Scottish Bank Headquarters, past, present and future:  a potted history of 21st century banking in Scotland.       By A Retired Bank Manager While Nicola Sturgeon suspended work on the economics of independence in March last year to concentrate on tackling the Covid pandemic, this hasn’t stopped the UK government encouraging its friendly think tanks and business contacts to speak out against Scottish self-government during the Holyrood election campaign. The latest to do so is the chief executive of the UK state owned NatWest Group, Alison Rose, who threatened to remove a token brass plate from Gogarburn in Edinburgh to London. Senior … Continue reading UK government ‘encourages’ business contacts to speak out against Scottish self-government during election campaign

From SNP Media today: The SNP has accused Scottish Tory Leader Douglas Ross of being “engulfed in Tory cronyism” – after admitting to directing thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money to a personal friend when he was an MSP. In an interview with the Herald, Douglas Ross confirmed he used Holyrood expenses – footed by the taxpayer – to cover £7,000 worth of rent on an Edinburgh flat which was half-owned by a refereeing colleague.  The property in question – valued at £265,000 – was initially bought by Ross’ referee chum Hugh Dallas and another individual in December 2016.  The … Continue reading Douglas Ross ‘directed taxpayer’s money to a friend’

From reader Alex Lee-MacDonald: Exactly, actual Education experts like Prof Mark Priestley and Dr Marina Shapira argue that the big “decline” in Maths in PISA came in 2006 before the introduction of Curriculum for Excellence- see https://mrpriestley.wordpress.com/2019/12/06/what-do-the-pisa-results-tell-us-about-scottish-education/. Supposed declines since then are not statistically significant (maybe UK education systems should be better at teaching journalists statistical literacy!) The declines between 2003 and 2006 actually seem pretty odd to me and I would probably guess they are due to sampling methods. PISA is clearly seriously flawed and I was disappointed the Institute for Government gave it so much weight (though to be … Continue reading Has the Institute for Government been primed to try to influence the Scottish elections by providing ‘oven-ready’ bad news?

The Institute for Government has clearly been primed to try to influence the Scottish elections by providing ‘oven-ready’ bad news for the MSM to pass on to voters just in time. On the 31st March they announced, ignoring all the sounds coming from the EU, that we’d wait 10 years to join the EU and only yesterday we were told that, based on estimates, breaking away from the UK would leave Scotland facing sizeable fiscal deficits. Today it’s this: Declining scores for Scottish pupils in maths and science can plausibly be blamed on Curriculum for Excellence (CfE), according to a major … Continue reading Declining scores for Scottish pupils in maths and science can plausibly be blamed on Tory austerity.

It’s a story not featuring even on the BBC Scotland website but Reporting Scotland opens with: The family of a Scottish woman who died after falling from a balcony in Benidorm four years ago today have (sic) called for Scotland to adopt a new system for investigating unexplained deaths. Kirsty Maxwell’s parents say if Scotland had coroners like those of (sic) England and Wales, they would have received far more help when she died. Instead they were left to cope almost entirely by themselves. Where has this come from, at this time? There is to be a new MTV documentary … Continue reading Reporting Scotland ambulance chasing into an election

On the 9th February 2021, Savanta ComRes for the Scotsman returned the first No majority in nearly a year. The Scotsman had misled readers with its reporting of the data but even after weighting it still did suggest a No lead. Since then, we’ve had almost exactly as many No as Yes leads and a wee cluster of apparent No leads in the last 5. But 2 of the last three have been for the Scotsman and done by Savanta Com/Res. Look back over the body of results since Savanta ComRes’s first in February and there’s a pattern. 6 out … Continue reading The Scotsman’s pollsters can always find enough NO voters

While, you will find the SNP and the Scottish Government explicitly accused of failure in addressing child poverty by Anas Sarwar and others, in BBC Scotland reporting, you won’t find either credited with any role in reports of success such as the above, even though it is clearly the result of an SNP policy, a Scottish Government Bill and its implementation by an SNP-led council. The Scottish Government introduced the Child Poverty Act 2017 that lays out a statutory requirement on local authorities and health boards to report progress against a set of ambitious targets to reduce Child Poverty by … Continue reading SNP’s Child Poverty Act in action in SNP-led Glasgow Council school

When Covid death rates were high, occasionally and briefly higher than elsewhere, we heard little else. They have now been the lowest in the UK for nearly two weeks: BBC Scotland seem to have missed this. Continue reading Scotland has lowest Covid death rate for nearly two weeks now

From SNP Media today:  First Minister Nicola Sturgeon today asked people in Scotland to vote SNP to keep the NHS safe as she highlighted the risk to the NHS of putting power in Tory hands. With the SNP Scottish Government currently offering an average pay rise of 4% to NHS Agenda for change staff, that would be paid within the first 100 days of a re-elected SNP Government, the First Minister highlighted the insulting 1% on offer from the Tories, despite the extraordinary lengths NHS staff have gone to over the last year.  On a campaign visit to Eastwood the SNP leader … Continue reading KEEP SCOTLAND’S NHS IN SAFE HANDS

From the thinking-man’s Galloway, Alasdair: In today’s Herald, Jody Harrison, writes about the most recent Panelbase survey (conducted for “Scot Goes Pop”). This suggests the forthcoming election will elect 61 SNP MSPs, while Alba will end up with “almost ten seats”, and the Greens will win 11 seats. Later on in the piece, while the SNP remain on 61 and the Greens on 11, Alba don’t have “almost 10 seats”, but in fact 8. As others, like you dear reader, not arithmetically challenged (like Mr Harrison) is 80 MSPs elected for independence supporting parties. Harrison claims this “means the ‘supermajority’ … Continue reading ‘Arithmetically challenged’ or……