Lord Hope's speech in Dunblane this week, in memory of the late Lord Rodger and reported in the Sunday Herald, strikes me as insightful and courageous given the previous context; and a further example of why Scotland is so fortunate to have jurists of his outstanding calibre.

Lord Hope made reference to Lord Rodger's observation of a 'corrosive anti-English sentiment', in relation to appeals going to the UK Supreme Court from Scotland. That observation is self-evidently correct. And it is more than just a sentiment if one considers the boorish personal insults and unconstitutional funding threats that ensued from the First Minister and Justice Secretary following the Supreme Court's judgment in Cadder v. HMA.

Listening to the First Minister these days you could be forgiven for thinking that Scotland was an oppressed nation, under the yolk of an insidious, foreign power. If only the mist would come down to reveal our Brigadoon where crime, poverty, injustice and corporation tax did not exist.

Only a fool would deny that anti-English or anti-London sentiment ran through the veins of the present Scottish administration. It's nothing short of an overarching policy that pitches grudge and grievance with London at every turn. And don't tell anyone, but apparently they want to separate Scotland from the UK too. In this context, Lord Hope's observations appear uncontroversial and diplomatic.

Yet in the same Sunday Herald edition, Scotland's political cuckoo, Paul McBride QC claimed that Lord Hope's speech represented an 'unprecedented political attack by a judge on the Scottish Government and indeed the Scottish Parliament'. Mr McBride went on to say 'I expect Lord Hope to respect the decision of the Scottish Parliament. And I hope that when Alex Salmond is asked to comment he can do so without being attacked'.

What on earth is Paul McBride going on about? Here we have a person who barks like a duck (who could forget the 'dysfunctional morons' jibe at his own Tory party, or the bizarre outburst against the SFA?) inveigling to defend Scotland's angriest MSP? A First Minister who is not adverse to delivering a verbal attack like a banshee with a claymore. I suspect Mr Salmond neither needs or requires Mr McBride's political advice. It won't end well, if the Scottish Tories are anything to go by.

Can anyone now take Mr McBride seriously on this issue?

Mike