Salmond on the brink?
It's not easy being a minority government, as Alex Salmond's Nationalist administration in Edinburgh is fast finding out.
First, the case for Scotland separating from England and joining Salmond's so-called "arc of prosperity" (Ireland, Iceland and Norway), suffered a blow because of the banking meltdown, which made may have made many Scots think again about the security and safety of being inside the United Kingdom.
Now the Nationalists have been hit by a full-blown budget crisis.
Last night Salmond's minority government in Edinburgh was plunged into crisis after the Scottish Parliament (all of which comes in a block grant from London). The SNP leader admitted that his government might have to resign if the budget, which he is reintroducing immediately, again failed to win a majority -- which could lead to a new government being formed or even an election. As we go on air, Scotland's First Minister will be answering his version of PMQs. We'll have the latest.
The country's other famous Scottish politician -- the Prime Minister -- is also having a tough time of it. According to the polls, the Brown Bounce is now a thing of the past and the Tories have a comfortable double-digit lead. It's not easy to see what will change that in the foreseeable future if the IMF is right (which would mean Mr Brown wrong) in claiming that, far from Britain being best placed to weather the recession (as the PM claims), we are heading for the worst downturn of any major economy.
As this blog has mentioned several times in recent months, the PM's claim was always a hostage to fortune and there are features of the British economy that made us especially vulnerable in this recession. Now the hit of all the advanced nations and that we are enduring the worst recession for 60 years. 
The IMF thinks our economy will shrink 2.8% this year (we've already lost over 2% last year) versus a 2% average for developed nations. It also thinks, unlike the government, that there won't be much of a recovery in 2010 -- but then the Chancellor's claim that growth would return this autumn is already being seriously revised inside the Treasury (expect recovery to be postponed come the spring Budget forecast).
Given all that, the current Tory lead in the polls could be more than a blip. We'll be looking at this month's poll of polls with Matthew Taylor, former head of policy at Number 10.
And we'll be looking at the Equality Bill with Yasmin Alibhai Brown and that should make for a good discussion, because our guest of the day is former Editor of the Sun newspaper, Kelvin McKenzie. So expect some lively debate.
All that coming up from noon today on ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ2 on the Daily Politics.
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