Nicola Sturgeon in the USA, Donald T***p in Florida, MSPs at Holyrood. This week has been a routine one in politics, which led us to discuss the First Minister’s trip to the US, and the Scottish Parliament’s record in scrutinising the executive. Joining podcast host Maurice Smith this week was regular contributor Steven Purcell — […]The post Podcast: How to lobby at...

Monday’s announcement certainly seems to have caught the Tory government flat-footed – but that just shows how badly out of touch they are with the mood in Scotland.

Scotland already meets all the requirements for EU membership. MEP envisages no problems with re-entry. #ScotRef

And we’re off… As it says on the running strap line at the bottom of the screen on the TV news channels, BREAKING: The United Kingdom. It doesn’t come as much of a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention, but the Scottish Government is to seek approval in the Scottish Parliament for a […]

And we’re off… As it says on the running strap line at the bottom of the screen on the TV news channels, BREAKING: The United Kingdom. It doesn’t come as much of a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention, but the Scottish Government is to seek approval in the Scottish Parliament for a […]

Cast: theSNP

Today Nicola Sturgeon announced a plan to ensure Scotland will have a choice - between a Tory-run Brexit Britain, or taking control of our own future, with independence.Here’s what you need to know.
 

Today Nicola Sturgeon announced a plan to ensure Scotland will have a choice - between a Tory-run Brexit Britain, or taking control of our own future, with independence.Here’s what you need to know.
 

Cast: theSNP

The Sunday Herald ran an extraordinary article on page 2 yesterday, and after we’d finished being startled by what nonsense it was, it set us wondering about why. The piece triggered a demented, vitriolic outburst on social media from the founder of a well-known Scottish website, furiously and bizarrely demanding apologies from a number of […]

Another turgid offering from Torrance which tells us… what, exactly? Nothing about Scottish politics, that’s for certain. As an observer of the Scottish political scene, Torrance is more hampered than most by his Tory leanings, his British nationalist blinkers and…

The BBC has appointed arch Tory Sarah Sands as editor of the flagship Radio 4 Today programme. She is best known to the public for a leaked policy memo she wrote while at the Telegraph, including memorably advocating “Play on people’s fears… stop just short of distortion”. The extraordinary thing is that if Sands does […]
The post BBC Daily Distortion appeared first...

It’s been less than two weeks since Donald Trump was inaugurated as US President, and already the world has got into a familiar ritual. You switch on your laptop or mobile phone, see the news, and splutter your tea or coffee all over the screen at his latest moral outrage and how it’s all perfectly […]

(This is how stupid they think we are. Amid the slurry of effluent arriving via email and Twitter after my recent rant was this oh-so-clever wind-up. So clever that the author enjoyed his joke too much and blew it. He (and I have his email address)  forgets I have form in this genre myself having […]

As regular readers I know, I get a few O levels and didn’t make it to university – it was much tougher in those days. So I don’t have a degree, not even an honorary one like that Jackie Bird. But I do know lots of academics and have come to value not just their […]

How much worse is it going to get?  Seeing a smiling Theresa May walk hand-in-hand with Donald Trump was nauseating enough. Knowing she was already aware of his plan to introduce an apartheid-based travel ban puts a whole new meaning…