Neil Mackay

4 days ago | heraldscotland.com | Neil Mackay

The most recent example came this week at Harbour Energy in Aberdeen. It’s one of Britain’s largest oil and gas producers. Established by an American financier, run by an American CEO, and largely owned by US shareholders, Harbour Energy doesn’t like the British government’s tax regime so it’s cutting 600 jobs. It announced 350 jobs losses under the Conservatives in 2023. Now, 250 more are going. A series of US-owned companies have recently put Scottish workers on the chopping block.

5 days ago | heraldscotland.com | Neil Mackay

Sign up for the Unspun politics newsletter and receive exclusive analysis and opinion straight to your inbox (Image: Derek McArthur) This article appears as part of the Unspun: Scottish Politics newsletter. Is Doctor Faustus a secret member of the SNP’s inner circle? You’d be forgiven for imagining that the party forged a pact with the Devil, that Mephistopheles promised them decades in power in return for the souls of every First Minister.

1 week ago | heraldscotland.com | Neil Mackay

Police officers by the Winston Churchill statue in Parliament Square, London, after it was vandalised during an Extinction Rebellion protest in 2020 (Image: PA) Won’t someone think of the poor statues!? In a world of horror, poverty and GB News, they’re getting an awfully hard time lately. In Dublin, guards have been posted around Molly Malone to stop drunk tourists molesting the fictional cockle-girl cast in bronze.

1 week ago | heraldscotland.com | Neil Mackay

Donald Trump with Nigel Farage (Image: free) The discussion around what are or aren’t Scottish values, or whether such principles even exist, reveals much about our tortured national psyche. In every country, where people speak freely, there’s a healthy, if sometimes uncomfortable, debate about national values. The citizenry ask: Is this what we stand for? Should we not hold these principles dear? Why don’t we leave these traditions behind?

1 week ago | heraldscotland.com | Neil Mackay

In Scotland, the problem is lack of government action. “We want to see the Scottish Government use the full extent of its powers to tackle poverty,” Telfer says. Claire Telfer is one of the country’s most influential charity chiefs. She tells our Writer at Large why the public wants politicians to do more to save children from poverty’s scourge RAGE, Claire Telfer explains, is the primary emotion that grips her when she considers the grinding reality of child poverty in Scotland.