Under that softest wee headline, the Herald notes: A TASK FORCE set up to help the Scottish seafood industry has produced its final report. The group was established as a reaction to complaints by producers and exporters that Brexit had caused damaging delays in getting seafood into the EU and beyond. https://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/19542882.scottish-seafood-taskforce-produces-final-report-amid-labour-crisis-industry/ The Herald report does go on to be quite critical offering numerous better headlines but they chose the one above. Most notably, they spotted that the report was quietly published yesterday with no statement from Westminster as is normal in these cases. The SNP Press Release was more punchy: Commenting … Continue reading The Herald wins ‘Hide the facts to protect the Tories’ award again

From SNP Media: The SNP has branded the UK government’s efforts to fix the catastrophic hard Brexit issues crippling Scotland’s vital seafood industry as “risible and woefully inadequate”. The final report of the UK Government’s Scottish Seafood Exports Taskforce was published yesterday on the progress made to mitigate the calamitous effects on Scottish seafood exports caused by the UK Government’s hard Brexit. Commenting on the report, SNP MSP for Banff and Buchan Karen Adam said: “After just six months and only eight meetings, the Westminster government’s taskforce has submitted its final report so you might expect that the numerous problems … Continue reading Tories give up on fishing industry

In the above BBC Scotland report on jabbing, we see: In a slightly earlier report for the UK vaccination rates by age: If we stop the Scottish graph lines just a bit to the left, we can make a reasonable comparison. One, around 72% of Scottish 18-29 had had their first jag by the 18th August while less than 60% did across the UK. Two, 16-17 year-olds are not included on the UK graph even though by then upwards of 30% had been jagged in Scotland. Three, and perhaps most striking, is the gap between UK (65%) and Scottish (72%) … Continue reading Young Scots coming forward for JAGS in greater numbers

From SNP Media: The SNP has said the Scottish Tories are making hundreds of thousands of Scottish families poorer by rubber-stamping £1040 cuts to Universal Credit – as new research reveals over a third of families in Scotland will be hit by the Tory cuts. On BBC Good Morning Scotland this morning, Scottish Tory Health spokesperson Craig Hoy MSP defended the cuts, which will slash the incomes of 400,000 people in Scotland, despite a growing rebellion of Tory MPs in England joining the SNP and anti-poverty campaigners in opposition to the move. New research from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, published today, … Continue reading ‘Wiping out the benefits of progressive SNP policies’

As with the Herald, we see the usual pro-Union knee-jerk selection of an image of a senior SNP politician to frame a health story. So, so different from the negative framing of working-class trade unions like the NUM or the RMT back in the 80’s, the GP reps are platformed uncritically, evidence-free, to undermine a major SNP Government programme. Remember, Scotland’s has far more GPs per head than England – 76 per 100K compared to only 58 per 100K. If they can’t cope with a bit more F2F, like they did only just over a year ago, what hope is … Continue reading Scotsman turns SNP £1bn package into Sturgeon vs GPs conflict

Here’s the Herald, today, picking out one hospital and selecting one or two cases from hundreds to imply a wider crisis and, as only the Scottish media do, putting a politician in the frame. Remember the Herald’s claim? This falls well short of ‘trusted’ or ‘quality.’ What are readers to make of A&E in their area from such selective sensationalism? Don’t go? Take a chance? Here’s a more useful, informative and trusted piece of information: In July 2021 (most recent comparable data) NHS Scotland saw 80% in 4 hours or less, compared to only 67% in NHS England. Some Welsh … Continue reading The Herald’s rotten cherry picking and politicising of the NHS

Some of us will remember how the transition from heavy traditional industries to newer technologies in the 1980s was handled by the Tory regime of Margaret Thatcher – sudden mass unemployment, destroyed communities and a legacy of drug and alcohol abuse still with us today. The oil money used to pay the costs. Today, 40 years later, as the oil industry enters its last days, the Scottish Government soon to be joined by Green Party ministers, ignores the Tory/Telegraph accusations of ‘extremism’ targeted at the Greens and does what they should have done had they cared about anyone, invests in … Continue reading Scotland’s ‘extremist’ coalition government moderates Thatcher economics

From BBC Northern Ireland: A review of the work of a former locum consultant radiologist in the Northern Trust has, so far, identified discrepancies in a total of 43 cases. The trust says six of these are at the most serious level, and could have had “immediate and significant clinical impact” on patients. A full lookback review of 13,030 radiology images began in June. It came after the General Medical Council raised concerns about the locum consultant radiologist’s work. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-58329138 Who is to blame? The trust’s medical director, Seamus O’Reilly, explains what happened but is not accused of anything. Richard Pengelly, … Continue reading Once more no calls for heads

In the week-ending 1st August (most recent data) 7 850 patients were reported for Covid. Only 1, one, had been infected in a hospital. That’s an astonishing performance in infection control across 279 hospitals. This data is hardly ever reported. BBC Scotland’s Lisa Summers will tweet excitedly if the graph goes up at all. At this level, the only way is up. Watch for it. NHS England deals with this by not reporting at all but a study published in Hospital Healthcare Europe suggested a figure of 10% over the first wave: https://hospitalhealthcare.com/covid-19/over-1-in-10-covid-19-infections-were-hospital-acquired/embed/#?secret=U9pV1osZUKAdvertisements Continue reading Only 1 out of 7 850 Covid cases was picked up in hospital

I wondered how long they would take. 3 days. 3 days ago, infection levels in Scotland caught up and surpassed for the first time in two months, those in England. The Herald has not asked why they were so low, the lowest in the UK, for most of the pandemic, nor for that matter why they are currently far lower than in Northern Ireland. Perhaps the most important questions never asked are based on these facts: Why has Scotland had the lowest overall infection rate? Why has Scotland had the second lowest overall death rate? Why has Scotland vaccinated more … Continue reading Why were Covid cases in Scotland so low compared to England for almost all of the pandemic?