Section 18 of 21 - Prev - Next
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[16.10] Skiing

Scottish Tourist Board / visitscotland skiing information
http://www.ski-scotland.com/
Includes the latest reports from the five Scottish Ski Areas

Scottish National Ski Council
http://www.snsc.demon.co.uk/
(loads of info here)

Edinburgh Ski Club
http://www.edinburgh-ski-club.freeserve.co.uk/

Scottish Avalanche Information Service - Daily forecasts of avalanche
risks in the Scottish mountains.
http://www.sais.gov.uk/

The Scottish Ski & Winter Activity Report
http://www.cali.co.uk/Users/freeway/mackay/ski/ski.html

Aviemore
http://www.aviemore.co.uk/


[16.11] Walking and Rambling

The Ramblers' Association
=========================
Ramblers' Association,
2nd floor Camelford House,
87-90 Albert Embankment,
London
SE1 7TW

Phone +44 (0)20 7339 8500
Fax +44 (0)20 7339 8501
mailto:ramblers@london.ramblers.org.uk
http://www.ramblers.org.uk/


Links
=====
Hillwalking in Scotland Web Site
http://www.b-mercer.demon.co.uk/

West Highland Way
-----------------
http://www.west-highland-way.co.uk/
http://www.albawest.com/

Tony Connery Scottish Walks
http://www.conneryscottishwalks.co.uk/

See [16.12] for books.


Walkers might also be interested in Itch Ease for Midgies
http://www.itchease.com/


[16.12] Books for hillwalkers

Rambler's Yearbook
------------------
"The Rambler's yearbook and accomodation guide" is a good source of low cost
accomodation (typically 10 - 20 pounds per person per night)
ISBN 0-900613-75-0. Published by
The Ramblers' Association, 1/5 Wandsworth Road, London, SW8 2XX
Tel: 0171 582 6878

100 best routes
---------------
Ralph Storer's "100 best routes on Scottish mountains", Warner books.
A division of Little, Brown and Company (UK) Ltd, 165 Great Dover St,
London, SE1 4YA
ISBN 0 7515 0300 2
223 pages, includes a variety of mountains throughout Scotland.
Mountains classified by grade; terrain; navigation difficulty and
seriousness. Includes diagrams and Gaelic translations and phonetics

Place names
-----------
Ordnance Survey: "Place names on maps of Scotland and Wales"
ISBN 0-319-00223-3
24 pages of info on Gaelic, Norse and Welsh placenames, meanings,
grammar, common Anglicisations. Very useful for translating place
names in remote areas.
http://www.ordsvy.gov.uk/


Book information
----------------
Get more information on the books listed here
via our books page in association with Amazon.
http://www.siliconglen.com/Scotland/books/amazon.html#[16.12]


[16.13] What is a Munro, Corbett or Graham?

A Munro is a Scottish mountain over 3,000ft. A "top" is a secondary
peak over 3,000ft. The distinction is not clear cut, and has changed
over the years; the current list was made by a committee of the Scottish
Mountaineering Council. There are 284 Munros and 517 tops.

The name Munro comes from Munros tables compiled by Sir Hugh Munro the
Tory MP, but there have been some modifications since the table was first
compiled.

A Corbett is a separate mountain over 2,500ft.
Distinct Corbetts must have a 500ft drop between them. A Graham is a
separate mountain over 2,000ft. (does anyone know how many Corbetts and
Grahams there are - I have heard 219 and 224).

The Inacessible Pinnacle on Skye is the only Munro to require climbing
equipment but in practice very few people do all the others without a
rope for some of the hard bits on the usual routes.

Don't go unprepared. It is rather easy to die on Scottish mountains if you
start with the attitude that they're all going to be an easy stroll you
could do in jeans and running shoes.

More info and full list of Munros in
http://www.willsher.clara.co.uk/html/downloads.html
http://www.scottish-walking.co.uk/muntab.htm


[16.14] Diving

Scapa Flow
http://www.rmplc.co.uk/eduweb/sites/jralston/rk/scapa/

Scapa Flow in Orkney is one of the premier dive sites in the world,
due to the number of historical shipwrecks from both world wars.
Scotland's coastline generally has lots of excellent dive sites, with
the Firth of Clyde, St Abbs Head, and Oban being particularly popular.

