GLENN'S UNDER THE MICROSCOPE AGAIN

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Though I know I'm treading a very lonely path here (as not even Scots are interested in it), I do find The Politics Show: Scotland really intriguing as concerns political bias. Its presenter Glenn Campbell is so shamelessly pro-Labour and, conversely, so clearly anti-SNP and (when he can be bothered to interview them) anti-Conservative that it stands out not just a mile but several miles. A re-built Tower of Babel in the Netherlands would be less obvious! Perhaps because the show doesn't get high viewing figures (probably only me and a few MSPs), Glenn thinks he can get away with it unobserved.
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Today he interviewed a UK Labour minister (who I'd never heard of) called Ann McKechin. He interrupted her only once, and then only for factual clarification. The resultant I.C. was a paltry 0.3. Amazingly for this highly assertive interviewer, there were even pauses after several of her answers, so respectful was he towards her. I had to smile at that. She shared the interview with an SNP MSP called Anne McLauglin, who Glenn interrupted four times, cutting her off twice (I.C. of 1.3). One of those interruptions was a cheeky contradiction, which put her off her stride and made the Labour MP laugh at her expense.
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Useless SNP minister Fiona Hyslop also came under Glenn's fire. The interview began with Haiti and there were, as would be expected here, few interruptions. However, in the final couple of minutes the conversation turned to Scottish affairs & the interruptions piled in (overall I.C. of 0.8).
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There were no Conservative guests this week (and no UKIP guests, but then again there are never any UKIP interviewees on this programme!!), so no harm came to them.
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As I keep saying, I look at this with complete scientific detachment (strongly disliking both Labour and the SNP). I can't help but wonder though why the feisty Alex Salmond isn't tossing a caber at Glenn Campbell even as I write?
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SN(i)P(ing)

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As a disinterested party in this (strongly disliking both Labour and the SNP), I find The Politics Show: Scotland and its pro-Labour presenter Glenn Campbell intriguing but not particularly unsettling (at an emotional level). In any interview featuring a Labour and an SNP spokesman, it's pretty much a dead certainty with Glenn that the SNP spokesman will come off worse. Today was yet more proof of this.
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Discussing health (smoking in particular), the SNP's pale-looking spokeslady Shona Robison was interrupted twice, while Labour's Richard Simpson was not interrupted at all. Even to this disinterested viewer, the disparity in the treatment between the two was blatant. When Glenn went on to interview UK energy minister (Labour) Lord Hunt, it was (like the Simpson interview) an interruption-free zone (I.C. of 0). I suspect regular SNP viewers of the programme will fume at Glenn Campbell rather as I fume at Andrew Marr or James Naughtie!
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A TALE OF THREE ARTICLES

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This comment from Llew needs bumping up to post status, as it's an excellent piece of research:
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All 3 main parties have a page each reporting their New Year's message.

Labour's, as you say, is quite long. The Tories do get 3 little
paragraphs at the end for a little dig at Labour. There's no dig from the Lib
Dems. The side bar from correspondent Ross Hawkins gets another dig in against
the Tories even though they weren't mentioned by name by Gordon.

The Tories page is a bit shorter, naturally. Unlike Labour, there's no side bar
section where a correspondent highlights a bit of David Cameron's message or
knocks Labour's message, naturally. There are 7 paragraphs at the end knocking
the Tories from both Labour and the Lib Dems, naturally.

The Lib Dems page is of course even shorter. There's no knocking from either Labour or the Tories but of course there is a bit of knocking of the Tories. They do get a side bar, unlike the Tories, but theirs is of course a tiny snippet when
compared with the larger sidebar on Labour's page.

3 main parties. 3 completely different levels of coverage. Balanced? I think not.

Here are the links to each article on the BBC News website:
For Cameron: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8431899.stm
For Clegg: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8433904.stm
For Brown: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8434137.stm
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I note since yesterday (http://beebbiascraig.blogspot.com/2009/12/bbc-fairly-reports-browns-great-new.html) that the 'Throw of Dice' subheading on the Brown article (relating to a comment by Conservative Chris Grayling) has now been cut, replaced instead by more words from Brown: 'Go for growth'. (At least, unlike Fairly Shared - which has survived the re-write - the webpage editor has put this in inverted commas!).
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************************CODA
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On a related matter, take a look at this BBC News website article, Scotland's politicians outline aims for 2010, and look at the order in which Scotland's leaders are placed:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/8433859.stm
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So that's:
1. Alex Salmond (SNP)
2. Iain Gray (Labour)
3. Tavish Scott (Liberal Democrat)
4. Annabel Goldie (Conservative)
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This, however, is how Scottish voters (at the last Holyrood election in 2007) have ranked the parties:
1. SNP
2. Labour
3. Conservative
4. Liberal Democrat
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Have the Conservatives been dumped below the Lib Dems because of their share of the vote/number of seats won at the 2005 general election? Is this why the article ranked the parties as it did? Possibly - or possibly not, as this was the result in 2005:
1. Labour
2. Liberal Democrat
3. SNP
4. Conservative
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So why place the Scottish Tories fourth in the pecking order, rather than the Lib Dems? Not a major point of course, but revealing nonetheless.

