Category: Scotland

Help me write about the future of Britain on Beacon

In 2014, I am planning something new: a series of weekly articles about Britain and how it is run, in the year that might see Scots voting to end the country in its current form, and certainly sees the UK struggling to decide what sort of country it plans to become.

The name I’ve given this project is The Ends of Britain. That’s as in a posssible ending through Scottish independence, but also ‘ends’ as in purposes, and also out-of-the-way parts of the country (places I always like to write about). Continue reading “Help me write about the future of Britain on Beacon”

Scotland’s Future NHS under independence: much like the existing one?

Scotland’s Future, the 670-page report published last week by the Scottish Government promoting Scottish independence, includes detailed plans on how the BBC, the Royal Mail and the security services would be divided up if Scotland votes in favour of a split next September. Continue reading “Scotland’s Future NHS under independence: much like the existing one?”

ID cards are dead but ‘your papers please’ lives on: for the Register

One of the great fears of those who campaigned against ID cards in Britain was that, as soon as the cards were in place, officialdom would start inventing reasons to demand to see them – the ‘your papers please’ problem, that a police officer or official in a country with ID cards demands to see your papers just to show who’s boss. To quote Richard Littlejohn, writing in the Sun in 1994 and quoted by Matthew Engel in the Guardian (and how often does that happen?): Continue reading “ID cards are dead but ‘your papers please’ lives on: for the Register”

An independent Scotland’s tough government IT choices for The Register

One year ahead of the referendum, The Register last week published my assessment of the choices an independent Scotland would face on government IT.

It’s a mixed picture. Some sections of the public sector, such as the NHS, education and the emergency service, are already run by Scotland on a devolved basis, and so is their IT. But the UK-wide ones that would need to be unscrambled are also the biggest: HM Revenue and Customs, Department for Work and Pensions and secret (leaving aside Edward Snowden’s cornucopia of stories) surveillance. Continue reading “An independent Scotland’s tough government IT choices for The Register”

Reporting the local NHS: credit where it’s due

The National Union of Journalists has started a campaign to support reporting of health and the NHS, especially in the local and regional media. It’s a good choice – and there’s a good article about it in the NUJ magazine The Journalist (starts on page 14), with contributions from Shaun Lintern, who covered Mid Staffordshire relentlessly for the Express and Star, and now works for Health Service Journal.

As one of my colleagues at EHI says, the NHS isn’t national. She also says it doesn’t deal with health and doesn’t provide much of a service, but leaving that aside, the point is that the health service is essentially local: you are normally cared for by your local GP, then your local NHS trust (or board, in Scotland and Wales). Trusts and boards vary greatly in quality – some are brilliant, a few are awful, many are somewhere in between. Continue reading “Reporting the local NHS: credit where it’s due”