There’s nothing to see here...
SHORTLY before noon yesterday, a lorry with a cargo of fireworks suffered a blow-out on the Royal Mile. Despite the heroic efforts of the driver to regain control, the juggernaut careered off the road, smashing through the outer wall of the Scottish parliament before coming to rest in the garden lobby.
The driver leapt from the vehicle just in time, as fire caught hold. The first explosion tore the roof off the lorry before howling rockets and Catherine wheels began whizzing out of the wreckage.
Screaming visitors took cover behind the coffee bar as the contents of the lorry spat white hot bolts of fire in every direction.
Then, striding through the chaos, came First Minister Nicola Sturgeon. Her sole concession to the scene unfolding around her was a pair of welding goggles, coloured purple to complement her sharply tailored suit. By her side, John Swinney punched fireworks off course – as behind, her MSP group affected disinterest. Miss Sturgeon spoke loud and clear: ‘There’s nothing to see here. Move along.’
This was classic Sturgeon stuff, to be repeated in reality – rather than in the depths of my mind – shortly afterwards during First Minister’s Questions. This was, unsurprisingly, dominated by an Audit Scotland report damning the Government’s stewardship of the NHS.
Tory leader Ruth Davidson was first up. She called the current state of the health service an ‘outrage’ and wanted to know what the First Minister reckoned.
There was nothing to see: the NHS in Scotland was doing better than the NHS in England, where the Tories were in power. Miss Davidson should think on that.
Whenever Miss Davidson spoke, Nationalist MSPs shook their heads as if they could somehow shrug off the reality that patients aren’t getting the treatment they were promised within the timescales guaranteed by the SNP.
When Miss Davidson pointed out health boards were having to make cuts, take out loans and even put off essential repairs to cope with the financial pressures, those SNP heads shook more vigorously still.
Labour leader Kezia Dugdale fared no better in getting details as to how matters might be improved out of the First Minister, who insisted she was in control.
Miss Dugdale raised the case of a man suffering debilitating pain who has been told to wait seven months for an appointment.
Miss Sturgeon was happy for the Health Secretary to look into that. But when it came to the SNP’s running of the NHS, there really wasn’t anything to see. Anyway, wasn’t it a bit rich for a Labour leader to criticise the SNP when her own party had failed the NHS in the past?
This diversion into history defence was hugely appreciated by the SNP group, whose members swapped vigorous shaking of their heads for frantic nodding.
AFTER Green co-convener Patrick Harvie asked about SNP support for a third runway at Heathrow, Lib Dem leader Willie Rennie returned the debate to that Audit Scotland report. Its contents, he said, were a horror show; didn’t they give the First Minister sleepless nights? The Nationalists risked shaking their heads clean off.
There can, I’m afraid, be no prizes for guessing what came next. There would be too many winners.
There was nothing to see, other than the fact that the Lib Dems had, until 2007, been in coalition at Holyrood with the Labour Party. And what had they done for the NHS?
So there we have it. A First Minister who spent five years as Health Secretary presides over a service in chaos, but she’s not really to blame. There’s nothing to see, you see.
If you do find yourself worrying about SNP mismanagement of the NHS, just take Miss Sturgeon’s prescription for dealing with this problem and get angry about Tories who don’t run it and a Labour-Lib Dem coalition that ceased to exist almost a decade ago.
You’ll soon feel much better.