Letters: The Union will never be the same again after this debacle

As the famous myth of trickle-down economics failed, and reliance on the City of London finally imploded (ironically under a New Labour government) I found no reason to change my views on the Tory Party, but then had to change my opinion of the Labour Party as well. Subsequently, when the Conservative/LibDem coalition of 2010 imposed the austerity policies (which are the fundamental reasons for our current plight) led eventually to the debacle of Brexit under the Cameron-Osborne Tory government, my detestation of the Tory Party was well and truly confirmed.

I could go on with many other reasons for detesting the Tory Party but your readers will possibly have read enough. Something good can come of this though: British politics, and the Union, will never be the same after this debacle, and I believe that the UK will look very different in five years' time.

John Jamieson, Ayr.

PUTTING STATE SCHOOLS TO SHAME

LIZ Truss has boasted that she is the first Prime Minister to have been educated in a comprehensive school. In the past few weeks since that election, her performance as Prime Minister has been such as to bring comprehensive education into disrepute.

Her colleagues from the public and grammar schools will use her ministerial career to stress the importance of selective education. They will point to her lack of planning, her refusal to seek guidance, and her inability to follow through on her "policies" as proof that those from comprehensive schools are unfit for high office.

As someone educated in, and having spent my career in, comprehensive schools, I would ask her to refrain from insulting the successful system that predominates in Scotland.

TJ Dowds, Cumbernauld.

• I’M old enough to remember the Second World War when £1 was worth four US dollars, Labour’s Aneurin Bevan classing Tories as “lower than vermin”, Eden’s Suez fiasco, Macmillan’s “Never had it so good”, Wilson’s “pound in your pocket”, Heath and Barber’s “dash for growth” (we know how that ended), the former’s long huff, Callaghan’s “Winter of Discontent”, Thatcher’s Falklands and “the lady’s not for turning”, Major’s Cabinet of “bastards”, Blair’s Iraq, Brown’s “no more Boom and Bust”, Cameron’s EU referendum, Brexit bilge, the wayward Johnson, a never-ending referendum, and now Truss fantasy economics.

It’s been quite a ride. Please excuse while I take a break to wring the digits and gnash the old pearly whites.

Then, to quote the late admirable Fidelma Cook, it’s “upwards and onwards”.

R Russell Smith, Largs.

SO WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE?

COULD someone please explain what is the moral difference between the following options?The first is awarding tax cuts to the already very rich. The second is accepting soup kitchens for the poor, hungry and homeless on the streets of Scotland’s largest city on the coldest of nights and watching on as drug deaths propel Scotland to the top of the league and in the meantime pretend embassies continue to be built and manned and SNP ministers and their entourages swan off on regular, expensive overseas jaunts?

Are not both equally morally repugnant in the midst of a cost of living crisis? And, dare I say it, detestable?

Alexander McKay, Edinburgh.

A TAX CUT IS NOT A COST

I WAS frustrated by John Milne's letter (October 14) repeating the phrase "unfunded tax cut". There is no such thing as an unfunded tax cut – there are unfunded spending commitments, but that is not the same thing. We must always remember that politicians only ever spend other people's money – a tax cut is merely them not yet grabbing more cash out of our own pockets.

I am disturbed by how much this phrase "unfunded tax cut" keeps being repeated – by implying that a tax cut is a cost in and of itself, it is perpetrating the regressive, outright totalitarian notion that everything belongs to the government and we own nothing without its permission.

Robert Frazer, Dundee.

A QUESTION FOR LABOUR

PETER A Russell (Letters, October 14) could have a little regard for the definition of a “colony”. It is when one country is under the political control of another, which also exploits it economically. That is a reasonable description of Scotland, and Liz Truss gets far more exposure in Scotland’s media than Nicola Sturgeon.

Unitary state? Well, Scotland has always had control of its own legal and education systems, the building blocks of a country, and the British state has been delegating responsibilities to the national level (Scotland) for a century as a means of depressing discontent with Metropolitan rule.

