For the first time since the pandemic, the Scottish Politician Awards took place in person in Edinburgh.
The event saw individuals from across the political spectrum gather at the Prestonfield House Hotel on Thursday.
The evening's host, broadcaster and columnist Brian Taylor, led the presentation of the prestigious awards.
Ahead of the award ceremony, comedian Matt Forde took to the stage to warm up the crowd.
Not a single political party was spared in his roast, but the crowd was laughing along.
Taking to Twitter, Mr Forde described the event as a "joy of a gig".
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar had been named the Scottish Politician of the Year and also scooped the Donald Dewar Debater of the Year prize.
It has been more than a decade since a politician from his party took home the main award of the evening.
READ MORE: Anas Sarwar named Herald Scottish Politician of the Year
Collecting the award, which was given in recognition of his work to transform Scottish Labour, Mr Sarwar said he “really wasn’t expecting that”.
But he said: “I love this job, I love the Labour Party, and I love Scotland, and it is a huge honour to do this.”
A rare lifetime achievement award was presented to former lord advocate Lady Elish Angiolini, honouring her public service.
Lady Angiolini was the first woman to be named as lord advocate when she took on the role in 2006, and said the award was a "profound honour".
The Public Campaign of the Year award was presented to Back Off Scotland and Green MSP Gillian Mackay for their efforts to establish buffer zones at abortion clinics.
Back Off Scotland has worked to publicise the impact protests outside facilities can have on both patients and staff, while Ms Mackay is bringing a member’s Bill to Holyrood in a bid to prevent demonstrations from taking place near clinics.
The SNP’s Neil Gray collected the One to Watch award after joining the Scottish Government in January this year.
The MSP has helped lead Government efforts to support Ukrainian refugees in Scotland.
Fellow SNP politician Stewart McDonald was named the Best Scot at Westminster for his work as the party’s defence spokesman.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel