Gloved welcome

When Queen Elizabeth met with Martin McGuinness recently it was noticeable that the Queen kept her gloves on when shaking hands.

Yet on a visit to Scotland the Queen granted Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond a private conversation at the Palace of Holyrood House where she is having a week long stay to mark the Diamond Jubilee. Photographs of the occasion showed her shaking her hand without her gloves on. Alex Salmond is campaigning for an independent Scotland yet was shown more courtesy than McGuinness. I was always told that it’s rude to shake a person’s hand with gloves on.

Gordon Cunningham