I have had a long love affair with Edinburgh. I recall many visits as a child, looking up at the castle, visiting the museum and eating sticks of Edinburgh Rock (an acquired taste). I was lucky to spend my final year of school just outside the city and then I spent four glorious years there as an undergraduate before returning to teach at the University of Edinburgh for a further eight years. Since then, any excuse finds me in Scotland’s capital. But over the years things between us have not been as cordial and a visit last week has killed my passion. I fear the relationship may be over.
When I was an undergraduate, Edinburgh was once described in the student newspaper as “a woman who powders her face but forgets to wipe her bottom”. This was a reference to the considerable beauty of the city but the poorly treated effluent that the city poured into the Firth of Forth. The effluent problem has been solved and it seems that while Edinburgh now wipes its bottom, it forgets to powder its face. The city, frankly, is a mess.
One of my favourite approaches to the High Street (more famously known as the Royal Mile), between the magnificent Edinburgh Castle at the top and the historic Holyrood Palace at the foot, is up Fleshmarket Close. The ‘closes’ of Edinburgh are historic sets of steep steps which join the lower levels of Edinburgh to the High Street; they feature in the tales of Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson, and Ian Rankin used the name as a title for one of his novels.
Fleshmarket Close has two famous pubs: the Halfway House (which is half way up) and the Jinglin’ Geordie, named due to the ‘jingling’ of the bottles and glasses when, nearby, the Scotsman newspaper presses rolled in the evening. The Scotsman is long gone but the pubs remain, and the steps are still used. However, walking up the close is now treacherous. There is a resident scrounger at the foot (I have watched them ‘changing shifts’; it’s a scam) and then a cascade of rubbish to negotiate which includes cans, bottles and discarded food containers, many with food still in them. The smell is ghastly. The nearby Scotsman Steps also has a cascade, but it is a liquid one and it is not water. The smell is ghastly. The permanent and increasing piles of rubbish in the closes of Edinburgh’s Old Town have been described by residents as a “fire waiting to happen”.
Clearly, Edinburgh City Council is not spending much of its £11.24 billion budget keeping the city clean. So, what is it spending its money on?
First, we have the trams. Edinburgh disposed of its original trams in 1956. Then early in the new century, the City Council decided to reintroduce trams to the city centre. Few in Edinburgh wanted them; massive disruption was expected and delivered. By way of final insult, originally tipped to be a new route to Edinburgh Airport, the trams went nowhere useful. Essentially, when first built, they went from one end of the main street – Princes Street – to the other. If you stand at one end of Princes Street, you can easily see the other end. The City Council was eventually persuaded to extend the line to the airport, but the first phase of the project – described as ‘hell on wheels’ – was delivered £375 million over budget. And they are not finished yet, a further £207.3 million has been spent extending the line to Newhaven. Adding insult to the injury inflicted on the Edinburgh council tax payers the city has launched an inquiry into the tram construction project at a cost of £13 million to which a further £100,000 has just been allocated.
Then we have the cycle lanes. This £19.4 million project (but watch this space), due for completion in 2023 (again, watch this space), began last year. Again, disruption was expected and is being delivered. With the combination of tramways, widened pavements and cycle lanes in addition to bus lanes which operate for most of the day, traffic everywhere is reduced to single lanes. Remarkably, traffic can still penetrate the inner reaches of Edinburgh; but drivers spend increasing amounts of time stationary and the frustration among drivers who make incredibly slow progress through the city is palpable. On a recent visit, I saw many illegal U-turns and right turns accompanied by a cacophony of horns as drivers looked for shortcuts. Needless to say, this is all in the name of climate change as explained by the (deep breath) Minister for Zero Carbon Buildings, Active Travel and Tenants’ Rights, Patrick Harvie MSP:
We are committed to becoming a Net Zero city by 2030 and a key element of this is encouraging and supporting clean and sustainable modes of transport through projects like this.
I spoke to three cycling colleagues about the cycle lanes and none of them were in favour. Apparently one major thoroughfare into the city, in addition to all the above lanes, also has a lane for walking with a cycle. That thoroughfare is now a logjam. The construction of the lanes is unsafe and is leading to accidents among cyclists (one of my colleagues’ wives went over her handlebars) and that is over and above cycling accidents involving tram tracks which have cost the city £1.2 million in compensation.
