Derek’s bad luck Budget

COULD Derek Mackay’s Scottish Budget be doomed? Things did not augur well for the Finance Secretary when printouts of his speech were handed out to hacks with page 13 left blank. But if Mr Mackay fears his plans will be cursed with bad luck and come to nothing when he tries to get them through the parliament, he was refusing to admit it last week. Blaming the blank on a printing malfunction, he insisted: ‘I’m not superstitious at all.’

IT could be bad luck for us all if Mr Mackay has to sook up to the Scottish Greens to get his Budget passed, as the likely price extorted by their co-convener Patrick Harvie is replacing council tax with a riotously costly alternative. But is Mr Mackay going too far in a bid to soften up the Greens, hence the sight last week of Mr Harvie hobbling around the parliament on a walking stick? Surely a horse’s head in his bed, or a lentil ban at the Holyrood canteen, would have been sufficient.