Readers Letters: Scotland should close borders to beat Covid

Lock down without lock out is only a half measure in controlling COVID 19

Is Scotland missing a trick by allowing travel into the country?

Over 100,000 coronavirus deaths have now been recorded. The UK has a death rate of 1471 per million of population. Only Belgium and Slovenia have higher rates and even the US with its much-criticised handling of the epidemic has a lower rate than the UK.

Regrettably the UK government’s approach to controlling the virus is not working and alternative or additional measures should be considered. UK governments have instituted measures to control the movement of people in the UK but have done little to control the entry of people into the UK, in fact some 4,000,000 people have entered the country from all corners of the world bringing the virus and its variants with them.

Incomers are requested to self-isolate but as far as I can ascertain no effort has been made to find out if they are doing so. The government's action can be compared to attempting to control the heating in the house and leaving all the windows and doors open.

Being an island nation, it is possible to close our borders as has been successfully done in Australia and New Zealand with the result that the total number of deaths in Australia and New Zealand is less than the daily number of deaths in the UK

The death rate per million of population in Australia is 1/40th that experienced in the UK.

These figures clearly demonstrate that we should now close our borders to control the virus.

(Dr) John Bennett, Mortonhall Road, Edinburgh

Well done Nicola

Peter Cheyne's comments (Letters, January 28) on Nicola Sturgeon's handling of the pandemic do not square with her own assessment. He blames the "holiday invasion that took place in Scotland" for the dramatic increase of the virus in the Autumn. Ms Sturgeon has admitted that amongst her mistakes she disregarded the warnings of medical advisers about the risks of foreign travel and did not do enough to prevent the virus entering the country.

When the First Minister is willing to admit her own mistakes I am not going to disagree with her. If she is to receive plaudits for doing a good job on the grounds that infection levels were driven down in the summer then she is surely open to criticism when levels increased dramatically in the autumn.

A massive factor in this has been the conduct of the people. The initial lockdown was adhered to fastidiously by the vast majority of people. But as the easing of restrictions gathered pace the evidence suggests that so did the public's increasing disregard for the rules.

The roll out of the vaccine is another matter. We need clarity on the figures for available vaccines and a road map for their distribution and injection. Current evidence suggest it is not going well.

Colin Hamilton, Braid Hills Avenue, Edinburgh

Relief for bees

Jennifer Rhind claims that the UK Environment Minister has given permission for limited use of a “class of systemic pesticides known as neonicotinoids, banned in the EU” and she fears for the health of our bee population (Letters, January 28).In fact, all George Eustice has done is agree to allow a product containing the neonicotinoid thiamethoxam to be used to treat sugar beet seed in an effort to protect the crop from a virus. Its use is authorised for only 120 days.

It is true that the use of thiamethoxam is banned in the EU but Ms Rhind is mistaken in claiming that it is not banned in the USA. In May 2019 the Environmental Protection Agency revoked approval for a dozen pesticides containing clothianidin and thiamethoxam as part of a legal settlement.

Because there are seven different neonicotinoids, Ms Rhind should not treat them as all the same, ignoring that fact that most are still banned in the UK. It may be that thiamethoxam is a danger to the bee population but it remains to be seen if the approval for its use on sugar beet seed will be extended.

As far as I can tell, sugar beet is not now grown in Scotland. The only Scottish sugar beet factory, in Cupar, closed in 1971. So it seems that Scottish bees are safe.Steuart Campbell, Dovecot Loan, Edinburgh

Corrosive beliefs

I feel genuinely sorry for Kenny MacAskill. Someone or something must have hurt him very deeply at one time for him to express such visceral rage at every turn. Clearly, he does not like the English one little bit and sees them as thoroughly malign.

Of course, there may be another explanation. Many people are aware of the instantly vanishing Road to the Scottish Parliament, a document which was an official SNP attempt to indoctrinate Scottish children with victimhood.

Indeed, it was so biased that historian Sir Tom Devine described it as "rotten". The aim of this document was to teach Scottish schoolchildren about the iniquities of the English. The document was a litany of ills visited upon Scotland and the Scots by the English, starting with Edward I.