The final word should go to the long suffering residents of Leith Walk. Once a wide and busy traffic thoroughfare, long ago this was the site of an unfathomable system of multi-coloured lines indicating where cars could park, not park, drop off/pick up and give way to buses. This is now another mass of widened pavements, bus lanes, tram tracks and now cycle lanes. But these are not just any cycle lane, they are ‘zig-zag’ cycle lanes. Described as ‘moronic’, these have been ridiculed by residents, have been the cause of one serious cycling accident (referred to above) and, despite promises by the council in 2022 to ‘make changes’, they are still there.
Next up are the low emission zones, approved by the city council in 2022, implemented in 2023 and due to be enforced in 2024. Edinburgh was once the ‘seat of the Enlightenment’… what went wrong?
Dr. Roger Watson is Academic Dean of Nursing at Southwest Medical University, China. He has a PhD in biochemistry. He writes in a personal capacity.
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Let’s hope others follow her example. A Labour MP on World at One today was complaining that many of his constituents were having to use food banks and could not afford to pay more tax. As that is true we should not be handing over any money to foreign governments.
When Starmer told VP Vance that we have had free speech in the UK for a long time, I waited in vain for someone to ask Starmer if that was compatible with the very new concept of Non Crime Hate Incidents and if so, how?
I know the supine journalists failed to hold Starmer to account but I guess pissing off guests might not get them invited back.
When your own people are well cared for and happy, you can consider helping other countries if you have a surplus.
We borrow to give to others, and our own people suffer, just insane.
I assume that She, of the wild hair, will be persuading 40% of the Civil Service staff in that Ministry to leave as I presume they will be unnecessary.
The free speech remark by Starmer is a bit rich with Mr T Robinson in solitary confinement.
Also in the Telegraph from Stephen Pollard: “Good riddance to Anneliese Dodds, the minister without sense…”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2025/02/28/good-riddance-to-anneliese-dodds-the-invisible-minister/
“…In a Government of non-entities, Dodds was perhaps the most invisible of all. It is perhaps unfair to pose of Anneliese Dodds’ resignation the oft-cited philosophical question: if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”
And a commenter adds, “It’s people like Dodds that give non-entities a bad name.”
Starmer is far right!
The Left will eat itself.
Only the plant-based left. Otherwise, they’d have to stop calling themselves vegan.
That was the most half hearted resignation I have ever seen. As International Development Minister it was down to her her to fall on her sword to placate the far left. She will be back in a top job before you know it. That International Man of Misery, Kier Starmer will find all the money for their stupid overseas spending projects from other departments, probably in a circular route back from defence.
“International Man of Misery” love it!
So will her trough money fall?
“Ultimately, these cuts will remove food and healthcare from desperate people…”
How perceptive of Ms Dodds. She wouldn’t by any chance be referring to the people of the UK by any chance would she?
Oh, silly me.
Who?
Astonishing to think that this idiot was Shadow Chancellor before Rachel from Accounts.
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/the-climate-scaremongers-weekly-roundup/
Here’s £100 billion of savings identified.
Paul Homewood at TCW.
And another £22bn in the pipeline for wholly pointless carbon capture.
Brief summary:
“Dear 2TK, I am really upset that I am being forced to take my snout out of this lovely trough. Why me, when I know you all still have your own? It’s just not fair”.
Yours Ms Gummidge
Could be the start of something beautiful. Perhaps the neocon rats all over the West will leave their sinking ship of their own volition. More or less the entire British political class is neocon including the dissident parties. Probably more likely that the Brits will try to go it alone as they do seem to like playing last man standing. It is a disgusting position, being the head of the ministry of regime change.
Frederick Edward rightly exposing Bozo for the despicable mass murderer that he is. This utterly corrupt piece of shytr is as Frederick Edward blodly states
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/the-unflushable-boris-johnson/
“Given his track record – with the blood of thousands on his hands – together with his central role in covid and his obsession with the civilisation-ending perversity of Net Zero, one can only wish that Boris Johnson would crawl into the nearest foxhole and never return.
As one of the unflushables, however, there is no doubt that he will keep coming back.”
A better idea would be to cut the so-called foreign aid budget by 100%. If people living in the UK want to support charitable causes in foreign countries, they can always contribute money voluntarily. We’re presently at the point where recipients of so-called foreign aid claim they’re owed ‘reparations’ for taking it. So, let’s take this burden away from them.
Utterly agree. Splot the saving between defence and care for the old. £8 billion for defence and £8 billion for Elderly Care, should make a big dent in that problem.
