HUNT TELT

This poor woman, who has just lost her daughter, has made public for all to see, her fury at Hunt making capital out of deaths (including her daughter's) during the two days of doctors' strikes in England last week.

An incredibly brave and  principled stand against a cheap, nasty, sordid, second rate politician.

Every day in hospitals all over the world, people die. For Hunt to simply get a total of those who dies on the two strike days and use it against the doctors is beneath belief.

We salute you, Mrs Lovell, and pass on our condolences on your loss.

The Scottish Heath Service may not be perfect, but aren't you glad that we have Shona Robison at the helm, and not that man?

TAKE A LOOK, MR HUNT

LETTER FROM MUNGUIN

To the BBC

Teaching the Libations a few chords before my big number

London 
England

Dear BBC,

We know that you are based in England, and that most of your staff are English.

Given the respective sizes of our UK constituent  countries, this is only to be expected. It's quite fair, and we have no problem with it. We just wish you would spend a little more of your money in our counties, instead of the bulk of it being spent in London and Manchester.

But it is important as a news organisation to remember that what you are broadcasting, although mainly for consumption in England, does go out in other countries too. You know, that is not unfair, given that citizens of the other countries pay licence fees at exactly the same rate as the English do.

It is, therefore, very important for you to distinguish, in your reporting of a news item, which countries you are referring to.

In many cases your failure to make it clear is little more than an irritation; a discourtesy, and what minor misunderstandings your misreporting of events cause are of no real significance. 

However, your reports about junior doctors' intention to take strike action, do not come into that category.

There are in fact four NHSs in the UK. The English one is the biggest of course, but in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, thankfully, Jeremy Hunt is NOT the Health Secretary. 

Mark Drakeford is Minister for Health and Social Services in the Welsh Government. In Northern Ireland Simon Hamilton is Minister for Health, Social Services and Public Safety, and in Scotland, as seen above talking about junior doctors,  is the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Well-being, Shona Robison.

Mr Hunt has badly handled the dispute with junior doctors and strike action applies only to his fiefdom In the other countries more mature and sensible heads have prevailed.

 MEDIASTORM Retweeted

Nicola Sturgeon ‏@NicolaSturgeon  14h14 hours ago

Nicola Sturgeon Retweeted Kay Burley

This is a massive vote for strike in England. NHS Scotland open to junior docs who want to be valued by government.

Nicola Sturgeon added,

Kay Burley @KayBurley

BREAK: Junior doctors vote overwhelmingly in favour of strike action. 98% in favour on a turnout of 76%

431 retweets320 likes

 

 

 

It matters so much this time becasue those who are ill, or expecting to be taken into hospital for routine procedures, or have outpatients appointments, or indeed friends or family of these people in the Celtic countries of this union, should not be alarmed by today's news. It doesn't apply to them.

When things are geographically specific, you should report them as such. You wouldn't, for example, warn everyone across the UK to evacuate their houses becasue of an unexploded bomb in Brown Street in Bristol, would you? 

No, because even if the bomb went off in Bristol, people in Cardiff or Derry or Aberfeldy wouldn't be affected. 

Same thing then with cancelled appointments in Scotland. They are not going to happen.

Now for heaven's sake it's not that difficult, BBC. 

Britain is not England is not Britain.

Try saying it over to yourselves a few times and see if eventually it sinks in.

Oh, and one last thing, before I go. If you seriously think that you can address the democratic deficit in your reporting in Scotland by appointing Sarah Smith, another of you Labour Party friends to be your Scotland Editor, then please, think again. We're not impressed, in fact we are howling with laughter at your ineptitude.

It's a bit like trying to fight a fire with paraffin. And we are beginning to wonder if you are doing this on purpose.

Kind regards

MUNGUIN

EASY GUIDE TO TAX AVOIDANCE FOR TORIES AND TO YOUTUBE/TWITTER DELETION FOR JIM MURPHY

Labour can't afford to have a similar flow chart constructed because Ed Balls, unlike Gidiot Osborne, absolutely refuses to allow anyone to do anything on the side, and demands receipts from everyone, unless it's going on his parliamentary expenses... presumably that includes his window cleaner, in which case... who cares?

