Scotsman Letters: People who choose to have large families should pay their way

Alan Woodcock says the UK Government is keeping children in poverty via the two-child cap (Letters, 26 April).

Not so – it is those parents who have more children than they can afford. Last December the Scottish Government wanted to remove the two-child benefit cap but this was blocked by the UK Government. Scottish Finance Secretary Shona Robison claimed the change would cost just £100 million a year but the Scottish Fiscal Commission said it would be £150m for 2026-27, rising to £200m in 2029-30. The Institute for Fiscal Studies stated it could eventually cost £300m a year.

Child benefit payments are available from the birth of the child until they reach 16 years of age, or 19 years of age if the young person stays in approved education or training. Why should Scottish taxpayers be forced to subsidise people who have large families, many of whom will then need to apply for a bigger council house?

Shona Robison wanted to remove the two-child benefit cap in Scotland

Clark Cross, Linlithgow, West Lothian

Unwise sum

It would reasonable to spend £49 million on investigations which prevented a major terrorist atrocity such as the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center or the Bataclan massacre in Paris. Similarly, it might be reasonable to spend such a sum to catch a prolific serial killer, such as the Yorkshire Ripper.

Is it, however, reasonable to spend £49m and counting on a public inquiry to determine whether race was a factor in the death of one man, Sheku Bayoh, in the town of Kirkcaldy? That is, £24m for the inquiry itself and £25m by Police Scotland in connection with the inquiry.

To ask the question is to answer it. No, of course not. The public sector does not have unlimited resources. Westminster, in this case Holyrood and local councils need to start using the taxpayers’ money prudently.

Otto Inglis, Crossgates, Fife

Work it out

May I take this opportunity to reply to Mr Woodcock (Letters, 26 April)?

As I have said previously in these pages, I am not anti-independence – I am a realist who understands the workings of a balance sheet.

Of the points I made in previous correspondence, as always the SNP apologists never say the points made are ridiculous or wrong.

No, they ignore the realities of what I say, coming up with unrelated nonsense. Add to this the utter incompetence of the SNP in government, the amount of money wasted on navel-gazing nonsense like the deposit return scheme and ferries, the horrendous amount of wasted money on insane legal fights – the list is endless.

Perhaps Mr Woodcock could do as I have requested on many occasions – that is, get a sheet of A4 paper and a pen – no pencils as rubbing out is not allowed – and write down how we can finance independence, how we would re-enter the EU, how we would be protected after dumping our nuclear deterrent, how we would keep the lights on while destroying our oil and gas industries and finally how we would trade with the “enemy foreign nation” down south – our biggest trading market – with all the restrictions independence would bring. Did I mention currency and banking?

Perhaps Mr Woodcock may use a term other than “cheap jibes” to describe my request above. If it wasn’t for the “good ship United Kingdom” bailing out these incompetents on a daily basis, we’d have sunk years ago. The day a balance sheet is put in front of me showing how independence can work, I will be the first to sign up.

David Millar, Lauder, Scottish Borders

Gaza graveyard

If I were living in Trump’s America, I would be arrested, if not deported, for what I'm about to write in this letter. Anything less than total, unconditional support for Israel is deemed to be unacceptable, and regarded as anti-Semitism.

What exactly has Israel to do to lose that support? Not content with the carpet bombing of Gaza, Israel has unleashed its latest lethal weapon, namely starvation. It seems that war crime is simply trumped by yet another war crime.

It's well past time to give total, unconditional support to the beleaguered Palestinians in a situation which has been compared to the Nakba of 1948. Arguably, it's worse, and Gaza has been described as a Palestinian graveyard.

In 1948 the Palestinians were ruthlessly expelled from their homeland to accommodate the state of Israel. While I accept Israel's right to a homeland after their own Nakba of the Holocaust, the Israelis themselves should recognise a similar right for the Palestinians.

