Talking-up Scotland

Your Complaint

Four headlines missing from Reporting Scotland:

1. Scottish growth ‘outpacing UK as a whole’
2. Scottish growth three times UK level
3. ‘Foreign Direct Investment in Scotland at ‘unprecedented’ levels
4. 8% of the population, nearly 9% of the exports but only 5.25% of the imports

In detail:

Scottish growth ‘outpacing UK as a whole’

First from the BBC Scotland website on 11^th June, but not broadcast to TV audience

‘Research by Royal Bank of Scotland indicates the Scottish economy is growing faster than the UK as a whole. The bank’s PMI report for May records the fastest pace of growth in Scotland’s private sector since July 2017. It also found the sharpest expansion in order book volumes for 46 months.’

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-44436783

Scottish growth three times UK level

Second, from the Fraser of Allander Institute, on June 11^th, but missed by its usual pals at BBC Scotland:

‘Slightly later than usual, here are our monthly nowcasts of the Scottish economy, covering the first two quarters of 2018. Our model suggests that GVA growth in 2018 Q1 was 0.29%, or at an annual rate 1.18% and GVA growth in 2018 Q2 is 0.29%, or at an annual rate 1.16%. By way of comparison, UK GDP growth in Q1 was only 0.1%.’

https://fraserofallander.org/scottish-economy/latest-nowcasts-of-the-scottish-economy/

When the news is less good, BBC Scotland, rarely miss Fraser of Allander reports. At the end of March 2018, they reported happily on the SNP government’s strategies:

‘Clutter’ of strategies stifling Scotland’s growth, say economists

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-43559165

‘Foreign Direct Investment in Scotland at ‘unprecedented’ levels

Third, on June 11^th, they missed this from Insider magazine:

Figures from accountancy group EY show the country is maintaining its attractiveness among foreign investors, even though other European countries are narrowing the gap with the UK. Scotland attracted a new record of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) for the third year in a row in 2017 and set a new 10-year high, according to new figures from accountancy group EY. The country experienced a 7 per cent increase in the number of projects it secured last year, taking the total up to 116. This rate of growth was higher than the UK as a whole at 6 per cent, and thus Scotland’s share of UK FDI rose to 9.6 per cent in 2017, above the historical average of 9.3 per cent.’

https://www.insider.co.uk/news/ey-foreign-direct-investment-scotland-12669006

8% of the population, nearly 9% of the exports but only 5.25% of the imports

And, fourth, from me, they missed:

8% of the population, nearly 9% of the exports but only 5.25% of the imports

https://www.uktradeinfo.com/Statistics/RTS/Pages/default.aspx

I’m hurt. Surely, they’re following me?

So, overall, a masterly demonstration of bias by omission.

© BBC Scotland

Yesterday, six times in the morning, once at 1.30pm, once at 6.30pm and again at 10.30pm we heard from ‘top psychiatrist’, Dr Jane Morris:

‘I feel very guilty. I feel we should be able to offer our patients the best that is available. And very often it’s just an accident of the clinicians you have and the training they bring with them.’

The quote was linked only loosely to BBC Scotland’s own ‘research’ into how long under-19s with an eating disorder waited between referral and treatment. Unable to get a response from many health boards, BBC Scotland were happy to have Dr Morris conclude that the service was patchy and to make some fairly limited comparisons with England:

‘In England there is a four-week target for teenagers with eating disorders, although it is not always met.’ (Special euphemism award?)

Though the Scottish government said teenagers with eating disorders were being seen within its 18-week target (unlike NHS England), this did not seem to satisfy Morris nor the BBC.

Top academic and peer-reviewed researcher, Professor John Robertson, snarled:

‘Dr Morris does seem to be a fine, caring professional. I don’t question her expertise or her compassion, but I doubt it’s matched anywhere in the BBC Scotland news team who are once more ‘ambulance chasing’ in a desperate attempt to find fault with the SNP government. However, Dr Morris does not seem to have done any empirical research upon which to base her guilty feelings or to justify comparisons with England. I’m sure she means well but I doubt that phrases like ‘often it’s just an accident of the clinicians you have and the training they bring with them’ will be warmly received by many of these professionals whose competence she seems to be doubting.’

