Sketch: Aggravated burgery steals the show

Burgers and milk came up – as it were – during this week’s instalment of First Minister’s Questions in Parliament. All of which appetite-spoiling fare was apposite following revelations that citizens were paying nine grand a time to sit and have dinner with the First Minister, Alex Salmond.

Presumably, there was more than burgers and milk on offer at these events, though why anyone should want to pay good money to watch Eck spill bhuna down his bib is beyond me. It didn’t take long for Labour leader Iain Gray, aka Elmer Fudd, to raise the issue at FMQs, saying: “Everyone knows there is no such thing as a free lunch, especially when it comes to Alex Salmond.”

However, his real beef was about cuts in local authority spending which, in a surprise development, he sought to blame on Eck. Eck in turn issued his standard reminder that, under Labour, the percentage of funding to councils had decreased, while under the SNP it had risen. He said councils and the Government alike were trying to cope with £800 million of cuts imposed by Labour in London.

Still unsatiated, Elmer said that, while cuts were being implemented across the country, Eck was playing “Celebrity Come Dine With Me”.

Quoth Eck: “Well, I’ve got a strong temptation to go to Burgergate since Elmer Fudd has opened up the issue, but I think I will stick to the issue of local government funding.” Burgergate? I was fogged by the reference. I recall Piegate, when then Labour minister Frank McAveety was tucking into just such a comestible instead of answering questions in the chamber. But Burgergate? I asked a leading Gate expert at Holyrood about it, and apparently it refers to the use of a council marquee for a barbie raising dosh for Labour in Fudd’s East Lothian constituency.

Thankfully, Eck desisted from going over this particular Gate but, instead, pulled out a flaccid pink thing and waved it about. Then he declared: “A document has fallen into my hands.”

This floppy A4 affair originated in the Labour group on West Dunbartonshire Council who, while not eager to increase police numbers – because it was SNP policy – wanted to withdraw free milk from primary schools.

Fudd was unimpressed, opining: “Presiding orifice, the First Eck will say anything, promise anything and blame anyone just to get through First Eck’s Questions.” He added that, if it was all Westminster’s fault and there was nothing he could do, citizens might ask : What’s the First Eck for?

Retorted Eck: “Well, I’m sure a lot more than dealing with Elmer Fudd at every First Minister’s Questions, which is not the hardest task in the world.”

Neither was it hard dealing with Tory leader Annabel Goldie’s reasonable question about GPs getting loadzadosh while working less, which was followed by Lib Dem leader Tavish Scott talking tasers. Tavish was concerned that regular rozzers in Cambuslang and Rutherglen were being issued with the shocking weapons, and feared this might lead to Strathclyde’s finest zapping citizens willy-nilly.

Eck reassured Tavish that the officers in the pilot study would be trained – hopefully in how to distinguish a ned from a decent taxpayer (can you picture the presentation, complete with overhead slides?). Still, Tavish wanted to know if Parliament would get a say.

Och Jesus, just let the cops get on with it, man.

In Parliament, we’d get Labour wanting only kids in SNP constituencies zapped. The Tories would want the tasers to have a “set to kill” button, while the Greens would wish them solar-powered, and the Lib Dems would demand that everyone concerned should have counselling.

Tavish said that when tasers were put on trial in England, they were used 600 times – Rozzers: “Wha-hey!” – in the first year. Thirty-four children were zapped with 50,000 volts. Serves them right for being young.

Changing subject, Jamie Hepburn (SNP) wondered why hardly any contracts for the Olympic Games had been awarded to Scottish firms, and asked Eck if he agreed the supposed benefits had proven “ethereal”.

Ethereal? Wot, the contracts were awarded to fairies? Not at all. They were being awarded to people in the south-east of England. Gosh, there’s a surprise. The First Eck said it wasn’t just a Scottish issue. The north-east of England, Yorkshire, Northern Ireland and Wales had all lost out too.

Said Eck: “I think everybody who cares about Scotland, and I hope that’s all of the chamber” – here, he looked significantly at the Labour benches – “will see there’s legitimate cause for concern.”

Andy Kerr (Lab) pointed out cleverly that Eck’s Government had awarded the redevelopment contract for Glasgow’s Southern General Hospital to an Australian company, while Michael McMahon (Lab) hadn’t had enough of cuts, and wanted to know the administration’s position on those in education.

Eck repeated his claim that the administration had increased proportionate funding to councils, despite Westminster’s cuts, and added: “It is, of course, for local authorities to manage and prioritise their own budgets.” That’s what I’d thought.

The sound of a farting hippo alerted us to the fact that George Foulkes (Lab) was heckling. Eck said he thought even Lord George would welcome the increased spending. I wouldn’t bet on it. Remember his lordship’s complaint that the SNP was trying to win support by deliberately improving public services?

Michael got up again, saying: “Can I thank the First Minister for his bluster ?” Ha, a good line followed – alas – by schoolboy reading from his notes, which urged the ending of the Government’s “historic concordat” with local authorities.

I don’t understand this. Isn’t a concordat between central and local government, of all parties, a Good Thing? What does Michael want? A historic huff?

He added: “Will he [Eck] not make take his historic concordat” – wait for it, wait for it! – “and consign it to the dustbin of history?”

That put the tin lid on it for Eck, who went over the figures again, like a primary school teacher to a remedial child. “When council spending is rising as a percentage of the total Scottish budget year by year, Michael, that means they’re getting mair money as a percentage of the total.”

He could have been reading from a Ladybird book. Even when Eck pointed out that Westminster had a Labour Government, Michael sat with a glaikit grin and shook his head. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to leave you with that image.

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