BBC Scotland today has: One care home closing every week, industry warns but ‘the industry’ reps have no actual figures to offer. The media are pretty much swallowing it whole and regurgitating it, undigested, for their anxious aging audiences. The opposition parties wait in the wings to pepper the regurgitated matter with their own spices. Here are the most recent data for 31 March 2022, published in September 2022: On 31 March 2022, there were 1,051 care homes for adults and 40,579 registered places – 20% and 5% fewer, respectively, compared with 31 March 2012. On 31 March 2022, there … Continue reading ‘Care home closures’ is a media-assisted scare by cash-cow owners to conceal increased availability and increase costs for us

Leaving aside the irony of someone with a name common on Shetland suggesting the Orkneys are the ‘most northerly’, David Leask tells us today that that is where Scotland’s worst ferry crisis is. He needs a holiday in South Uist to see some real suffering – folk eating their own dogs and, a contact informs us, their own grannies! As you can see from the photographs , these are wee boats, owned by the Council, the one planning to secede from Scotland. Where does the Council get the money to run them? Would council tax be a factor? I bet … Continue reading ‘Scotland’s worst ferry crisis’ cannot be blamed on SNP

Headlining in the Herald today, a warm story of a charity helping asylum seekers give birth. It’s very nice, touching, but missing a few things for a supposed headline news story rather than a cuddly women’s magazine. Here’s something newsworthy though little reported at the time: In September 2019: The safety of vulnerable mothers and newborn babies [in England] is being put at risk by NHS fees that deter undocumented migrant women from accessing care, a new report from Maternity Action backed by the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) has warned. NHS packages for overseas pregnant women start at £7,000 for antenatal, … Continue reading The brutally different realities, largely unreported, for pregnant asylum seekers in Scotland and England

The Scotsman is off today with a front page and an editorial suggesting the Scottish Government is putting the lives of those living in tower blocks at risk of a Grenfell-type tragedy by not even having identified those with inflammable cladding. It isn’t. It doesn’t need to. Most high rise buildings in Scotland with new cladding adding in the last few decades, are covered in inflammable material but it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter because the fire will be contained on one floor and residents will thus escape easily. Why? This: Reader Gordon Darge wrote for us in January 2020: As a … Continue reading The Scotsman and the Towering Inferno that will not light

BBC Health is warning, today: London could see tens of thousands of measles cases due to low levels of vaccination, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has warned. Mathematical calculations suggest an outbreak could affect between 40,000 and 160,000 people. Higher levels of immunisation in the rest of the UK means there is a “low risk” of a large epidemic elsewhere. Measles usually starts as a cold and then is followed by a rash – but there can be serious complications for some. “For every 1,000 children who get measles, one or two will die from it,” said Prof Beate … Continue reading 95.4% in Scotland immunised against deadly measles

Headlining today, an SNP rebel, gives BBC Scotland and Unionists what they desire so much, division: He accused the party of being “clueless” on independence and claimed that its leadership had been playing “tricks” on members over the past six years and continually “kicking the can down the road”. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-66201136 In the attached ‘Analysis’ by David Wallace Lockhart, there’s no mention of this, from 11 years ago: A SHAMED Scottish Nationalist MP made a humiliating public apology yesterday for romping on a hotel bed with two girls aged 17 and 18. Married father of three Angus MacNeil admitted he was … Continue reading How the BBC loves an SNP rebel!

BBC Wales has, today, a report on a woman travelling 200 miles for a dentist appointment. BBC Health linked to BBC UK and Northern Ireland has a similar account. BBC Scotland has a different dentistry story and is ignoring the ‘crisis’. The BBC Health report even has this: Compared with other nations, Scotland was found to have better access to NHS dentistry for adults, with 18% of practices accepting new patients. However Wales, England and Northern Ireland were at 7%, 9% and 10% respectively. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-66167563 Now, why would the BBC in Labour-run Wales want to ignore that? Why would the … Continue reading Only in the country with the best access to dentists is the Government accused of anything

Yesterday, the Herald and the Express mutually publish completes lies about CalMac executive staff bonuses. Within hours, CalMac had protested, offering an accurate account: I can find no sign of corrections nor of apologies from either tabloid. Continue reading Disgrace as Herald and Express fake ferry exec bonuses!

In 2020 (latest figures) Canadian ferry service, BC Ferries cancelled 1 163 sailings due to staff shortages. The corporation can’t attract workers because it’s not providing fair pay and security. https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2023/07/13/BC-Ferries-Cancelling-Sailings-Jobs/ There are no recorded incidents of a CalMac sailing cancelled due to staff shortages. As early as 2015: Caledonian MacBrayne named as the Living Wage Foundation’s Scottish Champion 2016 https://www.calmac.co.uk/article/5037/Caledonian-MacBrayne-named-as-the-Living-Wage-Foundations-Scottish-Champion-2016 They were the first transport operator to do so and, in November 2022: Nautilus International has achieved a 7.2% pay uplift for members working at Scottish ferry operator Caledonian MacBrayne (CalMac) during the latest round of negotiations with the … Continue reading Cancellations: British Columbia Ferries lose 1 163 NIL to CalMac

Reports of people in England pulling their own teeth out with pliers have prompted critics to say it’s no better in Scotland. What do you think? Are the SNP lying when they say access to dentistry in the poorer parts is 100%? If your self-dentistry has made it difficult for you to whistle-blow try this technique: Continue reading BBC Radio Scotland issues advice for mutilated self-dentists who still want to whistle-blow on SNP dentistry failures