AT another time, Anas Sarwar and Gordon Brown would be walking, talking adverts for how good an independent Scotland could be. In vastly different circumstances, each benefited from the qualities long associated with this country. In Mr Sarwar’s case, his family found that hard work and an entrepreneurial spirit could overcome significant challenges in a less enlightened age. Mr Brown’s intellectual gifts were fostered in the state secondary school of a working-class community in Fife. I’m glad they’re both Scottish. Mr Brown, former UK Chancellor and Prime Minister has spent much of the last decade giving the Pied Piper of Hamelin a codger’s makeover; sucking the joy out of what remains of old people’s lives with wild, apocalyptic visions of what independence will do to their pensions.
IN interviews, Nicola Sturgeon usually manages to mask her incompetence with her trademark articulacy, but even she was reduced to pretending that the line had broken to give her a few more seconds to think in the course of what proved to be a very uncomfortable interview with Justin Webb in this morning’s Today programme on Radio 4 (April 30). Mr Webb said that the UK, like many other countries, has only managed to get through the current crisis by engaging in quantitative easing and pointed out that an independent Scotland which still used the pound sterling would not have that option. She repeatedly failed to answer the question, saying Scotland would have its own central bank, oblivious of the fact that the primary role of central banks is managing the currency and monetary policy. She also had no answer to the problems associated with a hard border with England, were Scotland to rejoin the EU.
BBC News
By Andy Verity
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The governor of the Bank of England has come under new criticism for failing to declare a potential conflict of interest in a scandal that saw thousands of bank customers mistreated.
The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) was accused of benefitting as it left some of its customers in financial ruin.
Now, it is reported that Andrew Bailey did not reveal his role in the scandal.
That is despite being asked about it when he was appointed to his previous job as head of the city watchdog.
The Bank of England said there was no interest to declare.