Predictably with the launch this week of the SNP’s manifesto, the issue of Scottish independence is back on the forefront of our readers’ minds.
Yesterday, one of our correspondents wrote in praise of “the joint enterprise that is the UK”.
Today, a reader questions the value of that self-same “joint enterprise”, especially with regard to Glasgow.
Ruth Marr of Stirling writes:
Peter A Russell (Letters, June 20) refers to 'the joint enterprise that is the UK'; I am reminded that in 1707 the Speaker of the House of Commons, referring to the Act of Union, said: 'We have catched Scotland and we will bind her fast'. More up to date is Paragraph 18 of the Smith Commission Report following the 2014 referendum which reads: 'It is agreed that nothing in this report prevents Scotland becoming an independent country in the future should the people of Scotland so choose.'
Last Saturday, your featured old photograph ('Remember when ... Glasgow began tackling the problem of east end slums", The Herald, June 15) showed children in a "back court playground" in 1977, and it was reported that in Dalmarnock alone 'almost half the homes have either no access to or must share an inside lavatory. More than half have no hot water or must share, and more than 60% live in one or two rooms'. Huge areas of Glasgow were in a similar position, but they didn't get that way under the SNP, or because Scotland was independent, they got that way under Westminster control and under the control of decades of Labour domination in George Square.
I wonder if Mr Russell would use his favourite word 'stupid' to describe the way in which generation after generation of Glaswegians were condemned to live in what were called the worst slums in Europe. I can think of a few words, none of them printable."
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