Sir, – Travelling along Forfar Road, Dundee, northwards from the city today, we arrived at the Forfar Road lights, stopped at the traffic lights and waited for them to turn green so we could make a right turn and head along Kingsway towards Pitkerro Road.
Two cars had come up Forfar Road and had turned left, stopping at the first set of lights.
However, when our set of lights turned green, these other cars also moved off. The drivers had incorrectly looked at the wrong lights, that is, the set of lights meant for those cars travelling along the Kingsway and who had come downForfar Road and had turned right.
The set of lights pertaining to the cars coming up Forfar Road and who had turned right were at red.
This is a very common occurrence here and as we use this road frequently, I would say it happens on average two or three times a week. This is no exaggeration.
How many other cases of similar happenings must there be?
Jumping a red light can have very serious consequences but the thing which is very worrying is that these drivers seem oblivious to the fact that they have done anything wrong.
A police presence or some cameras positioned appropriately is most definitely needed here before an accident, serious or otherwise, occurs.
Tom McDonald. Durham Drive, Monifieth.
Problems of equality
Sir, – The principle of equal pay for equal work rests on cast-iron logic.
The new Women’s Equality Party’s case for equal parliamentary representation, however, is the flimsiest of fallacies.
It is also self-defeating, introducing a limit on their presence which does not currently exist.
A healthy democracy demands universal right to seek election, along with the right of electors to the widest possible choice of candidates.
Limiting either men or women to 50% is pure nonsense.
Presumably, the 50-50 arrangement would apply also to internal subdivisions, such as the cabinet and all parliamentary committees.
Would the Speaker be obliged to call male and female members to speak in sequence?
Organising this system would be a logistical nightmare. The first requirement would be an equal number of constituencies, followed by the not insignificant question of who decides, and on what basis, which of these would be reserved for each to contest.
Women already have parliamentary equality at the only point where it is relevant; in seeking selection as candidates.
Any unfairness at that level would be properly taken up with the party involved.
It is also worth pointing out that male/female is not the only subdivision in our multicultural society. Asians, for instance, might feel neglected if representation is to be regarded from the point of view of societal grouping.
I have no objection in principle to either all male or all female parliaments: the important factor is that the make-up of our parliament must result from freedom, not restriction.
Robert Dow. Ormiston Road, Tranent.
Festival of Remembrance
Sir, – May I pleasecommend to your readers the Royal British Legion Scotland (Angus and Perthshire Area) Festival of Remembrance.
The event is in the Caird Hall, Dundee, tomorrow, at 7.15 pm (doors open 6.30 pm) and features music from the pipes and drums of the 3rd Battalion, The Royal Regiment of Scotland better known in these parts as The Black Watch, of course and the legion’s Central Band, plus the Northern Area Band of the Sea Cadets.
Festival organisers are expecting no fewer than 35 participants in the parade of standardsand the muster willfeature regular and reserve forces, cadets, emergency services and veterans’ representatives.
Billy Naismith from Kirkcaldy will lead the community singing and William MacSween, head boy of Breadalbane Academy in Aberfeldy, will present a tribute to the soldiers of the Burma Campaign, before the ecumenical act of remembrance.
Tickets for the event are £5 from Dundee City Box Office.
As always, the festival is in support of Poppyscotland, or as older readers knew it, the Earl Haig Fund.
Alasdair Maclean. Colonel (Retired), Publicity Team, Festival of Remembrance.
Fed up with Jenny Hjul
Sir, – Every Wednesday on my way to the newsagents, I play a game with myself.
I think back over the past few days of all the big political stories and try to decide which one Jenny Hjul will choose to pass her opinion on. And every week I’m wrong. It is her hatred for the SNP that wins out.
Tony Blair apologising for the Iraq war? House of Lords voting against tax credit cuts?
No. It is always her hatred for the SNP.
I think I might play a different game next Wednesday. Maybe Ms Hjul should do the same.
Brian Petrie. 63 Arbroath Road, Carnoustie.
No apology to nuclear victims
Sir, – I notice the Rev Dr John Cameron (October 28) stated that Tony Blair had apologised for : “every historic British sin from the slave trade to the Irish potato famine and the Guildford Four”.
This is untrue.
No British Prime Minister, has apologised for using service personnel as laboratory rats during the British nuclear tests in the 1950s.
The cowardly way in which young, naive men were sent into areas of high radiation without any protective clothing was reminiscent of Hitler’s Germany.
Their radiation film badges, radiation meter readings and blood counts are either listed as “not returned” or “cannot be found”.
Even hospital records regarding ailments suffered after the eventcannot be found.
Now these men are being denied cytogenetic blood testing and specialised x-rays to determine the level of toxic chemicals in their bones, as well as Legal Aid to fight their cases in court.
Dave Whyte. 73 Blackcraigs, Kirkcaldy.
Security of UK union
Sir, – I refer to the letter of Harry Key (October 27) in which we see the all-too-common rant about the state of the union.
What he fails to consider, or mention, is the degree to which the facts of which he complains are a consequence of UK membership of the WTO and the EU which disallows the sort of protectionism of trade that Mr Key seems to be advocating, while forgetting that secession from the UK would require an independent Scotland to, at the very least, apply to become a member of the Eurozone.
How precisely that would improve the quality of life for either industry or private individuals is left entirely unspoken.
His letter is, therefore, just another “something must be done” complaint without the provision of any logical or well-made case for the betterment for which he yearns.
The fact of the matter is that Scotland and the UK have to live in a world of global economics and political power-broking in which Scotland, by itself, would be an even smaller and less significant presence on the world stage than is the UK presently.
Is he seriously asking us to believe that the SNP in Holyrood without any representation or respect in the wider world would fare better than the UK’s Westminster Government?
If Mr Key is advocating an era of protectionism of Scottish trade and jobs then it would mean isolation of Scotland from the rest of the world and the harsh reality of life that would measure the value of Scottish produce for export against price and quality competition from countries with far lower labour costs and tax regimes than our own.
The only way to overcome such issues is by inventive forms of government subsidy that the SNP in Holyrood could not afford.
As a case in point, the work given to Scottish shipyards by the MoD could more cheaply have been carried out in yards outside of Scotland.
Small independent economies have a much harder path to tread in our present world, than larger units and many examples abound.
The world at large would not save an independent Scotland from social and economic disasters.
But the close ties within the UK union would.
Derek Farmer. Knightsward Farm, Anstruther.
Stop assault on nation’s poor
Sir, – I am disgusted and outraged by Iain Duncan Smith’shypocritical and patronising idea to have job advisers in foodbanks and I would urge the Trussell Trust to have nothing to do with it whatsoever.
The need for foodbanks has arisen outof the tyrannical approach by Mr Duncan Smith to welfare reform and his measures have even driven people to suicide.
Foodbanks are non-judgmental, caring and accepting places and I doubt that this ethos would remain in place should the Government get involved.
What is rather ironic about this suggestion is that many referrals to foodbanks come from Job Centres themselves.
What really concerns me is that if job advisers are on the premises it may frighten people off using them who desperately need them.
Instead of offering to have job advisers, why doesn’t the Government give money to foodbanks, after all they are largely responsible for creating the problem in the first place.
Is there nothing that this man will not do to attack the poor in this country?
Shame on you Mr Duncan Smith.
Gordon Kennedy. 117 Simpson Square, Perth.