Infections saga: our fears were ignored
STEWART Paterson’s piece on the infections saga (Health boss blames former board.. December 2) put me in mind of an NHSGGC Board meeting I attended some time ago (June 17, 2017, since you ask). Board members were quizzing the then recentlyappointed Chief Executive on other matters, when the chairman intervened to plead with them to cut Ms Grant some slack, since she had “inherited a nightmare”.
Those were his exact words, although for some reason you will not find them in the minutes!
As a member of a health campaign group (since dissolved), I thought at the time of all the issues we had raised while the new hospital was being designed, only to be told we “didn’t understand”.
I still don’t, and it will be interesting to see what the current plethora of investigations produces. Not so much to point the finger as to see some clarity in a very clarty issue.
Meantime my sympathies are with the families robbed of their hopes, and with an administration struggling to emerge from the nightmare and not retreat into a communications bunker.
James Sandeman Newton Mearns
IT is a disgrace that so many people in a rich country like Scotland rely on foodbanks. But that is what happens when an SNP Edinburgh government actually INCREASES the austerity of a Tory London Government. It is a double whammy.
Labour says it will end Universal Credit which was brought in and supported by people like Jo Swinson of the LibDems. She has a lot of explaining to do to the electorate. She also voted for the bedroom tax and against raising benefits. These foodbanks are a consequence and part of her legacy when the LibDems shared power with the Tories.
The SNP now have devolved powers to help people on Universal Credit. But they have been so incompetent over the last 10 years that child poverty has increased and only yesterday we were told the education attainment gap is getting worse. England is doing far better.
T Paine posted online
THE ‘celebrities’ on l’m A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here are people who are already earning very high salaries. Ian Wright, former high profile footballer and current media presenter, is said to be receiving a fee of £1m and still looks as miserable as sin. How about next year Ant and Dec go for a radical revamp for the show’s 20th anniversary and have all the participants
playing for charities? The longer they survive, the more money the charities will receive. Then we’ll see how many are keen to put themselves out there.
AM Glasgow
PATRICK Harvie MSP is demanding that powers over energy policy is devolved to Holyrood in order to tackle the climate emergency. He says that “Westminster is holding back Scotland’s capacity to tackle the climate emergency” because it slashed wind turbine subsidies and he wants to introduce “a progressive support scheme for renewables”. That means even higher subsidies. At present the substantial subsidies paid to energy companies are added to the energy bills of all consumers in the UK. Since Scotland has far more wind turbines than the rest of the UK it means that 92 per cent of the population south of the border are paying for Scotland’s subsidies. If the energy policy was devolved as Patrick Harvie wants then the English and Welsh consumers would demand that Scottish energy consumers pay for their own wind turbines subsidies and Scottish energy bills would escalate. Still think it’s a good idea, Patrick?
Clark Cross via email