On 20 March 2023, in the Scotsman: “I have made clear my belief Scotland’s government should look as much as possible like the people we represent. As well as being the first ever First Minister from a minority ethnic background, I am pleased that a record number of women have agreed to serve, as well as a significant blend of younger and more experienced members. That said, every single appointment has been made on merit.” and Jackie Baillie, the deputy leader of Scottish Labour, said Mr Yousaf had assembled a bunch of “B rate politicians”. https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/humza-yousaf-unveils-full-cabinet-with-majority-of-women-for-first-time-ever-4084220 Nar mirrors in her … Continue reading Feminist charity did not criticise Humza at all

The Reporting Scotland team have been scouring the country’s teeth for weeks looking for a shortage of NHS dentists after hearing but not sharing this: From Public Health Scotland in January 2023: 95.4% of the Scottish population were registered with an NHS dentist as at 30 September 2022. Nearly all adults living in the most deprived areas were registered with an NHS dentist in September 2022, compared to 91.9% in the least deprived areas. As at 30 September 2022, 87.2% of children were registered, compared to 87.4% on 30 September 2021. As at 30 September 2022, 2.6 million registered patients had seen an … Continue reading Reporting Scotland staff have big smile as they find ‘NHS dentist crisis’ in Dunoon despite ferry fears!

Are you getting bored living up here in calm Jockoland? No health strikes at all while every profession in England has already struck several times with goodness knows the human costs. On reddit, I’m called a ‘ghoul’ for this kind of talk. Most will know that my only focus is the Scottish media’s failure to cover these events so as to inform the people they pretend to have a purpose in informing. Don’t they worry about folk afraid to turn up in a hospital or the old folk putting off a visit to relatives because they think the trains are … Continue reading No rail strikes in SNP Scotland

The Herald’s David Leask is on the case of the latest ferry fiasco narrative. Today, we hear that owners, the Independent-run Orkney Council, with a 62% of the vote Lib Dem MSP for the islands, anticipates two of its nine ferries breaking down and, of course, plans to pass the buck to the SNP Government in Edinburgh which subsidises it. Councillors have warned they may have to consider evacuation proposals for the outer isles. Well-down the page, we read, with interest: So, the Council took advantage of EU funding then lost it due to Brexit? Why do they then think … Continue reading 22% of not-SNP-council-owned ferries could go out-of-service and require evacuation of islands!

Under the headline ‘Doctors’ call for return of face mask guidance BBC Scotland is quoting the Scottish Healthcare Workers Coalition ‘accusing the Scottish Government of playing Russian Roulette with patients and staff.’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-66215539 The Scottish Healthcare Workers Coalition seems to be no more than a Facebook/Twitter group of 79 and 94 followers respectively. The FB page has had 3 posts in the last month and no new members in the last week – ‘growing pressure?’ The Twitter thread, with 429 following, seems restricted to healthcare workers affected by Long Covid. Clearly not much of a presence in the context of … Continue reading Unreliable sources on face mask safety – BBC Scotland allows tiny Facebook group of 79 to ‘accuse’ Scottish Government

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