ALISON Rowat asks: “Is there a doctor in the house who can heal the Tory party?’”(The Herald, September 21). The short answer is: No, there isn’t. It is not a doctor the Tories need but the analyst’s couch, although I suspect most of them are beyond psychoanalysis.

Apart from their apparent political ineptitude, played out weekly in the so-called Brexit “negotiations”, their dysfunctionality is much more deeply-rooted.

It can be found in their distance from the lived experience of ordinary people; their political imperatives are entirely self and party-centred (hence David Cameron’s pursuit of the EU referendum to save the party from the lunacies of Ukip and Theresa May’s foolish decision to call a General Election).

In such a context, policy elements such as prolonged austerity at the expense of the poorest in society, the bedroom tax and the rape clause should cause no surprise.

How can such distance from the lives of ordinary people be explained? Much of it can be understood in the light of the boarding-school experiences which characterise the lives of many of our political leaders and of those in high office in the wider culture which they inhabit.

Children develop survival tactics when separated from their families and removed from the usual patterns of attachment and relationship formation, and these tactics are marked by a hastily-acquired sense of self-reliance and entitlement.

The price they pay is emotional and social dysfunctionality, and scant acquaintance with empathy. The “human” qualities needed to navigate social relationships and to be in touch with the needs of others are depleted or missing. Thus we have Nicola Sturgeon describing Theresa May as “a woman who sits in meetings where it’s just the two of you and reads from a script”(“Sturgeon doubt on timing of new independence vote”, The Herald, September 21).

The Prime Minister’s behaviour following the Grenfell tower tragedy had, of course, provided ample evidence – if it was needed – of her emotional detachment.

The “healing” required, on this analysis, is clearly a very far-reaching re-structuring of the early-life experiences of our “elites” but, in the shorter term, perhaps we should be asking why we elect such people in the first place.

Dr Angus Macmillan,

76 Georgetown Road,

Dumfries.

DR Gerald Edwards calls into question Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP for not giving precise dates for a second referendum on independence (Letters, September 22); in other words holding back on independence

For any political party there are lines in the sand that must not be crossed; fundamental policies that are not up for discussion and, in the SNP’s case, that is independence.

It is disingenuous for Dr Edwards to question the foundation stone on which the SNP stands.

In his letter there is no recognition of the bigger picture – that of Brexit and the position Scotland finds herself in.

It voted remain yet it is being taken out of the EU, excluded from the negotiation table, silenced, without a voice.

With this in mind, is it any wonder the First Minister is holding back on a second referendum? She is the personification of the shrewd politician on this issue.

Catriona C Clark

52 Hawthorn Drive,

Banknock,

Falkirk