Letters: UK is well within its rights to fight EU on Northern Ireland

It is not a question of “tearing up or reneging on” the Protocol but of how it is operated in practice. Article 16 specifically allows either party “to introduce temporary safeguard measures to protect its economy and society, if the application of the Protocol leads to serious economic, societal or environmental difficulties that are liable to persist or to diversion of trade”. The evidence leaves no doubt that such difficulties and diversions have occurred.

Trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland equates to well below 0.01 per cent of the EU’s GDP, yet Brussels insists on implementing around 20% of all its external-border checks on goods, on that miniscule fraction – of which even less is at risk of being transferred illegally into the Republic.

Until June 2017, under the then Irish Taoiseach Enda Kenny, the UK and Ireland co-operated closely in developing sensible electronic off-border checks and controls; and the EU itself was reported to have published a similar solution. Mr Kenny was then replaced by Leo Varadkar, Theresa May lost her majority and authority in her totally unnecessary General Election, and Ireland and the EU decided to weaponise the border issue, resulting in Mrs May’s backstop and then Boris Johnson being forced to accept the Irish Sea border, but fortunately with Article 16’s safeguard, in order to achieve any sort of Brexit whatever.

Lord Frost and Liz Truss have proposed sensible changes to the EU’s demands; “good faith” is required by both sides; but if it requires the UK to invoke Article 16 to achieve them, with infinitely greater justification than Ms von der Leyen had, then so be it.

John Birkett, St Andrews.

SNP RIVALS MUST DO MUCH MORE

I'M not sure that Adam Tomkins is right about the SNP winning an Indyref2 by a 55% to 45% margin ("If 2nd independence vote was tomorrow, Yes would win it", The Herald, May 18). One thing is true: of 3.6 million who voted in 2014, 800k of them have never voted since, but more – roughly 500k – of two million No voters – have never voted since.

The biggest problem is his own former pro-UK colleagues in Holyrood, who might be a bit better at calling the SNP/Greens to account these days but have totally failed to create compelling "and this is what we would do" policies that would remove the nationalists from power.

If they did they might even get BBC Scotland and STV to start reporting SNP/Green fails and opposition solutions. They might even produce objective documentaries on the real issues – jobs, childcare, house prices, old age care and education – that are castrating this country.

If a Yes vote relies on the Boris Johnson bogey man and he goes and is replaced by a more acceptable Prime Minister the focus might just fall on Nicola Sturgeon.

But judging by her torn-faced attempt at the Brookings Institute to present her party's desire to eject Trident from Scotland as a great benefit to Nato and the UK, I can't see the one thing that keeps the SNP afloat lasting much longer either. Or the ridiculous but otherwise valid prediction that the pro-separation camp would win a referendum.

Allan Sutherland, Stonehaven.

FEAR OF NUCLEAR WILD WEST

IAIN Macwhirter ("Somebody remind Sturgeon that Nato is a nuclear alliance", The Herald, May 18) appears to suggest that it would have been better for Ukraine to have kept the Soviet nuclear weapons. Kazakhstan was in the same position and had 1,400 nuclear bombs and related facilities on its territory, so would it have been a good idea for it also to have remained a nuclear power? This is an argument for every state to have nuclear weapons or to be in a nuclear military alliance. In effect he is arguing for a complete disintegration of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and a nuclear Wild West.

None of the nuclear powers has made any effort in recent years to initiate negotiations for significant nuclear disarmament. There has been no interest in Nato (which in effect means the US), no interest in Russia, no interest in China, no interest in India, no interest in France, no interest in Israel. Instead they have been investing heavily in new technology with the futile objective of getting a step ahead of the others. We are talking about weapons which can within an hour destroy human civilisation.

It is good to know that Mr Macwhirter thinks it quite unacceptable to have a nuclear base close to a city of 200,000. I agree. But he seems to think it perfectly acceptable, even desirable, to have 240 nuclear bombs just down the road from the densest population areas in Scotland. Just as it was alright to give the Holy Loch to the US for their nuclear weapons at the height of the Cold War.

Scotland could effectively be de-nuclearised in two to three years by requiring the removal of warheads. These are regularly transported to and from the south of England for servicing and can be disabled and stored there.

This would be Scotland's great contribution to starting a serious international debate on how we reverse the nuclear spiral.

Isobel Lindsay, Biggar.

ASPIRATIONS FOR PEACE

I NOTE Jill Stephenson’s acidic comments (as usual) on the SNP thoughts on joining Nato (Letters, May 18).

Regretfully, she fails to understand that an independent Scotland, while having been formed centuries ago and founded in ancient roots, would be a new, young nation with intentions of being a contributor to peace and prosperity in the world.

It seems to be a Scottish trait to flatten aspirations of wellbeing and success particularly in the young.

I prefer these aspirations to the outdated dogma and bulldog spirit of a Tory Party which relies on their perception of empirical history, says one thing and does another.

Ken Mackay, Glasgow.

* MANY years ago myself and some friends were relaxing on a beach on Bute watching a rather large submarine making its way up the Clyde. By the time it disappeared from view I had convinced my friend that the racks of barrel-shaped life rafts on the Calmac ferries were actually depth charges “just in case…”

Jill Stephenson seems to be be making the same mistake of confusing ferries for warships.

Alastair Clark, Stranraer.

QUARANTINE THE GLOBETROTTERS

BOTH Boris Johnson and Nicola Sturgeon have recently been on virtue-signalling overseas tours. The former was in eastern Europe giving warnings to Vladimir Putin and the latter has been in the US pushing the climate agenda.

We should find a remote Pacific island where these types of politicians from all western countries could permanently stay where they could engage in these types of activities and it could be televised round the clock. They could put on masks for the cameras and rub elbows to their hearts' content. We could provide a suitable number of solar panels and wind turbines to power their net zero lifestyles. And we could drop off food at suitable intervals; not too much planet-destroying meat, of course.

Geoff Moore, Alness.

THE STUPIDITY OF OUR INFLATION

JUST as they promote the panic buying of fuel, the media are talking up the idea of inflation, assisted by the Bank of England’s own “apocalyptic” 10 per cent forecast. So at every point in a supply chain, something is added to a passing cost whether needed or not. The end effect is an appreciable and unwarranted price rise for the consumer, and inflation thus becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Inflation is the result of an imbalance between money and goods available, and that has been caused by the “narrow” money of quantitative easing at last filtering into the economy, plus a goods shortage caused by Brexit, which has created delivery problems. Many haulage firms will not now deal with Britain, as they can’t afford to sit in a lorry queue at Dover for two days.

To add further gloom, energy costs have finally responded to the high cost of our unreasoning drive for renewables, plus the dogmatic discarding of clean nuclear, as opposed to the use of our huge reserves of fossil fuel.

All in all, a perfect storm of stupidity.

Malcolm Parkin, Kinross.

Read more: Trident's fate must be sealed before Scotland tries to join Nato