What we learned this week…
Duke’s ban not his crowning glory
The man who organised the Queen’s funeral claimed he couldn’t afford a motoring ban because he needed his licence to arrange the King’s coronation.
The Duke of Norfolk admitted using his mobile phone to talk to his wife while driving his BMW through a red light and cutting across a police car, but argued there might be “very, very serious” consequences if he was separated from his car, including the loss of 20 or 30 jobs, such as his “tractor driver, which would mortify me”.
The Duke, who was given a six-month ban, is worth around £100m. He can afford London cab prices or, here’s a thought, re-hire that tractor chap – as his chauffeur.
Council plan gets two green fingers
You know where you are in Aberdeen – as soon as one group devises a plan to do something new, another faction will spring into action to declare it’s the worst idea since low-fat rowies.
This week, Conservative members on Aberdeen City Council came up with a proposal to rename Union Terrace Gardens after the late Queen Elizabeth II. But nothing has been straightforward about the future of UTG and Press and Journal readers made it clear why this controversial site has been in development hell for more than a decade.
Talking about the state of the unfinished project, Pat Davidson said: “Brilliant idea, but the gardens themselves need to be fit for a queen.”
Gregor Armstrong replied: “Surely renaming it should be done for someone of local significance rather than for someone who already has masses of things named for her?”
And, of course, there’s the cash to think about. As Wilma Collie said: “I’m afraid I will never be able to look at these gardens without thinking of how much the money spent on it could have been put to better use.”
Maybe the site should be turned into a boxing venue – the Granite City’s equivalent of Madison Square Gardens. That’s the feeling it seems to provoke among residents.
Bringing Sheen to the beautiful game
A video emerged this week of the actor Michael Sheen delivering a passionate pre-match speech to the Welsh football team ahead of a European Nations League game.
Even many people from outwith the Principality felt shivers running up their spine as Sheen put the ham into Hamlet and gained a round of applause at the finish.
It prompted the question: Who in Scotland could take on a similar role, now that Alex Ferguson has departed the managerial scene? Might David Tennant, Peter Capaldi – in sweary The Thick of It form – or Douglas Henshall step up to the plate?
But there again, considering Steve Clarke’s track record in steering his side to another notable achievement, gaining promotion in Europe even as England were relegated, perhaps the Scots need the opposite of a sabre-rattling, Braveheart-spouting thesp.
The Rev I M Jolly, anyone!
Eurovision… and then there were two
The battle to host the next Eurovision has been whittled down to a straight fight between Glasgow and Liverpool and it appears there’s a decent shout of Scotland’s largest city gaining the rights to stage the 2023 competition.
Whichever wins, it will be a relief to Aberdeen cabbie Kevin Sherwin, who has racked up more than 40,000 miles covering Eurovision since the mid-1990s and, despite disappointment at his home city missing out, he is in bullish mood about the contest.
As he said: “Already, hotel prices in both cities are being hiked up and there are reports of some people getting their hotels cancelled that they booked months ago.
“If it’s Glasgow, I feel Lulu might make a guest appearance, or if it’s Liverpool, we might get Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr as interval act… which would be a major step up from the Wombles in 1974.”
The man’s a walking encyclopedia on this annual cheesefest.
Split loyalties in the Sande family
Music superstar Emeli Sande spoke poignantly in a Channel 4 documentary My Grandparents’ War this week about how one of her grandfathers fought to uphold the British Empire – while the other joined the struggle to overthrow it.
Her English grandfather on her mother’s side, Bob Wood, served in the Second World War, before being posted to Kenya with his wife, Betty, at the height of the Mau Mau insurgency against colonial rule which was brutally put down by British forces.
But, meanwhile, her African grandfather on her dad’s side, Saka Sande, rose up against British rule and an apartheid system in what became Zambia.
The programme, in which she travelled to meet her grandmother, also named Emeli, was a reminder that not everything was black and white in the Empire’s history.
Conversation