The media game

The news is the NHS is in a helluva state: nurses treating patients in the back of ambulances because there's no room for them in hospital corridors; ambulance staff stuck in hospital car parks for hours because they can't offload their patients; hospital corridors blocked with trolleys because all the wards are full; operations postponed because hospital beds are needed for emergencies; nursing and medical staff at breaking point. 

Winter in the NHS. It happens every year. But wait a wee minute.

The horror story being described on TV, radio and in the UK newspapers right now is about the NHS in England. It may even be about the situation in Wales and Northern Ireland but there's no way to tell because the headline is always just 'the NHS.' We know it's not happening in Scotland. At least, some of us do. Some of us know that health is a devolved issue and the NHS in Scotland is actually doing a lot better than it is elsewhere, despite an ageing population and the usual outbreak of winter flu.

The same applies to the distribution of broadband: the Labour Party faults the Scottish Government for not setting up rapid broadband communication faster, but never mentions the fact that this issue is reserved (that's the right word) to Westminster and the Scottish Government has no control over the project. So the newspaper headlines and TV reports finger the Scottish Government, not Westminster.

This week, farmers in Scotland demanded the Scottish Government tell them what subsidies will be available after Brexit, although Brexit is again an issue that is reserved to Westminster.

But some of the Scottish public think postponed operations and total chaos on the wards apply to Scotland too, that the Scottish Government is failing to deliver broadband and somehow the Scottish Government is responsible for farming subsidies.

So it's turned into a wee game: it's not that Sky News and all the other news outlets like ITV and STV don't know that the NHS in England is different from the service in other countries of the UK. They just prefer to ignore the fact. And they have to know which matters are devolved to Scotland and the other devolved authorities and which are reserved to Westminster. Unless they are totally stupid. And even this lot are not that stupid.

Who is responsible for feeding false information to the public on these matters? I can't decide if it's the TV news channels which seem to miss out the word 'English' when dealing with matters that don't affect any other area of the UK. As if they think the word 'England' somehow covers the whole of 'Britain.'

Or maybe it's the constant flood of non-information put out by the Tories and Labour, often using Freedom of Information requests to provide false information, like this week's revelation that some ambulances in Scotland go out manned by a single person. Yes, they do: they always have - those are the ambulances doing non-emergency work, picking up and dropping up patients. But suddenly this is presented by the Tories in Scotland as a problem.

The ramifications for Scotland when another independence referendum comes are quite clear: the media (TV, radio, and almost all newspapers) will say anything, tell any lie, spout any kind of nonsense on behalf of the union. And since those of us who believe Scotland is capable of being an independent country have no other outlets, we have to keep battering away in the pages of the National and the Sunday Herald. And we have to demand - honestly, demand - that Scottish
Government spokespeople get out there and make it known how the news is being distorted. It's not that hard: most TV and radio journalists these days seem to be gutless: won't press home any point but just allow their interviewees to spout tosh. And if we can't rely on 'mainstream media' there are plenty of us out here online happy to spread the word.