THERE'S a lurgy going round Holyrood this week.

Not the virus of nationalism diagnosed by Johann Lamont in her Labour conference speech, but a precocious winter cold that's already got the place brimming with coughs and snotters.

It would explain the extra-grouchy mood at First Minister's Questions, when the usual light sparring was more like trench warfare.

Never one to let good news go unpunished, Ms Lamont opened with a demand to know why £20 million of SNP help for those affected by benefit cuts this year might not be repeated in 2014. Or as she chirpily put it: "Why is the Scottish Government cutting help for victims of the bedroom tax by £20m next year?"

Ratcheting down his eyebrows from Jaunty to Offended Scowl, Alex Salmond sneered coldly at her first FMQs mention of the bedroom tax.

Now that London Labour Party was safely opposed, "we should congratulate Johann Lamont at last for raising it," he grumped.

But the FM's shivers only warmed his rival.

"He has decided not to act because he does not care about the victims of the bedroom tax - he would rather exploit their pain," she sniffed, merrily exploiting their pain for herself.

Political footballs are for kicking after all.

If he was serious, the FM should urge voters in England to vote Labour to abolish the tax, she even added. It was hard to tell if Labour or SNP backbenchers laughed more.

Ruth Davidson attacked Mr Salmond over pensions, but her point, generously assuming there was one, was lost in a tornado of figures that would have given an actuary a migraine.

When your snappiest soundbite is "7% to 26% is 3.71 pensioners for every worker", you might as well not bother turning up as a politician.

Nicola Sturgeon literally hugged her sides laughing, while John Swinney stared slack-jawed across the aisle with a sort of crazed delight, like a yokel who'd been hit by a shovel.

Nationalist viruses may have been missing, but the scrappy debating was sadly infectious. A plague on all your houses, as voters might say.