John Finnie

THERE has been a lot of attention this week on the Tory policing bill at Westminster, and while most of it does not directly apply in Scotland, where policing is devolved, it does show a determination from the UK Government to crackdown on peaceful protest and marginalised groups.

IN Scotland, the tipping of one year into the next has long since been a major event and chance to anticipate the year ahead in the company of good friends and much-loved family. It’s a fine tradition and one that most people in Scotland look forward to with relish, but one we will have to skip this year.

OUR rural and remote communities in Scotland already often live with limited access to healthcare and other services, and are sometimes poorly served by public transport.

THE climate emergency has never been more visible. Record-breaking heat in Australia, record-breaking cold in the USA, and a huge chunk of ice has broken away from the Arctic’s largest remaining ice shelf in north-east Greenland.

THERE are almost no aspects of our lives that remain untouched by the coronavirus pandemic. In the space of a few short weeks the world as we knew it changed rapidly, and none of us are sure when things will return to the way they were.

MAKE no mistake, Boris Johnson is desperate to give the United States exactly what it wants when it comes to securing his new glittering trade deal. Rightly, much of the focus has been on whether this means opening the NHS to American market forces or allowing our food standards to drop to get cheap imports that will put Scottish farmers under enormous pressure.

THE closure of Ravenscraig, the coal mines, the collapse of Silicon Glen, the fight for the shipyards – we’ve seen in Scotland what happens when we don’t build a new future for people.

DISCUSSIONS in, and certainly around, parliament in recent days have often been dominated by the ongoing climate emergency. It’s heartening to see this issue at the top of the political agenda and igniting the passions of the public, but the debate has often been frustrating.

THERE were 934 drug deaths in Scotland in 2017. This shocking statistic, around eight times the EU average, shows that our current approach to the drugs crisis is not working. By way of comparison, there were 146 road traffic deaths in the same year.

LIKE many, I am always keen to support any cessation of violence or moves to peace.