Scott Crichton Styles

Senior lecturer in law at University of Aberdeen

Latest articles from Scott Crichton Styles

COMMENT Keir Starmer WILL miss open goal on Tory sleaze scandal

ON Wednesday, drunk with power, Boris “Teflon” Johnson finally overreached himself by trying to neutralise the House of Commons anti-sleaze rules and to prevent Tory MP Owen Paterson from being suspended for 30 days from the Commons. Reluctant Tory lobby fodder voted as instructed by their three-line whip even if many of them may have had strong misgivings.

NATIONAL EXTRA The levelling up fund could be the start of a Tory Trojan horse

“NEVER look a gift horse in the mouth” is probably the instinctive reaction of every Scottish council of whatever political persuasion to the announcement by London of more cash for local projects. Even the most passionate SNP council can hardly object to being given a few extra million for a pet project. But “beware the Tories come bearing gifts”: this gift horse might be the beginning of a Tory Trojan horse strategy!

NATIONAL EXTRA Attacks on politicians are attacks on democracy – we in Scotland can't be complacent

THE appalling killing of Sir David Amess, Tory MP for Southend West, generated shock right across the political spectrum of the UK. Instantly, one thought of the 2016 murder of the Labour MP Jo Cox who was killed on her way to a surgery and of the incident in 2000 where an attack on Nigel Jones MP resulted in the killing of his aide Andrew Pennington. In response to the murder of David Amess it seems likely that physical security around surgeries and elsewhere will be improved for both MPs and MSPs. But as well as improving the physical security of MPs, and other elected representatives such as MSPs and councillors, consideration should be given to changing the criminal law to protect them.