HOW bad are things for Kezia Dugdale over Labour’s council chaos? Grave indeed judging by the behaviour of gentleman Labour spindoctor Andrew Liddle. In a remarkable first, we hear Andy turned down a drink on Wednesday after suffering what he called a “horrible day”. For a man never knowingly far from a champagne bottle, these are clearly sobering times.

IT went from bad to surreal yesterday when Ms Dugdale held a press conference round the corner from Holyrood. The original intent was to plug a local community project, but it quickly turned into a media scrum about council rebellions. The improbable name of the venue? Serenity Cafe. It has now, naturally, been nicknamed The Calamity.

STILL, good to see silly one-upmanship remains undimmed in Scottish Labour’s press team. After political director Martin McCluskey left to be the candidate for Inverclyde, top spinner Alan Roden gave £20 to his Crowdfunder appeal. Sidekick Kieron Higgins then topped it with £21, before Kez’s gopher David Ross ‘won’ the race with £22. Children, children...

ALEX Salmond dropped in on Edinburgh South West, where the SNP’s Joanna Cherry is feeling the the heat from the Tories. Doing nothing to shake off his reputation as yesterday’s man, the former FM posed for pics with activists holding up “SNP: release our potential” placards. They must be very durable. That was the slogan the party used on its material in 2003.