Readers’ letters: Get the Commonwealth Games back on track

I see that the the chief executive of Glasgow 2026 has suggested that this year’s Games could be a template for future Games (your report, 3 August). I sincerely hope not. For financial reasons, this year’s Games were much scaled down with the unfortunate exclusion of many events, including the marathon, the most classic sporting event of all-time. I am pleased to note that, for the 2030 Games, India plans to have a full programme of events and I hope that will continue.

The Commonwealth Games (formerly the Empire Games) have been going for nearly a century but it is notable that, on only three occasions, have the Games been held outwith the UK, Australasia and Canada. Under the present set-up the poorer countries in the Commonwealth have little or no opportunity of hosting the Games.

It is an absolute disgrace that no African country has ever been selected to host the Games, despite the fact that there are no fewer than 21 African countries in the Commonwealth.

The CGF should consider the possibility of a common fund whereby all members of the Commonwealth would contribute according to their means and the common fund could be used to enable some of the poorer countries to host the Games.

To set the ball rolling, the fund could be started with a generous contribution from the CGF Patron and Head of the Commonwealth, who also happens to be the King. After all, the Windsors are one of the richest families in the world and it would set a good example if they were to make an effort to turn the former Empire into a genuine Commonwealth of Nations.

Dennis Canavan, Bannockburn, Falkirk

Look to ourselves

Congratulations should be given to Glasgow after stepping in to host the Commonwealth Games and making them such a success with only a few months left to organise the whole package. The venues were excellent and the organisation flawless.

But what about the Commonwealth itself? Is it about to crumble into dust, as it is only held together by the Games and the Royal Family. The two largest countries – Canada and Australia – are Commonwealth members in name only and the rest only look out for any trade etc that is coming their way.

The UK is not the country it used to be, and we should now release these countries from the “not as it was Commonwealth”, and look after ourselves in an international world that is changing every year.

James Macintyre, Linlithgow, West Lothian

False congruence

Tim Hopkins (Letters, 4 August) draws a parallel between his experience as a gay teenager more than 50 years ago and the current affirmation of gender identity in young people. The comparison does not hold.

Sexual orientation is a matter of attraction. It does not require the denial of biological sex or the medical alteration of a healthy body. Gender identity ideology, by contrast, often leads to puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgery – interventions with serious, lifelong consequences. Gay people of Hopkins’ generation were not offered experimental drugs that halted their natural development. Today’s gender-distressed children frequently are.

Hopkins also sidesteps the actual subject of Jenny Lindsay’s article: the ethics of running a new trial of puberty blockers on children aged 11 to 16. The evidence base for these drugs remains weak, as the Cass Review made clear. Continuing to experiment on distressed young people while claiming it is simply “recognition” and “fairness” is an evasion.

Having largely ignored the central argument of Jenny Lindsay’s article – the ethics of experimenting on children with puberty blockers – Mr Hopkins’s defence rests on equating homosexuality with the claim to be the opposite sex. This is a false congruence. Ironically, it echoes an older, reductive trope that many gay men of his generation spent years rejecting: the idea that same-sex attraction was essentially a form of gender inversion or cross-dressing. Conflating the two does no service to either group, and least of all to distressed children.

Alan McKissock, Gourock, Inverclyde

Misogyny card

Many of us women have encountered misogyny, in our working life and in other contexts, which experience enables us to distinguish between the real thing and any attempt to use an accusation of misogyny to deflect an interlocutor. In recent months, we have seen two notorious examples of the fake misogyny tactic, both from female politicians. Now we are confronted by Monica Lennon’s claim that there is a campaign within the Labour Party to keep women, including herself, from gaining a place on the leadership short list (your report, 3 August).

First, cabinet secretary Mairi McAllan accused Russell Findlay of misogyny on Question Time when he asked her whether John Swinney was the only party leader not to participate in that debate because he feared having to answer questions about oil and gas. Her irrelevant reply was: “Why do you have such a problem with women being represented in politics?”

Secondly, when Nicola Sturgeon was interviewed about what she knew about Peter Murrell’s criminal activities she became furious and claimed that, when a man does something wrong, people often look to “blame a woman”.

Speaking as a voter and a woman, I would like to see Labour elect as leader the candidate best qualified for the job, regardless of sex. The burning question is: who has the ability, talent, personality, stamina for the job? Some will have a deal breaker of one kind or another. For me, the successful candidate must accept the inalienable biological truth that the human race is divided into two: male and female, and that males cannot become females and vice-versa. We cannot have as potential first minister someone who believes in “gender” voodoo.

Is Ms Lennon sufficiently qualified? I do not know. If others are better qualified, let the leader be one of them. Whether male or female.

Jilll Stephenson, Edinburgh

Breast is best

Susan Dalgetty’s piece about trans women “chestfeeding” babies (Scotsman, 1 August), filled me with dismay. As a, retired midwife of more than 40 years, I did my best to support women to breastfeed. When it went well, it was an absolute dream, but many women experienced problems, at least initially.

These resilient women pushed on through the exhaustion from however long their labours were, the pain of stitches from C sections or other interventions. Feeding their babies sometimes once or twice hourly, sometimes through engorged, sore, cracked and bleeding nipples, mastitis, after pains, thrush infection etc. They pushed on through for as long as they could, because they considered it the best for their babies. Then I read about trans women using public money and NHS resources to “chestfeed” in order to validate their beliefs – it’s done purely to satisfy their own wants or to make a point. It’s certainly not for the benefit of the baby.

It saddens me to say that it smacks of male privilege and male entitlement (contrast this to the now well documented issue of women’s genuine health concerns not being taken seriously by the medical establishment).

Rona McCall, Gairloch, Highland

Spread the wealth

Jane Meagher, Edinburgh Councl leader, claims all parts of the city will feel benefits from the £100m visitor levy (Scotsman, 4 August).

The article includes every single word required for a full house in virtue signalling bingo yet fails to convince me that the additional money will be well spent.

As an alternative, can I suggest that at the end of the financial year the sum raised is simply returned to every council tax-payer in Edinburgh as a reduction in their 2027/28 bill and every year thereafter, with the option to decline the amount if they wish. This will definitely benefit the council tax-payers of Edinburgh.

K Harvey, Edinburgh

Nuclear unreliable

Two comments in response to Marjorie Ellis Thompson’s letter (1 August) caught my eye. Firstly, Martin O’Gorman talks of the “dismemberment” of a country by secessionist groups (4 August). But Scotland is not being dismembered. It would be the union of which it forms a part that would cease to exist.

He then states that the lack of nuclear weapons led to the invasion of Ukraine. In this he is joined by Brian Barbour, who argues that the possession of nuclear weapons stops invasions. But the fact that the UK possessed nuclear weapons didn’t stop the Argentines from invading British sovereign territory when they landed troops in the Falklands in 1982. The military regime knew that Mrs Thatcher would be unable to use our “independent” deterrent because the US would not let her.

As for the reliability of nuclear power, last week France had to shut down two nuclear plants because the cooling water was too warm thanks to climate change. This week it was Hungary and Romania's turn whilst Serbia had to shut down a coal-fired station due to a lack of water in the Danube. Indeed, water shortages in the future may impact hydro schemes leaving wave or tidal power as the only reliable large-scale options.

Robert Menzies, Falkirk

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