EVERY week without fail, Neil Mackay and/or other columnists hold forth about how the independence cause has stalled due to the inaction of the SNP Government, and how phoney the talk is of a new independence referendum in 2023. Every week, too, we hear acknowledgements from Holyrood that this Government was elected on its pledge to hold this referendum. When is this backing-and-furriting going to stop, and how much more prodding is it going to require for the Government to make a move?

The need for independence grows more urgent and more obvious by the day; and the enduring strength of the SNP’s electoral support is clear evidence that large numbers of voters recognise it and expect progress to be made in that direction. With a clear plan and decisive action by the Government, an independence referendum could have been held, and won, three times over in the last couple of years. Why has this not happened; and how much longer are we expected to wait?

Most of us remember the years when Labour held a near-monopoly on the Scottish political scene; and Labour’s support vanished like snaw aff a dyke when it betrayed the trust of the electorate. The same thing could happen just as easily to the SNP; and given the total uselessness of the other parties in Scotland at present, the result of this would not bear thinking about. Does the Government actually fail to recognise how critical the situation is, for it and, much more importantly, for Scotland? We, the independence-supporting voters, have waited a long time for action, and will not wait indefinitely.

Derrick McClure, Aberdeen.

KEY AIMS DON'T NEED INDY

IT is difficult to disagree with Andy Maciver’s conclusions (“Three ways that Yes can win over No voters like me”,The Herald, April 1) that our future is in renewable energy, that our education and health service are in need of repair and that entrepreneurship should be stimulated. There is one important omission, however, from the article. We are not told whether these objectives are dependent to any extent on independence.

From a brief review of the respective lists of devolved and reserved matters, I cannot see any reason why the present Scottish Parliament should not pursue most of Mr Maciver’s objectives. Setting up nuclear reactors in Scotland would require, and benefit from, some liaison with other inhabitants of our island regardless of the constitutional position. The one likely obstruction to the achievement of these objectives would be the convening of another referendum which, regardless of its outcome, would continue the current stagnation in Scottish governance and put progress in all of these objectives back by a significant number of years.

Michael Sheridan, Glasgow.

WOULD THE OTHER PARTIES STEP UP?

THE idea of the SNP disbanding (Letters, March 30) is a good one, and I had thought it had previously committed to some years ago. It cannot dissolve itself immediately though – who would negotiate terms with England, and run the country for the first few years?

The branches of the unionist parties in Scotland are not registered or recognised as political parties by the Electoral Commission; do not (in my view) have the breadth of talent to run a country, and people would simply not accept a newly-independent Scotland being run by politicians funded and directed from outside Scotland.

There should be an election as soon as possible after independence, and I think the SNP would split naturally into centre-left (Social Democrats?) and centre-right (Progressive?) parties. Of interest would also be the direction of travel for the Scottish Tory and Labour parties. Would they stay as they are (with their own funding/policies) or morph with the remnants of the SNP? The Greens would stay Greens, and the LibDems, with their seldom-promoted “federalism” would be sadly irrelevant.

GR Weir, Ochiltree.

THE FAIRNESS OF UNIVERSAL BENEFITS

JAMES Martin (Letters, April 1) points out that what he refers to as “free things” provided by the Scottish Government (citing “baby boxes, prescription charges, university education, personal care ... ") are “actually paid for from our taxes”.

Undeniably that is true, but of course Mr Martin could have included in his list the NHS, which as we all know is “free at the point of use”, but still “actually paid for from our taxes”.

Therefore, whether described as “free” or “free at point of use” is immaterial, as they mean the same thing. As economists never tire of telling us, “there is no such thing as a free lunch”.

However, why should some government services be free at the point of use, or put another way, why should provision be universal? One reason for this is that take-up is less for means-tested benefits, meaning some people for whom a benefit is designed may not receive it, not because they don’t qualify but because they don’t apply. Such benefits also involve a level of administration that universal benefits don’t require. One such in Mr Martin’s list are prescription charges to manage exemptions from the scheme such as pensioners.

Either way, though, the lunch is still not free, but paid for by taxation, which is (or should be) progressive (though what we have could be more so), while prescription charges are not, indeed are something of a personal lottery. In other words, it can be argued that universal provision, paid for by a system of taxation which is progressive, is a fairer system, as those who can pay most, do so.

Alasdair Galloway, Dumbarton.

HAS PUTIN MADE SCARGILL'S MISTAKE?

VLADIMIR Putin has announced that Russian gas must be paid for in Russian roubles ("Putin threatens to cut gas supply unless Europe pays in roubles – from today", The Herald, April 1). If history repeats itself then Mr Putin might well destroy the Russian gas industry in just the same way that Arthur Scargill destroyed the coal industry in the United Kingdom.

Mr Scargill called out the miners on March 6, 1984, which is generally accepted as being the start of spring and a time when the climate gets warmer and the need for coal is less. Mr Putin is almost one month behind Mr Scargill and the average global temperatures are warmer than in 1984. This might be a disastrous decision for the Russian gas industry, especially if the West finds an alternative fuel rather than the roubles to pay for the gas.

Sandy Gemmill, Edinburgh.

WE NEED CUSTOMER SERVICE REVIEW

I COULD not agree more with Rosemary Goring ("The customer is no longer king. The customer is now always on hold", The Herald, March 30, and Letters, April 1 & 2). Last June I wrote to you about my experience with my bank’s computerised calling system where customers have to have "pitch perfect questions" to get a response. It’s clear that nothing has changed in the field of customer service except that, with increased internet business as a result of the pandemic, it is likely to have got worse.

Certainly when I check a company’s contact systems online, I note that telephone numbers and email addresses are disappearing. Increasingly one is referred to FAQs; that is, frequently asked questions, which rarely match one’s needs and, more significantly, are pushing the onus on the customer to do the investigation despite their ignorance of the inner workings of the organisation concerned.

A good metaphor for this is the ending of the glass bottle deposit schemes with the introduction of plastic bottles. At one stroke the management of empty bottles was relieved from the drinks companies with tremendous cost savings. However, the world now faces horrendous problems with plastic litter polluting the globe – something governments haven’t really worked out how to solve. So too, the general public are being disempowered in the search for answers from both public (yes, try contacting your local authority) and private organisations.

The key point is that the man in the street is helpless and without government intervention it’s unlikely to change. The one-sided advantages to businesses to "electronically isolate" themselves are self-evident: reduced customer service responsibilities, no pesky complaints, reduced manpower costs and more. I’d like to suggest that it is time for an organisation such as Which? or the Citizen’s Advice Bureau to be commissioned by the Government to do a study in collaboration with business and consumers to establish what service customers should expect in this day and age of internet and telephonic communication. Having a universal code of practice would be helpful to businesses by providing a level playing field competitors also have to observe. In addition, and not a minor consideration, it would help the public’s mental health and well-being. Better service all round would be a win-win situation for the country.

John Walls, Glasgow.