Health Warning: NHS Lothian may be playing a waiting game

I AM NOT a fan of NHS targets. They create adverse events through perverse incentives. I am opening up a Freedom of Information request made to NHS Lothian for scrutiny. NHS Lothian has previously played ...

Ya beauty! The hated OBAF Act is finally binned

IT WAS, according to Labour’s James Kelly, “the worst legislation in the history of the Scottish Parliament”. Moving his motion at Holyrood on Thursday for repeal of the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications ...

There's a rumble goin' on...

WE’RE HEADED for a rumpus.  After months of monitoring the Brexit negotiations I’m betting on a stagey bust-up between the two sides. This would forestall the revocation sought by diehard Remainers, though their ploy can’t ...

The disinterest of Brexiteers over Britain’s future is surreal

I'M FEELING a chill under my collar of late and am becoming very uneasy about the state of the Conservative Party. It's worrying how little positivity has come from Brexiteers of late. They seem to ...

Without university expansion widening access must disadvantage some

A FEW WEEKS AGO I had the privilege of being the guest speaker at a higher education event in Stirling University which was attended, amongst others, by the secretaries of our nineteen higher education institutions. ...

Time for a Department for Veterans Affairs in Scotland

TWO RECENT EVENTS prompted me to delve into the lives of ex-service men and women – or veterans as we now seem to know them – living in Scotland. The first was the awful and ...

The Prime Minister's Mansion House speech in full

Theresa May lays out in more detail the shape of Brexit the UK Government Government is aiming for...

We should ALL be working for a clean Brexit, not doing the EU's work for it

I HAD an article published in The Herald just before the EU Referendum vote. You can read it here, I think it remains valid, but I did not imagine the result would not be ...

Why advancing disaster in electricity supply goes unrecognised

WE ARE SOMETIMES told by our elders and betters that history repeats itself, but that later generations still fail to learn the lessons.  Perhaps so, but events never repeat with every detail unchanged.  Two episodes ...

Was Morrissey wrong about Sturgeon's hand being in our pockets?

I AM no particular fan of the singer Morrissey, late of The Smiths, in relation to either his music or his politics. But, just occasionally, he gets it right.

Last weekend Morrissey ...

Why we desperately need a new government

GLOBAL HISTORIANS USE the expression ‘European Miracle’ to describe how Europe from around the eleventh century expanded exponentially in terms of economic growth and intellectual, technical, commercial and philosophical innovation till it could overtake (indeed ...

The SNP must drop ‘Whitabootery’ and face its responsibilities

WHAT IS IT about politicians, and especially politicians holding government office, that they cannot recognise they are being disrespectful to voters when they resort to “whitabootery”?

Scotland needs to face up to ...