Roy boast betrays hollow Labour victory

Lindsay Roy's boast that Gordon Brown has delivered the lowest interest rates in fifty years underscores how hollow Labour's victory actually is.

What Roy may or may not understand is that the Bank of England has had to lower interest rates so far because all the data points to a very severe and prolonged recession in the UK. It is in order to mitigate some of the effects of that recession that the BoE has been forced (belatedly many would argue) to take such dramatic action. Interest rates at this level only serve to advertise how badly the UK economy has been managed. This week the European Commission and the IMF have both said that the UK is worse placed to deal with the global economic crisis than any other developed country.

It is this backdrop that makes the Glenrothes election result so frustrating. Brown claims that voters supported Labour because he and his party have ideas about how to get the UK through these difficult times. The truth is that Brown remains clueless. His success recently has been in managing the news agenda. He has dominated it to such an extent that there has been no space for any other narrative to develop. His key success to date is to have packaged the bank bailout as the action of an audacious and decisive leader rather than the only course of action available to someone looking at the imminent collapse of the whole system. Brown has spun the line that the crisis is international in origin and for Scottish audiences has insinuated that small countries in particular are struggling.

Brown has a couple of advantages over other politicians. First Labour are in power in Westminster - with your hands on the machinery of government it is always going to be easier to look like you're doing more than anyone else. This coupled with an improved spin machine gives the impression that Brown is not only on top of the crisis but on the side of ordinary people - witness the daily demand from the erstwhile free market devotee that petrol prices are lowered or bank charges reduced. Brown has begun to look like he can deliver change when he is doing no more than timing his demands to fit in with, for example, already falling oil prices. His media management has been remarkably successful and he has left the other parties looking like also rans.

The SNP like the Tories in England have been sidelined by this dominant narrative. The SNP's problems have been compounded by the apparent difficulties facing some small countries. Taking Iceland out of the picture, the reality is that small nations are no worse off than anyone else. While some like Ireland face recession this makes them no different to the UK. Others - Norway and Finland, for example - seem likely to be able to ride out the recession. The issue for the SNP is that Labour has been able to reprise its tactic of engendering fear in an electorate which lacks confidence and is highly sensitive to "evidence" which appears to confirm their suspicions that Scotland is a place which will always struggle to be a success.

In the face of an agenda setting UK Prime Minister and a bedazzled press the SNP has struggled to communicate an impression of decisiveness and engagement with the economic crisis. There are limits to what the devolved government can do particularly in the face of the worst economic situation for 80 years. Some voters will interpret this as an indication of government failure rather than as evidence of the inadequacy of the present constitutional settlement.

Putting more money into people's pockets is something the SNP has done. The nationalist government's action in cutting business rates and freezing the council tax gives citizens more money to spend - vital in stimulating the economy and increasing consumer confidence. Somehow the message that the SNP is taking practical steps to create conditions conducive to economic good health has not been effectively communicated.

Glenrothes has been a Goldilocks election for Labour - the conditions have been just right and they've got their electoral porridge. Sooner or later events will overtake them and the election will be seen as a blip.