IN the light of last week’s shenanigans at Westminster let’s hope the SNP’s inertia on the independence question comes to a quick end. In the recent past it has had many opportunities to wound a corrupt political system but to my mind has failed to show enough of a killer instinct. Now that it has the ball at its foot again it should start kicking it, preferably with size ten tackity buits.

The SNP’s inertia reminds me of that of the French Communist Party in Paris 1968 which, to its shame, refused to align itself with the workers’/student movement. Tactically, it claimed to know best, that the outburst of politics from below was a misguided, romantic adventure; something which strikes me as similar to the SNP’s distancing itself from the enthusiasm of the AUOB marches.

READ MORE: Pete Wishart lodges formal complaint with police over Tory cash for honours scandal

We should remember what happened to the French Communist Party as a result of top-down bureaucratic disdain for its mass support. It suffered a terminal decline, ending up in the dustbin of history.

Now is a perfect time for the SNP to show leadership and to put fresh heart into the movement. It should never forget that the lifeblood of politics springs from below.

Alastair Mcleish
Edinburgh

ON return from marching with 100,000 others on Saturday, my friend in the US emailed me showing a photo in the New York Times of the march. Her words were – I know you were in there, Scotland gives hope, keep marching my friend.

I shall keep marching as long as my elderly body allows. I did and do feel heartened by the youth that marched and were so joyous to be there – probably making history.

READ MORE: Boris Johnson slammed as 'tin pot dictator' as he skips debate

One flaw! AUOB had asked that the chant for the march be “What do we want – independence / When do we want it – now.” I was happy to join in this chant but it didn’t happen. Instead there was the usual cry for wanting the Tories out. I am maybe not alone in finding this chant offensive. When the referendum vote comes we will need every vote to count. Those of Conservative voters will count as much as any other. We will all be in it together regardless of creed, colour and politics. Why alienate any potential vote for Yes? That is a narrow approach.

Readers may not believe it but I have amongst friends and family Conservative voters who want Scotland to be independent. They find the chant as offensive as I do.

If we are to be an open and welcoming sovereign nation, let’s start now. Stop this horrible chant, AUOB – it does no service to the cause of independence for Scotland, a welcoming and multifaceted nation.

Frieda Burns
Stonehaven

ARE these Insulate Britain, Extinction Rebellion-type people really so annoyingly crazy? Or do they have a point we should listen to? This past week as the weather has turned colder I’ve been glad of how – as we get older – our Victorian house has become warmer in the past few years.

Here in Scotland we lie next to the Nordic arc – yet our homes are reckoned inadequate in comparison to Scandinavia’s. The room in the north-facing corner of our house was always so cold that one either shivered or let the whole central heating system be on for longer than the rest of the house required. (Unfortunately, cavity wall filling doesn’t work in such lathe-and-plaster houses.)

READ MORE: Barack Obama delivers major speech to COP26 climate summit in Glasgow

When learnt about using a lining roll on the walls called Wallrock made in Erfurt, we decided to try it – and were amazed at the difference it made. Certainly it costs more than just mere papering – but for the saving of a holiday (plus the saving of flights overheating the planet!) you then have years of cosier living.

Much as I doubt if I’d have the courage now at my age to glue myself to the pavement (and in Arbroath they’d just think I was mad – though Angus Council has just added external wall insulation to the council houses near me) these Insulate Britain people do have a relevant point to make, as my cosier house can verify.

Catriona de Voil
Arbroath

IT was intriguing, but not unexpected, to note that all of Boris Johnson’s new post-Brexit trade deals put together will have an economic benefit of just £3 to £7 per person over the next 15 years, according to the government’s own figures.

Analysis by top academics at the University of Sussex UK Trade Policy Observatory have highlighted that the tiny economic boost – amounting to just 0.01-0.02% of GDP, and less than 50p per person a year – is dwarfed by the economic hit from leaving the EU, which the government estimates at 4% of GDP over the same period. It suggests that the much-trumpeted free trade agreements “barely scratch the surface of the UK’s challenge to make up the GDP lost by leaving the EU”.

READ MORE: Irish foreign minister warns EU could ditch entire Brexit deal

Mr Johnson has boasted of the deals creating a “new dawn” and representing “global Britain at its best” – but just two of the dozens announced since the UK left the EU are expected to have any measurable economic impact at all.

Official estimates from the Office for Budget Responsibility point to a Brexit loss of more than £1,250 per person over the coming years – more than 178 times the most optimistic prediction for the benefits from the trade deals.

The dream of a so-called “Brexit dividend” has turned into the economic nightmare about which many of us have been warning for years.

Alex Orr
Edinburgh

I AM absolutely delighted about the proposal of erecting a statue to Elsie Inglis in her native city of Edinburgh. It is of course long overdue considering she passed away in 1917. Born in the maternity hospital named for her more years ago than I care to mention, her very name was synonymous with my formative years.

Roderick MacSween
Stornoway