There’s no shortage of problems in Humza Yousaf’s in-tray as he gets his feet under the desk at Bute House. Striking workers, anaemic growth, a crumbling NHS: there’s plenty to occupy Yousaf and his new cabinet of old faces. So Mr S was therefore surprised that one minister clearly has enough time to moonlight as a media critic too. Step forward, Paul McLennan MSP, the who occupies the housing brief – a job with no end of issues.
But McLennan seems to not be fulfilled by his duties in parliament and government. For the East Lothian ex-councillor always finds time to criticise those journalists whose writings he feels are insufficiently supportive of the Dear Leader. A case in point was provided yesterday when The Spectator’s very own Rod Liddle asked in the Sunday Times ‘Which of the following most clearly shows our collective tolerance, forbearance and liberal-minded commitment to diversity: the fact that Yousaf is a Muslim or the fact that he is, by wide assent, formidably useless’ adding ‘Of all the 1.9 billions Muslims in the world, did they have to choose that one?
Such ribbing did not find favour with McLennan’s po-faced brand of Puritanism. The minister swiftly took to Twitter to declare that ‘this level of journalism is quite frankly atrocious – it’s opinion based, no analysis and laughable.’ Opinions in a column? It’ll never catch on. That episode was not just an isolated incident. In the space of a week, McLennan has also denounced The Spectator’s Alex Massie – sneering whether his work ‘is the best the Times can offer’ – and attacking the well-respected Herald political editor Tom Gordon for a ‘predictable opinion based article’ which was ‘nowhere near analysis.’ Mr S looks forward to his own screeds being subjected to the McLennan media treatment: a grievance-based IPSO for nationalists.
Imagine if the SNP applied such scrutiny to its leaders eh? Maybe then they’d actually achieve something in government – instead of whining on Twitter….
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