1 week Ago By Scotsman Letters
Loyal supporters of the SNP have desperately come to the party's aid ( Letters, 14 November ) but it is still looking like a lost cause. Bending the “two jobs” rule, in the case of Stephen Flynn, has now seen another two SNP MPs, Stephen Gethins and Dave Doogan, throwing their hats into the Holyrood job ring for what must inevitably be a much smaller circle. The SNP has been in power for 18 years and most members of the public would be hard-pressed to remember any successes but ultra-quick to reel off a long string of failures.
The SNP is in decline no matter what a few supporters might wish to think. It is the voters who will have the final say. These SNP ex-MPs are simply rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.
Gerald Edwards, Glasgow Tory playbook The SNP establishment savaged former Scottish Conservatives leader Ruth Davidson for taking £7,500 for being a talking head on an election night, only to be wholly unconcerned when Nicola Sturgeon was paid £25,000 for doing the same thing. Now SNP Commons leader Stephen Flynn, having repeatedly attacked another former Scottish Tory leader, Douglas Ross, for concurrently being both an MP and MSP, intends to do precisely the same. It seems to me that these days, the SNP specialises in replicating precisely what it has in the past opportunistically condemned the Tories for doing.
Martin Redfern, Melrose, Roxburghshire Rumbled It would appear that irrationality within the ranks of the SNP is worsening. Their huge loss of seats at Westminster has led to a form of paranoia amongst its members about the forthcoming Holyrood election on 7 May 2026. Many of those MPs who lost their seats in the House of Commons are determined to try to muscle into the Holyrood scene.
Are they so naive that they cannot accept the fact that the people of Scotland have abandoned Scottish Nationalism? Its time is up! At long last SNP policies have been rumbled. Salmond and his colleagues failed to persuade voters to back them in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum with a turnout of more than 85 per cent of the total electorate. So what chance do they have in these more enlightened times? It is forecast that the SNP will be drummed out of office following the Holyrood elections in the spring of 2026.
Robert I G Scott, Ceres, Fife Too many MSPs In his letter of 12 November Derek Farmer suggests that Regional MSPs represent no-one but themselves. In fact I think that like all MSPs and MPs they primarily represent their party. In the early days of Parliament, and even into the early 19th century, the number of electors was so small that they could have some personal knowledge of the persons they chose.
With universal suffrage that is no longer the case and it is the party label that matters. Where I would agree with Mr Farmer is that we have too many MSPs – more than we can afford. What I would propose, as a first step, is that we abolish the constituencies and have only regional MSPs chosen by some form of proportional representation S Beck, Edinburgh Haud yer wheesht It is deeply concerning that free speech is under constant pressure in Britain nowadays.
There have been several instances of that in England recently, one being the concerning complaint against a journalist, Allison Pearson. It appears that the police officers who notified her that a complaint had been made against her for a tweet she posted a year earlier were unable (or unwilling, I don't know which) to divulge what it was she was alleged to have said. Ms Pearson stated the alleged social media post was a “non-crime hate incident”, but Essex Police now say that they are investigating it as a “criminal matter”.
In Scotland, we have the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021, which has successfully prosecuted 42 people who expressed an opinion, and over 5,400 such “hate crimes” have been reported in the last six months. This figure is very close to being one in every thousand people in Scotland! If this is extended over ten years, that could total over 100,000 people, which is one in every 50 Scots. Once upon a time, Britain was noted as a country which had free speech.
Some readers may remember that. Scotland, I believe, didn't have this particular historical freedom and I believe that the first appeal from Scotland to the House of Lords concerned a complaint about something that someone had said and it was thrown out. Why? Because, in England at least, you could say what you wanted.
It is noteworthy that the Home Office in England is now looking into the Pearson case, but in Scotland, nothing has changed. We'll hae tae haud yer wheesht because the SNP says we must. Peter Hopkins, Edinburgh Enough ordinary! Last year the Scottish so-called Government told me I should be asking myself which of their 29 “Gender” categories I fit into.
Last month I had Sir Keir Starmer telling me I’m not a “working person” now that I’ve retired and yesterday, in The Scotsman’s letter pages, I’ve got Elizabeth Scott indicating that I’m not an “Ordinary Scot” because “Ordinary Scots” support Scottish independence and think of themselves as treated as living in a colony subservient to Westminster! I’m glad I’m not an “Ordinary Scot” because they are in the minority! It’s long past time – ten years past time, in fact – for this minority to stop being “ordinary”! Scotland is not an SNP fiefdom. It’s still a democratic country where majority opinion is what counts. Michael Officer, Bridge of Earn, Perthshire Health hyperbole Donald Trump is addicted to hyperbole.
The phenomenon seems to be contagious, as evidenced by the opinion of Andrew HN Gray ( Letters,14 November ) that the National Health Service is “one of the most expensive entities in the entire world”. But UK spend on healthcare pales into insignificance compared to that in the US and is significantly less per head than for the citizens of wealthy European countries like Germany, France, Switzerland and Sweden. As for Rachel Reeves trimming the NHS budget and expecting the same level of service to be delivered, even if she is not the Minister in charge of the NHS she knows that the absence of empty hospital beds, underused intensive care units, CAT scanners standing idle, and doctors taking excessive time off to play golf because their patient waiting lists are empty shows that the service is working at full tilt.
Administrative efficiencies could no doubt happen. Moving away from paper to electronic should improve efficiency, for example, without impacting the cutting time of surgeons and could cut costs, though I doubt savings would be anywhere near 1 per cent. The Post Office showed the way with Horizon.
Hugh Pennington, Aberdeen Forked tongue The Prime Minister and his wildly enthusiastic Energy Minister, Ed Miliband , are committing the UK to what many believe to be suicidal climate targets that will require major sacrifices and a haemorrhaging of resources – especially considering our miniscule contribution to the problem – from the British people. Clearly, for the kind of targets to which they have committed us, there will have to be profound and very painful changes to our way of life. Yet, on the record, Sir Keir Starmer has very recently said he won't tell people how to live their lives.
In these circumstances, I ask, how can that possibly be true? Alexander McKay, Edinburgh Strange states I may be mistaken but, recent events have highlighted for me features of the American justice system which suggest the degree of politicisation would render it ineligible for membership of the EU! Is it really the “leader of the free world”? Richard Perry, Burntisland, Fife Transition vamp It is over 100 days since The Scotsman published an article highlighting a four-fold increase in the cost of decarbonising Scottish homes to £130 billion. To date there has been no response from the SNP as to how such a debt will be funded, together with a deafening silence from our MSPs on the topic. How can the Scottish economy repay the £900bn cost of a Green Transition if it cannot underwrite a decarbonisation project? Ian Moir, Castle Douglas, Dumfries and Galloway Best medicine I was recently looking at TV listings and it dawned on me that great comedies like Blackadder and Porridge are no longer being produced or offered.
This inspired me to look into scientific research into the benefits of laughter. A 2023 paper lead-authored by Caroline Kramer concludes that “Spontaneous laughter is associated with greater reduction in cortisol levels as compared with usual activities”. Where does cortisol come into it? A 2020 study led by Carol Jones states “cortisol has been indicated as a factor in numerous chronic conditions” including weight gain, skin changes, mood swings, osteoporosis, high blood pressure and diabetes mellitus.
Bring comedy back. Geoff Moore, Alness, Highland Write to The Scotsman We welcome your thoughts – NO letters submitted elsewhere, please. Write to [email protected] including name, address and phone number – we won't print full details.
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