Scotland

Thursday

Andrew Liddle

Humza Yousaf is right to attack handouts for the middle class

In Scotland, everything from eye tests to prescriptions to university tuition is paid for by the state, even if you can easily afford to pay for it yourself. Such is the intoxicating effect of universal benefits that the only question up for debate in the Scottish Parliament is what else can be given to everyone for free, rather than what is most effective or affordable.  That was until Humza Yousaf became First Minister. In need of a political lift following the police investigation into the SNP’s finances, Yousaf has engineered a significant break – not just with his predecessor, Nicola Sturgeon, but with the Scottish political consensus that had nurtured

Andrew Tettenborn

Alex Salmond’s disturbing grab for the Stone of Scone

Claims of financial skulduggery abound, Nicola Sturgeon is politically hors de combat and Humza Yousaf is quickly rebranding the SNP as a party not only of shatteringly incompetent government but also of lost causes, political irrelevance and sheer kookiness. Thinking Scots who don’t fancy the Tories might be forgiven for contemplating a switch of loyalties to Alex Salmond. His new party Alba, formed in 2021, might be a bit rough round the edges, but at least it looks principled. There is an attraction in the straight-talking face of nationalism past, with no pretence to either elegance or middle-class faddishness: witness Salmond’s bon mot on LBC a couple of days ago

Wednesday

Steerpike Steerpike

SNP find some accountants, at last

Just in the nick of time, the SNP have at long last – after cold calling almost every auditing firm in the country – found some new accountants. The small Manchester-based firm, AMS Accountants Group, must be hungry for a challenge: the Westminster group’s accounts need auditing in just over three weeks, while the Holyrood party’s accounts have a deadline of 7 July. Tick tock! Commenting on this minor triumph, First Minister Humza Yousaf said:  We take our statutory obligations extremely seriously, so it is welcome news that AMS Accountants Group will complete the accounts for both the party and the SNP Westminster group. I am very grateful for the

Euan McColm

Why won’t the SNP stand up for Joanna Cherry?

The campaign by furious activists to destroy Edinburgh’s reputation as a great crucible of critical thinking continues apace. The home of the Enlightenment is under sustained attack. Students and – shame on them – staff at Edinburgh University have, for a second time, blocked the screening of the film Adult Human Female on campus. To allow the viewing and discussion of this documentary would, claim members of the mob, make the university an unsafe space. Not to be outshone in this parade of idiocy, The Stand comedy club subsequently cowered before the screeching fury of gender ideology campaigners and cancelled a show due to take place during this year’s Edinburgh

Iain Macwhirter

Trans activists will regret picking on Joanna Cherry

Another feminist getting no-platformed in Scotland is hardly news. Poets, writers, students, academics, comedians and, of course, film-makers have become inured to being cancelled north of the border if they stray from the dogma that trans women are women. Normally this kind of thing happens in the shadows, without publicity. People just find, like the poet Jenny Lindsay, that their livelihood disappears. Cancellation is the standard operating procedure for the handful of trans activists who seem to have a stranglehold on Scottish cultural life and education institutions. But this time they took on someone willing to fight back.  The SNP MP for Edinburgh Central, Joanna Cherry, refused to go quietly when the Stand Comedy Club, which was

Tuesday

Lucy Dunn

The Scottish Tories can’t continue to rely on SNP failures

The Scottish National party’s implosion brings good news for the Scottish Conservatives. At the Tories’ party conference in Glasgow, delegates had a spring in their step about their party’s rising chances. Poll results show that the Unionist parties are seeing their support gradually increase, while the SNP’s grip on power looks to be weakening, Meanwhile, support for the Greens, though not especially high to begin with, has halved.  Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross was joined in Glasgow at the weekend by an all-star cast from Westminster, including Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, secretary of state for Scotland Alister Jack and levelling up secretary Michael Gove. But while it is clear the

Saturday

Iain Macwhirter

Humza Yousaf’s illiberal campaign against juries

The leader of a governing party that seems to be spending most of its time helping police with their inquiries would, you might have thought, be a little wary of launching one of the most radical changes to the justice system in 800 years – but not Humza Yousaf. The politician who gave us the illiberal Hate Crime Act, which makes ‘stirring up hatred’ even in the privacy of one’s home a criminal offence, is now threatening to abolish jury trials in Scotland. Since Magna Carta was issued in 1215, those accused of serious crimes in Scotland have had the right to be judged by a panel of their peers,

