Letter: Poor candidates

Frankly, I am more concerned by the poor quality of the candidates proposed by Labour for convenorships of Holyrood committees than I am by the risk that the nine very independent-minded and experienced SNP convenors appointed will not be able and willing to set aside their partisan allegiances as and when required and take an independent view (your report, 2 June).

The decision made by Iain Gray to nominate Labour's Duncan McNeil instead of Malcolm Chisholm as chairman of the health committee appears depressingly partisan - even before attention reverts to Duncan McNeil's views in an earlier parliament on the subject of adding contraceptives to the methadone of those in receipt of assistance from the NHS in Scotland in weaning them off heroin.

I do not regard Labour's Dave Stewart MSP as a fit candidate to be in charge of the Holyrood petitions committee after his disgraceful and mercifully brief stint as convenor of the cross-party committee on international development, during which this Labour whip tried to exclude participants who disagreed with him.

Abuse of the role of finance committee convenor by Wendy Alexander in the last parliament was similarly quite disgraceful.

Neil Robertson

Glamis Terrace

Dundee