COME with me on a journey to the statosphere. It’s hazy. Dim. Swirling numbers cloud the senses. One minute everything looks clear, then the fog returns and it’s migraines all round.
Because Holyrood is tethered to an immutable Indycamp, the statosphere came to FMQs today, enveloping MSPs in a choking pea-souper of nonsense.
Oppo boss Ruth Davidson started it by asking about NHS consultant vacancies. Up 14 per cent in three months, she swooned, up 300 per cent since 2011!
Er, not so fast, countered Nicola Sturgeon, staff numbers are at a record high. “Nurses and midwives up 6 per cent; doctors up 26; medical and dental consultants up 42.9,” she recited.
As for consultant vacancies, “down from 7 to 6.5 per cent since the SNP took office”.
Besides, the First Minister pointed out, you lot are Tories. I’d sooner trust Dracula with my black pudding collection than trust you with the NHS. Check the nick of it in England.
“I know the FM is off to London tonight for a debate,” sneered Ms Davidson, “but we’re talking about the Scottish NHS, which her government has been in charge of for nine years.”
Labour’s Kezia Dugdale (remember her?) then got in on the act by emptying buckets of stats about poor students being shut out of university.
“Earlier this week, the FM was named as the 50th most powerful woman in the world. When will she use her immense power to improve the chances of Scotland’s young people?”
Unhappily for Ms Dugdale, Ms Sturgeon commands immense sarcasm too.
“Kezia Dugdale clearly pays more attention to those things than I do. Never mind. If she keeps trying, I'm sure she will get there eventually.”
An enormous telepathic ‘Miaow!’ rang through the head of everyone present.
The FM admitted there was “work to do”, but insisted the picture was improving. Ms Dugdale accused her of “three different excuses of why the numbers are wrong”.
Ms Sturgeon shrugged innocently. “I simply pointed out what the figures actually say.”
Finally, Labour education spokesman Iain Gray made the near-fatal mistake of asking about a “reported fall” in women studying science since 2007.
Ms Sturgeon flew at him. It was only “reported” because he’d personally fed the media bogus figures that didn’t compare like with like, and the numbers were actually up, she said.
“We must have a debate based on facts, not on distortions!”
Mr Gray looked painfully distorted himself. “Perhaps the First Minister and I can argue about the numbers another time,” he whimpered, another statistic in Labour’s exponential decline.
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