Myths about Glasgow’s LEZ

IT’S curious how people living outwith Glasgow argue against our clean air policy, ie the LEZ. Colin Mason from Kilmarnock (from where there is a good train service and express buses to Glasgow) highlights the fact that public transport is poor (Letters, April 10), so why isn’t he campaigning for better public transport? He also uses a very spurious argument when he quotes friends from

Kirkintilloch (East Dunbartonshire) who no longer ferry people to the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital.

The reason he quotes, and possibly his friends have used, is because of the LEZ. But the LEZ operates over a limited area within the city centre, ie the area bounded by the Clyde, the Saltmarket and the High Street, and the M8 (though not including the motorway itself) so why would someone choose to make the journey from Kirkintilloch to the QEUH via the city centre?

However, if those people were to drive through the city centre, then they would see something that William Gold (Letters, April 10) appears to have missed, and that is the queues of black cabs outside Queen Street Station and in George Square.

It’s sad that myths beat the facts but the facts often speak for themselves.

Patricia Fort, Glasgow.

The retail meltdown

I WAS horrified on a recent walk along Princes Street in Edinburgh at the total meltdown of retail, but this is repeated across the whole of the UK.

Why? Simple reasons: car parking charges, pedestrianisation, and generally “anti-car” opinions to the fore.

Those responsible should now realise they have killed our city and town centres through crazy short-termism.

Sir Brian Donohoe, Irvine.

Tesco profits a disgrace

THE latest figures from Tesco Group (“Surging profits see Tesco claim success in supermarket price war”, The Herald, April 11) suggest that it over-estimated the impact of the cost pressures from supply chain issues, and the cost input for food. No matter how you measure it, it is a shocking figure, at a time when so many families are still struggling with the costs of energy and food inflation.

It is also disgraceful (although I am assured it is legal, although I don’t how, since the practice is bordering on a cartel) how the competition authorities allow the “big four” to simply match the basics of Aldi stores. If they want to compete on price they should compete on price, not just copy a rival. I would have thought that too was the very definition of cartel-type price fixing.

Francis Deigman, Erskine.