Sir, I have never found the word “foreigner” to rest easy on the tongue. It can be used in a dismissive or derogatory fashion which is unsettling in certain circumstances.
Yet, I believe, this is exactly what the nationalists would feel comfortable in seeing our English, Welsh and Irish brothers and sisters become.
I sense a growing discord and division in the independence debate as those espousing Scotland’s separation from the United Kingdom become more shrill in their efforts to break up the union.
We shouldn’t be fooled by the carefully choreographed semantics used by them. For “Westminster” read “the English”, for a “fairer society” used regularly by the nationalists to describe a future Scotland, read “the rest of the UK is not capable of providing one, especially for Scots”.
This, of course, is despite the fact that the United Kingdom is home to the mother of all parliaments, abolished slavery, stood alone fighting the evil of fascism and created the NHS and welfare state.
To think that the union of nations in these islands will be any less energetic in its efforts to work for the benefit of all, regardless of where they live, is surely nonsense. Three hundred years of shared history proves beyond all doubt that we are greater than the sum of our parts.
This debate is about much more than dull economics and statistics. It’s about the very heartbeat of our union which has been resolutely tolerant, conciliatory and unifying for all its people.
I beseech fellow Scots to vote “no” in the referendum, so that we will never have to feel that our British brothers are foreigners and that they will never feel that of us. It does concern me greatly that this is what the threat of separation is leading to.
Iain G Richmond. Guildy House, Monikie.
Labour blew their chance
Sir, With the release of Labour’s new plans for devolution we now know two things: the Labour Party comes first, Scotland a poor second.
Here was Labour’s big opportunity to prove their pro-devolution credentials and make their mark in the referendum debate. By common consent they blew it, these devo plans have been universally derided as timid, unworkable and against the spirit of devolution.
In trying to appease Labour MPs at Westminster Johann Lamont’s devolution commission have effectively knocked Labour out of the referendum debate.
Labour politicians now cannot argue against independence whilst trying to defend their plans on devolution. That was clearly demonstrated in a TV interview when Johann Lamont, embarrassingly, could not even explain the convoluted tax system in her own commission’s report.
The field is now being cleared in the referendum debate, the Lib-Dem’s devolution proposals are unrealistic, Labour’s laughable. That leaves only the SNP’s white paper and Tory promises.
It is now up to David Cameron and George Osborne to save the union, and given Scottish hostility towards the Tory Party and memories of 1979 that is a very precarious position for the “No” campaign to be in.
Malcolm McCandless. 40 Muirfield Crescent, Dundee.
Wrong call by Brian Cox
Sir, I admire Brian Cox as an actor and fellow Scot and don’t doubt his love of Scotland. However, his call for emigrant Americans to support the “Yes” campaign is clearly based on cultural and historical memories and not current realism.
The “big campaign” he describes is not in the USA but within our own shores and probably Americans would naturally tend towards independence based on their own history.
Modern Scots who will vote on September 18 are not faced with Brian’s scenario of “pogroms, clearances and famine” nor do they need to feel “inferiority or to tug our forelocks” to any nation.
Instead of urging support from America, I would urge the vast numbers of Scots resident in the United Kingdom to voice their support for their native land to remain within the strong, free, vigorous and culturally successful United Kingdom that the past 300 years of history has achieved.
Angus Brown. The Orchard, Longforgan, Dundee.
Were Scots consulted?
Sir, I have a question for Johann Lamont and I challenge her to answer it: regardless of the referendum or future elections, will she pledge to return to Scotland the 6,000 square miles of Scottish territorial waters, rich in oil, gas and fishing stocks, stretching from Berwick to Carnoustie, generously transferred to England by her party?
One wonders why no explanation has ever been forthcoming for an unprecedented, and presumably illegal annexation, shrouded in secrecy for a decade and a half. Were Scots even consulted?
James Stevenson. 5 Drummond Avenue, Auchterarder.
Yes, they’re still in charge . . .
Sir, On reading and digesting Paul Reoch’s report of the “Stunning vision for the future of Bridgend” (Courier, March 18) with yet another footbridge, floating pontoons, houses on stilts and a waterfront music venue, I realised that a well-known old saying was still alive and well: the lunatics are (still) running the asylum.
J Alexander. 2 Stormont Way, Scone, Perth.