ALAN Morris (Letters, January 4) talks of the clear desire of voters being to hold another Scottish referendum. My impression is that voters are fed up with Nicola Sturgeon and her supporters banging on about this.

Circumstances have indeed changed since 2014 in that the UK will leave the EU. Were, however, another referendum to be proposed, supporters of separation would still have questions to answer.

1. Do they really want the 10 years of austerity forecast by the Growth Commission report which they initiated?

2. In 2014, Alex Salmond said Scotland would use the pound. Scotland would in that case be saddled with a currency dependent on economic policies which will be formulated, not to help Scotland, but England.

3.Will Scotland have to queue to join the EU? There is no guarantee of admission to a much smaller seat at a much larger table. Why, anyway, do nationalists want to be placed in this invidious position?

4. If admitted to the EU, Scotland would have to adopt the euro and all that that entails. The Greeks have first-hand knowledge of that one.

I suggest to Mr Morris that the case for a referendum has been revised only by the UK's leaving the EU. Other difficulties, some of greater magnitude than in 2014, cf 3 and 4 above, remain.

David Miller, Milngavie.

PLEASE allow me to compliment John Dunlop for his (I assume) humourous quotation from the preamble to the US Constitution (Letters. January 4).

However, I feel there are one or two minor matters which may contradict his sentiments. First and very significantly, the United Kingdom has no written constitution to give a set of guidelines and control the legislature. This becomes highly significant when Prime Ministers such as Tony Blair, Theresa May and Boris Johnson are in power as it gives them carte blanche to ride roughshod over the rights of the population.

I feel it is germane to also point out that the US constitution stipulates that two senators shall be elected from each state. If this is what Mr Dunlop is advocating then transferring this to a UK scenario, each equivalent would be the four nations of the United Kingdom and each would send an equal number of representatives to Westminster. Good luck with persuading the Westminster elite to agree with that.

The US Constitution also provides for individual states to have their own legislature and control virtually all internal matters and this is far superior to the half-baked powers grudgingly permitted by Westminster to the devolved parliaments. I did not realise that Mr Dunlop was praising and advocating a federal structure for the UK.

I guess Mr Dunlop only lauds a union when it suits his purposes.

David Stubley, Prestwick.

I NOTE the recent comments by Brian Cox on the subject of Scottish independence ("Cox: Enough is enough... it is time for Scots to have second independence vote" The Herald January 6). Personalities like the award-winning Mr Cox do not seem to appreciate that there are many Scots who do not take kindly to being lectured on how they should act and vote by fellow Scots who have chosen, for a variety of reasons, to live abroad. They are, of course, entitled to live wherever they choose, but not to pontificate on how those they have left behind should go about living their lives. It is open to him at any time to come back home and to support the independence movement if he feels so strongly about it, as distinct from getting an easy headline.

Ian W Thomson, Lenzie.