Letters: SNP partly to blame for the continuation of Tory policies

Phil D’Arcy,

14 Glen Avenue, Dyce, Aberdeen.

MUCH has been said about the influence the allegedly homophobic and anti-abortion DUP’s 10 MPs might have on the Conservative Government, but do the Scottish Conservatives not have 13 MPs? If whipped separately in Parliament from the English Tory MPs, might Ruth Davidson’s group not have more influence? With a tiny majority, and a resurgent Labour Party, the Conservatives will not risk another early election, so the 13 Scottish Tory MPs could hold great influence over whoever is the Prime Minister for the next five years.

The SNP’s previous feeble 53 did nothing to alter Government policy towards Scotland, despite much bravado from Nicola Sturgeon, and the departed Angus Robertson and hubristic Alex Salmond. The reduced group of 35 will do no more.

Perhaps Ruth Davidson’s personality, politics and personal life are more in tune with the zeitgeist and the aspirations of the Millenials, so effectively mobilised to vote by Jeremy Corbyn? Ms Davidson clearly is her own woman and took no orders from Number 10 during the election, much to her credit.

Could a distinctly separate Scottish Tory group led by Ms Davidson, aligned to the Conservative party, not prove to be a vote winner with the young and be more influential in representing Scotland interests in a Westminster Parliament?

Could the Scottish voters have begun a move towards a more federal Conservative Party? Scottish Tory or DUP influence - which is more palatable to the rest of the UK?

This may really have been a game-changing election.

Gavin R Tait,

37 Fairlie, East Kilbride.

THE leader of the Conservative and Unionist Party in Scotland has made no secret of her desire to see the Scottish Government’s request for a Section 30 Order, which would enable a second independence referendum to be held after the Brexit negotiations, withdrawn. Of course if Ruth Davidson had supported any of the proposals contained in Scotland’s Place in Europe with the Prime Minister then the order may not have been requested in the first place, as would probably have been the case if Nicola Sturgeon had known that Theresa May was going to quickly break her word and call a snap General Election.

However, we are where we are, and if Ms Davidson genuinely wishes to have an independence referendum at least temporarily taken off the table she now would appear to have a second chance to persuade Mrs May that the UK should retain membership of the European Economic Area Single Market, or that a “differentiated deal” should be negotiated for Scotland (perhaps this is actually what is meant by the suddenly introduced but still undefined term “Open Brexit”).

Instead of demanding that others betray their responsibilities and their principles to produce the outcome she seeks, Ms Davidson should examine her own principles and start acting in the best interests of Scotland instead of simply endorsing decisions made by her UK party purely for political advantage that have resulted in a hung Parliament just as the Prime Minister enters discussions pivotal to the future economic and social health of all of the Nations comprising the United Kingdom.

Stan Grodynski,

Cairnsmore, Longniddry, East Lothian.

HAVING listened to Theresa May promising a government of certainty for the next five years merely confirms my impression that I am living in a country governed by incompetents, dissemblers and three-card monte con artists. We had an unelected Prime Minister leading a governing party with a workable majority promising the nation that she had no intention of calling a General Election, within days deciding the opposite. She then proceeds to run the most inept election campaign since a Roman senator lost to a horse and reduces her government to a parliamentary minority. This is a woman who placed the repeal of the foxhunting bill as a priority in her party’s manifesto and whose proposals for a so-called “dementia tax” were considered so radical by her own party that she slalomed her way to a U-turn while claiming nothing had changed. This is a woman who having stated “It is not clear why other EU member states would give Britain a better deal than they themselves enjoy” prior to the Brexit vote now assures us that Britain will be able to negotiate with Europe from a position of strength and that her new minority government can promise the country “certainty".

Well she’s right there. I am more certain than ever that she and the bumbling poltroon Boris Johnson (he who campaigned for Brexit on the strength of a lie emblazoned on the side of a bus and who should have been banished to a locked room with a box of Lego and a couple of colouring books but instead of which was appointed Foreign Secretary presumably to provide comic relief to his European counterparts as a punishment for his buffoonery), will continue to examine the policies and actions required to salvage the nation from catastrophe and having identified them, take us precisely in the opposite direction.

I am more certain than ever that ever that come the Brexit deadline in less than two years, if she and her party are still in power we shall be a nation of the impoverished with a currency on par with the Burmese kyat and receiving foreign aid from Bangladesh, with the exception of her establishment support, the super elite who will, of course, continue to bleat about the need for continuing austerity while preserving all the loopholes that free them from any sort of tax obligation.

God help us all.

Bob Buntin,

GF1 Morland House, Longhill, Skelmorlie.

AS a Labour supporter, I was pleased with the outcome of the election but not as carried away as Kevin McKenna ("Dugdale should be dancing to Corbyn’s winning tune”, June 10). What Mr McKenna seems to be forgetting is, simply, he didnae win. He certainly surpassed expectations but that says more about how poorly Jeremy Corbyn had performed until the final weeks before the election than that he showed himself to be PM-material (remember the Women’s Hour shambles?).

Up against a very right-wing, deeply divided Conservative party led by someone who appeared to disintegrate before our very eyes, Labour, if led by a moderate left-of-centre leader, would have gone into that election well ahead in the polls and would, now, be forming the new government with a workable majority, able to offer hope to those who have most suffered at the hands of the Cameron/May Governments. So, please, no rejoicing at Mr Corbyn’s performance. Second place isn’t good enough in politics and if Mr Corbyn couldn’t do it this time, he won’t do it next time either.

Jim White,

44 Ravenswood Drive, Glasgow.

IN 2010, there were 41 Labour MPs in Scotland, so how can the return of just seven Labour Members in 2017 be considered a “bounce-back” as some suggest?

Less than a year ago, minutes after Jeremy Corbyn's re-election as leader of the Labour Party, Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale, who had supported Owen Smith for leader, claimed that Mr Corbyn was not competent and could not unite the party. This view may have been held by some of the longer-term constituency workers in Scotland (and, indeed, by much of the Labour Parliamentary Party), but it did not reflect the views of the massive new influx of Labour Party members who joined the party for the first time following Mr Corbyn's election as leader.

Sadly, the Labour vote in Scotland last Thursday did not reflect Scotland's traditional left-wing track-record. Nor did it follow the national trend through most of the UK, where even the Kensington constituency returned a Labour MP.

It was an opportunity missed which, at least in the short term, may have cost Labour dear. It is not surprising that Nicola Sturgeon, who ran an anti-austerity campaign, declared she had more in common with Jeremy Corbyn than with Kezia Dugdale.

(Dr) Carole Grbin,

8 Athelstane Road, Glasgow.