With Newsnight presenter Kirsty Wark clearly already in their camp, Professor Linda Bauld and Doctor Phillipa Whitford MP, were scathing in their assessment of Boris Johnson’s promised ‘World-class’ testing system for covid-19. Professor Pennington was not invited to comment.
Critically, as Bauld points out, to be successful as in Germany, the system needs to be localised, using systems and expertise already in place. The Scottish system will do just that.
In contrast, Johnson plans a centralised system based on contracting the work out to Serco and a mobile phone ‘app.’
Whitford then points out that Johnson should have put the money into strengthening the public health system in England and stresses that the testing should have been in place before ‘he sent people back to work.’
She finishes ominously with:
We have no idea what’s happening in London with people on tubes and buses going to work for the last eleven days
Pressed by Wark she admits regret but attributes Scotland’s abandonment of testing and tracing in the early stages as a consequence of the ‘4 Nations’ approach. Presumably it will have been the last?
It’s worth watching:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000jbcj/newsnight-21052020
Footnote: Several Reporting Scotland staffers have reportedly been horrified by what seems to them to be a clear case of BBC Bias….against England!
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
Amazing!!!
There IS a God.
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Richard North has a good idea, he thinks,of what is happening in London and elsewhere and why.
http://eureferendum.com/
“The problem is the way the test results are collated, in separate databases, processed by completely different systems. As collected, they cannot be broken down to local level and therefore cannot be usefully shared with councils. Thus, local officials complain that there are an enormous number of people being tested “but we don’t know who they are, where they work, we don’t know what their results are”.
With a government so firmly committed to its top-down approach, changing the system to make it more accessible would first require a commitment to localism which simply is not part of its DNA. And without the political will, fundamental changes are not going to be made. Yet, on the other hand, without that localism, the government’s control measures are not going to work…..
….Should a new winter Covoid-19 peak coincide with the end of the transition period, with no agreement reached, the combined effects could substantially intensify the recession and delay our recovery from it. And then there is the collateral damage, as the death toll from untreated cancers and other life-threatening ailments come to be reckoned.”
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I watched the clip usual coming from Wark just like Smith try getting a dig into Scotland and SNP.
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This strategy is straight out of the Johnson play book.
No attention to detail,quick fix solution,get it done,it will be someone else’s fault when it goes pear shaped.
Also,the Scottish system looks like too much hard work for Johnson.
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The key point being made by all three interviewees is the use of local expertise, especially since that is the way the public health has operated. The default mindset of the Conservatives and their advisers is that public service is, by definition, bad and that only private companies can carry things out effectively. They are not really interested in public service, but in profit.
PS. I am intrigued by your footnote. Is it a bit of a jibe against Reporting Scotland because of their history of bias or, do you actually have some evidence of what you are alleging?
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