This is my 200th column for the Scotsman, published in today's newspaper (31st March 2026). The elephant in the room remains the fraught question about the source of the killer Covid virus. No one who’s read Baroness Heather Hallett’s CV could have doubted she would be fastidious in her chairing of the UK Covid Inquiry. A former Appeal Court judge, she led the comprehensive inquiry into the 7/7 terrorist bombing. Her remit was straightforward: “To examine the UK’s response to and impact of...

Here's my latest column, published in today's Scotsman (17th March 2026). If council and emergency services are being starved of cash, where exactly are our unprecedented taxes being spent? With the embers still glowing in the smoking ruins of Glasgow’s grand old Union Corner building , our political leaders were already on the scene. Kitted out in obligatory hi-viz, to signify professionalism, we heard the predictably sombre declaration that the rules and regulations would have to be...

The techniques used to reduce the prevalence of violence could also be deployed against Scotland’s drug-deaths crisis. This is the topic of my column, published in today's Scotsman (3rd March 2026). First, a major success that may point a way forward. The number of murders in Scotland has fallen dramatically over the past 20 years, from 137 in 2005 to 47 last year. The figures are impressive but behind the statistics lies a huge reduction in the suffering of families and friends, stricken...