Author Archives: Editor

This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail column for Monday, March 22, 2021. ***** The final week before parliamentary recess typically has a last-day-of-term feel. When there’s an election in the offing, the focus is on tying up legislative loose ends and gathering for retiring rivals’ valedictory speeches.  After five years of knocking lumps outContinue reading “A government without rules”

This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail column for Monday, March 15, 2021. ***** Glancing at the opinion polls, pro-Union voters could be forgiven for growing disconsolate. Keeping half the country constantly ginned up for constitutional conflict may not create a single job or get a single child up to literacy standards but it certainlyContinue reading “Unionists who waste their votes will only help the SNP”

Nicola Sturgeon faced opposition leaders at First Minister’s Questions on March 11, 2021. This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail sketch of proceedings.  ***** Something majestic happens whenever the Scottish Government releases more of its Alex Salmond legal advice. Not the SNP being mildly accountable to parliament, though that’s always a Kodak moment. No, it’s theContinue reading “New SNP perfume: Eau de Cover-Up”

Yaaaiow! The smiling nurse plunged the hypodermic into my deltoid as though hooking my arm with a spear gun. One minute she was sweetly assuring me I’d only feel a ‘wee sharp scratch’, the next she was firing in like a trigger-happy whaler with a harpooning quota to meet. The shark in Jaws got off lighter. Continue reading “We need a shot in the arm… and not just the Covid jab”

Nicola Sturgeon faced opposition leaders at First Minister’s Questions on Thursday, March 4, 2021. This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail sketch of proceedings.  Yehhhp! Yehhhp!’ These guttural squawks are familiar to regular observers of First Minister’s Questions as John Swinney’s way of endorsing his boss’s every point. To the outsider, it may sound like aContinue reading “Sarwar gets the band back together”

Like one of those self-indulgent Netflix series that hangs around one season too many, Nicola Sturgeon’s starring role has been wearing thin for some time. The First Minister’s season finale came in eight hours of deflection and obfuscation yesterday before the Holyrood committee, the inquiry into how an entire government came down with amnesia aboutContinue reading “Sturgeon speaks”

This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail column for Monday, March 1, 2021. ***** It is not often the Budget is the second item on the news agenda. Yet on Wednesday, when Chancellor Rishi Sunak rises at the despatch box to unveil his spending plans, all eyes will be on parliamentary drama 400Continue reading “Will Sturgeon survive Salmond’s nuclear strike?”

Alex Salmond appeared before the Holyrood inquiry on February 26, 2021. This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail sketch of proceedings.  ***** It has been more than six years since Alex Salmond was First Minister but he continues to haunt Scottish politics. The Ghost of Holyrood Past took physical form in Committee Room No 1, theContinue reading “The Ghost of Holyrood Past returns to haunt Sturgeon”

Nicola Sturgeon faced opposition leaders at First Minister’s Questions on February 25, 2021. This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail sketch of proceedings.  ***** First Minister’s Questions is an unpredictable affair. Sometimes Ruth Davidson gets the better of Nicola Sturgeon. Sometimes Jackie Baillie does. Sometimes Sturgeon barely has to flick open her briefing folder to brushContinue reading “‘Is saving your skin worth all the damage you’re doing?’”

The Lord Advocate appeared before the Scottish Parliament on February 24, 2021 to answer questions on the redaction of Alex Salmond’s evidence to the Holyrood inquiry. This is the text of my Scottish Daily Mail sketch of proceedings.  ***** James Wolffe QC cuts a bashful, owlish figure, more suited to an academic symposium than the Holyrood bear pit.Continue reading “Witness for the prosecutors”