Talking-up Scotland

 

What is Reevel thinking?

This is the latest in a series of lies by Reporting Scotland on, for example, gangs, knife, crime, obesity and hospital infections. I’ll summarise in the next post today.

Last night, Jackie Bird opened confidently with:

‘Violent crimes, excluding sexual offences, has risen in Scotland over the past year.’

Reevel Alderson, looking quite uncomfortable, then quite hesitantly repeated the lie:

‘But I suppose the headline, of this snapshot is, as you say, that there has been a rise in non-sexual violent crime.’

Yet, in the introduction to the Police Scotland report, we read:

‘Overall violent crime is down 1.6 per cent however Group 1 Crimes (non-sexual violent crimes) have increased.’

What has happened here? Well, both have missed something important out. Bird should have said:

‘Group 1 Violent crimes, excluding sexual offences, has risen in Scotland over the past year.’

This does matter, because in 2016/2017, beyond the Group 1 crimes which did increase, there were 106 662 crimes including common assault, threatening and abusive behaviour and racially aggravated harassment/conduct and, in 2017/2018, these offences reduced to 99 314, a fall of nearly 7%.

Now, some will say that this is just an error and that my criticism is mere pedantry but by missing out ‘Group 1’, they turned a fall in violent crime into a rise in violent crime with an unavoidable consequence for the thoughts of viewers. Subtly, for some, this kind of reporting, repeated over years, suggests a country which cannot run its own services effectively.

Further, the report by RS, left out several other pieces of information which would have presented a more accurate view of crime trends in Scotland. From the Police Scotland report:

‘Crime is down and detection rates are up according to new figures published by Police Scotland.There were over 3,000 fewer (Group 1 to 5) crimes recorded in Scotland by the end of the third quarter of 2018-19, down 0.4 per cent year on year and 2.5 per cent down on the five year averageDetection rates for Group 1 to 5 are up to 50.4 per cent from 49.3 per cent from the same time last year. The report also reveals a higher proportion of people are satisfied with how Police Scotland dealt with incidents, with 81.4 per cent either “satisfied” or “very satisfied” compared with 80 per cent last year.’

https://www.scotland.police.uk/whats-happening/news/2019/february/quarter-3-management-nformation-report-published

Sources:

https://www.scotland.police.uk/assets/pdf/138327/232757/445136/management-information-force-report-quarter-3-2018-19

 

 ‘They don’t always report the news, though they like to pretend they do. Sometimes they just make it up.’

My own words a few days ago as the moral panic and scare story around hospital infections generated primarily by Reporting Scotland, became apparent:

How Reporting Scotland INVENTED a crisis of infected hospitals for us

Now, after Freedom of Information releases, we can see that the supposed widespread fear and anxiety, around the assessment of P1 pupils, last year, had all the lack of substance of most moral panics or scare stories. We’ve already reported today on the lack of evidence of parents, teachers or academics being sufficiently concerned as to write and condemn the testing, leaving us with only the unsubstantiated pronouncements of those typical moral guardians and careerists, opposition politicians, teacher union leaders, parent groups and those journalists imbued with unionist positions. See these for more detail:

Only 4 teachers write to Swinney or Sturgeon on the P1 tests and only one of those is opposed to them

Only two academics wrote to Swinney and Sturgeon on P1 testing, both to approve and one looking for a job

Only three parents write to Swinney or Sturgeon about P1 testing and none report a child stressed

Now everyone, including the Scottish Government, knows that an essentially media-bound frenzy is not the objective basis for a national review but such is its power, they agreed to one:

To repeat myself, this is a classic moral panic and a classic scare story with political and base human emotions, not science or reason, at its origin. The reporting and not the presence of fear and anxiety among pupils, parents and teachers, caused the inquiry.

In this case, unable to ‘lay a glove’ on the most competent and popular government in Scotland’s history, the corporate media in cahoots with the opposition parties and union leaders, is using Schools to conduct a proxy propaganda war against the whole idea of an independent Scotland capable of running its own systems.

When they cannot find a real problem within an infinitely improvable public service such as education or health, where such do often emerge, they are prepared to go well beyond any form of responsible journalism, to actually construct part of the reality of their readers’ lives.