As for the act of self-determination in the 2014 referendum: we were given a false prospectus on many issues (it would take a page to detail them all) and Mr Russell’s own letter claims that “Scotland chose to remain in that unitary state”; but in 2014 we were being offered the exact opposite with Gordon Brown (a federal state within two years) and Alistair Darling (devo max) both working with No 10 Downing Street. The Labour Party is in agreement with Ireland (north and south) having the right to choose its own future, repeated every seven years as required, and Labour would be neutral in any plebiscite. Why won’t Labour commit to this with regard to Scotland?

GR Weir, Ochiltree.

• WHAT a sad, pathetic lament from Michael Clayton (Letters, October 13). He expects my granddaughter to accept the result of a referendum held when she was 10 years old and the Scottish Government to ensure that any facilities previously utilised by Nicola Sturgeon's parents are never withdrawn.

Willie Maclean, Milngavie.

Renewable energy produced by wind farms has little effect on our bills

HOW OFGEM COULD HELP US ALL

TODAY (October 14) UK electricity production showed that in Scotland 81.5 per cent of our electricity was produced from cheap renewable sources and only 3.8% from fossil fuels (gas).

In Southern England 90.7% of the electricity was generated from fossil fuels (gas and coal) and only 5.8% from renewable sources.

If Ofgem allowed the cost of electricity to be decoupled from the cost of gas then the regional price of electricity would drop dramatically and we would be paying a realistic price for electricity related to the generation cost and the excess profits of the fuel providers would be greatly reduced.

This would also encourage the transition from fossil fuels as heat pumps would become cheaper to run than gas heating is at present, driving the transition from fossil fuels.

It would also help with the unfair imbalance in energy costs where the coldest areas in the UK pay 66% more for their energy costs than London.

A large proportion of rural northern Scotland does not have gas but is penalised by the high cost of other types of heating and reducing the cost of electricity to the cost of production would greatly reduce the unfair imbalance in energy/heating costs.

Ironically these are the very areas where a lot of cheap renewable energy is generated and it must be more than a bit annoying to look out the window at all the wind turbines producing cheap electricity which is sold to you at the cost related to the cost of gas, especially when this is only used to produce 3.8% of the electricity.

Iain McIntyre, Sauchie.

CARAVAN SECTOR IS SURELY DOOMED

THE Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) has published a cost-benefit analysis of the Government's plan to ban petrol and diesel cars by 2030. It shows that this plan will cost every household £1,000 per year from 2022 to 2050. Incredibly, the Government has not published a cost-benefit analysis of its own.

The CEBR, however, did not factor in the effect of electrifying the car fleet on the caravan industry, which is worth £6 billion per annum to the UK economy in product sales and services and employs 130,000 people. Nearly all caravans sold in the UK today are manufactured by Swift at Cottingham, Bailey at Bristol, Elddis in Consett and Coachman in Hull. A British success story. Most caravans weigh more than one and a half tons and many more than two tons. Battery cars cannot tow them. This is just one industry which the Government's plans will wipe out through unintended consequence. How many more industries will fail because reliable diesel and petrol vehicles will no longer be available?

William Loneskie, Lauder.

RIGHT-HAND MAN TO THE KING

I WAS interested in your photograph featuring Harry Margolis ("Dancing to the King of Swing", The Herald, October 14). The saxophonist depicted is in fact the late George McLelland, who was Harry Margolis's trusted right-hand man over several decades at gigs in and around Glasgow.

George, a versatile musician and devoted family man, passed away some seven years ago. He is fondly remembered as a generous and true friend to many.

Allan C Steele, Glasgow.

AH WELL, SOME CONSOLATION

LET'S look on the bright side: at least there have been plenty goals to watch this week.

Peter Wright, West Kilbride.

Read more: Why should I take advice from someone who detests me?