By Brenda Robb
I’ve done what BBC reporters routinely do ie scan a document and pick out selective bits to back up an argument. I make no apologies for this because rarely does Scotland get any positive mentions, while negative findings are highlighted, amplified in headlines and endlessly discussed. If I ever get the time & energy I’m going to work my way through all the Covid reports, maybe do a list of positive/negative statements and make my own conclusions before the BBC or Rupert Murdoch try to tell me what to think. Below are statements from the most recent Covid Inquiry report you might have missed:
“So there were four different names across the four nations. So in England, “Test[and] Trace Support Payment[s]”, I think. I feel that was less clear than in some of the devolved administrations. So, for example, in Scotland we had the “Self-Isolation Support Grant”. That, to me, is much clearer. So I would use that as an example from Scotland as being much more efficient than the title we had in England
The Scottish equality impact assessment is an example of best practice in that that drew on a really wide range of evidence, and specifically identified equalities issues for certain groups, for example people with disabilities, women, children and young people.And then clearly the Scottish Government could point to how their scheme catered for those groups.In England, the equality impact assessment, when it went through the protected characteristics of theEquality Act, simply made an assessment that there were no issues with any of those protected characteristics,which I think was a very incomplete assessment of equalities issues that were at play during the pandemic and risks the assumption that there aren’t any equality issues.
“An analysis of the effectiveness of COVID-19 financial support and the impact on adherence with the Test, Trace and Isolate system” PROFESSOR RICHARD MACHIN (associate professor in social policy in the Social Work, Care andCommunity Department at Nottingham Trent University, specialising in research on the UK social security system, poverty, and financial wellbeing)
The Scottish Government worked in partnership with NHS National Services Scotland and territorial health boards to deliver locally-led contact tracing. As noted by Professor McKee, using these local public health teams, who have local knowledge and experience, was preferable to using a centralised call centre.
As highlighted by Professor McKee, there is no point in testing someone if they do not isolate in the case of a positive result. Ability to self-isolate was often linked to financial status. Professor Arden referred to an intention-behaviour gap. The Scottish Government recognised this, and put in place a range of financial and practical support for those who were self-isolating to mitigate the barriers to doing so. This holistic support is cited by Professor Machin as an example of best practice.
The Every Story Matters record has noted that clear and regular messaging from officials in Scotland helped to build confidence in people that they were doing the right thing
MS DRYSDALE KC on behalf of the Scottish Government with Kenneth Young, Iain Halliday and Kristian Whittaker.
There seems little point waiting for the BBC (and others) to provide a more balanced picture. We do have some alternative sources like TuS, Broadcasting Scotland, various newspapers, podcasts and blogs but we should also consider reading the original documents or watching FMQs and parliament debates live to get the full story. Many of us indy supporters are accessing news from both angles (indy/union) but sadly many others UK wide get the news from one perspective only so reposting and sharing articles on social media is one tool we can use to reach out to open minded others.
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
Thanks for this, otherwise we would never have known it, especially from ‘usually unrelaible sources’.
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a great post mate. it is the frustration that a lot of Scots are still politically ignorant and either dont vote or just vote for the colour that they’re chosen regular vote automatically goes to. you’re absolutely correct here.
looking at countries like Italy and areas in German where the cost of electricity has dropped to almost zero due to green electricity generation leaves me raging about Scotland sending our green energy to England only to buy energy back from mostly foriegn companies at the highest cost in all the modern countries makes me sick.
yes..I can’t believe a lot of Scots either don’t believe that 2 of our islands on the wes0t coast generate more ££s than England’s second biggest city yet again these distilleries are now mostly owned by huge foriegn conglomerates and they’re scots products are shipped from England only while most of these conglomerates operate head quarters in tax free countries.
the list is endless to shout at shouting constantly till these Scots folk to understand the biggest issue for scots is not the price of your utilities and food and petrol from your provider but the root cause of similar problems than can be solved with independence within an structure that can be debated and a possible referendum to rejoin.
ask the EU for infrastructure grants via they’re EU infrastructure bill that has passed. ship all scottish goods via sotland. ship and provide our utilities including gas and oil at market rates.
make Scotland the greatest country to vacatin in.
it’s my dream and always will be while I educate my kids now they’re old enough to vote.
it’s yours and many more Scots dream to. including yourself. .
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Well picked up on Brenda – There was a reason so many in England were tuning into the SG Covid updates, it was the clarity, honesty and logic – This so incensed Johnson that he sent the media wolfpack after heads on plates, learning lessons clashed with his overarching ego.
When we next meet such a pandemic, we can only hope the preparatory work is back in place as it used to be before bozos such as Johnson et al disrupted functioning disaster preparedness in order to play with giant train sets….
Eton, born to lead everyone else to hell….
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From the Covid inquiry sessions I’ve watched, we know 100% that facilities we’ll need for the next pandemic (including a new strain of Covid) have been defunded and dismantled by the UK Government – where’s the outrage in the media?
And of course that means Scotland has lost the funding too.
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‘If I ever get the time & energy I’m going to work my way through all the Covid reports, maybe do a list of positive/negative statements and make my own conclusions before the BBC or Rupert Murdoch try to tell me what to think.’
From my own reading of output from the Covid Inquiry’s early modules, I’m sure that would be very enlightening – but a huge task to do manually given how much info has been assembled. I’m no expert in the available technology but wonder if ‘web scraping’ and AI tools would be helpful here?
Delighted to learn that Prof Robertson had put together a compilation of evidence on ‘ferries’ for the Scots Independent. Hope it gets wide distribution!
Regular readers of TuS know well the scale and quality of the body of positive evidence on health, social security support, crime and policing, education, energy – and no doubt other topics that voters typically care about – in relation to Scotland which counters the negative framing and candidly, the gaslighting that characterises the political opposition to the Scottish Government, aided by the mainstream news media’s output.
Scotland’s public services cannot be ‘perfect’ – can any country’s, even one with the full agency of a currency issuing, independent nation-state? But there is an extreme media bias towards the ‘negative’ here and a void when it comes to cross-UK comparative assessments if likely to be favourable to Scotland, and a void when it comes to the provision of context and perspective.
So the scope for comprehensive, evidence-based briefing accounts certainly includes ‘ferries’ and ‘evidence on national responses to the Covid pandemic’ but is far from limited to those two topics.
However, in addition to the effort preparing such ‘briefings’ would take (large but probably not insurmountable), there is the non-trivial matter of achieving wide distribution AND then grabbing attention for the output among those not presently aware (or interested). Moreover, I detect a concern among some that voting intentions are not changed by using facts in rebuttals. Changing the frames of political debate and convincing folk on shared values and aspirations rather than the use of (just) ‘facts’ – so the argument goes – are more potent.
Hopefully pro-Indy political parties and activist groups have access to better expertise/understanding over what’s needed, on what topics and by when (urgently?) than I have.
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Who has seen this one.
Douglas Ross panned for chairing Holyrood meeting from Caribbean
This person has no shame
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