The Scottish Parliament’s first days: a personal memoir. Part VII >>

Sheena and the Queen The Scottish attitude to the Queen is an odd one. Many Scots, in the 20th and 21st centuries, might have taken against an English monarch who dared to lord (or lady) it over them. But everyone finds the Queen hard to dislike. She rules as a Taoist would rule: quiet, unjudgmental, adapting to change like water negotiates rocks. But,... Read more

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The Scottish Parliament’s first days: A personal memoir. Part VI >>

Carry on up the Mile On 1 July 1999, Her Majesty, a Queen, was privileged to join me in what turned out to be a rather splendid occasion: the official opening of the Scottish Parliament. It was made splendid by the lashings of left-wing sentiment that topped off the dignified proceedings: a meeting of old and new; of tradition and future; of establishment... Read more

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The Scottish Parliament’s first days: a personal memoir. Part V >>

Introducing Banana-Mooth, Guilty Jack, and the Airdrie Avenger One of the first senior ministers was Wee Wendy Alexander (Lab). She’d a big brain in her wee heid, which doesn’t necessarily make for good judgment or ideological logic. Being New Labour, she could endlessly make reality fit her shifting principles. But there was nothing remarkable... Read more

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The Scottish Parliament’s first days: a personal memoir. Part IV >>

Pact away: Jimbo and Mainwaring take power Next day, once more, I found myself barred from the press gallery. I’d phoned ahead and was assured I could waltz in unmolested. I got through the first hurdle, right enough, at the bottom of the stairs, and mingled with the great and the good in the black-and-white corridor (so called because of its... Read more

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The Scottish Parliament’s first days: a personal memoir. Part III >>

The fun of being first minister In the end, MSPs agreed to a Time for Repentance slot at the start of Wednesday afternoon’s proceedings (the main body of the Parliament only meets one and a half days a week: Wednesday afternoon and the whole of Thursday till about 6 o’clock). After they’d agreed on a spiritual five minutes and had appointed... Read more

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The Scottish Parliament’s first days: a personal memoir pt.2 >>

PART TWO: THEIR SATANIC MAJESTIES In May 1999, on the first day of Parliament proper, I was in for a couple of shocks. Firstly, I’d been a strong supporter of a Parliament, and had told doubters that, as a reporter, I’d been to business and trade union conferences, teachers’ meetings, the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, and other events... Read more

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The Scottish Parliament’s first days: a personal memoir >>

PART ONE: FROM HADDOW’S TO THE MOUND GLASGOW, April 1999: Alex Salmond stood outside Haddow’s off-licence with a bunch of daffodils. The SNP leader wasn’t waiting for a date, but campaigning for the first election to the Scottish Parliament. The daffodils came courtesy of campaigners trying to save a local allotment. Later, I watched... Read more

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Column: You scratch my backwoodsmen, I’ll scratch yours >>

News that Nick Clegg and David Cameron might speak at each other’s party conferences has caused the usual outbreaks of rage, fury, and condemnation. You wish sometimes that folk would react in a calm and restrained manner to developments. Then you see them speaking on the telly and realise they did react in a calm and restrained manner. It was... Read more

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Sketch: Canape, won’t pay >>

Having unavoidably missed a few weeks of First Minister’s Questions, I managed to tune in to the final session and, as I saw the familiar coupons – Whitton, McNeil, Eadie, Curran – behind Elmer Fudd variously emoting bile or vacuity, my own face fell, and clouds of gloom threatened my sunny spirits. I don’t know what I was expecting.... Read more

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Sketch: Floccinaucinihilipilification follies >>

Last week, I began this sketch with a complaint about having to listen to porkies in Parliament. By a curious, almost cosmically mystical coincidence, it was also one of those rare occasions in which I thought Labour leader Elmer Fudd had made a good point. Oh, I should have known better. Silly, silly, silly me. But one desperately wants to be fair... Read more

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Sketch: Llama mince and retold porkies >>

Brollies up, ladies and gents, as we prepare to be sprayed with more immature ordure in the baby of parliaments, the numpty nursery, the kindergarten of cack. Actually, I do a disservice to many MSPs with these childish ascriptions. But, speaking personally, I can’t wait for the summer holidays. The toll of hearing retold porkies, unabashed hypocrisy,... Read more

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Sketch: Scotland, always knowingly undersold >>

Welcome to the new surreal realities. A Tory Westminster government, with its Lib Dem partners, is considering giving Scotland back £180 million of her own money that the previous Labour administration had kept locked up in a bank vault. And, as that curiously interesting coalition government struggles to hold together the British arc of prosperity... Read more

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Sketch: Shame, embarrassment and business as usual >>

Back to First Minister’s Queries at Holyrood and, boy, it was depressing. Whatever you think of the Rose Garden press conference at Downing Street – two public schoolboys twittering in front of a birds’ nesting box, just feet from a squirrel-proof feeder – it was charming and lovely. And whatever you think of Clegg and Cameron, at least... Read more

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Election sketch: Out of the frying pan and into the lavvy >>

Hello, and welcome to the post-election world. Actually, would you excuse me a wee second? Thanks. Whap! Sorry, just had to hit masel on the heid with a frying pan there. Whap! And again. Whap! And again. Whap! And again. That’s better. No, it isn’t. Nothing’s making sense. Ladies and gentlemen, this is nuts. First, how can the Lib... Read more

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And now a new dawn, loosely based on the old dawns… >>

So here we stand at the brink. Yada, as it were, yada. A new dawn, loosely based on the old dawns. If you’ve an abyss about your person, you can start staring into it now. Failing that, a pint glass will do. For we are going where no man has gone before: to Friday, 7 May 2010. At first, there will be The Hiatus. Nothing will change immediately.... Read more

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TV debate sketch: Game of three halves ends with a draw >>

Welcome to the third volume of proceedings from the Unionist Debating Society. I have to say I wasn’t much up for this last “leaders’ debate” or “prime ministerial debate”, depending on who you’re trying to fool. I didn’t want to give them the oxygen of publicity. Watching two Englishmen and one wannabe... Read more

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Sketch: Except for viewers in Scotland… >>

More news from St Elsewhere as, once again, Holyrood became a haven from politics. Politics, you will understand, is something that now happens on television. That’s where we hear the debates (Unionist v Unionist v Unionist), witness the gaffes and – based on choice of tie and cut of jib – decide which leader looks the least corrupt. Reality –... Read more

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TV debate sketch: tough on chefs and the causes of chefs >>

Leaving aside Scotland for the moment, let’s look at the second televised leaders’ debate, which saw Broon resume his obsession with keeping foreign chefs out of Britain. First, though, I’ll cut to the chase and tell you who won: Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg, by a country mile. Hardly surprising since most of his support comes from manure-booted... Read more

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Sketch: Carbon emissions a smokescreen for the main political event >>

Once more, there was a feeling that real life was elsewhere as the Scottish Parliament went through the motions at First Minister’s Questions. As is traditional, the first motion was produced by opposition Labour leader Iain Gray, known to the masses as Elmer Fudd. He focused on carbon emissions and, in a surprise development, thought the Scottish... Read more

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Debate preview: Can Clegg avoid becoming One of Them? >>

Do I detect that folk are resigned now to the exclusion of the SNP in the televised leaders’ debates, as the second one approaches this evening? All right, it’s foreign affairs, so the discussion will apply to Scotland (geddit?). And fine, I still can’t see a way around the problem – Nat leader Eck Salmond isn’t standing for PM. But... Read more

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