Chris

Regardless of anything the Natz might say, BBC Scotland is already *extremely* accommodating to their demands. Plus, missus and I are acquainted with more than a couple of people who work at Pacific Quay, and I can tell you for a fact there are plenty of Yessers in positions of influence in there already.

This is less about strengthening BBC Scotland per se, than it is weakening its ties with the rest of the organisation, especially its top management and senior journalists in London. The stooshie over Nick Robinson came about because, up until that point, the BBC's coverage of the referendum had been supplied and managed almost entirely out of Pacific Quay, but as the day drew near, the likes of Bumbling Brian Taylor and the insipid Glenn Campbell (who allowed Salmond and the nats in his audience to walk all over him in the second TV debate with Alistair Darling) became sidelined in favour of strong, experienced, unflappable journos from outside the Holyrood bubble. In other words, people who didn't owe the Natz any favours, had no need to keep them sweet, and were free to tell it as it was.

It is difficult to understate just how much the nationalists hated having journalists on the story that they couldn't bully, influence or otherwise control. After they lost the vote, they even took to barring certain London-based newspapers from their press conferences.

The SNP is a nasty, spiteful, authoritarian hate-fest, and it thinks it can control BBC Scotland if BBC Scotland can be relieved of the inconvenient reporting lines that lead up to offices it can't control.