In other news Jim Murphy has been obliged to delete a Tweet and a Youtube video complaining about the poor performance of the Scottish Health Service, when compared to the English Health Service, after his researchers managed to mix up the figures. 

Instead of apologising to NHS Scotland staff for the lie, as he was rightly asked to by the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Shona Robison, he blamed the mistake on Scottish Ministers. This, of course is Labour's modus operandi. No matter what goes wrong, blame the SNP or the Scottish government, or anyone the hell else, but not themselves.

Let's just remember that the majority of the staff in the health service work bloody hard, and that we would be lost without them. Have a go at Ministers, by all means, if you will, Jim. Take on Shona Robison, she's more than equal to it, but show some respect for the staff working hard on insufficient money to care for the sick.

There is an excellent comment on Jim's faux pas here from Derek Bateman.

INITIATIVE TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM OF BED BLOCKING

A further £100 million over three years is to be invested in the NHS to help reduce the numbers of people waiting to be discharged from hospital has been announced by Shona Robison. 

The funding will be used to support health boards and local authorities deliver good quality care and support for people at home.

Whatever your politics this is surely a good use of our money. 

When you have to be in hospital, that's where you have to be. I imagine very few people actually enjoy it, but it has to be.

But once you no longer need the hands-on 24-hour care, surely all most people want is to get out and finish your recovery in the comfort of you own home.

It's a win win situation too, because hospital beds are expensive and the fewer that are being used when they need not be, the more we can cut waiting times and improve the service we provide to their occupants. 

"Bed blocking" as it is sometimes called, has been a problem for as long as I can remember. It's good that the government is investing money to tackle it.

NEW CABINET ANNOUNCED

The First Minister has announced her new cabinet.

A well balanced team with a 50-50 mix of men and women.

Personal congratulations to my own superb MSP, Shona Robison, who takes over the massively important Health and Well-being brief while, quite logically, holding on to Sport, which is so closely related to health and well-being.

The two other deputy leader candidates are in the cabinet in charge of Infrastructure and Education. Again two big posts.

Nicola said of her team: 

"The aims of my government are clear: to create a nation that is both socially democratic and socially just, a nation that is confident in itself and governed effectively and a nation which will address poverty, support business, promote growth and tackle inequality.

"The new cabinet team I have announced today will pursue these priorities with verve, vigour and determination.

"Every member of the cabinet is part of this government's top team on merit, on the basis of the excellent work they have already done as ministers.

"The cabinet line-up is also a clear demonstration that this government will work hard in all areas to promote women, to create gender equality and it sends out a strong message that we will start the business of redressing the gender balance in public life right here in government."

I look forward to the rest of the ministerial team being announced. 

In the meantime Munguin's Republic offers hearty congratulations to all the cabinet secretaries.

MUNGUIN MEETS THE STARS

The Libations (or some of them) with their biggest fan

Munguin, as you know, has a fair number of friends in political high places. Honourable gentlemen and Excellencies are numbered among his close confidants.

And of course not so long ago he presented Pétula Clark with a box of Thornton's chocolates, with only a couple nibbled (he likes soft centres), at Glasgow's Royal Concert Hall, to celebrate her 72 years in showbusiness and a new album in the charts. 

Today he made further strides in the world of show business by meeting his own personal favourite boy band, The Libations. The guys were in Dundee to promote the single, Caledonia, which everyone on here now knows off by heart, is raising money for food banks.

It was a treat for Tris too, to meet such brilliant musicians and truly lovely people. We spent some time together walking through the centre of Dundee. Somehow it felt like we were friends who had known each other forever. I want to thank them for playing along and being such fantastic sports. I'm sorry to have missed Richy, but there will be another time, I know it.

La la la la la la .... It's the guitar that's out of tune!!!

The town was buzzing, Big Chris was there with his big blue goddess, the Spirit of Independence (seen just behind Munguin as he was just getting his vocal chords warmed up for his solo). On the other side of us Blair Jenkins and Shona Robison were there talking to people as they passed by. The streets were full of kids waving saltires and people with yes badges. It was like a carnival.

Great afternoon... So nice to see the town buzzing with excitement.

Tomorrow we will know if the lads, and Caledonia have made it to the charts. (Update It entered the chart at #16. Good start. Now let's get it in the top 10!) Fingers crossed. The more sales, the more money for hungry kids. You can buy up to midnight tonight!

