This morning on BBC Scotland’s wee insert into BBC Breakfast we heard that ‘Business confidence in Scotland has taken a BATTERING (heavy emphasis)’ based on a Bank of Scotland Business Barometer survey. We also heard that ‘there was a 17-point fall during the first half of July’ (a two-week trend?) and that confidence was the lowest in Scotland. The Scotsman and the National went for falling and sliding rather than battering in their headlines.
Somewhat confusingly the same Bank
of Scotland Business Barometer at the end of June had report confidence 17%
higher in Scotland and higher here than elsewhere in the UK! See this from Insider on
June 29:
‘Plans for hiring staff in
Scotland are at a year-long high,
according to a new report. The Bank of Scotland’s Business Barometer for June
shows a 17% rise in overall business
confidence across Scotland in the past month to 17%. Hiring intentions
north of the border have reached their highest level since May 2018 as a net
balance of a fifth of businesses (20%) plan to create new jobs in the next year
– up 23% on last month. Economic optimism has risen 19 points to 2% in the past
month, while firms’ confidence in their own business prospects was 32%, up from
17% in May. Brexit fears for businesses have dropped in Scotland, the barometer
found, but a net balance of around a third of firms still believe the UK’s exit
from the EU is having a negative impact on their expectations for business
activity. This has dropped 18% from last month. The monthly survey of 1,200
businesses found business confidence in
Scotland is four percentage points higher than that across the UK as a whole.’
As far as I
can remember, BBC Scotland had ignored the above good news at the time and did
not use it to contextualise or to make today’s report more reliably
informative. They did not, of course, report much if any, of these many other
good news stories on the Scottish economy:
Noticed this piece in the links offered by the wonderful ‘Nana’ today – interesting to see how both Johnson and ‘spreadsheet Phil’ have altered relative positions since the article was written in 2013. Bit embarrassing for Johnson to be quite so brutally reminded of his oh so flexible beliefs. Link and snippets below:
Writing for The Daily Telegraph, he (Johnson) says that if Britain left the EU, “we would have to recognise that most of our problems are not caused” by Brussels.
However, the London Mayor claims the “question of EU membership is no longer of key importance to the destiny of this country”. The political row risks overshadowing more important weaknesses in the economy.
In his article today, Mr Johnson… warns that Britain’s problems will not be solved by simply leaving the EU as many of his Conservative colleagues apparently believe.
“If we left the EU, we would end this sterile debate, and we would have to recognise that most of our problems are not caused by “Bwussels”, but by chronic British short-termism, inadequate management, sloth, low skills, a culture of easy gratification and underinvestment in both human and physical capital and infrastructure,” the London Mayor says.
“Why are we still, person for person, so much less productive than the Germans? That is now a question more than a century old, and the answer is nothing to do with the EU. In or out of the EU, we must have a clear vision of how we are going to be competitive in a global economy.”
The London Mayor’s intervention comes after senior serving Government ministers confirmed that they would vote to leave the EU if there was a referendum now.
Mr Hammond, the Defence Secretary, said that he would… support leaving the EU without significant renegotiation of Britain’s membership.
The Welsh tories are showing Davidson’s ‘Scottish’ tories up for the gutless bunch they truly are. Interesting how beeb Scotland hasn’t felt that comparing and contrasting the Welsh and ‘Scottish’ tory reactions might be in the public interest given the appointment of the chap Walker (MP for Bertie Wooster) as depute at the Scotland Office. Link and snippets below:
The UK government should stop recruiting English MPs to ministerial roles in the Wales Office if Welsh MPs are unsuitable, a Welsh Tory MP says.
David TC Davies (Welsh tory MP – and Chairman of the Welsh Affairs select committee) said the candidate “should ideally come from Wales”.
“It’s the Welsh Office, not the Welsh and English Office,” Mr Davies told BBC Wales on Sunday.
“If we can’t find someone from Wales who’s acceptable for the deputy position, then just get rid of the deputy position.”
He said the Wales Office “should not be seen as some sort of stepping stone towards another job somewhere else”.
And he added that he had “made it clear” he was interested in the role.
Since Guto Bebb decided to quit over Brexit, the UK government has filled the Wales Office minister job with English MPs.
Under former prime minister Theresa May, Mr Foster’s predecessors were Nigel Adams, who represents Selby and Ainsty in Yorkshire, Eastleigh MP Mims Davies and Welsh speaker Stuart Andrew, who is MP for Pudsey.
Mr Foster (newly appointed Wales Office deputy) has two other jobs – in the cabinet office and as a government whip.