Friday

Steerpike Steerpike

‘Calculated’ Sturgeon knows what she’s doing, says Scottish Tory leader

There’s not a day that goes by in Scottish politics without the woes of the Sturgeon-Murrell empire being discussed in full. Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross didn’t hold back when asked about whether he felt sorry for Nicola Sturgeon during what feels like the SNP’s perpetual state of crisis. Mr S caught the slightest of smirks cross the politician’s face before he conceded: ‘No.’ Did he believe Sturgeon’s performance in Holyrood on Tuesday, on the afternoon of former treasurer Colin Beattie’s bombshell comments on Scotland’s most infamous motorhome, was sincere? I thought it was very interesting that after a similar event like this with Colin Beattie, which was probably going

Steerpike Steerpike

Fury at Rishi Sunak’s Scottish media snub

Could the Scottish Conservatives’ party conference have been timed any better than bang in the middle of the SNP’s implosion? Mr S can only imagine the glee with which Douglas Ross’s party planned its 2023 Glasgow conference, the country’s ruling party having handed their opponents an entire dossier of material to orchestrate their ousting. And Prime Minister Rishi Sunak even managed to fly up from Westminster to help open the two-day affair. The PM didn’t disappoint the crowds: Sunak milked the nationalists’ downfall for all the comedic value it was worth. ‘Nicola Sturgeon quit Bute House to take up driving lessons!’ he called in faux bemusement at his 300-something audience.

Wednesday

Euan McColm

The abolition of the ‘not proven’ verdict is long overdue

When 20-year-old Francis Auld walked free from Glasgow’s High Court in December 1992, there was widespread belief that a monster had got away with murder. The evidence he had killed 19-year-old Amanda Duffy had seemed compelling: the pair had been seen together in the Lanarkshire town of Hamilton shortly before her death. A deep bite-mark on the victim’s breast had, he admitted, been inflicted by Auld. The accused’s defence – that he had left her, shortly before the time of her death as established by a post-mortem examination, in the company of another man – was flimsy. Auld walked from the dock not because the jury found him ‘not guilty’

Steerpike Steerpike

Ian Blackford’s tantrum over SNP auditor enquiries

The Mystery of the Lost Auditors becomes ever more exciting by the day. As scrutiny intensifies so does the shirking of responsibility, for it has now been revealed that the House of Commons authorities were not informed about Johnston Carmichael cutting ties with the SNP’s accounts until 13 February – a full five months after the fact. That was also incidentally three days after Stephen Flynn was informed, a mere two months after replacing Ian Blackford as Westminster leader. And last night, it was Blackford’s moment to return to the spotlight when asked if it was his responsibility to have let parliamentary finance staff know about his party’s lack of

Philip Patrick Philip Patrick

Do Scots support Humza Yousaf’s defence of devolution?

Devolution has largely failed in Scotland and Wales and some powers need to be returned to Westminster. This is a precis of a controversial article by Lord Frost in the Daily Telegraph last week that continues to provoke outrage. Leading members of the SNP have denounced it. Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf has vowed to ‘defend our democracy’ in the face of the attack, and Stephen Flynn, the SNP leader at Westminster, has called it evidence of ‘a deliberate, co-ordinated attempt to reverse devolution, …and force Scotland under Westminster control.’ Even some Tories and unionist commentators have slammed Frost’s piece either as outright ‘nonsense’ or a tactical error gifting the

Tuesday

Lucy Dunn

SNP Westminster leader says the party must ‘do better’

Is the truth about the ignorance of key SNP figures being exposed? Or is the party’s ‘inner circle’ even smaller than first thought? It certainly appears to have been the norm for senior figures to only become aware of party dealings after the fact. First Minister Humza Yousaf has said he didn’t know about the purchase of a £110,000 motorhome until after he became SNP leader. Former treasurer Colin Beattie initially said he didn’t know about the buy, despite his name appearing on the SNP’s 2021 balance sheet (though he has, this evening, clarified that he ‘became aware of the transaction via the 2021 annual accounts’ – still indicating that

