TODAY’S WEATHER

☀️ Another glorious day, especially for Glasgow which is, again, Scotland’s warmest city. Edinburgh and Aberdeen will still be pleasantly mild, while if you’re in London it’ll continue to feel like summer. (Here’s the UK forecast).

THE BIG STORIES
Holyrood backs assisted death | Trump basks in Saudi reception | Huge health benefits of weight loss drugs

📣 The Scottish Parliament voted to support the principle of assisted death, in an historic vote which saw a larger-than-expected 70-56 margin of victory for Lib Dem MSP Liam McArthur’s proposals. (BBC) (Mail) (Scotsman)

• It was an emotional but measured debate: today’s Early Line looks at that debate in more detail below. ⬇️

• In the end, the decision by First Minister John Swinney, and his predecessors Nicola Sturgeon and Humza Yousaf, to vote against the bill did not sway a large number of their colleagues in the free vote. Labour’s Anas Sarwar also voted against, but Lib Dems, Greens and some Conservatives - including leader Russell Findlay - voted to support the bill. (The Herald has a list of how every MSP voted).

• The Assisted Dying for Terminal Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill now passes to a committee stage, which is expected to make significant changes, including moving the age of consent for its measures from 16 to 18. The BBC looks ahead to that process. (See the full bill as it stands now)

📣 Donald Trump basked in the Saudi Arabian glitz yesterday as he announced the end of sanctions on Syria, and sealed $300 billion in deals with the kingdom, eying the same amount again over the next four years. (WSJ - free to read)

• The US President got the sort of royal treatment he’d like to get at home (Independent)

• Meanwhile, the grift - sorry, “gift” - of a £400 million jumbo jet from Qatar to Donald Trump really is an extraordinary moment. As Republican senator Rick Scott puts it: “I worry about the president of the United States flying on any plane owned by a foreign government, especially a foreign government that supports Hamas and has a working relationship with communist China.” (Semafor)

• Canada’s public broadcaster doesn’t hold back on Trump: “The 'New Deal' of grift: Trump sets standard for presidential self-enrichment”, they say. (CBC)

📣 Weight loss drugs could usher in a “golden age” of medicine, according to new research, bringing benefits even to those who do not need to lose weight.

The drugs - “GLP-1 agonists” such as Ozempic - appear to target the underlying biology of chronic illnesses, delaying 42 diseases associated with ageing and offering near immediate, and substantial, reductions in the risk of heart attacks.

Now the pressure is on for the NHS to prescribe them more widely. (The Times £) (Guardian)

IDEAS
Holyrood rises to the occasion of a life-and-death debate

🗣️The debate on assisted dying was passionate, inside and outside the chamber at Holyrood. But everyone watching agreed: for once, the Scottish Parliament distinguished itself with a measured and respectful debate on this most solemn of subjects.

The quality has been widely noted this morning. Magnus Linklater writes in The Times (£): “It is not every day there is a debate in the Scottish parliament which is hard to stop watching.

“Just as you think you have heard every argument for or against assisted dying, someone cites a case that brings tears to the eye, stops mid-speech in an effort to control their emotions, or comes up with an eloquent quotation you feel the need to note down. I guess that’s what talking about life and death does to you.”

The debate was, notes Linklater, filled with emotion: personal tales from MSPs who have been touched by questions of life and death in their own lives. He quotes Edward Mountain, Conservative member for the Highlands and Islands, who said he was speaking “with sadness, because it’s all about the ending of life” rather than prolonging it, and who realised that “death was inevitably coming closer”.

In The Herald, Hannah Brown similarly hailed the quality of debate. “Over several years, I have watched numerous Holyrood debates, many of which have allowed politicians to flaunt their oratory abilities or indulge themselves in political squabbling,” she writes. “Tuesday has not been a day for that.”

Both she and Linklater made particular mention of the contribution of Paisley MSP George Adam, who spoke in favour of the bill. “Nothing quite prepared us for the intervention,” writes Linklater. “Caring for his disabled wife had made him ‘an emotional mess’. She had multiple health problems, but he hoped she would continue for a long time. In the end, however, both of them wanted a dignified end of their own choice.

“‘Will I be strong enough to let her go?’ he asked. ‘I don’t know. She’s every song I ever sang.’”

Watching reporters also all noted the contribution of Labour MSP Pam Duncan-Glancy, the first permanent wheelchair user elected to the Scottish Parliament, who had - before the debate - joined campaigners opposed to the Bill protesting outside parliament. She also urged MSPs to vote it down.

John Paul Breslin, writing in the Mail, describes Duncan Glancy as “fighting back tears as she urged colleagues: “Rather than legislating to assist to die, let us resolve to legislate to assist people to live.”

Linklater notes how she “spoke of the intolerable stress some disabled people were subjected to — ‘broken, ill, crying, worn out fighting the system’. By making assisted dying legal, there would be ‘systemic coercion’ on those least able to resist it. ‘It can make us feel we would be better off dead.’

“There was silence after that, though not for long. ‘This,’ said one speaker, ‘has been the most powerful debate this parliament has joined for a long time.’ He was not wrong.”

AROUND SCOTLAND

📣 Sandie Peggie, the nurse who took legal action against NHS Fife after she had to share a changing room with a transgender doctor, says she wants the health board to “immediately” stop giving men who identify as women access to female-only single-sex spaces. (Scotsman)

📣 It took an intervention from John Swinney - and a deal - to stop disgraced former health secretary Michael Matheson from running in next year’s Scottish elections. (The Herald has the exclusive)

📣 Edinburgh’s electric bike hire scheme could, at least in trial form, be running by this summer’s festivals in August. (Scotsman)

AROUND THE UK

📣 Some vast Government buildings in London are to close as 12,000 civil services jobs in the city are lost, with some roles closing entirely while others are moved elsewhere in the UK. (Guardian)

• Thousands of those jobs could move to Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen. (Scotsman)

📣 A man jailed for 38 years for murder had his conviction quashed after new DNA evidence emerged. In a statement read by his solicitor, Peter Sullivan said he was "not angry, I'm not bitter […] What happened to me was very wrong but does not detract that what happened was a heinous and most terrible loss of life.” (BBC)

📣 Keir Starmer has “doubled down” on his rhetoric around immigration, despite a growing rebellion from within his own party, praise from Viktor Orban’s government in Turkey, and wider comparisons of his “nation of strangers” speech on Monday to Enoch Powell’s “rivers of blood”. (Independent)

AROUND THE WORLD

🌎 Volodymyr Zelenskyy has told the Guardian he hopes frantic diplomacy and high-stakes gambits between Russia and Ukraine will end with Donald Trump understanding that Vladimir Putin is the real obstacle to a peace deal. “Trump needs to believe that Putin actually lies,” he said. (Guardian)

🌎 “Unexplained communication equipment” has been found in Chinese-made renewable energy infrastructure, sparking an investigation by US energy officials and heightened concerns about using Chinese equipment in vital systems. (Reuters)

SPORT

⚽️ Derek McInnes is edging closer to taking the hot seat at Tynecastle, with a deal likely to be done today. (Scotsman)

⚽️ David Ancelotti remains the front-runner to become the next Rangers manager, but other names are still “in the mix”. (BBC) (Sun)

⚽️ The season isn’t actually over, of course… all 12 Premiership teams are in action tonight, with some important questions still to be settled. (BBC)