#TeamJockson
SCOTTISH Tory leadership contender Jackson Carlaw has been excitedly retweeting endorsements, we see. Like the one from Jackie McCamon, a Tory byelection candidate in Dumfries. “Jackie would be a first class Cllr. Delighted to have her on #TeamJackson,” he gushed. Alas, the photo Ms McCamon posted of her nomination paper clearly showed she had written the wrong name, one “Jackson Carlow”. Part of #TeamJockson perhaps?
Unappreciative
TALKING of endorsements, spare a thought for Glasgow councillor Eva Murray, who also took to Twitter to back a candidate. On Thursday, she declared she was “proud to nominate friend and fighter” Pauline McNeill to be Scottish Labour’s next deputy leader, as she was “committed to listening to the grassroots”, Cllr Murray gushed. Let’s hope Ms McNeill listens better than she types. The Glasgow MSP replied: “Thanks Eva very much unappreciated.”
Ballantyne boost
MR Carlaw looks like a shoo-in rep replace Ruth Davidson as Public Tory No1 in Scotland. Or at least that’s what Unspun thought until his launch, when in walked perpetual candidate Iain ‘Blue Jonah’ McGill. The former Edinburgh postie has tried in vain to get elected to Holyrood, Westminster and Brussels a dozen times. Superstitious observers declared that if Mr McGill was part of Team Jackson, it was definitely time to bet on Michelle Ballantyne.
Looking pasty
ELSEWHERE, Ian Murray, Scotland’s sole remaining Labour MP, launched his campaign to be the UK party’s deputy leader at his old school in Edinburgh’s Wester Hailes. In a lovely touch, he was introduced by Danny Costello, his 73-year-old former deputy principal. “From the outset, Ian fully and successfully engaged in the whole life of the school, the curricular and extra-curricular side of things, from music to PE,” said Mr Costello, beaming with pride. He added: “This was before he discovered Greggs.”
Labour values
MR Murray later reminisced about his time as a schoolboy entrepreneur, selling t-shirts through a Young Enterprise scheme. “We did very, very well out of it – the way the process worked is you sold shares to friends, family, teachers and colleagues, you used that money to buy stock, you designed them, you advertised, you marketed, you then sold it all and you paid the shareholders back,” he said. Before adding: “We forgot about the last bit.”
Top priorities
MORE news from the £1.4 million Citizens Assembly, the talking shop boldly reimagining Scotland’s future. Last week, Unspun noted an aspiration for the country to “be free of Nicola Sturgeon” among the hundreds of members’ ideas for “the Scotland we are seeking to build”. Other highlights include a plea for a football team “that can reach the world cup finals” and a noble desire to “make fags and alcohol cheaper”. It’s enough to make the heart swell with pride.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel