Professor John Robertson OBA
From STV News yesterday:
Scottish Labour has criticised the SNP of “robbing young people of opportunities” as college staffing levels fall to their lowest point since the start of devolution. Labour MSP Pam Duncan-Glancy has accused the SNP of treating colleges with “disdain” after Scottish Government statistics show in the second quarter of 2025, employment in Scotland’s colleges plummeted to just 11,800.
From Department for Education (DfE) – Further Education Workforce in England, 2023/24, published in May 2025 and DfE – Further Education and Skills, 2023/24, published in January 2025, we can see that the average ratio, varying across courses, is between 22 and 25 students per member of teaching staff:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/further-education-workforce-in-england-2023-to-2024 https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/further-education-and-skills/2023-24
From Colleges Scotland – Key Facts 2025, using 2023/24 data and published in 2025, we can see that the average ratio, varying across courses, is between 9 and 13 students per member of teaching staff:
https://collegesscotland.ac.uk/key-college-facts/keyfacts
https://www.sfc.ac.uk/publications/college-statistics-2023-24/
So, it looks like the staff in FE in England have responsibility for twice as many students as those in Scotland.
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
“robbing young people of opportunities”
Does she , Pam Duncan-Glancy, mean like all the restrictions and limitations of Brexit , which Labour HQ now support as a Tory policy and intends to continue to maintain as a Tory policy, while also trying to figure out how they can turn things around (for the better) within their UK , like say for example , things such as the UK economy.
In fact it’s not just young people in the Brexit British State that are being “robbed of opportunities” by UK parties like Labour , the Tories and Reform UK , it is also others too, as in people of various ages……
Then of course there is Labour HQ as the latest UK government who are robbing our Scottish government of powers and money and so trying to limit and restrict them into being unable to generate even more opportunities for even more people in Scotland to thrive……
Though the Scottish government does it’s best to overcome the huge obstacles that they are confronted with by various UK governments, including all of those via Labour HQ as the current one.
Also if we are talking “Colleges”..…..the name Dame Wendy Alexander, an ex Labour FM, springs to mind.
Her, Alexander’s, reward for failure by Labour HQ, after she left a huge mess behind in a Scottish college that she formally worked in, was for the Labour HQ leader and UK PM, Sir Keir Starmer, to then make the decision to elevate her, Alexander, into a privileged position within the HOL.
Pam Duncan-Glancy is yet another one within the Labour branch office whose only role it is, is one where she constantly tries to deflect attention away from Labour HQ .
That is with her , and also others within the Labour branch office, trying to constantly distract the Scottish public away from the mess Labour HQ are making as the new UK government ………..and also the current chaos there is within the Labour HQ party………
All Pam and others in Labour do is to fabricate a variety of sensationalist stories that convey the same message , which is #SNPBAD , that they know the majority of the media in Scotland will lap up as in promote, while also knowing full well who the real #BAD ones are…..that is them, Labour as a political party, at every political level.
Liz S
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Here’s one for Pam Duncan-Glancy ……..to ponder as a real mess within Labour HQ……where one says one thing while another one does the opposite.
Keir Starmer posted a video online on the 11 November and wrote on ‘X’
“I will always stand for unity and national renewal”
In the video he said this:
“I think the political divide now is between what I call patriotic national renewal , which is what this Labour government is doing, bringing people together, whether it’s partnerships working here or across the country finding those points of connection. Or, and this is what I fear , the toxic division of Reform and others on the right in politics, where they’re tearing our country apart. Some of the rhetoric we’re hearing , racist rhetoric , divisive rhetoric, that frankly (plugging NS autobiography) I thought we had dealt with decades ago, is returning to politics and it makes people feel very scared. And we have to stand up to that racism, to that division. And we have to proudly say that to be British is to be concerned for others, is to be reasonable, is to be tolerant and compassionate , and we’re proud of that”.
So “reasonable”, “tolerant” and “compassionate” is what he, Keir Starmer, states are the inherent attributes and values that those who identify as being British people then proudly stand up for, against Racism and division……..
Then along came the Home Secretary to burst that particular Labour and Starmer bubble………..
