Scotland in ice

This was first posted on Facebook on 6th March 2021, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

“…well, imagine a person standing on a block of ice, planning and planning and planning. Planning ways to get about on the ice, ways to decorate it, ways to divide it up, ways to cope with all the possible knowns and givens of a block of ice. That would be a busy person, provident and industrious and independent and admirable, isn’t that so? Except that when the ice melts, none of that is any use at all.” – Native Tongue, Suzette Haden Elgin

This week, the Tories threw their best shot at Nicola Sturgeon – accusing her before, during, and after her giving evidence of having committed resignworthy offences.

Nicola Sturgeon: Eight Hours

This was first posted on Facebook on  3rd March 2021, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

Nicola Sturgeon has spent all day today at the Scottish Parliament in the large committee room, giving her evidence to the committee investigating the harassment process.

The committee meeting began at 9am. They stopped for a mid-morning break, a lunchtime break that lasted less than an hour, and a mid-afternoon break. The Convenor very strongly suggesed the committee should be through by 5pm.

Police with guns on patrol? No.

On a summer Saturday night in Inverness, a fight broke out between two men outside a fast-food restaurant, and three police officers turned up to stop the trouble.

All three policemen should have been unarmed: that’s the fundamental rule of British policing since 1829. Our police go unarmed except for a concealed truncheon. And that has been the rule for nearly two centuries: firearms are carried as an exception, only on specific occasions when a senior officer decides guns will be necessary.

But each of the three policemen who showed up to stop the fight in Inverness were carrying handguns, identified as Glock 17 semi-automatic pistols.

Police Scotland says that these officers – and 272 others – represent less than 2% of the total force, that armed police officers won’t routinely be patrolling the beat, and that

By having a small number of specialist armed officers available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, this means that if the need does arise, we are ready.