Perhaps she should read the guidance for the Senior Phase of The Curriculum for Excellence which states: “It is designed to provide the breadth and depth of education to develop flexible and adaptable young people with the knowledge and skills they will need to thrive now and in the future. It aims to support young people in achieving and attaining the best they possibly can.”

Nowhere does it say this only applies to students from deprived areas. Part of thriving in the future must surely mean all students getting into a top university if they have worked hard to achieve the best grades.

Students from deprived areas should be getting places at Edinburgh University alongside students from every level of Scottish society. The problem is the number of places allocated to foreign students for the fees they pay. Why are we so proud of the fact that university education in Scotland is free if it means that many of our children cannot attend a Scottish University? These bright youngsters will go to England for their education and probably stay there. Why would they return to a country which wouldn’t let them finish their education?

The University of Edinburgh is at the centre of the row over places for Scottish students

Surely it’s time to review how university places are funded. Deprived students should have their fees paid, but surely it’s time to admit that we cannot afford to pay for the education of all students.

Catherine Baxter, Dunblane, Stirling

Foreign students

Nicola Sturgeon states (Scotsman, January 13) that it is “good news” more deprived students are going to university as a result of what is claimed to be positive discrimination. Students with outstanding qualifications may well agree but perhaps not if they themselves are excluded in favour of students with poorer results simply because of where they live or what school they attended.

Excluding applicants domiciled in Scotland in favour of other Scottish students is at least a debatable position. What is not acceptable is excluding Scottish students from whatever background in favour of wealthy foreign students.

Taxpayers’ money is awarded to universities to fund places for Scottish students and obviously the sum is limited. The result is a cap on the number of Scottish students who can be accepted. It is disgraceful that Edinburgh and St Andrews are so dependent on foreign students who can pay £24,500 a year that their total of Scottish undergraduates constitutes a mere 30 per cent! This doesn't seem to accord with the SNP mantra that education is based on the ability to learn not to pay.

Colin Hamilton. Edinburgh

Privileged pupils

Not one of the four letter-writers of 14 January who criticised the current University of Edinburgh admissions process chose to address the core issue of whether it would be morally justifiable to return to a process that essentially favoured those with parents able and willing to pay for private schooling over those who have not had that apparent academic advantage.

Some parents may be able to pay for private schooling but choose not to because they consider that while learning alongside students of a diverse range of abilities and attitudes presents challenges, confronting such challenges helps their children prepare better for life and a constructive role in a society.

Whichever education path a student follows, in an enlightened world universities should devise processes that seek to admit students on the basis of overall merit and the likelihood of succeeding both in obtaining suitable degrees and in progressing their career potentials. While Ken Currie complains about perceived “discrimination” he appears willing to return to a process that discriminated against poor or less-privileged students who perhaps had the talents or abilities to enjoy more success in their preferred careers than those seemingly academically benefitting from private schooling.

There is no doubt that the admissions processes at our universities could be further refined, but to return to the “dark days” when often genuine potential was effectively sacrificed on the altar of wealth and personal influence would be a retrograde step, not just for many less fortunate but aspiring and well-rounded individuals, but for our society in general.

It is understandable that those parents who send their children to private schools on the expectation that they would be admitted to their chosen university at which they felt entitled to a place, but perhaps their efforts should then be focused on helping their children to be successful in careers consistent with their objectively-assessed talents and potentials.

Stan Grodynski, Longniddry, East Lothian

Police crisis

It's a matter of concern that for a period of seven months last year a quarter of non-emergency calls to Police Scotland went unanswered. Together with earlier problems about police call centres making mistakes in dealing with 999 calls, it shows that yet another of our public services is failing to provide an acceptable level of service to people who are needing their help.

It’s interesting that the Scottish Government’s response should be to advise callers to use other ways to contact Police Scotland. With police stations being shut and officers non-existent on the streets, perhaps carrier pigeons stand the best chance of getting messages through!

Bob MacDougall, Kippen, Stirling

Teachers’ pay

With the news (Scotsman, 14 January) that children across Scotland are set to miss more days of school, I’d like make a suggestion to the teaching union.

I understand the desire for an inflation-matching pay rise. Perhaps in a bid to achieve that, teachers could offer to give up some of their very generous holiday entitlement? Most public and private sector workers get between four and six weeks on average. Teachers, on the other hand, enjoy significantly more. A reduction in holiday entitlement to reduce it closer that offered to other workers would be a fair swap in exchange for the ten per cent pay increase funded by taxpayers?

J Lewis, Edinburgh

Losers’ consent

SNP MP Stewart McDonald, suggests that the divisiveness his party inflicts on us is all part of normal democracy (“Let’s embrace ‘losers’ consent’ idea”, Scotsman, 14 January). Fortunately for Scotland, many do not accept that trying to turn people against each other is in anyway positive or normal. Aiming to break up the UK through a narrative of grudge and grievance against those who for many of us are family, friends and fellow citizens, does not feel like a particularly healthy version of democracy.

As for talk of “losers’ consent”, it is hard to take that very seriously when so many in the SNP, from its leaders through to its grassroots activists, have so blatantly ignored the democratic will of the majority who did not agree with them in 2014. What hope for those who prefer remaining in the UK if we should ever find ourselves in a minority in some future count of opinion, no matter how finely balanced such a result might be?

The overwhelming impression of Nicola Sturgeon and her Scottish Government is that those who do not agree with them simply do not matter. Are we really to believe that those who were the opposite of magnanimous in defeat, would be so different if they were ever to get their way?

Keith Howell, West Linton, Scottish Borders

Covid tactics

The Government’s policy of living with Covid needed to change over a month ago when cases started surging and hospitalisations rocketed.Three simple steps were required.

Firstly, the UK Government should have closed its borders to those testing positive for Covid from countries with high levels of accelerating infection like China and the US in late November when infections from virulent Omicron variants like XBB.1.1.5 and BF.7 took hold. Lessons have not been learned from 2021 when the UK let the Delta variant in from India.

Secondly, the Scottish Government should have continued the autumn Covid and flu vaccination programme to the whole population and started again on the most vulnerable given protection wanes after about 12 weeks. The latest variants would have been checked.

Thirdly, the Government needed to level with groups more susceptible to infection. Public Health Scotland data shows that in absolute terms Omicron has consistently infected women aged 20-64 more than any other age groups. The Government was warned about this in an Omicron evidence paper commissioned over a year ago. Moreover, the infection rate per 100,000 remains several times higher for over-75s than young age groups.

Given this knowledge, it would be sensible to communicate that the elderly and women are more susceptible to Omicron so that they can decide to take more precautions like distancing and avoiding crowded spaces.

Neil Anderson, Edinburgh

Bus lanes

It wasn't that long ago that Edinburgh made most of its bus lanes effective in weekday rush-hours only. Now they are proposing to make them all 7am-7pm seven days a week.

As both a driver and a bus-user I see this as pointless and a retrograde step. I have never seen a bus being held up outwith rush hours at a set of lights due to congestion in the preceding bus lane. What’s changed since the first decision?

William Hamilton, Edinburgh

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Readers' Letters: It's time to review the funding of university places

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