THERE was palpable glee among Scottish Conservatives when Nicola Sturgeon was interviewed by Andrew Neil earlier in the week. “She got a DOING!” tweeted Ruth Davidson, with all the grace and decorum of one of those big armoured tanks she’s such a fan of getting her photo taken on.
Over the course of a heated half hour, the two big beasts sparred over Scottish independence, currency options and who would win in an arm wrestle. I think the First Minister claimed she would be victorious, but I can’t be sure because Andrew Neil interrupted her answer by shouting “ANSWER THE QUESTION!” Quelle surprise.
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The Tories were delighted to see the First Minister under pressure because, they say, Nicola Sturgeon never gets a grilling on her record. Which is a bit rich considering their former leader spent more time grilling crème brulee on The Great British Bake off than she did answering questions from journalists.
And their current big boss – the Rt Hon Boris “Unidentified Number of Children” Johnson has followed in Ruth’s footsteps. Rumours are swirling that he will chicken out of his interview with Andrew Neil, a move which – if tolerated – will make the 2014 protests outside the BBC look like a garden party.
At the time of writing, it is being suggested that Channel 4 will be replacing AWOL Johnson with an ice sculpture during their climate change debate with the party leaders. They’ll probably get more sense out of it, to be honest.
And really, the Scottish Tories need only look to FMQs to see that Nicola Sturgeon gets her fair share of tough scrutiny. It just so happens that most weeks her opponents kick themselves in the face rather than kick the ball into the net.
Yesterday was not one of those occasions. Nicola Sturgeon faced a series of tough questions over – among other things – infection control and the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, delays in postmortems leaving grieving families without answers, the mental health problems faced by Scottish police officers and harrowing constituency cases of individuals waiting far too long for treatment.
Questions like these are what FMQs should be about. They are vital for the health of our democracy and the rigorous questioning of our government – far less so for people like me who’ve got to write a sketch on the bloody thing.
I found myself wishing for disorder. For those heady days of James Kelly not sitting down. When MSPs brought props to the chamber and were ruled out of order. From a very dark corner of my soul, I desired beyond anything else for Christine Grahame to take off that dazzling broach she was wearing and prick somebody with it. Not enough to draw blood – just enough to cause a bit of a scene.
We can’t all get what we want.
MSPs 1, Sketch-writers 0.
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