Scottish sub-aqua club
http://www.scotsac.com/

ScotDive Magazine online
http://www.mounthigh.co.uk/scotdive/

Scottish Diving Magazine online
http://super3.arcl.ed.ac.uk/scotfed/


[17.1] Intro to Scottish Education

Starting School
===============
In Scotland, the school (primary; secondary) system seems to have its
cut off at variable dates, roughly between the end of Feb and the middle of
March. It seems to stretch both ways though and parents are usually given
the option of which year they want their children to be part of. As with
most things final decisions regarding cut-offs are left to the school
administration to decide.

In England the cut off generally seems to run with the academic year
meaning that all the pupils are the same "age" at the end of the
academic year. This means that Scottish children born between August
and March are usually one year ahead than their equivalent English counterparts
and can go to university younger as a result.

Primary and Secondary
=====================
In Scotland, primary school runs from age 4/5 for 7 years and High School
(both private schools and state schools) runs for up to 6 years.
After 4 years of High School children are usually 15 & 16 and sit
Standard Grade exams (usually 7). A few children leave school at this
point, there is no obligation to graduate from High School as there is
in the US and pupils may leave at any time after the age of 16.
After 5 years of High School, pupils sit Highers. These can be used for
going to university in Scotland and pupils generally sit about 5.
Year 5 starts as soon as the Standard grade exams are over, i.e. the end
of May, and pupils who have to change schools to take Highers do so at
this point. At University level, Scottish courses are generally one year
longer than their English counterparts. An 'ordinary' degree usually
takes three years in Scotland, an honours degree takes four years.

Leaving School
==============
About 7% of the students intending to go to further education leave
school at this point, aged 16/17. The remainder stay on for 6th year,
to do Advanced Highers, additional Highers, resits or other
subjects. Advanced Highers are of a standard above that of A-levels
and constitute the equivalent of the first year of a university degree.
Advanced Highers are necessary for entrance to English universities
for subjects studied at both school and university. A small number
of Scottish schools offer A-levels.

A small number of English schools offer Scottish exams too. Scottish
results are generally published the first week in August and receive
modest publicity in England. English results receive extensive
publicity in Scotland, due to the fact that the UK news is in effect
the English and International news and there is no Scottish opt out
for English only news stories (maybe the director general of the BBC
will start seeing sense on this one?)

Exam options
------------
Pupils can study GSVQ's, NC modules, Standard grades, Higher grades,
A levels and possibly even Higher National Certificate at school.
There is also an 'Advanced Higher' which has replaced Certificates of
Sixth Year Studies.

The reform has resulted in the amalgamation of the two awarding bodies
the SEB (who awarded highers and standard grades) and SCOTVEC. The
new body is the Scottish Qualifications Authority (see [17.2]).See
http://www.sqa.org.uk/

In practice though you'd have to leave high school and study HNCs at
college as no high school could run them as it isn't cost effective
to teach a whole separate course to a single student.

Comparisons with England
========================
The Scottish "Higher" system is generally regarded as superior to that
in England for a number of reasons:
1) It is possible to fail one or two Highers and still have enough
qaulifications to enter university. Less pressure is put on pupils
to pass everything at the first attempt.
2) It is possible to use 6th year to resit Highers and gain additional
qualifications. In England, there is no time to do this if you fail an
important exam, the resits are in December (There are Tertiary College
courses to cater for pupils whose grades were not up to standard.)
3) Pupils study a wider range of subjects, offering the opportunity for
a broader education and perhaps a vocational subject.

Holidays
--------
The Scottish summer holidays run from the end of June to the middle of
August, usually two weeks ahead of those in England although the dates
of holidays are left to individual local education authorities (LEAs).

Advanced Highers
================
A bizarre quirk of the educational system is that whereas A-levels
and CSYS are broadly the same level, English students who have done
relevant A-levels may get exemption from certain subjects in 1st
year University (or even the whole year), whereas the Scottish
CSYS apparently counts for nothing within the Scottish further
education system. This appears to be changing (eventually)
and some Scottish universities now give direct entry to second
year if you have specified CSYS/Advanced Higher grades.

Scottish Universities have full control over their degree system and
while inspectors from education authorities evaluate the standard
subjects are being taught at the results and actual creation of the
exam is left up to the university the exam is sat at. Colleges tend
to either be affiliates of the SQA or a local university.

Due to the rarity of Advanced Highers (people only tend to do them for
subjects they plan to study at university) most universities have
slight alterations of their entry requirements when considering
Advanced Highers (i.e. if the university requires two subjects at
Higher in grade B for a subject (as well as other things for example
BBBB tends to be the norm for any subject in the faculty of art) it
will accept an Advanced Higher at level A or B in place of these two
qualifications.) The difficulty with factoring Advanced Highers in
when considering entry requirements is that entry requirements vary
drastically from one university to another so it is impossible to
say what is valued and what is not. While Advanced Highers ARE
recognised by universities it is quite possible to get into
any degree course without ever sitting one provided you received
reasonable results in your highers.


Gaelic medium
=============
There is education through the medium of English and at playgroup;
pre-school; primary school and college level there is also teaching
through the medium of Gaelic in Scotland. There are exams for both
Gaelic learners and native speakers.

In my school in the 1970's and 1980's Gaelic wasn't allowed despite us
having a national Gaelic bard as a teacher there. Russian and Latin were
offered instead.

Scottish Literature
-------------------
It is said that Robert Burns seems to occupy an incidental part of
the Scottish curriculum compared to William Shakespeare.

What is taught in Scottish schools as the literature portion of the
English courses (Higher and Advanced Higher) is left to the
discretion of the teacher provided the prose/poetry is of a
reasonable standard. At higher level Shakespeare is the only drama
which counts in the exam and generally schools teach one example of
prose, one Shakespeare play and a selection of work from one poet to
fulfil the literature exam. The SQA advises (though I'm not entirely
sure if this is mandatory, I'd have to check) that every class be
taught at least one example of Scottish text. This is simply to
counteract the old system (of about a decade ago I think) when
Scottish texts weren't counted as valid examples of English
Literature.

The teaching of Scottish literature and language is conducted to a
point however as the majority of pupils and teachers in Scotland
cannot speak Gaelic studying the language can hardly be made
mandatory. While schools have the option of teaching it they
tend not to unless in the far north as it isn't seen as being
especially useful when seeking employment or further education (or
at least not as much as German, French, Latin etc ). As far as
literature goes there is only so much can be studied in the years
at school and with the exception of older works like Burns and
colloquial speech like Irvine Welsh or Lewis Grassic Gibbon like
to write in, most Scottish writers tend to write in standard English
as it is what they, and the majority of their readers, speak.

Education History
-----------------
With reference to the rest of the world, Scots education is thought of
highly and we have a long history of being a well educated country.
Scotland had five universities for a long time when England only had
two. Scotland had way and by far the largest percentage of primary
secondary and tertiary educated population in Europe, until Prussia
caught up in the 18th Century.

England had one of the *lowest* percentages in Europe.

Example 1864

Secondary school :
Scotland        1 in  205
Prussia 1 in  249
France  1 in  570
England     1 in 1300

The Scottish Education Act of 1696, heralded the first National system
of education in the World since ancient Sparta, and spawned the Scottish
Enlightenment, which in turn spearheaded the European Enlightenment.

From my own experience in both Scottish schools and on an educational
exchange to the US, it seems Scottish schools are approximately
1-3 years ahead of their US counterparts in most subjects apart from US
History and US sport. This difference carries on right through
University and only equals out at the M.Sc. and Ph.D. level which are
about the same in Scotland and the US. Given that a M.Sc. usually only
takes 1 year full time in Scotland, and longer in the US it shows that
the American undergraduate degree does not reach as high a level. This
is borne out also in the way various professional bodies treat US
qualifications versus Scottish and British ones.