As for the comparison with England, I won’t waste my time on this but, as you might expect, all is not well there. See

Eating disorder sufferers waiting six months for treatment after seeing GP

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/eating-disorder-sufferers-waiting-six-months-for-treatment-after-seeing-gp-a8055226.html

‘New figures show UK eating disorders are at a crisis point’ https://www.harpersbazaar.com/uk/beauty/fitness-wellbeing/a17616964/eating-disorders-surge-uk-figures/

Children with eating disorders waiting months for help, first official figures show 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/11/children-eating-disorders-waiting-months-help-first-official/

From Insider today:

‘Foreign Direct Investment in Scotland at ‘unprecedented’ levels Figures from accountancy group EY show the country is maintaining its attractiveness among foreign investors, even though other European countries are narrowing the gap with the UK. Scotland attracted a new record of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) for the third year in a row in 2017 and set a new 10-year high, according to new figures from accountancy group EY. The country experienced a 7 per cent increase in the number of projects it secured last year, taking the total up to 116. This rate of growth was higher than the UK as a whole at 6 per cent, and thus Scotland’s share of UK FDI rose to 9.6 per cent in 2017, above the historical average of 9.3 per cent.’

https://www.insider.co.uk/news/ey-foreign-direct-investment-scotland-12669006

Previous examples of the 8%, good news, meme, include:

8% of the population, nearly 9% of the exports but only 5.25% of the imports

Return of the meme? Only 8% of the population but Scotland has 21.7% of all independent renewable projects in the UK

Still 8% of the population but now 30% of UK food and drink exports?

8% of the UK population and 28% of living wage employers. More evidence that we are different enough to want to run the whole show?

With only 8% of the population, Scotland’s maritime sector accounts for 25% of the UK maritime sector’s (GVA) contribution to the economy and is 17.5% more productive than the UK marine oil and gas sector. Once more, too wee, too poor?

Once again, it’s the ‘8% of the UK population but much more of something good’ meme. This time it’s 33% of employee-owned firms in the UK

Percentages – the reliable basis for comparing Scotland with the non-Scottish parts of the UK.

The Deputy Head of News and Current Affairs has replied to both complaints as if they were one.

The complaints:

1 Reporting Scotland

On Saturday 26^th May 2018 at 5:45pm, we heard:

‘New research suggests that more than 1 in 3 women in Scotland will be morbidly obese, that’s at least 100 pounds above their ideal weight, by 2035. The research presented today in Vienna at the European Congress on Obesity indicates that women who have been to university are likely to be more adversely affected than those who didn’t

Here are the figures from a report in Medical Express:

‘The new estimates indicate that rates of morbid obesity in adults will reach 5% in Scotland (compared to 4% in 2015), 8% in England (2.9% in 2016), and 11% in Wales (3% in 2015) by 2035.’

So, 1 in 20 Scots are expected to be morbidly obese by 2035. Even if the percentage for Scottish women is higher than for men, 1 in 3 is highly improbable. Perhaps Reporting Scotland have misread the prediction for overall obesity rates as being that for morbid obesity rates? See this:

‘By 2035, [not morbid] obesity rates will be highest, and see the greatest rise, in adults working in routine and manual positions. As a result, the difference in obesity levels between those in managerial roles (29% males, 31% females) and those in routine and manual roles (39% males, 40% females) is expected to widen in England and Wales (with the exception of English females where it is expected to reduce).’

It seems too obvious. Have I missed something?

There are two serious problems with this report.

First, we appear to have an error confusing obesity with morbid obesity, producing tabloid headlines with a consequent negative effect on many female viewers and thus failing to inform viewers in a manner promised in the BBC’s charter.

