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Jim Spence

Jim Spence

The Courier

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JIM SPENCE: How intrepid trio of Dundee priests solved man bag mystery

It’s amazing how much of our lives are tied up in what we carry around with us, as I discovered when I lost my shoulder bag on Sunday. Fortunately...

23.04.2024 2

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Perthshire SNP MP Pete Wishart is upset privileged position threatened

The possibility of three other independence candidates standing against the SNP’s Pete Wishart for his Perthshire seat at Westminster indicates the...

16.04.2024 5

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Assisted dying bill is dangerously misguided path disguised as dignified exit

Having given birth to a Hate Crime Law which has divided the nation, the Scottish Parliament will soon be asked to breathe life into another...

09.04.2024 5

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: SNP have divided country with hate crime law and put intolerable pressure on our police officers

Frontline officers have been put under intolerable pressure by the new hate crime law which appropriately came into force on April Fool’s Day....

02.04.2024 20

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: We’ve arrived at political mess because too many of us opted out and let zealots take over

I foresee an outbreak of absolute apathy at the next election. You don’t need a crystal ball to recognise great numbers of folk are fed up with...

26.03.2024 6

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Scottish devolution – success or failure?

Has devolution been a success or a failure? Would you vote for a Scottish Parliament tomorrow if you were asked again? Is it time to return real power...

19.03.2024 5

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Scotland’s hate crime law is dangerous intrusion into rights of free speech

April Fools’ Day this year could be the day JK Rowling ends up not in Hogwarts, but in the nick. That’s the day Scotland brings in a law so...

12.03.2024 4

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: If Tasmin Glass is released it proves parole is skewed in favour of the guilty and cruel

Victims of violent crime should always be more important than those guilty of committing the crime. When it comes to deciding whether parole should be...

27.02.2024 10

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Jason Leitch will step aside from Eljamel and NHS Tayside probe if he has any sense of propriety

Can those whose lives have been ruined by the disgraced surgeon Sam Eljamel trust anything the Scottish Government and NHS Tayside say? It appears...

21.02.2024 8

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Have we produced a generation of softies?

Have we produced a generation of softies? Are we cultivating a marshmallow-centred citizenry who would take fright at the flapping of butterfly wings?...

13.02.2024 5

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Scottish independence is as dead as a dodo but Kezia Dugdale’s SNP vote raises interesting indy question

The news that my fellow Courier columnist Kezia Dugdale voted SNP while she was a Labour MSP, over her anger at Brexit, has caused some gnashing of...

06.02.2024 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Jason Leitch-NHS Tayside affair points to wider malaise in Scotland

Just when you think the shenanigans in Scottish public life can no longer surprise you, another electric revelation stuns you. The bolt from the blue...

31.01.2024 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: What happens when power doesn’t care about the truth?

I’ve just watched the Netflix series Fool Me Once. It’s a tale of double dealing and duplicity; an edge of the seat affair with an unexpected...

24.01.2024 4

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Some say Dundee United and Dundee ground-share is a ‘no brainer’ – and they have a point

Dundee and Dundee United sharing a stadium is a “no brainer” according to a local businessman who knows both clubs well. He has a point – the...

17.01.2024 4

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: SNP have shambled into 2024 amid host of problems and infighting

Sitting not far from me at midnight mass recently was Humza Yousaf. A few pews away was local politician Michael Marra, Labour MSP for North East...

09.01.2024 4

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: We should remember wise words of Dundee United legend Jim McLean at next election

“If you accept mediocrity that’s almost certainly what you’ll get.” That was the football mantra of the late Dundee United chairman and...

02.01.2024 4

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Time of year to reflect on apologies, forgiveness and Michael Matheson saga

It’s often said that ‘sorry’ is the hardest word. If that’s true then it has an inseparable twin in ‘forgiveness’. Many of us, including...

28.12.2023 10

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: We must protect our NHS or risk losing it for good

The NHS is perhaps our most treasured national institution, and one which almost everyone has had reason to thank at some stage. Increasingly though,...

19.12.2023 4

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Time for tougher action against neighbours from hell

It may be the time of the season for goodwill to all men and women but some folk sadly don’t share that sentiment. Anti-social tenants don’t...

12.12.2023 4

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Is it time for BBC to stand on its own two feet?

Is it time for the BBC to stand on its own two feet? Should the TV licence – a form of compulsory poll tax on viewing – be scrapped? These are...

05.12.2023 2

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Shades of Ratner jewellery empire collapse in SNP demise

“You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.”...

29.11.2023 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Police increasingly thrown under bus by those they safeguard

Being a cop and putting yourself in harm’s way to protect the public is an increasingly thankless task. And the men and women who tackle the violent...

21.11.2023 2

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: My warning to well-meaning pro-Palestine protestors

The company we keep can say a lot about us. That’s why the majority of well-meaning folk on the pro-Palestine marches should be paying closer...

14.11.2023 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Kirkton rioters given free pass by Holyrood hierarchy’s naïve liberal agenda

I spent Saturday morning giving a Glasgow journalist a tour of my boyhood neighbourhood Kirkton. That’s where the police were attacked on Bonfire...

07.11.2023 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Chris Law heckling at pro-Palestine protest in Dundee confirms world I knew as a boy has changed dramatically

As a boy, my Saturday mornings were spent taking the bus to town to the arcade in Shore Terrace. It was there I’d buy Superman comics and generally...

31.10.2023 2

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Humza Yousaf’s government is shackling communities with council tax freeze

Dundee and other Scottish cities need freedom from the financial shackles of Holyrood and real power to decide which services are important for the...

24.10.2023 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Sturgeon’s theatrics make it impossible for Humza Yousaf to escape her haunting shadow

Nicola Sturgeon should really have handed in her equity card and left the stage to Humza Yousaf as he prepared for his first national conference...

17.10.2023 2

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Sturgeon’s theatrics make it impossible for Humza Yousaf to escape her haunting shadow

Nicola Sturgeon should really have handed in her equity card and left the stage to Humza Yousaf as he prepared for his first national conference...

17.10.2023 2

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Voters have decided SNP’s student-level philosophies are past their sell-by date

My opinion last week that the SNP were heading for the political rocks came true in Rutherglen. Labour wiped the floor, with the Nats soundly rejected...

10.10.2023 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: As SNP and Tories flounder, all Keir Starmer has to do is nothing

Both the SNP and the Conservatives have run adrift and are heading for the political rocks. And all Labour under Sir Keir Starmer has to do, as both...

03.10.2023 3

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Dundee is being fobbed off in the ‘weesht for indy’ mentality

I’m wondering if SNP voters in Dundee are suffering from a kind of Stockholm syndrome – that’s the condition where hostages form a sympathetic...

26.09.2023 5

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: I tip my hat to Dundee’s Pat Kelly – whistleblowers like him are fighting a machine

There’s no justice, just us, goes the old gag. But the state of justice at the moment, and the battle that some folk face to achieve it, is no...

20.09.2023 5

The Courier

Jim Spence

JIM SPENCE: Has V&A Dundee lost its way?

As Dundee’s V&A museum celebrates its fifth birthday, has it lost its way? Is the flagship design museum drifting from public consciousness? Is it...

12.09.2023 60

The Courier

Jim Spence

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