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As an alternative of setting apart £20 million for her subsequent independence referendum Scots ought to demand it’s used for a referendum on eliminating devolved powers in Scotland earlier than the SNP brings us to our knees – in any case in the event that they wipe out our center class Scots or give them no possibility however to depart this nation they will not have our taxes to make use of and abuse. How dare they deal with us like idiots.
After listening to Finance Minister Kate Forbes addressing the Scottish Parliament on the looming £3.5 billion finances deficit, I used to be reminded of an outdated Glaswegian phrase typically utilized by my mom, and one Nicola Sturgeon will likely be accustomed to, specifically “They couldnae run a Minodge”!The monetary mismanagement of taxpayers cash by this Scottish Authorities beggars perception. After treading water for practically 15 years, the nation goes backwards.They’ve failed to enhance Training, Well being, Transport and drug deaths, to call however just a few, while squandering hundreds of thousands on self-importance initiatives, vote-winning freebies, suspect inexperienced initiatives, quite a few quangos, spin docs, advisers, to not point out one other referendum the vast majority of our residents don’t need.
After 15 years of SNP smoke and mirrors politics, the smoke is starting to clear and the mirrors are reflecting the massive value of this monetary mismanagement.However in fact, their inventory response as at all times is, “it wisnae us, it was that massive dangerous Boris and his band of Brexiteers”. The SNP authorities have trashed the nation that gave us Adam Smith and as soon as had a worldwide popularity for monetary prudence and financial experience.
Any non-public firm with a stability sheet like theirs, if not put into administration, would have sacked the board instantly. Certainly, after sacking this cupboard, maybe they need to be given 15 years Group Service cleansing up our streets, filling in potholes and insulating our houses.
George M Primrose, Uddingston, Glasgow
Close to your editorial of two June, the UK doesn’t have a coverage of nuclear weapons deterrence – Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). Theresa Might stated she would fireplace the UK’s nuclear weapons as a “first strike”, and Baroness Goldie stated within the Lords on 23 June 2021, “The UK has neither a first-use nor a no-first-use coverage… we’ll stay intentionally ambiguous about when, how and at what scale we’ll use nuclear weapons.”
The Trident system will not be really impartial. It makes use of Trident II D-5 missiles, developed and maintained – and finally managed? – by the USA. The Eighth Report of the Defence Choose Committee acknowledged: “The UK has title to 58 missiles. Other than these at the moment deployed, the missiles are held in a communal pool on the US Strategic Weapons facility at King’s Bay, Georgia, USA. Upkeep and in-service help of the missiles is undertaken at periodic intervals at King’s Bay, usually after a submarine has been via refit.”
If I have been an enemy of the UK susceptible to a preemptive nuclear weapons assault from the UK, I’d have the 100-odd nuclear warheads saved in bolstered concrete bunkers at Coulport on the prime of my goal record for my preemptive strike.
Subsequent on my goal record could be Trident management and command centres elsewhere within the UK. Trident’s not a “defend” however a suicide threat.
E Campbell, Newton Mearns, East Renfrewshire
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Scottish independence: SNP should recognise it can’t disrupt UK’s nuclear deterre…
Frances Scott (Letters, 2 June) is true to level out that UK Treasury taxation revenues from Scotland’s North Sea for a number of years to come back will dwarf any estimated Scottish Authorities finances shortfall.
Below devolution, any Scottish authorities would face inconceivable finances decisions when excessive UK inflation, brought on by disastrous Westminster insurance policies on Brexit, Covid and power provide, means a much-reduced block grant in actual phrases. The reliance on earnings tax, as the one different supply to plug the shortfall, is undermined if the UK decides to scale back earnings tax slightly than spend its manner out of austerity. The Scottish authorities has to stability its books yearly and can’t print cash or run up a nationwide debt of £2700 billion, or £43,000 per head, as within the UK.
Scotland outperforms the remainder of the UK and Europe in attracting international funding that created 10,000 jobs within the final yr, highlighting Scotland’s power in high-value, high-growth industries like digital, clear know-how and life sciences. It’s a pretty location with a extremely educated workforce because of good enterprise networks and Scottish Authorities businesses’ help.
With out the traditional fiscal powers of independence to unleash Scotland’s huge potential, we will likely be held again and might’t keep one of the best public companies within the UK we’ve come to get pleasure from or mitigate the devastating UK authorities austerity that has brought about decrease life expectancy.
