Sir, I refer to your article, Concern over city policing, (August 12), and the comments made by Councillor Heather Stewart relating to the lack of policing in Perth and the use of officers from the Glasgow area in Dundee.
For 38 years Tayside Police managed to provide the necessary officers to police the region, only having to invoke what was then called “mutual aid” from neighbouring regions when dealing with major events such as summit conferences etc.
Yet, just four months into the great Police Scotland experiment, we see officers from what was Strathclyde Police being used on the streets of Dundee. Why?
No doubt considerable expense would be incurred in using officers from so far away, which will be repeated on any subsequent court cases arising from their duties on this side of the country.
In the formation of Police Scotland, the Government and senior police officers championed the change, citing the centralisation of various administration departments, which would in turn free up officers from “back room” duties, making them available for deployment on street duties.
So why do Police Scotland feel the need to use officers from around 80 miles away on normal policing matters, when no such use was necessary in the previous 38 years?
Why are residents and businesses in the Perth area left feeling that their calls to Police Scotland are going unanswered. Why, when the Government and senior officers assured the public that the creation of a single force would see an increase in officers on street duties, are the previous two questions even necessary?
One can only surmise that either some folk were being economical with the truth on the setting up of Police Scotland, or that Tayside Division is seriously failing to manage the resources available to it.
Stewart Pearson. Perth.
Weary of City Hall saga
Sir, Regarding the excellent idea of a public meeting to debate the future of Perth City Hall, and the comments by, particularly, Mr Linacre.
He mustn’t be allowed to exaggerate in the way he does, unchallenged, any more. For instance, I would not qualify the area he had at Perth Show as a “stand” apart from the fact that you indeed had to stand. Busy it was not; anytime! I was in the vicinity. Hundreds of visitors?
Does he also exaggerate the potential of his proposed City Hall project?
He also, tellingly, says that to turn the area into a building site would destroy the area as a shopping and tourist destination. That is exactly what he is proposing to do. Presumably he meant to say a demolition site?
However, his proposals for the hall require extensive internal and external demolition and rebuilding. Whichever solution is decided on, the building will be barricaded off for the duration.
Which would be quickest, renovation or demolition? Perhaps Mr Linacre would care to say? He needs to step up to the mark pretty soon. Everybody is indeed weary of the City Hall saga.
Alistair Clark. Cruities Nook, Rait, Perth.
Cannot hide the facts
Sir, Juggle the figures from the Office of National Statistics as they may, the liberal commentators on the recently issued demographics, reported by you, cannot hide the fact that the major cause of the record-breaking British population increase is not by reason of our longevity but the unstoppable flow of immigration to London and other urban centres.
Our future obviously lies in the birth rate: forget the non-breeding groups. Of the 813,000 births in the UK till June 2012, causing as it did, a rise of 7% in toto, 1/4 of the surge was in London. While a discreet curtain is studiously drawn over ethnic roots there is no doubt that the majority of the 203,000 new entrants to the British scene was immigrant.
Embarrassing analyses of the respective breeding rates of immigrants and indigenes are avoided at all costs by the Establishment. The reason is not far to seek. What price then their overworked claims to “transparency”?
The latest figures show that Britain is becoming more rapidly than was warned by the realists what the liberal commentators delight in calling us, a mongrel nation.
Alastair Harper. House of Gask, Lathalmond, Dunfermline.
Grid back-up is diesel power
Sir, This Government, especially Holyrood, seem unable to say “sorry we got it wrong about wind turbines”. Our national grid is “balanced” with standby gas and coal-fired power plants in order to keep the lights on yet the National Grid is planning to hook up thousands of diesel generators (which generate almost as much CO2 as the coal-fired plants which are being forced to close) to provide back-up at a cost of £1 billion every year.
Private firms are offering to build standby diesel power stations since they can expect to be paid up to £47,000 a year in “availability payments” for each MW of capacity. They will then be paid up to 12 times the going rate for generating electricity. Consumers will pay through their bills.
Clark Cross. 138 Springfield Road, Linlithgow.