Make sure all adults in Scotland can vote

It was widely believed, and so reported in the press, that everyone resident in Scotland who was of voting age could vote in the independence ­referendum.

This, of course, was not 
the case.

A large number of people were not permitted to vote, although they were taxpayers, and often resident in Scotland for a great many years and substantial contributors to the economic and cultural life of the ­country.

The vote in the independence referendum was restricted to British citizens and citizens of the Republic of Ireland, the Commonwealth countries (53 in number) and of the countries of the European Union (27 in addition to the UK), and members of the armed services.

There was no requirement regarding length of residence so that anyone from an EU country, for example, who could provide an address in order to register to vote was able to cast a ballot on 18 September.

At the same time, those who had already lived here for years, some even over half a century, and were committed to remaining in Scotland, had no voice. Alex Salmond used to ­declare that all residents in an independent Scotland would have the right to vote.

Our submission to the Smith Commission has called for this to be case in future elections north of the Border – and, of course, in any referendum.

The outcome, as a result, might be very different.

Virginia Wills

Sheriffmuir

Perthshire

The motivation of those who voted against a separated Scotland was the preservation of the United Kingdom, plus a good dose of common sense.

Many of those talked into the idea of a separate Scotland by the SNP probably did not realise the extent of the ­powers already handed to the Scottish Parliament in 1999.

These include agriculture, fisheries, education, environment, health, social services, housing, law and order, tourism, economic development, local government, sport, arts and transport.

But these very things were constantly promoted by the Yes campaign as areas where Westminster was somehow holding Scotland back, when the reality is that they have been serially mismanaged since 1999 by 129 MSPs of a mainly left-wing tendency .

To add taxation to that list as Andrew Gray (Letters, 4 November) rightly says, would be a huge mistake. They are just not up to it.

Malcolm Parkin

Gamekeepers Road

Kinnesswood, Kinross

Walter Allen and Andrew Gray (Letters, 3 and 4 November respectively) clearly voted No based on their own firmly held beliefs, which I entirely respect.

In claiming that there is little mandate for further powers because they did not need “the vow” to persuade them to vote No, however, both seem to miss a simple point of ­arithmetic.

No-one is claiming that
everyone who voted No did so solely because of “the vow” and similar last-minute promises of substantial new powers.

But some did, including several of my own friends who swithered until the last few days.

Given the closeness of the result, if just one in every 18 voters was persuaded to vote No rather than Yes by these last-minute promises, it was enough to switch the outcome from Yes to No.

I have some sympathy with those who would have preferred the chance to vote 
for the status quo, but that 
option was effectively removed from the ballot paper by the No campaign’s late, 
desperate pledges.

Those who feel misrepresented should take that up with Messrs Darling, Brown, Cameron, Clegg and Miliband. It is therefore entirely appropriate that these home rule promises are now honoured in full.

C Hegarty

Glenorchy Road

North Berwick

Now that the dust has well and truly settled after the referendum, it would be ­reassuring to believe that the SNP is now concentrating on looking after the country as a whole. The situation does not appear to be so.

Although, as Allan Massie and others have pointed out, the Yes vote was defeated in 28 out of Scotland’s 32 local authorities, in many of them heavily, by a margin of two to one in some cases, the SNP continue to “strut their stuff” as though on the winning side and show themselves to be driven by exactly the same idée fixe as before, refusing to accept the “sovereign will of the people” and using the same sort of language and showing the same sort of attitudes as before.

This is all in spite of the fact that Alex Salmond promised that the referendum result would be binding for both sides. This is the stuff of totalitarianism, not democracy.

You can bet your life that there would be plenty of shouting going on if the ­unionists were making noises about another vote.

What do we make, then, of Alex Salmond, if we are to believe it, seeking a seat at Westminster, among the very politicians he wished to have nothing to do with?

I quote his words of two years ago when the referendum campaign began: “The days of Westminster telling Scotland what to do are long past.”

Perhaps he intends to do the same within the hallowed precincts of the House of ­Commons.

M D Taylor

Ettrick Terrace

Selkirk