Readers' letters: Brexit could turn out to be making of the EU

When considering Brexit, we must study the profound effect it had on the European Union. It scared the pants off the Commission and sundry presidents, who naturally feared that the contagion might spread. If France or Germany had a similar referendum result the EU would be toast.

In response they have paused their progress towards a United States of Europe. There’s no current talk of a European army, despite the conflict in Ukraine. Nor unified taxation or any major further integration on the immediate horizon.

I’m all in favour of a democratic United States of Europe where we elect our president (with “anti-Trump” safeguards), but I cannot support the EU as it currently stands. The EU needs major democratic reform, which must be the non-negotiable condition of our return.

So Brexit – followed by us rejoining a grassroots, democratic EU – may turn out to be a good thing after all.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen holds a press conference during a European Union summit, at the EU headquarters in Brussels last month

​Barry Tighe, Woodford Green, Waltham Forest

No conversions

Faith groups who oppose the ban on conversion therapy need to be sure that their argument holds water. Prof David Galloway of the Lennox Evangelical Church in Dumbarton claims that we should live in the way Christ taught us (Scotsman, 3 April).

In fact there is no Gospel record of Jesus giving advice on sexuality, except to say that the resurrected are sexless like angels (Mk. 12:25). His only injunction on behaviour was to love God and obey his commandments. Of the Ten Commandments only one deals with marriage in so far as it prohibits adultery.

One needs to consider that these commandments derive from a primitive Jewish society which was ignorant of the sexual variations now known to us. Modern Christians seem to forget this and that Jesus, as a Jew, was giving advice only to his fellow Jews.

They should also consider Jesus’ own sexuality. In his Gospel, John makes it clear that Jesus loved him. Five times, in his Gospel, he refers to the disciple “whom Jesus loved” (himself). Jesus allowed John, the youngest disciple, to rest his head on Jesus at meal times and we do not know if there was further intimacy. As Jesus himself exhibited a homosexual tendency, Christians should be wary of condemning it and should welcome a ban on conversion therapy.

Steuart Campbell, Edinburgh

Apply the brakes

Parisians have voted overwhelmingly to ban more than 15,000 rental e-scooters from central Paris at the end of August (Scotsman, 4 April). It is thought that other towns and cities will follow.

So why is the UK Government still persisting in continuing with the e-scooter trial in England until May 2024 when there have been 17 fatalities and 1,437 injuries, some serious, in the year to June 2022 up from the year before of 1,033. It is safe to say that since they appeared, mostly illegally on our roads, pavements and shopping malls, the injury count must be well over 4,000.

There are more than 750,000 privately owned e-scooters being used illegally. E-scooters have been linked to crimes and perpetrators can speed off very quickly and avoid arrest. London transport has banned e-scooters from trains and buses due to the risk of the lithium batteries going on fire.

There are no e-scooter trials in Scotland so why is Police Scotland not arresting the riders of these illegal e-scooters, fining them, confiscating the e-scooters and putting six penalty points on driving licences?

Clark Cross, Linlithgow, West Lothian

Potholes plea

Scotland’s roads have “more holes than Swiss cheese”, says Lib Dem communities spokesman Willie Rennie (Scotsman, 4 April).

Why do politicians and others always talk of the need to repair potholes, but never demand from our road engineers a credible explanation as to why the original road surfaces are clearly far less fit for purpose and so much worse in terms of effective lifespans than in other countries with similar climates, weather, traffic levels and types of vehicles?

John Birkett, St Andrews, Fife

Big fish

Once again we see the separatist nonsense of a “democratic deficit” in Scotland being declared, this time by Dr Docherty of Melrose (Letters, 4 April).

There is no such thing. The SNP, like any other political party, is free to take the democratic route to achieve their aims by contesting every parliamentary seat in the UK. Of course they won’t do that. They much prefer to stay a regional party, jumping up and down behind Hadrians Wall while girning and shouting, “Look at me! Look at me!”

The leaders of the SNP are wedded to being big fish in a small pond, I think, for fear of exposure as incompetents under a more intense scrutiny.