On Friday Tory councillor Richard John said not recruiting Welsh MPs to the Wales Office was “damaging” to his party’s “Welsh credentials”.
Former Welsh Tory leader Andrew RT Davies agreed it was a “missed opportunity”.
How not to do research 1: BBC Scotland reporter wants bad news and reports it but only if that’s what they find.
Using
increased demand for school uniform grants to get started, Reporting Scotland today gave us one their extended poverty porn mini-documentaries.
Spending the opening minutes in a free breakfast club, they didn’t tell us why
it is free. See this:
More children
and young people will benefit from a nutritious meal and a place to play this
summer holiday. Charities and councils will increase support for children from
low income families during the school holidays, backed by £350,000 from the Scottish Government.
Mostly we heard about voluntary groups and councils. We did
hear the minister announce the increased school clothing grant but, by then,
the extended focus on just two individual mothers and their worries had set and
distorted the scene.
Most important for the piece to be comprehensive, balanced and
fair, would have been mention of these major initiatives, unique to Scotland
and designed to moderate the effects of Westminster austerity:
People
in crisis made more than 165,000
successful applications to the Scottish Welfare Fund in the last financial
year, according to new statistics. The Fund paid out £35 million, including £10.4 million in Crisis Grants to people in
financial emergency, such as those struggling on low incomes or benefits – a
14% increase on 2017-18. The money helped people with essentials such as food,
heating costs and household items. A
further £24.8 million in Community Care Grants helped those facing extreme
financial pressures with one-off costs for purchases including beds, washing
machines and cookers. The Scottish
Welfare Fund is part of an annual package of over £125 million to mitigate
against the impact of UK Government welfare cuts. Since its launch in April
2013, the Fund has paid out more than £200 million to support over 336,000
households, with a third of recipients being families with children.
Finally, we
heard nothing of those Westminster austerity policies which have created these problems
in the first place and which the SNP Government fights to compensate.
Much remains to be done, of course, but there is evidence of progress in Scotland’s Wellbeing: national outcomes for disabled people, published yesterday. Here are extracts:
Crime:
In the longer term, evidence suggests that the incidence of crime among disabled people has decreased. Research from the EHRC based on the SCJS, found that in the 2008/09 – 2010/11 period disabled people were less likely to be victims of crime. During this period, they report that 19.5% of non-disabled people were victims of crime, compared to 17.6% of disabled people. By comparison, in 2012/13, there was almost no difference between the number of disabled and non-disabled people experiencing crime. (28)
Culture:
This graph suggests a modest but significant increase in the number of adults with disabilities attending cultural events or places in only four years.
Cultural Economy:
The Screen Equalities, Diversity and Inclusion Survey25, carried out by Creative Scotland and published in 2016, asked over 500 individuals working in film and TV in Scotland about their experiences and perceived barriers to progression. This survey found that 24% of the respondents stated that they had a disability or long-term health condition, compared to 19% of the national working age population. (36)
Education:
The above graph shows a significantly falling number of disabled adults with no qualifications and a narrowing of the gap.
Further we see a 25% increase in the number
of disabled people in HE:
At Scottish Higher
Education providers, participation in Higher Education by disabled people
increased from 2013/14 to 2017/18. The numbers increased from 21,475 disabled
students in 2013/14 to 30,500 disabled students in 2017/18 (see Figure 6.6).
The overall percentage of disabled students in the student body has increased
from 9% in 2013/14 to 12% in 2017/18. (44)
Visits to the Outdoors:
The SHS provides data on how often individuals visit the outdoors. Among disabled people, 40% visited the outdoors at least once a week in 2017. This has increased from 33% in 2013. (47)
Employee Voice:
A higher proportion of disabled people are covered by collective bargaining agreements, when compared to non-disabled people. In 2018, 40% of disabled people in Scotland reported that their pay and conditions are affected by agreements between trade unions and their employer, compared with 36% of non-disabled people. (50)
Debt:
The percentage of households with a disabled member experiencing unmanageable debt has fallen significantly in four years to almost close the gap with other families.
From a Scottish Government Freedom of Information response
(requested by which opposition MSP?) published yesterday, we can see both a
dramatic rise in the number of applications processed within only 21 days and
yet an equally dramatic fall in…
The Scottish government’s action plan announced yesterday,
includes: Up to £1 million to develop solutions to the barriers employers face
in hiring and retaining disabled people Up to £500,000 to pilot the provision
of support similar to Access…
As I work on a larger post on the Equality and Human Rights
Commission report which has been already covered in full negativity for
Scotland, by our Nomedia, I came across these startling graphs on pages 138 and
139. Violence…
Based on the latest figures for 2016-17 published by Scottish
Funding Council, Scotland’s Further Education college sector has delivered
across a range of indicators which show that they are fulfilling their
essential role in providing meaningful access to the disabled,…
All English hospital trusts charge staff and patients for car parking.