So, when I read the bile that Mr MacAskill oozes about George Osborne's very pro-Scots comments, I am worried that his views now seem to be mainstream for Scottish nationalists, whose beliefs appear to me to be becoming extremely corrosive.

Peter Hopkins, Morningside Road, Edinburgh

Scexit stupidity

I have heard many nationalists try to win arguments over independence by justifying it as morally equivalent to Brexit – if you supported the UK leaving the EU, you cannot object to Scotland leaving the UK.

This is a strange argument to make. Aside from economic questions – if you oppose Brexit for raising damaging trade barriers, promoting “Scexit” when Scotland exports more than three times the amount to the rest of the UK than it does the whole EU is very much cutting off your nose to spite your face – comparing Scottish independence to Brexit is a false equivalence.

For good or ill, Brexiteers were at least consistent in their desire for the United Kingdom to have sovereignty where law is not decided overseas. Nationalists' claims to restoring sovereignty, however, are heavily qualified: they promote independence as a route to rejoining the EU, and so ultimately only want to swap rule from London with rule from Brussels.

Robert Frazer, Charleston Drive, Dundee

Jack it in

It seems that Laura Waddell finds that the Union Flag "gaudy" and "brutal" ("I don’t want a holiday cottage packed with Union Jacks”, Perspective, January 28).

Such epithets are clearly entirely subjective. To others the Union Flag is a fashion statement. I regularly find people in Europe wearing Union Jack motifs on tee-shirts, dresses and bags without any apparent problems, as it is a bright splash of colour and representative of a liberal culture.

To most of them, it is something that contrasts with the histories of their own countries which have, almost without exception, a dark past.

Strange then, to find that anyone should have such an antipathy to the flag of their own country, a flag that was waved with such gusto throughout Scotland to celebrate the end of the last war, for example. But, if Ms Waddell has such a problem with her own flag, she doesn't have to holiday in Scotland, or elsewhere in Britain. Although she seems to equate the Union Flag with Orange marches, there are always those other ones that she didn't mention, like Ancient Order of Hibernian marches with the Irish Tricolour, or snarling Scottish nationalist marches with the Saltire.

The Saltire is now representative of Scottish nationalist politics, a big step away from the togetherness of the Union Flag.

However, I think Ms Waddell doesn't like togetherness. She would rather attack our fellow-countrymen from south of the Border. That goes with the Saltire nowadays, which says it all.

John Fraser, Jedburgh Gardens, Glasgow

Up the pole

After reading Laura Waddell’s column I was somewhat disgusted at the rhetoric used throughout its entirety.

“Now add a giant Union Jack and some pictures of Royalty… what you have is a pivot to a Tory hipster vibe”. “But when I see a gaudy Union Jack”. “It’s brutal”.

Might I enlighten Ms Waddell what sticks in my thrapple. Anti-English drivel, for this is not Just an attack on the Union, it is directly aimed at the English. For if confirmation were needed we need go no further than the following, ”But it seemed entirely to be aiming for the kind of crowd who gets the train up from London for Edinburgh Fringe and makes jokes about fried Mars bars and the lack of salad”.

What also sticks is the disgusting language used against the flag of the Union. Gaudy is it?

If that term was used to describe the Saltire, all hell would break loose, because when you sully a flag, you sully the people it represents. Ms Waddell may feel it does not represent her, but it seemed to do so for the “people of Scotland” who decided “better under the flag of the Union than under the Saltire-waving SNP”.

Nationalism is a vile trait, one which, as history has proved over and over again, when pursued with the kind of ultra-enthusiasm we see in Scotland (I choose my words there carefully) causes national unrest, division and animosity to ridiculous levels.

As for what also sticks in my throat, that is the appalling misuse of my national flag.

For when I see it now, it does not represent my wonderful country, it represents mass gatherings of people advocating senseless and unsupportable division, bitterness, animosity and hatred.

I was born a Scot, I will die a Scot, but there will be no Saltire on my casket – nor will there be a “See you Jimmy” hat either.

David Millar, West High Street, Lauder

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