Summer is a strange time in a newsroom.
Colleagues pass like ships in the night to take well-earned time off. Desks are left empty, there can be an eerie quietness, yet only for it to be shattered when staff return (often with suntans, occasionally biscuits, and always with tales from far-flung or not so distant locations).
The usual order of things is suspended for a couple of months, a pattern mirrored across the country in many of our institutions, including Holyrood and Westminster where breaks are in place.
And yet the demands of our digital and print products remain the same: we have readers expecting news, comment and analysis. And our priority is, of course, to deliver.
This week, my top pick comes from my politics team which, with both parliaments in recess, does not have the usual diary commitments to cover.
Highlights for me have been the team’s in-depth analytical pieces, many offered through the evening political Unspun newsletter, which thousands of readers have delivered to their inboxes every day.
My favourites have included Thursday’s, by our political editor Tom Gordon who – amid a sea of them this week – looked at by-elections, and asked whether they were a significant indicator of political watershed?
His conclusion? Only very few in history could be hailed genuine watersheds, but ‘they really do count’.
Gordon gave a fascinating look back over political by-election history and explained why. Sounds dry? Absolutely not. It was great. You can read it here and sign up to Unspun (and all/any of our other newsletters) here.
Something we are never short of at The Herald is something to say. No season can get in the way of that. And this week, my next top pick comes from our fantastic opinion section from the very talented Alison Rowat, who managed to make light of a frustrating start to a holiday (while weaving in the topics of Scottish independence, crazy golf and adult/child relationships).
This piece was unsurprisingly a top performer on our site, with readers clearly sympathetic to ferry delays and the need for family holidays.
Editor's Pick | Catherine Salmond: King Charles celebrated (and objected to) in Edinburgh
My final pick comes from reporter Catriona Stewart who spoke exclusively with Joyce Landry, the CEO of the charter company responsible for supplying the controversial barge being used to house asylum seekers in Portland, Dorset.
Landry hit back at claims the Bibby Stockholm vessel is a ‘floating prison’, telling Stewart the facility – which will house 500 asylum seekers in a bid to alleviate the cost of and pressures on hotel accommodation – is ‘actually quite lovely’.
It is a topic – and a vessel – that is attracting media attention from around the world, so I was thrilled for us to secure an exclusive interview. Refugee rights groups have condemned the project, saying conditions on board are inhumane and amount to floating detention. Our readers have expressed a range of views. We will, of course, be following events closely.
Enjoy your week,
Catherine Salmond
Editor
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