Talk of the Town: 'Perfect candidate' who missed the cut

Word reaches us of last-minute changes to the short leet for the city council's £160k a year chief executive job. One of eight finalists had already dropped out after the original list was leaked. And now a few-well placed councillors have demanded that another name be added.

They were less than impressed that Alastair Maclean, the council's top lawyer, hadn't made the cut. Was he too young (just the "wrong" side of 40)? Too smart (a former high flyer in private practice, he halved his salary to work for the city)? Or simply not one of the boys (he only joined the public sector last year)? And the first thing he did was streamline his legal affairs department...

All of which, some councillors realised, would seem to make him the perfect candidate.

Sandy gets that winning feeling . . all over again

MODEST to a fault is Evening News athletics correspondent Sandy Sutherland in telling friends after victory at the first extra hole of the Portobello golf club (C section) championship: "This is the first time I've won anything!" .

Not true. Highlander Sandy is known to have won the Scottish shot putt championship back in the 1960s while a trawl on the internet has revealed the following from the Ross-shire Journal of June 22, 2007 in an "all our yesterday's" feature: "Sandy Sutherland, Ardross, the heavyweight athlete, had a field day winning the 16lb hammer, shot putt and 56lb weight over the bar."

Annie speaks out

CHART-TOPPER Annie Lennox says today's celebrity-fixated culture has made her "a little sad".

The former Eurythmics singer and HIV awareness campaigner said that artists should not "necessarily" use their elevated status to champion worthy causes but pop stars who did not use their fame to promote good causes were missing an opportunity. Speaking ahead of her appearance at the Festival of Politics in Edinburgh, she said: "I don't believe in 'should', but I do feel for myself, that having come to a certain place in my life . . . this is very important to me."

Festival puts the heat on

YOU may not have noticed, but there is currently a little arts festival under way in the Capital.

Talk of the Town has become aware that journeys which usually take five minutes on foot are now taking considerably longer.

In fact, so bad have things become that one councillor has claimed that the Royal Mile is now positively "claustrophobic".

Tory Cameron Rose said it was time to pedestrianise more areas of the city during August to allow some of the crowds to fan out.