Religious nonsense
==================
It is mandatory to attend religious education in Scottish High Schools.
It isn't general, though. Many schools subsume RE in Social Education.
Why religion has such a high place in the curriculum and Scots
literature and language do not is anyone's guess.

Religious Education is mandatory to such an extent that when school
inspectors discovered it was not being taught in my school to fifth
years (note : Fifth and sixth years have the option of not being there
at all so why it is necessary to teach them RE god only knows [sic])
they enforced the practice. In Scottish schools RE, Social Education
and, I think, Physical Education is mandatory up to an including
fifth year. No doubt some schools have not had this enforced yet but
it's only a matter of time. Thankfully sixth years are
excluded from this ruling seeing as, in general, they tend to have
so many free periods that enforced subjects would simply be stupid.


One person's experience
=======================
In closing I'll give the example of my own school which is currently
messing around with its timetabling system in order to increase the
uniformity of subjects and period length.

In first year pupils are taught English, Maths, General Science,
History/Modern Studies/Geography ( on a rotating basis, 3 months each if
I recall correctly) Home Economics, Computing, Tech Studies, Graphics,
Craft and Design (more complicated system due to the availability of
craft rooms or lack thereof) Art, Music, Drama, PE, RE and Social Ed and finally
by order of the SQA 'whichever modern language they had begun to have taught to
them in Primary school'. As all the schools in our catchment area teach French,
the school has decided it will teach French as well. To all of them. Whether
they wish to do German or Spanish or not. Subjects such as English, Maths Science
get three periods a week, rotational subjects two and subjects like computing,
drama and music only one.

In second year the exact same subjects are taught the exact same way
with the exception that at the end of the year pupils will choose their subjects
to study for standard grade based on teacher recommendations as to whether they
should be taught Foundation/General or General/Credit.
The Scottish Standard grades are graded 1-7 with 1-2 being Credit, 3-4 General,
5-6, Foundation and 7, Fail. Each level ( Foundation, General
and Credit ) has a single exam but each pupil sits two level based on
what their academic level has been estimated at. The highest grade
you attain receives dominance so even if you get a 4 in the general
exam a 1 in credit will still be a 1 in credit.

In third and fourth years candidates study for their standard grades. Classes
for larger subjects tend to be ability filtered but some subjects such as Tech
Studies only have enough applicants each year to justify a single class. It is
worth noting that Drama screws up the whole system by only having one single
paper for all three levels. Candidates can choose whatever they want with the
following restrictions - The must choose English, Maths, a science (either
Physics, Chemistry, Biology or General Science if it wasn't felt they could
handle the individual disciplines), the modern language they were studying
(French), An Aesthetic subject (Art, Drama, Home Economics, Music), A social
subject ( Modern Studies, Geography or History), a technological subject
(Tech Studies, Graphics, Craft and Design, Computing) and finally an additional
subject which is either social, a modern language, aesthetic, a science or a
technological subject. Personally I opted for English, Maths, French,
Modern Studies, Chemistry, Tech Studies, Computing and Drama.

In fifth year candidates sit their 'Higher Still' exams. The difference
between Higher and Higher Still is that the latter has internal assessments
during the year which decreases the emphasis on the final exam. Candidates in
my school can either do the subjects they did at Standard Grade, 'Crash' Highers
in related subjects or ... leave. Crash Highers tend to be rare in Fifth year.

While most people who only received Foundation marks for their standard
grades just leave it's worth mentioning that in addition to Higher Still
(only available if you got a credit grade in the subject or a related subject)
there is Intermediate 2 for those with general grades and Intermediate 1 for
those with foundation grades. It's also worth mentioning that there is talk of
the standard grades being phased out alltogether and replaced with the
Intermediate exams which means pupils will be doing the same style of exams from
3rd right into 6th. Pupils are limited to maximum of five subjects, no exceptions.
I was the only person to receive eight '1's in my school and opted to study
English, Maths, French, Computing and Chemistry at Higher Still.

