DISTURBING scenes at Holyrood ahead of yesterday’s Scottish LibDems manifesto launch, where campaign boss Alex Cole-Hamilton was heard loudly declaring he was off home for a “shave and a s***” before the event. One witness unable to shake the mental image tells Unspun it was the first time they’d have welcomed a LibDem U-turn.

AS Willie Rennie dawdled with broadcasters at the launch, the scribblers were shown, childlike, to a table laden with sweets. Some seemed to be sly digs at the leader’s animal woes. There were sugary sheep (he was biffed by a ram) and pinky pigs (a different biffing and ramming). When he saw them, Willie groaned: “Oh not pigs. That’s so last year.”

FROM there the press pack loped to the Ukip launch along the road, where the media outnumbered the ‘kippers 2-to-1. Perhaps it was the pair of lads in the front row necking lagers that put him off, but Scottish chair Calum Walker opened proceedings with the immortal line: “Good evening everyone. Thank you for coming here this afternoon.”

COMEBACK Corbyn was also facing the press yesterday. Asked whether he had called for an IRA ceasefire during the Troubles, the Labour leader showed his new-found professionalism by ducking the question. Instead, he said he’d always wanted one. That he kept this opinion to himself for years was a mere footnote. The start of a new, quieter politics perhaps?