Readers Letters: UK's skills gap must be plugged if economy is to grow

Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall has announced a range of measures including localised up-skilling and a guarantee for young people aged 18-21 of work or training. It’s unclear whether these will go far enough to plug the skills gap currently mitigated by near record net migration.

I remember the 1979 Tory election slogan “Labour isn’t working”. If the new government is not to fall into the same trap it needs to ensure employees are properly incentivised back to work. With nearly 40 per cent of public spending going on welfare and pensions the Government literally can’t afford to have a quarter of the potential workforce not working.

There is strong evidence to suggest working improves mental health and the increased tax receipts will help fund public services like the NHS which are on their knees.

Neil Anderson, Edinburgh

Scotland hobbled

Without repeating all the reasons, such as better public services and lower council tax bills than in the rest of the UK, higher income tax in Scotland has resulted in a higher standard of living, but only half of that enjoyed by our independent neighbours in Ireland and Scandinavia. Also, the latest National Records of Scotland figures show that 12,500 more people moved to Scotland from the rest of the UK than left in the most recent year, and this net immigration was across all tax bands.

The main problem for businesses is the lack of skilled workers. which will hamper ambitious housebuilding plans or growing the economy, a situation exacerbated by Brexit, which the new UK government supports, while U-turning on a dedicated Scottish Visa scheme.

In another success story for the Scottish Government's overseas offices, Scotland’s increased foreign direct investment in 2023 was double that the rest of the UK, with an increase of 13 per cent on the previous year, yet the new Labour government wants to pass control of these offices to The Secretary of State to further undermine Holyrood’s powers.

Scotland is a net exporter of energy, and this week the CEO of Octopus Energy claimed that we could experience periods of free electricity if Ofgem modified its regulations to better utilise renewable energy. If the Labour government was serious about fuel poverty it would nationalise the privately run National Grid that has failed to invest in proper infrastructure and hindered Scotland’s vast cheap renewable energy potential. Labour’s much-heralded GB Energy company is just another PFI scheme and the omens aren’t good when new Scottish Secretary Ian Murray refused to say that Labour wouldn’t impose expensive nuclear power stations on Scotland against the wishes of our Scottish Parliament.

Mary Thomas, Edinburgh

Will of the people

In her farewell article Laura Waddell attempts to portray the election result in Scotland as mainly an anti-Tory vote, with the desire to “give the flagging SNP a boot up the bum” relegated to second place (Perspective, 11 July).

A somewhat curious position to take, given that many separatist politicians maintained that this democratic event would be a “de facto referendum” on the constitutional question? Had there not been a single surviving Scottish Nationalist MP, Ms Waddell would no doubt have deployed the same excuse. Nor can she resist mentioning Brexit, even when this doesn’t appear to have been of much interest to voters on the doorstep.

Desperately referring to Holyrood's unpopular Gender Recognition Bill, our new Prime Minister is described as showing “the same authoritarian willingness to ride roughshod over devolved democracy”. It’s apparently irrelevant that a majority of “the people of Scotland” opposed this legislation and that Westminster was (ironically) safeguarding their right to single-sex spaces through Section 35.

Trident also features on the grievance list, despite a 2022 Survation poll finding that 58 per cent of Scots support the nuclear deterrent. In reaction to Labour’s victory north of the Border, Ms Waddell can’t refrain from wheeling out the “branch office” jibe from the SNP playbook. This shows little respect for democracy or the will of “the people of Scotland”, sadly.

All the best to Laura Waddell as she moves on to pastures new.

Martin O’Gorman, Edinburgh

Poor show

The winning of only nine seats at Westminster in the General Election has been devastating for the SNP. John Swinney can only look on in horror at the growing numbers of SNP supporters calling for him to stand down and he apparently doesn't know what to do about it. His strategy of blaming Westminster for all of Scotland's woes has spectacularly failed.

Gone are the halcyon days when we witnessed Ian Blackford strutting up and down on the floor of the Commons, beguiling his audience with his wit and wisdom. In my younger days I vaguely remember the then celebrated pianist Winifred Atwell having a missive hit with a tune called “Poor John” aka “The Poor People of Paris”. Now we have the poor people of Scotland brought about by a very poor John Swinney and his predecessors!

Bob MacDougall, Kippen, Stirlingshire

Damning words

The welcome post-election statement from nationalist grandee Jim Sillars will knock the stuffing completely out of the SNP, its present and past leadership, and rightly so.

Pro-Union supporters have been proved right in condemnation of a failed regime under “Stalin’s little sister”. Sillars went on: “...the movement lost its common sense in government... while the real priorities of the people such as education, housing, NHS, infrastructure, were notable only for the staggering level of incompetence with which they were dealt with.”

This is the factual verdict on the Sturgeon/Yousaf/Swinney reign – politics used as a plaything by underqualified, self-obsessed, over-remunerated failures. But, there will be disciples who will have none of Sillar’s criticism, totally duped by master illusionists.

Douglas Cowe, Kingseat, Aberdeenshire

NHS origins

Clement Attlee was not charismatic. Even so, there is general agreement that his achievements as prime minister were outstanding. Leah Gunn Barrett suggests (Letters, 10 July) that we copy his policy of massive government spending to solve today's problems.

But it wasn't his policy. Attlee's time was one of austerity. Bread rationing came in. So it is not the case, as Ms Barrett suggests, that the spending taps were opened. Neither did they have to be opened to get the NHS going, because it wasn't, as she claims, created from scratch. It built on and reformed large parts of the healthcare system that had been publicly funded since the 19th century.

I declare an interest. When I was a medical student I worked in two giant psychiatric hospitals. Funded from the rates, when the NHS was established institutions of that kind had three times more beds than all acute hospitals taken together.

And as for Ms Barrett's penultimate claim, that the UK speedily paid off its Second World War debts, the last Lend-Lease debt to the US was indeed paid by a Labour Government.

The final reimbursement was made on 29 December 2006, by Tony Blair.

Hugh Pennington, Aberdeen

Dead duck

John Swinney is in the firing line following the disaster for the SNP last week. Will changing the leader help? Undoubtedly not, for the simple reason that it is not the personalities in the SNP that are causing the problems, it is the policies.

None are working. Scots face two more years of SNP mismanagement before the next Holyrood election. Few can expect an SNP bounceback, then, given that if the party has not fixed the problems after 17 years, two more are superfluous. All the SNP will achieve is to make its defeat in 2026 even more resounding.

Gerald Edwards, Glasgow

Love knowledge

Further to the letter (10 July) citing lack of cricket coverage being a contributory factor in the Holger Rune story, may I also add that Novak Djokovic and the BBC tennis team should also brush up on their golf knowledge? It is well known to us golf fans that Matt Kuchar is not being booed, but supported, with shouts of "Kooooch".

Elizabeth Towns, Edinburgh

Narrow minded

I have had to contact my local MSP as a matter of urgency. I notice with dread that in the extremely unlikely event of England winning Euro 24, some new MPs are demanding a national holiday.

Well, fine if these pompous, narrow-minded fans want to do that in their country, then get on with it, but leave us be please!

I have asked my MSP to table an immediate motion in this unlikely event, that Scotland should declare a National Day of Mourning accordingly!

For goodness sake, in the last week you would think the Ukraine war had stopped and there was no general election.

If you do win, then keep your BBC and keep your celebrations off the Scottish television please!

David M Coutts, Edinburgh

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