News.Scotland.Org

Scotland, May 9: Scotland has huge number of tourist inflow every year. It boasts several impressive landmarks that attract hoards of tourists, according to VisitScotland Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Scotland was found to be the busiest visitor attraction last year.

In the year 2007 above 45 million visitors came to see the Scottish attractions as per the statistics. Among paid attractions Edinburgh Castle was the most popular with over 1.2 million visitors followed by Edinburgh Zoo and the free Glasgow museum had 2.23 million visitors.

While responding to this Jim Mather, the Tourism Minister said: “The statistics show that Scotland is developing as a favourite tourist destination that is expected to draw more tourists in the following years. We want to show the world that the whole of Scotland has something to offer and the figures show that the efforts taken in this regards is giving a positive result. The visitors are eager to visit both the biggest cities and the remote region of Scotland, as Scotland flaunts some of the best attractions in the world.”

According to Philip Riddle, chief executive of VisitScotland, visitor attractions play a significant role in uplifting the tourism sector and will help the industry to attain 50% growth in the revenue by the end of 2015.

Other attractions which draw huge visitors are the Scottish Seabird Centre in north Berwick, that saw 26.3% increase in the number of visitors and St Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh that saw 21.4% increase in the number of visitors. The Falkirk Wheel has also seen a 17.5% increase in the number of visitors.

Scotland, May 1: In a whopping auction the White Roses and the Red Roses, an artwork of Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh fetched £1,700,500. The decorative panel was first displayed in the year 1902, with this auction the decorated panel set a new world record for highest amount achieved by a Scottish art work.

The Heart of the Rose, another panel by the same artist was sold for £490,900 at the same auction held at Christie’s in London. The artist Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh was the wife of renowned designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

The White Rose and Red Rose panel is purchased by a private US buyer. The artwork was decorated with jewelled gesso, a type of plaster and paint. This incomparable decorative panel is a joint work of Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh and her husband. The celebrity couples created lot of artistic works, with Macdonald Mackintosh creating the interiors of her husband’s work.

While commenting on this Professor Pamela Robertson, senior curator of Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery in Glasgow said: “It was a rare treat for the art lovers when Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh’s works come up at auction. Only some of her art works exist today and most of them are in public collection.”

Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh was born in 1864 and died in 1933.

Scotland, Apr 29: Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond and Prime Minister Gordon Brown have met to resolve the strike that had led to the closure of Grangemouth oil refinery. The meeting took place at the House of Commons and it lasted for about 20 minutes.

The 2 days long strike has disrupted the fuel supply and led to the halt of UK’s North Sea oil production. Mr Salmond assured that there will be no shortage of fuels in Scotland as a result of this closure.

Business Secretary John Hutton will visit the oil refinery on Tuesday, Finance and Business Minister John Swinney will also visit Grangemouth refinery. Earlier about 1,200 Unite union members walked out of the central Scotland Ineos plant on Sunday in a dispute over pensions. The founder of Ineos plant, Jim Ratcliffe was heckled by workers when he visited the site on Monday.

The Forties oil pipeline delivers about 30 per cent of the UK’s oil output from the North Sea was closed as a result of this issue. Oil prices reached a new high of about $120 a barrel.

As an attempt to tackle the issue of oil shortage 65,000 tonnes of fuel were imported, as Ineos oil refinery is considered as the main oil fuel supplier in Scotland. Even though the workers called off their strike on Tuesday morning it will take few days for the operation to get normal.

The employees and the company authorities held negotiations last week at the conciliation service Acas but it failed to bring any amicable settlement.

April, 25

Homelessness has struck the buzzing capital city Edinburgh badly with a significant shortage of homes for people. The scarcity of homes is such that it has been forecasted that Edinburgh would need an additional 12,000 homes over the next ten years. In such an adverse situation people are left with no options other than to choose for temporary accommodation options rather than having their own dwelling.

