Sir, The Scottish Government wants to use the data that NHS Scotland has about me to give to all arms of government.
Okay, I am a dissident, impervious to John Swinney’s charms and unlikely to sign a loyalty pledge to the SNP any time soon, but they want to use everyone else’s data too.
The good news is that, as yet, they don’t want medical data. The bad news is that they want to share our details with an enormous list of quangos, charities and trusts within and outwith Scotland.
Quite why my details should be shared seamlessly with the Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, the Hutton Institute and Quality Meat Scotland I cannot understand.
Imagine the fuss if a hapless NHS employee left a laptop containing data in a taxi. The Government’s proposal amounts to a hundred laptops left in a hundred taxis.
Once the principle goes there will be little to stop the regulations widening to include more recipients or widening the data type permitted.
Poll tax refuseniks had only to disappear off the electoral register; soon you would need to avoid being born and/or having medical treatment in Scotland to escape the eye of official-dom.
Until recently I can’t remember any fuss in the media about this but we really must send a message to the SNP that they needto desist.
George Hayton. 6 Montgomery Way, Kinross.
Blue badge charge . . .
Sir, With reference to my recent letter concerning the proposed £20 charge by Fife Council I think Mr Richards (Letters, March 3), is missing my point.
I am, like most other people, struggling with the increased cost of living and any extra expense is not welcomed but I would be able to do without many things before I could do without my blue badge.
The charge will not be means tested nor is Attendance Allowance, Disability Living Allowance or PIP as these benefits are to help with extra expenses disabled people have.
For instance, many people who had polio have feet with a big difference in size eg one foot size four and one size seven, therefore they have to buy two pairs of shoes at a time.
Fife Council will be only one of many councils charging for a blue badge and I suppose we can be thankful it has not happened sooner.
However, maybe Fife Council could look at not charging people who do not qualify for the above benefits.
M Gibb. 5 The Barns, Burntisland.
Grateful for his skill
Sir, Re your articles about Professor Eljamel. In the latter half of the 1990s, my late husband Allan, who had ongoing spinal problems, suffered a fall which left him partially paralysed and unable to walk.
He was operated on by Mr Eljamel at the then Dundee Royal Infirmary. The operation was a success and as a result he had another 14 years or so of reasonable mobility.
I will always be grateful to Mr Eljamel for his skill and care during that difficult time.
Sheena Urquhart. 4 Gallowden Avenue, Arbroath.
Train service is not ‘atrocious’
Sir, I must take issue with letter writer Mr Denis Taylor (March 3), when he describes the train service from Dundee to Edinburgh as atrocious.
From the present Scotrail timetable it can be seen that there are 37 trains from Dundee to Edinburgh on weekdays and 17 on Sundays.
In the opposite direction there are 34 trains on weekdays and 16 on Sundays. Journey times range from just over an hour to an hour and a half depending, of course, on the number of stations stopped at.
Far from being atrocious the numbers and frequency of the service appear to be providing an excellent service.
Iain Bell. 24 Victoria Street, Arbroath.
‘Full house’ at this church
Sir, Re you’re headline and article “Minister: Lack of interest killing us” (February 28), had your writer attended the morning service at the Church of the Nazerene the previous Sunday, he would have been hard pushed to find a seat among the 250 available. In fact this church is in the process of increasing its seating capacity.
I reckon this would have been true at the Baptist Church, the Christian Centre and any of the other evangelical churches in the area.
So what makes the difference? I would suggest that these churches believe the bible to be the word of God, teach it as the word of God and the divine promise that “my word will not return to me void”, (ie empty/worthless) applies and the preached word has life-changing impact on the hearer. And then they come to church regularly to get fed on that word.
Paul in his epistle to the church in Corinth, notes that: “If the trumpet gives an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself for the battle?” I think the problem with the Church of Scotland is that they fail to take an uncompromising, bible-based stand against anything; are all things to all men and crucially fail to preach the Gospel. As a 65-year-old who became a Christian when I responded to the message of the Gospel aged 15, I take no pleasure in virtually empty churches. May God in His mercy change it.
John Napier. Redgorton, Perthshire.