Iain Macwhirter

Humza ‘useless’ Yousaf is living up to his nickname

It’s often said that those whom the gods wish to destroy they first turn mad, which may or may not apply to the Scottish National Party. But the deities always find it easier to punish hubris when those guilty of it turn themselves into figures of fun. And, when it comes to that, Humza Yousaf is your man.  The First Minister is a virtuoso of bathos. He can hardly open his mouth without saying something that turns a serious matter into an unintentional gag. When the SNP national treasurer, Colin Beattie, was arrested last week, on the day of the new First Minister’s big ‘vision’ speech to Holyrood, Humza told

Steerpike Steerpike

The SNP’s civil war erupts in Westminster

It seems that the acrimonious civil war embroiling the SNP isn’t merely restricted to Scotland. For amid growing questions about the party’s finance structures, a new front has opened up down in London, with Stephen Flynn, the party’s leader at Westminster, turning on his predecessor Ian Blackford. Flynn admitted to Good Morning Scotland on Monday that his group of 45 MPs is currently struggling to appoint auditors, following the decision of the party’s long-time accountants Johnston Carmichael to cut ties. That is significant because the SNP must submit an auditor’s certificated by 31 May or risk losing its annual sum of more than £1 million of ‘Short money’ – taxpayer

Steerpike Steerpike

SNP treasurer in the dark about motorhome purchase

It’s a day ending in y, which means another bad 24 hours for the SNP. And as the party’s leading lights all turn on each other like rats in a sack, this morning it was the turn of the party’s former treasurer Colin Beattie to come out swinging. Beattie said earlier that he was not aware of the purchase of the £110,000 motorhome supposedly bought for a second referendum campaign, back when he was in charge of the party’s finances. Cornered by journalists in Holyrood today, Beattie floundered when faced with a simple question ‘Did you know about the motorhome purchase and did you sign it off?’ The beleaguered beancounter

Euan McColm

Lord Frost has offered the SNP a lifeline

First Minister Humza Yousaf met with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak last night for the first time since he took over from Nicola Sturgeon almost a month ago. Amongst other things, Yousaf ‘raised concerns’ about ‘UK government attacks on devolution’, including recent comments from a certain Lord David Frost in the Telegraph, who wrote: ‘Not only must no more powers be devolved to Scotland, it’s time to reverse the process.’ But it’s pro-Union politicians who are really up in arms after the Tory peer’s calls that some of the Scottish government’s devolved powers be rolled back. The former Brexit negotiator’s clumsy intervention has been a lifeline to Yousaf in the middle

Sunday

Iain Macwhirter

Scotland awaits the fate of the Third Woman

Scottish politics has never been more febrile. If we go a day without an arrest, a resignation, a revelation about financial mismanagement in the Scottish National Party we wonder what we’ve missed. It’s probably a little like this after a coup or in a failing Latin American state. Okay, there are no tanks rumbling along Sauchiehall St., but the political and media worlds have been holding their collective breath waiting to see if the former First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, will be arrested by police. Newspapers have their profiles ready to run. So far she has avoided the long hand of the law. Why is everyone expecting this hitherto blameless politician, this

Saturday

Andy Maciver

SNP rule has been disastrous for Scotland’s schools

This week was supposed to be Humza Yousaf’s big relaunch for the SNP. His speech on Tuesday was designed to show how he was combining his adopted role as the ‘son of Sturgeon’ with his ability to be his own man. Alas, it was not to be: the arrest of SNP treasurer Colin Beattie completely and utterly derailed the new First Minister’s best-laid plans. Yousaf had wanted to show he recognised that the relationship between the Scottish government and the business community had fallen into a ditch, to make clear it needed a ‘reset’. His willingness to compromise came in his announcement that the deposit return scheme would be delayed, and

Thursday

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Humza Yousaf’s track record remains the focus of FMQs

Does Humza Yousaf really want to be ‘focusing relentlessly on the day job’, as he claimed at First Minister’s Questions today? It’s not a fun day job to focus on. The First Minister naturally had to face questions on the crisis in his own party when he faced MSPs today, with both Douglas Ross and Anas Sarwar majoring on it. The Scottish Tory leader tried to suggest the investigation into the SNP’s finances was distracting Yousaf from his day job, and moved onto one of the ‘matters of substance’ he felt needed more attention, which was sentencing policy. Yousaf, of course, previously served as justice secretary, and had to answer