As the debate about smacking has been aired in Holyrood, in the press and on the radio, I have been feeling increasingly uncomfortable. Because although I fully support Highland MSP John Finnie’s Member’s Bill to outlaw the physical punishment of children, and am proud that Scotland will be the first part of the UK to… Read more »
Posts Categorized: HNM Column
Scotrail needs to step up.
We took a couple of weeks off work at the beginning of the month and it’s fair to say that our holiday was fairly complex in terms of travel arrangements; a train from the Highlands to Edinburgh, a Ryanair flight to the south of France, a return flight to Luton, then a BA flight from… Read more »
Tributes: to a friend, to Mr Marr & to my second Highland home.
From the end of this week I will no longer feel quite as ‘at home’ at my second home in the Highlands. This isn’t a ‘second home’ holiday pad I’m talking about – it’s the place I have probably spent about as many evenings sitting in as on my own settee in the past two… Read more »
Wild Swimming? Don’t knock it till you try it.
What is it that my Mum used to say when I was reluctant to try something new? ‘Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it’. When you think about it, that’s annoyingly good advice for most of life’s situations – without taking that advice I would never have picked up a ukulele (I now enjoy an… Read more »
Scotland relies on tourism. Let’s get it right for every single one.
For a country with a population of just over 5 million Scotland doesn’t half punch above its weight. It has been well documented that we discovered, invented or manufactured many things without which the modern world would be very different, from the phone and the TV, through penicillin and anaesthesia, to modern banking, the pneumatic… Read more »
Search and Rescue – a picnic?
I’ve had picnics in some fairly unusual places –on the tops of mountains, on beaches, and sitting in the car sheltering from the rain. But none has been a more spectacular than on the deck of a lifeboat in the Moray Firth as the sun set last week. There was barely a breath of wind… Read more »
Kids leaving home? The First Cut is the Deepest.
It’s that time of year again. As university terms start across the country, parents and their almost-adult off-spring will be stuffing bedding, clothes, books, laptops and family packs of pasta into the back of estate cars, and spreading out across the country to off-load precious cargo, maybe not to be seen again till Christmas. By… Read more »
#NoWrongPath for Wick’s Envirocache
You might have noticed or been involved in the #nowrongpath campaign a couple of weeks ago. It was spearheaded by Developing the Young Workforce, a Scottish Government initiative which aims to help young people bridge the gap between education and employment – between ‘learning and earning’. DYW operate Scotland-wide, and have already done some sterling… Read more »
Motorways? Learners need lessons on rural roads.
The news this week that motorway driving is to be encouraged for learner drivers from as soon as next year must have been met with more than just a few raised eyebrows in the wilds of the Highlands and Moray. Because while the idea is a fine one, it would make for the mother and… Read more »
Beautiful, Beautiful Belladrum.
Stunt riders and wrestlers, fortune tellers and a ukulele band, Gaelic duets, 12 foot tall wicker badgers, story-telling and Chinese dragons with the faces of monkeys. Flash mobs and silent discos, book signings and whisky cocktails, yoga, hippies, a giant tin of Spam, and wellie-clad brides. What do all these things have in common? No…. Read more »