Thanks for coming to Dundee and for a great afternoon guys.

NOW THAT IT'S ALL OVER....

A Guest Post by Wilson Crichton

Following his successful post last week, Wilson brings the figures up to date, with grateful thanks from Munguin.

On the subject of the Commonwealth Games, Munguin would also like to pay his respects to the people who organised what I think most of us would describe as a successful Games. 

It was ready on time; it came in on budget; it wasn't totally devoid of politics, but there was genuine warmth between athletes and fans, and a few reprehensible moments with two faced flags, etc, were soon pushed into the dust by the friendly warm atmosphere reported widely by the press and bloggers alike.

Congratulations to Glasgow, the committee set up to organise the Games, the City council and the government and a special word for Munguin's friend, Cabinet Secretary for the Commonwealth Games, Sport, Equalities and Pensioners' Rights. 

************

Now that it’s all over......

Last weekend driven by the BBC outpost in Scotland from the Commonwealth Games on the telly to stir the medals numbers about, I was quite surprised that there appeared to be a pattern (albeit fuzzy around the edges) that per capita smaller nations generally did better than the larger ones. I thought that larger nations may have had the advantage of “bandwidth” in that they could afford, and had the talent to invest in, a broader range of sports for their athletes. The smaller nations would be dead good in a few sports but may well be swamped by the larger's greater resource base once all the events were over.

I thought at the time I might have seen that with Scotland slipping from 3^rd to 4^th, about the time when the games moved on from the Velodrome and Tollcross Baths to track & field etc. By the way, did you see Mr. Bolt's race – my goodness, he's well named.

Here's the final medal standings:

Trad placng		Tot-gold	Tot-silver	Tot-bronze	Grand Total
1	ENG	58	59	57	174
2	AUS	49	42	46	137
3	CAN	32	16	34	82
4	SCO	19	15	19	53
5	IND	15	30	19	64
6	NZL	14	14	17	45
7	RSA	13	10	17	40
8	NGR	11	11	14	36
9	KEN	10	10	5	25
10	JAM	10	4	8	22
11	SIN	8	5	4	17
12	MAS	6	7	6	19
13	WAL	5	11	20	36
14	CYP	2	4	2	8
15	NIR	2	3	7	12
16	PNG	2	0	0	2
17	CMR	1	3	3	7
18	UGA	1	0	4	5
19	GRN	1	0	1	2
20	BOT	1	0	0	1
20	KIR	1	0	0	1
22	TTO	0	3	5	8
23	PAK	0	3	1	4
24	BAH	0	2	1	3
24	SAM	0	2	1	3
26	NAM	0	1	2	3
27	MOZ	0	1	1	2
27	MRI	0	1	1	2
29	BAN	0	1	0	1
29	IOM	0	1	0	1
29	NRU	0	1	0	1
29	SRI	0	1	0	1
33	GHA	0	0	2	2
33	ZAM	0	0	2	2
35	BAR	0	0	1	1
35	FIJ	0	0	1	1
35	LCA	0	0	1	1

So far, so ho-hum. The top 10-15 nations are mostly developed and wealthy, wha'dya expect?

Engineers when trying to compare disparate information may look to find some way(s) to normalise the data, to put it on a more even footing. The two most stand out elements in this data set for me are wealth and population. The wealth side of things is the basis for a PhD project, so, I'll concentrate on the population issue. As before, I found the countries' population from worldpopulationreview.com/countries/, and those not there I picked out from Google searches. The exception to this is the population of Cyprus, for which I took Philip D's number.

The medals standing seriatim looks to be based on most to least golds, then likewise silver and to bronze. So, dividing through by population in millions and sorting as described above, gives the following table:

