Latest news with #Shetlanders
The National
04-07-2025
- Business
- The National
Labour created the welfare state. Are they now dismantling it?
The backdrop? The end of the Second World War. UK voters wanted an end to wartime austerity and certainly didn't want a return to the pre-war economic depression. In other words, they wanted change. Clement Attlee's Labour government, in essence, delivered it – inspired by a report by economist William Beveridge, which detailed a system of social insurance covering every citizen, regardless of income. It promised nothing less than a cradle-to-grave welfare state. This included, notably, the establishment of the NHS and a significant expansion of social security and education. READ MORE: Shetlanders raise £10k for Gaza charities through pop-up art exhibition The Beveridge Report was widely accepted at the time, including by the Tories. But it would be unfair to not give credit to the party for ushering in what are widely considered some of the most radical reforms in UK history. Fast forward almost 80 years to 2024 and we found UK voters also clamouring for change. This time, after 14 years of Tory austerity lay waste to public services. Labour, led by Keir Starmer, ran – quite literally, of course – on a platform for 'change'. The party's manifesto was marketed as 'quietly radical', as was Starmer, according to more than one Labour source of mine. But since the July 2024 General Election, the party founded by Keir Hardie has instead scrapped the Winter Fuel Payment for pensioners before then partially U-turning. It has so far remained steadfast on the move to refuse compensation for WASPI women. And then there's the Labour Government's welfare reforms benefit cuts. (Image: PA) The Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill was first announced in March, including measures to limit eligibility for Pip, the main disability benefit in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and freeze the health-related element of universal credit. The legislation passed its first hurdle on Tuesday, albeit not without a huge backbench rebellion which saw the changes to Pip stripped out pending a review. To note, Pip does not exist in Scotland as it has been replaced by the devolved Adult Disability Payment (ADP), administered by Social Security Scotland. So while changes around Pip will not impact on benefit claimants in Scotland directly, changes made south of the Border will hit Scotland financially due to the Barnett formula. The National spoke with Chris Renwick, a professor at the University of York who specialises in the history of the social sciences and the welfare state, and asked whether it would be accurate to say Labour – with moves such as the welfare cuts – are, in essence, dismantling the welfare state. 'I think it's complicated because I think that when you talk about dismantling stuff, I don't think that Labour is ideologically committed to the idea that the state shouldn't be doing those things,' he said. 'They're not like the Thatcher government in the 1980s. And if you were to talk to Labour MPs about it, I'm sure they would tell you that they didn't get into politics to do this kind of thing. I don't think that they're interested in deliberately dismantling things. 'I just don't think that they have a coherent governing philosophy that says what it is that they should be doing and all they all they've got as a response is to try and trim at the edges of things.' Renwich added, speaking before Tuesday's vote on the welfare bill: 'Now you might, you might argue that the effect, should they actually go through with it, would be the same. 'But I don't think they're actually actively looking to kind of stop the state from doing things. 'It's just that they don't, they don't seem to have any kind of coherent idea about what the state should be doing.' READ MORE: How Scotland's black cabs are fighting back against megacorp Uber He went on: 'I think what's very obviously the problem with Labour at the moment is that they do not have a theory or philosophy. There seems to be no explanation of what it is that they're trying to do. 'Take the example of the cuts to disability [payments]. I mean, what is it they're trying to do? That seems to be a good example of the difference between a cut and a reform. "Because you can't look at some of those underlying figures that are associated with sickness-related benefits and not think, well actually there kind of seems to be a problem here when you look at the comparison between claimant figures in the UK and broadly comparable nations. But the response being just to say, well, the answer is that we just need to cut the amount of money available, it's not really a serious response to it for a variety of reasons.' Renwick added: 'One of which is that they're only doing it to save money. They're not doing it as a kind of a reform because they don't seem to have any explanation of what they should be doing instead. 'And you don't need to spend too long looking at what it is that they're trying to do and what the possible consequences are just to realise how hugely problematic it is.' Regardless, it's a series of stark decisions that will impact some of the UK's most vulnerable. (Image: Carolynne Hunter/PA) For Marylynne Hunter and her daughter Freya (above) – who has severe complex health problems and disabilities, is non-verbal and blind and requires full-time oxygen and at-home nursing care – it's a rollback of the welfare state which flies fully in the face of what the former Labour Party stood for. The prominent disability campaigner, who resigned from the Labour Party over the plans last March, said the Universal Credit freeze will 'absolutely affect my daughter' as well as other children. 'A young adult like Freya, who can't access life outside, she can't go to college, she can't go anywhere,' Hunter said. 'That money is essential for her.' Hunter told The National that she feels as though Labour are betraying their core values. 'I agree with the original values of the Labour Party, where if you weren't able to work, due to illness or whatever, then you were supported in a dignified way. 'Those are the core fundamentals of the Labour Party, to support people and distribute wealth between people who are wealthy to support people who are not quite as wealthy and are vulnerable. 'Throughout the years, obviously there's been a lot of other governments – including Conservative governments that have stripped things away, but you wouldn't ever have expected it [from Labour]. 'And that's why I left.'
