NHS Scotland’s A&E departments see around 300 000 patients in a year. Around 5% wait more than 12 hours because after triage they have been found to be not at serious risk. A Scottish Cons freedom of information request found one person who waited 84 hours, nine months ago. We are not given the full details. There are beds in A&E. Did they wait in one of those as seems likely. Did the medics try to send them home but they refused to go? The Cons also found ‘others who were not treated for 79, 64 and 53 hours‘ so … Continue reading Only 0.001% of emergency cases interesting to Scottish Tories

BBC Scotland regularly reports when Scotland has the highest Covid 19 infection rate in the UK. On 8 July, we read: Scotland still has highest Covid rate in the UK and last week they were careful to remind us The number of Covid-19 infections in Scotland rose last week. They’re saying nothing this week as cases fell sharply in Scotland by 18% and by 606 to 2 841. In England, they climbed by 13% to 28 167 making the rate pretty much the same as in Scotland and so not newsworthy for the agenda. The rate in Wales climbed 4% … Continue reading Covid cases plummet in Scotland as they surge in England and Wales

By stewartb Rightly, poverty and its negative consequences are important, politically charged subjects. The purpose of this blog post is to put the feasibility of addressing these issues in Scotland today in a context viz. that within which the Scottish Parliament and Government operates whilst within the UK. The Scottish Government’s constraints and dependencies were described recently in a publication from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS): ‘… the challenges of projecting the finances of a government (the Scottish Government) that has to run a balanced budget, and whose funding depends to a large extent on decisions by the UK … Continue reading On poverty and inequality: how England’s voters have chosen for the UK to be!

By Alasdair Galloway For many people Neil Oliver is a zoomer. Even the National Trust couldn’t put up with him. Someone though must think he’s ok though even if it is just his mammy and GB News. This https://twitter.com/i/status/1571975114673061891 is a classic Oliver defence of the Union. But he makes several points that even though I don’t agree with him, remain important. First of all, there is his view of the “Scottish connection”, which seems to take the form of the Queen dying in Scotland as a reflection of the significance of Scotland’s place in that Union. Even a cursory … Continue reading Neill Oliver and Britishness

We’re used to a sequence of small surveys of around 1 000 Scots showing, recently, support for independence down just below 50%. These opinion polls are carried out by private companies and often for newspapers with an agenda on the issue. They’re by no means useless but neither are they authoritative. Not on the Herald’s front page in paper but leading in the online version and of course, in the National (above), this major report is being ignored by the BBC, the Scotsman, the Record and the Courier. From the British Social Attitudes Survey 2022: Just over half of people … Continue reading Support for independence at least 52% in first large scale reliable research

In a quick-fire hat-trick of reports carefully avoiding the Scottish Government’s achievements in child poverty reduction, in increased nurse staffing, Reporting Scotland give us an evidence-free piece on the living wage. A quick bit of research by their many paid researchers would have provide the context all professional journalists claim to practice but, at Pacific Quay, they don’t. See this: So, to summarise: Scotland has among the highest median earnings in the UK, dramatically reducing numbers of low-paid workers, a narrower gender pay-gap and has significantly fewer workers earning less than the Living Wage, than the other parts of the … Continue reading Not telling us about Scotland and wages

On a bit of a negative roll this morning, Reporting Scotland goes from supposed failures on child poverty, quickly into this: The number of student nurses recruited this year is almost 1 000 short of Scottish Government goals. University admission figures from UCAS show that from more than 4 800 nurse and midwife places for the academic year, just 3 850 have been accepted. The Royal College of Nursing [trade union] said the shortfall could add to the current ‘workforce crisis.’ Leaving aside the overall situation in Scotland with more than 50% more nurses per patient than England has (https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-19-00620/), … Continue reading Scotland recruits far more student nurses

BBC Scotland is reporting throughout the day on child poverty in Scotland with none of context nor the comparisons to reveal how much the Scottish Government is already doing to compensate for the austerity policies of the Conservative Government in London. This, of course, contrasts with their reporting of drug deaths where comparison is all. Missing from the BBC Scotland reports, this: The comparative facts: Scotland currently has 19% of households living in poverty, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) said. This compares to a rate of 24% in Wales and 22% in England. The Scottish rate has declined from 23% … Continue reading Child poverty in larger families 50% more common in non-Scottish parts of UK

The little narcissist is everywhere in ‘our’ media lying about the NHS that pays him for the odd visit to a practice. Has anyone you know benefited from his treatment? Here’s the real news on nurses in Scotland: So, Scotland has more than 50% more nurses per patient than England. That’s a huge life-saving difference. Student nurses and midwives entering Scottish Government funded degree programmes will increase by 8.7% in 2022-23, to a total recommended intake of 4837 students. This will be the 10th successive increase in recommended student numbers, with the intake doubling over the last decade. To address the … Continue reading Sandesh Gulhane ignorant of how many more nurses Scotland has?