Professor of Public Policy, Edinburgh University
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James Mitchell retweeted
The Scottish universities should keep repeating this. They are capped in how many school leaver scottish students they can take, and they are not appropriately paid by scottish govt for that intake.
This is the scottish government policy.
The Vice-Principal of St Andrews has literally just had to publish an article explaining that the Scottish Government dictates "precisely how many they can admit every year". If the university goes "even one student beyond our cap, they are fined". Trying to frame St Andrews as anti-Scottish when it is the SNP’s own funding model that restricts domestic student numbers is entirely dishonest.
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James Mitchell retweeted
Oh my good God!! this is unconscionable nonsense. Like the safe injecting spaces, happy to have any "world firsts" irrespective of evidence or positive outcome but unable to provide any real evidenced strategy to prevent deaths. SNP have completely lost it for me.
Citizens will continue to die so long as this shameful, irresponsible nonsense is the response. I'd hope there would be some in the SNP who will publicly condemn this disgraceful MSP.
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James Mitchell retweeted
How is Scotland doing? Sceptical Scot publishes different views. What resonates? Here's top three Sceptical reads of the week:
Number 1: (still) @HubrisTheBook long view on data centre boom. What Scotland can learn from past sceptical.scot/2026/08/data-…
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James Mitchell retweeted
“The day Scottish policy makers abandon some failed distinctly Scottish approach in favour of a successful English policy would not only serve the public well but signal a maturing of Scottish politics.” @ProfJMitchell
Sceptical.scot
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James Mitchell retweeted
🚨🚨 NEW: The Standards Commission is being formally investigated by National Records of Scotland for their destruction of records. The destruction coincided with 3 live court proceedings concerning human rights protections and procedural fairness.
heraldscotland.com/news/2657…
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The case for extending devolution in any existing area - such as drugs policy - would be strengthened if there was evidence (and that means measured by OUTCOMES) of competence in use of existing powers. 1/2
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Leave aside the possibility that some may be unable to understand stats, there are many in the SNP who certainly can. The statistically literate should speak out.
There are, of course, many SNP supporters claiming that issues with how drug death data is collected or recorded fully explain Scotland’s outlier figures. They are wrong, and this @NatRecordsScot blog explains why: blog.nrscotland.gov.uk/2023/…
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James Mitchell retweeted
Stop the shameful spin. This is NOT Westminster’s fault or responsibility. Rehabilitation and recovery is what people need and the Scottish government has every lever required to focus on this approach. They chose not to.
SNP MSP @jackmiddleton95 says UK laws are "holding back" Scotland's response to the drugs death crisis.
Drugs minister @MareeToddMSP says there's a "very strong case" for Scotland having greater control over drug policy.
Community note
Scotland and the rest of the UK operate under the same reserved Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. Health, treatment and social care are devolved; Scotland's drug death rate is substantially higher than England and Wales.
holyrood.com/comment/view,s…
gov.scot/news/rise-in-d…
legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/46/…
nrscotland.gov.uk/publications/d…
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James Mitchell retweeted
Every single year on this day SNP supporters claim that ‘drugs policy is reserved to Westminster’. This is not true. To illustrate - in Sept 2021 the Lord Advocate - a member of Scot Govt - gave police officers authority to issue recorded warnings for possession of Class A drugs
BREAKING: Drug deaths rise 11% as Scottish figures remain worst in Europe bbc.in/4dvoc90
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Citizens will continue to die so long as this shameful, irresponsible nonsense is the response. I'd hope there would be some in the SNP who will publicly condemn this disgraceful MSP.
You’ll never guess who Jack Middleton believes is preventing Scot Gov from taking action on drugs deaths.
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James Mitchell retweeted
Local government reform must find consensus and not lead to a further centralisation of powers, writes @ProfJMitchell holyrood.com/inside-politics…
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James Mitchell retweeted
Jenny Gilruth suggests the Scottish Government intends to devolve precisely zero new powers to councils after they are forced to merge.
Centralisation and aggressive cost-cutting is the agenda here.
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James Mitchell retweeted
ARTICLE:
Duncan Bell, "John Stuart Mill on Federation, Civilization and Empire," History of Political Thought (2024)
go.shr.lc/3EFfrLf
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Now a serious contribution.
Commenting on the report published today @AlexNeilSNP said:
"We are well past the point where we can afford for this to be a party political issue. There are some immediate actions which transcend ideology and transcend politics, and it is those actions we must now take." 1/2
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A weird, at best highly selective and odd, interpretation of history.
I’ve seen a lot of people saying today’s events in Cardiff aren’t historic
They are. Not because Scotland, Wales and Ireland have never worked together before - they absolutely have and that history stretches back well over a century
But what happened today is v different 🧵
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