In sixth year pupils either leave, re-sit exams from the previous year
they needed/wanted to get a better grade in or sit additional exams. Advanced
Highers become available for subjects you got either an A or a B pass in at
higher (but the latter only if the teacher(s) you had feels you were capable
of an A) but only tend to run in my school for English, Maths, The Sciences
and Music as there just aren't enough people for the other subjects. You
cannot justify running a class for only one or two people. Last years
Advanced Higher English only had six candidates. Universities allow applicants
from fifth year to enter degree programs so both low and high performers often
leave in fifth year however the number of pupils 'staying on' in sixth year is
growing. Pupils in my school must do a
minimum of three subjects in fifth and sixth year and people applying to
do Intermediate 1 or 2 in sixth year are encouraged to leave and
pursue those subjects in college (and 'stop wasting everyone's
time' to quote my depute principal). As far as Advanced Highers go
while a good number of people take them due to the limitations very few
do more than two. The norm tends to be one, either English or Maths. A
fair number this year are taking Maths and Physics, one English and
Physics and one Maths and Music I think I'm right in saying that not a
single person is doing three subjects at advanced higher. Personally
I'm applying for Advanced Higher English, Higher Still Physics (crash),
Biology ( crash) and History (crash). I've applied to do Psychology
(Higher Still) on what is called a 'distance learning programme' from Telford
College Edinburgh ( which allows schools to run subjects for their pupils via
the internet which class sizes and lack of staff would otherwise render infeasible).
I am the only person at the school who has applied for five subjects in sixth year
however as Telford have not got in touch it's unlikely that Psychology will be going
ahead which means not a single person at my school will be taking five subjects
in sixth year. Some of these I may later be ejected from, naturally it
all depends on the results of the exams I'm in the middle of sitting right now.

See also
========

http://www.hmis.scotoff.gov.uk/
The Scottish Office Education and Industry department, information about
education in Scotland

and
http://www.ecommerce-scotland.org/scotorg/scotorg.htm
Scotland org's Educational section

The Scottish Higher Education Funding Council is at
http://www.shefc.ac.uk/

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Webber/
has information on Scottish Primary schools

Learning and Teaching Scotland, see [17.4]
http://www.ltscotland.com/


[17.2] Scottish Qualifications Authority

This is the new national body responsible for all Scottish qualifications
except university degrees.

http://www.sqa.org.uk/

See also [17.1]


[17.3] Books and information on studying Scottish culture

Further info
------------
http://www.scran.ac.uk/

Open University
---------------

The Centre for Scottish Studies at the Open University in Scotland
has launched

"Studying Scottish History, Literature and Culture".

which is a rewrite of the former Scottish Studies pack and is
a comprehensive and accessible introduction to the whole range of
Scottish Studies.

What follows is copied from the printed flyer - the Web site isn't ready
(yet...)

196 pages, illustrated throughout.

* Historical topics covered include the Reformation, the Union, the
agricultural and industrial revolutions, government and politics, the
Highlands, towns and cities, developments since 1945

* Literature includes studies of early Scottish literature, major
authors such as Burns, Scott, Hogg and Galt, Stevenson, Grassic Gibbon,
Gaelic literature, the modern novel, poetry and drama.

* Cultural history before 1560, cultural effects of the reformation and
the Union, Enlightenment and Romanticism, questions of identity in the
modern age.

The writing team, Angus Calder, Ian Donnachie, William Donnelly, George
Hewitt, Shiela Lodge and Glenda Norquay are all experts in their
respective fields.

Available for #12 + #1.50 post and packing from

The Open University in Scotland,
10, Drumsheugh Gardens,
Edinburgh EH3 7QJ
Scotland.
http://www.open.ac.uk/

Sterling cheques only, no plastic. Or order it from your friendly local
bookshop - ISBN 0 7492 7349 6.


Book information
----------------
Get more information on the books listed here
via our books page in association with Amazon.
http://www.siliconglen.com/Scotland/books/amazon.html#[17.3]


[17.4] Learning and Teaching Scotland

Learning and Teaching Scotland
74 Victoria Crescent Road
Glasgow
G12 9JN
Tel: +44 (0)141 337 5000
Fax: +44 (0)141 337 5050
http://www.ltscotland.com/
mailto:enquiries@LTScotland.com

This organisation specialises in producing, marketing and distributing
materials on computer for the Scottish educational market.


