By Professor John Robertson OBA
In the Guardian today:
Budget cuts mean farmers in England ‘must do more with less’
UK [sic] ‘among most nature-depleted countries in the world’ warns environment secretary’.
Farmers and conservationists will have to “learn to do more with less” ahead of expected deep budget cuts to the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), the environment secretary has said.
Steve Reed said that Labour would continue to prioritise the restoration of the nature in England, but acknowledged that the chancellor’s budget would be “difficult”.
Typically conflating the UK and England, the claim, for Scotland, is wrong.
Almost exactly one year ago BBC Scotland tried the same trick to keep their viewers down:
Research from the RSPB and other nature organisations say we’re now one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world.
This is a lie.
The report does say on page 3:
The UK is now one of the most nature-depleted countries on Earth.
Nowhere is Scotland given that title and with good reason when you dig deeper. On the basis of a 30 minute look at a 200 plus page report:
While there are clear and disturbing reductions especially in seabirds and harbour seals (page 5), but also in plant and other species, the rest of the story is a bit different.
First invertebrate species down 13% across the UK (4)
Invertebrates in Scotland (133):
That’d be ‘up?’
Protected areas
England 11%, Wales 10%, Scotland 18%.
Condition of protected areas (65)
Forestry – areas of certified woodland
England 315 000 ha; Scotland 895 000 ha (53)
Source:
chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://stateofnature.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/TP25999-State-of-Nature-main-report_2023_FULL-DOC-v12.pdf
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Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
It is now so so very obvious as to what they all , as a combined UK media, are trying to do.
The real conundrum is why more people in Scotland cannot see it , as that is indeed a mystery, though perhaps they too , as people within Scotland , are being as deceitful as the media that they choose to read and also in some cases believe.
I think self deception is strong with some in Scotland who are seemingly only too willing to ignore the truth while simultanously they are also only too willing to believe all of the deception that they hear and read about Scotland via the UK media.(and UK politicians too).
That is why Labour managed to get 37 MP’s elected in the GE.
Some in Scotland agreed with the UK media that the SNP were indeed #BAD while other parties were apparently far #BETTER.
Also when England alone let’s down their UK it then becomes #UKBAD
However if promoted as being only within Scotland then never is it then promoted as being #UKBAD but instead it is always to be seen and promoted as #ScotlandBad .
That is the unspoken but decidedly very much UK rule for Scotland as part of their UK. (but where England can never be promoted as #BAD by the media or politicians but the burden and shame of a very much #ENGLANDBAD is then , by the media, spread across the UK to then become #UKBAD).
Simples (or rather not so simple is it – for Scotland that is).
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Lots of new folk in Scotland have no clue whatsoever as to how devolution came about, why it came about, what it means, what the Scottish government (administration) can and can’t do, what they are doing, what they have done, and the terrible terrible legacy of English rule over centuries and in particular since Scottish oil was ‘dicovered’.
Subjugation, and assimilation of the people of Scotland into the idea of the ‘united kingdom’ (it was never the united queendom lol) being the only and viable arena by which your country (Scotland) had and has any chance of functioning at all, nevermind being a forward looking, independent, soveriegn country where you choose who governs, not the country next door.
Scotland will be destroyed, and subjugated, again. Destroyed societally, economically, and environmentally should any English HQ’d party (Labour or Tories or Libdems or all of them) take control of Holyrood in 2026. It just does not bear thinking about quite frankly.
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Scotland less depleted ? Give the UK/England time … they are doing their best to drag us down to their level !
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Also talking of “Labour” and the “BBC” today MSM tweeted this:
“The Radio Scotland phone-in was struggling to find folk who were optimistic about tomorrow’s budget so they invited a Labour activist on. When the activist blamed the SNP for eroding trust, Kaye Adams didn’t just let it go unchallenged, she defended Starmer for taking freebies”
He , MSM Monitor, also included a recording of that interview on the BBC Scotland Radio programme called “CALLKAYE” to prove his point.
She Kaye Adams stated “just to clarify that little point , as we have to do , all of Keir Starmer’s donations , all of his donations, were declared and some of them were paid back that was more than £6000 of gifts and Hospitality, Taylor Swift tickets, tickets to the races and a clothing rental agreement. But they were all declared. Just have to keep these things straight”.
Meanwhile the same clarifications and BBC adherence to “keeping things straight” are never confirmed or done when it is the SNP, as she, Kaye Adams, allowed the Labour activist to make certain accusations/observations without her, Adams, intercepting with facts that dispute what was being said by the Labour activist !
The Labour activist stated that she would “keep the faith on what Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves said they would deliver in the next couple of years” and also she said “But I don’t think it’s a surprise that so many people are struggling to get onboard with that message because I think that is a product of the SNP and the Tories over the last nearly 20 years. Absolutely eroding people’s trust in politicians and in Politics”.
I see , so then Labour basically telling us all before the GE that they , as the new UK government, were the party for “Change” but then after the GE they turned out to be anything but the party for “Change” and so then surely they, Labour as politicians, have “Absolutely eroded people’s trust in politicians and in Politics”.
We hear Kaye Adams, like many of those employed in BBC Scotland as reporters (of fake news) , prove that their true objective is not to provide what they, the BBC, state is their Editorial values, which they state as being “independent, impartial, and truthful” reporting of news , but instead we know it to be , for many of them including Kaye, nothing more than an opportunity for them to convey their personal opinions . personal political bias and very much their opposition to both the SNP and also to Scottish independence.
While allowing those in opposition to the SNP to make statements that they , as BBC employees, do not challenge or refute as false statements being made only for party political reasons.
The rule (another one) being ‘anyone but the SNP in Scotland’
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Well here is yet another enigma with Labour and the BBC.
On Sunday 27 October they had this below as their top ‘positive for Labour’ story on their website in the Scottish Politics page:
“Budget to bring ‘era of growth’ for Scotland – Murray”
What is strange is that today ,as in the actual BUDGET day, this story has now disappeared from the Scottish pages of the BBC Website.
Surely if this story was actually factual and true it would then still be, as a apparent positive story for Scotland, be on the Scottish pages of the BBC website.
For them, the BBC, to have now removed it completely tends to make one think that it was yet another non (fake) story to promote Labour as being #GOOD for Scotland.
However what is also strange (though not really) is that I noted that two of the #SNPBAD same stories in respect to the Green party apparently “not going to support or vote for the Scottish government’s budget” has somehow, as political stories, remarkably still survived from the 27 October on the BBC Scottish pages of their website.
I mean could the BBC be any more transparent to their true motivation and underhand tactics that drives their opposition to and hatred for the SNP and also their , BBC’s, support for the Labour party in Scotland just now (and also prior to the recent GE).
(Currently that is until they, the BBC, think the political so called ‘public’ opinion in Scotland has changed to another UK party being favoured by those British Nationalists who live here in Scotland, and so seen as more likely to unseat an SNP politician somewhere in a area within Scotland).
I think the BBC could not be any more transparent , as to their true intentions , than they so obviously are as a media hostile to Scotland as a nation.
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This is where quoting the article headline works wonders with Google etc.. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cm2mmwwvk4vo
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What constitutes a ‘protected area’ – and if such areas are indeed protected, how come their condition is “unknown”?
With well over half of theirs in the unknown category, the Labour government in Wales seems to be particularly lax in protecting what is theirs – presumably this is an indicator of what Scotland could expect if Labour win in 2026? A grey area in more than one sense.
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