What evidence do we have that might make us take them seriously? Not this: From Housing Statistics for Scotland Quarterly Update published by the Scottsish Government yesterday: Between 2007/08 and 2017/18, the annual average supply of affordable housing per head of population in Scotland has been 13.4 homes per 10,000 population, higher than England (9.5 homes per 10,000 population), Wales (7.6 homes per 10,000 population), and Northern Ireland (10.2homes per 10,000 population). In 2018/19 the figures were 17.5 homes per 10,000 population in Scotland, 10.2 in England, and 8.2 in Wales. Nor this: From BBC UK today with, of course, no BBC … Continue reading Scottish Tories pretend to be unlike English Tories

Scottish Conservative leader and future list MSP, maybe, Douglas Ross has branded leader of the Alba Party, Alex Salmond ‘unfit to stand for office.’ Readers know all-too-well what Salmond was charged with, that he was found not-guilty but that, for some, he hasn’t apologised enough to the women involved. He also has not yet apologised to Tony Blair for trying to get him the jail for the deaths of half a million women in Iraq. Anyhow, remember Damien Green MP, colleague of Douglas Ross and near neighbour on the benches at Westminster? What did he do? 28 November 2008 Damian … Continue reading Fit to stand for office? Tory double standards

From https://twitter.com/joao_kay, this morning: Can you imagine the state @BBCNews would be in if N. Sturgeon had behaved as appallingly, even cruelly, towards a cancer patient husband AND on top of it all given her equally ghastly affair partner £126.000 of taxpayers money? Can you imagine the doorsteping? The enquiry? Try googling ‘Johnson Arcuri story‘ and almost every report headline will start with her name first, implying she initiated the affair, making her the ‘guilty woman’, the ‘home-wrecker’. The Telegraph, above, try to protect Boris as only they can. What about the broadcasters: BBC? Nope he’s our leader! ITV? Nope, … Continue reading BBC Scotland admits First Minister did not need to be cleared of cheating on cancer-ridden husband or giving our money to her lover!

Irregular contributor to TuS, the thinking man or woman’s Galloway, Alsadair (above), has a letter in today’s Herald which persuades me that the Alba Party will take seats from the Tories and Labour in the process. I’d already detected the fear coming from them. Here’s the bit that matters: TuS Pictures Editor, Jamie (16) has been authorised to pay full whack for a photograph, preferably unflattering, of the elusive Galloway. Continue reading Galloway ‘bets on Alba to take seats’

While we’re all so interested in poverty: Why is there no word of the numerous attempts, against the tide of Tory austerity ideology, by the Scottish Government to do something to make life a bit better for the most vulnerable? The UN and researchers across the UK have: In 2019, the United Nations report on ‘Workhouse Britain’ noted that Scotland was spending ‘£125 million per year to protect people from the worst impacts of austerity and unlike the UK Government provided funds for emergencies and hardships.‘ In 2017, researchers in Wales who studied how 7 ‘small countries’ – Wales, Scotland, New … Continue reading While we’re all so interested in poverty

“a beacon of progressive policy for the rest of the UK” “the most progressive policy brought in since devolution 20 years ago” By stewartb I understand from an earlier post here today that the leader of the Labour Party in Scotland is claiming – in stark contrast to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation – that the Scottish Government has a ‘record of shame’ on child poverty. Who view to believe? The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) is widely regarded as the authoritative, independent source of evidence on poverty in the UK. It provides a readily accessible set of graphs on poverty levels … Continue reading Joseph Rowntree Foundation on the SNP’s Scottish Child Payment

By Alasdair Galloway SNP 1, Alba 2 John, I have to take issue with your recent blog “Less popular than Boris Johnson? Aye right!” (https://talkingupscotlandtwo.com/2021/03/28/less-popular-than-boris-johnson-aye-right/). I agree with you, as I agreed with John Curtice, that the Greens are threatened by Alba running candidates on the Regional Lists (you can find Curtice at https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/19192169.alex-salmond-alba-stands-party-boost-pro-independence-msp—may-cost-snp-majority/). The error, I would suggest, you both make is to presume it is the Greens who are at most risk from Alba. The reasons for this view are obvious, It is known that some who vote SNP in their constituency vote Green on the Regional List. … Continue reading Galloway dares to question the infallibility of the Prof!

Incensed by the First Minister getting her offer in first, the opposition parties were left scrabbling for sound-bites. Accusing the FM of copying his policy of copying her policy then doubling it, Anas Sarwar was interrupted by a 5 year-old shouting: ‘Tell yer mother tae pay ma dad the living wage fur working in her food factory and we wouldnae need Nicola tae help us oot!’ Lib Dem leader, Willie Rennie, invited the nation’s punners to engage with his policies: ‘If you’re rooked and can’t afford to feed your bairns, just pawn some of your jewellery? Reader entries below. Same … Continue reading Campaign Day 1: Best Quotes

Today, Anas Sarwar has suggested that the Scottish Government has a ‘record of shame’ on child poverty. Already today, I’ve outlined what has been achieved, praised by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, within the heavy limitations of devolution. Read it at: https://talkingupscotlandtwo.com/2021/03/29/the-impoverished-soul-of-tom-gordon/ As for Labour: In 2010, Professor Danny Dorling then at Sheffield University, wrote: [W]hen writing a book, The Widening Gap, with colleagues in 1999, which considered how, under both the Tories and the start of New Labour, the gapbetween rich and poor continued to grow. We highlighted that New Labour explicitly continued Conservative spending policies for those two years … Continue reading Sarwar Labouring under amnesia

Responding to another lie from Tom Gordon, two readers have posted evidence worthy of as big an audience as possible. Share, share, share. Legerwood In its February 2018 report on University Applications UCAS analysed the applications from all 4 nations over a 12 year period, 2006-18, using the POLAR3 measure of deprivation. For Scotland the results showed that the gap between the most advantaged and least advantaged applicants had halved and that had been due to the increase in applications from the most disadvantaged applicants. In 2006 the ratio of applications from the most advantaged compared to the most disadvantaged … Continue reading How Scotland has not failed to close the attainment gap