Trump’s America, described by Benjamin Netanyahu, as “the best friend that Israel has ever had”, tragically supports the elimination of Palestinians from Gaza and the time has surely come for the watching world to become the Palestinians' best friends.

Ian Petrie, Edinburgh

Small steps

Whether one agrees with their politics or not, most would consider Alex Salmond, Nicola Sturgeon and John Swinney to be serious politicians, not puppets of the economic elite acting on behalf of the British Establishment. Nigel Farage, on the other hand, has made a rewarding career out of conjuring up the illusion of a successful UK through distracting from the dire long-term consequences of following regressive policies such as those pursued by US President Donald Trump.

Those who, like William Ballantine (Letters, 28 April), would state that “the SNP claim that independence will solve all our ills”, would also be accurate in alluding to “pie in the sky” if correct in making such statements. However, most genuine supporters of self-determination agree that independence will not solve all of Scotland’s problems which have accumulated over decades, if not centuries, but democracy will most certainly be improved, and serve the Scottish public better, with overriding control in Edinburgh rather than London.

With regard to the economy and public services, there will be many challenges ahead whether Scotland remains in a dysfunctional union or becomes independent.

That said, with independence all the political parties governing Scotland will be focused on making Scotland a prosperous, fair and equal country for all of its citizens instead of some operating as “branch offices” of parties focused on enriching those inhabiting the southern corner of Britain (as regrettably evidenced even by the Labour Party in government at Westminster).

Will more mistakes be made in government procurement – yes, as repeatedly exhibited by governments around the world, but hopefully not of the scale of the billions wasted on “useless” PPE or on the high speed railway to “nowhere”.

Will progressive moves to make Scotland a fairer and more egalitarian country often be delayed by vested interests – yes, but as our population becomes even more informed and enlightened our basic humanity will eventually overcome the forces of regression that would take us back to a darker past.

Stan Grodynski, Longniddry, East Lothian

Take charge

Chris Skidmore, who is a former Conservative energy minister, sings from the same hymn sheet as Labour Minister Ed Miliband when it comes to turning the UK into a "clean energy superpower", which is a delusion (Perspective, 25 April).

Mr Skidmore should consider this. The world relies upon fossil fuels for 80 percent of its energy and will be doing so for decades to come.

Any CO2 given off will still get into the same atmosphere as we breathe, but it will come from our competitors who will be able to tell us what to do unless we seize the opportunity to use our own North Sea resources, which have not been used up, as he suggests. We have much left to use and we have not yet even started to put small atomic reactors in place which could be built for us by our own Rolls-Royce.

He argues that our oil is exported. It may seem strange, but we are perfectly capable of directing it to our own use and becoming self-reliant. The field newly discovered in Lincolnshire alone would power the UK for a decade!

Then, we have Cambo and Rosebank fields, let alone our other fields. Wind power is a boon to China, as they build the wind turbines, but not to us, except sometimes when the wind blows.

We have vast coal resources which are left totally untapped. China imports it, as we do now. What insanity. We also have huge iron ore resources. Everything has been exported. It is time we did things for ourselves instead of letting other nations benefit while we sit on the sidelines.

Peter Hopkins, Edinburgh

Cut energy cost

In his article on First Minister John Swinney’s extremism summit (Perspective, 26 April), Brian Wilson gives a quote by Anas Sarwar that states “people across our society feel as if the economy does not work for them”.

What the Scottish Labour leader failed to include in his statement is that the root cause of the current cost of living crisis in the Scottish economy is the high unit price of electricity arising from Net Zero policies .

At around 28p/unit it is nearly 50 per cent higher than in 2022 prior to the start of the conflict in the Ukraine, yet gas has long since returned to the 6.8p/unit price charged at that time.

Why was the main topic of the SNP summit not a plan to reduce the unit price of renewable electricity by 20p/unit to match the cost charged for gas?

Ian Moir, Castle Douglas, Dumfries & Galloway

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