The main reason for this growing shortage for houses in the capital is the slow rate of construction of new homes which makes the situation more severe. It was known that the housing association of Edinburgh builds some 500 new homes every year which is not sufficient to meet the requirements.

If we look into the core of the issue we can find that among all other cities Edinburgh is the place which has the major shortage for homes. Another reason for this problem is inadequate investments for building new homes. The government should make sure that sooner or later this problem has to be tackled or else this stigma will ruin the cities treasured glory.

January, 28

The working culture is making people of Europe to dump their creativity and fun-filled nature, to fit into the working environment of the industry. One of the recent report revealed that more than one-in-every three people use to suppress the lighter side of their personality as they switch to work. With so much corporate culture and hectic working environment these days, people are living on the edge sacrificing their creativity and interest for adapting to the work atmosphere.

This study conducted on the employees showed some hidden facts, which pointed out that around 37 percent of employees agreed that they hold back their fun factor, as they arrive at work. It was noticed that people after getting in to the working ambit tend to cull their personal interest and creativity in order to be part of that working population.

This growing problem is slowly widening its scope to few other countries to, where the working population are compromising their personal interest and fun for the sake of their job. This is not only affecting the employees, but it was learnt that even the recruiters were seen having a divided opinion when it comes to picking up the right candidates for jobs. Half of these recruiters eyes for candidates who could fit to their working culture, while rest looked for people who could bring in some difference to their company.

With all these mixed opinions, and employees embracing a workaholic kind of living, it seems these professionals are killing their interest to fit in to the working atmosphere. The growing industrialisation can soon turn these working creatures to a machine with no feelings and interest in their life.

December, 1

Hey! Christmas bells are all set to ring, this biggest festival is on the cards and all preparations have started to celebrate the festival with huge fervor and gaiety. So with markets decked up for the arrival of Christmas, shopping too is getting heated up. This time UK shoppers have decided to embrace the online shopping method rather than the traditional way. The analysts have said that online shoppers are expected to splurge £200 million a day.

So this festive season people are going to spend more time sitting in front of their computers and picking the right gifts for their near and dear ones online. It is estimated that the spending on food, drink and gifts would come to around more than £4 billion. Meanwhile the study has found that this time about half of the UK shoppers have shown interest to buy gifts online.

Now a days the shopper are preferring more to shop via internet as they could save time and get the desired commodity for all occasions at one go. The Scots are ready to go online and crack some cool deals this Christmas. A boom in internet shopping will curb the traditional shopping method to some extent this time. According to Tarlok Teji, head of retail at analysts Deloitte “We expect 2008 to deliver double-digit growth in terms of internet retailing. The number of people shopping online and the number of retailers with online stores are increasing quickly. The strongest sectors will be grocery and clothing.”

As per the shoppers ideology the reason for them to prefer the online way of shopping is the value for the money and convenience. About 66 percent of the shoppers have said they like the online method of shopping. Well even though the online shopping sector have seen a jump, there is nothing to worry for the retail sector as majority of the high street shops offer online facility too, said Fiona Moriarty Director of the Scottish Retail Consortium.

The other reason for the increase in the online shopping trend is the vast scope for shoppers to select the goodies they want from a vast shelf. But it is for sure that this Christmas shopper will get their desired gift for a click of a button. So the Christmas would be merrier for online shopping’s this year.

