Dear readers, we hope you’re all wrapped up warm and ready for the cold snap. We’ve been enjoying the autumnal air and bright sunshine over the past few days. Robbie would mainly like to take this opportunity to tell you all about the hot chocolate he enjoyed yesterday at La Gelatessa, served with a crown of something called cacao whip (think grown up skooshy chocolate cream). It may even have been worth the 20 minute queue, which is saying something, given his overwhelming aversion to standing in line for food. It certainly jostles with Bare Bones for the city’s best chocolat chaud, but we’re all ears if you have your own reccos.
We’ve had a very strong response to our investigative dispatch from Glasgow’s most cherished library, so much so we’ve made the decision to make the article free to read for one week only — share it far and wide. At the risk of making Mr Grewar blush, it’s exactly the kind of journalistic endeavour we had in mind when we set up The Bell. Read it below, if you haven’t already.
Calum Grewar
We’ve got a busy newsletter for you. We’re pulling apart the slippery media tactics of McGill’s owners, the Easdales. And we’ve got a beezer of a headline of the week for you too; actually, make that two. So without further ado…
🚌 Easdales under fire
Earlier in November, McGill’s buses, owned by Greenock brothers James and Sandy Easdale, received a £29,700 fine and humiliating slap down by the Traffic Commissioner for Scotland. The reasons cited in the accompanying report are “maintenance and punctuality”. Said maintenance issues? The small matter of a bus catching fire with 30 passengers aboard, many of whom were school children. The blaze was noticed by a student on the 324 service in Stirlingshire in late November 2023, who then alerted the driver before the bus was evacuated.
Barely two weeks later, another fire hit the bus company, this time to a vehicle not in operation but on its way to start a route (the M4, if you’re interested). In the words of traffic commissioner Richard Turfitt, these events “severely tarnished” the reputation of McGill’s, who blamed the defects that led to the fires on the stock they bought as part of their takeover of bus companies Midlands Bluebird and First Scotland East in 2022.
On the back foot
So what does a massive bus company that is trying to keep the public onside in anticipation of the recently-announced bus franchising upheaval do when its reputation takes a hit? Go on the offensive, or that’s how it reads, at least.
A week after news broke of the fine, the Herald published not one, but three stories that will have made Sandy and James feel all warm inside. The first, a puff piece announcement of the brothers’ £25,000 donation to the Royal Children’s hospital. A useful sum for a good cause, but barely pocket change for billionaire bros (are they really though?). The story was picked up by fellow Newsquest titles the Glasgow Times and Greenock Telegraph.
The second, published on Friday, a day after the donation article, was less feel-good and more an attack on the Easdales’ old foe: Strathclyde Partnership for Transport. The article calls into question SPT’s finances with the sassy headline: “Hard-up SPT hikes CEO pay by £35k and hoards £180m amidst funding row”. (It’s not been a good week for SPT: this morning, all services were suspended following a signal failure.) In the article, SPT CEO Valerie Davidson’s pay rise and the £180m in reserves that the transport body has amassed is not only called into question, but according to the reporter, “some quarters” are even calling for Audit Scotland to “examine how the SPT is financed”. Could these quarters, we wonder, consist solely of McGill’s and its outspoken owners?
Unnamed officials
In Martin Williams’ piece, other than Davidson, the only person quoted is Sandy Easdale. It’s a predictably provocative line, as he calls for interest made from SPT’s reserves to be handed back to the council to “save some teachers’ jobs, house a homeless family or keep a swimming pool or library open”. No other primary sources in the supposed row are given. An “official” from a “transport user group” is reported to have said there should be a “rethink” of how SPT is funded. Such an official is pictured in the header image for the article, Ellie Harrison from Better Buses for Strathclyde. We asked Ellie to confirm if she was approached for William’s (hit) piece. She was not, although she did tell us, “SPT is not perfect, but the point is that it is a democratically-accountable public body”. “McGill's, although it is providing a key public service, is not. They say SPT’s reserves are ‘obscene’, if only we could see what McGill's look like?” She must have read The Bell’s October story about the Easdale’s “adverse” business accounts.
Parcel of rogues
We may be cynical old sprouts here in Bell HQ, but the Herald’s stories are very convenient for the Easdales. Of course, the paper could have come to these stories all on their own. But this morning, the Herald took another bite at the cherry: Billionaire bus firm owner calls on SPT to return cash reserves. Three’s the magic number, even if we contest the billionaire bit.
Let’s tot it all up, in case you weren’t keeping score. Bad press for the Easdales: 1. Good press courtesy of the Herald: 3. A win for their press team, crisis management guru Jack Irvine and Media House International. The Easdales keep colourful company at MHI: Irvine’s back catalogue of clients include Michelle Moan, governments in the tax havens of the Cayman and British Virgin islands, and none other than Nigel Farage.
