I need to remind my self what the situation was before June: In explaining this, much is made of three factors: The Johnson Brexit The First Minister and Covid-19 Journalists love to explain the surge in terms of one or more of the above factors but there will be more to it. I have no hard evidence but I think: People are just getting used to the idea of decisions being made in the country they live in. Younger voters don’t remember when it was different. Some older voters has passed on. Covid, it may be insensitive to say, might … Continue reading 18 in a row!

Thanks to Peter A Bell for alerting me to this. Writing in THE WEEK yesterday, Joe Evans, makes this astonishing claim: Stricter lockdown measures north of the border have not produced lower death rates. and then toward the end: An Ipsos Mori poll of voters in Scotland published in November, when Scots were dying at a higher rate than England, found that 72% thought the Scottish government was handling the coronavirus well. This compared with just 25% who said the same of the UK government. This is just wrong and you’re left to wonder, is Evans just ill-informed or does he have … Continue reading Astonishing ignorance of the Week

BBC Scotland has been tip-toeing around the crisis in seafood exports for the last few days, either ignoring it, inserting very short reports of only seconds length and late in the broadcast or, as above, minimising it and using innocuous words or expressions in place of ones that may be found offensive or suggest something unpleasant – euphemism. The Times, which to be fair, is one of the few places still featuring anything you could call investigative and which seems prepared to go all the way in criticising the Johnson regime, had this: Scotland’s fishing industry faces a damaging and … Continue reading Fishy Propaganda by Euphemism

‘If it bleeds it leads‘ as the say but when things are changing fast, yesterdays research report inevitably becomes not be the ‘latest thing‘ on the very day it is published. The Herald is keen to keep you on edge and anxious for the latest on this risk to your life but they’re ‘behind the curve’ on this. I didn’t need to go far in to the report to confirm what I guessed would be the case from my time in HE: Over the last two weeks there has been a step change in the course of the epidemic with … Continue reading Not the ‘latest’ any more as situation shows not-that-early signs of improvement

As before, I’m not suggesting for a minute that we can afford to ease up, to lose discipline, but a wee boost to our confidence that we can do it helps us keep going with even greater determination. Jeanne Freeman’s prediction that I might get my jag in early March has been another wee boost. Anyhow, back to the graph. The FM and Prof Leitch were understandably not keen to use words like ‘falling’ but the infection rate is falling. One-day changes matter little but changes in the 7-day average tell you something more reliable. It has been dropping consistently, … Continue reading Steady as we go: 7-day average falls for 6th day in a row

After weeks in 3rd place, with only sad Wales below them, England has pushed past Scotland into 2nd place in the UK league for the percentage of its population vaccinated. The Conservative Government, with their adolescent obsession to be ‘world-beating’ contaminates everything they do. How have they overtaken Scotland? It’s clear from comments yesterday. In the Commons yesterday, replying to a question, Matt Hancock said that 24% of care home residents had been vaccinated. Sufficiently stupid or just callous, he didn’t think to conceal the figure. On the same day in her media briefing, the First Minister announced that the … Continue reading Hancock and England’s dash to be first in the Vaccination League will cost lives

‘Research’ by failed Chancellor and failed Prime Minister, Gordon Brown’s ‘think tank’ drew an angry rebuttal from the First Minister and the National Clinical Director, Professor Leitch, yesterday. It was good to see after too much polite passivity in the past. No doubt Leitch will be accused of various things by opposition politicians. The Herald, of course, pounced on the story but there was less media attention than I feel sure Broon would have expected. Is he disappointing them? A Scottish Government spokesperson was first to describe the report’s findings as ‘false‘ and insisted ‘We find – and therefore isolate … Continue reading First Minister and Professor Leitch dump Gordon Brown’s ‘think tank’ droppings

Continue reading Scotland’s Future: A Roadmap to Scottish Independence by Christopher McEleny

Today in response to a question by Philippa Whitford, Matt Hancock confirmed that only 24% of care home residents in England have been vaccinated. Also today, the First Minister indicated that 80% of care home residents and staff have now been vaccinated. Some councils, Inverclyde and North Ayrshire claim 100%. Yesterday, in Parliament, Whitford explained in greater detail: The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation was very clear that those who live in care homes were the top priority for vaccination against covid-19. Due to integration of health and social care, Scottish health boards were able to deliver the Pfizer … Continue reading Philippa Whitford exposes UK Government’s disregard for JCVI advice on vaccinating care home residents

You can tell when one of these non-research profs uses his title to pontificate. Never having so much as seen a research methods course, they’re content to use rumour and casual observation in place of the hard evidence the people deserve to see. BBC Scotland, of course, don’t care as long as they get an SNP-bad headline. Today: A shortage of NHS staff could prevent the opening of the NHS Louisa Jordan to Covid patients if capacity is exceeded elsewhere, a leading doctor has said. President of the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh, Prof Mike Griffin, said the increasing … Continue reading Made up, Scare story