From Alasdair Galloway Here’s an idea (for discussion) In my previous contribution I “spoke of many things” to paraphrase “The Walrus and the Carpenter”. I want to bring together a couple of ideas discussed in there. First “Is there anyone who doesn’t see the hand of the Americans behind the Good Friday agreement, and the influence of the Irish-American community behind that? If the Irish, why not the Scots? Why not use the Scottish community (or including the ‘wannabe’ Scottish community)? Such activity may be belittled by our critics (devolution doesn’t allow for foreign policy so ultra vires, embarrassing etc), … Continue reading ‘Were America to put it to Westminster that allowing Scotland to become independent was a good idea?’

In a campaign to mis-represent winter death data and equate it with A&E waiting times, the media have once more concealed the facts. From 2000 to 2023, winter mortality has increased from 23 379 to 24 427, by 1 048 or 4.5%, with yearly fluctuations in between. In the same time period, the proportion of over-65s in Scotland increased from 15.9% to 20.1% of the population, a 39% increase. So, despite a surging demand, NHS Scotland has held back the likely surge in deaths of the elderly with a range of better methods and performance. In a frankly disgusting and … Continue reading Winter death toll increase far lower than increase in older population suggests heroic NHS Scotland holding back tide and exposes disgusting scare mongering

The BBC Breakfast broadcasts and their Health website are making much of: Sepsis failings still causing too many deaths – ombudsman The UK Sepsis Trust estimates about 48,000 people die each year from sepsis-related illnesses, “thousands” of which are preventable. NHS England said it was working to improve sepsis management. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-67204563 The report is, of course, entirely about England. There is a separate ombudsman in Scotland. Is there evidence of a comparable ‘crisis’ in NHS Scotland? Well, BBC Scotland has only a report of one of their reporters getting it during an interview: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-63546160 We reported the evidence up to … Continue reading Sepsis deaths in Scotland falling fast

Tom Gordon has his regular carefully timed attacks on NHS Scotland under a picture of Humza Yousaf and Michael Matheson (Health Secretary) today: Scottish A&E performance at two-month low entering busy winter season Any Modern Studies pupil will know that if you want to consider the fitness of A&E to meet winter demand increases it would only be sensible to look at the data for last year at the same time and not picking a few weekly figures to meet your agenda. So in August 2022, 39 380 waited more than four hours to be treated. As we approach Winter … Continue reading Scotland’s A&E better prepared for Winter increases than last year?

From Public Health Scotland today: A sharp 43% increase in the number of children with no obvious decay experience in Scotland from 2007 to 2023. And even sharper fall of 66% in the number of decayed, missing and filled teeth after 16 years of SNP rule. Source: https://www.publichealthscotland.scot/publications/national-dental-inspection-programme/national-dental-inspection-programme-20222023/ Continue reading 66% less decay after 16 years of SNP rule

STV, 7 hours ago, not too prominent I know, but there: This is a hugely important sign of the success of the SNP in Government despite lacking full control of taxation, benefits or any ability to borrow. It should be a big story, at least much as drug deaths but it’s nowhere. BBC Scotland? 14 hours after the JRF embargoed release, nothing: Continue reading Destitution – Watch STV News if only to remind BBC Scotland they’re more popular with Scots

By Alasdair Galloway The promise by Humza Yousaf to use a majority of SNP seats at the coming UK General Election as the trigger for negotiations with Westminster to transfer powers for the holding of independence referenda has been well received by the membership of the SNP. The motion passed at their recent Conference commits them to a strategy in a number of parts. The SNP scale Part 1 of their strategy focuses on the next UK General Election being used as an “opportunity to advance the cause of independence, and to demonstrate how the powers of independence would enable … Continue reading Independence – a chorus in every scale including not getting stuffed

Let me just fend off accusations of insensitivity here, a bit anyway, with ‘Drug deaths! Drug deaths! Only the Guardian seems to be covering this. BBC Scotland? Ho ho! 1.31% of Londoners live in destitution, compared with 0.8% in Scotland. That 0.51% more would mean nearly 10 000 Scots. Glasgow, the only Scottish town in the 30 worst locations fell from 11th worst in 2019 to 26 worst in 2022. Still bad I know but SNP takes Glasgow out of worst 20 places for destitution in the UK? Source: https://www.jrf.org.uk/report/destitution-uk-2023 Continue reading Anger as Labour-run London has 64% more destitution than Scotland and SNP take Glasgow out of 20 worst places!

In the Scotsman suggesting a ‘crisis’ and in the Herald suggesting a ‘risk to life’, repeated on BBC Scotland’s early morning inserts to the BBC Breakfast broadcast, the firefighter’s union survey of some of its members opinions get an uncritical showing. Older trade unionists will remember a day when the media in Scotland were not friends at all. In the 1970s, researchers at Glasgow University revealed strong media bias against the unions [https://www.worldchanging.glasgow.ac.uk/article/?id=46] and as recently as 2008, my own research showed their exclusion from TV debate on the UK budget [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0163443710361659] Hmmm…what happened to change all that and make … Continue reading A risk to life in fire? Well a firefighter union wants you to believe that yet fire deaths are down by 60% but staffing is only down 13%