Readers' Letters: What can we do to keep nursing numbers up?

Yesterday’s editorial (15 February) contains the unpalatable fact that applications for nurses courses are down by 8.3 per cent, following on from shortfalls in previous years. This is extremely worrying.

Scotland is facing the prospect of a shortage of nurses in the NHS (Picture: Adobe)

Recently I needed to spend a day in one of the Edinburgh hospitals where a young nurse was assigned to look after me. Gauging ages is not one of my strong points, but I would have guessed she was no more than mid-twenties. We got into conversation and I asked her if she enjoyed her work. “Very much so”, she replied. “So, will you be staying here?” “No”, she said, with a degree of sadness in her voice. “I'm off to Australia. The pay and conditions are so much better."

I suspect we will only fill the unacceptable level of nursing vacancies when we learn and show in practical terms that, as a society, we value the work that nurses do by rewarding them appropriately.

David Hamill, East Linton, East Lothian

The old ways

In the article “Scottish nursing in 'desperate situation' ” (15 February) financial pressures were identified as a cause for the diminution of nursing as a career. Is it time to revert to Health Board Colleges of Nursing based in hospitals where student nurses learnt more on the ward (thereby reducing the need for agency nurses) and were paid during their apprenticeship? Win/win!

(Dr) Roger G Smith, Edinburgh

Wait to judge

One thing to at least try to increase the number of home-grown trainee nurses is to lower the entry qualifications and make the subsequent training less like the boring old school stuff which many youngsters are only too pleased to escape.

We don't need so many nurses with degrees, but we do need many more with all the other desirable qualities a good nurse should offer. Let's choose them more for these and less for academic success. In fact entry qualifications matter far less than the exit ones. A late cousin of mine was responsible for college and university entrance in one of the Canadian states. His research showed that as judged by the final qualification achieved it was impossible to tell who had started their degree course with brilliant exam results and those who had entered with none. Judge people on how they end up, not on how they begin!

Tim Flinn, Garvald, East Lothian

Two prongs

Has minimum unit pricing (MUP) worked? In his column, Murdo Fraser claims not (Perspective, 14 February). This is surprising, given the strength of the evidence published last year in the respected medical journal The Lancet. That study, which found that MUP was indeed saving lives, is widely accepted as conclusive by medical and scientific experts in the field.

Those like Mr Fraser who question how MUP can be working when alcohol deaths in Scotland have in fact risen should consider how our recent track record compares to England, which has no MUP. The Covid pandemic saw a rise in alcohol deaths throughout Europe and North America, and in Scotland since 2018, when MUP was introduced, alcohol deaths have risen by 10 per cent. But over the same time period alcohol deaths in England have risen by 38 per cent. Between 2012 and 2018 the number of people dying because of alcohol in Scotland was almost twice the rate as in England. But since MUP was introduced in Scotland in 2018, the gap has narrowed and was almost halved by 2021. Common sense dictates that MUP must be at least partly responsible for Scotland faring less badly than our English neighbours.

Mr Fraser also claims, with no supporting evidence, that MUP has caused alcohol-dependent drinkers to turn to illicit drugs. In fact this exact issue has been examined in four separate studies which found no effect of MUP on illicit drug behaviour.

Mr Fraser argues that we need to do more for dependent drinkers – and here we are in complete agreement. Although MUP, by increasing the price of the cheapest drinks favoured by heavy drinkers, will reduce the number of drinkers who become dependent, it is not a treatment for those who, unfortunately, are already dependent. However, to suggest we should abandon MUP to focus only on the treatment of alcohol dependency makes no sense. We need both prevention and treatment.

MUP is not the sole solution, but it is part of the solution and I encourage politicians from across the political spectrum to support the Scottish Government’s proposals to continue MUP and to uprate it to a level appropriate for 2024.

(Dr) Alastair MacGilchrist, Chair, Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems, Edinburgh

Drink on beaches?