The National
23-06-2025
- Science
- The National
Ocean off Shetland coast turns green due to natural phenomenon
Nasa's Earth Observatory published the photo of the ocean with a burst of green colour in the middle, and the Fair Isle is visible at the top left corner, earlier this month. According to the American space agency, a large algae bloom, phytoplankton, amassed in the waters near Scotland's Shetland Islands. Scientists added that despite their microscopic size, the plant-like organisms can become visible in satellite images when they explode in numbers, forming what is known as a phytoplankton 'bloom.' READ MORE: Shetlanders raise £10k for Gaza charities through pop-up art exhibition The bloom likely contains coccolithophores as well, notably Gephrocapsa Huxleyi, which is armoured with plates of highly reflective calcium carbonate, researchers added. However, scientists will need water samples to confirm the types of phytoplankton present. (Image: NASA) Nasa said such blooms do commonly occur in the northern North Sea, but on rarer occasions, they can turn up in Scottish coastal waters. The OLI-2 (Operational Land Imager-2) on Landsat 9 captured this image on June 13, 2025, and the part of the bloom shown in the picture spanned a width of around 160 kilometres (100 miles).
The National
23-06-2025
- Science
- The National
Ocean off Shetland coast turns turquoise due to natural phenomenon
NASA's Earth Observatory published the photo of the ocean with a burst of green colour in the middle, and the Fair Isle is visible at the top left corner, earlier this month. According to the American space agency, a large algae bloom, phytoplankton, amassed in the waters near Scotland's Shetland Islands. Scientists added that despite their microscopic size, the plant-like organisms can become visible in satellite images when they explode in numbers, forming what is known as a phytoplankton 'bloom.' READ MORE: Shetlanders raise £10k for Gaza charities through pop-up art exhibition The bloom likely contains coccolithophores as well, notably Gephrocapsa Huxleyi, which is armoured with plates of highly reflective calcium carbonate, researchers added. However, scientists will need water samples to confirm the types of phytoplankton present. (Image: NASA) NASA said such blooms do commonly occur in the northern North Sea, but on rarer occasions, they can turn up in Scottish coastal waters. The OLI-2 (Operational Land Imager-2) on Landsat 9 captured this image on June 13, 2025, and the part of the bloom shown in the picture spanned a width of around 160 kilometers (100 miles).
ITV News
28-05-2025
- Health
- ITV News
The 'Viking' DNA screening saving lives in Scotland's most remote islands
Words by Louise Scott & Stephanie Docherty When John Arthur volunteered to take part in a local study over a decade ago, he never thought it could end up saving his life. The 63-year-old fisherman just wanted to know if he had Viking ancestry, so he donated blood to a University of Edinburgh study, after hearing a talk in his local village. Ten years later, a letter came through the door which potentially saved his life. John carried a variant of the BRCA2 gene which puts him at a much higher risk of developing cancer. After receiving the letter, he went to the doctor and was diagnosed with stage one prostate cancer. 'If I had not done the study and put these things together, I would never have gone to the doctor in the first place," John told ITV News. 'I thought I better go and get tested and get the [prostate] test done to find out more about it. 'I wouldn't have even thought about going to the doctor about it, to tell the truth." After his early diagnosis, in February this year he underwent a successful operation to remove his prostate and is already back to work with the all clear. He now believes everyone should have access to these types of tests to prevent serious health conditions from developing in the first place. John Arthur is one of more than 60 volunteers who were sent letters last year after contributing to the study which found that those from Shetland, or with ancestors from the islands, are at a much greater risk of carrying genetic variants which can cause a number of life-threatening conditions. These include the BRCA2 gene which causes breast, ovarian and prostate cancer and the KCNH2 gene which causes fatal heart rhythms. Plans have now been unveiled for a groundbreaking genetic screening programme to provide another 5,000 Shetlanders the opportunity to find out if they are carriers of these variants. Professor Jim Flett Wilson from the University's Usher Institute visited Lerwick to announce the £1 million fundraising campaign. 'I've been studying the genetics and the health of the people of Orkney and Shetland for over 20 years now," Professor Wilson said. "When I started this, there wasn't all that much that we could do and now we can read all of the DNA of everyone for a reasonable price so we can learn enormous amounts. 'The first one we noticed was the breast cancer variant. Of course, you find these things in London and Edinburgh, but they're rare. Whereas here we were seeing it in remarkable numbers of people. And when we looked further, we found this wasn't the only case. There were other examples, different genes, different diseases. All of them had become a whole lot more common than we would have expected. 'It's because a lot of people from remote communities have been marrying locally for many years, so many of them come down from one ancestor. But if that ancestor had a mutation, had a change in his or her genes, then it would have come down the generations all the way down to today. 