all those out-of-pocket Scottish workers will really easily find the time and money to attend.

A bit of research reveals that No2EU is actually a coalition made up of the following organisations: RMT, Alliance for Green Socialism, the Communist Party of Britain, the Indian Workers’ Association, the Liberal Party, the Socialist Party, Socialist Resistance and Solidarity. Communists? Solidarity? Indeed, Tommy Sheridan is number 2 on the list in Scotland. Yup, that seals the deal. I shan’t be voting for these people.

Socialist Labour Party

We got no leaflet, so I looked at the website. It’s a little bit scary. The design is garish and primitive, and the first words apart from the title are: “Scargill. VOTE SLP JUNE 4TH” That’ll be Arthur Scargill’s vanity party then.

Click on the link and you are told that this is “one of the most important elections since the Second World War.” Eh?

Ukip

This Ukip leaflet has the same sort of naff symbolism as the BNP one, with a huge image of Winston Churchill dominating the front of the leaflet and making an appearance on the other side. “Say no to the European Union”, the leaflet proclaims, seemingly oblivious to the fact that Winston Churchill actually called for a “United States of Europe”. Ho hum.

Ukip provides some information on their candidates. Their qualifications? One is “Scotland’s best-known horse whisperer.” Another is an “experienced geophysicist.” Still, at least it underlines the point that “Ukip candidates are real people, not career politicians!” — and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Still, you wouldn’t catch me voting for this lot. In these corruption-aware times, it would be a bit silly to vote for Ukip, who are kings of the art. They also have a track record of telling massive porky pies about the EU.

The collapse of the SSP / Solidarity has been spectacular. They have lost all of their MSPs, and apparently even have only one councillor each in the whole of Scotland now. What I am most surprised about, though, is the fact that Solidarity actually seem to have the upper hand.

The SSP clearly owed almost all of their support to the charisma of Tommy Sheridan. Now that he has gone off to form his own party, the left vote has split. But Tommy Sheridan has been quick to point out that Solidarity is already the largest socialist party in Scotland, after just eight months.

It is still a huge comedown. In many areas Solidarity are behind Christian parties. In most areas they are also behind the BNP. Meanwhile, the SSP linger around among the truly diddy parties, registering between roughly 0.5% and just over 1% of votes.

I had got the impression that the SSP had a bigger movement behind it. But clearly among the electorate, SSP support is dead. But I wouldn’t be surprised to see Solidarity bounce back by the next election. Tommy Sheridan will have to rebuild trust, but he is the only person in a position to get any socialist party winning seats again.

Outside the five main parties, the best performers have consistently been the SSCUP. In effect, they are now the strongest small party (apart from the Greens). Not bad going, but they have still lost an MSP which really underlines just how badly the small parties have done in this election.

UKIP have taken an absolute drubbing — at the very bottom in Central Scotland, and not much more popular elsewhere. Clearly there just isn’t that same level of support for UKIP in Scotland as there is down south. I wonder if this is to do with their promises to sack all MSPs. I just don’t think there is any appetite for that sort of thing. Maybe to reduce the number of MSPs, but not to sack them all.

Elsewhere, it is evident that the BNP has got at least 1% of the regional vote. The Christian parties also put in surprisingly strong performances. Damp squibs from Scottish Voice and the Publican Party.

Among the bloggers up for election, the 9% Growth Party came last in Glasgow with 80 the votes (ahem, 0.0%). Adam Lyal’s Witchery Tour Party got 0.3% in the Lothians, which was just more than the similar Had Enough Party.

Oh, and a word about independence as well. There is no mandate for an independence referendum. The SNP have more seats than Labour, but they do not have a majority. Indeed, they only got around a third of the votes cast and all of the other independence-supporting parties of note saw drops in support.

And of course, not every vote cast for the SNP will have been a pro-independence vote. In many instances, it will have been a simple anti-Labour protest vote. Pro-Union candidates still have a majority in Parliament, and they picked up a majority of votes.

It’s not quite time yet.

Update: Forgot to say my bit about the Lib Dems. I’m glad they are not in a position where they can be sole kingmakers. I was getting the impression that they were a little bit too comfortable with the idea of being perpetually in government. It is not a healthy attitude.

And while I am usually sympathetic to the Lib Dems when they are accused of getting in to bed with anybody, it is easy to see how they can just focus on finishing third rather than, say, pursuing good policies.

Because of the electoral system used, a coalition needs to be formed, and the Lib Dems will usually find themselves in a position to be part of the Scottish Executive. I’m just glad that this time round they will need to get someone else — probably the Greens — on board as well.