Working Class Zeroes 14 - Nicola Sturgeon

‘Like most people who are clever but have no sense of humour, she was always on the lookout for the possibility of being mocked’ - Reggie Oliver ‘The Giacometti Crucifixion’

Horror-comedy is a tricky genre. By aiming for contrasting effects, you run the risk of your film turning out neither scary nor funny. For every success in the field, every Shaun Of The Dead, American Werewolf In London or Cabin In The Woods, there are many more stinkers - tedious, trying-too-hard attempts at bad taste, adolescent rubbish like Lesbian Vampire Killers or the later entries in the Scary Movie franchise. But the career of today’s WCZ is the great horror-comedy spectacle of our age, her story flipping constantly and frictionlessly between the iciest chills and the heartiest guffaws.

The mysterious workings of chance that weave their spooky spell over this Substack put today’s subject, long earmarked for the Number 14 slot, slap-bang front-and-centre in the headlines again at exactly the right moment. Nicola Sturgeon, former leader of the Scottish National Party and ex-First Minister in the Scottish Parliament, was fading slightly from the public consciousness. And then, her estranged husband Peter Murrell pleaded guilty to embezzling £400,000 worth of party funds - mostly public donations to the cause of Scottish independence - on an eye-watering variety of high-end tat, from Lalique Feuilles crystal salt and pepper grinders (£2618 the pair) to a Husqvarna robot lawnmower (£3070 including installation) to, most notoriously, a Niesmann & Bischoff luxury motorhome (£124,550). Nicola Sturgeon denies any wrongdoing, or indeed any awareness that these items had been purchased using funny money. She simply didn’t notice, for example, the Jaguar SUV and Volkswagen Golf, or the thousands of pounds worth of Montblanc pens, or the multiple expensive coffee makers including the Jura Giga 5 Cromo - ‘fast and quiet as a whisper thanks to two ceramic disc grinders … TFT display with Rotary Selection’ (£3232). She never really went into the kitchen of Castle Sturgeon, apparently. Maybe hubby Pete also kept his £1200 deep space telescope and his stash of computer games in there.

Following these revelations, Sturgeon headed swiftly for the BBC studios to attempt an epic snow job on Laura Kuenssberg; almost two hours of ‘I didnae see or suspect a thing, I didnae have a Scooby’ etc. She released a statement saying that she had cooperated fully with the police investigation, which it transpired meant that she had replied ‘no comment’ to all of their questions. Intriguingly, it was revealed that ‘women’s razors, knickers, makeup and fitness gear were deleted from Murrell’s rap sheet as part of his plea deal with prosecutors’, including ‘vanity products including £886 worth of foundation and motion sensor make-up mirrors worth £480’. Also dropped were ‘a £300 Dyson hairdryer and nine make-up organisers at £116, Nike tracksuits totalling £175, a £3,775 Leica Q camera and £466 of accessories.’ I’m not sure Pete Murrell has need of a hairdryer, for the same reason that I don’t.