Letters: If it's like this now, what can we expect in Indyref2?

Richard Allison, Edinburgh.

TONE DOWN THE RHETORIC OF HATRED

IT is gratifying to see that Nicola Sturgeon and some of her ministers have condemned the nationalist demonstrators in Perth who abused the BBC journalist James Cook, who was covering the Conservative leadership hustings in Perth on Tuesday ("Nicola Sturgeon condemns abuse hurled at BBC reporter over independence", heraldscotland, August 17). Shouting "lying scum" and "traitor", as the mob did, is not a good look when captured on national TV. Ms Sturgeon needs to realise, however, that this is what happens when visceral hatred is stirred up by politicians, and in Scotland no-one stirs up hatred better than the SNP.

The long blue banner tastefully proclaiming "Tory Scum Out", held by the agitators in Perth, has a pedigree: it has appeared at nationalist events in recent years. In its far right-hand corner, it bears a runic symbol associated with Siol nan Gaidheal (Seed of the Gael), a splinter group of nationalists shunned by the SNP but nevertheless an active campaigner on the Yes side in 2014. At an All Under One Banner event in 2020, at least one SNP parliamentarian processed behind that same banner.

Scotland’s problem is that it has suited first the Labour Party and now, in much more virulent form, the SNP to demonise "Tories". In the 2019 election campaign in Glasgow, Ms Sturgeon made a speech as follows: "The Scotland we seek is open, welcoming, diverse and inclusive, and no Tory is ever going to be allowed to change that. And down that Boris Johnson path lies a future where Boris Johnson has his strings pulled by Donald Trump. Make no mistake, if we accept for our country that future, our National Health Service, workers’ rights, environmental standards – all of that is on the line. That is not the Scotland that we want."

Election rhetoric, some might say, but it is part of a concerted campaign by the SNP to delegitimise a legal political party (of which I am not a member).

The demonstrators in Perth may or may not be SNP members, but they are activists in Ms Sturgeon’s cause. It is long past time that she toned down the rhetoric of hatred – of the UK, England, Westminster, Tories – and tried to return Scotland to civilisation.

Jill Stephenson, Edinburgh.

• FOLLOWING the unedifying scenes outside the Tory leadership hustings in Perth, here is a question for the leadership of the SNP and all Scottish nationalists: have you ever seen supporters of the Conservative Party standing outside another political party’s meeting, with aggressive banners and screaming abuse and vitriol at them?

Dr Bruce Halliday, Dumfries.

TRUSS CLAIM WILL HAUNT TORIES

LIZ Truss has now repeated several times that, if she becomes Prime Minister, she will ensure that "UK policies" are applied in Scotland.

Did she explain to her audience of Tory sycophants in Perth the warped mental process by which she has reclassified policies, promulgated at Westminster for application in England (or, in some cases, England and Wales), as "UK policies"? Did she also explain to her Perth audience that those "UK policies" would include reintroducing extortionate university tuition fees and crippling prescription charges in Scotland?

If she did, I foresee that, after the next General Election, Scotland will return to being a country which has more pandas than Tory MPs.

Eric Begbie, Stirling.

WILL SHE BE THATCHER MKII?

LIZ Truss played to the gallery of Tory members at the Perth hustings when she told them she would "never ever" agree to an independence referendum. She declared that the UK is a family – but families can stay close without having to inhabit the same house, and her "never ever" vow doesn't even pay lip service to democracy.

Former Chancellor Rishi Sunak promised that he would bypass the democratically-elected Holyrood parliament more in order to spend money in the way the UK Government wanted, although he did acknowledge that "we live in a union which is of course there by consent and by democracy and I accept that"; however, he clearly intends to ignore consent and democracy when it suits him, and when the subject is Scotland's right to decide its constitutional future.

But if the polls are to be believed, it will be Ms Truss who will shortly be the new tenant of Downing Street. I wish I could say that the best thing to do with Ms Truss is to ignore her, but in spite of her having only a handful of Scotland's Westminster MPs she will be making decisions which will affect all of us in Scotland, and I fear that it looks very much as if Ms T will show herself to be in the same mould as the late Mrs T – and may indeed turn out to be even worse than the original.

Ruth Marr, Stirling.

• VLADIMIR Putin asserts “there is no historic Ukraine, it is part of Russia”. Xi Jinping claims Taiwan is a breakaway Province and is part of China. Liz Truss declares “she will never ALLOW the Union (her family) to be split up”. Those who believe in democracy and the rights of peoples to choose will regard these three imperialist declarations as outrageous.

GR Weir, Ochiltree.

RESPECT THE ELECTORATE

WHILE the Tory leadership candidates are entitled to their own views on our First Minister, to suggest that the House of Commons should be holding the Scottish Government to account flies in the face of the devolution settlement ("Truss and Sunak set out plans for more transparent Scotland ahead of hustings", The Herald, August 16). The Government in Edinburgh is accountable to the Scottish electorate and no one else.

Conservatives may not like it, but the governing party in Scotland was elected with a much larger percentage of the popular vote than they were. If they want to influence the performance of the Scottish Government that’s where they ought to be concentrating their efforts.

Cameron Crawford, Rothesay.

PERIOD OFFICER SHOULD RESIGN

IT is absolutely absurd that a man should be hired as a "Period Dignity Officer" by a Tayside "period dignity working group" ("Fury over man appointed to be public face of free period products", The Herald, August 17)

The job advert said the suitable candidate needed a "successful track record of engaging and empowering a large range of people from a diverse range of cultural and socio-economic backgrounds, in particular young people who menstruate." Apparently, the successful applicant was "the strongest candidate for the job". Just what experience has a thirtysomething-year-old man have in periods and the menopause?

I have for some time thought that the virtue-signalling and the roar of the misinformed minority are casting too much power over reason and common sense. As a man, I now feel justified.

The Scottish Government will pay the wages of this expert but has distanced itself from any involvement in the concerning issues raised. One has to ask: would the First Minister have rubber-stamped this?

How has such a personal subject that has to be so sympathetically handled by the female of the species have been so incompetently dealt with?

If this man has any dignity, he should resign. Period.

Peter Wright, West Kilbride.

• WITH reference to the issue of "period poverty" and the problems faced by women on low incomes not being able to buy sanitary products, can I suggest there is also an issue affecting young men which no politician seems to have considered?

If you are on a low income, purchasing shaving products can be difficult for men. In the interests of equality, here is a chance for the Scottish Government to be fair to both sexes. So far, the handouts that I can think of are aimed at women – baby boxes and now sanitary products. Or would the feminists say they should just all grow beards?

Elizabeth Mueller, Glasgow.

Read more: Tories should follow SNP lead in fighting cost of living crisis