Adam Bienkov posted this on BlueSky on the16 November
“Shabana Mahmood on the BBC this morning talking about desperate people fleeing war and persecution as being given a “golden ticket” and “handouts” and saying she’s got a “moral mission” to take them away from them”.
She , Mahmood, also said on the Laura Kuenssberg programme that “Illegal migration is “tearing the country apart”,.
Oh please come on , I think that we all know what and who it is that is tearing her England apart………and also trying to drag all other nations of the UK State into the fray as well , as in trying to promote this as a position that represents the whole UK State……..that would be Labour HQ as the current UK government.
The BBC website added this below , based on Mahmood’s interview with Laura Kuenssberg.
“New measures set to be announced by Shabana Mahmood on Monday that will include people granted asylum needing to wait 20 years before they can apply to settle permanently”.
“Those granted asylum have their refugee status regularly reviewed and those whose home countries are then deemed safe told to return”
The BBC wrote “The changes are aimed at making the UK a less attractive destination for illegal migrants “.
Really ?
I thought it was to try to appease and so adopt Reform UK policies on Immigration and also then pander to those kind of voters who would normally vote for Reform UK……….also allowing Nigel Farage to dictate the future immigration policy for the whole UK with the additional threat for Labour being that recent polling is showing Reform UK potentially winning the next UK GE…..and not Labour HQ again.
“Mahmood added her plans also aimed to address “unfair” conditions that she said gave some asylum seekers better provisions than UK citizens”
So are her comments aka rhetoric to be considered as being “reasonable, tolerant and compassionate” as a “British” position to be “proud of“…..
If so, then my definition of these words differs hugely from that of Keir Starmer’s definition and also from Shabana Mahmood’s, as in the new Labour UK Home Secretary……also now to be known as one who is ‘no friend to Refugees and asylum seekers’.
#NotMyHomeSecretary
( Mahmood also said “I am the child of migrants myself, my parents came to this country lawfully in the late 60s, and in the 70s. Immigration is absolutely woven into my experience as a Brit and also that of thousands of my constituents”…….but now she wants to close the door behind her parents in now changing the rules on immigration…..indeed if her own parents were to have arrived in the UK in the future….they , via her new rules, may not have been allowed to remain within the UK under her new review on immigration. How intolerant, unreasonable and uncompassionate of her).
This is Labour HQ my fellow Scots and so no amount of attempted distractions by the Labour branch office and also by the media within Scotland will ever change that sorry (UK) state of affairs.
Liz S
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Hi Liz
Good to see your comments are getting through.
John
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🙂
Liz S
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Oh there will be some weaselly interpretation of stats behind ” as college staffing levels fall to their lowest point since the start of devolution “, it’s what Labour Spuds (No it isn’t a spelling error) do, such as the average height of staff is less, etc..
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What is the state of further education in Wales under a British Labour Party government in Cardiff?
From the National Education Union – NEU Cymru (Sept 28, 2025) ‘The ongoing funding crisis in education in Wales’.
Source: https://neu.org.uk/latest/press-releases/ongoing-funding-crisis-education-wales
‘NEU Cymru, Wales’s largest education union, is concerned about the ongoing funding crisis in education in Wales, with pupils in Wales receiving up to £400 per annum less than pupils in England.‘
But at least here the education trade union has some grasp of reality. The Wales Secretary of the National Education Union Cymru, is quoted:
“The underfunding of education over the past 14 years by the UK government has had clear knock-on consequences for students and staff in Wales. Education in Wales is really struggling. In real terms, there are year on year cuts to the education budgets across the country.
And on the state of Welsh local government under a British Labour Party government in Cardiff? NEU Cymru notes: “Many local authorities across Wales are in a dire financial predicament with a number facing bankruptcy. The Welsh government need to change the way that monies are divided between local authorities across Wales and replace it with a consistent, transparent model of funding.’
The text of a motion to the union’s conference is published: ‘Motion 9 School Cuts – A Welsh Funding Crisis in Education – “The underfunding of education over the past 14 years by the UK government has had clear knock-on consequences for students and staff in Wales. Education in Wales is really struggling. In real terms, there are cuts to the education budgets across the country.”
