The excellent blogger, ex journalist, ex Labour press officer (they weren’t called spin doctors in those days) and now Labour MP Tom Harris is cheerfully ignoring the general advice that Labour should not be trying to spin their way out of trouble today. But this post shows how much trouble they really are in. Does Tom really believe the Glasgow East result is no more than the kind of by-election that happens in the UK from time to time?  This is an an excellent example of what Times comment editor Danny Finkelstein talks about today of Labour “sleepwalking to a massacre.”

Before getting on to the politics, two odd things about BBC Scotland’s coverage of the Glasgow East by-election. First of all, and in a truly bizarre editorial decision, last night’s 1030pm Reporting Scotland seemed to virtually ignore this massive developing story. No insert from a reporter at the count; nothing with a political corr, just a trail to Newsnight on BBC2. It was left to the network news to suggest that something spectacular was on the cards.

Then today on Radio Scotland, there was massive excitement that David Cameron was calling for an election. This started to lead the news from about 0830 on. On a night when the story was all about the SNP/Labour you can’t blame Cameron for wanting to get into the story – but did his intervention really justify the top line?

As for the politics, once again this contest showed how out of touch the commentariat can be. Margaret Curran was an excellent candidate apparently – really? She’s a skilled politician used to dealing with the media, but her never-ending mantra that she would be fighting for the East End cleary irritated voters who knew that she and the Labour Party as a whole had taken them for granted for decades. 

The other main media misconception is that there was no demand for Independence. In fact the SNP established that a large number of Labour voters (maybe a majority) actually backed Independence even if they weren’t voting for the SNP. If there had been a mini-referendum on Independence in this seat, my guess is that there would have been a big Yes vote. That, however, is not part of the media narrative – protest vote, disaster for Gordon Brown – so it gets ingored. If journalists actually started to talk to voters their stories and comments might be rather different and more accurate.