Most Scots oppose a new justice policy that allows people caught with Class A drugs including cocaine to escape with a police warning instead of prosecution. A Panelbase poll for The Sunday Times — published before Nicola Sturgeon and the Scottish Conservatives leader Douglas Ross make a joint visit to a drugs recovery group tomorrow — suggests that the authorities are out of step with voters on a key aspect of Scotland’s growing crisis. Official figures show cocaine was implicated in one third of Scotland’s soaring drugs deaths in 2020 (in 459 out of 1,339 cases). But Dorothy Bain, the lord advocate, announced … Continue reading Unresearched drugs scare story from former BBC Scotland head of news

Immediately, I thought, surely ‘the SNP’ or Scottish Government has not had complete control over fisheries in our waters, in the sense that, they and Labour before them, would have had to allow access by trawlers because of the EU access rights and regulations, operating for decades now. I did have a look at this: Sea fisheries: https://www.gov.scot/policies/sea-fisheries/ and found these statements: Marine Scotland works with the UK Government to negotiate fishing opportunities through a suite of international negotiations. The UK / EU Trade and Cooperation allows full reciprocal access to both Parties. This means that all EU-registered fishing vessels … Continue reading Something fishy about this?

According to Scottish Care, there were 35 989 residents in care homes in 2017, the most recent data. Most of these have had three jags now so that’s more than 105 000 jags altogether. To our knowledge only 11 have been bungled, 0.01%. How many of these 11 then went on to catch Covid or die from it? None. You can be sure the error was remedied quickly and that no one suffered. Jackie Baillie and the Record would be shrieking about that if it had. Who told Jackie Baillie about this? What was their motive? Labour membership or money? … Continue reading 99.9% given correct vaccine, three times!

Sadly, Johnson is correct. Rewarding donors is pretty much a cross-party tradition which Johnson and his pals are taking to its logical conclusion: William Manuel Morris, Baron Morris of Handsworth, OJ, DL (born 19 October 1938), generally known as Bill Morris, is a former British trade union leader. He was General Secretary of the Transport and General Workers’ Union from 1992 to 2003, and the first black leader of a major British trade union. Morris sat in the House of Lords, under the Labour Party whip, from 2006 to 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Morris,_Baron_Morris_of_Handsworth In 2001, here are the top donors to the Labour Party: Bill Morris’ TGWU was in 5th place, donating £200 000 in … Continue reading Thanks to Labour, Johnson’s answer is not entirely astonishing

Yesterday, Jamie Maxwell tweeted this response to the above news: @chaillich offered us the above unholy triptych. So, how good is Sarwar’s judgement? I don’t need evidence that Labour supporters are again austerity do I? 56% of Scots opposed Trident renewal in a 2016 Survation poll. In a 2014 Panelbase poll, Scottish respondents were most opposed to fracking (82%). Which other group is in favour of 2 and 3? The GMB! Do they help fund the Labour Party? They do? Well, well, well. Continue reading Scottish Labour leader shoots himself in foot…again

The Glasgow Caledonian University led study found 1% of patients develop hospital associated infections (HAIs). It compares favourably with previous estimates for the UK (7.8%) and recent figures from Europe (3%). https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-57942366.amp?fbclid=IwAR3yKRZdAemFIeBaGGPkrITNP7wyV-_crXdg4qiO7YizFsMq5VSZvi1p4SI A friend has just shared this July report again. At the time I wrote: BBC Scotland wins ‘Cringeprop21’ award as hospital infections fall to lowest in Europe! That headline is a belter, a howler, the cringyest of cringy. Why? Well it looks bad doesn’t it? £46 fn million!!?? Yousaf must go? Bring back Freeman and make her resign before she retires again? The people have a right to … Continue reading Reminder: Hospital infections nearly 8 times as common in non-Scottish parts

Already this morning, I’ve posted a fantastic piece on the Livingston vaccine, prompted by a comment from Clydebuilt and I’ve reposted a stewartb comment on Scotland’s Jäger units. I could have missed them. I will have missed others before. If I wake up to exciting new opportunities to rebut, I just plough-on, devil take the hindmost, and forget to look back for yesterday’s truffles in the comments. Very occasionally readers will remind me of a good comment by themselves or others that I could repost to good effect but mostly they are too modest to do so My ‘system’ is … Continue reading BBC: Talking-up Scotland’s ‘Heath Robertson’ editorial system is failing its readers

Like that Grand Old Duke of York, not the current one with juvenile preferences, BBC Scotland have been force-marching those oh-so-few squaddies with needles or recently-crashed ambulances, up and down on a regular basis to give the impression they’re saving NHS Scotland. Wait, would Sisyphus be a better analogy? Anyhow from stewartb: From an article in the US magazine Wired in 2017 (by Emily Dreyfuss) we learn that: ‘The human brain has a built-in tendency to conflate the aberrant with the norm. The news industry—and certain politicians—know this all too well.’ This seems highly relevant when reviewing this evening’s (19 … Continue reading BBC Scotland conflates the aberrant with the norm for you

I’m grateful, once more, to reader Clydebuilt for drawing my attention to this report ,suggesting that the Livingston Valneva vaccine, cancelled by the UK Government in September, may be the best yet. Why might it have the edge? From aljazeera.com on 9 November 2021: Rather than induce an immune response that targets just the spike protein of the coronavirus, the Valneva vaccine, also known as VLA2001, stimulates an immune response to the entire virus, and that might just give it an edge over its competitors. It is different in that it uses the tried and tested method of taking the … Continue reading UK Government denies Scots the vaccine with an edge over its competitors!

Above, today’s headline story, the tragic death of one man and his non-medic wife’s belief that the cause was covered-up. Below, the almost identical story with no updated information of any note that I can see, repeated only 24 hours later. Surely John Beattie has a neighbour who knows someone who knows some one who died in hospital. A big Union Flag in the garden would be a nice bonus. If things don’t improve, they’ll need to ask Anas Sarwar to get one of his in-laws to scour their practice records for a suitable candidate. Continue reading BBC Scotland faces shortages of health scare stories