[17.5] SCRAN - Historical and cultural on-line resource

The Web resource base of the Scottish Cultural Resources Access Network
was launched by Sam Galbraith, Scottish Office Minister for Arts and
Cultural Heritage, on Friday, July 25th 1997.

SCRAN is a Millennium project to build a networked multimedia resource
base for the study, teaching and appreciation of history and material
culture in Scotland.

At launch, the SCRAN resource base contained about 60,000 text records of
objects from over 30 museums. A few hundred of these are attached to
images. By the Millennium we plan this to have grown to 1.5 million
text records and 100,000 multimedia objects, including movies, sound
clips and Virtual Reality.

Please visit the website and choose "search SCRAN", try out the pilot
user interface and let them know what you think!

http://www.scran.ac.uk/


[17.6] League tables of Scottish schools

Scottish school league tables

1999
----
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/education/school_tables_1999/scotland/

2001
----
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/education/school_tables_2001/scotland/

2002
----
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/2516247.stm


[17.7] Research papers

I thought this would be of interest to researchers

Computer Science Research Paper Search Engine [.ps]
http://www.cora.justresearch.com/

Created by Just Research, an applied research lab in Pittsburgh, PA,
this site will find ready use among computer science students and
professionals. Using Cora, visitors can conduct keyword searches over
the partial text of some 50,000 Postscript-formatted computer science
research papers. Alternatively, users can browse top-ranking papers
organized under a number of topics and sub-categories. Search returns
include title, author, institution, and abstract, with a link to a
Postscript version, the referring page, a detailed entry (including
references), and a BibTeX entry. Although the site has not been recently
updated the sheer number of papers indexed make it a valuable resource.


[18.1] Newspapers

Papers on-line
--------------
http://www.scotsman.com/  - The Scotsman

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/  - Daily Record

http://www.theherald.co.uk/ - The Herald

http://www.scotlandonsunday.com/ - Scotland on Sunday

http://www.sundayherald.com/ - The Sunday Herald

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/ - The Evening Times (Glasgow)

http://www.edinburghnews.com/ - Edinburgh Evening News

http://www.timeout.com/ - The List - look for Glasgow/Edinburgh sections

http://westernislesonline.co.uk/ - Stornoway Gazette

http://www.northern-scot.co.uk/  Northern Scot

http://www.shetland-news.co.uk/               (The Shetland News)

http://www.shetland-times.co.uk/st/           (The Shetland Times)

http://www.freescotland.com/si.html - Scots Independent

http://www.dcthomson.co.uk/ - D C Thomson (Sunday Post, Courier, Scots Mag etc)

http://www.scotsmagazine.com/ (The Scots Magazine)
The world's most widely-read Scottish interest publication. First published in
1739, The Scots Magazine is a monthly periodical with around 300,000 readers
worldwide.

http://www.businessam.co.uk/
Business AM

http://www.argyllinternet.co.uk/scotmem/
Scottish Memories magazine

Courier and Advertiser, 80 Kingsway East, Dundee, DD1 9HU
Tel: 01382 223131
http://www.dcthomson.co.uk/courier/

Press and Journal, 84 Academy Street, Inverness, IV1 IJY
Tel: 01463 222801
http://www.thisisnorthscotland.co.uk/

The West Highland Free Press
http://www.whfp.co.uk/
mailto:newsdesk@whfp.co.uk
(Broadford, Isle of Skye, IV49 9AP) , tel: 01471 822464

Festival
--------
Newspaper dedicated to the Edinburgh Festival:
http://www.threeweeks.co.uk/
mailto:info@threeweeks.co.uk

Other Scottish Newspapers
-------------------------
Edinburgh Herald and Post, 108 Holyrood Park, Edinburgh EH8 8AS
Tel: 0131 243 3659. mailto:edinhp@scotsman.com

Oban Times, PO Box 1, Oban, PA34 5PY
Tel: 01631 563058, Fax: 01631 565470

Stirling Observer, 40 Upper Craigs, Stirling, FK8 2DW
Tel: 01786 451110

Linlithgowshire Journal and Gazette
114 High Street, Linlithgow EH49 7AQ
tel: 01506 844592
fax: 01506 670281
http://www.linlithgowtoday.co.uk/
mailto:editorial@Linlithgowherald.co.uk

