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Cleared for sell-off take-off

Boris Johnson is advising against "machine-gunning the bankers", and it seems that other instruments of splurged revenge are being eschewed by the Independent Commission on Banking. Its interim...

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Reality Check: Prison Pressures

There's popular support for locking up those found guilty of knife crime. That's particularly in west central Scotland, where chib culture has an unusually strong grip on young men. Both Labour and...

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Reality check: who benefits from frozen council tax?

It's a vote winner, for sure. Do you want to have your tax frozen at 2007 levels? Of course you do. But at what price? It's a simple enough mechanism that has persuaded councils to freeze tax, as my...

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Royal banks on women

If you're looking for signs that Royal Bank of Scotland has changed since it hit crisis, its chairman wants to highlight its right-on attitude to women. It might seem one of the lower priorities for a...

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Reality Check: In several black holes, and digging

Election campaigning has reached a sad stage when it's a battle over which party has the biggest black hole. With astronomical figures and unexplained gaps, drawing in mysterious political energy...

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Divorce for Scottish Widows?

With a company as sprawling as Lloyds Banking Group, there are any number of options for the full review being carried out by the new chief executive. Antonio Horta-Osorio has already got 600 branches...

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Scotland's oil tax reckoning

So Labour's decided it wants to talk about independence for the final stages of the Holyrood election campaign. And that brings back the old chestnut of how Scotland's finances would fare if it had...

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Reality check: Green jobs greenwash?

Who doesn't love a green job? It puts the sustainability into growth. It makes you think you're earning money while saving the planet. And it gives our politicians a warm glow too. LibDems are offering...

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Reality Check: How many wind turbines?

To some it's cloud cuckoo land. To others, it's a big business opportunity. The SNP target of achieving 100% of Scotland's electricity needs from renewable sources by 2020 has been met with disbelief...

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Reality Check on the NHS: This Won't Hurt?

A third of Holyrood's budget goes on health, so where's the election debate about the future of the health service? The pledges being made are towards the margins: Lib Dems want more efficient medicine...

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Weir running with the Frack Pack

Other chief executives might dream of having Keith Cochrane's biggest worry - ensuring he can handle a bulging order book. That's the view from the headquarters of Weir Group in Glasgow, as he sets out...

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The new business minister's in-tray

Wanted: a new business minister. Whatever else Alex Salmond does with his ministerial team, he'll have to find a replacement for Jim Mather, who stepped down from frontline politics ahead of the...

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Spicy finances and hot topics

Newly-elected MSPs probably think they've heard what their priorities should be from listening to voters on the nation's doorsteps. But as they arrived at their offices over recent days, they've been...

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Do Bankers Deserve Bonuses? Discuss

Let's talk about getting very rich, with news of investment bonanzas and company executives on vast earnings - before I set you a challenge fit for a 13-year-old schoolgirl. First, this might seem a...

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On the move

With a mighty thud, the Ledger has been slammed shut. Thanks for reading it. But it's not finished - far from it. As with other BBC journalist blogs, it is flitting to a new home, and appearing in a...

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