Percentage point

IN HER weekly propaganda piece (Perspective, 6 September) Joan McAlpine states that a recently published opinion poll showed a majority of Scots in favour of independence.

The only poll I can see indicates that 39 per cent of those polled agree that there should be negotiations on independence. In the first place, it may be that some of these respondents may wish negotiations to take place in order that uncertainty may be removed with the defeat of the independence lobby, but even if that is not the case, only in the wacky world of SNP arithmetic could 39 per cent be described as a majority.

I suppose we should not be surprised as the votes of less than 25 per cent of the electorate are routinely described as an overwhelming majority. Incidentally, in the same poll, the unionist position seems to have attracted 38 per cent, in Ms McAlpine’s phrase a “crushing embarrassment”.

Ian Lewis

Mayfield Terrace

Edinburgh