Faith schools

Sentence total

DAVID Robertson (Letters, 10 July) says I and others attribute to him views he does not hold, He then does this himself.

No one has proposed “onesize-fits-all” schools”. I support choice but that should be within one school.

In many areas the population is too low to support more then one such. In the others, having pupils travelling to several schools from one area would cause many transport problems with transport.

I know of schools pushing religious propaganda (because that is what parents, not pupils, want) but of none using “atheist” propaganda.

Richard Dawkins is a scholar, not a propagandist, since he supports his views with evidence and asks others to do likewise.

Pupils can and should question him, as they should those who disagree with him, including parents.

If, as Mr Robertson says, they feel he is “mocking their faith” then their minds are closed as a result of propaganda, and not being taught to think for themselves, which should be key aim of education.

No good parents want their children to hear and read only what they themselves believe. I am grateful my parents never sought to have me indoctrinated either in religion or politics and left me free to think for myself

Mr Robertson should also explain what he means by “atheist secularists”. The inference is that there are “theist” secularists. He says he is not a theocrat, so he must be one of these EUAN BREMNER Perth Rd Dundee

FOR the six years of my secondary school education, in the 1950s in Glasgow, during the first period in the morning, designated as RE (religious education), I never received any religious education.

That period was for chatting, catching up on homework, reading comics, or whatever.

Any religious education I received was at our local Church of Scotland Sunday school. ROBERT M DUNN Oxcars Court

Edinburgh

IT IS quite astonishing that an official of the National Secular Society (Alistair Mcbay, Letters, 10 July) writes against the United Nations Charter on Human Rights in declaring that parents do not have a right to have their children educated according to their faith.

Mr Mcbay not only goes against this basic human right, but also against logic and reason, when he paints the nightmare scenario of 300 Christian denominations in Scotland each having their own state-funded schools.

Of course such a scenario would be ludicrous but that is not what I was arguing for.

Does Mr Mcbay not know of the Dutch system whereby a national curriculum must be followed, and there must be more than 200 pupils?

There are almost no denominations who would get those kind of numbers – Christians would actually have to work together!

He does not seem to realise that Scotland did have a statefunded Christian school system (officially it is still supposed to be that) which worked perfectly well.

However, now that it has largely been taken over, cuckoolike, by the atheistic secularists, it is time for the churches to reclaim the schools they handed over to the state.

I agree of course that schools are for teaching, not preaching. The trouble is what is taught and from what perspective.

Mr Mcbay does not seem to realise that all schools are “faith” schools, in that they all have an ethos and basic philosophy. Why should the only philosophy allowed be a state-mandated secular humanism?

Why not allow parents their human right to choose which philosophy/faith their children are educated under?

I would even be happy for the National Secular Society to have schools based on their philosophy – providing they could actually get 200 parents in the same area who wanted that! DAVID A ROBERTSON

Solas CPC St Peters Free Church

Dundee “ARMED gang are jailed for 43 years” (your report, 10 July).

Why does the headline quote the total number of years to be served by the five men? This is at worst misleading since the gang were not jailed for 43 years and at best irrelevant since the actual sentences varied from five years and ten months to 12 years and nine months. BRIAN MORRISON Dixon Terrace

Pitlochry

The problem with the whole North-east white fish industry is that it has been squeezed so much that making a profit is impossible. The consumers won’t pay a fair price, supermarkets squeeze their suppliers, the suppliers employ cheap immigrant labour and the fishermen have to employ cheap crews. It simply is not sustainable.

- Galloway gal

This is one hell of a blow for Fraserburgh.

- Lyin Rampant

First-hand experience of fish processing plants in the North-east says these losses are dirty, minimum wage jobs, and predominantly female economic migrants. Nevertheless, it is still a blow for the local economy.

- Cludgie

Boycott Sainsbury’s.

- Futchereagle The Scottish Government can no longer sit wringing its hands or blaming the UK. Perhaps good road/rail connections have a big part to play in the commercial sense and in that respect the whole of Banff and Buchan have been bypassed for the past 50 years.

- Liberal for life

This is a devastating blow for the town and one of the few politicians to have said anything seems to be Stewart Stevenson, who is hardly the most vocal of MSPS.

- Agnes Angry

Competition, competition. That is the name of the game. If Young’s (which produces good quality seafood) cannot compete, that is a problem for Young’s and no-one else, and no “SNP task force” will change that.

- Jack Hobbs

I’ve always found Young’s fish to be very good and I’m glad they will continue to supply fish to Sainsbury, but I won’t be getting my salmon from Sainsbury.

- Njimorourke