Year: 2025

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BBC Scotland still struggling to say ‘County Lines’ or ‘England’ or any English city in a drugs report on the flood that is keeping our drug deaths high

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Professor John Robertson OBA From BBC Scotland South today: A woman has been charged after a police discovered heroin worth an estimated £180,000 during a car stop in Dumfries and Galloway. Officers acting on intelligence stopped the car on the M74 near Lockerbie at 20:25 on Friday. The 25-year-old was arrested and released on an undertaking to appear at Dumfries Sheriff Court at a later date. Det Supt Steven Elliott described the recovery as “significant,” adding: “Drugs cause misery in our communities and we are committed to disrupting their supply.” https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crkx0g016mmo Now I know there are limits on what can … Continue reading BBC Scotland still struggling to say ‘County Lines’ or ‘England’ or any English city in a drugs report on the flood that is keeping our drug deaths high

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14th sub-poll confirms SNP support at least double Labour

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Professor John Robertson OBA Find out Now don’t weight according to the 2014 referendum result but did to GE 2024 to make the SNP share of the sample smaller than that of Labour (284/241). That may well understate SNP support after these first months of Labour Government. From Find Out Now, for 2 April 2025, the above sub-poll suggests considerable confidence in the SNP winning well enough to form the next government with issue by issue support from the Greens. On 26 March 2025, also from Find Out Now, we saw: On 4 December 2024, Find out Now had: On 8 January 2025, it … Continue reading 14th sub-poll confirms SNP support at least double Labour

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Islanders furious as New Zealand government’s ‘dilly-dallying’ gets it into $800 million (£600 million) cancellation debt without even a contract signed for new ferries to replace the unsafe ones still being used

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Professor John Robertson OBA From NBR in March 2025, the above. What happened? From the New Zealand Herald: Within months of unceremoniously scrapping the previous Government’s iRex project, Finance Minister Nicola Willis was advised by the crack team, set up by herself, to go back to try to salvage something with the scorned shipbuilder. This new figure of $800 million is a shock after earlier reports: New documents reveal the coalition has set aside $300 million to cover broken infrastructure contracts and a break-fee with Hyundai, after the government ended a contract with the Korean company to build two new Interislander ferries. … Continue reading Islanders furious as New Zealand government’s ‘dilly-dallying’ gets it into $800 million (£600 million) cancellation debt without even a contract signed for new ferries to replace the unsafe ones still being used

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How ‘two 13-year-olds charged after Scottish primary hit by ‘sectarian arson attacks’ tells us to calm down

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Professor John Robertson OBA In the National today and no doubt all over the Scottish media with dramatic headlines, two 13 year-olds are charged with vandalism in the form of ‘anti-Catholic‘ graffiti on the wall of a primary school. I do feel for the staff, parents and the children. It will have been unsettling and it is unacceptable. I was pleased that the FM will visit the school to show support but let’s keep things in perspective. This is not evidence of surging or worsening hate crimes against Catholics. Hate crime based on religion, including against Muslims, Jews, Sikhs and … Continue reading How ‘two 13-year-olds charged after Scottish primary hit by ‘sectarian arson attacks’ tells us to calm down

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FACTCHECK – How the former Lambeth councillor and helicoptered-in Labour MP lies about NHS Scotland and NHS England

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Professor John Robertson OBA From PMQs yesterday, Imogen Walker MP, fed the PM with these demonstrably questionable statements. In Hamilton and Clyde valley my constituents are struggling to access the health care that they desperately need. In the last quarter of 2024, NHS Lanarkshire, treated 97% of cancer referrals with a decision to treat within 31 days and 96.2% of urgent referrals with a suspicion of cancer within 62 days.1 The target is 95%. The equivalent figures for England were 91.3% and a shocking 69.6%.2 In the same period, for the critical 18 week target for life-threatening conditions, NHS Lanarkshire … Continue reading FACTCHECK – How the former Lambeth councillor and helicoptered-in Labour MP lies about NHS Scotland and NHS England

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Drax the Destroyer of Worlds, Jackie Baillie, £10 exrtra on your bill and the UK’s biggest CO2 emitter

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By Professor John Robertson OBA In the Times today: British households paid around £10 each, on average, on their energy bills last year to support a controversial wood-burning power station. Drax, whose biomass facility in North Yorkshire is the UK’s largest power station, received £869 million from public subsidies in 2024, according to an analysis by campaigners. DRAX!!! From BBC North Yorkshire, 9 February 2025: A UK power station that has received billions of pounds in government subsidies has failed more than once to report it burned wood from primary forests, BBC News has found. Drax Power Station, which burns wood pellets, … Continue reading Drax the Destroyer of Worlds, Jackie Baillie, £10 exrtra on your bill and the UK’s biggest CO2 emitter

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Labour , the union which supports them and ‘their’ media have all damaged the reputation of this shipyard

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By Liz S Gary Cook of the GMB at Ferguson Marine, and others like him, needs to get their stories straight and adopt a consistent narrative. So with a workers Union and a media supporting a Political party (Labour) targeting , as in making political attacks, upon this company, as in their shipyard, that then prompts a lack of confidence in the company’s shipyard, but then their , Labour’s, real target (the SNP) must somehow be in the thick of this story , as they were the ones who nationalised it so this must end up, like all things Scottish, … Continue reading Labour , the union which supports them and ‘their’ media have all damaged the reputation of this shipyard

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Water bills in Labour Wales to increase by TWO to THREE times more than in Jackie Baillie’s taps

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By stewartb Wales Correspondent I missed this on April Fools’ Day. The Daily Record published an article below the headline: ‘Water bills in Scotland to soar today – find out how you are affected’. Perhaps it was a ‘slow’ day in the office. After all, the BBC News website and others had covered the rise in charges introduced by Scottish Water way back in January. On January 28, the BBC News website published a detailed, informative piece headlined: ‘Scottish Water bills set to rise 9.9% in April’. The article gave lots of factual information. Perhaps the Record’s motivation for regurgitating old news becomes … Continue reading Water bills in Labour Wales to increase by TWO to THREE times more than in Jackie Baillie’s taps

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EIGHT months in and Labour has had no impact on ‘avalanche of harrowing stories of the impact of dentistry’s system failure’ in England

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Professor John Robertson OBA In the Guardian today: The official plan to increase access to NHS dental services in England has been a “complete failure”, and some of the government’s initiatives have worsened the crisis, a damning report warns. Millions of patients continue to be denied dental care, forcing them to pay for private treatment, build up mountains of credit card debt, or even worse perform dangerous DIY dentistry on their own teeth, the research by MPs found. Without immediate and significant changes to fix the “broken” system, there would be no future for population-wide access to NHS dentistry, the report by the public … Continue reading EIGHT months in and Labour has had no impact on ‘avalanche of harrowing stories of the impact of dentistry’s system failure’ in England

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Feeling safe in school – a widening gap across the UK

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Professor John Robertson OBA In the Guardian today: Girls in England say they feel less safe at school and are more disenchanted with their education, research has found. Using data from an international study of pupils at primary and secondary schools, researchers said the steep fall in girls’ “emotional engagement” compared with the years before the Covid pandemic has become a pressing issue for schools. While the results from the international survey showed pupils’ feelings of belonging, safety and pride have fallen in many countries since the pandemic, researchers from University College London (UCL) found that England had one of the biggest drop-offs among … Continue reading Feeling safe in school – a widening gap across the UK