‘Snub’ablessing?
With the World Health Organisation reporting on Monday that the UK has currently the highest number of Covid cases in the world, isn’t it time our governments agreed a strategy to suppress the virus? they continue to pursue herd immunity, relying almost solely on the vaccine defence. This strategy is wreaking havoc with our NHS, already stretched to breaking point, with hospitals full and an anticipated flu surge this winter.
The irony is that we almost got to elimination last summer, with daily cases in single figures in Scotland. Then we opened up foreign travel and let the delta variant in, with disastrous consequences. A future strategy needs to learn from countries like New Zealand (28 deaths out of 5 million people), with quarantining for those testing positive on entry, and South Korea (2,600 deaths out of 51 million people) with its advanced test and trace system and supported quarantining.
Public health experts are “very worried” and claim that vaccines can’t defend on their own against such high transmission rates, with some citing a new delta plus mutation of concern in England. Deaths are the highest since March and here in Scotland cases are starting to rise, having bottomed out at around 2,500 a day, with more than 800 and rising in hospital. Given the state of our NHS, this is unsustainable and to avoid a lockdown the only way forward is to mandate distancing and mask wearing in indoor places, enforce testing at our borders, reinforce home working, more effective track and trace and supported quarantining.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid this week expressed pride in the vaccine rollout but he should hang his head in shame at his government’s record of 139,000 deaths, roughly equivalent to the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Learning from mistakes and from other countries clearly comes second to patting themselves on the back.
NEIL ANDERSON
Edinburgh
Surprise! Politicians placed the first two carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects in the north of England. The long-trailed levelling up strategy of Boris Johnston has seen the red wall constituencies all-right. The Scottish government helped by making the decision easy for him.
It was Nicola Sturgeon who invited the Greens into coalition, who are both against CCS and economic growth. In addition, the First Minister’s refusal to cooperate with Westminster over other infrastructure upgrades (think freeports and roads) was a gift to the bid winners.
Also notable is the Scottish government’s poor relationship with key, active industrial players. Last week Ineos announced a £2 billion green hydrogen project in Germany. Could our government’s dishonest campaign against fracking have tipped the balance against similar investment at Grangemouth?
The demises of CSS in Scotland may, however, be a blessing in disguise. The technology is unproven at scale but will still heap unaffordable costs onto gas consumers. Green hydrogen is another inefficient and uneconomic energy concept, so loved by the civil servants who bought into fragile wind power.
A more enlightened future sees small modular reactors (SMRS) generating zero carbon power at source. Countries who master fission safely will be the first to exploit the unlimited potential of fusion. Scotland hosts the cooling core of a nuclear industry that still has valuable experience handling small nuclear submarine reactors.
Scotland has the potential to participate and win in the first SMR funding round, but we lack the necessary gumption in government. English/ Welsh regions are again way ahead in the bidding stakes, with Scotland not even mentioned in the rumoured list of new sites.
Scots need to recognise that a legion of civil servants – all keeping themselves busy – doesn’t amount to an industrial strategy. If the Scottish economy is being hollowed out, it is by the hands of our own idle government.
CALUM MILLER Prestonpans, East Lothian
Sheerhypocrisy
Ian Blackford MP declares his outrage in the Westminster Parliament that the UK government have not granted the funding to Scotland for the new carbon capture facility to be based in Scotland. He declares that the UK government is an “active barrier” to renewables.
This coming from a representative of the SNP who in the very recent past has declined funding from the UK government around the “UK Connectivity”
review, and indeed, declined any involvement from the UK government, and therefore funding, for the development of at least two Scottish freeports, likely to create thousands of jobs.
The well-worn and utterly discredited excuse offered by the SNP around a potential “power grab” simply has no credibility. Their decision to reject UK funding is simply predicated on their grievance culture. It never ceases to amaze me how the SNP manages to raise the bar from the highs they have achieved in contemptible hypocrisy. RICHARD ALLISON
Edinburgh