Returning to a favourite ride Pedalling around Lochs Faskally and Tummel in highland Perthshire last month I was tempted to imagine the landscape timeless. Starting close to Pitlochry’s Festival Theatre, the single track traces their south shores: climbing beside the …
A sweat-bath revelation at the seamens’ mission A Finnish folk tale equates saunas with the pursuit of godliness. An aged farmer, so the story goes, found fame for enjoying the hottest of sweat baths. His reputation spread until word reached …
A tribute to Phil Woolas – boss, mentor and friend. “I’ve a dozen white horses and a donkey on their way up to you in Edinburgh, can you locate somewhere to stage a procession tomorrow – oh, and you will …
Speech to the All Party Writers Group at the House of Commons on 2 December 2025 Some five years ago, I was invited to join the Trades Union Congress AI working group. We were a gathering of trades unionists trying …
A tribute to my late friend Gareth Smyth – I should have chased him up sooner How many unanswered emails should it take to prompt a proof-of-life Google query? In my case, it was two – albeit a year apart. …
Originally published in The Sunday Times Scotland, 24 September 2006 Outdoor swimming may be choppy, cold and sometimes scary, but once you get used to not being able to see the bottom it is intoxicating. And right now the sport …
A seaside postcard Surveying the seafront at Margate from the window of a barrel sauna, the juxtapositions are striking. Fishing boats bob beneath Turner Contemporary’s elegant sheds. Flamingo Amusements and adjacent Weatherspoon entice one market niche, Wayne Hemmingway’s reimagined Dreamland …
The journalists’ union’s Delegate Meeting in Blackpool The NUJ’s incoming general secretary, Laura Davison, painted an upbeat picture of her first few months at the helm. She told the union’s biannual Delegate Meeting (DM) of new recognition agreements – most …
As the Atlantic alliance falters, recalling the Normandy landings is all the more poignant On 6 June 1944 Private Francis McKinney from North Carolina stepped off the Castletown dock, in Portland, Dorset. With four crew mates, he boarded an amphibious …
A new age of steam brings rejuvenation by the barrel load The rush of scalding vapour is too hot for me to breathe. My ears might be on fire. Airborne moisture swirls so thick that it occludes my view over …