I QUESTION whether it’s worthwhile spending so much effort to get shot of B Johnson. As far as most folk are concerned, he is banged to rights along with the rest of the charlatans that make up the Tory government at Westminster. Either he goes, in which case another malign influence will take his place, or he doesn’t, proving that the Tories are even more reprehensible than we imagine.

Therefore, rather than repeating exhortations for Johnson to go, I’d prefer if Ian Blackford used PMQs to lay about the woeful performance of the Tory government. He would have a rich choice of subject matter – child poverty rates, increasing levels of inequality, the undermining of the NHS (setting it up for further privatisation), the hollowness of Global Britain (viz Afghanistan, Yemen, Gaza), the treatment of asylums seekers, poor productivity rates, nuclear arms expansion, and of course Brexit. Or what about the reckless use of public money? Take your pick from £4.3bn to £29bn in fraudulent loans.

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Wouldn’t it be nice to have an audited account of how the £37bn was spent on Track & Trace, and what value that resulted in combating Covid? How much did the private sector gain from this? To put this amount in context, the £700m bid for wind farm leases in Scottish waters is less than 2% of that amount.

At the same time, the Tory claims about comparable vaccinations rates and levels of economic performance should be corrected once and for all (it’s all the Tories have, and it doesn’t stand up to examination).

We should be foreseeing what arguments the Unionist parties will try to set up against Scottish independence, and attack them relentlessly now, so that by the time a campaign starts their credibility has already been undermined.

A shift in focus now, please, SNP.

Roddie Macpherson
Avoch

IT’S another groundhog day scenario. No Scottish Tories available for BBC Good Morning Scotland on Tuesday – they are back in hiding. It is the usual Tory way: obfuscation, deny, lie, and if all else fails, buy time – use the Gray enquiry as a shield or hide in a fridge.

Now we have Boris’s birthday bash – three months after he wrote a letter praising Josephine, a seven-year-old girl who cancelled her birthday party to keep in line with the Covid regulations. He certainly did not respond by telling her she could invite her friends for birthday cake and be with them for 10 minutes – and we only have his word that he was there for 10 minutes. His word is not worth much because then in the evening he proceeded with another birthday bash in his flat at 10 Downing Street, though he says they were outside. But people were fined for having three people in their garden during this period.

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This has gone on long enough – he obviously still cannot persuade enough people to back him or he would not need even more time to “influence” what people think or will do. What on earth will it take for Tory MPs to realise that Boris is not fit for office and should never have been there in the first place?

Winifred McCartney
Paisley

TO justify the infamous birthday party it has been claimed Boris was “ambushed by a cake”. What a crumby excuse – the sooner he’s scone the better!

Bill Drew
Kirriemuir

AM I the only reader that finds the column by Alba Party’s Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh tiresome and anti-independence in feel?

It would appear that Alex Salmond’s SNP government could do nothing wrong while the SNP government led by Nicola Sturgeon can do little right, according to Tasmina.

At a time when the most corrupt Tory government, led by a proven liar, is devastating lives and businesses in Scotland, she prefers to attack the performance of the SNP government.

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Has it escaped her notice that the Scottish Government has already spent around £600 million offsetting Tory cuts?

Her big idea is a continuing freeze on council tax, but she neglects to say how much that would cost the Scottish Government and what areas should be cut to facilitate this policy.

If her outlook and attitude is representative of the Alba Party, it is hardly surprising that they are polling at around 1%. While there are many genuinely committed independence supporters in Alba, the party itself is a distraction that will only give succour to opponents of independence.

David Howie
Dunblane

IT is not the Scottish Government’s report that the English Covid infection rate “is over 20% higher than that in Scotland” that is “seriously twisted”, as stated by Willie Rennie, it is Willie’s ability with simple calculations that is twisted, or maybe non-existent (‘Twisted’ stats claim rejected by watchdog, Jan 25).

Last Saturday, an Edinburgh newspaper not known for its sympathy towards the cause of Scottish independence devoted most of a page and a banner headline to this story. The Office of National Statistics had reported the English and Scottish infection rates as 5.47% and 4.49% respectively. The author of the item then stated: “The English figure can be calculated to be 21.83% higher than Scotland”, implying some sleight of hand in the calculation maybe?

READ MORE: Willie Rennie's claim Nicola Sturgeon 'twisted' Covid stats is rubbished by watchdog

Well, no, 5.47 is indeed 21.83% higher than 4.49. But the massive calculating engine within Willie’s head took 4.49% away from 5.47% and got “0.98% between the two numbers”! So Willie obviously took it from that that the difference between the English and Scottish rates was less than 1% and on that basis reported Nicola Sturgeon to the UK Statistics Authority!

Better get back on your oversize deckchair, Willie, and hae a wee lie doon.

Ken Gow
Banchory