Glasgow in Brief
🍊 At the invitation of literally nobody, Andrew Neil clumsily weighed in on the Sauchiehall Street debate over the weekend. Brilliant stuff, Brillo, if a bit belated. He was back in Glasgow for the first time in a decade, visiting his alma mater to judge a debate marking the 140th anniversary of Glasgow University Union. He drove down (less than a third of) the street, describing it as a “shambles”, “disgrace” and “national scandal”. We won’t waste our precious time picking apart his flimsy half-baked take. What we will do is share our more nuanced piece on the fate of Sauchieha’ from back in February. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même moan.
Robbie Armstrong
🗣️ In the latest instalment of politics’ most disruptive (should that be ‘disrupted’?) new start-up, Your Party leader/co-head/idol Jeremy Corbyn was up in Glasgow over the weekend. Meeting members, whose dues are currently being fought over by the party’s divorced parents, Jezza C and Coventry South MP Zarah Sultana, a few interesting nuggets that will affect Glasgow. Corbyn said, as reported in The National, that Your Party plans to stand candidates in all seats in next year’s Holyrood election. And when it comes to the matter of independence, Corbyn was unequivocal. Speaking with the former Green MSP who defected to Your Party, Ellie Gomersall, on the National’s podcast, the Islington MP said that Westminster “ought to hold” an independence referendum as “the demand is there”. In unrelated news, Corbyn fully endorses the National, going as far as saying its £20 Black Friday offer is “not a bad number” for the coverage it provides.
Stories you might have missed:
🇷🇺 How a blacklisted Russian oligarch secretly invested in Scottish car parks, The Ferret
🌲 Not enough space in Glasgow for number of trees required for net zero. Glasgow Live
🏗️ B-listed Glasgow building could be demolished to make way for hotel with rooftop bar, Glasgow Live
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Read/listen/watch: The Glasgow Style
Peter Capaldi, ice cream and Italian design: what’s not to like? This short doc — first broadcast on BBC One Scotland in 1984 — spotlights designers who cut their teeth in Glasgow before attaining global recognition. It features Bellshill-born Gerry Taylor, a GSA grad who went on to work at Milanese avant-garde studio Memphis Collective, as well as hairdressing royalty Irvine and Rita Rusk, who started their careers on Clydesdale Street in Hamilton, before going international. Sadly, Taylor died in July; read his obit in the Guardian. Castlemilk-born Rita Rusk, ‘Scotland’s first lady of hairdressing’, died in 2022. Irvine Rusk survives; the pair separated back in 1989.
We also rec
- Glasgow-born Kate Clanchy and the anatomy of her cancellation
- Inside the new Grand Central hotel (£)
Catch up and coming up:
- If you didn’t find time over the weekend to read Robbie’s story about two men’s friendship that had a great wedge driven through the middle, I (Calum) really recommend you do. Here’s what reader Gordon had to say on it:
“Great story. Friendships don’t end, they just get suspended by separation. I went to school in Cecil St. and my pal from primary one stayed my pal until he past away in our seventies, even after our lives took us all over the world. I still feel the anger re that destruction of the Charing Cross area.”
Robbie Armstrong
- The reaction to Calum’s story on the state of the Mitchell Library was reassuringly passionate. But an interesting theme emerged: Libraries or bike lanes? We counted three comments in different corners of our social media which proposed that, if the council only spent less on cycling infrastructure, perhaps there’d be more money to fix the Mitchell. Feel free to have your say.
Headline of the week: take your pick and let us know in the comments
‘Jobby geyser’ on Glasgow street as burst sewer spews human waste
Sold-out Glasgow gig forced to cancel last minute due to ‘exploding toilet’
Re:view: Yianni’s, 16 Bath Street
Sad to see Yiamas Greek Taverna close earlier this summer after 15 years of trading? Fret not, it hasn’t so much gone out of business, as Phoenixed as Yianni’s — in honour of its founder, Yiannis Bantouvakis, who died in 2016. It’s now run by his wife and daughter. I dropped in for a quick gyro after the Brutal Scotland book launch last week. The gyros itself were good — if not extraordinary — as were the chips; we have no real complaints. But something about the place felt off: too clean, like an aquamarine McDonald’s. The fit-out, instead of adding warmth, has stripped all character out of the space, rendering it akin to a soulless airport café. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, until I happened upon the ‘franchise opportunities’ on their new website. Next stop: Edinburgh, followed by Dundee. After that, it’s a one-way trip to Nowheresville.
Glasgow Calendar: James Allsopp at the Glad Cafe
Saxophone, psychedelic and dub come together at Jazz at the Glad tomorrow evening, ahead of a new album, Stars and Sand, released by Glasgow’s Vibe Collide records. The release draws on traditional North African music, soul jazz and 70s Berlin for musical inspiration. Expect tenor sax, a wonderful-sounding instrument called a mellotron, electric bass and percussion.
Tuesday 18 November, 7.30pm, tickets from £8, The Glad Cafe, 1006A Pollokshaws Road, G41 2HG
Another date for your diary:
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