Professor John Robertson OBA
From the Scottish Government today, news that funding for affordable housing supply for 2025/2026, will increase by a massive 37% in one year, from £510 782 000 to £700 065 000.
The only MSM response I see, so far, is grudging whining from two Labour spokespersons above.
The first, for Edinburgh, moans about a 30% increase in one year.
The second, for Glasgow, moans about a massive 41% increase.
Make you wonder what these two Labour politicians would have to say about affordable house building in Labour England or Labour Wales:
Source: https://www.gov.scot/publications/resource-planning-assumptions-data/
You can still support Talking-up Scotland at: https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/checkout/help-talking-up-scotland-tell-truth-about-scotland/payment/nBQxjVzq/details or by direct bank transfer method - Bernadette/John Robertson, Sort code 08-91-04, Account 12266421
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
Excellent news, terrible for the Labcons though, though I’m sure English Labour/Tory run cities in Scotland will find another use for the extra Scottish government cash, hmm, bollards, and traffic cones comes to mind for the city of Edinburgh!! They like those, a lot. I literally have hundreds of photos of them adorning the streets of even just our part of the city, have even seen one person fall over one of them. Homes? Who need ’em! Pah!
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O/T Evidence of Westminster governments allowing England’s deterioration, this time its school buildings. What follows comes in a report from the National Audit Office (NAO) published today, 21 October: ‘Departmental overview: Department for Education 2024-25’ (See https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Department-for-Education-Overview-2024-25.pdf )
It reports, in the ‘matter of fact style’ that is characteristic of the NAO, that: ‘DfE has reported the risk of school building failure resulting from structural safety issues as one of its top risks since 2021-22. Our 2025 report ‘Maintaining public service facilities’ identified a £13.8 billion maintenance backlog in schools – 28% of the government backlog. Cabinet Office estimated that deferring work to address backlogs could multiply costs by over 1.5 times over a two- to four-year period.’
In addition to any adverse impacts on education outcomes or on health & safety, the £13.8 billion NOT used to improve school buildings, NOT used to generate work in the building trades, has resulted in the foregoing of employment, of personal and business tax revenues, and of knock-on beneficial economic multipliers in communities and in supply chains. Moreover, if the DfE for England had the budget needed for basics like school building maintenance, then presumably the governments in Belfast, Cardiff and Edinburgh would have seen uplifts in their so called ‘Block Grant’.
For context, from the Scottish Government (September 16, 2025) on the latest national review of the condition of Scotland’s school estate. (See https://www.gov.scot/publications/school-estate-statistics-2025/pages/section-1-schools-built-or-substantially-refurbished/ )
‘During the 2024-25 year 17 school builds or substantial refurbishment projects were completed. This brings the total number of school builds or substantial refurbishment projects completed since 2007-08 to 1,156. Only builds or refurbishments costing at least £500,000 for primary and at least £1 million for secondary and special schools are reported here.’
It reports on schools’ ‘condition’ i.e. the current state of the fabric: ‘This includes the state of repair of features and facilities that are part of the school fabric and its current design. It also includes the adequacy and appropriateness of the design, the security of the school fabric, contents and occupancy and general health and safety requirements.’
The number of schools with good or satisfactory condition ratings is reported to have increased from 1,669 in 2007 to 2,251 in 2025, an increase of 29.3 percentage points from 62.7% in April 2007 to 92.0% in April 2025.
It also reports on schools’ ‘suitability‘ i.e. a measure of whether a school is fit for the purpose of delivering the education curriculum. ‘It measures the extent to which a school building and its grounds support quality learning and teaching.’
The proportion of schools with good or satisfactory suitability is reported as having increased 14 percentage points from 75.2% in 2010 to 89.2% in 2025 – ‘representing the highest proportion since 2010′.
The neglect of the UK government’s estate goes beyond schools. On January 22, 2025 the National Audit Office published this report: ‘Maintaining public service facilities’. It included this: ‘We calculated that the government’s maintenance backlog has increased steadily in recent years and is now at least £49 billion. This equates to approximately 4% of the government’s total expenditure in 2023-24, or around £710 for each person living in the UK (based on mid-2023 population estimates).
‘The OGP has estimated that the actual cost of remediation (the real cost of repairs to improve property condition, rather than simply maintaining it) could be substantially higher, in some cases 10 times higher.’ (OGP = Office of Government Property)
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