As winter approaches, we as a country face many challenges and I believe it will be crucial that we do so as a population, as united as we can be.

Covid remains a very real threat to health and life and must be taken seriously, whilst our NHS both hospital and community services are under pressure like never before.

The positive is the rollout of the vaccine, which at the time of writing, Scotland has vaccinated 92% of adults aged 18 and over with first doses of the COVID-19 vaccine and 88% with second doses and, to date, our NHS has provided 55% of all 12 to 15-year-olds, and 76% of all 16 and 17-year-olds with a single dose.

Now whilst this is good, we still have to do better and get as many of the population as possible vaccinated. I have to say I am sometimes taken aback when I have some of the anti-vaccine arguments put to me and in general when you ask people where they got that information from, the reply is Facebook.

I noted one European leader say this week to the anti-vaccination people in his country, "Switch off social networks and turn on your brain," and I would sign up to that point of view given the levels of misinformation and downright lies that are circulated through social media.

I am also asking people to get in touch with my office if you or a loved one are struggling to get access to community care, a medical or hospital appointment or your appointment is cancelled or your care package is being cut.

The approach that Fife Council is taken to try and manage the shortage of care workers is just unacceptable and every Fife councillor should be demanding answers from the highly paid executives who are in charge of managing Fife Council.

Likewise, the highly paid executives and Board members within NHS Fife must be held to account for the poor management of NHS Fife and the failure to workforce plan. Staff are now working under immense pressure with questions about their safety and the safety of patients being raised by myself and the trade unions.

We all went out on a Thursday night and clapped for these people but now they need more than claps, they need recognition of the scale of the challenges and more staff to deliver to meet the needs of the people.