Alex Salmond has launched an audacious bid for Scotland to take part in crucial international talks at the United Nations on ending the nuclear age.

A deal to freeze council tax rates is set to be reached within the next few weeks. Finance Secretary John Swinney met local authority chiefs last week and has put a 'carrot and stick' deal to the country's 32 councils under which those who agree to freeze rates will then be compensated by Holyrood.  

SNP ministers are earning thousands of pounds for their party this week by offering time with lobbyists from the pharmaceutical industry, rail firms and energy companies. 

The Government is poised to "steal" the Conservatives' policy of setting limits on the number of non-EU migrants who come to live in Britain each year. 

It could have been codenamed Operation Blonde Bombshell. Margo MacDonald has revealed that she was wined and dined by both Soviet and American spies at the height of the Cold War.  

Sir Menzies Campbell could be given the task of overhauling the UK's constitution by Gordon Brown.