(Tuesday 18 November 2008)
MALCOLM BURNS reviews the latest goings-on north of the border.
Fantastic news for Star
I WAS delighted to read the feature articles by John Haylett and Richard Bagley in the Star last week outlining plans for the paper's bright new future.It is good to think that some of the path forward has been opened by the Scottish experience.
Sales are on the up. For many years, we Scots were only getting the paper from the day before due to circulation problems. It's great to be able to pick up today's Star in our local newsagent.
Every little helps. We order two copies and the deal with the shop is that the extra one goes on display and we'll buy any that are left at the end of the week. I hear that a woman who works nearby is now frequently buying the extra copy.
Having been an online journalist myself over a number of years, I think that the decision to make the web version of the paper free to access is exciting.
I know what the risks are. There is a danger that sales of the print edition could be undermined. But the opportunity of getting the Star's unique and vital broad left news and views heard more widely is really important to grasp.
So, if you're reading this but you don't take the Star regularly, you know what you have to do. Order it at your local newsagent and get it every day. And make sure your union office and branch are ordering their copies too.
That way, we can make sure that the new improved paper and free-to-access website will survive and grow.
Annual award bash big on backslapping
SCOTLAND'S annual Politician of the Year Awards took place last Thursday at the plush Prestonfield House Hotel in Edinburgh.The winner was Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who followed in the footsteps of last year's winner Alex Salmond after the SNP success in the Scottish Parliament elections.
I suppose that it was inevitable that the SNP would be recognised two years on the bounce. After all, you'd be hard pushed to award the top prize to any of the Scottish opposition.
Gordon Brown's favourite MSP John Park was handed the title of "one to watch." Some people think that this might be because of his brutal football tackles, painfully evident to sports hack Chick Young in the recent unseemly fracas during a "friendly" between Sottish parliamentarians and journalists. He's now universally known as "Chopper" Park.
Meanwhile, in a bizarre juxtaposition, Alistair Darling won the gong for best Scot at Westminster, an award sponsored by Bank of Scotland, the bank that he has just bailed out with billions of our dosh.
Harmless political fun or a tedious self-aggrandising drink-fuelled backslapping bore? Hmmm. Which could it be? Yes, you've guessed. Dismal.
It's a wonder that no-one's ever thought of just torching the whole proceedings.
Salmond's comic turn
The internet is a great thing. Those of you who missed Alex Salmond's sketch for BBC Scotland Children in Need as the Rev I M Jolly, the miserable TV padre created by the late great Scottish comedian Rikki Fulton, can catch it online at news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/7730701.stmIt's the longest that you'll ever see the First Minister going without looking smug.
Opinions differ on whether he was any good. Labour loyalists tend to think not. Personally, I reckon his humorous self-deprecating performance was not at all bad and he had the sense to make sure that he had a first-rate script.
Meanwhile, over on YouTube, another video called Glenrothes Downfall also features some top-grade writing and it skewers Salmond mercilessly.
It's not an original idea - there are plenty of Downfall voiceovers on the web - and I know that I have said that I despise cheap allegations of nazism, but that's not what this is.
As satire, I think that it nails the SNP strategic problem over the independence referendum. But mainly it's just very funny.
Search YouTube for "Glenrothes Downfall" and judge for yourselves.
Argentinian return
IT'S so long ago, was it just a dream? The first time that Scotland played Argentina at Hampden was on June 2 1979. I remember it well. I was there.It was just a year after the nation had gone World Cup crazy with manager Ally McLeod, who really did claim that we'd come back from Argentina '78 with "at least a medal." So much for that.
But at least we got to see the real champions and Diego Maradona, who, at 17 hadn't been picked for the previous year's World Cup squad, give a lesson in football brilliance to a Scotland team which was led by our best ever player Kenny Dalglish.
The Hand of God is due back in the home of Scottish football tomorrow night, assuming that he hasn't walked out, as he has threatened to do in a dispute with the Argentinian FA. My teenage sons Liam and Neil are going to the game and I hope that they see some Maradona magic. I'd settle for 1-3, as it was on the summer night when I was spellbound.
Money for Palestine
FULL marks to Labour MSP Pauline McNeill for putting on a great fundraiser for Gaza on Friday night in Glasgow's G2 nightclub.With the venue donated free by the management and artists playing for no fee, the gig raised a healthy four-figure sum to help Edinburgh Direct Aid organise a convoy of medical aid to Gaza hospitals.
The convoy is supported by Medical Aid for Palestinians.
Find out more or make a donation at www.edinburghdirectaid.org
STUC women's conference
CAN I add my comradely, even fraternal, greetings to the STUC women trade unionists gathered in Perth on Monday and Tuesday.The sisters are not just doing it for themselves. As a regular source of imaginative and hard-hitting policy initiatives for the movement as a whole, the women's conference and the committee that it elects are doing it for all of us.
Salud, sisters.
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