Readers' Letters: Short memory over JK Rowling remarks 'designed to offend'

In a briefing urging MSPs to reject this, they claimed that providing this protection would “fundamentally undermine trans people’s long established Convention right to be legally recognised in their transitioned gender” and lead to “open season” on trans people. This contributed to the ongoing confusion and anxiety about what can safely be said here, deliberately engineered by groups like Equality Network, who have encouraged people to report stickers with dictionary definitions as hate crimes.

Had the Scottish Government made it explicit either in the Act or in guidance (promised discussions on which with ourselves and others were pulled, to avoid upsetting activists like Mr Hopkins), no one, including Ms Rowling, would have felt the need to establish now whether naming the reality of sex was likely to trigger a police investigation.

That she was compelled to take this step was largely due to the past actions of organisations like Equality Network and their attempts to shut the door on debate.

Susan Smith, Director, For Women Scotland, Edinburgh

​Talent spread thinly

An interesting editorial on the faults of Holyrood (4 April), one of which mentioned being the quality of elected representative.

This was predictable, because, if you have more legislatures, then whatever talent there is, gets spread thinner. Perhaps linked to that, is the lack of wisdom in the place!

William Ballantine, Bo'ness, West Lothian

Too many MPs

Old adages are rarely wrong and the case of the MP William Wragg is proof that the devil finds work for idle hands.

Which gives me another chance to shout that we have far too many politicians with nothing to do. Oh I'm sure some of them work some of the time but what exactly do backbenchers get up to except jaw their time away on irrelevances.

If in the upcoming elections some “brave” candidates stood on a single issue of demanding a huge reduction in numbers in the Commons and Lords and devolved chambers I do believe their election would be a given. This is a great opportunity for some Tories – they're going to be trounced so they can do something worthwhile and get back into their seat.

Stan Hogarth, Strathaven, South Lanarkshire

University funding

I came to Scotland from England via the United States to take up a job at the Institute of Virology in Glasgow. Its lavish funding by the London-based Medical Research Council perpetuated a tradition of funds coming from England to support intellectual activities in Scotland, a tradition that goes back to the 17th century when, for example, Eton, Oxford and Cambridge sent money to Aberdeen to be spent on new university buildings, a tradition that continued well into the twentieth century, exemplified by the massive expansion of Scottish university campuses funded by the London-based University Grants Commission.

But a new tradition started when Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister – let us be hard on the universities. The SNP had continued it with vigour, adopting a European policy of freedom from fees but with government compensatory funding of unprecedented meanness, a policy characteristic that even applies to the number of Scottish students, which is capped for financial reasons.

John McLaren (Scotsman, 4 April) has simulated a debate about the reasons behind the relative unattractiveness of Scotland for migrants (David Sowden’s letter, 5 April). Why should anyone move to a place where the government is hammering the universities? However, poor standings in international rankings of educational outcomes and the failure to stop patients lying on trollies for hours in A&E probably carry more weight!

Hugh Pennington, Aberdeen

Where’s Humza?

Saturday 6 April 2024 will surely go down in the history of Scottish journalism as the day when the people of Scotland stood still, stunned and shaken to the core. The reason? That day's edition of the Scotsman had no, I repeat no, pictures of Humza Yousaf! Like a demented fan of Where’s Wally I searched through the pictures for hours again and again but to no avail. It will become a legendary collectors’ item.

Had Humza run out of photo opportunities? Had his army of PR advisors, paid for at great expense by the taxpayer, run out of ideas, lost interest, pulled a sickie or gone off on Easter holidays? I suspect we will never know.

Surely this is a resignation matter. The people of Scotland demand to know.

Fraser MacGregor, Edinburgh

Shut the gate

The picture of a gate on the Scotland-England border in Picture Gallery (Scotsman, 6 April) had me wondering if the notice on the gate said “will the last high earning taxpayer to leave Scotland please put out the lights”.

Paul Birrell, Linlightgow, West Lothian

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