'This happens everywhere on Earth, but people spread all over the world. They're mixed up there in Yorkshire and America. And here obviously some people have left, but there's still a concentration, a core of local people. And we see this this increase in frequency and having these genes, it doesn't necessarily mean that they have cancer or that they have a rare condition." The screening will focus on 50 genetic variants that have 'actionable findings', meaning that they can be treated through NHS to manage the condition. Volunteers in the programme will be notified of their genetic findings and be advised on the appropriate NHS pathway of care. 'The NHS is great as it stands, but it really works in a reactive mode. It only tries to fix people when they're broken, and I think we want to turn this around," Professor Wilson said. "This is a great example of preventative medicine, and we want to start in Shetland because it has the greatest need. And it's also an opportunity. "It's not that big a number of genes that we need to look at. So there's a sort of cost effectiveness argument here as well. It helps to save lives." The Jewish community in England have recently been given access to a similar screening programme, because of the greater levels of the BRCA genes found within their community. The Viking Genes study believes it is only fair to roll this out to other remote communities, like the Scottish islands. The screening will be designed for people over the age of 16, from anywhere in Shetland, by a DNA saliva collection kit. The new screening project will in time identify those individuals who may not be affected themselves, but who carry an elevated risk of passing on certain genetic conditions to their children. The campaign says it could take around one year to lay the 'ground work' for the project before screening commences.
Scotsman
21-05-2025
- Health
- Scotsman
Inside the pioneering £1m 'Viking gene' project to screen thousands of Scottish islanders
Unique project aims to help islanders take preventative action Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... A major fundraising drive for a pioneering large-scale genetic screening programme has been launched in an attempt to help thousands of Scots discover whether they are at risk of developing a series of life-threatening conditions. In what has been hailed as a significant step forward towards Scotland's first ever community-focused preventative healthcare screening campaign, the appeal aims to provide people in Shetland with free access to leading genetic research so as to test for disease-causing variants that could cut their lives short. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Those living on parts of the archipelago have a seven-times higher risk of developing breast, ovarian and prostate cancer caused by so-called BRCA2 gene variants than the population on the Scottish mainland. It is hoped the screening programme will enable early preventative health interventions to either reduce the chances of disease occurring, or stop its progression. Dr Shona Kerr and Professor Jim Flett Wilson picking plasma as part of their research for the Viking project. Picture: University of Edinburgh | University of Edinburgh The Viking Genes Shetland initiative aims to provide 5,000 Shetlanders with the opportunity to take part in a free generic screening developed specifically for the islands. Those volunteering will be advised of actionable genetic findings and, in time, the project will also identify those individuals who may not be affected themselves, but who carry an elevated risk of passing on certain genetic conditions to their children. They include the likes of cardiomyopathy, haemochromatosis, Batten disease and island-specific multiple sclerosis. Health Secretary Neil Gray has asked to be kept informed about the progress of the community screening project and its implications for shaping future genomic medicine policy across Scotland, where several more high-risk population groups have been identified. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Jim Flett Wilson, a professor of human genetics who leads the Viking Genes programme at the University of Edinburgh's Usher Institute, said: 'Preventative genetic healthcare like the Viking Genes Shetland community screening project will directly impact the health of Shetlanders. 'It's likely to save lives and keep many more people healthy and contributing to the community rather than not realising they were at risk and then suffering from advanced stages of disease later in their lives. Shetlanders have a much higher risk of certain genetic diseases, so there's a clear need and we are trying to help. Shetland Islands Council, including the town of Lerwick (pictured) takes fourth spot when it comes to standards of nursery provision. There are 1,301 under-fives in the area, with 5.4 nurseries per 1,000 under-fives rated excellent in at least one category. | Canva/Getty Images 'Most people we screen will find they have no elevated health risks and have that peace of mind. But we've already demonstrated that for the expected 100 individuals we find with elevated risks, it can be life-changing and life extending.' Community leaders in Shetland have formed a committee in an effort to raise £1 million towards the costs of the programme, which will test for 50 genetic variants found to be prevalent in the local population. Research shows one in 40 Shetlanders carry one of these variants. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Sandra Laurenson, chair of Viking Genes Shetland, said: 'The voluntary group was formed following a presentation Prof Wilson gave in Lerwick last autumn. It was an eye-opener for many of us learning of the number of conditions that stem from a genetic variant, and interesting how it traced back to specific island communities. Those volunteering will be advised of actionable genetic findings. Picture: University of Edinburgh | University of Edinburgh
