REVIEW OF THE DECADE: PART ONE 2010-2012 GOLDEN YEARS
As the 2010s draw to a close, it’s a time to reflect on the good, the bad and the ugly of the past 10 years. In the first of a three-part series, ANNIE BROWN looks back on the key events which have shaped our nation, beginning with 2010 to 2012
IT WAS in 2010 that the seeds of our current political crisis were sown, as Gordon Brown handed over the keys to the Tory-Lib Dem coalition and the father of the Brexit debacle, David Cameron.
Brown was lurching from one crisis to another, including being caught calling a pensioner a bigot after she quizzed him about immigration.
He was being driven away after the confrontation with Gillian Duffy but didn’t realise he was still attached to a Sky News mike which caught every word. He later personally apologised to Duffy, saying he was mortified.
With no clear mandate in that year’s general election, Brown resigned as prime minister in the vain hope that it would pave the way for a Lab-Lib coalition. But as he exited No10 Downing Street, it was clear that Cameron was moving in, having sealed an unholy alliance with Nick Clegg’s Lib Dems, in a pact which would spell disaster for those who would suffer under the cruelty of austerity.
As Scots mourned the return of the Tories, there were also tears for Andy Murray as he dashed the hopes of a nation when he lost the 2010 Australian Open Final.
The tennis hero went down in three sets to Roger Federer and said: “I can cry like Roger. It’s just a pity I can’t play like him. I’m sorry.”
He was down but not out and later defeated Novak Djokovic in the 2012 US Open final, becoming the first British player since 1977, and the first
British man since 1936, to win a Grand Slam singles tournament.
Earlier that year, he had won gold at the London Olympics and thousands lined the streets of his home town of Dunblane to catch a glimpse of its favourite son who returned wearing his medal.
No such joy for Tiger Woods, whose career continued to nose dive in 2010 after he was forced to make a grovelling TV apology for serial philandering, which saw him divorce his wife Elin Nordegren with an £80million settlement.
Philandering also ended Cheryl Cole’s marriage to footballer Ashley Cole after claims he bedded four women.
And there was tragedy for Scotland in August 2010 with the death of working class hero Jimmy Reid from a brain haemorrhage.
Jimmy, 78, led Clyde shipbuilders to victory when they took on Ted Heath’s Tory government in 1971.
But there was joy in 2010 as Chilean miners finally resurfaced after two months underground. The world was watching as they emerged one by one from the hellish tomb which had kept them captive for 69 days.
In 2011, ex-MSP Tommy Sheridan relinquished his freedom, as he was whisked off to jail to start the year with a three-year prison sentence.
He had lied on oath during his successful defamation case against the News of the World newspaper in 2006, to cover up his adultery and visits to a swingers’ club.
That year, the world watched in
horror when an earthquake and tsunami ripped through Japan leaving 20,000 dead, knocking out the cooling systems of Fukushima’s nuclear power plant and triggering a series of explosions, making it the world’s worst nuclear accident in 25 years.
And there was an important victory for the SNP, which stormed to a historic triumph in the Holyrood elections. Alex Salmond’s party grabbed an overall majority with 69 seats, while Labour and the Lib Dems suffered humiliating defeats.
The scandal of Jimmy Savile came to the fore in 2012, after it emerged the DJ and Jim’ll Fix host had been a serial sex abuser.
Later in October, Salmond and Cameron put pen to paper on a deal to allow Scots to vote on independence in a 2014 referendum.
In yet another fat-cat debacle, the Record revealed that Scotland’s biggest energy company, SSE, parent company of Scottish Hydro, announced profits of nearly £1500 a minute weeks after hitting customers with inflation-busting price hikes of 9 per cent.
A couple who never need to fret over the bills, Kate and Wills announced they were pregnant.
But their joy was overshadowed by the suicide of Jacintha Saldanha, the nurse at the Duchess of Cambridge’s hospital who was duped by a hoax telephone call from two Australian DJs pretending to be royals.
On Monday, we take a look back over the years 2013-2015