Edinbugh soft-fruit farmer John Sinclair is worried. "I could have tons upon tons of rotten fruit lying unpicked", the BBC reports him saying.

Why? Changes in immigration rules, brought in at the behest of hysterical newspaper editors and panicky culture-warriors, have banned non-EU nationals from taking part in Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme, meaning that the Ukrainians who have provided the backbone of seasonal agricultural work in Scotland are no longer legally entitled to enter the UK to take up these jobs. The BBC says:

Across Scotland fruit farmers are reporting a worrying low-level of interest from Eastern European migrant workers, the backbone of the Scottish fruit picking industry.

And the Romanians and Bulgarians who are eligible to take part in the scheme largely aren't interested; better paid and easier work like bar work is readily available. Fruit-picking is is so badly paid that the only people interested in it are people who can repatriate their earnings to a low-wage economy and live most of the year there. And the pounds weakness against the Euro means that equation stacks up only for those living in non-Eurozone countries and, more importantly, countries with non-Euro pegged currencies.

So, it looks like those evil immigrants are stealing all our jobs again... Remember that when the price of your jar of raspberry jam goes through the roof.

While Jörg Haider's BZö (Alliance for the Future of Austria) seems headed for annihilation, the even more right-wing remnant of the Freedom Party which it seceeded seems to be polling a solid 6-8%, comfortably ahead of the 5% threshold needed for re-election to the Austrian parliament.

While the Christian Democrats seem static within a couple of points of 39% with no credible coalition partner, the Social Democrats and Greens between them seem stuck in the mid 40s. Will this be enough to form a coalition government? That depends on whether or not renegade former Social Democrat Euro MP Hans-Peter Martin cross the 5% barrier? Opinion polls show him hovering either side of it, with his personal list running on a clean government ticket.

Could the Christian Democrats actually form a coalition with Hans-Christian Strache? Will the mathematics of other parties allow a red-green coalition to take office? Or will the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats fall back on a grand coalition and a return to the old, corrupt days of Proporz?

Or will the whole thing just end up being one big mess?

Latest polling - Christian Democrats 38%, Social Democrats 34%, Greens 11%, Freedom Party 8%, Hans-Peter Martin 5%, BZö 3%.

I know, I know, I haven't blogged this properly yet!

With 9 days to go until polling day, the latest poll has the Social Democrat government with its future Green and post-Communist coalition partners on 48.2%, the centre-right "citizens coalition" on 47.3%. Wow!