YOUR report concerning the policing of any visit to Scotland by President Donald Trump made me smile ("Police Scotland have ‘made plans’ for any visit by President Trump", The Herald, May 18). It contains the statement “Police Scotland has confirmed that arrangements are in place to police any visit in the way that maintains the public’s right to protest peacefully while enforcing existing laws as necessary”.

Do you remember the G8 meeting at Gleneagles in June 2005? That was in the days before the financial crash; many people from Scotland and beyond wanted to make a protest about the globalisation of trade and the overriding power of multi-national companies around that summit meeting. Then, as is probable now, a very heavy-handed policing operation kept all protestors many miles away from the scene of the action. People could not board trains going that way, buses were stopped and turned around, there were road blocks around the whole area.

I wonder if things have changed or will we see a re-run of the organised prevention of protest wherever the President goes?

DS Blackwood,

1 Douglas Drive East, Helensburgh.