Mark Irvine - Blogger, Campaigner, Organiser

I don't always agree with Rod Liddle, but he was spot on in The Sunday Times the other day with his comments about the behaviour of selfish cyclists.   "Every day it’s the same. Walk out of my front door with the dog to be swept aside, into a hedge, by a middle-class family from the city who think they’re all Bradley bloody Wiggins. Daddy and Piers, 11, in the peloton. Mummy bringing up the rear with little Poppy, 6, and Oliver, 4. All in Lycra, all with their energy drinks and fatuous expressions on their faces, expressions of self-righteousness and irreproachable virtue. This is a local lane for local people — go back to your tenements, I shout at them. My wife has persuaded me that, strictly speaking, it is against the law to tie piano wire at neck height across the road. Oh, but it’s tempting." I'm a keen cyclist myself, but I can't defend morons who cyclone public footpaths and refuse to slow right down when there are pedestrians around.   https://w...

Twitter was awash with speculation yesterday about this group demanding 'Justice for George Floyd' and whether they are from the Amish or Mennonite communities in Minneapolis. Now it hardly matters if you ask me, but their message of solidarity could hardly be clearer to the White House and its race-baiter-in-chief.  

Here's a powerful message in the Sunday Herald about the challenges faced by Scotland's care homes in coping with the Coronavirus epidemic.  A public inquiry will get to the bottom of things in due course, but the evidence is mounting that the government effectively threw care homes 'under the bus' by failing to give the sector the same priority as the NHS.  Many of the problems are already well documented - see previous post below dated 20 May 2020.   ‘Three months of mixed messages, mismanagement and missed opportunities’ – care homes chief speaks out Exclusive by Tony Banks, chairman and founder of Balhousie Care Group The news this week that a BBC survey found one in three Scots thought care homes had mishandled the coronavirus crisis was sobering – but not surprising. Reading that made me realise people don’t know the full story surrounding Covid-19 in care homes. And it’s about time they did. We locked down our 26 care facilities on Ma...

When the time comes to look back on the battle to stop the spread of Covid-19 I suspect the evidence will show that care homes across the UK were 'thrown under the bus'.  Some of the many challenges have already been widely reported in the media, often with the aim of finding someone to blame, but here are several issues which have jumped out to me so far. Hospitals have discharging patients into care homes without ensuring they are not infected with Covid-19 Care home residents and staff in care homes have not been routinely tested for Covid-19 - despite repeated promises The supply of PPE (Personal Protection Equipment) to care homes has been slow and patchy The guidance on the use of PPE in care homes has been poor, for example on the wearing of face masks The absence of a robust TTI (Test, Trace, Isolate) policy has made it more difficult to contain outbreaks of Covid-19    Patients who would normally be transferred t...