They call it the Bedside Guardian for a reason. Every year we produce a collection, drawing together our best writing and the big stories of the past 12 months, just in time for Christmas. Its ideal perch is not on your bookshelf, but your nightstand table. Not because it will send you to sleep. But so you can dip in and out of it in the evening – flipping between your favourite writers and the coverage of some huge event; rereading at leisure the pieces you enjoyed in haste or enjoying the articles you missed first time around in sections you maybe never read. Cherry-picking from the cherries that have already been picked.

In 2005, Strathclyde police set up a violence reduction unit (VRU) in an effort to address a problem that had made Glasgow, in particular, notorious. Later that year, a United Nations report illustrated why that strategy was so urgent.