November, 19
Petrol stations one of the new victims of the severe competition in UK, has left no other option for these filling station resulting to their closure. It is known that every day at least one petrol pump shuts down with the increase in prices and less profits share. There are several factors responsible for this downfall, with supermarkets and other small filling station making the competition more tight, its very hard for these petrol station to resist such a fight.
Not bothered by the decline in petrol stations in Scotland, the demand for petrol continues to rise. Figures suggest that in present context the number of petrol station left in UK is the lowest number since 1920. All these facts points out the poor state of petrol stations in UK.
This problem has now taken a huge shape making the authorities to workout plan to contour this serious issue. Action is needed to stop the downfall of many such petrol pumps in coming years. Looking to the graphs it is known that about 30 percent filling stations has shut down in past thirty years.
Highland Council has now began new research to identify what action can be taken to halt the decline and what can be done to help vulnerable businesses in order to maintain a viable network of pumps in rural areas. Not only the rural petrol stations have been the victims of this competition but even the urban filling stations are forced to close down. Ray Hollywood of the Petrol Retailers Association said “In recent years in Scotland it has been the urban areas that have lost the forecourts. An underlying problem is the supermarkets, but the closures have also much to do with the major oil companies coming out of ownership. They can’t get the volumes to warrant development and are selling on those pieces of real estate.”

It is also seen that nowadays people prefer to head towards local supermarkets to fill petrol, killing the business of the filling stations. People are looking for local convenience these days, this change in physiology of people have made the survival of petrol station very hard. If this trend continues in future then people living in rural sections or highlands have to face severe problem to get petrol. Now the government needs to chalk out some strategy to handle this problem or else it would change in to drastic problem for Scotland.

October, 8

Good news for Scottish whisky lovers, in an initiative to protect the Scottish whisky industry, government has decided to regulate the imitation of Scotch whisky. It is know that many of such whisky’s like Highland, Lowland, Speyside, Campbeltown and Islay will be made illegal. This decision was taken by the Westminister Government yesterday.

Government took this step to conserve the heritage of Scottish whisky; this new law will take over from the Scotch Whisky Act 1988 and the Scotch Whisky Order 1990. It will also permit few labels of Scotch whisky to be added to an EU list of Geographical Indications. The Scottish whisky industry is worth £2 billion a year, which gives the economy a great push and also provides employment opportunities to many.

The new move by the government will also help to check the rapid incidences of foreign distilleries trying to misrepresent Scottish whisky and harming its authenticity in the global market. Many such brands are forged into markets creating a wrong impression of the age old Scottish whisky industry. There has been a long waiting by the Scottish Whisky Association for a revised regulation to safeguard the Scotch whisky.

The association needed to protect the place of Scottish whisky in the export market, said Hilary Benn, the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary. He further added “The proposed legislation will make special provisions relating to Scotch whisky. The proposals will define tightly the descriptions applied to Scotch whisky - for example ’single malt’ or ‘blended grain’. They will also tightly define its geographical provenance - such as Highland or Islay - and ensure that if the product uses the name of a distillery then it must also come from that distillery.”

Another benefit of this regulation is that it has widely classified the Scotch whisky into five categories, single malt, single grain, blended, blended malt and blended grain. It also has categorized five geographical areas including Highland, Lowland, Speyside, Campbeltown, and Islay. The regulation mentioned that the whisky will only have the label of these areas if it has been completely made here. Another important point mentioned in the regulation was the whisky exported should be bottled and labeled properly.

Experts says that this move from government will benefit the Scottish whisky industry, to raise the exports which are worth over £2 billion and holds a major part in the economy of the country. This move will help the industry to make its ground firm in the market.

Edinburgh, Oct 2: Strict laws are being implemented against the pubs in Edinburgh. The restrictions include the opening hours and the number of people allowed to stand up in the bar. Mixed remarks for and against this pub laws are coming out since then. The council put forth this law as an attempt to restrict the anti social behaviour.

The council’s plans to impose the pub laws were announced last month by the Liberal Democrat coalition Councillor Marjorie Thomas, chairwoman of the city’s licensing board.

The deputy council leader Steve Cardownie raised doubts regarding the outcome of this implementation. The SNP leader made an outspoken attack and he termed this attempt as a backward step. He further described the idea of sending “bean counters” to count the number of people standing up in individual bars as “nonsensical”.

While commenting on the need of the pub laws Cardownie said: “I think it is a good thing that people can go out a bit later now if they want to. Changing the rules would be a backward step when we are trying to compete with other major cities around Europe”.

