We were rather gobsmacked, readers, when we tuned into this morning’s BBC Radio Scotland phone-in at 9am. Ostensibly discussing the promotion of “Rangers” to the Premiership, presenter Louise White adopted the most astonishingly, openly partisan and aggressive approach we’ve ever heard from a host on the state broadcaster (which is no small feat), on the subject of whether the club was a new one or not.

Callers were harangued, interrupted and hustled on for daring to suggest the truth. It was a jaw-dropping display of disregard for not only impartiality but basic journalistic regard for the plain, uncontestable facts of the matter.

But don’t panic, football-haters. This post is about something else.

Because an alert reader, on seeing our tweets, forwarded us details about something remarkable that happened last week, at an LGBTI election hustings in Edinburgh.

During the debate, White was criticised onstage by Ruth Davidson for being too “interrogatory” towards Nicola Sturgeon. Davidson chastised the BBC journalist for not treating the panel of party leaders equally, after what one audience member called “hostile questioning” from White to Sturgeon:

“Sorry I’m going to do something probably quite bad and not very well thought of here, but I’m actually a little bit uncomfortable with the way this evening’s going, because we’re at an equality event and we all agreed to come here on the grounds that we’d all be treated equally.” “There’s five people on this panel and four of them have been given a platform to say what they want and one of them is being treated in an interrogatory way, and you either chair this in a way that we’re all being interrogated….”

At this point the Tory leader was interrupted by applause from the floor, rendering the rest of her comment inaudible. Our source sent us a recording of the incident:

(Stonewall Scotland LGBTI hustings, 31 March 2015) .

The presenter replied:

“If that is pointed at me, I want to make you aware that I am attempting to treat everyone in a fair and equitable manner. Nicola Sturgeon has been in power for nine years, I am trying to look back to get her to justify her actions, and I’m also asking the rest of the panel, including Nicola Sturgeon, to look forward to what they would do if you come to power.”

White is due to interview the First Minister on an episode of the phone-in show soon.

We commend Ruth Davidson for speaking up on behalf of a political opponent. But when even the Tories are having to intervene to stop the BBC being overly hostile to the SNP, readers might well feel that there’s something rotten in Pacific Quay.