Move on, Nicola

Sometimes Nicola Sturgeon goes beyond parody. On Sunday evening, on the BBC evening news, she tells the nation that “the terrorists will win if we allow ourselves to become divided”, when her party’s entire ener- gies are focused on exactly that. She accused Ruth Davidson of a “constitutional obsession” with independence and ridiculed a Conservative flyer because it mentioned that subject a number of times, and yet, here she is, harping on about the very same subject again.

Ms Sturgeon opines that Scotland will be independent by 2025 in yesterday’s Scotsman and uses all the same, tired old excuses for holding a secondreferendum,whichare not about independence, but about Brexit and who is supposed to have said what about the EU in 2014.

Clearly, she is now totally out of touch with the mood in Scotland. We have moved on from the independence referendum, which was emphatically settled in favour of Scotland remaining in the United Kingdom.

The question is now one of not being divided, by terrorists or Nationalists, and of focusing all our collective attentions on getting the best deal for the UK in our Brexit negotiations. By her failure to understand that the debate has moved on, Nicola Sturgeon merely confirms how pointless a vote for the SNP will be on Thursday.

ANDREW HN GRAY Craiglea Drive, Edinburgh

Nicola Sturgeon has called for the SNP to be part of a progressive alternative to the Tories. This is just political mischief making and nobody should be fooled. She says Labour are putting forward policies that the SNP has already implemented in Scotland. But is that entirely correct?

Labour proposes tax rises for those earning above £80,000. At Holyrood, the SNP have refused to increase the top rate of tax for high earners, apart from a token adjustment to the higher rate limit. Education? Under the SNP education in Scotland has been a disaster – Labour will certainly not follow that path. And let’s look at tuition fees. Labour promises to abolish tuition fees and reinstate the Educational Maintenance Allowance, while supporting further education and lifelong learning. This is a big improvement on policies in Scotland and we should note that if, as the SNP hope, Scotland became independent, the £15 billion budget deficit and cancellation of the Barnett Formula would put free tuition, and so much else, under threat.

We must not forget that the whole purpose of the SNP is independence, while Labour has ruled out another referendum. Their manifesto is explicit on this: independence will make Scotland poorer and there will be no second referendum. Labour is looking to win on 8 June; Nicola Sturgeon is playing political games – there will be no coalition.

LUCY GRIG Roseneath Street, Edinburgh

On page 88 of its manifesto the Labour Party says it will “set up a national review of local pubs to examine the causes for their large-scale demise”?

The cost of this review in terms of support staff, premises, IT, incidentals, “expert” witnesses etc and, of course, some essential factfinding visits must surely run to somewhere in the region of £5-10 million.

As has been much heralded. this has doubtless been costed and the funding for this review identified. Am I alone in thinking that any eventual findings will revolve around the availability of considerably cheaper supermarket beers and, for rural pubs, the effect of drink driving legislation?

I suggest we pocket the cost of this nonsense and spend the money “saved” on something worthwhile like the NHS. JOHN RHIND Meadow Lane Beadnell, Northumberland