I found myself with an excellent dinner companion last Thursday evening. Seated to my right was the new star of Dragons’ Den, the funny and feisty Jenny Campbell. After leaving school at 16 she worked her way up in the banking sector, before turning entrepreneur. She sold her business in 2016 for a reported £50million,… Read more »
Posts Categorized: HNM Column
Food for thought from ‘The Beast’ and Brownies flying high
The disruption and chaos caused by ‘The Beast from the East’ was widely reported, and with a thaw having set in, councils, businesses and The Scottish Government are left counting the cost of the some of the worst weather the country has seen in over a decade. But rather than leaving us with just a… Read more »
Less focus on jobs, it’s about entrepreneurship too
When I was at school the emphasis was all on passing exams in order that we could either get a good job or get into university. If university was the goal then the push from school was towards vocational subjects, so that when we popped out of the other end we would be fully qualified… Read more »
A new movie from Karen Gillan; and grateful for a pothole!
All eyes will be on Inverness’s most famous daughter Karen Gillan on Saturday night, when her new movie, The Party’s Just Beginning, gets its world premiere at the Glasgow Film Festival. A student of Eden Court’s drama classes, Karen shot to fame in 2010 when she was cast as Amy Pond, the flame-haired, feisty companion… Read more »
It’s been a bad week for Oxfam, but we’re in hub-cap heaven
It hasn’t been a great week for Oxfam. There was an almost audible intake of breath across the nation when the news broke last weekend that senior aid staff, working in Haiti in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake, had used prostitutes at a villa rented by Oxfam. We learned that once the allegations came… Read more »
100 years of votes for women, but no equality yet.
It is 100 years ago this week since Westminster passed the Representation of the People Act which, for the first time, allowed women the right to vote. This milestone is being marked with exhibitions and celebrations across the country, and statues are being unveiled to honour those women, both militant suffragettes and law-abiding suffragists, who… Read more »
Cuts to public funding – but please not to arts for kids!
There is no doubt that for some reason – and I’m not going into the reasons here – there’s simply not enough public money to go around. The NHS is in trouble with GP practices and hospitals in the north unable to recruit doctors who are either suitably qualified for our many vacant posts or… Read more »
Behind the Scenes at the funeral home
Years ago, interviewing the then Chief Executive of Highland Hospice, I was moved by her aim to give all Hospice patients what she called ‘a good death’. Where resources are rightly channelled to giving babies the best start in life and the NHS is there to – hopefully – pick us up as we falter… Read more »
Awesome reaction to an anthem for diversity
Have you been to the cinema in the past few weeks? Then you might have seen Hugh Jackman’s new musical extravaganza, The Greatest Showman, a biopic which tells the story of man behind one of the world’s best known circuses, PT Barnum. Jackman plays Barnum, and the feel-good film (did it remind you a bit… Read more »
Channelling Oprah: The power of speaking the truth
January is a month of battles, mainly with the alarm clock when getting up for work and with the hoover, to try and get the last of those pesky Christmas tree needles out of the carpet. But it’s also a month in which to look forward. The days are already getting longer, there are Easter… Read more »