Questions raised over freesheet’s funding

What’s going on with the Going Out ‘freesheet’ magazine that pops through the letter boxes in South Ayrshire?

Well . . I hear there is a lot going down at the legal services and the election offices of SAC where the magazine has come under a barrage of complaints!

Going Out’s directors includes Troon SNP councillor Craig Mackay – and it accepts funding from the SNP controlled South Ayrshire Council.

Er . . . nothing smelly there then.

But the complaints, I’m told, centre on the publication of an SNP advert that invites postal vote applications on an SNP.org website. This could allow the SNP to gather information on potential postal voters. People are being steered towards an SNP database – for a form that is only available from the Government. Is this in breach of electoral law under the Representation of the People Act? Somewhere between the Electoral Commission in Edinburgh and the office of SAC Returning Officer Eileen Howat – an answer is due soon.

Meanwhile, a second row also brews over whether SAC should be funding a magazine that contains political messages during an election. If this is the reason Tory election leaflets carry the message “Printed and delivered at no cost to the taxpayer” - then I stand corrected for a reference made last week about candidate Mary Kilpatrick. But how do you explain a full page Tory advert in the March (Issue 95) of Going Out bearing the same words “Printed and delivered at no cost to the tax payer” – when the publication is printed and delivered by a business partly supported by the tax payer? Maybe our returning officer knows the answer? And we’d all love to hear it?