	Population	Trad placng		Tot-gold	Tot-silver	Tot-bronze
1	0.1	19	GRN	10.00	0.00	10.00
2	0.1	20	KIR	10.00	0.00	0.00
3	5.3	4	SCO	3.58	2.83	3.58
4	2.8	10	JAM	3.57	1.43	2.86
5	4.5	6	NZL	3.11	3.11	3.78
6	0.8	14	CYP	2.50	5.00	2.50
7	23.3	2	AUS	2.10	1.80	1.97
8	3	13	WAL	1.67	3.67	6.67
9	5.3	11	SIN	1.51	0.94	0.75
10	1.8	15	NIR	1.11	1.67	3.89
11	56.1	1	ENG	1.03	1.05	1.02
12	35.2	3	CAN	0.91	0.45	0.97
13	2	20	BOT	0.50	0.00	0.00
14	7.4	16	PNG	0.27	0.00	0.00
15	52.9	7	RSA	0.25	0.19	0.32
16	44.6	9	KEN	0.22	0.22	0.11
17	29.8	12	MAS	0.20	0.23	0.20
18	173.6	8	NGR	0.06	0.06	0.08
19	22.4	17	CMR	0.04	0.13	0.13
20	37.8	18	UGA	0.03	0.00	0.11
21	1255.7	5	IND	0.01	0.02	0.02
22	0.009	29	NRU	0.00	111.11	0.00
23	0.09	29	IOM	0.00	11.11	0.00
24	0.2	24	SAM	0.00	10.00	5.00
25	0.4	24	BAH	0.00	5.00	2.50
26	1.3	22	TTO	0.00	2.31	3.85
27	1.2	27	MRI	0.00	0.83	0.83
28	2.3	26	NAM	0.00	0.43	0.87
29	21.3	29	SRI	0.00	0.05	0.00
30	26	27	MOZ	0.00	0.04	0.04
31	183.8	23	PAK	0.00	0.02	0.01
32	157.2	29	BAN	0.00	0.01	0.00
33	0.2	35	LCA	0.00	0.00	5.00
34	0.3	35	BAR	0.00	0.00	3.33
35	0.9	35	FIJ	0.00	0.00	1.11
36	14.5	33	ZAM	0.00	0.00	0.14
37	26	33	GHA	0.00	0.00	0.08

Looks surprisingly similar to the one I did on the 28^th. In terms of weight punching, the less populous, developed nations KO the larger by some margin. With one exception, the top 10 nations have a population of 5.3 million or less. The exception, as was the case on the 28^th, is Oz, double good on them.

Well behind Oz, England and Canada lead the charge for the larger nations (30 million and more) by a sizable margin with a gold score of c. 1+/- pm with their nearest challengers being half that. These two being perhaps the wealthiest countries left in the table.

The countries of Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and England, all did pretty well. However, on a gold per head basis: Scotland - 3.6 golds/ million Scots, Wales – 1.7 golds/million Welsh, Northern Ireland – 1.1 golds/ million Nor'n Irish, and finally England – 1/million English. 

Well that looks a bit different from the gushing guff we've been getting from our BBC outpost in Scotland crew. England may have had a great medal haul but as a nation they were the poorest at punching their weight. They got their bumps felt. Think if I was His High Excellency Grand Sports Poo-Baa Coe, I'd be wondering where the failure was in the sporting systems in England - definitely not in their athletes. Or, maybe he's just good at going around in circles, and being dismissive of Scotland. 

Super well done to Granada and Kiribati, in my view the winners of the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

Well done Scotland, a great games and a great result!

(As a matter of interest if the medal table was arranged in order of total medals, then on a population basis, the standings would be: Wales #4, Scotland #8, Northern Ireland #12 & England #18 – well done Wales in that case.)

Obviously, the traditional medal standings favour the larger nations and by inspection the wealthier ones too. But across one set of nations with broadly similar wealth, sporting culture, much of the same sporting environment opportunities, the smaller nations kick arse.

In my last wee note I was pretty scathing about the scunner BBC Scotland for letting themselves be invaded and subjecting us to that crew.

Sad Sack that I am, I wondered why BBC Scotland couldn't put together a decent commentary crew. Sure, put in a few non-Scots to add flavour and experience but why not? John Beattie easily could have carried it off as the leader of. Hugh Dan could have given us a bit of the Gaelic for those that have it and for colour for those of us who only have enough gaelic to order decent whiskey. BUT, then it struck me.....

was it as simple as

                                                                    they were

        scared

                                                                        someone unreliable might,

                                    on live TV

                                                                                                   to half the world,

that half which had

                                                shed the shackles of colonialism

            said

                                            YES,

                                                            its TIME.

Enough of the BS

                                                                    let's do it...............