PERSPECTIVE / LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Lifespan of a bridge isn’t a matter of fortune, it’s down to human calculations

Nicola Sturgeon is quoted as having said the Forth Road Bridge fault was “unforeseen and unforeseeable”. She also said that she didn’t have a crystal ball five years ago to forecast this event.

A structural engineer could have told her that the engineering fraternity does not rely on crystal balls to foretell structural problems. The life of a structure is calculated by formal engineering procedures In my career as a parish minister I was often approached by charities asking for my support, but when I asked for a sight of their accounts that was usually the last I heard from them.

Now a report by the True and Fair Foundation shows why they vanished: a fifth of our bestknown charities use less than 50 per cent of the funds raised for “charitable activities”.

In fact, more than 1,000 “charities” spend less than half their cash on good work and 300 spend just 10 per cent, with the rest going to bloated workforces and obscene salaries at the top.

And our excellent small and medium-size charities are clearly being shoved aside by the publicity machines of the aid industry’s big beasts both at home and (especially) abroad.

It is high time a light was shone on this sector so we can see how our money is spent, because too many charities appear to exist for the sake of their staff rather than beneficiaries. With the world price of oil in freefall, alarm bells are now ringing in the North Sea as to how oil production can carry on at an uneconomic price of less than $40 per barrel.

With many thousands of workers having lost their jobs and many more to follow, the only comfort in the situation is that Scotland said a resounding NO to independence and can continue to enjoy the strength and security of the United Kingdom.

Independence would now have left Scotland in dire straits during the design phase. If there is some significant change to a structure or its environment (such as a major increase in the traffic volume and weights on a bridge) then it is incumbent on the structure owner to reassess these life calculations. Much time and effort is typically expended on these activities.

Further, there is an engineering discipline generally known as “Structural Health Monitoring”. SHM is applied to a and going cap in hand to Europe for a bailout and facing the same austerity programme regime that Greece was forced to accept. I have mixed emotions about Brian Wilson’s article, “Please let this uncivilised word lie” (The Scotsman, 12 December): weariness and frustration. What politicians and those in the political bubbles of Westminster and Holyrood don’t understand is that the rest of the population, the electorate, is completely fed up with being lied to by “Honourable Members”.

It is neither “piqued spite” nor “the fine line between mendacity and confusion”, it is anger that, yet again, a leading politician has openly lied to the public and expects us to shrug it off as “a political lie” and accept his lip-service apology because all politicians lie.

Exactly. Mr Wilson quotes Bill Clinton, in support of this truth, replying to a question about why he lied about his relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky as, “Because I didn’t want people to know”.

How any public figure can approve of this excuse for repeated lying shows the degree to which politicians have lost touch with everyone else’s sense of justice.

Mr Wilson objects to the use of the words “lie” and liar”, “on the grounds that there are usually more civilised ways of communicating the same general sentiment” but unless and until the harsh truth of expressions favoured by Tony Blair, like “creative ambiguity”, are laid bare, “untruths” – whether personal or political – will be the currency of our elected representatives.

MPS and MSPS have deluded themselves for decades that they can fool the public. Faced with criticisms from the electorate they would claim that “they hadn’t got their message across”, preferring to ignore the harsh truth that voters understood exactly what their message was and rejected it.

Sadly, reading Mr Wilson’s wide range of structures, and is extensively used on many of the world’s major, critical bridges. In recognition of the uncertainty in design calculations, construction quality, reassessment, maintenance and inspection, SHM is used to monitor the actual behaviour of critical components to ensure that these components continue to operate as designed. Indeed, there was a great deal of publicity when SHM was installed to monitor article, even after a year in which the Labour Party in Scotland was all but wiped out and Jeremy Corbyn was elected into office by a huge majority in what is obviously a comprehensive rejection of the old political verities, some of the old guard still don’t understand a simple lesson: if you want us to trust you to represent us stop lying. the main suspension cables of the Forth Road Bridge.

Unforeseen structural failure is a human failure, and not a whim of fortune. We are told that the Forth Road Bridge is to be retained, “as a public transport link,” once the new Queensferry crossing opens. However, a valuable asset such as this being used for only In my youth I took a course on statistics.now many, many years later I can only remember the first half hour, which was devoted to the most salient fact that if you did not have a “representative sample” the maths were worthless.

It is accepted that our globe’s surface is seven-tenths ocean and we now have thermometers all over being read by buses and taxis would represent an enormous waste of taxpayers’ money. It will require virtually the same amount of maintenance irrespective of traffic volumes, therefore we must make full use of it.

The new bridge is yet again only dual carriageway and will suffer growing congestion along with periodic maintenance restrictions. We should therefore use the existing bridge as a toll crossing for those willing to satellites. That was not the case in 1860, the base date for comparisons, therefore no similar “representative sample” is available. You cannot take any calculations seriously until at least 1960.The same goes for chemical sampling of the ocean.

It is hoped the money being spent in Paris currently will come up with something more persuasive than guesses. pay to avoid congestion and as a standby. The revenue raised would pay for its upkeep and ensure its availability when the new crossing requires maintenance.

We already have the example of the M6 toll section at Birmingham which provides muchneeded relief during peak periods and a diversion route in the case of accidents.