Can a Swinney change his spots? - John McLellan
There’s no quarter asked or given in these weekly jousts, and that certainly applied to John Swinney, whose aggression in support of his bosses over the years was more like the kind of behaviour current Conservative leader Douglas Ross experiences from the football terraces when he’s running the line.
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Hide AdI should therefore credit our latest First Minster with some self-awareness during his acceptance speech on Tuesday when he accepted his role in creating an “intensely polarised” parliament, “whether by shouting put-downs from the front bench or heckling from a sedentary position.”
In today’s climate, for a man to bay at a woman in her early 30s would attract accusations of misogyny, indeed I have heard female Nationalists make the same accusations against men for far less.
And although I wouldn’t put Mr Swinney down as a misogynist, his sledging displayed a vicious edge beyond the usual debating rough and tumble, and there was certainly little humour about what was an obvious tactic to create as hostile an atmosphere as possible in which the opposition leaders might fluff their lines.
“I promise that that will all stop. I have changed,” he said, before adding the qualification that “perhaps time will tell on that one”. I give it a week.
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