Mailwatch(ed) Forum

On to the real issues. Bar charts that don't start at 0 are bad, but they're fairly common, not least among Remainers. In defence of the BBC here, the numbers are clearly marked.

Is it really worth complaining about this? "BBC displayed our dreadful death figures on a bad chart". I'd maybe let that go.

This stuff bugs me. The Scottish Government make shit up less than the UK one, obviously, but this seems so unnecessary. Just say "X mispoke", we all do, and that's without being put on the spot like politicians are all the time. You'll get a bit of stick, sure, but probably some respect too. The alternative is to waste a load of civil service time, and get embarrasseed anyway, probably more so, because the media can file this story away for a slow news day.

This is how dumb this stuff is. The excuse is something that makes no sense. What do they think all this has achieved? Just made themselves look dodgy on one of their strongest subjects- renewable energy.

Apologies for more SNP bashing.

This is obvious nonsense- what negotiations? But he isn't stupid, and I'd be surprised if there weren't some polling evidence that Alba weren't a bigger threat than appreciated before.

The SNP very quickly realised that the big hitters needed to be in the Scottish Parliament, not Westminster. Here's the flipside of that.

Actual MP rages at ITV for signing a deal for England games. One reason they haven't signed a deal for Scotland games today may be that the existing deal has four more years to run. And wouldn't it be STV bidding? Can't say I've ever really understood how ITV works.

If the comments are anything to go by, Gavin hasn’t thought this one through.

He's very insistent he knows what he's talking about. He may well do after these exchanges, but he didn't before. He later says his point is that Viaplay are trying to offload the Scotland games. That may well be right, but what's that got to do with ITV? Are they supposed to announce they've got games that haven't been offloaded?

I'm not quite sure why England being on ITV is "a slap in the face" either. Perhaps it is if you don't like football.

Oh I dunno, there's one person blaming the BBC for ITV not bidding for something which isn't up for renewal until 2028 anyway.
I expect she's under 18, yes that'll be it.

This isn't a particularly balanced thread, admittedly, but silliness from an MSP this time.

I don't know who will win the court case, above my pay grade. Wouldn't mind if the Scottish Government won it at all, and that's not for cynical reasons. But you get these cases everywhere with federalism-devolution. It's not something particular to "London". This is the sort of thing some Polish nationalist would say about the EU.

It hasn't been "blocked", it's been taken to court anyway.

SNP MP Lisa Cameron is defecting…to join the Tories??!?

This is like fleeing a sinking ship in favour of the Titanic.

SNP MP Lisa Cameron defects to the Conservatives https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-67087840

Edit: by remarkable coincidence, looks like she was about to be told she’d been deselected.

Yeah, perhaps some personal preferences pique here. Eccentric decisions like this are generally easy to laugh off.

It’ll matter more if she an flesh out her allegations about toxic culture.

This is what sounds iffy - who complains about toxic culture *and then joins the tories*??!?

Not to say her complaints are without merit, but she’s either not done her research or is really, really trusting!

Her wiki doesn't make her sound great.

On 5 January 2016, the Scottish Daily Mail published a story highlighting that Cameron owned five ex-council houses (managed by her husband) despite campaigning against the sale of council houses at the 2015 general election. She responded by stating that she had been transparent in her property dealings and had declared ownership of the properties per parliamentary rules in her register of interests.[11][12] Cameron made a complaint about the article to the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) which was not upheld.

The complaint to IPSO looks like it was very weak indeed. Looks like it was put together by someone who did their own research . Challenged under 5 parts of the code, lost all of them. Or maybe she was just buying herself some time.

Even the Mail sometimes gets people banged to rights.

15. Whether or not the areas in which the complainant owns former council homes are “impoverished” was a judgement made by the newspaper. It said that the homes were in areas which were considered to be deprived, and it noted that the rents were at such levels that they would indicate that the areas were not prosperous. The Committee found that there was no failure to take care over the accuracy of this aspect of the article, and it did not identify any significant inaccuracies which would require correction under Clause 1 (ii) of the Code.

16. The Committee had sight of the complainant’s husband’s listing on the Accountant in Bankruptcy’s Insolvency Service website, and noted that it listed the “trading name” of the business associated with him as “Lisa Cameron & Associates”. In light of this, the Committee concluded that it was not inaccurate to report that the complainant’s husband had run a business that “traded in her name and went bust”.


17. The article had accurately set out the manner in which the complainant had acquired her properties, and it had accurately set out the manner in which her husband had applied for and been granted bankruptcy. The article did not give the misleading impression that the complainant’s husband had so ordered his assets as to avail himself of a bankruptcy scheme to which he was not entitled, and it did not give the misleading impression that his wife had assisted him with any such activities. There was no breach of Clause 1.


18. Approaching the complainant for comment while she stood in her garden with her children did not amount to an intrusion into her private life. While conversing about the complainant’s husband’s bankruptcy, the journalist had asked “did it have anything to do with gambling or playing poker?” After the complainant responded “no”, the journalist did not ask any further questions in this regard. Asking this question in the presence of a child did not intrude into the complainant’s husband’s private life, or into the child’s private life. There was no breach of Clause 2.


19. It was clear from the recording of the journalist’s interview with the complainant that the complainant had engaged with the questions being posed. She did not ask the journalist to desist from contacting her, or to leave the vicinity of her home. The nature of the questioning was amicable and professional – both towards the complainant and her children – and there was no breach of Clause 3.


20. There was no objection from the complainant about the interview being conducted with her child present, and the conversation that took place was with the complainant, not the child. The interactions between the journalist and the child, which could be heard on the recording, did not constitute the journalist “interviewing” the child; he did not attempt to obtain information from the child for inclusion in the article, and when he interacted with the child on a few brief occasions, this was done in a jokey and friendly manner, which did not appear to distress the child. The quotation in the article about how the complainant’s husband “tidies up” her properties came from the complainant herself. There was no breach of Clause 6.


21. The journalist did not acquire any material using a clandestine listening device. The interview with the complainant was conducted openly, and while he did not explain he was recording the conversation for note-taking purposes, the journalist made clear who he was and the reasons why he wished to speak with the complainant. In this case, the use of the tape was a means of effectively recording the complainant’s comments. There was no misrepresentation or subterfuge, and no breach of Clause 10.


22. Although he initially left the impression that he had not been involved in interviewing the tenants of the complainant’s properties, in circumstances where he had introduced himself to the complainant as a journalist working for the newspaper, there was no breach of the Code.

Does she think the Tories will automatically select her as a candidate?

Apparently she won't be standing again.

Not sure what her idea is.

Anyhow Labour Gain

Watchman wrote:Does she think the Tories will automatically select her as a candidate?

Why not? Tories seem to like thick people.

Yousaf isn’t very good, is he? Says she never believed in independence. She sure played a long game then.

Just say “we don’t accept what she says about our party. This is obviously a very personal decision etc”

Well, if she's joined the Tories it's obvious she couldn't give a toss about independence. They're not noted for their enthusiasm on such matters.

People change their mind about stuff.

Tubby Isaacs wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2023 2:58 pm People change their mind about stuff.

That's a good point but I'm leaning more to she's done this out to cause maximum embarrasment to the SNP.