Calm down, Harry

YOU report on Stanley Johnson’s “Covid-proofing” trip to Greece (PM’s father defends lockdown visit to his Greek property, July 5).

Where to start at this time of crisis? Perhaps with education. Would any institution care to set up the Scottish Enlightenment Centre in commemoration of all who have suffered from Covid, to a greater or lesser extent, since the New Year?

Specialists to hire, subjects to study, students to recruit:

A historian who understands the 700th anniversary of the Declaration of Arbroath. Which was, of course, made 120 years before poor Henry VI founded a place called Eton – wonder what became of that? Did any of its alumni ever amount to anything?

Someone who combines geography and philosophy, to answer the vital question eating away at Dominic Cummings’ mind: where exactly is Bishop Auckland?

Someone with a good memory of how the British constitution used to work before a blond bloke tried to prorogue the Westminster Parliament last autumn.

A health and safety professional with extensive experience in historic buildings, to advise MPs on how to protect themselves and their families from Jacob Rees-Mogg’s sloppy approach to their wellbeing, when others are encouraged to work from home.

A mathematician with experience of how the benefits system works for ordinary families, to help Stanley work out how many grandchildren he has.

A vexillologist, to explain what Nigel Farage was waving, and why, in January.

A second, peripatetic historian, to wander between Hadrian’s Wall and Gretna, forever explaining to Priti Patel that the wall only worked while the Roman army patrolled it: after that, immigration became a completely different issue.

A Sinologist, to explain to President Xi that a wall in China may have had the same problem (no point wasting time explaining this in Trump’s White House).

Someone with experience of bridges (not just London Garden ones), railway engineering, and economics, to explain why Tory transport policy will be a shambles in 15 years’ time.

That should keep future generations busy for a while, and we’ve not even considered Greta Thunberg yet … Norrie Forrest Kincardine

JACOB Rees-Mogg compared the First Minister’s talk of a border with England and possible quarantines being imposed on visitors with Donald Trump’s delusional wall.

When it was pointed out in the House of Commons that there is no border as neither country is a sovereign nation, the SNP troops were quick to tell us that there is Scottish law and English law on either side so there is, de facto, a border.

Of course, to that the answer is there are also different local laws in force between, say, Glasgow and Edinburgh and Surrey and Devon. But, why worry about details, this nonsense was the stuff on which the zealot wing of nationalism salivates. Borders and walls, what could be better? A chunk of red meat thrown to assuage the headbanging fringes. I am sure the First Minister was well aware – more than anyone – the furore it would cause.

Who was it again who said the pandemic should not be politicised? Alexander McKay Edinburgh

BORIS Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg appear to have a selective short memory by claiming in Parliament that there was no border between England and Scotland. The day before devolution the then-Labour Government secretly and without debate shifted the North Sea boundary line, thereby giving England 6,000 square miles of Scottish waters.

The Scotland 1998 Act and the Scottish Adjacent Waters Boundary Order of 1999 apply should they still really believe that the UK is one country.

I attended a debate at the Scottish Parliament about the legality of moving the North Sea boundary adjacent to Montrose. I recall John Home Robertson saying that this was merely to give the Westminster Government “more clout” when discussing UK fisheries with the EU in Brussels. When further questioned he said the seabed would still belong to Scotland.

David Cameron said if he was elected as Prime Minister he would readdress the legality of the Westminster-approved North Sea boundary changes. Of course, he never did.

Donnie Morrison Benbecula

Jim Daly Edinburgh

IT would appear that Prince Harry is determined to right the wrongs of the past. He surely must be aware that he is treading on dangerous ground as well as opening up the part our monarchy has played not only in the illustrious moments of the UK’s past, but also the implication of our sovereigns in the darker moments of our chequered history.

Meghan may well be a republican, but has she converted him to her way of thinking? Can it be that he contemplates the end of monarchy as having outlived its purpose? At the back of all this, everyone ought to recognise that different times have different customs.

Gradually we are becoming more enlightened, though politically today we seem to be drifting away from a world based upon rational policies to a period of powerful autocratic personalities.

There is also abroad a brand of puritanical intolerance not seen since the time of Oliver Cromwell, in that many are wary of opening their mouths to express any opinion which runs counter to the zeitgeist of our world today out of fear of reprisals.

Harry should ca’ canny with his criticisms and rely upon the gradualist approach to politics and history instead of being swept along in knee-jerk fashion by the undeniable strength of today’s emotional orthodoxy.

Rome was not built in a day, nor will the wrongs of yesteryear be corrected overnight.

Dennis Bruce Bishopbriggs