With annual perversity the schools are returning just as Scotland’s main festivals season gets underway.It is also time for the education minister, John Swinney, to take centre stage. He is second only to Nicola Sturgeon in the SNP hierarchy and was willing to leave the key office of finance secretary to sort out the problems in the schools and colleges: only a handful of … [Read more...] about Schools: ending poverty and poor performance
Charles Kennedy: a principled politician
Charles Kennedy was a conviction politician. Affability and an ability to bring commonsense warmth into the nation’s living rooms won him affection, but no one who studied his career from 23-year-old MP to sceptical (but loyal) observer of the LibDems in coalition could doubt that principles were more important than public performance.In his thinking about how the strands … [Read more...] about Charles Kennedy: a principled politician