Some folk are bit too keen to smugly tell you that, based on Betteridge’s Law, a headline ending in a question mark can always be answered with a resounding NO. I don’t subscribed to such a rigid view but in this case it’s true. You do need to read down a bit in this bland anon piece, with no analysis I note, to find: Long waits for potentially life-saving diagnostic tests are common in Ireland, as they are in Scotland. The two countries have similar populations but very different health systems. The Irish Cancer Society estimates that more than 200,000 … Continue reading NHS Scotland does cancer scans TWICE as fast as Ireland’s health system

Back in 2011, Labour Shadowy Health Secretary, Jackie Baillie, said it was concerning that 21 Scots, treated in a back pain centre in Bath, could not be treated closer to home. 11 of the 18 paragraphs in the BBC Scotland report were given over to Jackie Baillie and Murdo Fraser, blaming the Scottish Health Secretary directly for this. Today, BBC Wales has People with eating disorders in Wales could be sent as far away as Scotland in order to get treatment. There must a Con Shadowy Health Secretary there to attack the Labour Health Secretary for this gross failure. No, … Continue reading Jackie Baillie shocked by patient transfers FROM Labour Wales

Every state or corporate media outlet not serving the Scottish electorate is currently drooling at the prospect of an SNP ‘civil war.’ They haven’t had such stained fronts to their shirts since ‘Salmondgate‘. The corporate pollsters have, pretty much together, revealed a dip in support down to just above 40% with a too-small-to-matter Labour climb and the Con support creepily hanging on. Even at that level, the SNP walks through the gap to win all bar a few seats where Labour is a close second or where the Unionist vote just swaps Con for Labour. Remember SNP support actually dipped … Continue reading Snap twitter-poll suggests support is solid with 87% more likely to support SNP after leader debates

Leah Gunn Barrett This sent to the Scotsman on 8 March 2023: Murdo Fraser writes with a straight face that the Windsor Framework doesn’t put Scotland at a disadvantage and anyway, we don’t deserve a deal like Northern Ireland’s because we don’t share a land border with an EU nation. This is the incoherent guff Scots have to endure from Murdo and his fellow Tories, who must after all show fealty to their English masters.  Because Northern Ireland has full access to both the UK and EU markets, its economy is outperforming the rest of the UK. Once the ‘Windsor … Continue reading ‘Scots don’t deserve a deal like Ulst….oops, Northern Ireland!’

On February 20th 2023, I sent this to BBC Complaints: Failure to inform viewers important NHS issues  Since the beginning of December 2022, there have been numerous strikes by nurses, ambulance staff and other key health service workers which the BBC UK broadcasts have carefully reported, early and repeatedly, fulfilling their duty as a public service broadcaster, to alert the public, especially the older and more vulnerable who rely on TV news. The elderly and vulnerable in Scotland may have seen and been confused and worried by these reports because BBC Scotland has never reminded them that, on all of … Continue reading BBC Scotland feel no remorse if the elderly and vulnerable suffer from their failure to inform

From Alasdair Galloway, no relation, I trust UK government reply to “Grant a Section 30 Order to enable a Scottish Independence Referendum”. Some time ago, I signed the petition “Grant a Section 30 Order to enable a Scottish Independence Referendum” more in hope than expectation. Since the number signing was above that which required Westminster to respond I have this morning received that response by email. I think its fair to say that my expectations have been fulfilled. It’s copied in below BEGINS The Government has responded to the petition you signed – “Grant a Section 30 Order to enable … Continue reading “Just say naw!”

Under the headline: More than 500 deaths in England last year after long ambulance wait, the Guardian today offers the above data and claims: More than 500 seriously ill patients died last year before they could get treatment in hospital after the ambulance they called for took up to 15 hours to reach them, an investigation by the Guardian reveals. The fatalities included people who had had a stroke or heart attack or whose breathing had suddenly collapsed, or who had been involved in a road traffic collision. In every case, an ambulance crew took much longer to arrive than … Continue reading Scottish ambulance waiting times on target as Guardian finds more than 500 deaths in England after ‘long waits’

Only the non-Tory press, The Mirror and the i make this a front page story. HS2 is already 8 years late and expected to exceed it’s projected cost in 2010 of £33bn by a huge amount. It’s already at £71bn and some think it may go beyond £100bn. When I saw that 2041 and thought of trains, I remembered this 2004 SF film: In the future, a rail network connects Earth. Lonely souls try to reach a mysterious room called 2046; nothing ever changes there so there is never loss or sadness. No one has ever returned from 2046 except … Continue reading HS2 will be 8 years behind and triple the cost but no heads need roll

From SNP Media today: The price of the biggest scandal of the Devolution era – Scottish Labour’s PFI catastrophe – continues to increase after it was revealed the cost to the public purse ballooned by an extra £1million every week in just the last year alone. In response to a question from Kenneth Gibson MSP, Deputy First Minister John Swinney confirmed that the amount the Scottish Government and local authorities must find to pay for the botched Scottish Labour initiative had increased from £1,410 million last year to £1,460 million this year. Now, after many years of payments and 16 … Continue reading Cost of Scottish Labour’s PFI Incompetence balloons again by £770m to £1.46 BILLION

The Dowey husband and wife team, Tory council leader (1) and not-really-elected Tory MSP (2), have been caught out by this news: South Ayrshire achieves glowing report for positive school leaver destinations The School Leaver Destination Report (SLDR) recorded an impressive 98.6 per cent of pupils across South Ayrshire progressing from school to a positive destination. https://www.inyourarea.co.uk/news/south-ayrshire-achieves-glowing-report-for-positive-school-leaver-destinations/ Has this happened elsewhere in Scotland? Yes, see: Latest figures published by Scottish Government show a record number of 2022 school leavers are in work, training or further education, with the proportion in unemployment at its lowest. https://childreninscotland.org.uk/magazine-school-leavers-in-positive-destinations-reaches-record-high/ Why have the Tories been … Continue reading Just arrived Ayr Tories embarrassed by ‘glowing’ school report fail to praise Education Secretary