“The situation is better in Edinburgh than it is down south where you get all the pubs shutting at once and huge queues forming at taxi ranks, when you get arguments and fights breaking out. I also think it’s nonsensical to try to impose some kind of limit on the number of people who can stand up in a pub. How on earth would you enforce that?”

Meanwhile the Councillor Thomas said: “I stand by the comments I made earlier this month but it is important to stress that we have simply put these proposals out for consultation at the moment. We have already had a big response, both from publicans and the licensed trade, but also from people in local communities across the city. Some don’t like what has been proposed, some are in favour, but we are going to listen to all views. However, we’re certainly not talking about turning the lights out on Edinburgh“.

Paul Waterson, chief executive of the Licensed Trade Association, Scotland, said: “The draft policy isn’t just bad, it’s plain daft. Are they going to have people walking into pubs and demanding that half the customers sit down?”

Liberal Democrats Councillor Paul Edie, who is leading the council’s efforts to tackle antisocial behaviour, said: “Although this is really a matter for the licensing board, I’m certainly not aware of any demands by the police to cut back the hours of city pubs. There are obviously hot spots in the city, but there has been a lot of money invested in CCTV facilities and the police do seem to have coped well with the liberal licensing hours in Edinburgh“.

While commenting on the political version of things the city’s Labour leader, Ewan Aitken, said: “This is just another example of the complete chaos the SNP and the Liberal Democrats have got themselves in. They don’t seem to be speaking to the other party or even amongst themselves.”

Hope all these mixed responses will pave the way for some clear modification in the pub laws considering the public interest.

In a sensational issue one of the government minister made an eye raising announcement previous night on the move to sell his shareholding in an energy company after he was alleged of a ‘conflict of interest’. It was learnt that the minister owns £30,000 of shares in Scottish Power. Stewart Stevenson, the minister under allegation is responsible for drawing up Scotland’s target on renewable energy. After a question was raised by one of the newspaper spokesman over the breach of ministerial code of conduct by Stevenson, the SNP government denying all allegations on Mr Stevenson said he has the right to hold the share even while dealing with ScottishPower as the transport and climate-change minister.

Later in the evening after a dramatic day full of negotiations with Alex Salmond, the first minister, his advisers and Mr Stevenson. He announced to sell those shares in order to avoid any insight of conflict of interest. Making a statement last night at around 8:20pm he said “I know that there has been no conflict of interests, and I cannot see any likely conflict of interest in these shareholdings and general legislation. However, I am passionately committed to the climate-change legislation that I will be charged with bringing forward as a minister. “Given that the ministerial code does speak about perception, I am disposing of all energy company shares to remove any scintilla of any possible conflict at any time in the future.”

This ruckus on the holding of share by Mr. Stevenson began with the question raised by one of the dailies over the government. The question was whether he is going to sell the shares, or will keep him away from any discussions with the ScottishPower. It is also known that the company is a key player of the energy market in Scotland and deals in coal fired electricity generation and is moving towards the renewable energy sector.

Ending the silence over the issue Bob Graham of the campaign group Highlands Against Wind Farms said, “There is a clear conflict of interest here. He is going to make recommendations that are going to have an impact on ScottishPower. This government has to be seen to be squeaky clean. Its credibility is up for grabs.” The government spokesman informed that in order to avoid any chance of doubt over Mr. Stevenson, he will dispose his shareholdings in ScottishPower and also few other shares which he has in Scottish and Southern Energy. Even his wife who also has some shares of the same company will dispose her shares too.

The spokesman further added that all this was decided by Mr. Stevenson as provided for in the ministerial code and has informed in writing about the issue to the first minister and permanent secretary. Adding more he said, Mr. Stevenson will not engage in any further shareholdings while being in ministerial office. This wrangle over the shareholdings has caused problems for the Scottish government and also for the first minister. The government avoiding any problems from this conflict of interest bringing any distrust from the people, acted timely and sought out this issue without further delay.