BBC Scotland today is delighting in an increase in drug deaths for 2023, after a big fall in 2022 and the opportunity once more to remind us:
It means Scotland continues to have a far higher rate of recorded drugs deaths than other European nations, including England and Wales.
Not mentioned, this in the Sunday Mail in February 2024:
Scotland is seeing an explosion of ‘county lines’ gangs forcing children and vulnerable adults to smuggle drugs to every corner of the country. The Scottish Mail on Sunday can reveal at least 55 gangs have been identified operating north of the Border – more than double the number in 2020. Gangs from parts of England have forced youngsters and vulnerable adults – aged from 14 to 77 – to smuggle packages of heroin, crack cocaine and other narcotics into Scotland on buses and trains.
Nor this:
County lines is a complex problem that involves social exclusion and lack of resources in social services and education. It is a network of exploitation that links international crime networks to some of the most vulnerable people in our communities. Our current approach has also led to record levels of drug-related deaths, while illegal drugs are stronger, cheaper and more widely available than ever before. https://transformdrugs.org/blog/county-lines
Will BBC Scotland ever tell us that Scotland has a far lower knife death rate than England and Wales?
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
DO THESE GANGS GET PAID BY ENGLISH ESTABLISHMENTSEEMS STRANGE HOW WESTMINSTER RULES HAVE CHANGED TO TARGET SCOTLANDMAKING OUR COUNTRY A DEPENDENT STATE
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is police scotland involved in turning a blind eye to allow the spread and thus force up the deaths and undermine the community. Might explain the BBC ‘s silence. So many of the senior officers now are now appointees of the union.
also supports their spinning out branch form. Garden tents and garden digging for what is essentially a review of receipts and invoices.
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Even today the BBC did not mention the fact that drugs are a reserved matter or that a significant part of the supply lines are outwith Scotland.
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O/T
Long comment apologies.
Sarwar’s (negligible amount of) crediblity is left in tatters as a former Labour First Minister, Henry McLeish, says they, Labour at Holyrood, have no control over anything they do in Holyrood.
As a former Labour First Minister he, McLeish, said that if Labour win power again at Holyrood, they will have no say over what the (Scottish) government does, and that what laws it passed would be decided by the UK Labour Prime Minister.
Henry McLeish, who was First Minister for just over a year , said this in an exclusive interview on BBC Radio 4.
“When I was First Minister, as was Donald Dewar and Jack McConnell, we all had weekly phone calls with the Prime Minister who would then tell us what we were to bring to Parliament and what the government was going to be doing over the year, then in the programme for government only 20% of the program was decided by the (then) Labour-Lib Dem Executive, the rest was all decided by Westminster. The SNP is the only party in Holyrood other than the Greens who are not accountable to WM which means whenever they make a decision or want to bring a bill to parliament, they don’t need to constantly look over their shoulder and ask permission from the Prime Minister before doing so.”
Asked on his thoughts on Anas Sarwar standing up to Keir Starmer, McLeish said:
“The reality is you can’t do this, if you’re a Labour First Minister and leader of the Labour Party in Scotland, you are 100% accountable to the Prime Minister or Leader of the Labour Party and they essentially dictate what you say at First Minister Questions in opposition too. I tried to change the Executive’s name as it was back then to the Scottish Government but the opposition I got from my party was very strong and it was vetoed by Tony Blair. Anas, if he does become First Minister, will be like what the Mayors are in England and the Labour Government in Wales, you’re accountable and what you do is dictated to you which isn’t a progressive form of politics”
So really McLeish has only confirmed that which we already knew in respect to the Labour party.
As this clearly exposes Anas Sarwar’s assertion that any supposed (pretend) intervention or opposition by him, Sarwar , against his UK party leader Keir Starmer , who is now also the UK Labour PM , would be as an act, totally futile.
One example (of many) as evidence of this as a fact is upon Sarwar’s supposed opposition to the two child cap. Which, as a Tory policy, has now been retained , as voted for , by a majority via UK Labour as the UK Labour government (including Keir Starmer).
Also not one of the Labour MP’s recently elected in Scotland (and too Ian Murray) voted against their UK party on abolishing this two child cap but instead they all voted with the party to retain it.
So proving that Sarwar has absolutely no influence upon either his UK leader Keir Starmer, or UK Labour as a party or the recent influx of Labour MP’s elected in Scotland in the recent UK GE.
This then lends credibility to what Henry McLeish has stated , as to who within the Labour party it is that holds all powers , makes all decisions as in it is Labour HQ via their PM or as the Labour party leader.
It also exposes who it is in Labour that does what he or she is telt . However purely for the optics they as FM’s may , like Anas Sarwar, pretend that the opposite is the case.
Unfortunately the BBC here in Scotland play along with Sarwar in them also promoting the lie that he, Sarwar has ,within the UK Labour party, a lot of power and influence.
So the BBC here , as a media, are knowingly putting themselves in a situation of self imposed denial of the political fact that it is UK Labour and their UK PM (and also the UK Tory & Lib Dems parties too) who call the shots and not their leaders in devolved governments playing at being FM’s.
Meanwhile some of those voters within Scotland will, it appears, always be oblivious to truth as far as the Labour party are concerned. Some of them through choice and some through their reliance on believing everything they read in the papers or hear on the news on TV. (Also in part by believing Labour and their crude slogans and (now broken ) pledges and promises pre and post 2014 to also include their 2024 GE campaign).
