Invest in education for more fairness

At a time when their lives should be enriched by employment and the prospect of a secure family life, hope has obviously been replaced by jobless despair.

With the SNP government focusing mainly on the independence referendum and colleges having insufficient training places, it seems  that the young people’s  prospects will not improve for some time, particularly since there are plans to cut college funding.

Perhaps the government should reduce the millions it spends on “spin-doctors” and channel more money into training and job creation so that the younger generation can be given hope.

Quality of life for the young is surely more important than image.

Bob MacDougall

Kippen

Stirlingshire

It is very sad that educated people like Dr Mary Brown and Dr Paul Beswick appear to be oblivious to the fact that it is the policies of the left that tend to create greater inequality (Letters, 1 and 2 January).

The current policy of  effectively unrestricted immigration tends to depress the wages and curtail the  opportunities of British and already settled unskilled  labour.

The ideological destruction of selective education denies opportunity to a great many working-class children.

Indeed, the left have had control of every aspect of our education system for nearly 50 years, and they can’t even ensure that children leave school functionally literate.

It is no secret that progressives have created a vast, complicated and perverse welfare system, which traps millions in permanent dependency on the state.

It is not merely counterproductive but actively immoral that people are penalised for doing the right thing, whether that is  marrying or taking low-paid employment.

The evidence shows that if we genuinely want a more equal nation then we should adopt policies that put freedom, free enterprise and prosperity before those that ostentatiously, but falsely, claim to advance equality.

Otto Inglis

Inveralmond Grove

Edinburgh

In response to Dr Paul Beswick, poverty is not the same as inequality and there is no rational basis for saying that inequality is bad. In fact, this idea is Marxist in origin.

Naming Keith Joseph and the Economist as stating the evils of inequality is simply to commit the logical fallacy of argument from authority.

As it is, the measures of tax and spend and redistribution of wealth advocated as a cure for inequality will simply strangle an already stagnant economy and lead to even more widespread poverty.

Bruce Crichton

Victoria Road

Falkirk