Good Result For SSP in Council By-Election

Glenrothes SSP declared the Thornton, Stenton & Finglassie South by-election a resounding success. After a hard-fought campaign that always seemed likely to be about swings away from Labour to the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National Party, Jim Balfour received 64 votes for the SSP (4.6%). This was good enough to beat both the independent candidate and the Tory. It was bad news for Labour, who saw their percentage share fall by 16%. The Conservatives also saw a significant drop in fortunes.(See graph below) It was not just about votes however. The campaign also saw the local SSP membership increase as people took the opportunity to join Scotland's fastest growing political party.

The full result was as follows:

fig.1 The share of the votes.

fig.2 How the percentage polled compared with 1999 Council Election Result

Jim's Main Election Leaflet can be read below

Jim Balfour has lived in Stenton for most of his life and has become increasingly angry at the cuts Fife Council have inflicted year on year, while expecting Fifers to pay more Council Tax. Jim is a former Fife Council employee, having worked in residential childcare for a number of years. He has been the press officer for the SSP’s Glenrothes Branch since its formation. He has campaigned actively against health cuts and mobile phone masts, as well as speaking out against privatisation. He is a committee member of Stenton Environmental Play Scheme (S.T.E.P.S.).

SSP: The Only Alternative to Labour

Council Tax has risen at above the rate of inflation, despite £4.1million of cuts by the Labour administration. The bill gets higher but the services get worse.

Stenton’s playparks have been left to rot since 1986. The SSP fully endorse the Stenton Environmental Play Schemes (S.T.E.P.S.) initiative and we have already played an active part.

Fife Council has allowed Thornton’s bus service to be decimated by Stagecoach. We will campaign for more frequent services that meet residents' travel needs, not Stagecoach's greed for profits.

In Finglassie, catching a bus often involves trudging through mud, as there are too few paths.

Did you know that Stagecoach owner Brian Souter, who gets richer by providing a second-rate bus service, only pays double what we pay in council tax?

The Labour Party has begun privatising schools in the Kingdom. When Fife Council announced the PPP deal to build three schools in Fife at FIVE TIMES the 1999 costing of the project, the SSP were the ONLY party to speak out against this RIP OFF.

This means that Fife Council will have to pay £6.4million for the schools EVERY YEAR until 2026. Is this why they're asking us to accept cuts of £4.1 million in council services?

This is Labour's double whammy - parents pay now and our kids will still be paying off this debt when they're long out of school!

The recent Right For Fife public consultation was a whitewash. The goal of Labour quango NHS Fife was to cut costs and cover the fact that staffing numbers have reached crisis level. This will result in more work for already overworked GPs and local community health centres.

Fifers were divided East and West by NHS Fife, fighting to secure the future of our local hospitals. The SSP saw through this "divide and conquer" tactic and has consistently called for both the Victoria and Queen Margaret to be maintained as acute hospitals and be given massive funding to improve services and staffing levels.

The SSP were horrified to learn that at certain times and under certain traffic conditions, the local Fire Brigade were failing to arrive in Finglassie within TARGET TIMES. The decommissioning of Thornton Fire Station (now Fire Brigade HQ) was conditional, we’ve been told, upon the construction of a new fire station in Stenton.

If elected, Jim Balfour would campaign to have a FIRE STATION located nearby.

The Scottish Socialist Party's proposals for a Scottish Service and Water Tax would abolish the unfair council tax/water charges and replace them with an income-based local government tax. Those on £100,000 a year would pay ten times more than the current highest council tax band, while 882,000 people with an annual income below £10,000 would automatically be exempted from paying without having to apply for a rebate. This would help to improve local services and start to redistribute wealth more evenly across Scotland.

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