Eric Joyce has pleaded guilty to abusive behaviour and been fined £1,500 over last May’s incident at Edinburgh airport. He also has to pay the airport worker he abused a hundred quid over an incident sources close to Joyce described to Guido as:

“Left phone on plane, went to bloke at BA counter saying ‘any chance of getting my phone back before the plane turns around & goes back to London?’ Bloke said words to the effect of ‘No, I’m busy’. Eric said ‘But my phone’, bloke said ‘Stop going on or I’m calling the cops’. Eric said ‘please do’, cops arrived, Eric said ‘B******s to this, I’m off’, one cop said Ok, one cop said not so fast. No drink, no hitting, which is nice.”

He says he is undecided about whether he wants to stay on as an MP after 2015:

“My instinct is to stay but I don’t know how I will feel in a few days. I am very embarrassed that this has happened. My constituents have seen this before, so they might think other apologies are not meant, but they are.”

Guido looks forward to hearing all about it on Eric’s blog…