ONE swallow does not a summer make, but Martin Geissler’s persistence on BBC Scotland’s Sunday Show perhaps began the long-overdue process of unmasking the fake face of Anas Sarwar.

Not daunted on this occasion by Sarwar’s usual obfuscation, Geissler pushed him to reveal whether his “family business” in which he supposedly has “no involvement” paid all its employees the living wage, which he states all Scottish businesses should pay.

Hopefully in the coming days other reporters and journalists at BBC Scotland, as well as in the rest of the Scottish mainstream media, will not allow themselves to be diverted and find the professional courage to complete the process of unmasking this sleekit political charlatan who fronts the UK Labour Party in Scotland.

READ MORE: Stephen Flynn calls out 'sleekit' Anas Sarwar as family firm fails to pay living wage

The statement of Wes Streeting (shadow health minister) that “all roads lead back to Westminster” gave the game away, so perhaps the next time he deviously attempts to conflate Westminster and Holyrood actions, Mr Sarwar could be asked about the Labour government’s dismal performance in Wales, where both the NHS and education are in dire straits. Or, perhaps he could be asked how Labour can be trusted on the economy given the horrendously expensive PFI schemes that the Labour government (under Blair/Brown) at Westminster encouraged and for which local councils – desperately short of funds the length and breadth of Scotland – are still paying dearly decades later.

The analysis by labour economist Professor Danny Blanchflower that there is a high 97% correlation between the growth rates of the economies of Scotland and the UK simply confirms that as long as Scotland remains bound to the “Union”, Scotland’s growth potential, and its potential to fund public spending priorities, is severely limited. This analysis begs the question of how a “Broken Brexit Britain” governed by “Sir” Keir Starmer’s Labour Party is going to pay for measures to end child poverty, restore public services, build massively more social housing and progress a “green transition” without funding previous commitments subsequently abandoned.

READ MORE: Workers at Anas Sarwar family firm paid real living wage, union insists

Until now, Mr Sarwar has been allowed to divert from almost every media question posed and to embark on a contrived series of soundbites which disingenuously avoid admission that the Scottish Government’s purse strings are controlled by Westminster, thus scurrilously absolving the Tory UK Government from responsibility for the catastrophic economic mismanagement that has had a damaging impact on all aspects of the lives of the people of Scotland.

Perhaps the real reason Mr Sarwar is “feart” for his shapeshifting boss to openly debate John Swinney, or Stephen Flynn, is that his duplicity and that of the Labour Party will finally be fully exposed over the extensive catalogue of Westminster failings for which Labour has no honest remedies.

Stan Grodynski
Longniddry, East Lothian

LAST week I was admitted to my local NHS hospital for some serious neck surgery. As the operation was expected to be complicated, I was processed soon after admission and there were about 40 other scheduled admissions that day. From the scheduling white board, I could see that most of those were due to be operated on within a few hours at most.

The hospital was, of course, busy but they had factored in a normal level of attendance at A&E and even then had planned to be within maximum capacity, to allow for unforeseen circumstances. This required all nursing staff to be on 12-hour shifts, and weekend working for doctors and consultants.

READ MORE: What is United Wholesale Scotland and how is it linked to Anas Sarwar?

Within that sort of regime, eliminating backlogs will take considerable time, without a very significant boost to resources – not expected in the foreseeable future – and meanwhile every hospitable will be having to set its own priorities in keeping with existing resources and available staff.

Morale in my hospital was really very good in the circumstances, despite the moaning minnies in Holyrood, and I have nothing but praise for the staff responsible for my care.

How do Douglas Ross, Anas Sarwar and their like, sleep at night, knowing that their excessively unfounded criticism of the state of Scotland’s NHS can only be harmful to NHS staff morale and consequently to the wellbeing of patients?

I would ask that the moaning minnies remember to qualify their criticisms and don’t tell downright porkies like “Scottish NHS is the worst performing in the UK” when it is the best-funded NHS in the UK, with the best-paid staff, and performs better than the rest in waiting times etc. Also, it is so obvious that the answer to capacity issues, exacerbated by austerity and Brexit, is a huge increase in the block grant, regularly being cut by the Barnett Formula, or independence now!

Alan Parker
via email

THE BBC’s misreporting continued during The Sunday Show on May 26 when Martin Geissler said that he had “two party leaders and a deputy leader” on the show, as neither the Labour Party leader, Sir Keir Starmer, nor the Conservative Party leader, Rishi Sunak, appeared. Instead we were treated to appearances by Douglas Ross and Anas Sarwar, who are at most the Scottish faces of the UK Tory and Labour parties.

This inaccurate introduction effectively demoted the deputy leader of the Scottish National Party, Keith Brown, to an inferior position compared to Douglas Ross and Anas Sarwar.

READ MORE: Keir Starmer refuses to rule out raising university tuition fees

It’s about time that the SNP officially issued reminders to the media that the “Scottish Conservative Party”, “Scottish Labour Party” and “Scottish Liberal Democrat Party” are not eligible to take part in the General Election on July 4 as none of these parties appear on the current Electoral Commission register of UK political parties and it is now too late to register a new political party.

John Jamieson
South Queensferry