4 days ago
- Politics
- The Herald Scotland
Why it feels like there are more f-words in Shetland
All of a sudden, people were phoning up the broadcaster to say there were 'lots more' f-words in the Sunday night police drama.
'So I went through the compliance forms from the previous series,' Allen said — in remarks first reported by comedy site Chortle — 'and it was the same [amount]. But it's just that this series there was a female detective, and people get worked up more about a woman swearing.'
DI Jimmy Perez, played by Douglas Henshall, was replaced by Ashley Jensen as DI Ruth Calder. And that, for some viewers, made all the difference.
I thought of that — though without the underlying current of misogyny — when I read a recent blog by former Labour MP Tom Harris.
He was in the party for 34 years, joining under Neil Kinnock, becoming a minister under Tony Blair, and staying loyal (if sometimes uneasily) through Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband.
It was Jeremy Corbyn who finally broke him.
In 2017, he quietly voted Conservative. By 2019, he was publicly backing Boris Johnson — to the horror of some of his family.
This year, he is back voting Labour — though it is fair to say his support is hardly enthusiastic.
It's weird that this is worth noting, but it is.
Parties and, to be fair, we political hacks often forget this: most voters are not like activists.
They do not pick a team and stick with it no matter what.
They switch. They weigh up who makes sense. They ask:
Has this party fixed the thing I care about? Are they listening? Do they seem like they know what they are doing? Are they better than the other lot?
While there may not have been more f-words in Shetland, one word I've heard a lot more of recently — especially in relation to Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse- is scunnered.
It has been the word of the by-election campaign.
How much Thursday's vote tells us about the 2026 Holyrood election is hard to say. It is a snapshot of where people in South Lanarkshire are just now. We should be careful about overanalysing.
There has been relatively little scrutiny of the SNP's long record in government — something they will not be able to avoid next year.
And by then, Sir Keir Starmer's Labour government will have been in office for two years, making more of their tough choices - the Chancellor's spending review next week might tell us more than anything said in this campaign, about their chances in Holyrood.
All that said, if there is one clear message from the battle in South Lanarkshire, and from Tom Harris' blog and from the TV exec in Belfast, it's this: There might not be more f-words. But sometimes, it feel like there are.
Right now, voters feel like there are. The party who wins next year, will be the one who convince the scunnered that they're on their side.