The Inverness Courier, Inverness, IV1 1QW

Guth na Gaidhlig, Highland News Group, Henderson Road, Inverness
IV1 1SP, Tel: 01463 713700

La/ newspaper (Northern Ireland) and Am Braighe (Nova Scotia) have
Scottish Gaelic columns. Am Braighe is at
http://www.ambraighe.ca/

Metro (A DC Thomson free paper) Tel 0141 225 3345. Fax: 0141 225 3316
mailto:news@metroscot.co.uk

Political bias in newspapers
----------------------------
I understand from The Scotsman journalists I've spoken to (perhaps
better not to name names) that Andrew Neil, who is hardly ever there,
is detested and there is a constant struggle away from his hard
Unionist line. The Scotsman also uses ICM as a polling organisation.
The director of ICM has admitted that the allocation of "don't knows"
in ICM polls has a bias against the SNP. The ICM poll for the North East
Euro seat by-election in Nov 98 was 600% out in terms of the SNP majority
over Labour. During Andrew Neil's tenure, the Scotsman reported a drop in
circulation of 2.2% for the first six months of 1999 when the Scottish
General Election was one of its main stories, and projected ABC figures for
the Scotsman for the year are about 3.5% down. The Herald over the same six
months only lost 0.5%. This was the period during which I switched from
The Scotsman to The Herald because of The Herald's political neutrality.

Having got himself a new job presenting s daily  afternoon show on
Radio Scotland veteran Scotsman columnist Tom Morton felt free to
comment on what has been happening at what used to be the establishment
voice of the nation, (or at least that part of the establishment living
on the east coast).

His thoughts were quoted in the Sunday Herald diary 31-March-2002

"The Scotsman is a paper run on the whim of someone who has no insight
into or concern for Scotland, its culture or politics.  It has become
a vanity publication and I want nothing to do with it."

Additionally, on 16th April 2002, the staff of The Scotsman and its sister
publications passed a vote of no confidence in the group's publisher Andrew
Neil in the face of declining revenues and sales. Hint: Maybe the publisher's
political stance might have something to do with this.

The Herald has gone through bad periods and two editors as it works out
where its readership lies, although its history is unionist and Whig.
They both give a lot of space to nationalist letter writers with
circulation in mind, often tending towards the controversial (but misinformed)
simply to stir up a good debate. The Sun has dropped circulation badly
since dropping the SNP, and even the arch unionist Record now has Ian Bell
as a columnist, at least till they see if he is increasing circulation. The
Scotsman has of course held its price well below The Herald for over a year.
The general perception and one which The Herald is keen to emphasise is that
the Herald is politically neutral.

The West Highland Free press has an exceptionally hard anti-SNP line and
is often little more than a front for Brian Wilson's press office. One
wonders whether the paper should be entered as an election expense for
the Labour party.

Political bias in Journalists
-----------------------------
See also http://www.freescotland.com/media.html

Some journalists and columnists with political interests:

Margaret Vaughan - The Herald - wife of Social Security Minister
Alistair Darling.

Gerald Warner - Scotland on Sunday - former spin doctor and adviser to
Michael Forsyth.

George Birrell - The Herald - former spin doctor and adviser to
Michael Forsyth.

Michael Kelly - The Scotsman - former Lord Provost of Glasgow and Labour
activist

Jim Stevens - economist Fraser of Allander Institute and Member of Labour
NEC.

Michael Fry, who occasionally works for the Herald, is a former Tory
candidate in one of the Glasgow seats.

Brian Meek, also a Tory activist, also works for the Herald.

George Galloway - Scottish Mail on Sunday - current Labour MP for Hillhead.

Alex Salmond and Tommy Sheridan also have columns in the Scottish
Press. Sheridan in the Record IIRC, and Salmond in the Sunday Mail or
News of the Screws.  Lorraine Davidson, erstwhile Labour spin

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