ALISON Johnstone, Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament, forced our First Minister to apologise to Tory leader Douglas Ross for calling him a liar, which he undoubtedly was. Someone then proceeded to qualify her remarks, for those whose craniums have buttonholes, with the arrant nonsense “it is generally considered unparliamentary language to accuse another MP of lying.”

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It is generally considered a joke worldwide when Alison Johnstone’s counterpart in Westminster chucks someone out of the House of Commons when they refuse to apologise for calling someone else a liar, but I’ll bet it never happened in the old Scottish Parliament that Winnie Ewing announced was being reconvened in May 1999.

Our FM is not an MP, he is an MSP, and it’s nobody’s business if the Scottish Parliament wish to do away with archaic English rubbish. Let Scottish philosopher Thomas Reid’s Scottish School of Common Sense, founded during the Scottish Enlightenment in the 18th century, reign supreme in the Scottish Parliament. We’ve suffered enough English arrogant interference and nonsense already, and this one is beyond the pale.

Bruce Moglia
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