Around half of them charge disabled people for parking in disabled spaces. Only
three Private Finance Initiative hospital car parks in Scotland at Edinburgh,
Glasgow and Dundee…
The UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has
written a damning report attacking the UK government’s plans to introduce its
Personal Independence Payment (PIP) and called on them to repeal it and to
ensure protection and security…
There’s only one problem and that’s the possibility that the nasty
Tories will cut disability benefits before they are transferred to the Scottish
government and thus limit what they can do. So, according to the news.gov.scot
site today: ‘Health Secretary…
In a report condemning the UK’s record on disability rights,
positive commentary was reserved only for the actions of the Scottish
Government:
Governmenthttps://thoughtcontrolscotland.com/2017/09/01/un-condemns-uk-government-and-praises-scottish-government-on-disability-rights/
More recently, the Scottish Government has allocated of £2.5 million to 13
projects across Scotland designed to…
In England, the National Housing Federation has warned that
housing associations cannot afford to build new sheltered homes due to new Tory
funding rules, the shutting-down of services and the ‘crushing’ of investment.
They predict a shortfall of 240 000…
Almost half a million businesses in the UK are in significant financial distress, with the property, leisure and tourism sectors particularly badly hit, according to research published today.
Scotland was the only UK nation to see growth among builders accelerate
in the last three months, with an increase in both workloads and enquiries,
according to the Federation of Master Builders (FMB) Scotland. The trade
association’s State of Trade Survey for the second quarter of 2019, which
assesses the SME construction sector, found that in Scotland in terms of the
overall score for workloads, expected workloads and enquiries, had an increase
of 23 percentage points compared to the previous quarter.
The
above report does not mention the part played in this by Scottish government funding
of new public housing, though a previous one (22nd July) did:
Growth
in Scotland’s construction sector has accelerated as businesses become “fed-up”
waiting for Brexit, according to new figures. The Q2 2019 RICS Construction and
Infrastructure Market Survey also shows workload and employment expectations
are gathering pace for the year ahead. Workloads in public housing grew
at the fastest pace, with a net balance of 52% more respondents reporting
an increase in activity – up from -30% in Q1. This was closely followed by
growth in private housing workloads.
This
contrasts with decline in the UK. From Insider on 2nd July:
The
UK’s construction output has plummeted at
its steepest rate since 2009, as Brexit uncertainty and weaker demand hit all
major areas of the industry. The Markit/CIPS UK Construction purchasing
managers’ index (PMI) recorded a reading of 43.1 for June, down from 48.6 in
May.
I saw the above in the Guardian today
and was astonished. I quickly found this, but for the previous year, in
Scotland, where the rate seems to have been significantly higher, 13 times
higher:
I appreciate the limits of comparing crime figures between a country and a mega-city. The rate of rape conviction in Scotland had dropped from 49% in 2015/16 but was slightly higher than it had been in 2008/09, when it had been 37%. One-year statistical variations are not generally considered to be reliable indicators of a trend. You need at least 5.
I could not easily find recent conviction rates for other parts of the UK but did find this for 2007 when the Scottish rate had been around 37%.
Note that the conviction rate in London in 2007 was 14% compared to 3% today! Then from the USA:
These seem like stunning differences
in the quality of policing and in the attitudes of those working across the justice
system to the experience of victims of rape. In Scotland, rape has the lowest
conviction rate of all crimes, so I’m not suggesting that 39% is necessarily
satisfactory. I don’t know enough to have a strong opinion.
NHS
England has been hiding its A&E
performance away from easy scrutiny for some time, but the Nuffield Foundation
has been able to extract it (above). Most news coverage fails to distinguish
between Type 1 and Type 2 (‘minor’) A&E departments, in England. Only Type
1 A&E departments are comparable with those in Scotland. Only 77.2% of Type
1 A&E attendances were seen in 4 hours or less in Q3 of 2019 (red line).
See how BBC News presented the damning report
on alcohol treatment in England (top right). The broadcast had it only half way
through. Compare this with the headlined and wall-to-wall coverage of drug
deaths in Scotland. BBC 1 did it then Reporting Scotland did it again, over more
than one day. So, we had this kind of thing:
And
of course, we had Sarah Smith weighing in with a big lie about treatment:
Talking-up Scotland 