Letters II: Elation after Ewing’s victory will, for me, never be surpassed

the SNP’s wonder of Westminster, The National, June 6) was very much appreciated.

I am sure the SNP understand just how important that success was and are making arrangements to mark the 50th anniversary on Thursday, November 2, this year.

If I live another 50 years, I will not know a better day.

My abiding memory is of the courage and dedication of the activists of the SNP of those days, who faced a mountainous climb to reach even the foothills of political relevance.

Most of those who were engaged with us in that campaign have now left us but some tangible memorial to remember them all would be very appropriate in Hamilton and we could surely get something together.

I remember the “pitiless rain” on the night as Hamish described it, as a huge bedraggled crowd gathered in the yard of St John’s Grammar for the count.

We hoped beyond hope. We had a hint. A campaign that had started at 1/16 against Winnie with the bookies has gone in to 7/2.

A Labour firebrand called Jim Sillars had come up from Ayrshire to help and told the local Labour Party they were losing the election. Oh, how they laughed.

We knew this because in those days we had a perfectly pleasant relationship with the Labour activists. We were no threat to Labour dominance. At the count in Hamilton I saw the first signs of that changing, sadly.

But when I went out on to the balcony from the count to wave my tie to the huge crowd below (a pre-arranged signal) the scene was set for a night-long celebration at the Zambesi Hotel on Burnbank Road and car cavalcades keeping the residents on the town awake all night.

When you talked to folk in the street the next day you could find nobody who had not voted for Winnie Ewing!

Sadly I missed the journey to London. I had a class to take at John Ogilvie High so it was home for breakfast and straight to work. I can’t remember if I managed to stay awake.
Dave McEwan Hill
Argyll

HAMISH MacPherson in his article on the victory in Hamilton states: “The SNP even then felt they were not ready to win”. Nobody told us!

In an aside to George Leslie on the day, John McAteer, the election agent and main driving force behind the by-election victory, said that we would win. Larkhall branch had organised a victory ball and it had sold out.

Our canvas results and feedback all pointed to a victory. As regards the Daily Record, the Labour candidate had made several disparaging remarks about their coverage, all of which we gleefully made sure the paper was aware.

The result may have been a shock to the world at large but to us it was expected.

Larkhall and Blantyre are never mentioned in any reports but it was there, inspired by John, that the victory was formed.
Iain M Fergusson
SNP constituency secretary and Larkhall branch organiser, November 1967

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Does Fry want to take more money from poor?

IN his column, Michael Fry claims that enormous sums are squandered on the welfare state and favours the introduction of a Universal Basic Income as now being run or planned in Finland, Alaska, Ontario and Namibia (Michael Fry: Despite the SNP’s blind spots, they are the best hope for our economy, The National, June 6).

A citizen’s income scheme was trialled from 2007 to 2009 in Namibia. It was a donor-funded project giving each man, woman and child about $12 a month to help tackle malnutrition. The Namibian government did not extend the experiment.

In Alaska, people get around $1100 dollars each year from oil taxation via the Alaska Permanent Fund – only a fraction of an adequate basic income. In the Finnish two-year pilot scheme 2000 unemployed people are receiving 560 euros a month, which is deducted from any other state benefits they are receiving, The Canadian province of Ontario is still consulting interest groups on the introduction of a local basic income pilot.

An all-party Westminster committee concluded on April 27 that the cost of introducing an universal citizen’s income scheme, at a level that would be beneficial for the poor, would be prohibitive.

Michael Fry obviously believes that the £7 billion welfare cuts planned by the Toryocialists in the next Parliament are not sufficient and there needs to be a bigger transfer of funds from the poor.
Colin Darroch
Kinross

IN light of revelations that, during the time Theresa May was Home Secretary, control orders on suspected jihadists were suspended to allow them to participate in near and Middle East armed conflicts where they were trained in terror techniques, does this give us an insight into the current trait of incisive “strong and stable” leadership? It seems to have been government practice from the 18th century to the current day to arm groups it is thought might do our fighting for us.

When will the lesson be learnt that these weapons are subsequently turned and used against us. Never pick a snake up by the tail to bite your enemy: its venom can’t be controlled from there. When will politicians wake up and smell the coffee before it boils over and scalds us even more than it has in London and Manchester?
Brian Rattray
Edinburgh

IT is obvious that Theresa May does not like to answer political questions and prefers to stick to short phrases which she can repeat time after time. However, like most people in the UK, I am concerned about terrorist murders and would like her to answer some questions on that subject: What does May know about the so-called Manchester Boys, a group of Al-Qaeda inspired jihadists based in the city? The were well known to MI5 and MI6, who appear to have been happy to allow them to fly frequently between Manchester and the Middle East.

Were Salman Abedi, the Manchester Arena bomber, and his family part of this group? Was it known to MI5 and MI6 that members of the group were involved in illegal acts of violence in other countries? Did May think there was no risk to the general public in Manchester from these people?

Did she think the risk to the UK public was acceptable?

No doubt she will say she can’t answer these questions because such matters are “state secrets”. But since the answers to these questions are now well known all over the world, surely she can tell the British people.
Andy Anderson
Dunoon

NOW that the identity of the third London Bridge attacker has been revealed, we know three of the five men involved in recent UK attacks were known to the security services and one had convictions for violence yet the system did not rate them as high risk. Perhaps this type of attack will never be predictable but the present surveillance system is not protecting the public.

Perhaps I am being cynical in suggesting that if our high-ranking politicians were wholly dependent on the intelligence services for their protection without their rings of steel, we would see the development of a better system given much higher priority.
John Jamieson
South Queensferry

I COULDN’T agree more with Andrew McCrae’s letter (June 6) about his concern that some Scottish voters may be about to hand over tax revenue from the new oil and gas discoveries west of Shetland to the UK parties.

Just one omission, though – when the oil does run out, we will very quickly be given our independence.
Norman Henderson
Clydebank