(c) SFN
The percentage of school leavers entering a positive initial destination – workplace or further education – has risen by 8.88%, to a record 94.7%, since 2007, when Hugh Henry was in post.
https://www.parliament.scot/S5ChamberOffice/WA20190227.pdf
You want a GP? There’s any number just along that road! Frankly, the SNP are just actin it! (c) Morning Star
Thanks to a parliamentary question and answer, Scottish Labour MSP for Lothian, Neil Findlay, has been able to report that there are now 941 GPs working in Lothian, up 15.64% from the 815 operating there under the last ever Labour administration:
(c) RBS
We know from a parliamentary question that more than £4.5 billion has been given in rates relief to businesses across Scotland since the SNP came to power. We also know that we can say, as in BBC Scotland headlines that major reductions in unemployment and increase in wages, relative to the UK, have come after these subsidies:
Unemployment in Scotland nearly 13% lower than in UK!
Unemployment in Scotland below UK level and employment better paid
We also know that around 50 000 businesses are exempt entirely from business rates.
Full details:
Having kind of apologised for earlier mispeaking on pigeon poo fungus, Reporting Scotland now seem tired:
‘You cite two uses of the word “after” which, on examination, are both valid in this story. In the first instance, the two people contracted a disease and then they died; they did not die before contracting the disease.’
Reporting Scotland’s forensic investigation team confirms that patients did not die BEFORE they caught the disease! Is this an attempt at dark humour or am I getting to them?
‘After’ is now officially confirmed to only ever mean ‘after’ in a chronological sense. I can now write:
‘143 people die minutes after watching Reporting Scotland.’
They watched and then they died. Simples.
In a Freedom of Information request from an anonymous source:
https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-19-00473/
Could the source have been hoping for a trend going the other way?
Regardless of the Scottish Labour Branch led EIS action, the above data merely confirms a wide range of indicators demonstrating the relative good health of Scotland’s schools and of those who work in them. See these ‘few’:
New Scottish teachers 8 times more likely to stay than those in Tory England
Are Scottish teachers more stressed and depressed than the rest?
Boom! 35% fewer vacancies in Schools and 15% more student teachers
Scottish Teachers Less Likely to Consider Quitting
How Scotland’s media INVENTED a tear-sodden crisis of P1 assessment
Scotland has far fewer pupils for every teacher
Alexander Burnett MSP reminds me that it has been some time since the BBC Scotland ten-part series, ‘Soaked to the Skin in Skene’ which accused the SNP of abandoning the folk of Aberdeenshire to flooding on a biblical scale.
Here’s Burnett’s attempt to get the fear flooding back into Grampian minds:
Unsurprisingly, Burnett’s question reminds me of the warm dry glow I got from writing about more accurate news at the time.
In October 2016, I was able to write:
As far as flood protection is concerned, unlike in England, the 1 in 200 year standard of protection is ‘universal’ for all new buildings, with a 1,000 year standard for such vulnerable uses as old people’s homes, schools, hospitals etc.. In addition, construction in flood hazard areas has almost completely ended. Crichton (2003: 26) estimates that “the active flood management programme currently in progress will result in almost all high risk properties being protected against the 200-year flood within the next three years, taking climate change into account.” It is also interesting to note that the Scottish Executive grants for flood defences have never been refused on the grounds of budget restraints and there is no rationing of flood defence spending.
It is clear, however, that the more stringent building standards which are applied in Scotland ensure that severe storms result in much less property damage than comparable events in England. Also the level of flood protection and the commitment of funding to achieve flood protection are higher in Scotland than in England.’
More recently, with SNP leadership, the favourable comparison still seems to hold. Published research from the esteemed Joseph Rowntree Foundation, in 2012, seems to support my first impressions quite strongly:
‘Where English planning regulations permit building in flood plains where there is no alternative, Scottish Planning Policy does not permit building in areas in which ‘the flood risk exceeds the 200-year return period’, i.e. where in any year there is a greater than 0.5 per cent probability of flooding. Scotland has stronger regulations governing the capacity of sewage and drainage systems for new building. It also has stronger minimum standards for flood defences. Building regulations ensuring flood resilience in the housing stock are more developed. Scottish planners, through Flood Liaison and Advice Groups, are engaged with local communities, the emergency services, insurers and other interested parties in drawing up flood plans. The differences in regulatory regimes between England and Scotland are reflected in the number of households that are at risk of flooding, and the resilience of communities in responding to those risks.’
For more go to:
In the Torygraph today:
‘Almost half of GPs say they plan to quit the NHS within five years, amid complaints about the rise of Skype consultations. Research by the University of Warwick suggests the number of family doctors intending to retire or leave the health service has risen by almost a third since 2014.’
Scotland’s GPs seem strangely quiet on this, leaving Reptilian Scotland with no alternative but to make up a story about patients not being prescribed enough dangerous drugs, to fill today’s ‘Emergency Word Scotland.’
Talking-up Scotland have decided not to doorstep the Health Secretary on how one guy told them he might resign but we have just done the effin research ourselves. Please read and summarise the evidence presented in these recent reports then just go for a nice walk:
Labour’s Neil Findlay exposes increased GP staffing across almost all of Scotland
Why did BBC Breakfast pretend GP staffing figures for Scotland are not available?