Anas Sarwar got here of age this week in Holyrood. His forensic questioning of the First Minister – along with that of the opposite non-nationalist leaders – was excellent.
He has realized within the job. It was framed in a method to stop as a lot obfuscation and scrambling for spinner-prepared crib folders as we usually need to undergo and his comparisons of the figures ready for severe operations when the SNP got here to energy all these years in the past and people ready now was good. The sense of change within the political air is nearly tangible.
Everybody, aside from zealous nationalists, knew this time would come and Previous Abe’s dictum of being unable to idiot all the folks all the time has been confirmed right as soon as extra.
Alexander McKay, Edinburgh
Though all main political events supported the introduction of Curriculum for Excellence, criticism has arisen from some who don’t seem to understand CforE’s vast aims or from others who would favor to return Scotland to reliance on the narrower instructing programmes of the previous. Whereas Scotland was just lately lauded for main Europe within the degree-level schooling of its folks (EuroStat analysis 2011-19), some proceed to criticise Scottish state-school schooling primarily based on outdated ideas, selective statistics and restricted league tables.
When in Austria just lately I turned on the TV in my resort room to hearken to one of many few channels broadcast in English, France 24, and was to listen to dialogue round declining charges of proficiency in maths to the extent that right now many making use of to check engineering at French universities would not have the extent of maths schooling thought-about adequate for his or her chosen programs, and that there have been explicit points in relation to encouraging extra women to study maths. This curiosity turned to nice shock when the one nation singled out for example the place extra progress is being made on this regard was Scotland.
Is it an excessive amount of to hope that earlier than we learn one other letter denigrating the usual of Scottish schooling that the author has first taken the time to broadly and objectively think about what instructing is greatest suited to enabling all Scotland’s youth to efficiently and responsibly obtain their profession and life ambitions in right now’s world?
Stan Grodynski, Longniddry, East Lothian
I be aware {that a} group of social scientists from Aberdeen Enterprise Faculty at Robert Gordon College (RGU) are looking for grant help in order that “Communities can shut a information hole on decarbonising results” (Perspective, 31 Might). Likely those that scrutinise the obscure, imprecise and convoluted phrasing used to justify this RGU utility will give it the nod of approval for the straightforward cause that’s pertains to “mitigating” local weather change. They are going to be part of the multitude of college analysis services keen to simply accept funding with a view to climb aboard the already overcrowded local weather gravy prepare with a view to advance the “warming regulatory agenda”.
There’s a course of referred to as The Amplifying Cascade of Systemic Bias which is outlined as any scientific exercise the place the prospect of funding influences the leads to a manner that advantages the funder. This encompasses questions equivalent to 1) Does bias funding skew in a most well-liked route a end result that helps an company mission or coverage? 2) Do directives steer funding in direction of particular analysis areas by posing particular questions? 3) Do pc fashions are likely to favour a selected agenda? 4) Is there a bent in direction of failure to report damaging outcomes and/or manipulate knowledge to bias outcomes and current conjecture as truth? Aligning your programme/company to political imperatives is all too incessantly seen as the important thing to success.
Governments have already got in place groups of social scientists, referred to as the Behavioural Insights Crew, popularly referred to as Nudge Items, which “encourage” public considering in most well-liked instructions with a view to enhance compliance with authorities insurance policies. We’re already seeing carrots being supplied and sticks being wielded to make sure that companies fall into line with the online zero agenda. This bears a rising and regarding resemblance to China’s social credit score system whereby each enterprise and citizen is evaluated in keeping with how polluting they’re deemed to be and rewarded or punished accordingly. Are we on the sting of a slippery slope?
Neil J Bryce, Kelso, Scottish Borders
Allow us to assume that the Prime Minister has ultimately conceded to an independence referendum, however this time it’s not Scotland however England, that has received the possibility to vote on remaining or leaving the UK.
On this occasion and given the fixed reminders that Scotland, Wales and Northern Eire get extra out than they put in to the general public purse, what arguments could be made by these looking for to maintain England within the UK?
We welcome your ideas. Write to [email protected] together with title, deal with and cellphone quantity – we can’t print full particulars. Hold letters beneath 300 phrases, with no attachments, and keep away from ‘Letters to the Editor/Readers’ Letters’ or related in your topic line. Don’t ship letters submitted elsewhere. If referring to an article, embody date, web page quantity and heading.
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