Sir, – I’ve noticed a common thread running through letters on this page by Unionist-leaning correspondents when trying to defend inhumane Westminster Tory governmental decisions.
For example, depriving the poorest in our society by cutting life dependent Universal Credit payments by £20 per week, whereby instead of trying to justify these malicious
and merciless acts, they instead, deflect by saying things such as, “Oh, that’s a devolved area”, or “the Scottish Government can offset these cuts if it so wished”.
While Scotland is dependent on its finances from Westminster and receives only what that government deems sufficient, and has no control of its own finances, nothing is ever really devolved. Scotland is even allocated a share of the UK debt – money it never
borrowed or had any say in how those borrowings were spent.
And for those who believe only the Tories can be trusted with the UK finances, a reminder that the UK debt is now £2.25 trillion! To put a trillion in perspective, 1 million seconds would take you back about two weeks, 1 billion seconds you’d
be back to 1989, 1 trillion seconds and you’d be in 30,000 BC!
Douglas Black, Kingsford, Alford.
No hiding on social media for anti-social misfits
Sir, – The unsocial mayhem created by so-called social media can be resolved instantly by removing anonymity and requiring all media inputs to be supported by verifiable identification.
No name, no number then no internet access. If people won’t go public then why should their message go public? Accountability via identification is what’s missing and this can be easily fixed.
CA Smith, Upper Garmouth, Fochabers.
Fail to see benefits of SNP leadership
Sir, – According to Grant Frazer’s latest rant the current UK Government is “useless” and is led by a “clueless” PM. He then went on to somehow claim that the Holyrood election was all about whether or not Scotland should have another referendum.
First, the reality of course is very different to what he says, especially if one compares the shocking and inept performance of Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP Government.
Take for example the fall in Scottish educational standards, the new hospital closures, drug deaths and alcoholism, the ferry and BiFab fiascos and the memory lapses of the FM on crucial matters like “misleading” parliament during the Salmond inquiry – the list is endless.
To be fair, Boris has had his problems but unlike Sturgeon has had some spectacular successes like furloughing, business grants and the Bounce Back Loan schemes, but
most of all the amazing development, procurement and administration of the highly successful vaccine programs.
On the other hand what successes has Sturgeon had – other than to blame Westminster for all her failures?
Finally, he trotted out the usual nonsense about the settled will of the people (following the election) even though SNP is an minority government and Sturgeon stated very clearly beforehand that it was ‘not an independence referendum’ – notwithstanding that poll after poll shows the Scottish people do not support indyref2 (in the near future) and that the SNP are also behind in the opinion polls.
Rather than lead with his chin it would be helpful if Mr Frazer actually considered some basic truths before unwittingly drawing attention to the woeful inadequacies of the independence argument.
Ian Lakin, Murtle Den Road, Milltimber, Aberdeen.
Danes got it right, why can’t we?
Sir, – In Denmark all Covid restrictions were lifted on September 11.
I hear that is also the case in Sweden. So, given that one month on, there has been no surge in infections there, in fact they have about 90% less daily compared to Scotland, can’t we despatch a Nicola minion to look at what they are doing right so we can get to this point too?
James Walker, Union Grove, Aberdeen.