Flood dangers - 'It should not take 11 years for protection'

Anyone who remembers the floods that brought havoc to parts of the Capital in April 2000 will agree that it is vital that everything possible is done to prevent a repeat.

A 36-hour downpour - the city's worst deluge in 80 years - saw the Water of Leith and its tributaries burst their banks, hitting 500 properties and causing 25 million of damage. The Braid Burn flooded 250 properties, including Cameron Toll Shopping Centre and Peffermill Industrial Estate.

More than a decade on since those devastating floods, a new Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) study is the most detailed effort to date to assess the current risk to the area - as part of a wider, national consultation document.

And it doesn't make comforting reading.

According to SEPA, more than 13,000 homes and nearly 1300 businesses are at risk of flooding in the Lothians. The bill for potential damage tops 115m.

Of course, this is the worst-case scenario, but the information must be used to minimise the risk to property, and most of all to people.

The SEPA maps should help guide planners and builders away from unsuitable areas for further development, and they must be used to check that flood protection is available where most needed.

It will never be possible to eliminate all flood risk and in some cases the chances of flooding will be too low to justify big spending against it.

But where a real risk is obvious it must not take 11 years to provide protection, as has been the case with the first phase of work on parts of the Water of Leith.

Care qualifications

it cannot be right that someone can effectively walk in off the street and start work as a carer for vulnerable elderly people.

But that is the reality of life in nursing homes across the UK where no qualifications - other than no criminal record - is needed to take on the role.

Anyone who has cared for a relative with dementia, for instance, will know it is not something you can do well without at least some basic training.

Of course, insisting on qualified staff could push up costs for an already cash-strapped industry, but we do have to ask ourselves what level of care we are willing to pay for, both for ourselves and our loved ones?

It is to be hoped that the Scottish Government, which has declared itself open to good ideas from all quarters, will give serious consideration to Margo Macdonald's eminently sensible idea.