An Open Letter

Dear people who are forever bitching about the overly English slant on national news reporting.

(You know who you are.  The people bemoaning via Twitter, that bastion of social change, ‘Oh, they’re too biased in favour of the national football / cricket / rugby team!  Scottish teams don’t get the same coverage south of the border!  And the papers are so London-centric!  It’s not fair!’)

Consider, if you will, the main news stories this week.  Bosomy businesswoman stroke glamour model Katie Price dumped her orange-faced husband over his obsession with promoting himself in the tabloids, with nary a trace of irony.  Tony Blair admitted to the Chilcot inquiry that Lord Goldsmith told him the invasion of Iraq was illegal, a factor he chose to ignore.  Malcolm Tucker-lite Andy Coulson finally resigned over those claims he had journalists hack people’s phone lines during his tenure as News of the World editor.  And Shadow Chancellor Alan Johnson discovered his inability to do sums had led his wife to have an affair, so he also resigned.

Like it or not, these are the things people have been talking about, and all of them happened south of the border.  Meanwhile up here, Gail Sheridan – a woman known mainly for standing by a man found guilty of perjury – announced her intention to run for an election that’s not happening till May; and Liz Lochhead – a woman known mainly for a play she wrote in 1987 – was named Scotland’s national poet.  There is an argument to be made that these stories aren’t really on the same scale, n’est pas?

Ergo, if we want equal coverage in the national press, we’re going to have to do something interesting.  I have a few ideas.

1. Get Alex Salmond to set himself up as Katie Price’s next husband.  Last week’s Sunday Herald said in slightly insidious tones that he never speaks about his wife, ergo he clearly isn’t that into her.  And it’d be interesting to see Katie get together with someone who can back peddle as effectively as she can.
2. Proclaim war on somewhere.  Maybe one of those tiny islands in the Atlantic, because we can definitely take them, or a small African country who don’t have too many guns.
3. Stop being so good at protesting peacefully and have a proper riot over something.  Maybe the fact you can never seem to get Barr’s cream soda anymore, I know that gets my goat.
4. Stage a disaster of some kind, like a flood that takes out Edinburgh and most of Glasgow.  The Beeb can then do their boring live reporting schtick from a chopper circulating Ben Nevis, where everyone will be camping till the water levels recede.
5. Burn Sean Connery in a Wicker Man at Beltane.  It’ll make the headlines because he never comes to Scotland anymore.