Letters: Put us out of our misery, Sunak. Call an election now

I will even let go the billions wasted by you and your party during Covid on useless PPE contracts that enriched your mates. Buy Michelle Mone another yacht. I do not care, only call an election.
Call an election. 

In my student days I dreamed of a utopian three-day week, full employment and an end to sexism and racism. Now I just dream about an end to collective national madness and hopelessness.

Put us out of our misery. 

No-one knows what that will bring. We all just know it cannot be this hell. 
Call an election. Call an election. 

In case I have not made myself clear... CALL AN ELECTION.
Amanda Baker, Edinburgh.

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Read more: Scottish Tories add to pressure on beleaguered Prime Minister

SNP say Sunak is putting 'money before morals' in Tory donor race row

Boris Johnson will not be campaigning for Tories in Scotland

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Will things really get better? 
THE then Labour government proposed in 2010 to halve the deficit within four years by applying £32 billion annual savings. Alistair Darling admitted that cuts in public spending “will be deeper and tougher” than under Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.

Liam Byrne, chief secretary to the Treasury under Gordon Brown famously left a note for his Tory successor, “saying I regret there is no money”.

The 2022/23 deficit was £131 billion.

Peter A Russell (letters, March 13) writes of an incoming Labour administration,  “It is a realistic prospect to expect that things can get better in the future just as they did in the past” Really?
Alan Carmichael, Glasgow.

Confidence in Rachel Reeves
PETER Russell claims, “It is not the funding model [PFI] that is the issue; it is the contract terms and project design.” On terms and design, I agree. That, however, does not necessarily lead to the conclusion that the funding model is of lesser significance. 

As Deep Throat advises Woodward and Bernstein in All the President’s Men, “follow the money”. 

Without funding, the project will not happen, so while funding, terms and design are conceptually distinct, they flow one into the other in practice. Any government using PFI concedes the banking and financial industries more significant influence on political decision-making than they could otherwise hope to enjoy. Is it any wonder PFI is the only game in town?

Mr Russell also claims, “Life is too short to outline the very many differences in the policies of the two parties [Labour and Conservative] in all of these areas”, but leaving it at that glosses over the fact that some policies are more influential than others.

Brexit was one example of a ‘very’ influential policy, but on an ongoing basis, it’s hard to beat such as fiscal and monetary policy and overall government spending decisions – the reasons why the Treasury rules the roost.

It might be claimed, for instance, what about Health or Defence? Yes, what about them? It must be crystal clear that what can be done and what can be spent will be subservient to decisions not in the pertinent Ministries but within the envelope of what the Treasury would allow them to spend.

Given this, Rachel Reeves’ potential influence (if appointed Chancellor) will be much the same as Jeremy Hunt’s currently. The New Statesman argues that while Labour’s commitment to fair growth is correct “it won’t be achieved by a back-door return to austerity or by wishful thinking”.

How much confidence can there be in a Shadow Chancellor who has already gone wobbly on Labour’s green jobs, as well as unwilling to do away with abominations such as the two-child rule?
Plus ca change, plus la meme chose?
Alasdair Galloway, Dumbarton.

America’s post-war loan to the UK
LEAH Gunn Barrett referred to Rachel Reeves telling Laura Kuenssberg, during a recent interview, that an incoming Labour Government’s economic inheritance “will be the worst since the Second World War” (‘Reeves should study Attlee’, letters,  March 13).

The times following that war were clearly difficult and arduous for the British. In 1945 John Maynard Keynes, the economist, is reported to have advised Attlee that the country ‘is virtually bankrupt and the economic basis for the hopes of the people non-existent ‘.

In her letter Ms Gunn Barrett goes on to point to the policies pursued by the Attlee Government and to that Government’s many achievements, which are particularly impressive when seen in the context of the multiple challenges then faced by Britain at the time .

However, it is interesting that she makes no mention of the 50-year loan made by the USA to Britain of $3.75 billion at 2% interest. That loan was eventually paid off  in 2006 during an administration led by Tony Blair. 

The response of The Economist at the time to the loan was a measured and sobering one – “We are not compelled to say we like it. Our present needs are the direct consequence of the fact that we fought earlier, that we fought longest, and that we fought hardest”.
Ian W Thomson, Lenzie.

What do decent Tories think?
IT would be interesting to hear what decent Conservatives voters (I’m sure they must exist) think of the views expressed by Lee Anderson and Frank Hestor.  And does anyone really think that they are a tiny minority?
Jim McSheffrey, Giffnock.

SNP just ‘carry on regardless’
THE Scottish ‘government’ in its wisdom has donated £750,000 to UNRWA, an organisation which allegedly has Hamas terrorists in its ranks. Creative Scotland, a Scottish ‘government’ quango, has awarded £85,000 to an organisation which will use the money to make a "porn movie".

Essential services like NHS Scotland, Police Scotland, and many others are desperate for more funding, with some even having funding cut. It would be nice to think that the SNP administration would see that they’re using our money the wrong way but I doubt that will happen. They’ll do what they want regardless of what the taxpayer wants.
Ian Balloch, Grangemouth.

Bonfire of the vanities
IT is a worrying time for Scots who cherish our long-held freedom of speech and thought.

Feminists such as JK Rowling could be under pressure with the introduction on the first of April, appropriately, of the First Minister’s piece de resistance, his new Hate Law,  and I am well aware thatMs Rowling is more than capable of looking after herself in every way. But many others lack her intellectual ability and wherewithal. 

In any case, Police Scotland are at full stretch having to deal with all the SNP’s cuts and are seeking to give up entirely on thousands of ‘’minor crimes.’’ 

The surely fatally flawed hate crime law will mean that age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, and trans identity will be ‘’protected characteristics’’ as well as race. 

The laws, introduced by Humza Yousaf several years ago, have been delayed due to fears of lack of police training and coping with the IT systems involved.

Parts of his Bill raised genuine fears for free speech and sections were backtracked. Many observers feel the police will be overwhelmed and unable to handle what will ensue. 

This whole affair has been typical of SNP maladministration and lack of forethought, which the people of Scotland have witnessed and from which they have suffered time after time for many years. 
This law will surely follow the SNP’s Gender Bill on to the top of their massive bonfire of the vanities. 
Alexander McKay, Edinburgh.

Nurses’ contact with the dying
WHAT evidence does Baroness Findlay have that the opinion of the 2,500 doctors who are backing a campaign to halt the Assisted Dying Bill is not being heard and taken into account? (Letters, March 14).
In terms of day-to-day, hour-to-hour, minute-to-minute contact with the dying. nurses surely have a much deeper and more meaningful relationship with them.

On another point, why is it always assumed that doctors will carry out the administering of the final drug? Why can we not have due diligence officers?
Doug Clark, Currie, Midlothian.