Conference Cymru was asked to note that: ‘The Welsh government are somewhat restricted by monies they receive from the government in Westminster, with the real terms budget being estimated at £4 billion less over the next three years.’
Also: ‘NEU Cymru is calling on the Welsh government to direct the local authorities to ring fence school funding to ensure that it is spent on education.’
So what else is the British Labour Party up to in government?
From the Financial Times (March 5, 2025) ‘Colleges of further education in England will get less funding than promised’. It reports that the UK Department for Education has announced a last-minute cut in funding it had promised to pay for additional students at further education colleges in England this year.
And for context, on the legacy of recent Tory governments: Institute of Fiscal Studies (January 9, 2025) Why 2025 is a critical year for FE funding.
Describing the situation in FE in England: ‘FE has faced some of the deepest funding cuts across the education system. This reflects a persistent historical trend: when overall spending increases, FE tends to receive smaller boosts, and when budgets are tightened, it often bears the brunt of the reductions.
‘The data tells a stark story. Between 2010–11 and 2019–20, funding per student in colleges dropped by 14 per cent in real terms, while school sixth forms saw an even sharper decline of 28%. Although extra money has been allocated since 2019, funding remains well below 2010 levels. Funding per student in FE colleges is 11 per cent lower than in 2010-11, while sixth form funding has fallen by 23 per cent.’ (my emphasis)
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BTW as I am sure most peeps who are interested in Football would know that….
Scotland played Greece last Saturday in a match that was a World Cup qualifier……..
So what then did the UK PM post on ‘X’ in respect to this match to show support for the Nation of Scotland, in a very important match, a Scottish Nation that is a part of his UK State, as in a State , that he is the UK PM of ?
Zilch. Nada. Nowt……
Or rather it was the opposite of what he does in any crucial matches for the Male/Female English National sides……who both have nicknames that he loves to use….as in the Lions and Lionesses.
Starmer failed to acknowledge Scotland’s important football match on Saturday night, as he, Starmer, will never surrender to becoming neutral as the UK #English PM.
I suspect that has a lot to do with all of those English flags that he said are hanging up in his house……something he bizarrely confessed to, and that The National newspaper reported upon……..when they wrote this:
“NEW: Keir Starmer has said he hangs the English flag in his home and “always sits in front of a Union Jack”“
(There is a name for that ….as in staunch English Nationalist…as both flags seem to represent England).
“He said he was “very encouraging” of people putting up national flags, but warned against devaluing and belittling them”.
(Surely the awful way that he and his party are running the UK State , as the new UK government, is in itself proof that they are “devaluing and belittling” the UK State and also his English Nation).
“Asked whether people putting up the Union and St George’s Cross flags in the wake of asylum hotel protests could be considered racist, Starmer told BBC Radio 5 Live: “I am supporter of flags.”
(So really this is where you need BBC’s Nick Robinson to say “He never answered”).
“He added: “I am the leader of the Labour Party who put the Union Jack on our Labour Party membership cards. I always sit in front of the Union Jack. I’ve been doing it for years, and it attracted a lot of comment when I started doing it.”
(Yes we know you put the Union Jack on the Labour membership cards that’s why many people in Scotland will not support, vote for or join your party (as well as other reasons….too many to list)………as to sitting in front of that Union flag….. if indeed you have “been doing it for years” then you may need to seek professional help, as at some point in the future you may need to change the design of it – as in get rid of the blue part in it Tee Hee).
“The Prime Minister also said his family has “got St George’s flag in our flat” in Downing Street“
(Of course he does….and that is how he runs his UK government….. as if it were an English government…….)
Note please, the words in brackets are my additional comments and not The National newspapers……..as if…..Ha Ha
Liz S
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Labour lies. Sprouting nonsense. Labour are polling 11% in Wales. Scotland has the most universities and college in the world – pro rata. Unemployment 3.7%. Lower than the rest of the UK. Scotland’s wealth has been drained away by Westminster. The lost opportunities.
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