Saturday, July 31, 2010

Summer quiz no. 1 : Find the MSP!

I may not be around much to blog in the coming days and weeks, so it occurred to me that I could keep things ticking over by writing a few posts in advance and pre-scheduling them to appear at regular intervals. One obvious snag, though - it's impossible to know what's going to be topical a couple of days ahead of time, let alone a couple of weeks. So instead I thought I'd try something completely different - quizzes! Mind you, there's a snag with this as well - if the first one goes down like a lead balloon, it'll be too late because I've already pre-scheduled a whole batch of them. In that eventuality, never fear - there will be an end in sight at some point!

The idea is very straightforward. Answer all of the following simple clues, and write down the first letter of each answer. (If the answer to a particular clue is a person's name, you're looking for the first letter of their first name, not of their surname.) Then, rearrange those letters until you have the name of a sitting member of the Scottish Parliament. The first person to name the correct MSP will win the fabulous prize of...well, nothing, really, but don't let that put you off - the world is materialistic enough as it is.

Here are the clues -

1. The name of a political party that was once a 'Representation Committee'.

2. A Welsh political leader in whom the BBC spotted some distinct alien potential.

3. A central African country that the son of a former British Prime Minister had designs on.

4. The adjective Neil Kinnock used to describe the nature of the chaos caused by Labour-run Liverpool city council hiring taxis to deliver redundancy notices to its own workers.

5. The constituency of an MP who, as a Murphy, finds that it breaks his heart to feel compelled to tell us so regularly what a rubbish country Ireland is.

6. The wife of the man who was the youngest Cabinet minister in John Major's government.

7. The scene of a famous 'Liberal revival' in 1962.

8. A TV celebrity talent show, which both the current Business Secretary and his immediate predecessor have expressed an interest in appearing on.

9. The government department which the Chancellor Norman Lamont refused to be demoted to in 1993, preferring instead to return to the backbenches.

10. The Scottish location for the 2005 G8 summit, which was the focus of the Live 8 concerts.

11. A political party in the UK that was in government for 51 consecutive years during the 20th Century.

12. The opponent of a newt-lover in a forthcoming internal party selection.

13. A former England football manager who once practiced headers with Tony Blair for the cameras.

I'll reveal the answer when it's time for the second quiz!

1 comment:

  1. OK... I got it... but I don't want to post it... otherwise I'll spoil it for everyone else.

    But I was first (with a little help from my friends).

    Bonnes Vacances!

    ReplyDelete