Big increase in number of women GPs is excellent news for Scotland
No GP Crisis in Scotland but..
Report of GP staffing crisis in England appears before Scottish media can fake equivalent story
Scottish GP vacancy rate now only one -third of that in non-Scottish parts of UK
In the Scotsman today, 93% of Scottish patients get appointment with GP within 2 days!
Lib Dems feed STV with dubious tale of GPs working too many hours
Scottish GP Contract rated ‘far superior’ by BMA, introduced today, to strengthen patient care
Really good news on news.gov.scot today regarding the legislative paving for the Scottish National investment Bank – Link and snippet below:
https://news.gov.scot/news/establishment-of-national-bank-takes-step-forward
Establishment of national Bank takes step forward
Scottish National Investment Bank Bill published.Legislation to support the establishment and capitalisation of the Scottish National Investment Bank has been published by the Scottish Parliament.
The Bill grants the necessary powers to set up the Bank which will provide financing for businesses through their whole life cycle and for important infrastructure projects to catalyse private sector investment. The Bank will be a public limited company and Ministers will be given the power to guide its strategic direction by setting missions that will address socio-economic challenges.
The Scottish Government has committed to investing £2 billion over 10 years to capitalise the Bank. The Bank will be operational in 2020 investing in businesses and communities across Scotland.
Brexit, and particularly a no deal Brexit, will increase demand for a Scottish National Investment Bank to provide essential support to continue to grow Scotland’s economy throughout a challenging period.
However – couldn’t help but contrast this (very welcome) news with today’s beeb Business page coverage of the Norwegian state investment fund – link and snippet below. Devolution or Indy? – let’s make the correct choice Scotland:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-47399500
Norway’s giant state investment fund has said it will increase its investment in the UK.
The sovereign wealth fund, which has $1tn (£750bn) to invest from Norway’s oil and gas income, is already one of the biggest investors in UK assets.
Its chief executive has said that it will continue to be a “significant” investor in the UK, despite Brexit.
The fund takes a long-term investment view of 30-years and expects its UK investment to rise over that period.
“We foresee that over time that our investments in the UK will increase,” Yngve Slyngstad told Reuters.
Commenting on whether the risks associated with the UK’s decision to leave the European Union on 29 March had affected the fund’s investment plans, he said: “With our time horizon, which is 30 years plus, current political discussions do not change our view of the situation.”
The fund has investments in nearly in 200 UK properties and is a co-owner of London’s Regent Street.
It holds about £5.6bn in UK government debt, and is also a big shareholder in UK-based firms, with investments in 394 UK companies. The stakes it holds include:
0.97% of engineering giant Rolls-Royce
2.4% of Marks and Spencer
1.65% of Sainsbury’s
2.3% of BP
2.97% of Barclays
‘A quarter of people with bipolar disorder are prescribed medication that may be doing more harm than good.’
Beginning as they love to do with the extended morbid exploitation of a single patient, feeding on their personal tragedy, Reporting Scotland set the scene for today’s episode of their long-running daily series ‘Emergency Ward Scotland.’ We know why they love to tell this story of NHS Scotland in crisis even though objective assessment tells us it’s among the best in the world.
‘Lithium acts as a mood stabiliser. Academics found that only one in twenty patients were prescribed it as medication. They were also surprised to find a quarter of patients were on anti-depressants alone.’
The ‘academics’ turn out to be one academic from Glasgow University, just around the corner from BBC Scotland HQ, who insists that ‘lithium is the gold standard treatment for bipolar disorder.’
Knowing nothing really but sensing that they are in the dangerous waters of a medical, drug-related, dispute between professional medics, any professional journalist would be careful to get a second opinion and be extra careful not to report in a way that might influence the behaviour of vulnerable, perhaps suicidal people.
Reporting Scotland do not ask a single mental health practitioner the obvious question:
‘Why are you not prescribing lithium to bipolar patients?’
Remember, in 95% of cases they are not doing so. Might they have a good reason? Doesn’t that thought reveal their showy 1 in 20 image above to be the work of the intellectually challenge and the emotionally underdeveloped?
I do know that lithium is a very powerful dangerous drug with many risks associated with it. Why did Reporting Scotland not present any other opinion on it? You can find this very disturbing piece easily:
‘In my view the evidence that lithium helps prevent episodes of manic depression is far too weak to outweigh the harms it can cause (which commonly include thyroid damage, kidney damage, and acute neurological toxicity at doses very close to those used in practice, hence the need for blood monitoring). Manic depression is a highly variable condition. Some people have many episodes, some people few, and the pattern of episodes varies throughout life as well. Long periods of remaining well are not necessarily evidence of a treatment’s effectiveness. What we would need to demonstrate the efficacy and value of lithium is a prospective randomised trial in which people who had not previously been on long-term drug treatment were randomly allocated to start lithium or placebo. At present, my view is that the evidence that lithium might be effective is not strong enough to justify such a trial, given the health risks associated with it.’
https://joannamoncrieff.com/2015/07/01/reasons-not-to-believe-in-lithium/
Anyone can see that journalists are not competent to mess with people’s lives in this way, just to get a story. Sadly, RS have previous. See these earlier cases suggesting that they really need to take the Psychopath Test.
Is BBC Scotland’s promotion of call to reduce number of children in care dangerously ill-informed?
Talking-up Scotland 