 

 

Teacher 1 wrote to support the scheme but suggested more flexibility in the timing:

As a former primary school HT I wholeheartedly support assessment of pupils throughout their school years to ascertain their strengths and learning needs.

Teacher 2 wrote, by hand (!), to cast serious doubt on the character of those current teachers and union leaders moaning about the tests:

Teacher 3, with 40 years of experience, was angry about the tests:

‘I am watching the current debate on P1 tests. Your comment regarding “tears” of a young child during the test is no big deal because children cry in school all the time (admittedly, I’m paraphrasing, but it is exactly the essence of your message), makes me despair. Your flippant attitude for the well-being of our youngest learners is despicable and demonstrates the enormity of your ignorance regarding early education.’

Teacher 4 was all for the tests:

As a teacher who had 20 years of experience, I think you should stand firm about the P1 tests. I am disappointed that the other parties will vote against you. If some of the children were crying it may have been because some tension in the teacher was transmitted to the child. Perhaps, if it was presented as a game and called an assessment there would not be so much hostility. Other countries realise that education is the key to future prosperity for its citizens. As far as I can see the test is pretty minimal and it is important to see how the child is progressing.

So, one out of four teachers, one out of three parents and no academics, write to complain about the P1 assessment? People are angry! Clearly it’s a crisis!

 

 

https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-19-00270/

We’ve heard that ‘all the evidence is against P1 testing’ yet only two academics bothered to write to the Education Secretary or to the First Minister. They were not at all critical:

Academic 1:

I wish you well in persuading your colleagues in the Scottish Parliament that your policy is responsible, progressive and necessary. Ask them to imagine a health service without diagnostic assessment. Why then should we embark on the most critical learning years of a child’s life without a description of the communicative abilities the child brings to school?

Academic 2:

I am writing about the Scottish National Standardized Assessment, and more generally about how the Scottish Government manages assessment processes and results. This is not a letter of complaint, but an offer of assistance.

So, three parents, only one critical, and now only two academics, neither critical. Could the opposition to the P1 testing be a product, only of a media/trades union campaign?

 

 

The applicants asked for the following information: ‘for any letters or emails from parents to John Swinney or Nicola Sturgeon on P1 testing/assessment from 1 September 2018 to 23 January 2019.’

Parent 1:

I showed the pictures to [redacted – exemption applies] and asked if he remembered doing this test and he said yes that he’d done it twice, at the beginning of the year and then at the end. He thought it was really fun! Said he did it on the iPad with his teacher, she told him he did really well. I knew he’d be tested in the year and was told it was only to identify learning gaps or difficulties for the teacher.

Parent 2:

I write as a mother of a P1 pupil in our local comprehensive school with a plea to scrap the relatively new practice of testing children at this stage in their schooling. All evidence points to the results having no validity and serves only to put unnecessary and damaging pressure on our youngest at a vulnerable and impressionable part of their lives.

No mention of their child’s actual reaction is offered.

Parent 3:

As a parent who has a son who had in his early years special educational needs I understand and fully appreciate the need and requirement for proper assessment in order to ensure his development.

Again, no mention is made of the child’s reaction.

https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-19-00269/

So, not much evidence of stress-out parents or children?

Once again, we’re grateful to Shadowy Health Secretary, Miles Briggs, for exposing the SNP government’s failure to make more use of the private agencies which most Tories favour and often have shares in. See this parliamentary question and answer:

NHS Scotland has reduced spending on private agencies for locum neurologists by nearly 9% in one year. A near 10% increase in the FT staffing of neurologists must be helping.

What, the Scottish Tories are against NHS Scotland wasting money on private agencies? I don’t know what to think now.

(c) GETTY: Look, up there, it’s Tony!

A sub-poll of 90 Scots, for Deltapoll and the Mail on Sunday, with fieldwork on 21^st to 23^rd February 2019, found SNP support steady at 41% and seems to reinforce four previous sub-polls giving them between 40 and 44%:

Conservatives  26%

Labour             26%

Lib Dems         5%

SNP                  41%

But, but, but, when they asked this question:

look what happens:

Conservatives  29%

Labour             13%

Lib Dems         2%

SNP                  45%

TIG                   9%

While the new Independence Group gets 9% and the Tories climb to 29%, the SNP reach a figure, 45%, which in a first-part-the-post system with the opposition further split like this, would enable them to almost wipe-out the opposition.

