Lockdowns don’t hit all businesses equally. That’s a point that Andrew McRae, the Federation of Small Businesses policy chair, made following the latest announcement of tougher restrictions. He said that small businesses like retailers had to shut their doors for the next three weeks, “when many big businesses face few operating restrictions”. If you can […]
Analysis
Devolution has been a “disaster” in Scotland, and was Tony Blair’s “biggest mistake”. Boris Johnson has only said what is almost certainly the quiet consensus in the British establishment, but it’s important that the words are now on record. I would wager that Blair thinks the same. You have to see devolution from the the […]
Johnson’s devolution comments are a sign of weakness
“Empty work sites and idling labour amid a renewables boom driven by foreign multinationals has become the image of Fife’s transition to green energy.”
Analysis: The transition to green energy is well underway and anything but ‘just’
Two things are clear from the news this morning: a) there’s an election coming, and b) there’s an SNP annual conference soon. A flurry of indyref chatter always precedes these events, and this time is no different. Those of us who have seen this act play out time and time again can be forgiven for […]
The Brown and Blackford double act
A bit of escapism is sometimes needed in these grim times, so Scotland’s men’s football team making it to a major championship for the first time since 1998 is not an unhealthy tonic. In 1998 there was no Scottish Parliament, Google had just been founded, and the DVD was sold for the first time – […]
It’s right to question Test and Protect
Some Source Direct subscribers may have a vague memory of a huge chicken following David Cameron around the UK during the 2010 General Election. The chicken had a Daily Mirror badge on, and was meant to indicate that Cameron was too chicken to answer tough questions. Fast forward a decade, and the Mirror Chicken has […]
Flew the coop
When we talk about regional inequality, we usually talk about the chasm between London & the South-East and the rest of the UK, including Scotland. On that scale, Britain is one of the most regionally unequal country’s in Europe. But regional inequalities matter within Scotland too, have been growing for a long time, and are being […]
Inverclyde, and why we should worry about Scotland’s regional inequality
“Powerful forces are converging around a new stability. But just as with Biden’s eventual, narrow victory in the US, achieving it is harder than willing it.”
Analysis: Biden’s ‘Transatlantic Return’ – and what it means for us
All hail our innovative Big Pharma overlords, riding to the rescue to save the world from the scourge of covid-19 with their vaccine developed at record-breaking speed! Well, not quite. First of all, Pfizer and BioNtech’s vaccine will be going to the wealthy nations first, and those poor folk in the global south may get […]
Celebrate science, not Big Pharma
“Scottish Ministers could usefully commission further rapid reports on aspects of what is going wrong from people prepared to think critically. The users of services, their families and the staff who work in care deserve no less.”