NORMAN McNab (Letters, November 4) hits the nail on the head. He accuses the renewables industry (wind in particular, I would guess) and our Government ministers of spreading misleading information in relation to renewables producing the cheapest form of energy. He's right, but unfortunately most people only hear or see what they want to.

The latest RenewableUK poll conducted by YouGov claimed to show "overwhelming support" of 70 per cent for onshore wind farms. Of the 1,700 respondents to the poll, only 7% (119) were from Scotland, that is 0.002% of the Scottish population. Of those 119, only 38 (32%) replied that they lived within five miles of a wind farm. That is 0.0007% of the Scottish population. Choosing so few respondents from the UK area with the most onshore turbines in a poll seeking to determine public opinion on the issue makes the results inherently unreliable. In contrast, there were 192 respondents from London. Why ask Londoners their opinion of living within five miles of an onshore turbine when there are none anywhere near?

RenewableUK has interpreted results from a statistically skewed section of the UK public to show that there is "overwhelming" support for onshore wind farms. As the mouthpiece of the renewable industry, it might be expected that any poll would be biased in favour of commercial concerns. It is more worrying that results from this and similarly unreliable and biased polls are widely quoted by mainstream media such as the BBC and used by the Government to inform and underpin policy, justifying the push for further expansion of wind farms in the name of reducing carbon emissions, regardless of impacts on hapless rural residents and environmental damage.

Aileen Jackson, Uplawmoor.

WE WILL CONTINUE TO ADAPT

ROGER Waugh (Letters, November 4) is correct in stating that sea levels are rising and the polar ice caps are melting.

On November 2, 1922, however, the Washington Post published an Associated Press report that the Arctic Ocean was warming, icebergs were growing scarcer, and that within a few years the sea would rise and make most coastal cities uninhabitable. Ninety-nine years later, the prediction has been proven wrong.

On July 5, 1989, a director of the New York office of the United Nations Environment Programme warned of entire nations being wiped off the face of the Earth by rising sea levels by the year 2000; wrong again.

In 2007, the chief of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said that if no action was taken before 2012, " that's too late". It is now 2021.

I prefer to rely on history, and like your correspondent Bill Brown (Letters, November 2), not on the "so-called science".

Man has been adapting to climate change since the Ice Age, and will, I believe, continue to do so.

David Miller, Milngavie.

WHY AREN'T OUR BILLS CHEAPER?

IAIN Macwhirter states that "huge reductions in the cost of renewable energy – especially offshore wind and desert solar – mean that the fossil fuel age is finally over" ("We are seeing new realism in the environment movement", The Herald, November 3). Well, if there are huge reductions in the infrastructure costs, where are they being reflected in our electricity bills?

By the way, where in Scotland do we have desert solar power installations, as the only desert I remember in Scotland is the one called Drumchapel, or as Billy Connolly described it, the desert wi windaes?

George Dale, Beith.

THE ARMY AND ITS DAY JOB

CLARK Cross's solution to disruption of this conference and Glasgow life in general by sundry protesters (Letters, November 2) involves passing laws which allow mobilisation of HM Forces.

Is Mr Cross aware that the servicemen and women already have a day job (defence of the realm) for which they are already somewhat under strength, and have been somewhat further depleted by the need for some of them to do "homers" with the Scottish Ambulance Service, vaccination centres, and sundry health boards?

Christopher W Ide, Waterfoot.

WHEN CHILDCARE DUTY CALLS

VICKY Allan tells us that workers feel time poor (whatever the heck that means) due to “childcare duties” ("Issue of the day: Resign? Work less? A great work rethink", The Herald, November 4). As an old fella I’ve listened as my generation has been savaged and labelled, misogynistic, bigoted, racist, sexist and many other things.

Work is what we do to get money to enjoy life outside work. Work used to be a place where we were for eight hours and had no contact with home or friends. Despite this we often worked overtime to get more cash if on offer.

However, one thing's for sure, we never felt “time-poor due to childcare duties”. The world is going mad and we’ve created a society where personal and parental responsibility is almost a thing of the past.

“Childcare duties”? Oh dear.

John Gilligan, Ayr.

STRIKING A CHORD

THE Diary’s reference to a chatty server saying "Having a party?" to a customer (The Herald, October 30) reminded me of an occasion when I bought a few metres of transparent nylon line from an ironmonger who said: "Going to be doing a bit of fishing?"

It was only after I’d left that I realised that his cool demeanour after my reply would have been because he’d misinterpreted as gratuitous sarcasm my purely factual correction of his assumption: "No – I’m going to string a ukulele."

Robin Dow, Rothesay.