Front Page Lies

This is about politics. If you're not interested, feel free to move on!

I get the Herald delivered 7 days a week. There are things I like about the paper: some good columns by people like Iain McWhirter and Fidelma Cooke. Good arts and book reviews, and excellent restaurant reviews. I like the Diary, although just lately I suspect the Diary editor is reading the same Facebook entries as I am.

The editorial page claims the Herald is not affiliated to any political party. It may even claim to be 'impartial.' That may have been true at one time but not now: the Herald has swung sharply to the right. In particular, it seems to be solidly unionist (except on Sundays). The Herald has pet subjects: the NHS, education, anything to do with Holyrood, the SNP. It is now so anti the Scottish government, it's hard to get past the lies to find out what's actually going on. Its letters pages over the past few weeks have been openly hostile to the Scottish government, though I can't claim bias without knowing how many letters the editor gets from readers and how he chooses which ones to print in the paper.

Today's front page headline is about the NHS. It claims 'junior' (that is, hospital) doctors are left overnight in charge of over 100 patients.

One junior doctor left to care for 100 patients in hospital amid NHS nighshift (sic) staffing turmoil

So many questions occur to me - and none of them are answered by the Herald:

- Does this ratio of 100+ patients to a doctor apply now, during the holiday period with doctors wanting time off to spend with their families, or is it all the time?

- Is over 100 patients a lot for a doctor to be in charge of overnight, compared to other parts of the UK or even other parts of the world? Are the figures the same for all wards: general medical wards, acute care wards, children's wards and neuro wards?

- Is there a protocol, setting out how many patients a doctor should be in charge of in each type of ward? If so, are our hospitals breaking those protocols?

- It seems to be hard to get medical staff to cover. Again, is that just now at Xmas and new year or all the time? Is that due to a shortage of junior doctors? If so, exactly how many junior doctors should we have and how short of doctors are we?

- How exactly does this amount to turmoil?

What's missing here is context. Oh, and maybe evidence there's a problem. This article is just a jumble of figures, with a big figure in the headline to get the readers rummeled up.

Last week, the Herald's item on the NHS was about the move to the Southern by several hospitals. It seems they got hold of the minutes of a meeting at which 38 consultants expressed concern about the move from the Sick Kids to the Southern, before the move. There was no information about how the same consultants felt the move had gone or how things are going now. I'm no journalist but I know that's not a story.

I could, of course, cancel my order for the Herald. And get what instead? The Scotsman? Please! The Daily Record? Please again! I do have an online sub for the National but where the Herald is rubbish at politics, the National is weak in every area except politics. And I have a local reason for keeping my delivery of the Herald: we've gone from 3 local newsagents to 1 here in recent years and I want to support a local business.