Second, we have the failure to report on the key finding that morbid obesity, in Scotland, is expected to plateau at 5% while soaring past that figure elsewhere in the UK.

Third, we have the failure to report on the explanation for the above trend. The researchers offered a clear, confident and simple explanation for the significantly slower growth in obesity in Scotland – Scottish Government policy initiatives and resource allocation. For example: ‘The government put a massive push on developing a route map for how we can actually combat this. They put together resources from the NHS that were proving to be effective. They did put a lot of work into it.’ Further evidence of the effectiveness of the above initiatives can be seen in this from the Evening Express: ‘However, almost no 15-to-24-year-old males in Scotland are expected to fall within this category, compared to 6% of the same group in England, the data shows.’

2 Good Morning Scotland

In the report on obesity, at 09:00, we heard nine, long, compound sentences yet no reference was made to key role played by Scottish Government policy initiatives and resource allocation as stated clearly by the university researchers. In the Independent newspaper report, for example, we were able to read that the researchers offered a clear, confident and simple explanation for the significantly slower growth in obesity in Scotland – Scottish Government policy initiatives and resource allocation. For example: ‘The government put a massive push on developing a route map for how we can actually combat this. They put together resources from the NHS that were proving to be effective. They did put a lot of work into it.’ Why was this omitted?

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/morbid-obesity-double-britain-poverty-education-employment-study-a8369731.html

The GMS report is thus missing a key explanatory component and one which, when omitted, denied the SNP-led government due credit. I remind you of your responsibility to inform your audience.

BBC RESPONSE 1:

Morbid obesity complaint

Thank you for your e-mail. Your comments under CAS-4941139-HMPVR9 and CAS-4940361-J4C08P were passed to the Deputy Head of News and Current Affairs, who has asked that I forward his response as follows:

“Thank you for being in touch about Good Morning Scotland and Reporting Scotland on 26th May. As the complaints are similar I propose to deal with them both here.

The radio item to which you refer lasted less than a minute, including the intro; and less than half a minute in the television report. In that timescale, only the principal points can be made. One of them was that by 2035 obesity levels in Scotland amongst women who had gone to university would have doubled and be higher (40.1%) than levels amongst women who had not gone to university (36.7%). On Radio Scotland, the report (which was longer than the TV report) also made the point that Scotland was likely to fare better than England and Wales over the next seventeen years.

However, as you rightly point out, the report on television also said that new research suggested that more than one in three women in Scotland would be morbidly obese by 2035. The reference should have been to general obesity. (Although you do not mention this in your radio complaint, the same reference was also made there.) I have investigated this and I believe that there was an honest mistake made under customary newsroom deadline conditions: the table for general obesity (which was mistaken for morbid obesity) was included in a research file marked “morbid obesity” in amongst information about morbid obesity. However, to explain is not to excuse and I have ensured that your detailed comments are being taken on board by my team in order to help prevent such an occurrence again.

The compilers of the research stated: “Our study reveals a worrying picture of rising morbid obesity across England, Wales and Scotland that is likely to weigh heavily on healthcare systems and economies.” They also pointed out that “the limitations that apply to the quality, precision and availability of the data demand cautious interpretation” and they also noted that “uncertainties always exist when making predictions as past trends do not always predict future trends. In addition, the study cannot predict the effect that future interventions or policies will have on social inequalities in obesity.” These are in our view important caveats, entered by the authors themselves, and we took these and other factors into account in reporting this story.

MY SECOND COMPLAINT:

Second complaint in cases CAS-4941139-HMPVR9 and CAS-4940361-J4C08P.

1. Your conflation of the two complaints is not really acceptable and, I suspect, contrary to the regulations for dealing with such as it seeks to confuse and to obscure them.
2. Regarding the factual error in your use of the term ‘morbid’, whether the mistake was honest is not the issue. This was a serious error which may have caused upset and anxiety and requires correcting publicly in Reporting Scotland. Please let me know when you will do this.
3. Your excuse of timescale does not justify a failure to inform accurately. Three principal points – that morbid obesity is expected to plateau at 5%, that the authors have identified Scottish government policy initiatives as responsible for this in Scotland and that no Scottish 15-24-year-olds are expected to fall into this category compared to 6% in England – were central for Scottish viewers, you audience. Please let me know when you will make these corrections public on both Good Morning Scotland and Reporting Scotland.

