Letter: An ill-wind blows?

Sadly, we have become inured to gesture politics in the glove- puppet show of Scottish politics, but with recent revelations over the Climate Change Bill its £8 billion cost and its impact on other government programmes, we have now entered the era of futile gesture politics.

At the tactical level, we now know, from sources such as the Neta website (www.bm reports.com/bsp/bsp_home.htm) that current renewables - especially wind, pump storage and hydro - offer no viable alternative to fossil fuels and that an expansion of wind and tidal power will be a waste of time, financial resources and treasured marine and terrestrial environments.

The Climate Change Bill is a gross strategic failure in judgment and a potential death blow to the revival of the Scottish economy. With only one-fifth of 1 per cent of the world's carbon emissions originating in Scotland, it was a disgraceful indulgence by our political class and NGOs.

Our health and education services are at risk, hundreds of thousands of Scots are "drowning" in a sea of poverty, ill health and unemployment. The Climate Change Bill is the equivalent of throwing a drowning man an anchor.

RON GREER

Armoury House

Blair Atholl, Perthshire