Monthly Archives: August 2020

Sandra White’s decision not to contest next year’s Holyrood election brings the number of retiring SNP MSPs to an unlucky 13. Unlucky for us in that some will be replaced by even direr representatives of the power-hungry superiority complex that is Scottish nationalism, but unlucky also for Nicola Sturgeon. White will be chiefly remembered forContinue reading “Holyrood’s ghosts”

Dominic Raab has visited Israel for his first trip as Foreign Secretary. By all accounts, he was made very welcome, despite the UK’s craven abstention at the UN over extending an arms embargo on Iran, a country where they arrest our ambassador, burn our flag and chat ‘Death to Britain’. Quite the dilemma we faced in that vote. According to theContinue reading “It’s time for Boris to back Israel”

  Just when it seemed like the Tories had finally arrived at the fight for the Union, they go and take a detour up a dead end. Michael Gove, head of the Cabinet sub-committee on the Union, hinted last week that a future Scexit referendum could give the vote to Scots living overseas. He didContinue reading “You can’t fight for the Union on the SNP’s terms”

This week there will be an almighty row about Westminster stealing powers from Holyrood. You may be wondering how that differentiates it from any other week. Ginning up grievance over imaginary encroachments on your authority is infinitely easier than governing. Scottish ministers are so concerned they could lose some of their powers they might evenContinue reading “A small step in the right direction”

Holyrood heaved itself up from its low-grumbling torpor yesterday to roar like a real parliament. The opposition stood no chance of withdrawing confidence in John Swinney after Patrick Harvie marshalled his Scottish Greens into their regimental role as human shields for the SNP. The arithmetic gave the proceedings an air of futility, but if theContinue reading “How John Swinney survived again”

I wouldn’t want to be Douglas Ross. Given my knowledge of Scottish football was only recently updated with the startling information that Dundee has two teams, that is probably for the best.  But the challenges facing the latest Scottish Tory leader are more daunting than anything he has encountered on the football pitch. He assumesContinue reading “Douglas Ross must blow the whistle on Tory failings”

There is a frisson in the air around constitutional matters, an abrupt zing of urgency at Westminster about the future of the Union. After years of indolence, ministers have suddenly awoken to the scale and immediacy of the threat to the United Kingdom. The ‘resignation’ of Jackson Carlaw, the candidacy of Douglas Ross and theContinue reading “Boris needs Avengers for his Union fightback”

Jackson Carlaw’s leadership of the Scottish Conservatives will not be remembered as one of the party’s high points. But while his personal qualities as a leader, a strategist and a communicator are plainly not beyond reproach, neither do they fully explain why he is stepping down after just six months in the job. Certainly, heContinue reading “A new Act of Union is needed to save the United Kingdom”