Just a quick report on the recent trade figures. Scotland remains the only part of the UK with a strong trade surplus and has had the biggest increase in exports in Q1 of this year.

Look at the massive trade deficits in London and the South.  Now remind me why we’d want to join the UK if we weren’t already caught up in it?

https://www.uktradeinfo.com/Statistics/RTS/Pages/default.aspx

(c) arnesantics.com

Six times this morning, BBC Scotland headlined with:

‘Dead bodies are being left in hospital mortuaries, in part, because families can’t afford funerals.’

See that nervous wee ‘in part’ there?

This is one of the best/worst examples of the early-morning scare story to effectively frighten the old folk into thinking conservative. I’ve written about this before when they chose pregnant mothers as the target population, at:

The Power of Early Morning Nightmares and Expectant Mothers: BBC Scotland callously undermines the morale of midwives, their patients, expectant mothers and their relatives, with highly selective and un-contextualised information

Helpfully, for me, and typically numerically naïve, BBC Scotland, they told us that 22 bodies are currently ‘waiting’ (?) in hospital mortuaries. Helpful, also, the BBC Scotland website report tells me that, typically, there are 55 000 funerals per year in Scotland. So, 22 out of 55 000 or 0.04%.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-44151702

Footnote: As I carried out my ‘investigation’ looking for an image of a ‘hearse-chaser’, I found few good images but a film and a band! See:

The BBC/YouGov research missed one obvious question – Should Scotland have its own foreign policy? The responses might have been quite revealing given those for other questions about decision-making commonly associated with Westminster.

On the decision about who should decide where nuclear weapons can be sited, only 33% on average, and falling as low as 23% in the Highlands and Islands or 26% in Glasgow, thought that it should for the UK Government to do so.

On the location of nuclear power stations, it was only 26% overall and as low as 15% in the Highlands and Islands, agreeing that the UK Government should have the say. The figures for where business tax level setting should be, were very similar.

On setting income tax levels, currently only partly devolved, only 33% thought it should be at the UK level and only 25% thought foreign worker levels should be set by Westminster.

Taken together, these responses kind of suggest majority support for full independence in practice.

Perhaps most encouraging for the SNP were the responses to the question comparing Scotland with other countries with only 6% think it is worse than others and a whopping 51% thinking it is better.

Most discouraging for the UK government was the response on the extent to which Westminster politicians ‘reflect the concerns of people in my part of the country’. For Scotland it was only 11%, falling as low as 7% in Lothians and 9% in Glasgow. For Holyrood, the figure was 37% rising to 45% in Glasgow and 52% in Lothians. To see just how bad that 11% is, see the graph above.

Satisfaction with the current almost complete devolution of control over the NHS can be seen in only 17% thinking that should be at the UK level. Given the clear disaster that is Tory-managed NHS England, you have to wonder who these 170 are?

So, Scots seem to want reject Westminster on every major question other than on the key question – Should Scotland be an independent country?

(c) Common Space

The BBC/YouGov research published on 5^th June and interpreted for them by Professor Curtice, has surely finished off any idea that Scottish Nationalism is, in any way, akin to the narrow, exclusive, nasty forms we saw in the former Yugoslavia, or for that matter, that we see in the contemporary English/British nationalism underpinning the Brexit movement.

Here are the opening comments from the BBC Scotland online report:

‘The SNP has long argued that it promotes an inclusive sense of Scottish identity – anyone who comes to live in Scotland has the right to be regarded as Scottish, irrespective of whether they or their parents were born in Scotland or not. In England, however, politicians have tended to promote Britishness rather than Englishness as the identity to which all living in England can lay claim.’

