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John Scott
Riddoch, Farquharson and Wishart
Gerry Hassan’s article (11 October), on the influence of Scottish commentators, is very welcome, though it has to be said that he is himself a (semi-detached) member of the commentariat. A large number of others, Lesley Riddoch, Ruth Wishart and Kenny Farquharson, for example, hold similar views to those he cited.
Although not part of the mainstream, most of the comments in SR would be approved by Joyce McMillan and Iain Macwhirter. There are commentators who do not fit into this scheme, Allan Massie and David Torrance come to mind, but there is a critical mass of those with near-identical views. They constitute an orthodoxy which has been almost unchallenged in Scotland for the past 40 years.
Sadly, there is no Scottish Private Eye or Guido Fawkes to subject this group to scrutiny. This is, in itself, a telling point about the introverted nature of the Scottish media. The reason why Johann Lamont’s speech got such a hostile reception was that she, entirely unexpectedly, stepped outside the consensus. Her ‘crime’ was apostasy – made worse by her central role, as leader of the Labour Party, as an upholder of orthodoxy.
However, when Gerry Hassan criticises ‘debasement by the commentariat’, there are two problems; first, the assumption that the commentariat is more honest than politicians – a doubtful premise; secondly, an assumption that politicians and the commentariat are two separate entities. In Scotland this is not the case.
The commentators cited by Gerry Hassan regard themselves as activists involved, like politicians, in the creation of a new (and better) Scotland. Reading or listening to these commentators, you have the impression of Iain Macwhirter as a permanent part of the Scottish political scene while the Ruth Davidsons and Iain Grays come and go.
It is worth looking at the values these commentators share. They are, as Gerry Hassan says, proudly on the liberal left. They assume, like so many on the left, that they are morally superior to those on the right. For several decades they have viewed the constitutional question as being the key issue facing Scotland and they are hostile to capitalism, which they equate with selfishness. Wealth creation is, for them, almost a non-issue.
They are also overwhelmingly secular. This is hugely important since it overturns centuries of Scotland being dominated – for good or ill – by specifically Christian values. They are polite, at least in public, and there are few open feuds. Those of us looking for entertainment of that sort have to rely on football pundits. There appears to be an absence of competitiveness, such as characterised journalists on the Scottish Daily Express and the Daily Record a generation back. The approach to journalism is serious if not profound; its eyes are on improving Scottish society. Does any of this matter? I think it does.
Scotland has many of the worst social problems in western Europe: poor housing caused by the building of second generation slums to replace the ones knocked down earlier; alcohol abuse, even worse than in the heyday of industrial Scotland; very low levels of educational attainment in poor areas; endemic unemployment in much of urban western Scotland and, a comparative newcomer, illegal drug use killing hundreds of young people annually.
The commentariat show little interest in these things. They and their families are largely untouched and the fact that these problems blight hundreds of thousands of their fellow Scots does not impinge on their complacent belief that Scotland is a better place than England. To call attention to the ‘underclass’ would undermine the superiority they take for granted. They genuinely believe that they are in the process of creating a modern, progressive Scotland.
Unhappily, reality is closing in. The recent economic crisis has shown that money for public services will be limited for the foreseeable future. There will be insufficient funds to pay for the services people take for granted, let alone the extra cost of an ageing population. The future, for Scotland, may not be as grim as Greece but it will be a rather bleak one and we lack the compensation of sunshine. The failure of wealth creation has left Scotland with almost no room to manoeuvre. Johann Lamont was trying, clumsily, to point this out. Not surprisingly, the commentariat did not welcome her intervention. Nobody wants to be told that the game is up. But it is, for Joyce McMillan as much as for Craig Levein.
John Scott is a retired teacher who lives in Leith
