Stuart Cosgrove: These are my suggestions for Scotland’s person of 2020

In the past, US presidents have featured prominently, so too have inventors, media moguls and even inanimate objects such as the personal computer in 1982. Although the cover is often seen as an honour, Time magazine has consistently reminded people that it can be a person whose malevolence has shaped history, Hitler (1938), Stalin (1939) and Ayatollah Khomeini (1979) have all featured on the annual covers.

For 2020, Time has gone with the conjoined profiles of president-elect Joe Biden and his vice-presidential running mate Kamala Harris. Irrespective of the posturing and legal manoeuvres of the defeated and discredited Donald Trump, Time sided with the electorate. Biden and Harris feature not merely as the winners of what was a bitterly divisive election, but because they represent a reaffirmation of democracy itself.

But what of home, how might the imaginary editors of Scotland arrive at a cover that fits our year? One obvious candidate would be the First Minster Nicola Sturgeon. Remember, the featured person need not be universally loved, but there can be no doubt that she has taken centre stage in the Year of Covid, hosting daily briefings, never ducking out for trivial reasons and fielding questions from the nation’s journalists, most relevant some risible. Day in day out Sturgeon has worn the most immaculate flak jackets, usually colour co-ordinated with the sign-language assistant behind her. She has been willing to shoulder blame, when care homes suffered pitiful infections and when recently published figures show that Scotland’s drug deaths are untenable.

You can dislike her, you can wonder what she really thinks of Alex Salmond, but you cannot question her work ethic, as they once said in Scotland before the year of Zoom calls, she puts in a shift. When it come to the First Minister, and her daily briefings, I suspect that familiarity has bred a low-level form of contempt, her popularity and efficacy ratings still soar way above other national leaders in the UK, but a bit of the gloss has been chipped off by her omnipotence. For all her graft – this is not Nicola’s year.

So might a year, unprecedented in worry and weariness, be reflected in the persona of the National Clinical Director Jason Leitch? He has been sent out to engage with the widest possible audience in uncertain times, as the pandemic brutalised lives and livelihoods. It is a job he had done exceptionally well, but one that has a built-in flaw, Leitch has been prevalent on media platforms that are both needy and intolerant. It seems the more he appears to finesse the message, the more he is criticised and unfairly expected to take responsibility for every twist of a virus that has challenged global science.

Leitch has appeared weekly on the BBC Scotland radio show Off the Ball where he is required to answer tricky and troublesome questions without fear or favour. On one show he was asked a brilliant question tied up in metaphor, would the Broons be able to visit their But ‘n’ Ben? Patiently, he picked his way through the family, including the bairn, the twins, Horace, Daphne, Hen and all, and argued that as a family bubble living in Dundee in a level 3 area, they had to be incredibly careful and on balance should delay their trip to the Highlands.

It was a masterful piece of improvisation only to be torn apart by his own father, listening at home, who reminded him that Grandpaw Broon lives in his own flat and was not normally resident at 10 Glebe Street, and so he was technically in breach of the current Covid guidelines unless there was an over-riding issue of care.

Very few public health servants would put themselves through these circumlocutions, but he did so masterfully.

The know-all army online has queued up to criticise Jason Leitch using remarks he made in February to accuse him of inconsistency in December. He has been required to be consistent with an inconsistent pandemic. Week after week on the radio he was required to disappoint some hopeful dad as he asked whether he should pay a deposit on his daughter’s wedding. He has been accused of being too keen on the sheen of the media and relishing the role too much. But his skin was thick.

National clinical director Jason Leitch

READ MORE: How Scots have learned in 2020 that independence feels good

One by one, every branch of business from hospitality to soft-play areas, and from karate clubs to vegan cafes, pointed to anomalies in the tiering system. I for one tired of the convoluted examples that shared by sceptics with next to no self-awareness. How is it that I’m not allowed to have a cup of tea with my mum in her house in Tillicoultry, but I can drink lapsang souchong outdoors in a café in Shawlands? Answer because there is a global pandemic that science is trying to cope with and your mum is perfectly happy with her new boyfriend, so shut it. Another strong candidate for the imaginary front cover is the Scotland goalkeeper David Marshall whose last-gasp penalty save against Serbia took Scotland to the finals of the delayed Euro 2020 tournament.

It was a huge moment for the Tartan Army, who had been prevented from travelling due to Covid restriction. The playing squad stepped in, enacting a series of memorable celebrations – the post-match Conga, Yes Sir I Can Boogie and No Scotland, No Party. It was a long-time coming, but at long last Scotland were back on the international stage.

In another year it might have been enough but in a year shaped by the pandemic, a goalie’s save however exhilarating, does not define the year.

I have considered several other outsiders including Lord George Foulkes, Ruth Davidson who became a Dame and the freelance archaeologist Neil Oliver. Their names came into my mind not for any special achievement but to send regular readers into paroxysms of rage. So if you are frothing at the mouth, wear a mask. Finally, and without doubt the characters best suited to occupy our imaginary front page were both largely unknown to me before the pandemic. One is Devi Lalita Sridhar, the American scientist and public health advisor, who holds the Chair of Global Public Health at the University of Edinburgh.

Her intelligent and grounded performances across the TV networks have made her a go-to person for a London news bubble prone to marginalising Scotland. The other is Linda C Bauld the Chair of Public Health at The Usher Institute, University of Edinburgh. These two women, both informed and passionate about public health, fulfilled a widespread yearning for clarity in a year often blurred by obfuscating quackery.

Over and above their own personal achievements, they represent a vital strand of the independence argument, that we are massively enriched by those that chose to make Scotland their home.

And so, an American woman with Indian parents and a one-time teenager from Vancouver Island are my choice to illustrate the Time Magazine Cover of Scotland.

Education, public health, and the enrichment of our national life in adversity are the enduring values of a year marred by cruel and indiscriminate devastation. A happy New Year to you all.