Notebook by Bill Heaney
Beware of what you wish for. The candidates for the Dumbarton seat in the Scottish Parliament all want change, but should that change arrive on May 7, it will bring with it a mixture of surprises and even shocks for voters.
For a start, it could mean defeat for Dame Jackie Baillie, who has held Dumbarton since devolution led to the official opening of the Holyrood parliament in Edinburgh at the turn of the century.
It could lead, though, to significant celebrations in the constituencies of Argyll and Bute, Dumbarton and Clydebank and Milngavie for the Scottish National Party, which, we are informed by the polls, is far out in the lead at present and is uncatchable.
A tartan carpet could soon be laid out across the floors of the town halls in the main towns of these three constituencies, and saltires flown in celebration of victory from the flag poles around their grey sandstone entrances.
West Dunbartonshire Council would need to act quickly to replace the tattered and torn saltire outside their Church Street headquarters, just around the corner from Jackie Baillie’s constituency office in Castle Street.
It could well be Labour No More in Dumbarton come a week on Friday.
If a majority goes to the SNP’s Sophie Traynor, who is yet just a lassie in a tartan skirt with her only political experience, lord help us, on West Dunbartonshire Council, the residents of Dumbarton, Vale of Leven, Helensburgh, and Lomond will receive the change they are said to crave.
Candidates for the SNP in the Scottish Parliament election on May 7. Sophie Traynor, Jenni Minto and Marie McNair.
Sophie is local, caring, intelligent, and articulate. The kind of person we want to see attracted to politics, which has such a bad name in the current era.
Why have all these catastrophes crashed down on the heads of the Labour Party, who have been in power almost continuously in Dumbarton and Clydebank since 1950?
Everything changes. There is the old saw that a week is a long time in politics, and that much can happen in just seven days.
Change isn’t just at the door in Dumbarton. It’s a cold wind blowing up the stairs of the old Burgh Hall in Church Street, where the ceud mile failte for the council taxpayers is non-existent, and they have to be escorted to the useless public gallery, where people cannot see or hear the proceedings.
I’m told the council spent £52,000 on a new sound system, which still doesn’t work properly, although the council maintains that it was working perfectly when they were challenged about people not being able to hear what’s going on in the chamber. Talk about the three wise monkeys.
Dear, dear … democracy in Dumbarton works in some weird and wonderful ways.
Jackie Baillie is out canvassing with colleagues, who include former Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander.
In Clydebank, during one crisis – when is there not a crisis in West Dunbartonshire Council – the council locked the doors and sent the prospective audience home to nurse their grievances.
This is when they should have been thanking them warmly for coming and taking a commendable interest in matters relating to the council, which, in its wisdom, was spending £500,000 of our money on communications and at the same time refusing to answer questions from the press.
It was frankly stupid to attempt to publicise their affairs through a communications team that majors on silence. Communications and silence put together are an oxymoron.
So, how does the outcome of this Scottish Parliament election affect West Dunbartonshire Council?
We are living through the age of the influencer. The local government influencer here for the past five years has been Jackie Baillie, but she has had little or no influence on the shambolic council, which it has or had until they all fell out over who was getting the Provost’s job.
Some members threw the dummy out of the pram and resigned from the Labour group. One word from Jackie and they do as they wish.
Nowadays, it is the passing of the parcel with the council administration. Nobody wants it except Labour leader Martin Rooney, who has demonstrated he can’t handle it. For example, when the current carers’ issue came before the council, the Labour members all sat shamefully silent.
If Jackie Baillie has something to be proud of, it is not there for all to see in West Dunbartonshire and Helensburgh, and Lomond or Argyll and Bute, which has conveniently been tagged on to its political map.
And where the local media reflects the anger of the electorate over issues such as the £millions wasted on the leisure centre at the Pier, which has been all but blown away.
The Helensburgh Advertiser has not been banned for shining a light into the dark corner of that piece of procurement, at least not yet, by the highly paid A&B officials, but that envy seems to be coming down the West Highland Line fast from Lochgilphead.
Democracy is a fragile flower up there, too. It would make even the stone statue of Bonnie Mary of Argyll blush and badly needs protecting from self-serving politicians, placemen and time servers. The ripped saltire hanging over Church Street is a clear indication of how bad things are here.
As for those I believe will win the majority of votes in Dumbarton, which includes Cardross, Helensburgh, Rhu, and the Lochside, my choice is Sophie Traynor of the SNP.
Sophie has been making hay while Jackie may have spent too much of her time working for the Labour Party and dead man walking Sir Keir Starmer, a disastrous Prime Minister, whom even the Scottish leader Anas Sarwar can’t bring himself to support.
The Nationalists could be celebrating a hat-trick of wins with Marie McNair taking Clydebank and Milngavie, and former SNP government Minister Jenny Minto taking Argyll and Bute.
However, as I wrote here earlier, a week is a long time in politics, and there’s much of that still to come. Watch this space.
Argyll and Bute Constituency
The candidates seeking election to represent the Argyll and Bute Constituency in the Scottish Parliament have now been confirmed.
The constituency candidates are listed below in alphabetical order by surname:
- Calum George (Scottish Labour)
- Amanda Hampsey (Reform UK)
- Tommy Macpherson (Independent)
- Jenni Minto (Scottish National Party)
- Alan Reid (Scottish Liberal Democrats)
- Mick Rice (Independent)
- Peter Wallace (Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party)
The full Notice of Poll, along with a list of polling places, can be found on Argyll and Bute Council’s dedicated Elections web page.
Please note that voters living in the Helensburgh and Lomond area are part of the Dumbarton constituency and the West of Scotland region.
Clydebank and Milngavie constituency
The names which will appear on the ballot papers of residents in Clydebank and Milngavie have been revealed.
On Thursday, May 7, people will be asked to go to the polls to pick who they want to represent them as their MSP. Alternatively, many will have already completed their postal vote by this time.
- Claire Gallagher – Scottish Common Party
- Ben Langmead – Scottish Liberal Democrats
- Alix Mathieson – Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
- Marie A McNair – Scottish National Party (SNP)
- Callum McNally – Scottish Labour Party
- Andy White – Reform UK
Which Andy White is standing for Reform UK is the big question in Clydebank, but Reform UK wouldn’t tell The Democrat, and their media officer lost the rag when we had the temerity to ask the question and resigned her post the next day. Tammany Hall doesn’t even cut it in Dumbarton.
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The most exciting election I have ever covered, this was not. The most interesting contribution to the Leaders’ Debate on STV from a media point of view came from Reform UK leader Lord Malcolm Offord, who told Ross Greer, the Green Party co-leader: They were put next to each other, and their bickering during the one-on-one questions was fired by thinly-veiled contempt. “I own six houses, five cars and six boats,” said Offord, although he insisted he wasn’t boasting. Maybe he wasn’t, but Lord Offord could have added: “No’ bad for a wee boy frae Greenock.” Dumbarton people have always looked down on people from Greenock by way of their view down the Clyde of the Renfrewshire Hills and the Tail o’ the Bank from the cliffs along the Clyde shore from Cardross to Brucehill. The Reform UK candidate for Dumbarton, David Smith, is well placed to keep an eye on his boss (I’m told he needs watching).
David, right, who is attracting significant support attention amongst electors who won’t be voting for either SNP or Labour, is said to be the most common-sensical of a long list of Reform UK candidates following in Lord Offord’s wake. He has one over on the rest of them. He retired from the Royal Navy before settling down in Dumbarton, which should go a long way with the voters in Forces families in Helensburgh.
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Trump to lift tariffs on Scotch whisky 
Never thought I’d ever utter these words here: Great guy that Donald Trump
The enigma who is President of the United States of America, in a gesture of diplomatic friendliness after King Charles visited the White House, said the US would be removing all tariffs on Scotch whisky imports.
“In Honor of the King and Queen of the United Kingdom, who have just left the White House, soon headed back to their wonderful country, I will be removing the Tariffs and Restrictions on Whiskey [there’s no E in Scotch whisky, donald] having to do with Scotland’s ability to work with the Commonwealth of Kentucky on Whiskey and Bourbon,” Trump said in a post on social media.
Ah, well, Samuel Smiles said a man who never made a mistake, never made a discovery.
The US and the UK signed a deal in 2025 allowing Washington to impose a 10% baseline tariff on imports of most British goods.
Trump wrote on Truth Social: “The King and Queen got me to do something nobody else was able to do, without hardly even asking!”
He wrote: “People have wanted to do this for a long time, in that there had been great Inter-Country Trade, especially having to do with the Wooden Barrels used.”
The whisky market has suffered from higher levies and declining rates of alcohol consumption. The Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) estimates the charges cost the industry £4m a week.
Last year, Diageo, which used to be in Dumbarton (whisper it!), the parent company of spirit brands including Johnnie Walker, Talisker and Lagavulin, said it would reduce production at some of its distilleries to balance out lower demand.
On Thursday, the SWA called the deal “a significant boost” for the industry — “Distillers can breathe a little easier during a period of significant pressure on the sector,” the SWA said.
As can the many workers at the Chivas plant and all those spirits-related businesses in West Dunbartonshire, from Dalmuir to Dalmonach.
Jackie Baillie is out canvassing with colleagues, who include former Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander.