Sir, – Alistair McBay (Drag queen fury is misplaced) feels that inviting a drag queen to talk to schoolchildren is on a par with taking them to see a pantomime dame. There is a world of difference. A pantomime dame is obviously a man to one and all.
Typically they wear layers of brightly coloured skirts, puffy sleeves, with chaotic over-the-top hair and make-up. It is slap-stick family entertainment.
A drag queen is a sexualised female impersonator.
Drag queens earn their living by being sensual. Everything about their appearance is designed to look like a sexually attractive female.
They are adult entertainment, end of story.
They have no place in children’s education. No matter how often John Swinney speaks about “equipping them to understand the modern world” there is absolutely no justification to introduce this tawdry adult media into the classroom.
Sylvia Brown.
Cupar, Fife.
National Investment Bank is a better bet
Sir, – Mrs Maike Cook (Far better use for £2 billion of banking cash, Courier, February 25) slates the Scottish Government for its plan to set up the Scottish National Investment Bank, with initial capital funding as above.
The idea of the new bank is to provide support to fledgling companies, particularly in the field of innovation and green enterprise, at a point in their development when a little bit of funding can make all the difference, a section of business where the UK has not distinguished itself in the recent past.
The Courier’s Business Matters supplement on February 25 covered this very topic of spin outs from universities and colleges, or start-up companies, which had great ideas and huge potential, but access to development funding may be not so easy.
For Mrs Cook’s information, the Bill to create the new bank had cross party support in the Scottish Parliament, including the Conservatives, with similar banking initiatives fairly common in many of our neighbouring European countries, most of which have better records on innovative business start-up success than the UK.
The other side of the funding equation is the UK Government, which ploughs huge amounts of money, of which we in Scotland have to pay our share, into projects which are of no use to Scotland, maybe no use to anybody, with no say in the matter whatsoever.
For example, HS2 is planned to cost £106 billion, almost certainly at least double, if it ever goes ahead, to save an hour on a journey within southern England.
Crossrail has cost £18bn and counting to save a few minutes on a journey across London.
Renewal of the Palace of Westminster, soon to be redundant as Ireland unifies and Scotland leaves, has a ball park budget of £4bn, a teaser figure to get approval, after which the cost will multiply.
We now hear, not from our government, but from the US, that we are to be spending countless billions, for a generation, if we survive that long, on nuclear weapons which will be much more of a danger to the people of Scotland, than to whatever enemies they are designed to deter.
I would suggest to Mrs Cook that it will be of much more benefit to the people of Scotland to spend £2 billion of our money on developing innovative Scottish businesses, from which we would hope to see a healthy return, rather than, as our prime minister would say, “spaffing” it away on the dubious projects I list above.
Les Mackay.
5 Carmichael Gardens,
Dundee.
Futureproofing with bank plan
Sir, – Regards your letter (Use cash to fund public services, Courier, February 26).
There is no doubting that public services would always benefit with additional funds.
What is more difficult to explain and often gets missed is that if a government, in this case the Scottish Government, concentrates on the “now” exclusively, we as a country have no capacity to respond to changes in circumstances in the world at large.
This is also true of the UK Government.
The Scottish Government cannot “borrow” the required significant amounts of funds to perform the stimulation required to accelerate the growth in the Scottish economy as per the rules of the Devolution Agreement.
Many comment that taxation in Scotland is the restricting factor but that has been debunked.
With the Scottish National Investment Bank announcements, I think it is obvious that our Scottish Government has the best interests of our people at heart.
Alistair Ballantyne.
Birkhill,
Angus.
Hubris comes before a fall
Sir, – Speculation over a possible SNP candidate for the Holyrood seat of Edinburgh Central, between Joanna Cherry and Angus Robertson, is interesting.
They both speak as if winning this marginal seat was some kind of foregone conclusion.
This is the behaviour and language of a party that has been in power for too long, giving them an inflated sense of entitlement.
This is hubris, which usually precedes a fall!
William Ballantine.
47 The Quarryknowes,
Dean Road, Bo’ness.
Open eyes to divisions
Sir, – If Messrs Auchterlonie and Hinnrichs cannot see what everyone else can see that Scotland has already been divided by virtue of the antics and political posturing of the SNP for the last 10 years, then they need to get out more often.
D Adams.
31 Kirklands Park,
Cupar.
Coughers must cover up
Sir, – In spite of all the advice about washing hands to prevent the spread of disease and covering your mouth and nose when coughing and sneezing, particularly with the current coronavirus threat, I find it frustrating to see the number of people who either do not wash their hands or just rinse them quickly under a tap without using soap and do not cover up when coughing and sneezing.
It is now time for all of us to start challenging these people about their unhygienic habits when we see it happening as they are threatening the health of all of us.
We also need a public campaign of posters to reinforce this.
Paul Lewis.
99 Guardwell Crescent,
Edinburgh.