OCH, THAT'S NAE FAIR

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For anyone who doesn't watch BBC 1 in Scotland, or the BBC's Parliament Channel, The Politics Show: Scotland is available on the BBC i-player. Today's edition confirmed many of the points I have made (intermittently) on this blog about the programme's various biases. I have suggested that the show's presenter Glenn Campbell is a leftie sympathetic to Labour and the Liberal Democrats while being unsympathetic to the Conservatives and SNP.
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The Pre-Budget Report of Alistair Darling and the coming Scottish S.N.P. Budget was discussed in a joint interview between the Scottish government's finance secretary John Swinney (of the SNP) and Labour's Andy Kerr. The interview could not have been less evenly handled! Though Mr Swinney got a little bit longer to speak (4 minutes 40 seconds to Mr Kerr's 4 minutes), he was interrupted 5 times while Mr Kerr was not interrupted at all. The I.C.s work out as 1.1 against John Swinney and 0 against Andy Kerr. Kerr was allowed to ramble along to the very end of his answers (with no great coherence at times) while Swinney was badgered throughout. Case proved I'd say as regards anti-SNP/pro-Labour bias. (I, naturally, don't care for either party!)
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The issue was also discussed with Tavish Scott, affable leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats. Here there was only one interruption, resulting in a small I.C. of 0.3. Further proof!
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There were no Conservative on the programme. The nearest we got to a Conservative was Iain McMillan of the Scottish C.B.I., described (in typical left-wing terminology) by Glenn Campbell as "the bosses' organisation". This interview resulted in the day's highest I.C. of 1.3 (with 9 interruptions). During the interview Campbell called public-private initiatives "a rip-off" and spoke up for the public sector. This may be a questioner's stance, but it's not a surprising one for this interviewer (who is now appearing nationally as an occassional presenter on Radio 4's PM.)
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A NOT SO LOVABLE EXPERIENCE FOR ANNABEL GOLDIE

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Bias on a single edition of a programme is at its most obvious when there are interviewees from a range of political parties being interviewed by just one interviewer. Such a situation was afforded by today's Politics Show: Scotland, hosted by Glenn Campbell (who now does an occasional stint on Radio 4's PM as well).
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The first interviewee was Labour's Susan Deacon, a former Scottish health minister. Glenn did not interrupt her once in 4 minutes 37 seconds (I.C., obviously, of 0).
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The closing interviews featured Mike Russell of the SNP and the Labour leader in the Scottish parliament, Iain Gray. Russell was interrupted 4 times, but got 6 minutes 23 seconds of the interview (I.C. of 0.6). Gray was interrupted only twice, but got less time, namely 3 minutes 46 seconds (I.C. of 0.6). The I.C.s here don't quite reflect the intensity of Glenn's interview with Mr Russell (who carried on talking regardless, as at one stage did Glenn Campbell).
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In between came the fine Scottish Conservative leader Annabel Goldie. She got 7 minutes 2 seconds of Glenn's precious time but was interrupted no less than 10 times (I.C. of 1.4)!!
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It's the usual pattern with this man.
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JUST ONE BRICKBAT FOR 'THE POLITICS SHOW'

