In your briefing today:

📣 Families of patients who died or caught infections at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital say they are concerned it is still not safe, and are seeking more assurances on safety at Scotland’s biggest hospital.

In an open letter, the families write: “We believe it is right that you hear our position, in our words, direct from the people who have lost their children, their soulmates and those whose lives have been forever changed. While our journeys started at different times, we share one common aim — no family should ever again go through what we have.” (The Times - gift link)

📣 Prime Minister Keir Starmer has promised to “crack down on the addictive elements of social media” as part of the UK government’s plans to improve online safety.

In a Substack post, the PM said AI companies would be brought within the scope of existing online safety laws. The government will also look to introduce a minimum age limit for social media - although it did not specify what age - and limit access to VPNs for children, to make it harder for them to get around restrictions. (BBC) (Substack)

📣 Hundreds of teachers have needed hospital treatment because of rising violence in Scottish schools over the last five years, new figures show. More than 5,000 violent attacks have required teachers to seek medical treatment - with the true number likely higher, as only 18 Scottish councils of 32 provided data under a Freedom of Information request. (The Scotsman)

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📣 Scotland’s busiest airport is going to get bigger: its owners plan to spend £150 milllion a year to add new gates for aircraft, expand the departure lounge and merge the two international arrival halls. (The Scotsman has the exclusive)

📣 Dr Beth Upton, the transgender doctor at the centre of the single-sex changing room dispute that sparked a costly and high-profile employment tribunal, has left the NHS. (BBC)

📣 A Scottish father says his baby daughter was left “vomiting, bleeding and in pain” after consuming three infant formula brands - all of which were later recalled. (STV)

📣 A body has been found in the search for Jason Anderson, who was reported missing from East Ayrshire more than two months ago. (Daily Record)

📣 The UK is considering a big increase in defence spending, with Keir Starmer thinking of bringing forward a 3%-of-GDP target. (BBC)

📣 Intelligence chiefs say Russia’s Wagner Group has turned its attention to sabotage in Europe, with recruiters for the organisation looking to sign up “economically vulnerable Europeans to carry out violence on Nato soil”. (The FT (£) has the exclusive)

📣 Right-wing activists are turning their fire on Apple News, with apparent success in pushing more right-wing content on the news aggregation service. (Semafor)

⚽️ Another day, another twist in the Scottish Premiership: it was a thrilling afternoon, heartbreaking for some, as Celtic and then Rangers overcame deficits to win - away to Kilmarnock for the former amid wild scenes, and at a pulsating Ibrox later.

🏉 While The Early Line tends not to dwell on Saturday games for reasons of brevity, sometimes there needs to be an exception… here’s some analysis of that brilliant Scotland win over England at Murrayfield. (🎥 BBC)

🏂 Team GB is celebrating its “greatest day at a Winter Olympics” after winning two gold medals - in the mixed snowboard cross and mixed team skeleton. (Guardian)

⚽️ Biggest upset (in a largely upset-free FA Cup weekend) was Premiership strugglers Burnley losing to League One side Mansfield Town. (BBC report & highlights)

🗣️Anas Sarwar wants you to know just how hard his decision was last week to demand the Prime Minister’s resignation.

We know so after a weekend of him sharing that pain - first in a Valentine’s Day missive in the Daily Mail, and then an interview in the Sunday Mail the following day.

The final straw, he said in both pieces, was when his questioning of John Swinney on the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital scandal, at Holyrood, was drowned out by the Mandelson affair exploding in London.

“I realised it wasn’t credible to call out the lies and dishonesty of John Swinney and his party while having to face questions about the lies and dishonesty of Peter Mandelson,” he writes. “Having made that decision, I feel liberated. I did what I believe is right for the people of Scotland - and my party in Scotland.” (Daily Mail) (Sunday Mail)

🗣️The Alba party has been plunged into a financial crisis just as it would be looking to power up its Holyrood campaign - with police called in and an investigation underway.

The investigation is understood to involve claims of illegitimate expenses claims and invoices to companies which were claimed not to exist. (The Sunday Mail has the exclusive)

🗣️ It’s going to cost how much to rebuild the Palace of Westminster? The recently released “Delivering restoration and renewal of the Palace of Westminster: the costed proposals“ says it’ll take between 19 and 61 years, and cost between £11 billion and £39 billion. According to Nicholas Boys Smith, that’s between 27 and 93 times more expensive than it cost to build.

Little surprise, then, that it’s become fashionable to suggest it should be razed to the ground, while the real work takes place somewhere altogether more sleek and modern, in a somewhere that’s not London.

Chris Bayliss makes a cry to save the famous old building, saying the Renewal programme that has considered its future contains “all of Whitehall’s worst shortcomings brought together in a single, minstrous document”.

“These include an inability to consider trade-offs, an addiction to spurious consultation with ‘stakeholders,’ a vast surfeit of management matched by a deficit in direction, a constant churn in senior personnel leading to an absence of institutional memory, innumeracy, and a belief that to work to a budget or a deadline is to set oneself up for failure.” (The Critic)

🗣️“For many women, home is the most dangerous place she can be”, campaigners tell the Sunday Post. Almost 200 women have been killed by men in Scotland in the last 16 years, with as many as 14 likely to be killed this year, sexual violence is on the rise and one in five women faces domestic abuse in their lifetime. Why are things going backwards, it asks?

“Our government’s Equally Safe strategy has failed,” says campaigner Mary Howden. “Scotland should be committed to mandatory education in schools on healthy relationships, challenging misogyny, and preventing violence against women from an early age.” (Sunday Post)

🗣️ The Observer goes deep on how TeamGB “became the most successful nation in Olympic skeleton history, despite not having an ice track”.

“In the early 1990s,” writes Jessy Parker Humphreys, “Kristan Bromley was embarking on a PhD in Materials Engineering and designed a sled for the British skeleton team. At the time, the team was made up of soldiers and none of them wanted to risk riding the newfangled sled. Bromley, needing data for his studies, decided to have a go himself. By 1996, he was British champion in skeleton.

“Twelve years on, he was world champion and had garnered the nickname ‘Dr Ice’. It was through his designs, which changed global sledding forever.” (The Observer)

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