THIS is going to be my last regular column for The National, at least for the time being. I plan to step back from frontline politics to take some time to reflect on what has happened to the
IT’S a brutal business being sacked from your job in public in the early hours of the morning. But as I have learned from bitter experience, politics is a very brutal business.
WEDNESDAY evening saw the final leaders’ debate of the General Election campaign. And what a pathetic, uninspiring spectacle it was.
ACCORDING to a report by election guru Professor Sir John Curtice published earlier this week trust and confidence in British politics has fallen to a record low.
YESTERDAY saw the publication of a book which chronicles the long-running campaign to protect women’s sex-based rights in Scotland.
ON Monday it was reported that right-wing protesters in Israel had blocked aid trucks destined for Gaza, throwing food packages onto the road and ripping open bags of grain.
IF Kate had stood for the leadership of the SNP, she would have had my backing. She has not and therefore I will fall behind the leadership of John Swinney ...
LIKE most of my SNP colleagues, I believe that our political representatives should be accountable to the electorate and so I do not approve of the way in which the House of Lords is selected rather than elected ...
I REALLY wish I did not have to write about the new Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act again this week. Instead, I wish the post-2014 leadership of the SNP had spent half as much time on advancing the cause of independence as they have on identity politics.
OVER the last few days, a succession of men have taken to print and to the airwaves to tell you there is no cause for concern about the new Hate Crime Act coming into force on April 1. One headline even proclaimed concerns were “silly”.
