A word from our leader

I have spent some of the last two days at the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland as I am co-presenting the BBC coverage.

The General Assembly has struggled to find its role after the arrival of the Scottish Parliament, having been for so long the nearest thing we had to something that resembled a one. I well remember a succession of Scottish Office Ministers and other politicians coming to listen to debates because those debates in some way at least, reflected Scottish opinion.

And then of course 20 years ago this week there was the sermon on the mound which was dsigned to shape Scottish opinion. I doubt that I have heard a less well advised speech to such an audience. The theology was dodgy, (the point of the good Samaritan story was not that he could help because he had created the wealth to pay the innkeeper), the presentation patronising, and the target of consensus well missed.

Gordon Brown is often accused of being Thatcherite and coming to the Assembly on this "anniversary" might be seen as him risking perpetuating that connection. But I think we will see that the opposite is the case and that far from another sermon on the mound, we will hear that his is a very different world view