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Small-scale bloggers should never get big ideas about their influence, so I won't delude myself into believing that the makers of The Politics Show avidly read this blog each week, with trembling limbs, in anticipation of my latest damning verdict; but, indulging this delusion for just a moment, imagine that they do. Might that account for today's extraordinarily balanced Jon Sopel interviews with Liam Fox (Conservative) and Liam Byrne (Labour)? Almost identical interview times, an identical number of questions, an identical number of interruptions and identical I.C.s - a remarkable contrast to last week and the contrasting treatment of Yvette Cooper and Theresa May. Scrupulously fair then, with only the tiniest blemish when Sopel criticized Dr Fox for attacking Labour ("Yes, there are easy political points to be made there") but not Mr Byrne for attacking the Tories. This is how political interviewing should be - fair and unshowy. Would Sopel were like that more often!
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Alex Salmond got a slightly rougher ride (with four interruptions, I.C. of o.6), but I don't think he (or his opponents) would have much grounds for complaint here and I only note (as a minor quibble) that Colette McBeth's short introductory report featured only one 'talking head' - that of the-even-further-Left-than-Alex-Salmond nationalist Jim Sillars.
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Having Conservative blogger Iain Dale on at the end to discuss the coming week was also a further feather in the programme's cap.
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My only real reservations concern David Thompson's latest report from the Stourbridge constituency, more precisely the way the feature was trailed throughout the programme. This might have led the viewer to expect actual proof of criminal activity on the part of the Conservative candidate, whereas Labour allegations of 'treating' were, as sitting Labour MP Lynda Waltho made clear, 'questions' rather than 'accusations'. Ms Waltho was allowed her say, and the Conservative candidate Margot James was allowed hers. I have other reservations though - firstly about the way Jon Sopel introduced Margot as "millionaire businesswoman Margot James" (as happened last time she appeared) and, secondly, the way Labour's donations were presented as 'unglamorous' and largely collected not from the unions and rich donors but from volunteers through tombolas and garden parties - as if to show that Lynda Waltho is a true woman of the people, unlike the 'millionaire businesswoman Tory'.
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What was most heartening though was the results of a poll of young people (aged 14-24), carried out by the Citizenship Foundation, which showed how sensible they are in their opinions. Very interesting. I bet the results would have disappointed a fair few of the life-long lefties in the audience. Ha!*

THE MOST SUPER OF ALL THE SUPER-AVERAGES

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So far, since beginning my survey in June this year, I've reviewed 1129 BBC interviews with UK politicians. This allows me to extend the super-average principle to all these interviews & get a single measure of bias for each political party for the last 5 months. (See my previous posts for all the thinking behind this!).
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The results are revealing - and not a little damning. Remember that the more interviews I've surveyed for each political party the firmer the evidence (so the figures for Labour, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats are very firm, and those for UKIP, the Greens and, above all, the SNP pretty compelling!). I think Lord Pearson will be very interested in which party is the most-interrupted of all!!:
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UKIP (12 interviews) - 0.90
Plaid Cymru (6 interviews) - 0.88
Conservatives (312 interviews) - 0.84
English Democrats (1 interview) - 0.8
SNP (39 interviews) - 0.76
Sinn Fein (2 interviews) - 0.75
BNP (4 interviews) - 0.65
Labour (557 interviews) - 0.57
Liberal Democrats (167 interviews) - 0.41
DUP (3 interviews) - 0.27
Greens (9 interviews) - 0.24
UUP (1 interview) - 0
Alliance (1 interview) - 0
SDLP (1 interview) - 0
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I think I'm on pretty safe ground in suspecting that many right-of-centre readers (and not a few nationalists, of every stripe) will have known already in their guts that these might be the sort of results that a scientific study of BBC interviews would produce. This provides objective proof for such gut feelings. I intend to carry on doing just what I've been doing all the way up to the general election - and, maybe, beyond.
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I will, as usual, be looking at each interviewer in turn over the coming days. Who will be a saint, and who a sinner? Who will be October's King (or Queen) of Bias?
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OCTOBER'S I.C.s - SUPER-AVERAGE I.C.s

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My favourite measure of bias across the Beeb is the super-average interruption coefficient - which is calculated very simply by adding up all the individual I.C.s for each party & then dividing them by the number of interviewed granted to each party that month. As with all statistics, the larger the sample, the better the result (with the consequence that the Sinn Fein figure, based on 2 interviews, is probably not typical!) - and more significant any differences (hence the increase of the I.C. to 2 decimal places).
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Here is how things worked out in October 09:
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Conservatives (124 interviews) - 0.87
Sinn Fein (2 interviews) - 0.75
SNP (11 interviews) - 0.65
UKIP (4 interviews) - 0.60
Labour (134 interviews) - 0.54
BNP (2 interviews) - 0.50
Greens (2 interviews) - 0.45
Liberal Democrats (32 interviews) - 0.37
Plaid Cymru (2 interviews) - 0.35
DUP (2 interviews) - 0.15
Alliance (1 interview) - 0
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Now here's some strong statistical evidence that the BBC, as a whole, is significantly more likely to interrupt a Conservative spokesman than a Labour spokesman, not to mention a Lib Dem.
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OCTOBER'S I.C.s - AIRTIME PERCENTAGES