Which then totally suits the Labour party and the media here , especially the BBC , both in and outwith Scotland.
So when these same voters cast their votes many of them do so while knowing only a fraction of information relating to Labour , such as the above information from Henry McLeish, who was a former Labour FM.
While also as voters in Scotland they hold, it seems, an abundance of misinformation on both Labour as a party where they wrongly assume that a Labour FM is his own man (and also they make the same wrong assumption when electing a Labour MP in Scotland|) .
However that is also thanks to the BBC here (and other media here also) whose main role as a media seems to see them trying to obscure any negativity connected to the Labour party while simultaneously recklessly smearing and promoting any and most of the political negativity towards the SNP , both as a party and as the Scottish government.
Hence why Labour got more MP’s in Scotland in the recent GE and Sarwar , and UK Labour, hopes this will be repeated in 2026 in the Scottish parliament election. If the BBC here keep doing that which they are renowned for. Which is promoting propaganda.
Those of us on here (and elsewhere too) wonder when the truth will finally hit home for all voters in Scotland because only then will we see more of those voters break the (bad) habit of casting a vote for parties like Labour (and also other parties who have a UK party connection) who, as UK political parties, all work AGAINST Scotland and it’s interests.
That is because their main and only focus is directed at working FOR the UK and it’s interests. (same goes for the media who often , as a UK media, confuse the UK as being synonymous with England as do some UK politicians too)
The above statement by me is not a claim by me but , it is based on recent and past evidence so it, like Henry MacLeish’s statement, is also a fact.
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“Scotland’s drug deaths still worst in Europe after 12% rise” by Jonathan Geddes BBC Scotland News, and James Cook, Scotland Editor, the pivot being ” But the latest figures remain far higher than the 244 deaths in 1996 when comparable records began ” – Now just ponder that ” when comparable records began ” left hanging without reference, the art of the grifter, privy to Spanish ambassadorial emails since 2014…..
Yes, Scotland has a drug problem, County Lines and BBC Scotland, both do your head in, you can’t shake off either, yet the latter appears to be protecting the former from exposure….
PS – There are absolutely NO comparable records since 1996 for England to Scotland in 2024 – ” Scotland continues to have a far higher rate of recorded drugs deaths than other European nations, including other parts of the UK ” because of completely different recording procedures – Ask Nick Robinson for an explanation, he has form on ‘different recording procedures’….
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“when comparable records began”
Same “comparable records” that BBC Scotland have access to now in order for them to compare public service performances between Scotland, England, Wales & NI in the UK but they, the BBC as a UK media, choose not to.
Instead they, the BBC here, allow anyone to comment about what they refer to as the supposed ‘poor record of the Scottish Government (SNP) on the NHS, Education etc’ while obscuring (ignoring) the public service performances of England, Wales & NI via their respective NHS, Education etc.
Just as they, the BBC here, fail to factor in English County Line Drug gangs as a significant part of the problems that Scotland and our government encounter in their fight to reduce drug deaths then they, the BBC here, also fail to factor in Brexit and staffing issues that has impacted our NHS, Social Care and other occupations within much of the public sector.
The BBC here ignore English County line Drug gangs coming up to Scotland mainly because it then clearly demonstrates something that is not directly the fault of the Scottish government (SNP) but it is instead a major obstacle that our government is confronted with in their fight against drugs.
Mainly because we, Scotland, are still a part of the UK so we then have no real border security to monitor who is travelling between our two countries, Scotland and England.
So open borders on occasion do have their downsides and we all know how important it is for some political parties in England that their English borders are protected and limited in access for certain nationalities.
Open borders are also a hige problem when there is global crisis like a Pandemic e.g. the recent Covid pandemic.
As to the BBC here ignoring Brexit that is predominantly because it , as a UK policy, was instigated and implemented by a UK party (Tories) and also the current UK government (Labour) intends to continue with it as a policy for the whole UK. (against Scotland’s wishes who voted in 2016 to remain in the EU)
Pity the BBC here in Scotland were not also as relentless and focused on the damage Brexit has done to Scotland as they are upon their rabid obsession with Drugs in Scotland (minus the inclusion of County Line Drug gangs from England in their various reports/articles).
Mind you other media in the UK (press, Radio & TV news channels) will also give ‘Drug deaths in Scotland are the highest in Europe” a huge amount of attention with the blame being laid solely at the feet of the SNP (no external factors or mitigating circumstances highlighted for the SNP as that treatment is always only reserved for UK political parties).
This is like never ending repetitive nightmare where we will only break free and see it stop once we are free of both UK parties and UK media (perhaps Ed Milliband had a point that borders should be militarised between us and England so as to stop criminals from England, like County Line drug gangs, coming into Scotland.
Only half joking on that BTW.
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if someone dies of a heart attack but drug abuse was an underlying factor – how is that recorded – a drug death or heart attack? I seem to remember a while back being told Scotland would record it as a drug death and rUK as a heart attack- anyone know if this is true?
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It would be listed as a potential contributory factor after cause of death – That’s what I was driving at over the misleading ‘comparable records’ – The Scottish way of recording death is NOT the same and was not the same during the pandemic.
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