Tag: wales

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Too positive to be newsworthy? Scotland’s train cancellations found to be lowest of any country or region in Great Britain.

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By stewartb ‘Worst major train stations for cancellations named’ is the headline of a BBC News website article today (December 20). Despite being Great Britain wide in scope, the story features in the site’s news for England. The same story featured prominently in Radio 4’s Today programme (also on December 20), both in news bulletins and in interviews, including with a Westminster government minister. Although a Today presenter challenged the Labour minister about the benefit of rail run by the public sector in a part of England given its relatively high level of cancellations, the programme made no mention of … Continue reading Too positive to be newsworthy? Scotland’s train cancellations found to be lowest of any country or region in Great Britain.

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Welsh students punished again by tuition fee hike, to leave them in debt more than twice that in Scotland

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By Professor John Robertson OBA Thanks to AR for alerting me to this: Today from BBC Wales: University fees in Wales are set to rise to £9,535 a year – nearly a £300 increase – from September 2025. The Welsh government announcement brings tuition costs in Wales in line with a hike in fees already announced by the UK government for universities in England. It is the second increase in charges for Welsh courses within a year, after the maximum charge went up from £9000 to £9250 from September 2024. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5yw97y9xnwo?s=03 Things were already bad for students in Wales, under Labour: Average student debt … Continue reading Welsh students punished again by tuition fee hike, to leave them in debt more than twice that in Scotland

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They are not only doing political journalism in BBC Wales differently from BBC Scotland but opponents of the government in Cardiff may behave differently too

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By stewartb Seems they are not only doing political journalism in BBC Wales differently from BBC Scotland but opponents of the government in Cardiff may behave differently too. The BBC News website in its Wales section today (November 26) had this headline about NHS Wales: ‘Ambulance response target may change after failures’. It reports: ‘Ambulance response targets in Wales may change in 2025, after four years of the service failing to meet its key measure.’ ‘A total of 65% of the most life-threatening calls are expected to arrive to a patient within eight minutes, but this has been missed for the past … Continue reading They are not only doing political journalism in BBC Wales differently from BBC Scotland but opponents of the government in Cardiff may behave differently too

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Scottish homicide rate falls 23% to 10% below that in England & Wales and more than 100% solved

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By Professor John Robertson, OBA From Recorded Crime in Scotland published today, we see that there were 48 recorded cases of murder and culpable homicide in Scotland in the year ending September 2024, down 11% on the previous year and down 23% on 2022.1 How is BBC Scotland covering this? They’re not. From the ONS in July 2024, there were 583 homicide offences in England & Wales for the year ending March 2024.2 All things being equal, England & Wales might have been expected to have a homicide rate 11 times that of Scotland, or 528 but had 583, 55 times … Continue reading Scottish homicide rate falls 23% to 10% below that in England & Wales and more than 100% solved

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Scotland has one of shortest gynaecology waiting lists but gets BBC Scotland’s bad news while Northern Ireland with more than twice as many waiting doesn’t seem to need to know that

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By Professor John Robertson OBA BBC Scotland’s and BBC Northern Ireland’s main pages above – spot the difference? Should Northern Ireland be told this? Maybe fewer women there are being left in pain? See this from the BBC Health report: Wow? BBC England is not covering the story. BBC Wales is, as they should, but why is BBC Scotland’s news editor choosing it, given the above graph? Is this just more of the thinking behind yesterday’s rape fake news? See: Today, the BBC Scotland News Editor (James Cook) chooses to include 2 rape reports in the 7 top stories. BBC England, Wales and Northern … Continue reading Scotland has one of shortest gynaecology waiting lists but gets BBC Scotland’s bad news while Northern Ireland with more than twice as many waiting doesn’t seem to need to know that

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Shock as some heart ops no longer possible in NHS Wales but Health Secretary not questioned

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By Professor John Robertson OBA From BBC Wales, yesterday: Some major vascular operations will no longer be going ahead in north Wales, a health board has announced. Betsi Cadwaladr health board said it was pausing its provision of planned and emergency open abdominal aortic aneurism (AAA) surgery to help improve its other care. The health board confirmed there had been an “incident”, but said the decision was not based solely on this and other vascular care would continue as normal. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gp58z7pr2o Wow! Dramatic news. The Health Secretary will be challenged? Nope Opposition politicians call it a scandal? Nope, not a word. How … Continue reading Shock as some heart ops no longer possible in NHS Wales but Health Secretary not questioned

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Productivity, measured as GVA per hour worked, is lower in Labour-run Wales than in other UK countries and regions in England

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By stewartb In the House of Commons this week (PMQs November 13) the leadership of the British Labour Party was at it again, denigrating Scotland and its government. Hansard records the response of the PM to a question from the SNP’s Brendan O’Hara on the ending of the winter fuel payment. The PM finished his answer with this: ‘I will take no lectures from his party about running the economy; the SNP’s record in Scotland is terrible.’ This rivals the false claim from Labour’s Chancellor recently that Scotland has the worst performing NHS in the UK. How to counter such … Continue reading Productivity, measured as GVA per hour worked, is lower in Labour-run Wales than in other UK countries and regions in England

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Devolution offers little protection for Scotland’s democratic choices – sobering assessment of the Sewel Convention and Westminster power by the Institute for Government

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By stewartb The Institute for Government (IfG) – the London-based think tank close to the Westminster/Whitehall establishment – has published an assessment of the operation of the Sewel Convention. It explains the convention is ‘designed to give the devolved institutions a degree of certainty that their powers will not be overridden, and enables the UK and devolved governments to work together on legislation where their policy objectives are aligned.’ Source: Allen et al (November 7, 2024) The Sewel convention in practice – five case studies from the 2019–24 parliament. Institute for Government, London (https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/sites/default/files/2024-11/Sewel-convention-in-practice.pdf ) The IfG reports that the … Continue reading Devolution offers little protection for Scotland’s democratic choices – sobering assessment of the Sewel Convention and Westminster power by the Institute for Government

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As ‘Britain’ imports record amounts of electricity from Europe, England gets as much from Scotland as it buys from France

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By Professor John Robertson OBA From the Telegraph, yesterday: Britain importing record amounts of electricity from Europe – The UK warned its growing dependence on imports leaves it at risk of outages. Britain importing record amounts of electricity from Europe. According to data published by the National Energy System Operator (Neso), net imports totalled 26.3 terawatt hours from January to September – a new record for the UK. That beat the previous high of 24.6 terawatt hours reached three years ago.1 From the UK Government in September 2024 – In 2008, the first year of SNP Government in Scotland, 8.7TWh were … Continue reading As ‘Britain’ imports record amounts of electricity from Europe, England gets as much from Scotland as it buys from France

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Why is the British Labour Party failing to solve waiting lists/times issues in NHS Wales if the Party’s leadership in opposition in Scotland have the answers?

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By stewartb Misrepresentation – with associated hypocrisy- from the British Labour Party politicians both at UK and Scotland levels is not new; it has become endemic; it may well have assisted Labour’s success in Scotland at the recent GE; and there is little or no sign of it being countered effectively at scale as we approach the REALLY crucial Holyrood election in 2026. Meanwhile in Wales where the British Labour Party has been in power since the establishment of devolved government … Senedd Research – the research and information service supporting the Welsh parliament – on 4 October, 2024 published … Continue reading Why is the British Labour Party failing to solve waiting lists/times issues in NHS Wales if the Party’s leadership in opposition in Scotland have the answers?