For most of the past year, Alex Salmond has been engaged in a vicious and high-profile war against his successor, Nicola Sturgeon, with Salmond suggesting that the Scottish establishment has conspired against him to keep him out of public life and have him jailed.
Now it appears that Salmond has been waging war against a Scottish newspaper as well. Today the press regulator Ipso published details of a complaint made by Salmond against the Scotland on Sunday, sister paper to the Scotsman. Salmond had taken issue with an article published by the paper in April in the aftermath of his criminal trial – at which the former First Minister was acquitted on all counts.
Salmond made numerous complaints about the piece and accompanying front page, parts of which were upheld by the regulator. But Mr S was struck in particular by one gripe from Salmond: that the paper had conspired to make him look more haggard than usual.
The regulator writes that:
‘The complainant [Salmond] said that he believed the image of his face in the print version of the article had been deliberately edited in order to emphasise the stubble and grains in his face and to paint him in an unflattering light. He also found the use of the image of the woman looking upset in both versions of the article to be misleading as it was not made clear if it was a stock image or an image of one of the complainers.’
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Ipso decided to not pass judgment on the former First Minister’s facial hair, noting that while ‘it did not appear that the image had been distorted’ the committee was ‘not able to make a finding on this point’.
Mr S will therefore let readers decide if the First Minister was given a rough deal by the paper:
With the committee finding no fault, it sounds like the incident was a close-shave for all involved…
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