I have been reading about the benefits of red wine (but not white wine). Numerous scientific studies show that it is good for you in moderation. For example, a 2021 study concluded that “cardiovascular beneficial effects were observed in humans after ingesting 400ml of wine daily for 4 weeks” and “moderate red wine consumption extends life expectancy”. Yet here we have the SNP increasing its price again from April because they do not think it is good for you at all.

I wonder if there is another benefit to be accrued from alcohol consumption – mental acuity? In vino veritas. Winston Churchill, whose alcohol intake was prodigious, was an excellent decision maker with his “action this day” orders and expecting reports and plans on no more than a single sheet of foolscap; no messing about.

William Loneskie, Oxton, Berwickshire

Off the lead

The maxim “My enemy’s enemy is my friend” may explain the desire of so many people in Scotland to vote Labour at the next General Election to get the Conservatives out. That is understandable.

The problem is that I don’t think many in Scotland support Labour's policies on a Gaza ceasefire, Brexit, the child benefit cap, the bedroom tax, the lack of commitment to rolling out free school meals, nuclear weapons, immigration, diluting green policies, tuition fees and the weekly flip flopping on eg bankers' bonuses and inheritance tax.

For 18 months, as Labour enjoyed the seemingly unassailable lead in opinion polls, their cheerleaders in the Scottish press (Brian Wilson, Jackie Baillie, Bill Leckie etc) have been celebrating victory prematurely.

The Savanta opinion poll reported yesterday, highlighting the Labour lead slashed to 12 per cent, suggests Labour needs to be rather more than Tory Lite.

Perhaps they could entitle the Labour Party General Election 2024 Manifesto “Don’t Frighten The Horses”!

John V Lloyd, Inverkeithing, Fife

Labour twins?

On Wednesday I watched a party political broadcast by “The Scottish Labour Party”. Anas Sarwar appeared. But so did Sir Keir Starmer, who had the dominant role in the film. Why were the leaders of two parties together? Is there some kind of electoral pact for the two Labour parties to work together? Or is it simply the case that Scottish Labour pretends to be a political party, when it is in fact no more than a London-registered branch of the Labour Party? After all, Keir Starmer did say last September, “Whatever I say will be what Anas says”.

E Campbell, Newton Mearns, East Renfrewshire

Pointless

Before last autumn’s Rutherglen by-election we were threatened with huge council tax increases, then our First Minister panicked and announced a rate freeze, now we may have increases. This has shown Holyrood's irrelevance; my MP may influence important affairs and a councillor can get my bins emptied, but SNP MSPs cannot even negotiate with local councils which are often SNP-controlled. If the turnout for the next elections is less than 50 per cent, surely Holyrood can be closed down?

George Craig, Glasgow

Democracy threat

While almost everyone agrees that council tax needs to be reformed, it is ironic that the Our Scottish Future think tank is proposing this when Gordon Brown sabotaged Alex Salmond’s attempt to replace the council tax by withholding council tax relief funding from Westminster. Gordon Brown also promised a near federal Scottish Parliament in his last-minute Vow that broke normal purdah rules in the run-up to the 2014 referendum.

Scotland already has the largest local government units in Europe, now Our Scottish Future is trying to reduce Holyrood’s powers by advocating larger powerful council units, with shades of Strathclyde Council, which together with elected mayors or provosts will remove local democracy even further from the ordinary voter. We should be having smaller local council units with greater financial discretion, plus a more powerful Scottish Parliament with borrowing powers to offset Westminster austerity cuts to its budget.

Labour has no plan to strengthen Holyrood or reverse Tory attacks on democratic decisions like the bottle return scheme, which has recently been introduced in Ireland and Lidl has launched a bottle return scheme across all its supermarkets in Glasgow in a move that is anticipated to facilitate the recycling of 10.5 tonnes of plastic and aluminium every month. We can’t wait for Westminster to get round to these things.

Mary Thomas, Edinburgh

No holiday

Looks like we hyper-sensitive Scots can't go Butlin's any more – look out for the Redcoats!

Steve Hayes, Leven, Fife

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