It’s snow joke that Scotland is so underprepared for some actual winter weather
It happens every year between autumn and spring. It is called winter and yet it comes as a surprise to the transport minister, Humza Yousaf.
Why is Scotland so woefully unprepared?
Why is our country suffering this predictable periodic paralysis? How do other countries manage this chilly phenomenon? Why are oth- er countries able to keep their schools open, their roads and pavements clear, their airports open, their trains and buses running and keep an honest hardworking people safe on their journeys to work?
How do other countries manage to keep their hospitals running normally and avoid a mass exodus of non-essential staff at the first sign of two snowflakes landing in quick succession? How do other countries manage to keep services like meals on wheels running and district nurses on time for their patients?
Can we put these questions to the transport minister? Er no, probably not – the Parliament is being closed early because of snow!
I don’t remember schools ever being shut when I was a pupil. We were issued with a bottle of frozen milk and told to get on with it.
Even the boys had to wear shorts until high school and no one died. I’m not saying people should risk their lives going to work, I’m saying they shouldn’t have to.
It is not unreasonable to expect people to clear their own pavements in the first flurry of snow, but if the local councils only clear the main arteries leading into towns, and leave the snow to build up in the side streets, the traffic will not flow.
It took four phone calls since November to have my local grit bin filled in Dalkeith and I was told that their priorities were schools and hospitals. And yet it is the schools and hospitals that have buckled under the roar from this “Beast from the East”.
It’s time the transport minister got a grip and bothered to start planning properly for the winter season, instead of copping out and telling Scotland to not even bother trying.
MAGS PRYDE Glebe Street, Dalkeith