Wouldn’t it be a pleasant change if Sandesh Gulhane and Jackie Baillie, rather than childishly bitching about Scotland’s NHS actually tried to do something constructive to alter the policies of the UK Labour Party and Conservative Party who pull their strings and are actually deliberately causing the collapse of the NHS?
David J Crawford, Glasgow.
• IT’S a shame that Bob Scott’s important climate article (“A chilling outlook as the world gets hotter”, The Herald, December 24) wasn’t on the front page, instead of the grossly one-sided finger-pointing from the British nationalist health spokespersons over A&E waits. It’s about relevance to the future of human civilisation versus a story that is largely mirrored in Labour Wales and Tory England of UK-wide NHS decline over the last two decades.
Five minutes on her computer could have easily have given Kathleen Nutt enough ammunition from the Royal Colleges of Emergency Medicine of England and Wales to embarrass Sandesh Gulhane and Jackie Baillie into abashed silence over this particular issue. The NHS in Scotland has more medical staff per capita than England or Wales, so what exactly would Dr Gulhane (previously a doctor in England) or Dame Jackie do differently to solve Scotland’s decades-long health issues? Hold the door open for private medical operators, as the Labour and Tory parties’ stated preference these days?
GR Weir, Ochiltree.
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Excellent service
I’M quite a fit and healthy person, so don’t call on the NHS often, but on Tuesday December 17, before 10am, I contacted my doctors’ surgery, using their online form. My appointment with one of the practice doctors was at 2pm that very same day. Super service and there has since been an improvement in my ailment.
Today, December 24, our son, who lives in Edinburgh, but has been with us since last Friday, when he was already under the weather, was noticeably worse. I phoned the surgery at 9.35, on their guidance registered him as a temporary patient and at 10:33 one of the doctors phoned, spoke to my son, heard the symptoms and invited my son to the surgery for 11:15. Son os now back on the settee with his prescribed medicine. What could be better?
Patricia Fort, Glasgow.
Sturgeon is no trump card
SIR John Curtice surmises that Nicola Sturgeon could be the SNP’s trump card in attracting Scots to a new secession campaign (“Could Sturgeon head up SNP campaign for independence?, heraldscotland, December 22). Does he not know that many of those already behind secession detest Ms Sturgeon a lot more than anti-separatists do? Her failure to make progress on the separation issue scunnered many more than those who defected to Alba. The SNP’s preoccupation surely is with all those voters who deserted the party in the July election, rather than with bringing back to their front line a leader whose reign has discredited her in the eyes of nationalists and pro-UK Scots alike.
It is true that the SNP is now a party with nothing to offer in terms of capability, charisma and competence. Those now at the head of the SNP are singularly clueless, playing the same old clapped-out tunes, wasting taxpayers’ money on ill-thought-out schemes and resorting to the litany of untruths that won them significant support in years gone by. Yet there is no-one else. Look at the calibre of junior ministers and SNP backbenchers. Their performance at Holyrood is lamentable, yet they are all the SNP has.
As for a new secession campaign, that really is for the birds, whatever the wilder cohorts of nationalism pretend.
Jill Stephenson, Edinburgh.
Another pledge has melted away
STUFFING the House of Lords with a raft of new nominations (“Labour duo Curran and Alexander join ex-chief of staff Gray in Lords”, The Herald, December 21, and Letters, December 24) is a funny way for Labour to fulfil a pre-election pledge to abolish it.
With around 800 members, the House of Lords is the only upper house of any bicameral parliament in the world to be larger than its lower house. It is also the second-largest legislative chamber in the world, behind the National People’s Congress of China.
It is incredible that as we move into 2025, we are still using a system that allows the government to appoint unelected cronies, donors and friends.
This is despite Keir Starmer, before becoming Prime Minister, pledging that he would get rid of the “indefensible” chamber in his first term of government, and that this would be replaced with an elected chamber.
Anas Sarwar, Labour’s leader in Scotland, also similarly promised that the party would scrap the House of Lords, noting that “it is an institution that has no place in 21st-century politics”.
It is patently clear that Labour has no intent to abolish the House of Lords, and as with so many other promises made prior to coming into government, this pledge has quickly melted away.
Alex Orr, Edinburgh.
Stop Musk’s meddling
I TRIED to donate funds to Donald Trump’s opponent, but my attempt failed when I was asked for my US passport number. I am a UK citizen. Having worked in the US nearly 40 years ago, I have a social security number there; but that alone confers no rights.
On a simple reciprocal basis, Elon Musk ought not to be able to fund UK domestic politics. The UK Government is invited to take immediate measures to stop him doing so.
William Durward, Bearsden.
Nicola Sturgeon (Image: PA)
Food for thought
I WAS surprised to read David McKay’s letter (December 24) in which he objects to Brian Taylor’s use of the word “caravanserai” in a recent column. When you come across a word or phrase you don’t understand, it takes but moments to find its meaning and you learn something new.
A wee while ago there was a letter in these pages that included the phrase “raw dogging”; not one I’d come across before, so I searched online. It turns out its original meaning was sex without a condom; however, those who frequent anti-social media platforms now use it to mean sitting through a flight without using any in-flight entertainment.
So, if your beloved teenager comes home from their first holiday abroad with pals and tells you they had a great flight back, raw dogging the whole way, some further delicate questioning might be in order.
It was good juxtaposition (another word I haven’t used in a long time) to place Mr McKay’s letter immediately after one from George Morton in which he uses the phrase “post hoc ergo propter hoc”. It’s over 50 years since I sat my Higher Latin (passed, with an A, as you ask) and I had to dig deep to work out what that meant. Thank you, Mr Morton, for stirring up cobwebs deep in my brain.
Doug Maughan, Dunblane.
Fiery talk
JOHN Jamieson’s apposite use of “Weel, ye ken noo” (Letters, December 24) is a variation on a theme.
The grumpy local minister had a dream. “Ah dreamt ye were aw doon in the fires o’ hell. Ye were moaning and wailing and beseeching the Lord wi ” Oh, Lord, we didnae ken it wid be like this”. And the Lord in his infinite mercy said: “Weel, noo ye ken”.
David Miller, Milngavie.