In the Sunday Times today, the less than appealing, to me anyway, Michael Glackin opens with: There’s something about Kate Forbes that reminds me of the scary young girl in the cult film The Ring. Certainly, the economy secretary’s shouty response on television when questioned about the latest Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland (Gers) figures the other night was fearsome. ITV Borders political editor Peter MacMahon looked decidedly grateful for the protection afforded by social distancing. But more frightening is Forbes’s inability to master facts. The increase in Scotland’s notional deficit to 8.6%, from 7.4%, is deeply worrying. Our deficit is … Continue reading No mirrors in the Glackin house?

Research published in July, missed by me a the time but now shared with me by a reader suggests a strong correlation between infection levels in care homes which were, for the elderly, large and in private ownership. Carried out by staff at Glasgow and Edinburgh universities in association with researchers at 9 health boards in Scotland, it found: Sixty-six (94.3%) outbreaks were in older people’s care-homes, where 60.6% had experienced an outbreak compared to six (5.0%) of all other care-home types (Table 2). Care home characteristics systematically varied by care-home type. Older people’s care-homes were much larger (median 48 … Continue reading Covid-19 research: Private care homes in Scotland were more likely to be infected

Scotland is now testing at around twice the rate in Wales and perhaps in England too. It’s ‘perhaps in England‘ because the authorities there have stopped publishing the figures. I wonder why that could be when it’s a ‘world-beating system’ according to the PM? Scotland’s percentage of tests positive is significantly lower than elsewhere in the UK. Why does this matter? From the Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health: The percent positive is exactly what it sounds like: the percentage of all coronavirus tests performed that are actually positive, or: (positive tests)/(total tests) x 100%. The percent positive (sometimes … Continue reading Scotland’s positivity rate is low. That’s good

As the UK Government warns of possible moves to rota-based and remote learning in the event of outbreaks, the Scottish Tories accuse the SNP of politicising a health crisis to ‘promote separatism.’ Here are the stages of response planned for England’s schools: The Scottish Tories are now struggling to regroup and to find some form of words to explain why these earlier statements do not now make them hypocrites unless they attack the Johnson Plan, above. BBC Scotland’s, Gordon Brewer is not expected to grill Jamie Greene, above, on this, but to ask him what tartan his tie is and … Continue reading Scottish Conservatives to accuse Sturgeon of keeping schools open full-time and cynically politicising a national public health crisis

Desperately seeking soothing click-bait advertising revenue, the Herald chooses the above to inform the same public they hope to persuade that they have trusted, quality journalism: Hmmm…does it work for you? Me neither. Here’s something informative: The level of new community infections is very very low everywhere except in Glasgow where there is a very large population (600 000+) and an outbreak restricted to a single factory. So, even in Glasgow, community spread may be very low there too. Continue reading Community infection levels very low across the country

By Gordonb Meanwhile, back in the REAL world….………. GERS was invented in 1992. Holyrood opened in 1999 That detail alone, speaks volumes. GERS are propogandised as ‘Scotsgov’s figures” by unionists. Yet there was NO SCOTSGOV in 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 So NOT ‘Scotsgovs’ figures at all then… WM figures to suit their anti Scots indy agenda. A fact borne out when all but 2 of the data sets used for GERS are WM FIGURES VIA THE ONS and the vast majority of those are ESTIMATED figures (code for: pick a scary number, treble it, present as factual). … Continue reading That £15.5bn is NOT a deficit, it is a SURPLUS !!!

According to the Food Standards Agency for England: Food Standards Scotland appears to be monitoring no outbreak other than the one in Coupar Angus. Might this situation be the result of a higher frequency of environmental health inspections in Scotland? This is evidence from 2017: From Environmental Health News on 20th September: ‘English local authorities are seriously falling behind their devolved neighbours when it comes to resourcing food inspections. The latest LAEMS figures published this week reveals that each Environmental Health professional inspecting food establishments in England is responsible for 345 premises annually while in Wales the figure is nearly half that at … Continue reading England and Wales’ hidden ‘tsunami’ of coronavirus outbreaks in food plants

I haven’t read any of the above in Herald today. I don’t need to. I can guess. It’s about Nicola trying to stop Old Firm fans from singing offensive songs and some other supposed ‘totalitarian’ behaviour from a man who has no apparent problems with Papal bulls. The detail doesn’t really matter because the basic premise in the headline is plain daft. In the most recent full poll from YouGov, it’s clear that SNP support is and remains significantly (around 15%) stronger among the working classes (C2DE) than among the middle and upper classes (ABC1): Why might that be? It’s … Continue reading Is the SNP too popular with the working classes, Kevin?

In a remarkably out-of-touch piece, Douglas Fraser who, according to an odd BBC profile page, ‘is alleged that he has degrees from Oxford and Harvard‘ has written to argue that the GERS figures seriously undermine the case of Scottish Independence. Alleged? He writes: GERS shows the gap between Scottish tax take and spending is big, but coronavirus is set to make it humongous, with fiscal repairs requiring years of effort. GERS shows the gap between Scottish tax take and spending is big, but coronavirus is set to make it humongous, with fiscal repairs requiring years of effort. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-53924126 This is … Continue reading BBC Scotland economics heavyweights at odds over GERS

With no grateful comment on the efforts of the local contact tracing teams to shut down this large-scale outbreak and reminding us of the attempts by private care home owners to deflect blame away from their heavy reliance on agency staff and onto the Scottish Government, the 2 Sisters company is allowed, with no critical assessment from the BBC, to suggest the virus came into the plant from the local community: Whilst it is important to ensure our measures on site are robust and working, we believe it is also critically important for our people to understand their obligations away … Continue reading Coupar Angus factory owners try to blame local community and distract from use of agency workers