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With the BBC's coverage of the Conservative Party conference an unprecedented thing happened in October - the Conservatives got more air-time than Labour! Last month they came third behind the Liberal Democrats (whose party conference it was then). As I posted then, this distorts matters (http://beebbiascraig.blogspot.com/2009/10/septembers-ics-airtime-percentages.html) - distortion ironed out by combining October's figures with September's (the party conference season). This I shall do, as promised.
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But first, here's this month's figures, complete with the actual amounts of interview time granted to each party:
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Conservatives - 10 hours 51 minutes 29 seconds, 43.20%
Labour - 10 hours 42 minutes 41 seconds, 42.61%
Liberal Democrats - 1 hour 45 minutes 39 seconds, 6.99%
SNP - 1 hour 0 minutes 22 seconds, 3.99%
UKIP - 11 minutes 17 seconds, 0.74%
DUP - 9 minutes 2 seconds, 0.60%
BNP - 8 minutes 8 seconds, 0.54%
Sinn Fein - 6 minutes 16 seconds, 0.41%
Greens - 5 minutes 20 seconds, 0.34%
Alliance - 3 minutes 26 seconds, 0.22%
Plaid Cymru - 3 minutes 16 seconds, 0.21%
UUP - 2 minutes 27 seconds, 0.15%
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Now for the combined figures for September/October:
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Labour - 23 hours 7 minutes 58 seconds, 51.01%
Conservatives - 13 hours 43 minutes 30 seconds, 30.26%
Liberal Democrats - 5 hours 50 minutes 49 seconds, 12.88%
SNP - 1 hour 19 minutes 57 seconds, 2.92%
UKIP - 22 minutes 9 seconds, 0.81%
DUP - 11 minutes 17 seconds, 0.41%
Plaid Cymru - 10 minutes 50 seconds, 0.39%
Greens - 8 minutes 11 seconds, 0.30%
BNP - 8 minutes 6 seconds, 0.29%
Sinn Fein - 6 minutes 16 seconds, 0.23%
Independents - 5 minutes 16 seconds, 0.19%
UUP - 4 minutes 54 seconds, 0.17%
English Democrats - 2 minutes 27 seconds, 0.08%
SDLP - 1 minute 56 seconds, 0.06%
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So, despite the Conservative Party conference, Labour continues the rule the BBC's airwaves, with a majority of the corporation's interview time.
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Click on the label for 'Air Time' and you'll see that this is par for the course.
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OCTOBER'S I.C.s - THE NUMBER OF INTERVIEWS FOR EACH PARTY

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As this month contained the Conservative Party conference, the Tories got a lot more interviews than usual. This makes my usual totals for the month less valuable in their own right but, as promised last month (http://beebbiascraig.blogspot.com/2009/10/septembers-ics-number-of-interview-for.html) I shall then remedy that difficulty.
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Here, for the record then, are the figures for October alone:
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Labour - 134
Conservatives - 124
Liberal Democrats - 32
SNP - 11
UKIP - 4
DUP - 2
BNP - 2
Sinn Fein - 2
Green - 2
Plaid Cymru - 2
Alliance - 1
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Even with all coverage of the Conservative Party conference Labour still got the most invites to the BBC's studios!!
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Now, as promised, here comes the combined tally for September and October, covering the whole of the party conference season, which gives the truer picture:
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Labour - 259
Conservatives - 169
Liberal Democrats - 87
SNP - 15
UKIP - 7
Plaid Cymru - 4
DUP - 3
Greens - 3
UUP - 3
BNP -2
Sinn Fein - 2
Independents - 2
Alliance - 1
English Democrats - 1
SDLP - 1

