Shame on both our governments for the harm they do to social care

How would a just and compassionate society respond to these problems? Seems pretty simple. Increase funding for social care and increase the minimum wage for care workers to a level commensurate with the valuable job they do.

Instead the Scottish Government reduces local government funding and freezes council tax. Even more catastrophically, the UK Government’s imminent changes to immigration policy preventing care workers bringing their dependents with them will decimate the care sector workforce further ("SNP describes new immigration salary measures as 'economic vandalism’", The Herald, December 5). My own carers consist of four Nigerians, a Zimbabwean, an American, a Kenyan and an Algerian. They are all wonderful individuals and care professionals, and without them I would never have got out of hospital.

As a society we get the social care we are willing to pay for. I never imagined that I would require 24-hour care at the age of 51, and want to urge both governments, on behalf of those who are not able to access the care they require, to please reconsider these funding and immigration policies. They would do well to remember most of us will need care at some stage of our lives, and consider how they would feel if they were stuck in hospital with a debilitating terminal illness and were unable to get home because there was neither the funding nor the care professionals to facilitate this.

Brian Murphy, Glasgow.

Read more: When will our leaders wake up to this hideous reality in Gaza?

Cleverly walks the walk

AT long last a politician who acts not talks. Home Secretary James Cleverly has unveiled tough reforms designed to slash immigration by 300,000 a year.

Care workers will be barred from bringing family members to Britain. Work visas will only be given to those securing jobs over £38,700. Another gaping wound was university courses where overseas students enrolled on cheap courses were able to bring over relatives and then before finishing the course were able to transfer to work visas. Unfortunately these regulations will not come into force until April 2024.

I note that the UK population has increased by 1.3 million in the last two years due to uncontrolled immigration. No wonder our schools, NHS and other services are under acute pressure.

Clark Cross, Linlithgow.

• YOU are welcome to come to the UK if you have a job to come to that pays £38,700 a year. This figure represents a cool and calculated rejection for most applying to come here to assist with our massive shortages in social care and our NHS.

This is the Conservatives at Westminster reaching out to their supporters in an attempt to hold on to power; demonstrating the ultimate in greed instead of need.

Your article highlighted the numbers entering the UK whom Home Secretary James Cleverly suggests are idle, not contributing and who could actually be "drawing on our public services". Perhaps he should be asking himself and his Government why this occurs, because the answers may be lurking at the Home Office where there are in excess of 200,000 "work in progress" asylum/refugee cases at varying stages of process where the applicants are not allowed to work. Those who are waiting for the process to conclude should be allowed to work and make a meaningful contribution to the country they wish to call home.

Scotland welcomes immigrants and refugees as has been the case for decades and we will feel the negative impact of these draconian new measures. More evidence if it were needed for immigration to be devolved to Scotland.

Catriona C Clark, Falkirk.

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Sunak clutching at straws

WITH every opinion poll Rishi Sunak's stock sinks lower. That surely explains the feverish desperation in the Westminster Government as it thrashes around to find a policy to resuscitate his electoral prospects.

He has tried reset after reset but so far to no avail.Now migration is the issue he is pinning his hopes on to reignite his challenge to remain in Downing Street. James Cleverly is in Rwanda to sign and seal the treaty which it is hoped will allow that flagship policy to finally take off.

His spokesman while he is away putting pen to paper is Robert Jenrick, who was interviewed on Radio 4 about the forthcoming legislation aimed at removing the obstacles which allowed the Supreme Court to veto the implementation of the Rwanda project. In the course of that feeble interview, he refused to answer any question posed about whether the legislation would include withdrawing from the ECHR or any other international agreements to which our UK Government is signed up to.

The Rwanda flights will just remove small numbers of those who come over in small boats, having been declared illegal immigrants thanks to the petty and self-serving legislation pathetically passed in our Parliament, even though Mr Sunak likes to pride himself on that ploy as being the deterrent which will sink the likelihood of immigrants using that mode of entry into the UK. It has not worked so far and it does not look as though it will have much traction in the immediate and long-term future.

Mr Sunak, the drowning man of British politics, is clutching at any and every straw to stop himself from going under and being washed away.

Denis Bruce, Bishopbriggs.

Will the new measures do much to 'stop the boats'? (Image: PA)

A basis for civilisation?

I WRITE to thank you for the Letters Page on Gaza today (December 5). I am not usually slow to head for the keyboard and write to The Herald, but on the subject of Gaza, I have felt inadequate to the task. Today's letters from Doug Maughan and others said everything I wanted to say but felt unable to express properly.

I am an atheist and one letter from Grant Frazer stood out. He wrote: "This square mile is one of the most contested and fought-over patches of land on the planet, yet remains the basis of our western civilisation". Quite.

I felt comforted to realise I was not alone.

John Jamieson, Ayr.

• IN common with your numerous contributors (Letters, December 5), I was moved to tears by the photo of the two youngsters in Gaza. It brought to mind an anti-war poem written by Lascelles Abercrombie after the First World War called The Box. I would urge you to google it and perhaps Lesley Duncan could consider publishing it in full. On conclusion, you will realise that plus ça change …

Thomas Brennan, Glasgow.

Read more: More power to those who are out to stop Patrick Harvie

Denying full rights to Arabs

I REFER to Norman Ogston’s letter (December 4) in which he fails to acknowledge that in 1948, more than half of the Palestinian population were driven from their land and homes initially by Zionist militias and then by the Israeli army. Many of these displaced Palestinians ended up in refugee camps in Jordan and Lebanon and elsewhere in which many of their descendants still live. This puts a different light on Mr Ogston’s assertion that the Palestinians were “given Jordan and Lebanon”.

What is more, the situation outwith Gaza is frightening with the UN human rights office last month warning of an “alarming and urgent” picture in the West Bank. “A sharp increase in raids by Israeli forces and attacks by settlers since the Hamas attacks of 7 October have killed a growing number of Palestinians, including children, and forced more from their homes”.

Mr Ogston also maintains that “there are many Arabs who live happily in Israel with full rights of citizenship”. However the situation is not so straightforward as he suggests. For instance, the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs (Georgetown University) points out in its paper “Israel as an Ethnic Democracy: Palestinian Citizens and the Fight for Equal Rights” that “an important distinction has to be made between formal citizenship and full citizenship. Although religious minorities are formally considered to enjoy liberties equally with the Jewish community, in practice they do not share and enjoy the same rights and liberties”.

John Milne, Uddingston.