Bill Cooper, Kinross, Perth & Kinross

Ports in a storm

There has been pushback from unionists denying Scotland is a de facto colony of England.

The history of Scottish ports illustrates our colonial status. Ports used to be owned by the Burghs (local councils) who owned thousands of hectares of prime waterfront land. Ports once supported the entire economy, creating much of the wealth of the town and sustaining the local population. They raised substantial revenues from local taxes on goods and ships, enabling the Burghs to re-invest in new port infrastructure.

In the 1960s, the UK Government transferred port ownership from councils to private trusts which operated in the vested interests of the trustees, not the community.

In 1991, the UK Government allowed the trusts to sell the ports to private companies. Half the revenue went to the UK and half to the trust owners. Burghs received nothing. The owners then sold the ports to private equity firms at inflated prices.

The private equity model doesn’t allow for investment in new infrastructure because the ports are bought in leveraged transactions with debt. Port profits are then used to pay the interest on this debt.

A colonial territory has no control over its land or people because colonialism is about economic exploitation involving external political control. Scotland is run by Westminster where our MPs are outnumbered ten to one. Without a Scottish veto over English decisions, there is no Union.

Today, none of the major sectors of the Scottish economy are Scottish-owned, not even renewables. The Scottish people have received very little from the mass sell-off of their assets.

Colonialism results in an under-developed nation where people lack opportunity. To eradicate poverty and restore prosperity for all Scots, we must stop the plunder by returning Scotland’s wealth to the Scottish people.

Leah Gunn Barrett, Edinburgh

Vote for change

You can vote Conservative, Labour, even Lib Dem and stand a chance of getting the government you vote for in an independent Scotland.

All you have to do is join the majority who will vote for independence and a return to the EU. Then you have a better chance of getting the government that you want than you do if you are voting against the rest of the UK as you do at present.

You will even have a better chance of getting across the Channel for your skiing trip or summer holiday. Have you seen the queues at Dover (Scotsman, 4 April)?

Elizabeth Scott, Edinburgh

Thriving nations

Martin O’Gorman misses the point when he trashes Scotland’s nearest independent nations (Letters, 4 April). Despite most of them having fewer natural resources, all of these countries thrive when compared to Scotland in a failing Union, and crucially their citizens get the government the majority of voters choose.

Inequality in Ireland has fallen over the past 25 years with fewer in the lowest ten per cent cohort in poverty when compared to UK equivalents.

The Irish economy is booming with the population growing to above five million mainly due to highly skilled and highly paid migrants. Last year, foreign direct investment (FDI) increased by €109bn to €1,208bn. Around 257,000 people are directly employed by FDI firms in Ireland and around 30 per cent of higher-education students in Ireland are studying STEM courses, which is a massive attraction for foreign companies.

Scotland remains the second-top destination in the UK for FDI, behind only London. Scotland achieved a 14 per cent rise in the number of inward investment projects secured in 2021, to 122. This put a 1.8 per cent increase for the UK as a whole in the shade.

The IFS report was obviously printed prior to OPEC announcing another cut in oil and gas produced which saw Brent Crude rise to $80 and Scotland’s North Sea production expected to last for at least another 30 years. The amount of renewable electricity generated in Scotland in 2022 is the equivalent of powering all households in Scotland for around three and half years. Scotland’s net exports of electricity in 2022 were 18.7 TWh, a 17 per cent increase compared to 2021 with an estimated wholesale market value of £4 billion which is never reflected in GERS or IFS reports.

Mary Thomas, Edinburgh

Energy bills

The key factor missing from the letter by Tim Flinn on ditching fossil fuels (Letters, 4 April) is the data that electricity is four times more expensive than gas, hence energy bills will return to the current levels that has resulted in the cost-of-living crisis once fossil fuels are banned by Holyrood.

In addition, Mr Flinn makes no reference to the cost of the hydrogen-fuelled back-up system required to keep the lights on as windmills are unreliable should the wind fail to blow!

Ian Moir, Castle Douglas, Dumfries & Galloway

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