YOUR front-page report and pictures (May 14) reveal that MPs Dennis Canavan, Michael Connarty, and Ian Davidson together with Scottish Office special adviser Murray Elder are likely to be rejected as Labour candidates for the Scottish Parliament.

Your report indicates that Mr Davidson's lamentable failure to wear a suit to the interview may have contributed to his rejection, but this is, of course, just nonsense.

Anyone who is tuned in to New Labour conformity and the Thought Police knows that Mr Davidson didn't stand a chance with that moustache, and neither did Murray Elder with his off-message beard. Dennis Canavan might now be clean-shaven, but everybody remembers he sported a beard for years. As for Michael Connarty, he was probably thinking of growing a moustache or a beard, and let it slip out at the interview.

Bill Whyte,

31 Dunchurch Road, Paisley.

May 14.