Sir, Re Johann Lamont and her total destruction of the Labour Party at Westminster. Was this sour grapes, or an honest appraisal of where Labour are at the moment?
Bleeding support in their heartlands; weak proposals for the Smith Commission; inter-ference from Westminster; trade union members with-drawing from the political levy; can it get any worse for them?
They would do well to heed the advice of former leader Henry McLeish who has been warning them for some time now that politics in Scotland has changed and that people now look to Edinburgh for their political leadership outside the bigger issues of foreign affairs and defence.
If they are to survive and thrive in Scotland they need to radically overhaul their constitution and a good start would be running their party from Scotland and not Westminster, with policies for Scotland.
The other parties have settled into the Smith Commission and would appear to be trying to make some headway but with the confusion around Labour are they even relevant to the commission as they would appear to stuck in some kind of outdated politburo central-isation past where Miliband and Balls pull the strings.
Things have moved on in Scotland and in the past Labour have contributed a lot to social improvements in this country but they now need to realise there are new kids on the block who are innovative and dynamic and not prisoners of their own past.
Scotland needs a Labour Party but it needs one that is in tune with modern Scotland. If the referendum did nothing else it certainly showed that Labour in Scotland is way behind the curve on what people want in Scotland and if they are not careful they could become nothing more than a fringe party with nothing to offer.
Bryan Auchterlonie. Bluebell Cottage, Ardargie.
In for a spell of coalitions?
Sir, With the referendum now firmly behind us and the UK general election looming, it must now be fairly obvious even to the most committed of party members that the Westminster three-party winner-takes-all system is now in terminal decline.
The recent by-elections heralded the arrival of UKIP with every prospect of outstripping the Lib-Dem numbers and with the recent surge of popularity of SNP in Scotland, there is a strong possibility that it will also increase its task force at Westminster.
The prospect of either Labour or Conservative taking overall control is becoming increasingly unlikely. We are almost certainly in for a long spell of coalition government and the prospect of even more elections as coalitions fall apart and readjust and reform.
Party manifestos will then be seriously compromised and pre-election promises will become little more than wish-lists. To avoid what some might regard as unholy alliances, the electorate will have to resort to a form of tactical voting en masse.
Despite the Conservatives’ loudly proclaimed differences with the UKIP agenda, it is not at all unlikely that if push comes to shove, they will cosy up to form a government. The same applies to Labour and SNP. With the change of senior management at Holyrood it is quite within the realm of possibility that the SNP Westminster force will be strong enough to combine with Labour to effect a coup de grace to the Tory alliance.
The Lib-Dem rump will, of course, have to consider taking a small step to the right or a long leap to the left to retain a foothold in govern-ment, or simply retire to the back benches as spectators.
For those who voted in the independence referendum to remain in the union, a major factor in their decision was the thought of all the upheaval that would arise in the general reorganisation of administrations and the uncertainty of the economic future at a time of serious problems within the euro zone.
We must now accept that the next decade within the UK will be just as unpredictable and unsettling.
Harry Racionzer. Angler Road, Kirriemuir.
Destroying British society
Sir, One of the prime duties of government is to provide energy at all times, and news of possible power cuts shows they have failed in this simple task. So if government fails at that, what next?
Well they have made us defenceless by reducing our armed forces and have also failed to feed us by allowing the EU to wreck our fishing and farming industries.
The liberal left is destroying British society prior to rebuilding it in the post democratic new world order, where Britain will simply no longer have a place.
Malcolm Parkin. 15 Gamekeepers Road, Kinnesswood, Kinross.
If UK is so bad why come?
Sir, I refer to Allan MacDougall’s letter (October 27) in which he derides my earlier comments regarding the status of the UK in the wider world. It is difficult to understand his counter- argument that no country would wish affiliation to the UK and the reason we don’t win the Eurovision Song Contest is that we are hated by so many the other participating countries!
The UK granted indepen-dence to its former colonial empire, having bestowed the UK parliamentary, judicial and educational infrastruc-tures during colonial times. These countries retain the bestowed infrastructures and remain part of the British Commonwealth of Nations (with the exception of Zim-babwe, influenced by the dictatorship of Robert Mugabe).
If the UK is so abhorrent, as Mr MacDougall suggests, then it is a mystery as to how the Commonwealth survives. It is also the case that, of all the colonial powers prevalent in the 19th and 20th centuries (France, Belgium, Nether-lands, Germany, Portugal, etc), only the UK has been able to sustain its links with the countries over which it held sway
The newly independent countries of Central and Eastern Europe are all struggling economically and being assisted by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, based in London. If the UK is hated so much by European countries engaged in this faintly ridic-ulous song contest, then it is surprising they are taking so much advice and assistance from UK citizens engaged by the EBRD to assist them.
Mr MacDougall casts his mind back to when he was a military conscript in Egypt (must be some 50 years ago) and cites this experience as being a reprehensible feature of UK “occupation”. I have some rather more recent experience of Egypt, living and working in Cairo (2005-2007) and did not see any of the revulsion to which Mr MacDougall refers. Quite the opposite, in fact.
If the UK is so bad, why is it that so very many immigrants arriving in Italy from the African continent, are making the further trek all the way to the French channel ports in order to try to gain illegal entry to the UK?
Seems to me that Mr MacDougall’s vision of reality is somewhat flawed and the fact remains that Scotland presents a far higher profile of itself to the world being part of UK than would ever be possible as a small indepen-dent nation with limited resources.
Derek Farmer. Knightsward Farm, Anstruther.
A9 diversion is preposterous
Sir, The very idea of avoiding the A9 by travelling via Crieff, Dunkeld and Pitlochry to reach Calvine is preposterous unless you want to attempt a world record for the slowest journey from Stirling to Inverness, only to be beaten by the driver taking the Fort William route!
This road would take the traveller through Crieff, where traffic is generally slow, before having to cross both the northbound and southbound traffic to reach Dunkeld before meandering up to Pitlochry where the next congestion will be encountered.
The final section of road reaches the junction with the A9 at Bruar where our, now weary, traveller will have to cross in front of the south-bound traffic in the hope of finding a gap in the north-bound vehicles. And then on to Inverness. Total lunacy just like trying to get north via Fort William!
Sorry, but neither route will help people reach their destination quicker and will just add to the traffic on even narrower and less suitable roads.
Colin Young. Meadowland, Dunning.