Last word Business as usual
Rab McNeil
Rab.mcneil@
holyrood.com
LOVELY to see First Minister’s Questions back after the summer recess. It’s like the football season resuming, only with more hooliganism, dirty tackles and offensive chanting. First Minister Ecksworth Salmond’s easy, almost casual, intellectual dominance of proceedings was disconcerting. In the first episode at least — the only one I’ve seen (on telly) at the time of writing — it was even more pronounced than last term, possibly because the two main opposition leaders have already thrown in the towel and are just going through the motions till replacements are found. Tory leader Annabel Goldie even described herself as “unplugged”, as if she were an android. And whatever her other faults — being a Conservative springs to mind — no one has ever accused her of that. As for Labour, Mr Spock look- alike Ken Macintosh has thrown his phaser into the ring, while Iain Gray clings on for now. Te latter threw out the tired old saws about “separation”, deploying the word in such a transparently calculated way that the intelligent voter feels insulted by the ploy. Having previously blocked a referendum, Labour is now demanding — you guessed it — a referendum. Mr Gray invoked the support of unionist campaigning organisation, CBI Scotland, though the last time I looked its views on a referendum were that a referendum might be illegal and that, certainly, it should be done only on Westminster’s say-so. Tese are Scottish people saying this, in Scotland — the country you couldn’t make up. Across the opposition benches, the same feeling persists: “No power, please, we’re Scottish.” A bizarre place; truly, indisputably weird. Mr Gray also accused the First Eck of having an improper relationship with Rupert Murdoch, a newspaper vendor, which allowed Mr S easily to bring up Labour’s persistent toadying to the controversial Australian, not least in former leader Tony Blair dressing all in white as he played godfather at the baptism of Mr Murdoch’s babes by the banks of the River Jordan.
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Sometimes, it gets so surreal, an impression not helped by the First Eck accusing Iain of “speaking Portuguese”, meaning that his locution was garbled. Cloudy clarity resumed when Iain came away with his usual, ill-advised “scoop”, a piece of surprise information that always backfires. Mr Gray revealed that a fortune-teller in
Dundee, called Gypsy Amalia, had a picture of the First Eck on the wall, if that’s the word, of her tent. Iain wondered if the aforementioned Gypsy A could divine when the independence referendum would be. It was a good line, if not meriting the oh- my-aching-sides über-laughter that politicians practise. You don’t hear that sort of thing even
her money on the British pound rather than the dirty foreign euro, and asked the Eck what he preferred to jingle in his capacious trooser pockets. Te Eck said he’d stick with sterling till the Scottish people decided otherwise. Annabel said that wasn’t very clear. Again, Eck said he’d stick with sterling till the Scottish people decided otherwise. Again, Annabel said that wasn’t very clear. Again, Eck said: aw, shut up. Or words to that effect. I’d the feeling Annabel’s heart wasn’t in this.
Te Tories are all muxed-ip. Teir main hope, the estimable Murdo Fraser is — like Annabel — somebody the public would like, for the simple reason that he’s likeable. But, as he himself says, the Tory brand is “toxic”, and being a decent cove won’t suffice. Murdo has rightly concluded the best plan is to start a new, autonomous right-wing party in Scotland, but the comical irony of seeking independence for the party, while vehemently opposing it for their own country, went unnoticed by the populace for an estimated 0.00001 seconds. Te aforementioned Mr Spock (Lab) attempted a mind-meld with his butt, out of which erupted a question about university fees for English students, a cause célèbre of the Craven Scotch. Certainly, it ought to rake in a fortune for Embra Uni. Last time I looked in there — admittedly some time ago — all the students were English. Indeed, for a moment, I thought I was in that other famous English university: St
“No power, please, we’re Scottish”
watching the funniest film at the cinema. You only hear it in parliaments. When Labour’s giddy thigh-slapping finally subsided, the Nats retorted with their own extravagant guffawing, after the Eck revealed that he had indeed visited the Dundee soothsayer at a fair in his constituency. Tat had been in 2006, and she’d predicted the SNP’s win in 2007, he said. Aye, it’s the way he tells ’em. And he hadn’t finished there. He said he was going to return to the vouchsafer of visions to see if she could foretell when Labour would eventually get round to selecting a new leader. Temporary Tory leader Annabel Goldie put
Andrews.
Anyhoo, as for that first FMQs, yon was yon. Te First Eck’s casual stroll over the broken bodies of Iain and Annabel generated the usual headlines — “SNP accused”; “Salmond defends” — helping to deepen the feeling of living in a surreal, topsy-turvy country where, increasingly one feels, we should take advice about our identity crisis from a hookah-smoking caterpillar and make our national sport playing croquet with flamingos (well, we might be better at it than football).
Since last time... enjoying a bumper tattie-harvest (straight from soil to
pot to tummy — yum!) ... also enjoying Sky’s increasingly desperate attempts to lure me back as a customer ... growing fat on dark chocolate, but at least I’m happy.
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