Fiona McCade: Why I fail to warm to winter warnings

ONE day, a few years ago, the sun shone. In fact, it was unusually warm, so I went to the newsagent’s to buy something cold.

While I was there, another customer – an old lady – keeled over and we had to call an ambulance. It soon emerged that the reason for her funny turn was that she was wearing a thick, woollen coat; thick, woollen cardie, skirt and vest; thick, woollen tights and a thick, woollen hat.

I’m pleased to report that, despite the (surely unique) experience of getting heatstroke in Edinburgh, the old lady was eventually fine, but you can’t blame her for wrapping up warm. She was Scottish. She knew that even if it’s August and the sun is blazing, the weather can change at any second. Meteorologically speaking, north of Berwick, you can’t rely on anything. You always need to be prepared.

I thought that everybody who lives in Scotland understood this basic fact of life. Even at the height of summer, I carry a fleece and an umbrella, just in case. In fact, summer is the difficult season, because you never know what’s going to happen and the variety of possibilities is vast. I once found snow in the Highlands in June.

Winter is much easier. Supposing you survive the killer conker-fall of autumn, you know it’s going to be unremittingly cold, miserable and grey, and you’ll need one pair of thermals on, one pair off and one in the wash from at least September to May. So why has the government only just decided to officially warn us that winters can be a bit parky?

The newly launched Ready for Winter? campaign kindly informs us that we need to take “simple but sensible” steps to make sure we don’t accidentally wear our bikinis to work.

According to justice secretary Kenny MacAskill, the initiative was inspired by the fact that we’ve had two “severe” winters in a row, and that a government-commissioned survey showed 50 per cent of respondents were worried about “extreme” winter weather, but frankly, I’m not convinced.

Does the word “Aviemore” mean anything to you? Scotland used to have a skiing industry, remember? Snow every year? Predictably low temperatures? Our most recent winters haven’t been pleasant, but they’ve been nothing to what I remember as a child. If a government representative asked me if the possible effects of “extreme” weather worried me, I might say yes. But if they asked me if I think we’ve had much lately, I’d say no. In fact, I reckon we’ve had a very long run of relatively mild winters and the powers-that-be have simply got out of the habit of preparing. So now, they’re showing us they care.

Don’t get me wrong, many of the Ready for Winter? recommendations are perfectly good: plan ahead, be prepared, help other people out, etc. I just resent the holier-than-thou inference that we’re too stupid to be doing this stuff already and as a matter of course.

This is Scotland. Snow, wind, rain, sleet and general, gonad-anaesthetising weather isn’t severe, it’s NORMAL. Traditional, even. It’s what we always used to expect before we had a slight lull. It’s why all our old ladies have thick, woollen clothing and are scared to take it off.

So please, Kenny and friends, don’t patronise us by telling us how we should expect wintry weather in … er … winter. It feels like only a few weeks since the last one ended, so we can remember the drill. Rather than spend our money on glossy initiatives telling us to be prepared for the bleedin’ obvious, we’d rather you got yourselves sorted first. Get those gritters and snowploughs ready. Have a clear, easily-implemented strategy for keeping the roads, rails and airports clear. That’s all we ask.

Logic suggests that since we live north of the 55th parallel, it’s not going to get warm again any time soon. In fact, it rarely gets warm at all, so we’re generally very good at preparing for the worst. I appreciate the Scottish government’s concern, but I have every confidence that we can cope, as we always have. I mean, it’s not like we’re Londoners, is it?