The cost of keeping nothing secret

 The voters in South Dunfermline could be forgiven for wondering which are the parliamentary candidates and which are the council candidates, going by the election leaflets Calton's contact in Dunfermline has sent him. The would-be MSPs all seem to be more exercised by issues such as the proposed closure of a local school, local bus services and the state of the town centre, none of which they would have much control over if elected, than issues of national importance, such as the economy. The Green candidate is even concerned about the ability of Pars fans to buy their club! The Libdems are relying heavily on Willie Rennie's track record as MP for the area, conveniently forgetting that he was comprehensively booted out by Labour's Thomas Docherty in 2010. Calton suspects that Labour will do the same to the SNP this time round, especially with the latter's choice of a recycled Lothians list MSP as candidate to replace the disgraced Bill Walker.

Meanwhile the SNP seem to be increasingly sensitive to accusations that they have been in any way "economical with the truth", leading to journos and other bloggers/tweeters inventing new euphemisms for telling porkies. Calton's current favourite is "saying one thing in public and another behind closed doors". Whether or not the SNP are being honest with the people of Scotland is a matter of debate. What is clear is that a good number of people, including Johann Lamont and Calton, think that they are not being honest, which means that the SNP have a massive credibility problem. The onus is now on them to prove that they are being honest and are not hiding facts which are inconvenient to their arguments for independence. Otherwise they are going to struggle to convince people to vote yes next year. And spending £20k on legal action to keep the fact that they didn't have any EU advice secret doesn't help their cause.