There is a danger that some folk watching Reporting Scotland and STV might believe the big balloon when he says:
‘Their lackadaisical government, the highest taxes anywhere in the UK, declining educational standards and inadequate healthcare!’
Both leave his astonishing rant unchallenged. No surprise there. If you know anything at all, it’s a statement of unparalleled inaccuracy. It’s all wrong. It’s stunningly galling for him to think he can say it. He has no evidence. Here is just some:
Lackadaisical government:
Three times more trust Scottish Government over UK Government to act in Scotland’s best interests. Public trust in the Scottish Government to act in the best interests of the country remains significantly higher than in the UK Government, according to the latest Scottish Social Attitudes Survey (SSA). People were nearly five times more likely to say the Scottish Government should have most influence over how the country is run than the UK Government.
https://www.gov.scot/news/public-trust-in-scottish-government/
Highest taxes in the UK:
Roughly speaking, people in Scotland pay less income tax than the rest of the UK on earnings below £27,000 a year, and more income tax on earnings above that. The differences are relatively marginal though.
https://fullfact.org/economy/scotland-doesnt-have-highest-taxes-europe/
All of those benefit from free prescriptions, free student tuition, free care for the elderly and bus passes for the over 60s.
Declining educational standards
Only 66.9% of GCSE entrants in England got 1 or more GCSE awards compared to the 86.1% in Scotland achieving 1 or more SCQF Level 5 awards.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-45282518
‘In England, the proportion of children reaching a good level of development at age five has increased, but the attainment gap has remained fairly constant at 20 percentage points. This gap widens through secondary school, to around 28 percentage points by age 16 and 25 percentage points at age 19.
In Scotland, children aged five living in the most deprived areas were 16 percentage points less likely to reach the expected standard in reading, and 14 percentage points less likely in numeracy than those living in the least deprived areas.
https://www.jrf.org.uk/report/uk-poverty-2017
‘94.4% of pupils had a ’positive destination’ including work, training or further study within three months of leaving school last year, official statistics show. The figures also reveal that the gap between those from the most and least deprived communities achieving a positive destination has halved since 2009/10, with an increase in positive destinations for school leavers, from both backgrounds.’
https://news.gov.scot/news/record-high-for-school-leavers-in-positive-destinations
Inadequate healthcare:
There are just too many to report in full here so click on the links if you need more on these 2019 reports:
NHS Scotland hovers around near perfect efficiency as cancelled operations hold at only 2%
NHS Scotland: Despite increased demand more chronic patients seen within target time
I can’t understand why we don’t get that level of rebuttal from the SNP.
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How do you know they don’t rebut it? Would the MSM report it when they did? The SG does put out information/statistics etc on the Scottish Gov web site. These releases include info for the MSM but it rarely sees the light of the inside pages of the newspapers let alone the front page.
We each of us have to be the rebuttal unit for the SG. We have to arm ourselves with this sort of information and use it whenever anyone says that education, health care etc are all failing under the SG. We have access to the newspapers – letters pages and online comment sections – that we can use to get the info out there. Far more people read the comments than actually comment so you can reach a wide audience and in doing so open people’s eyes to the shortcomings of the MSM.
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They’re being mature.
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A real eye-opener for how poorer Scotland surpasses far richer England with careful housekeeping practices.
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Hi Legerwood – I strongly suspect you are correct. I suspect a fair old bit of Scottish Govt information services’ time and effort is put into informing the media and seeing much of their efforts ignored. Similarly, the SNP as a Party will be doing huge amounts of corrective info provision and advance briefings. Guess what – most of it is entirely ignored (or twisted to even more bizarre postulations from the -britnat supporting – meeja). There’s a surprise. I suppose we simply have to accept that all this tomfoolery is part and parcel of the long (and successful) march to an Indy Scotland.
Tiny bit of good encouraging statistical info I noticed on Scottish Construction site from 18/10. Latest figures confirm 16% rise year-on-year for total Scottish housing starts – with a 10% year-on-year rise for Social Housing starts. Link and snippet below: SNP Scottish Govt doing the Day Job – meanwhile The Col grabs herself a second (massively rewarded) day job with a lobbying outfit.
https://www.scottishconstructionnow.com/article/social-housing-tender-prices-largely-unchanged-for-last-three-quarters
Published 18 October 2019
A total of 22,764 dwellings were started in the year to the 1st quarter of 2019 (the latest figures available), of which 6,719 (30%) were for the social sector. The total is up 16%, on the previous 12 months, while social sector starts are up 10%.
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More LIES from this Tory government why am I not surprised ,
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i no longer believe any of the tory media news,i trust the scottish government and the well informed people in scotland to correct the lies from a corrupt westminster and biased media.freedom.
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