Scots Wha Hae

Leader: Unseemly rush leaves Scots law open to ridicule

I- sectarianism bill, she said such songs would not be considered offensive behaviour under the legislation. But she added that each case would depend on individual circumstances, citing an example of Celtic fans making signs of the cross to Rangers fans in an "aggressive" manner. This may potentially be construed as offensive. So even if it is not be the songs as such that constitute the offence, the manner in which they are sung and the context in which they are rendered could put you in court. Few dispute the need for a crackdown on offensive words and behaviour at football grounds and on websites after the appalling incidents of recent months. The bill aims to stamp out abusive behaviour from football fans whether they are watching matches in a stadium, in the pub or commenting online. It would raise the maximum jail term from six months to five years. But here is a law which at its heart is aimed at nuance and mannerism, one whose vagueness and ambiguity aims to make implied or perceived aggression a crime. As such, few can be safe from abuse of it. If the crime is to be measured by intention rather than fact, how can it be objectively measured or proven? How are the police to act on the point of arrest when hundreds of fans are singing? What counts in court for proof? The look in the eye when the song was sung? The expression of the mouth? Whether eyebrows were raised or lowered? If this is what the proposed Offensive Behaviour and Threatening Communications Bill is setting out to render a crime, it is destined for trouble. Yet this is legislation which the administration is determined to ram through the Holyrood parliament in a dangerous and unseemly rush. It was introduced only last week. Parliament is being asked to vote on it tomorrow so that is in place by the start of the football season next month. It is precisely such pressure and rush that risks lumbering us with a law of unintended consequence. Could the National Anthem really land us in trouble? Could Flower of Scotland be seen as provocatively offensive? As for the myriad examples of satirical songs, what on earth would the law make of Noel Coward's Don't Let's Be Beastly to the Germans? The administration, no matter how large its majority, needs to allow proper time for consideration. What is needed is sound law, not ridicule. We should (where appropriate) be tough on crimes but we should not be tough on the causes of crime. They are not the business of the state to concern itself with.

Great Scot, what a bunch of true heroes | Kevin McKenna | Muse ...

Has asked each of the people who feature in its latest edition to name the top 100 Scots of the last 25 years. I am assuming the invitation was only extended to those who are still alive, but I hae ma doots.

According to these people, Donald Dewar is our greatest countryman of this period, but it gets worse; the Queen Mother, the egg-stained old soak who hated Gandhi, is number three. I’ll concede that Dewar may possibly be the greatest Scot who has ever represented Glasgow Garscadden at Westminster, but even that accolade was tarnished when he committed one of the biggest political blunders of all times: allowing Derry Irvine (later Lord Chancellor and part-time painter and decorator) to run off with his wife. Previously, it had been thought impossible for Irvine to have succeeded even in running off with the wife of the deceased at an Armadale funeral.

Almost as politically catastrophic was Dewar’s idea that devolution would kill off Scottish nationalism. Now the place is swarming with them and we’ll soon be posing for our Scottish passports and being forced to recite “Scots Wha Hae” at our citizenship interviews in 2016. Thanks, Donald.

The shallow Who’s Who list includes the usual predictable assortment of the worthy and the well-behaved. It could have been compiled by Ethel and Gertrude over tea and bannocks at the Morningside parish church needle-exchange fundraiser. And so, once again, I find myself having to compile a list of real Scots heroes to remind us what really makes the country brilliant.

I have been helped in my endeavours during this enterprise by some hand-picked chinas and philosophers from Glasgow’s golden triangle of Vroni’s, Urban and Rogano. There is only one house rule in the compilation of what is already becoming known as the Who Iznae list. You can never appear on the list two years running. And we also opened it up to non-Scots who have been resident for at least 10 years.

The last time I mapped the nomenclature of civic and cultural Scotland’s crème de la menthe, I included such cultural icons as Jim Baxter, Hot Shot Hamish and Sawney Bean, the deeply misunderstood Ayrshire cannibal who has since lent his name to a chain of high street coffee emporiums. So it’s farewell to all of them.

Here, though, is the new top three in the people’s list of all-time heroic Scots. A full list of our top 100 is available on request.