Also, look at the Lib Dem vote as half of them appear to have been drawn away from Willie, to Chuku and Chums. I know, tiny sample, but if anything like this happened more widely, they’d be in real trouble. In the Northern Isles, the already compromised Carruthers, would be out.

Click to access MoS-Deltapoll190223_pdf.pdf

 

East Ayrshire bucking the trend or…

TuS is grateful for this Freedom of Information request made to SNP-dominated East Ayrshire Council by Jacob Catrine.

There were 510 incidents of school violence across East Ayrshire’s 50 schools in 2016/2017. In 2017/18 this had fallen by nearly 6% to 480 incidents.

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/violent_incidents_towards_staff?nocache=incoming-1313393#incoming-1313393

The Freedom of Information request to East Ayrshire Council was made by a ‘Jacob Citrine.’ There is a village called ‘Catrine’ in East Ayrshire. There is also a kind of jewellery called ‘Jacobs Citrine’ produced by a Jewish family called ‘Jacobs’ in Reading. I’m going no further with this, in case I tread on the Labour anti-semitism problem.

 

In a predictably canny piece of writing, of the kind academics prefer, there are, however, one or two clear indicators that divorce from the UK might be much less troublesome than Brexit is. As when looking for a dropped toy in a ball swamp, you need to stay calm and sharpen your vision for phrases that go beyond the hesitancy and qualified reservations, to suggest something promising.

On the economy, Hughes writes:

‘[S]cotland would lose a significant net fiscal transfer from the UK on independence. But the costs of Brexit – impacting on the UK even before it leaves the EU – are, according to most studies, many times bigger than this. And the UK would still have to pay some amount to the EU to participate in the various programmes and agencies that Theresa May has indicated it may wish to.’

On trade agreements:

‘Scotland would not face the challenges the UK faces to replicate or replace all the EU’s international trade agreements and other treaties. Rather it would join those agreements once it acceded to the EU.’

On the, for the UK, thorny issue of Ireland:

‘[T]here is no independence equivalent to the challenge posed by the Northern Ireland backstop to Brexit politics.’

So, overall, leaving the UK, even after 300 years, looks considerably less problematic for Scotland, than leaving the EU does:

‘Compared to Brexit, it is likely there would be less uncertainty along a number of key dimensions if Scotland were aiming to rapidly join the EU. Much of Scotland’s future relationship with the UK would then be determined by the UK-EU relationship (which might hopefully be clearer in the next 2-4 years as the UK transitions out of the EU).’

https://www.scer.scot/database/ident-10268

This is from a leading academic, whose boss, Professor Michael Keating, is one of those federalists who seem prepared to remain tied to the foreign policy of a post-imperial delusional Britain led by people like that Hunt who recently insulted the Slovenes and those many who think the Irish are getting a bit uppity and need reminding who is in charge.

I’m guessing someone like this might allegedly be the one who might have sidled up to Nick to say: “The Irish really should know their place.”

A Freedom of Information request for data on the sources of demand for information from government departments, by TuS, has revealed that around £750 000 has been wasted on trawling for ‘scandals.’ This does not include the many requests made directly to such as local authorities, health boards or Police Scotland.

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/549805/response/1316185/attach/2/FOI%2019%2000357%20Response.pdf?cookie_passthrough=1

The average cost of a Freedom of Information request has been estimated at £234, so:

1. The total cost of requests from all these groups trawling for bad news is around £750 000 since 2009.
2. The costs incurred by opposition parties, often then fed to Reporting Scotland, the Herald and the Scotsman, is more than £300 000 and they are using such methods increasingly.
3. The costs incurred by the newspapers such as the Scotsman and the Herald which often announce that they have done so, and then fed to Reporting Scotland, is nearly £400 000 and increasing steeply.
4. The demand for information from TV broadcasters, mainly BBC judging by their own announcements, and had increased by 1600% in 2017.
5. An unnamed political blog has made 10 such requests in the last year. Which is it? This was the first from TuS.

While there are legitimate reasons for some FoI requests, we know from the scare stories that were constructed out of a few of these that this is money not well-spent.