‘Straightforward facts’ on independence not enough to convince No voters

Mary Thomas (Letters, 13 October) presents “straightforward facts” to answer Doug Cowe’s basic questions on independence (Letters, 12 October). Few No voters will be convinced by them.

Ms Thomas claims the No vote in 2014 was built on a “tissue of lies” without identifying what those lies were. This looks a bit like the pot calling the kettle black. The Yes side were less than totally honest with their “once in a generation” promise, their claims of legal advice on EU entry and their assurance that after a No vote the Scottish NHS would bestarvedoffunds/privatised.

Worse, a “Yes” newspaper told families they would be £5,000 a year better off after a Yes vote. We now know from Alex Bell that not even the authors of the White Paper on independence believed that or much else contained within that paper – hardly an honest position.

The 2016 “mandate” for Indyref2 to which she refers was no such thing, as it relies on support from the Greens who reneged on a pre-election promise only to support another referendum if the Scottish people demanded one – they clearly do not. Ms Thomas claims Scotland’s share of the UK national debt is somehow theoretical. In fact it is real, and in 2014 the SNP were committed to honouring it. One assumes they still are.

She also claims that at $85 per barrel oil revenues would bring in £6 billion a year to make a dent in the £13bn deficit. You would think nationalists would have given up on predicting oil prices – besides, we were told in 2014 that oil was “just a bonus” so it can’t be relied on to bring down our deficit.

Ms Thomas goes on to say that Scotland could have a cheaper defence than at present. Not if the SNP stick by their commitment to Nato – they would insist a new member pays the full 2 per cent of GDP, just as we do at present, so there would be no savings there.

KEITH SHORTREED Cottown of Gight, Methlick

The most important numbers to remember in this blizzard of statistical claim and counter-claim are not whether the support for independence has gone up by 3 or 4 per cent, nor how long the queues will be at Dover or how many weeks or months Theresa May might hang on, but that 88 per cent of English Leave voters, ie over 50 per cent of all English voters, consider the break-up of the Union and the independence of Scotland as “a price worth paying”.

Well done, then, the audience member who pointed this out during Question Time from the Scottish Parliament last week, and well done Emily Maitliss, who did the same on Newsnight. Unfortunately, her guests completely ignored the Scottish dimension to this shattering statistic and concentrated entirely on Northern Ireland! QED.

It is clear, then, that Richard Leonard’s recent assertion that there is no Scotland v England aspect to the constitutional “bourach”, both international and intra-national we find ourselves in, is simply not true.

The English, it seems, only care about reclaiming a fantasy Eden when “we” stood alone as “the greatest country in the world”... Good luck with that. We just want our country back.

DAVID ROCHE Isla Road, Perth