Fluid policy

It would seem that Colin Hamilton, with his quip about the hokey cokey (Letters, 18 December), thinks political parties are not allowed to change policies.

The decision to seek membership of Nato for an independent Scotland was debated at an SNP conference, voted on and democratically accepted.

Those who did not agree were free to leave and a number of MSPs have done that. That’s how democracy works, Mr Hamilton.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

For his information, Scottish Labour’s new leader Jim Murphy studied for nine years on student grants, gained no degree and then supported the introduction of tuition fees.

Murphy backed the welfare cap and failed to turn up for the vote on the bedroom tax.

He backs Labour’s continued austerity drive, but wants Scotland to be the “fairest country on the planet”.

He backed two illegal foreign wars and believes we should waste another £100 billion on Trident.

However, such is the fear of the SNP from the unionists that we now have standard bearers such as Colin Hamilton desperately trying to turn a flip flop dissembler of a politician into a saviour, describing him as “impressive”.

It’s as laughable as the plans for tactical voting being presented by columnists such as Brian Monteith and Allan Massie, who are happy to urge the supporters of the Conservatives and 
Liberal Democrats to abandon their principles and vote for 
Labour.

Roger Cartwright (Letters, same day) is worried about the erosion of democracy and simply cannot bear that so many people have seen fit to celebrate it by joining the SNP.

Yes, Thursday was an excellent day for the demonstration of naked fear with a procession of diatribes aimed against the 
“losers” of the referendum.

Douglas Turner

Derby Street

Edinburgh