However, the key data comes in the responses to the question about how long someone has to live in Scotland or England, to be Scottish or English. The contrast is marked, with 47% of Scots saying that someone who has lived in Scotland for more than 10 years makes someone Scottish, but only 25% of the English agreeing that having lived in England for more than 10 years makes someone English.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-44300916

That suggests that almost twice as many Scots, per head of population, embrace the more inclusive, civic as opposed to ethnic, form of nationalism. Evidence of this kind reinforces the claim I’ve been making here that we, including those born elsewhere, are objectively different enough, in our core values, to justifiably see ourselves as a distinct people. Here are some of the earlier reports of a difference that makes a difference:

Only in Scotland! ‘A review of small country’s approaches to public policy reform in response to economic, demographic and other pressures found that only in Scotland could this ‘golden thread’ be so clearly discerned’

Scientific evidence that Scots tend to be different from the other groups in rUK?

8% of the UK population and 28% of living wage employers. More evidence that we are different enough to want to run the whole show?

Who said Scots were not more left-wing than those in the rest of the UK?

There are more. Search the blog for ‘different’ if you need more.

Footnote: The last question in the survey about who Scots will support in the world Cup was also revealing. Only 12% choose the ‘anyone but England’ option.

(c) House of McLaren

Today’s BBC/YouGov research shows Scots to be more optimistic about the future and Yes supporters to be especially so. This is, of course, the third recent report showing Scots to be happier and more satisfied than those in the non-Scottish parts of the UK. See these two:

Do Office for National Statistics figures reveals SNP rule is good for us? The Fraser Institute seems to agree

Scots happiness levels continue to soar:  https://www.scotsman.com/news/odd/scots-happiness-levels-continue-to-soar-1-4575355

But, it hasn’t always been this way.

‘It is never difficult to distinguish between a Scotsman with a grievance and a ray of sunshine’

Fairly recently but pre-SNP government and before bedded-in devolution. See this:

The full BBC report is not on the YouGov site yet, but it’s unlikely that they will have asked:

1. Have ten years of SNP government made you more optimistic about the future?
2. Has the new ………… policy made you more optimistic about the future?
3. Does the thought of Scottish independence make you more optimistic?

I suppose the data do give an answer to that last one.

Here’s a reminder of the policies and other changes that might be inserted into versions of question 2:

Even more evidence of becoming a better nation as Scottish Government moves to end upfront childcare deposits

More evidence of becoming a better nation as SNP ‘future-proof’ social security

SNP moves to finally put an end to foxes’agony being ripped apart by hounds as the English Tories plan a return to the unspeakable business. Different again?

8% of the UK population and 28% of living wage employers. More evidence that we are different enough to want to run the whole show?

Racial hate crimes increase by 33% in England & Wales while falling by 10% in Scotland: Who says we’re not different?

Scottish social housing more accessible and cheaper than in rest of UK

BBC Scotland’s shameless attempt to scare with claim that Scottish hospital has cladding ‘similar’ to that of Grenfell revealing ignorance of Scottish building regulations.

Of 35 children and teenagers killed with knives in Britain in 2017, not one was in Scotland, yet in 2005, the UN called Scotland the most violent country in the developed world.

Reported domestic violence in Scotland falls. Is this part of wider change?

Scotland has lower poverty rates than England: JRF Excerpt 1

Could Scotland end homelessness?

Scottish Government to fight alongside UN to defend disabled against Tory cuts.

Scottish care workers to receive Living Wage for ‘sleepover’ hours while English care workers receive only the National Minimum Wage.

Scots more likely to give to charities, to volunteer or to sponsor others

Scots the least respectful of the upper classes: More evidence of a difference that makes a difference?

In Scotland, 58 000 new mothers every year to get baby box worth £160 but Labour are not completely happy

And today, we saw:

‘Scotland to pardon gay men with historical convictions’

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/nov/07/scotland-to-pardon-gay-men-with-historical-convictions