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This is where you can find my take on what's happening in the world of Scottish politics
15:23 UK time, Thursday, 25 October 2012
The Garden Lobby gossip? Not, all in all, Alex Salmond's most comfortable Holyrood half hour - although not by any means fatally wounding at this stage.
I refer, of course, to the exchanges in the chamber during questions to the first minister anent the issue of Scotland's putative accession to the European Union; legal advice thereon.
17:14 UK time, Tuesday, 23 October 2012
Brian added analysis to:
Frankly, much of the argument for Nato within the SNP rested on a pragmatic calculation that most voters favoured membership.
Mr Finnie and Ms Urquhart have concluded that this is a pragmatic compromise too far.
13:34 UK time, Tuesday, 23 October 2012
Politics, especially party politics, involves compromise. Few individuals will agree with all elements of their party's programme.
They subsume their doubts about one aspect or another in pursuit of a wider, collective aim.
15:50 UK time, Sunday, 21 October 2012
The SNP's overarching ambition is to achieve independence. (Enough, Brian, enough. Such startling disclosures will surely drive the audience wild.)
In order to promote that objective, they pursue essentially a triple track....
15:43 UK time, Sunday, 21 October 2012
Brian added analysis to:
"Her [Nicola Sturgeon's] objective was to argue that independence would give Scotland the opportunity to pursue policies more in line with the general instincts of her people.
"Hence, her announcement of an additional £9m for the Social Fund (when it is devolved to Scotland from next spring and becomes the Scottish Welfare Fund providing emergency support to the poorest families.) She contrasted that quite deliberately with tax cuts for the wealthiest which, she said, were the concern of the UK coalition.
18:08 UK time, Saturday, 20 October 2012
On display at this SNP conference, a selection of the strategies and narratives which will help form the Nationalist pitch in the referendum.
Two from Alex Salmond in his thoughtful conference speech. Firstly, he depicted independence as part of a continuum from devolution - a narrative he has already essayed through his use of the formula "Home Rule road."
17:43 UK time, Saturday, 20 October 2012
Brian added analysis to:
"On display at this SNP conference, a selection of the strategies and narratives which will help form the Nationalist pitch in the referendum.
"Two from Alex Salmond in his thoughtful conference speech. Firstly, he depicted independence as part of a continuum from devolution - a narrative he has already essayed through his use of the formula "Home Rule road."
19:17 UK time, Friday, 19 October 2012
Alex Salmond's rather fixed smile said it all - that was close. By a relatively narrow margin, the SNP conference voted to change long-standing party policy and to commit to an independent Scotland retaining membership of Nato.
Mr Salmond sat on the platform throughout, applauding those who backed Nato membership. But he deliberately chose not to intervene in the debate itself. He wanted the conference to take the decision without turning it into an explicit leadership loyalty test.
16:43 UK time, Thursday, 18 October 2012
Party conferences are remarkable affairs. They can be, variously, energetic or enervating. Sometimes they become internalised, dwelling upon the concerns and anxieties of the mustered tribe rather than the outside world.
But from time to time that puzzling external environment intrudes. Here, at the SNP conference in Perth, minds have undoubtedly been focused by an external event - admittedly one that is very firmly in the realm of politics rather than the mundane.
17:22 UK time, Monday, 15 October 2012
As he briefed the media about today's agreement, Alex Salmond confided that he had been told by his advisers: do not look triumphalist.
Plainly, they know their man. Mr Salmond is occasionally given to displaying a sense of internal satisfaction. And so it was with full mock seriousness that the first minister said he always listened to his advisers.
15:47 UK time, Wednesday, 10 October 2012
So deal or no deal? Deal. Definitely deal. But Alex Salmond is quite correct to point out that there remain a few troublesome issues with regard to the agreement over holding a referendum on Scottish independence.
Mr Salmond is a mite irked at what he sees as pre-emptive comments at the Conservative Conference in Birmingham to the effect that an agreement is absolutely and finally concluded.
12:49 UK time, Wednesday, 10 October 2012
Brian added analysis to:
So where are we anent the discussions on the independence referendum?
Progress, progress - but the deal is not yet entirely done.
11:41 UK time, Tuesday, 9 October 2012
So where are we anent the discussions on the independence referendum?
Progress, progress - but the deal is not yet entirely done.
15:39 UK time, Thursday, 4 October 2012
There is, it would appear, a discernible pattern in the current state of play at Holyrood with regard to the debate over public spending.
The SNP is seizing what it believes is a political opportunity granted by their principal opponents. That is, to characterise Labour as posing a threat to valued services by their questioning of universality - suggesting further that this stance matches that of the Tories.
14:01 UK time, Tuesday, 2 October 2012
Not everyone, Johann Lamont has told the Labour conference, is going to like the policy prescriptions she is outlining.
As she is undoubtedly only too well aware, that includes members of her own party. It includes parliamentary colleagues at Holyrood.
12:04 UK time, Monday, 1 October 2012
Remember the Scottish Government consultation on the independence referendum? Are you perhaps one of the 26,000 people who responded and thus took part directly in the debate?
That level of interest was hailed as a "fantastic response" by Scottish Government Ministers.
14:15 UK time, Thursday, 27 September 2012
Nicola Sturgeon plainly felt she had delivered the ultimate insult - not least because she kept it until the very last word of her exchanges with Labour's Johann Lamont.
Building to a crescendo, she constructed the condemnation. Johann Lamont was "warming" to Conservative policies. She was a "poster girl for the Tories."
17:03 UK time, Wednesday, 26 September 2012
Much talk both at Holyrood and on the fringe of the Liberal Democrat conference in Brighton anent the emerging deal on an independence referendum.
Nothing, of course, is settled until it is all signed off by both governments, Scottish and UK. But that need not prevent us from having a little fun spotlighting the troublesome issues and the likely outcome.
15:15 UK time, Tuesday, 25 September 2012
The self-image, I suppose, is "Honest Johann". At one and the same time, she is setting out to engage with what she would depict as harsh, contemporary reality - but also, intriguingly, to disengage from elements of contemporary debate.
Already Johann Lamont has shown her desire to take charge of her party through senior staff departures, voluntary or otherwise.
17:37 UK time, Thursday, 20 September 2012
John Swinney's demeanour is customarily modest and restrained. Mostly, he presented his spending plans for 2013/14 in that fashion - reflecting, no doubt, the wider, grim economic environment.
But there is fire there too, real fire. And it flashed into flame when he turned upon Labour's Ken Macintosh who had accused the Finance Secretary of a "pass the buck" budget.
Brian has been a journalist for ever, well, since 1977.
He covers politics in all of its guises - UK, European but mostly Scottish.
Before joining the BBC he spent six years as a lobby correspondent at Westminster.
He has lectured on politics and identity across Europe and the USA and has written two books - and co-written a handful of others.
At St Andrews University, he studied literature.
He is a proud, patriotic Dundonian and fanatical supporter of Dundee United Football Club, losing no opportunity to trumpet their many glories.
He is married with two sons.
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