A RED SOFA

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The spread of guests on this morning's Andrew Marr Show was pretty broad, with two Labour politicians (Baroness Helena Kennedy and Lord Myners) and a Labour-affliliated union leader (Billy Hayes of the CWU), a Conservative politician (Liam Fox) and a Conservative-supporting actor (Julian Fellowes), as well as the leader on the SNP (Alex Salmond) and the historian/BBC presenter Dan Snow. Why then was the usual bit at the end on the sofa a gathering of all the Labour guests only. Couldn't (Shouldn't?) Liam Fox have replaced Helena Kennedy on the couch? It would have been interesting to hear what he had to say to Billy Hayes.
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I will let the Interruption Coefficients do the talking now:
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Liam Fox (Conservative) - 1.8 (with 17 interruptions)
Lord Myners (Labour) - 1.0 (with 6 interruptions)
Alex Salmond (SNP) - 0.2 (with 1 interruption)
Baroness Kennedy (Labour) - 0
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Again, the Conservative gets the roughest ride.
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On the paper review, Andrew Marr was openly agreeing again with left-wing sentiments. When the Baroness said "The focus goes off. Here we are. We're blaming post office workers, we're blaming public service workers, and we've lost our focus on the fact that it was the bankers who led us in the crisis that we're currently in, and that focus should not be lost", Marr added "Yeah, absolutely." When she criticized Afghanistan's President Karzai, he 'mmm'-ed supportively twice before adding another "Absolutely."

IS THE BBC ALSO BIASED AGAINST THE SNP?

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The Scots Nats have a real bee in their bonnet about bias at the BBC. (That's rich, coming from me!!) Witness today's entertaining tussle between Alex Salmond and Anita Anand on The Daily Politics, following a piece by news reporter Adam Fleming.
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The report featured (as usual) the pro-SNP singer Pat Kane (of Hue and Cry fame), as well as an anti-independence businessman and a skeptical academic. What particularly got Big Al's goat though was the straw poll young Adam conducted in a carriage on the Glasgow underground. Less than a third supported independence, and when the show of hands came for those in support of the union, Adam Fleming cried "Ooh, a big majority don't want independence in this carriage!"
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Alex Salmond was at his most sarcastic in the exchanges that followed, describing the straw poll as "highly scientific" and began his interview with the words "Wow! The usual impartiality of the British Brainwashing Corporation at its best!"
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Tell us about it Alex!
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*UPDATE

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The sparring between the SNP and the BBC continued on Sunday 18th October's The Politics Show: Scotland, when Alex Salmond reacted to a report from the lovely Catriona Renton with these words: "Quite a remarkable report. You'd almost think it were a Labour councillor reporting from our conference!"

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Tell us about it Alex!

BIAS ON MY MIND

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My suspicions about The Politics Show: Scotland's presenter Glenn Campbell seem to be being bourne out. Essentially, these are that he is softer on Labour and the Liberal Democrats than on the Conservatives and the SNP.

Today's programme featured a pretty gentle interview with Alistair Darling (I.C. of 0.6). Glenn interrupted Darling a few times during his answers to questions about a public sector pay freeze. (That does seem to exercise BBC employees, for some reason). When Glenn asked about Conservative proposals, however, and Darling repeatedly turned his fire on the wicked Tories - there were no interruptions whatsoever (in answer after answer). Uncanny!

Regarding Labour and the SNP, we witnessed a joint interview with the Labour leader of Glasgow City Council Steven Purcell and the SNP deputy leader Nicola Sturgeon. Both got to talk for a similar amount of time and on the same topics but, whereas the Labour man was only interrupted twice, Nicola was interrupted 6 times. (In terms of I.C.s, that's 0.6 for Steven Purcell and 1.8 for Nicola Sturgeon).

Somewhat countering my suspicions though were the I.C.s accrued by Glenn Campbell during a debate between the four main candidates in the forthcoming Glasgow North East by-election - though not the one about the Conservatives nor the one about the Liberal Democrats!:
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Ruth Davidson (Conservative) - 1.4
Willie Bain (Labour) - 1.3
David Kerr (SNP) - 1
Eileen Baxendale (Lib Dem) - 0

AUGUST I.C.s - AND WHAT OF THE I.C. SUPER-AVERAGES?

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The super-average I.C.s (please click on label for I.C. averages for the thinking - and the cautionary words - behind these) are as follows:

UKIP - 0.6
SNP - 0.6
Conservatives - 0.5
Labour - 0.4
Liberal Democrats - 0.2
Green - 0.1
Independants - 0
Plaid Cymru - 0

This shows the familiar trend but is far less sharp than last month.

AUGUST'S I.C.s - AIR-TIME PERCENTAGES

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Here are the percentages for the amounts of interview air-time for each political party (as shown in the previous post ). This (as you may know) is one of my favourite indicators of bias. The figures are similar to last months (and June's too), except for the Labour & SNP figures. There has been a noticable swing from Labour to the SNP!! Still, Labour continues to have an absolute majority of the BBC's air-time.
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Labour 52.21%
Conservatives 22.55%
Liberal Democrats 13.19%
SNP 9.61%
Greens 1.04%
Independent 0.53%
UKIP 0.50%
Plaid Cymru - 0.37%

AUGUST'S I.C.s - TOTAL AMOUNT OF TIME EACH PARTY GOT

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Who hogged all the hours & minutes & seconds of the BBC's precious interview air-time in August? You'll never guess!!

