AS someone with both professional and personal experience of the benefits system, I wholeheartedly welcome the decision by the Scottish Government to try to reform attitudes by addressing the terminology used regarding benefits. (Welfare shake-up: ‘payments’ may replace ‘benefits’, The National, July 30).

One of the most toxic terms surely has to be “welfare” itself. When used on its own as a synonym for social security, it’s a stigma-laden import from the US, one that has been deliberately used to demonise unemployed, sick and disabled people and encourage a “them and us” attitude in order to justify an ideologically-driven erosion of the social safety net.

The Scottish Government appears to recognise the necessity and value of restoring the language of social security. Jeane Freeman states that: “We have deliberately talked about ‘social security’ instead of just ‘welfare’. We need to recognise that social security is potentially for everyone.”

I would go further than this: social security is for everyone – having a robust safety net is essential for society and it impacts on everyone if we don’t have one, hence the term “social security”! Even if we were to ignore the appalling human and social costs of our increasingly punitive, precarious and downright cruel benefits system, the cuts and so-called “welfare reforms” have impacts on the NHS, social services, the criminal justice system, etc etc, and end up costing the public purse considerably more.

Social security not only benefits individuals and society as a whole, it also makes sound economic sense. The social security powers being devolved to Holyrood may only be limited, but let’s start as we mean to go on: the stigmatising and divisive language of “welfare” should have no place in an enlightened, progressive, independent Scotland.

Mo Maclean, Glasgow

THE indyref2 movement has to start mobilising now as there are just over two years until Scotland is dragged out of the EU against the wishes of the majority in Scotland. We may not have time for the opinion polls to tell us that 60 per cent of the population would vote for independence. Leading up to the 2014 referendum support for independence started from between 30 to 35 per cent and with a well organised and highly motivated Yes movement carrying a positive message over a relentlessly negative No campaign which was supported by the full weight of the British establishment and press, we brought that number up to 45 per cent. A remarkable achievement.

The support for independence will start from a much better place next time around and the lessons that needed to be learned from before (e.g. the currency issue) I am sure will be. With independence inside the EU Scotland has a huge opportunity to develop and grow our economy, not least in the financial sector. Our financial centres in Edinburgh and Glasgow will be able to attract investment as Scotland will be the only part of the UK which will have unfettered access to the EU. Similarly foreign technology companies and manufacturers may see Scotland as an ideal place to set up new business given our countries world-class universities, good infrastructure and full access to the EU single market. Investment that would otherwise have been located in other parts of the UK may well now end up in Scotland as the only EU member state in the UK.

And there’s more positive news for Scotland as an independent country within the EU whereby we will not be paying for hugely expensive infrastructure projects in England, for example the London Crossrail Link, and HS2 which Scotland gains no benefit from at all and the London economy gains massively. This investment can be re-directed into infrastructure projects in Scotland instead, growing our own economy and creating employment, and of course we can also get rid of Trident and the cost of maintaining that monstrosity too. The EU gave Nicola Sturgeon on her visit to Brussels after the Brexit vote a very warm welcome and we can build on that response.

The positive impact of Scotland as an independent nation within the EU far out weighs anything the UK Government will negotiate for us, their priorities lie in the City of London, not the Scottish fishing industry which can be used as a bargaining chip to get the concessions they want for the City. However we need to start getting the positive messages across quickly while the momentum is with us and I for one am more confident than ever we can turn the result around this time. 55 per cent Yes, 45 per cent No would do it.

Kenny McGhie, Clarkston

I MUST agree with your correspondent John P Ross’s comments on middle-class attitudes to family problems (Letters, The National, July 30).

I was for a few years in the distant past a member of the Children’s Panel and came up against the same problem. In too many occurrences it was difficult to get to the core of the problem because of parental actions, their aim being to stifle enquiries in attempts to preserve the veneer of respectability under which they lived.

Judging by the comments of many of those opposed to the named person policy, the same motivation is apparent. Put simply it amounts to saying that they’re scared that the “ideal family” image presented to the public by them is being questioned, and that hurts.The unwillingness of others to take them at face value is the real reason for the objections.

Drew Reid, Falkirk

IS FOOTBALL more important than “the news”? Recently I tried as usual to listen to Radio Scotland News at 5pm on digital radio and instead was treated to “the ball curling into the net”. I’ve nothing against either Celtic FC or Astana FC, but the BBC’s claim that “many listeners would have been disappointed” if the game was broadcast elsewhere suggests that the disaster in Syria, the ramifications of Brexit etc, are all somehow less important. Is this how our priorities lie nowadays?

Derek Ball, Bearsden

THOUGH this happened some days ago now, I have wondered since what it says about the priorities of those who programme our news. My teenage granddaughter and I were both watching the news. The order of the stories were as follows: the nine people killed in Munich, some football news, some cricket news and then – a brief mention of the 80 people and countless wounded in an attack in Afghanistan claimed by Daesh. We were stunned. Not only was sport given precedence over 80 souls, it was as if their deaths were only a tenth as significant of those in Munich.

Morgana Green, Wormit

Letters II: The House of Lords has a key function that helps make better laws