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The sands of the times 265

Posted on February 24, 2016 by

Newspaper sales figures in Scotland now come out in a patchy and unco-ordinated sort of way, with different frequencies and at different times of year, so we thought it’d be worth collecting them together for easy reference.

scotpapers1

The numbers below are the most recent figures for each title that we know of – for papers classed as “national” that means November last year, and for those counted as “regional” (which includes the Scotsman and Herald titles) it’s this month.

Figures have all been rounded to the nearest 100, and increase/decrease stats refer in all cases to the corresponding sales for one year previously.

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The cold hard numbers 81

Posted on February 24, 2016 by

The first quote below is from Magnus Gardham in the Herald, the second one is from Kenny Farquharson in the Times, both today.

heraldtimes

So just to clear that up: four times £12 million is £200 million. The mystery of why people are increasingly reluctant to believe what they read in newspapers continues.

Every loser wins 205

Posted on February 23, 2016 by

So after all the kerfuffle and commotion and comedy, a deal was done, of sorts. The unsquareable circle wasn’t squared, but the day of facing up to it was punted down the line for five years, by which point everyone hopes that it’ll be someone else’s problem. (Which is certainly the case for David Cameron.)

Every newspaper in Scotland tomorrow will look like this:

vowwhine

But what else happened?

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Breaking news broken 113

Posted on February 23, 2016 by

File this one under “the wish is the father of the thought”:

onthehoof

We wonder which government?

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A trip down Memory Lane 78

Posted on February 23, 2016 by

This was a little cruel, frankly.

(From today’s Daily Politics.)

Song For The Fiscal Framework 86

Posted on February 23, 2016 by

Watch the devolution committee live from 8.30am here.

More repeats 297

Posted on February 21, 2016 by

The slow news year in Scottish politics continues. These are all from today:

ae1

ae2

ae3

Sound familiar?

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The Taffy Tories 120

Posted on February 20, 2016 by

Alert readers can’t have failed to notice a desperate Scottish Labour dusting off the old “Tartan Tories” attack on the SNP recently, over the Nats’ unwillingness to join in with Kezia Dugdale’s kerrazy kaper of hiking up income tax.

welshlabourtax

So after today we can only assume they’ll be looking for some similarly pithy zingers for their colleagues in Wales. They can have this one for free.

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We agree with Michael Gove 143

Posted on February 20, 2016 by

And you can’t say that every day.

michaelgove

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The drained pool 219

Posted on February 19, 2016 by

It’s curious that as the Scotland Bill negotiations deadlock drags on, well beyond its original deadline of 12 February and now hurtling headlong towards the extended 23 February one with no sign of progress on the horizon, that nobody is remarking on one of the most striking facets of the new devolution proposals.

govanhillpool3

Remember “pooling and sharing”, readers? Whatever happened to that?

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Toadies Of Toad Hall 243

Posted on February 18, 2016 by

Last night, MP Natalie McGarry made another heavily-qualified semi-apology to the popular abusive-tweeter enthusiast JK Rowling, because that’s how bullying works. (As far as we know McGarry has still refused Rowling’s demand that she make a sizeable donation to Rowling’s charity under threat of legal action.)

mcgarryjkr

One of George Orwell’s most-quoted lines is “Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed: everything else is public relations.”

We wonder who was trying to silence the torrent of drivel below, then.

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Making numbers dance 86

Posted on February 18, 2016 by

Without a doubt our new favourite Unionist website is this one:

64percent

And it’s not just for the snazzy badges.

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