Labour - 6 hours, 5 minutes & 33 seconds
Conservatives - 2 hours, 37 minutes & 57 seconds
Liberal Democrats - 1 hour, 32 minutes & 15 seconds
SNP - 1 hour, 7 minutes & 6 seconds
Greens - 7 minutes & 11 seconds
Independents - 3 minutes & 47 seconds
UKIP - 3 minutes & 33 seconds
Plaid Cymru - 2 minutes & 42 seconds

AUGUST'S I.C.s - NUMBER OF PARTY APPEARANCES

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Who got the invites in August 2009? There were 164 interviews with UK politicians.

Labour - 80
Conservatives - 39
Liberal Democrats - 27
SNP - 14
Green - 1
Independent - 1
UKIP - 1
Plaid Cymru - 1
BNP - 0

HOOKING A STURGEON

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Following on from my post yesterday, I note that this morning's Today took up the Sunday Times story about Labour and the release of al-Megrahi and put strong questions about it to...Nicola Sturgeon of the SNP.
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Jim Naughtie's interview scored a lowish I.C. of 0.4, but it was not friendly in tone.

The only other interviewee on the subject was Oliver Miles , chairman of the Libyan British Business Council, who didn't think there was a business deal between Britain and the Libyan government, but suspected a political deal. He got less than 2 minutes.

HOOKING A SALMOND

The soft ride Jack Straw got on The World This Weekend contrasts starkly with the rough ride Alex Salmond got from Stephen Evans on Broadcasting House this morning.

Whereas Straw was not interrupted at all by Shaun Ley, Salmond was interrupted five times - and Evans heckled and tried to interrupt on several more occasions too.

Here are some of Evans's questions/comments to Mr Salmond:

"Perceptions don't look good, do they? The cat's out of the bag!"

"You were discussing Mr Megrahi with Westminster". (Salmond said, yes & I made an emergency statement about it in the Scottish parliament in 2007).

"But it's that phrase 'carve up' from it, it's that phrase 'carve up'. You were negotiating with Westminster to exclude Mr Megrahi specifically from it. The perceptions now don't look very good, do they?"

All well and good, but shouldn't these questions (or ones of similar force) be being asked of the Labour government too? Today's Sunday Times story was more about Labour than the SNP after all. And with similar sarcasm? Instead we get Shaun Ley, and his lovey-dovey interview with Jack Straw.

All this might lead us to think that the Beeb is trying to disguise Labour's major role in the Megrahi release & trying to stick all the mud onto the SNP instead.

DOCTOR GROSSMAN 'S DIAGNOSIS

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David Grossman's report into the day's goings-on at Holyrood (Newsnight) is worth a comment or two.

Who did Grossman interview to make his report? Scottish Labour, that's who! Was the report about Scottish Labour's response to Megrahi's release? No, it was about the Kenny MacAskill and the SNP. So why interview Labour MSPs only? Odd, isn't it?

We heard from Scottish Labour leader, Iain Gray (briefly), then (at greater length) Dr Richard Simpson MSP, Labour, deputy justice minister 2001-2002, and finally (and briefly) Lord George Foulkes MSP (Labour). Now, Lord George was asked about Big Broon's silence over Megrahi's release (though not, of course, about England's victory in the Ashes!), but this topic took up all of 52 seconds of Grossman's report. The rest fixed squarely on the SNP and Labour's Dr Simpson was Grossman's trump-card in the report's central thrust - to challenge the 'under-three-months-to-live' prognosis that underlay MacAskill's grounds for 'compassion'. The Labour doc was "well qualified to comment", in Grossman's words, being "a GP who studied prostate cancer and ran a hospice". (He is, indeed, well-qualified to comment!). He cast doubt on the 'less-than-three-months-to-live' judgement - as did the report itself. This could only be harmful to the SNP.

Grossman's report was followed by an interview between Kirsty Wark and Alex Salmond which, surprisingly given the fireworks that went off during their most famous (or notorious) previous encounter, was a very modest affair with an I.C. of only 0.2. Kirsty was slagged off something rotten following that previous encounter, & was treading very carefully here. In question after question she kept calling Big Al 'first minister', in a way that made me laugh. It was as if she was trying too hard to be on her best behaviour!!