Five things you need to know today

The first of the televised Election 2011 Leaders’ debates took place last night in Glasgow and was  broadcast on STV as well as being streamed live over the internet.  The Greens leader, Patrick Harvie, has complained bitterly about being excluded from the debates, but took part in the mass tweeting which was happening in the background.  The list of candidates for seats in Edinburgh and the Lothians is here.

BAA should still be required to sell Stansted Airport and Edinburgh or Glasgow Airport, the Competition Commission (CC) has provisionally concluded today.

The CC has been considering whether there have been any material changes in circumstances since it published its final report on BAA in March 2009, that would give it cause to reconsider the implementation of the airport sales required by that original decision.

The decision was subject to a legal challenge by BAA, which eventually culminated with the Court of Appeal reinstating the CC’s findings in October 2010. In February, the Supreme Court refused BAA permission to appeal further.

The CC has provisionally concluded that the sale of the airports is fully justified and that passengers and airlines would still benefit from greater competition with the airports under separate ownership.

An Edinburgh woman has been found dead in her sheltered flat after apparently lying undiscovered for about two weeks. BBC has a report on this story. The woman lived at a flat in Gillespie Crescent, part of a development run by Viewpoint Housing, a charitable organisation which describes itself as “an award-winning provider of supported housing and care services for older people in Edinburgh, the Lothian’s and Fife.”

STV reported that 9 paintings have gone missing from the National Portrait Gallery, or more correctly the stock for the gallery which is in storage pending its renovation, due to be completed in November.

And tonight you could Swish for Success…….Don’t know what we are talking about? You get along to the event with something to swop (clothes, jewellery or an accessory) and then…..swop. It is recycling with a difference. Any other swishers out there?