In a Zoom clip acquired by the right-wing blog, Guido Fawkes, Ian Murray makes the most outrageous, bitter and bizarre claims (in italics) in an effort undermine the Scottish Government at any cost to the reputation of his own home and people.
He says:
I’ll just give you some stats. Our care home deaths are double that of England because PPE is a shambles. We’re still not testing in care homes. We always slag of the UK Government for not hitting a 100 000 a day. If we were doing the equivalent in Scotland we should be doing 10 000. We’re doing four and half of them were in UK testing centres.
Well Scottish care home death rates are lower, even based on official statistics and perhaps far lower once the UK Government starts to collect data properly:
As for PPE supplies to care homes, that was a shambles in England but not in Scotland except where private care home owners were failing to order, were prevented by English Government directives to suppliers to prioritise English care homes or where, as revealed by the GMB, owners were locking supplies away from staff:
And on testing, he must know England’s data are a con trick. See:
We had a massive outbreak of covid-19 in Edinburgh on the 27th February. The Scottish Government didn’t think to tell anybody about it. They just covered it up and moved on.
At most, there were 25 cases including 8 Scots. The public health officers decided what to do:
All of these things in Scotland are actually in a lot of instances worse than what’s happening in England but Boris gets the blame and not Nicola Sturgeon.
There is objective evidence, in 9 instances:
- Higher recovery rate
- Lower excess mortality rate
- Mortality among BAME groups is lower
- Death rate in care homes is lower
- Mortality among key workers is lower:
- Assessment centres protected GP surgeries
- Better staffing
- Cleaner hospitals
- Better Government leadership
that Scotland performs better:
But the second big crux of all of that is that the UK media in terms of its knowledge of Scotland and Scottish politics is nothing short of absolutely deplorable. It would be like me doing to camera in the next tend minutes or writing a story about the opposition in Uganda. I wouldn’t even know where to start. But I’ll just go on and do it anyway. The opposition in Uganda’s fantastic because that’s what I read in my last newspaper article.
There is really no evidence at all for this claim other than a few prominent presenters recently noticing that Sturgeon does a better briefing than Johnson and seemingly this pisses Ian off. There is however, evidence that the UK media tends to be far less critical of the UK Government than the Scottish media is of the Scottish Government:
And, Uganda? Why pick Uganda, a militarised police force, weak opposition and power-hungry president, rather than a European democracy such as Denmark or Norway? The choice is revealing of the bitterness and contempt for his own people.
There’s a real education and I’ve been on to people like Robert Peston this week and the national BBC networks this week and to Kay Burley at Sky to say ‘Look if you’re gonna comment on something make sure you know what you’re talking about.’ I would under no circumstances ever comment on something to do with a local community in Walthamstow without knowing anything about it but that’s what the UK media are doing and it’s a real problem.
What have these people done to annoy Ian? They’ve noted Sturgeon’s more professional competent manner and that gets him badly. They have masses of researchers and Scottish correspondents, quite well informed, and commonly critique what happens here.
Once more, Walthamstow? First he compares Scotland to an autocratic dysfunctional state and then to a mere district in London. Bitterness and contempt are sadly all there is to this wee man.
Talking-up Scotland / Scottish media fact checking is like shooting fish in a barrel 
Why is Murray getting all hot and bothered?
Health in Scotland is not his remit,although funding is to an extent.
Could it be that his political career depends almost entirely on a No to Independence message (his constituency being historically unionist) but he sees that slipping away the more people see Sturgeon and Johnson and do the comparisons?
He is attacking the wrong administration (assuming he is really a Scottish Labour politician as claimed).
Westminster has demanded the right to make most decisions about what happens in Scotland so,rightly,they are responsible for most of that.
The problem for the Murrays of this world is,that in the small areas where Scotland has a say,we have been seen to be more effective.
That is their real problem.
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If a government BUILDS UP testing capacity and then it USES that capacity to the max BEFORE rolling out a track, test, isolate programme then the government does not have enough testing capacity.
Unless of course at the same time it STOPS testing some group/s within the population that had previously been receiving tests and by this means, free up testing capacity for the TTI programme. So which one/s to stop testing, why and exactly when?
By the very nature of a TTI programme, the number of tests required at any time will be a variable and difficult to predict exactly when and where the requirement will be.
Therefore the government needs to have available (just in time) testing capacity headroom to ramp up testing numbers if and when the tracking results indicate it is required. A key issue is how big does the spare capacity need to be.
Moreover the purpose of all testing is to require an ‘outcome’ which helps understand/surveil the pandemic at a population level, for drug testing, for diagnosis purposes and/or help contain Covid-19. One or 100,000 tests – that number is an input or activity metric: the decision making on how to allocate resources that decide such inputs should be judged not by the number of tests (the inputs) but by the beneficial OUTCOMES they are designed to, and actually, deliver – unless the desired outcome is some PR benefit!
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Me thinks this man is a reincarnation of
Lord Haw Haw
And as such I shall always refer to him by that name
If enough do so then it could stick and most definitely in his throat
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Lord Hee-Haw, more like.