DOGE the rest of the civil service budgets, too.
Down with this state!
And for a more comical yet equally eviscerating look at the Uniparty’s attempts to ensure that thousands more lives are lost in Ukraine here’s John Ellwood at his best…
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/your-bunter-needs-you/
“The KemiKorps: Not wishing to miss the show and inspired by the impressive tactics of Rommel’s Afrika Korps in World War Two, the Tory leader hopes to boost the flagging fortunes of her once-great party by forming a fighting force of young men from her ancestral home, West Africa. Because of her party’s immigration policies there are tens of thousands of Nigerians, Ghanaians etc in the UK who are available to volunteer.”
I’m sure our new arrivals cannot wait to prove their allegiance to their new homeland especially with the new leader of the KemiKorps.
What an unbelievably stupid woman.
Having risen without trace, the only time she makes the headlines is when she flounced out in a huff.
She so obviously hates the British people…
I’m sure she will be sadly missed.
Oh, how she will be missed. Having identified a pressing need for aid I am sure she will resign nd go overseas to some god foresaken place to assist.
Or not.
It is sad for the Brits who don’t go along with the agenda and feel temperamentally opposed to it. Russia has said that it is happy to take western refugees from neoliberalism. There was a secret clause in that 100 year agreement and pledge from Starmer to Ukraine which involved mineral rights. At that point in time it was the perfect opportunity to pre-empt Trump. The deal included complete British control over the Black Sea ports. That is why the British media went crazy when Trump suggested that Zelensky might be a dictator.
Good riddance to another evil,
Communist feminist who thinks foreign men are more in need of our taxes than out own men and women.
Nasty, middle class A-hole
And who is such a traitress that she would put our people’s defence behind aid to lazy, workshy foreigners.
They do love to eat themselves don’t they?
Read the Futurist manifesto if you want to understand where women like this one are going to end up. It is a beautiful document and a huge influence on the German national socialists. On a spiritual level the Trump movement is essentially an antidote to the horror of the sacrifice carried out in broad daylight in November 1963 on a Friday morning. The plotters hoped that it would lead into terminal decline of America and the age of the Antichrist. But in a sense the opposite has happened given just how much this event opened minds to everything else. There are deep spiritual links between Trump and Kennedy.
I’m praying for Almighty God to divide Starmer’s house, for a house divided cannot stand.
This is the beginning.
We do need to beg for direct intervention. Even if he just creates a new enclave in the desert and calls it New England. With taverns and bawdy houses. Perhaps in such an environment the best will wake up. I suggest that we approach the American embassy within the next few weeks and try to come to some sort of arrangement. Because the reality of staying here is simply too grim to contemplate.
Who she ?
Cares only for people in far away places, while voting to impoverish the old and needy here. As she has failed to instigate audits on the money she’s happily sending to these places, how much of it does she think reaches its intended target.?
She’s no great loss…
Nil desperandum. It is rumoured the role might be filled with a v close friend of 2TK, who can share those long, lonely journies to foreign parts together.
The inability for these inept politicians to see around the next corner and assess the consequences is quite staggeringly stupid.
If these politicians want to really see what has gone wrong with governance in Western countries, then need just look in a mirror and stop pointing fingers elsewhere.
Maybe they should be made to prove where that £13 billion Foreign Aid goes to, probably not much goes to those who need it, or should receive it.
Someone once quoted that Foreign Aid is where you take money from the poor people of a Rich country (taxpayers) and give it to the rich people of a poor country – might have been Ron Paul.
They can always find a school they’ve built somewhere, and maybe a hospital – but what these poor countries need are debt forgiveness and access to cheap reliable energy.
Those would be a start!
I understand some Foreign Aid is used to grease the palms of certain people to facilitate trade deals and overseas orders, but like USAID, lets have a full audit.
Dodds and co are peas in the same pod. Left and woke. High tax and anti white. Open borders and endless wastage on illegals. Good riddance. 500+ more to go.
Dear Anneliese
Greed is the belief you are entitled to other people’s money to use for your own purposes.
With respect to your greedy self, you believe you can take my money without my consent using the coercive powers of the State, to disperse in foreign aid to people I don’t know, or I don’t care about, or I don’t like so that you can feel warm and fuzzy about being caring and compassionate.
It’s easy to be generous with other people’s money, innate in Socialists, but if you care so much for others, use your own, and now you have gone, don’t come back.
Your ever!
A Taxpayer.