Second Forth crossing will be expensive folly

Sir,—I was taken aback at the intemperate response of Willie Rennie MP and Jim Tolson MSP to the YouGov poll showing that 57% of Scots supported the option of repairing the existing Forth Road Bridge, with only 34% supporting the building of an additional crossing.

Indeed, 56% of Lib Dems supported repair.

I was even more concerned at their statement that the bridge could not be repaired whilst remaining open. That is not true.

The traffic management measures necessary if new cables were to be required were laid out in a report to FETA on February 22, 2008.

For most of the time, most of the bridge lanes would remain open, though the report notes that there may be “additional short duration carriageway or total bridge closures at weekends and overnight”.

While the politicians exaggerate to the point of falsehood the official position regarding traffic management if new cables are required, they fail to acknowledge that construction of an additional bridge will bring traffic disruption.

Transport Scotland are on record as seeing the re-modelling of the Ferrytoll interchange to accommodate another bridge as being “more complicated and challenging than the bridge itself”.

Even were cable drying to fail, new cables would cost between £91 and £122 million. A new bridge is guaranteed to bring traffic disruption.

Scotland’s energy farce

Sir,—In answer to the question posed by Iain McLaren (November 14) about the extent of Scotland’s hydro-electric capacity, it stands at 1379MW, with 657MW of financially viable hydro schemes still remaining to be exploited.

Most new hydro-electric generation is likely to come mainly from small-scale installations in possible conjunction with intermittent wind generation and from other small-scale river local schemes. That said, the total effect of such schemes in generation terms are almost insignificant on a national basis.

Therefore, given that almost all available catchment areas have been exploited, it is unlikely that there will be scope for the further development of significant amounts of new hydro generation.

This fact was also confirmed by the Energy Minister Jim Mather in January.

That there is so little potential capacity left is a tribute to the work done in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s by the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board.

It is regarded as one of the major achievements of politician Thomas Johnston, who chaired the board from 1945 to 1959.

What would the great man now think of the present SNP Scottish Government’s energy policy?

However, with profits of the energy companies soaring and fuel poverty and consumer bills rising, I would be surprised if Tom Johnston, in stark contrast to the wind turbines at Alyth which Ian Mclaren noted “sit stationary on a still morning”, was not now to be found fair birlin’ in fury in his grave at the nonsensical and costly ideological farce that is now unfolding.

Christian values forgotten

Sir,—John Knox will be turning in his grave at Dundee City Council’s decision to turn the Christmas lights ceremony into a Winter Lights ceremony.

The reason is that this is part of a wider celebration that is linked to the year of Homecoming Scotland.

The council declares that there is no wish to upset the Christian community, well, are they so divorced from reality that they have forgotten that, like it or not, Scotland is a Christian society?

Christian values are held the length and breadth of Scotland, it is part of our national psyche.

There are communities of Sikhs, Hindus, Muslims and other minorities but they all live within the Christian society. Have we to believe that this Homecoming Scotland has led to a regression in Scottish celebrations to a point that we should all renounce Christianity and take to painting ourselves in wode and erecting standing stones?

If Winter Lights is an attempt to embrace other religions, then the whole thing is farcical.

Generally, where Christianity is a minority religion, Christians are persecuted, and that is a worldwide occurrence—ask the Copts in Egypt, the Christians in India, Indonesia or Nigeria. The list is endless.

Perhaps Dundee should be added to the list.

Commonsense frozen out

Sir,—I am incredulous at Dundee City Council’s decision to drop Christmas in favour of Winter Lights.

It beggars belief that this decision was even put on a council agenda. One is left wondering if the last grain of commonsense has finally been squeezed out of our council representatives.

International embarrassment

Sir,—Why do Dundee City Council feel they have the authority to rename the Christmas lights as Winter Lights? Have Buddhists changed the name of Diwali, have Muslims changed the name of Ramadan? This is farcical.

They have embarrassed Dundee on an international scale. This story is being carried by newspapers and media outlets worldwide.

Hopefully heads will roll over this. Perhaps Dundee City Council should at least have surveyed opinion before making changes.

I am a Scottish postal voter.