Because that is all BLiS have to offer the electorate.
Murray is only an MP because BritNats have coalesced behind him as the best chance to elect a Unionist MP.
Nothing more, Nothing Lees.
A disgrace of a man, who screams into the void hoping we will listen and obey.
British Nationalist Labour Party in Scotland (Accounting Unit) have lost their Fiefdom and want it back.
Labour in Scotland do not fight the Tories, they assist them knowing the BBC have their back.
Hell Mend Them All.
Never Forget Independence make all those fuckers, Murray, Carlaw, Turdo, A C-H, Sarah Smith UNEMPLOYED.
That on it’s own is reason enough to vote YES.
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He’s a nonentity and should be treated with the contempt he deserves, labour is dead in Scotland and he knows it.The proud people of Scotland will rise above.🏴🏴🏴🏴🏴🏴🏴🏴
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Scotland’s daily deaths have been dropping continuously for 38 days.
England’s have been rising for last 3 days.
The picture people are painting of lack of social distancing in Edinburgh and tourists heading into the Highland could destroy all the good work that Scotland has been doing to get this under control (admittedly after a slow start).
The police and government need to stop this now.
This feels like losing the Indi vote all over again.
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I speculate. The Scottish Government – over the pace of easing lockdown – has, pragmatically, had to have been influenced by, among other things, the prevailing official attitudes, government plans on nature and pace of easing, and example being set by the public, all in England. All of which are covered endlessly on all sorts of news outlets and seen/heard/read about by people in Scotland.
We remain still in one nation-state after all and arguably it’s not feasible to sustain significantly different levels of lockdown across the board – either by nature or period of time – and still expect high levels of public compliance in the more severely restricted part of the nation-state. That is unless there is explicit support and reinforcement by all parts of central (some chance!) and devolved governments – and even then it may be hard to sustain.
It is possible to sustain difference on a certain number of big issues that involve fairly binary choices (e.g. keep closed or open) which are under the direct control of government. The selection of these – which ones are likely to be most impactful, most beneficial or the opposite – is a big call. Keeping schools closed until August in Scotland is one big call of this type that the SG has made.
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I agree.
There is one thing i don’t buy 100%. It has been said that the scot gov couldn’t close down earlier because they didn’t have the power but the thing is, i don’t remember hearing NS protesting about that at the time. It was a case of life and death (and would also have been a politicians gift) to have spoken out loudly. Maybe she did and it was never covered and i would be happy if someone can show she did. But right now i don’t believe that the scot gov wanted to close down more than a few days before England. We know for a fact that that idiot Jason Leitch was advocating going to mass gatherings as late as 16th March when he said on Good Morning Britain “I read the science. The science tells me that mass gatherings at this point in our trajectory are not a danger to our public health…We are balancing the care of the public with the care of individuals, … We believe that we’re following the science, we believe that we’re doing the right thing…. today, the guidelines are very clear….what [they’re] looking at is not to completely socially isolate…I don’t think there is chaos and confusion,… My wife went to the Stereophonics concert… I would have gone myself.”
When asked “You think it’s perfectly ok to go to mass gatherings?” he answered “I don’t know where your master of public health has come from.”
https://www.irishmirror.ie/tv/coronavirus-piers-morgan-rages-after-21699334
Then later on same day he is using his Masters Degree to prove he is right.
The scot gov chose this madman and Catherine Calderwood agreed with him.
The strange thing is that on this point the Scottish media thought he was perfectly right! It was interesting in trying to find the video clip to see the press at that time getting behind this very dangerous fool.
We know that Sage was wrong and so was the Scottish version.
This is from Devi Sridhar, Professor & Chair of Global Public Health, Edinburgh Uni Medical School.
I admire NS for is her ability to admit mistakes and she has said that mistakes will ‘undoubtedly have been made’ and i think this is one of the reasons she has such respect. The ability to admit mistakes means, i hope, that she will continue leading us through this crisis until Scotland is a safe as it can be. Without a hard border and without the finances this could be very difficult.
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I suspect the R no.is much lower in Scotland than England
I note the Case nos.in
Scotland are in steady and prolonged decline.
And such is not the case in England
If this continues for next 5-10 days
Then at the possibility of causing the utmost of a clash with Westminster
Then N.S.must control the border
She will have the DUTY to do so
As her responsibility is too the peoples of Scotland and NOT to the integrity of their
Precious Union
Life and health are of far more importance
Tis the English who are rolling the dice
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The SAGE minutes have been released and are summarised in this article in the Guardian.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/29/sage-minutes-reveal-how-uk-advisers-reacted-to-coronavirus-crisis
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If fact checking was standard in the media, this clown would be long gone.
Union Jock suit, an’ all !
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Thanks for your excellent article on Murray. As a Glaswegian, I can’t say I’m surprised and as a Socialist, I’ve got to wonder if there’s any chance for Labour in an independent Scotland, or if they’ll all just scuttle down south, where they’ll be a disgrace to what’s left of Labour in England?
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