IT has just been announced that £440 million is being made available to supply superfast broadband to remote areas by the end of 2017, with £18 million coming to Scotland – news greeted with many a wry smile by those living in the Western Highlands, aka the Dark Side of the Moon.
I had been with BT for more than 36 years before moving to outside Fort William two years ago, where the broadband was incredibly slow. I appealed to BT for help – and went from slow broadband to no broadband for three weeks. Service is via a subsea cable in operation since the Second World War, so superfast broadband is no more than a pipedream, though BT chairman, Sir Michael Rake, said last week that it was “a utility everyone should have.” I would settle for basic, reliable broadband and, after my connection was restored, that’s what I had – until about six months ago. That's when my connection suddenly started to go, sometimes for a weekend, or it would flicker off and on all day. At the same time the phone line crackled or went so faint that I couldn’t use it, all making it impossible to concentrate on my work as a writer.
Engineers came – nice, helpful people doing their best – and for a few days all would be well, but the old problems soon resurfaced. “It’s an intermittent fault,” one engineer said sadly. “The system is antiquated.” And like many others I have been paying for a full service on this antiquated system. 
Until the worm finally turned and I refused to pay the latest bill for the last three months of dire service.  BT’s tech people said I hadn’t been without broadband for a full day, despite weekends without it, so they didn’t see it as a problem. And another little comment – “We do not supply a no-faults service.” Really? So why don’t they put that in their advertising material when customers sign up?
I was offered all sorts of minor adjustments to the line rental in “full settlement” of my complaint, but they refuse to cut the bill for even half the months when the connection was hit-or-miss. If I accept I could, they say, “save £120-150 over the next 12 months.” My position is that the next 12 months shouldn’t be a problem and I will happily pay the full rate if that’s the case, but I don’t see why I should pay for the months when the service wasn’t delivered. As another BT customer said: “Why should I pay for lobster when I only get a sandwich?”
So now they will “restrict” my service – I will receive incoming calls and can make emergency calls – but they will cut off the broadband completely, meaning I won’t be able to work. And I must pay penalties to be re-connected, despite this being ruled out earlier in the dispute. Blackmail passes for customer care with BT, a situation Sir Michael Rake said this month he knew would have to improve.
I made several calls asking him for his opinion on whether this matter reflects good customer care but he refused to reply. 
Ross, Skye and Lochaber MP, Ian Blackwood (SNP), says there are more complaints about telecommunication problems in the area than about anything else, and only this week Ofcom reported that BT was the subject of the most complaints in 2016, with Plusnet and EE – both owned by BT – coming second and third. Is anyone surprised?
Meg Henderson
Lochaber

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May must win EU consent as a brutish Brexit is doomed to fail 

I WAS amused by the apposite words of Hugh MacDiarmid that you quoted (This ‘Brutish’ view of the pro-indy side in verse could not be much worse, The National December 22): Never call me British. I’ll tell you why.

It’s too near brutish, having only The difference between U and I.”

The words well sum up Theresa May’s dogmatic approach to Brexit.

The EU referendum mandate, though valid, is tenuous. Only 17.1 million of the UK population actively voted “leave”. For various reasons, 73 per cent did not. Post Brexit, the EU block, one way or another, will remain the UK’s largest trading counterpart.

A non-brutish approach both to the wider UK population and to the EU might therefore be a good idea. Instead, Mrs May is treating departure from the EU as a competitive game to be won or lost, as indicated by her continued use of the “cards close to chest” metaphor.

For a one-off game of poker, all that matters is the win-lose outcome. An enduring relationship matters not one iota. However, in Brexit, preservation of the long-term relationship is vital, both with non-Brexit voters and with the EU. That means May should be working towards consensual win-win, not win-lose outcomes.

Win-win, solution-based negotiations require the facts to be agreed, not disputed.

They also require open prioritisation of essentials and desirables, such as the relative importance of market access, movement of labour, etc, so that issues of high value to one party but low cost to the other can be identified and used as tradables. As well as openness and clarity, the process needs trust and the ability to wear the other party’s shoes.

These are accepted, fundamental principles of negotiation.

Worryingly, they are being totally ignored by Mrs May. Pursuing the brutish win-lose agenda of a hard Brexit rather than the consensual opportunities of a soft Brexit will do nothing but store up relationship issues that will come back to haunt us all.

There are also lessons for the journey to Scottish independence. A victory that alienates large sections of the population will be entirely pyrrhic.

Raymond Hunter
East Kilbride

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WHILE some letters (Letters, The National, December 22) rather sadly but predictably dodge the fundamental points I made the day before and instead raise a blizzard of red herrings over topics upon which I never touched, such as “a moderate opposition”, sarin and Saudi Arabia, etc, a news article in the very same edition (Iran implicated in mass killings and attacks on civilians in Syria) actually supports much of what I did write.

It is sad that some appear so rigidly self-assured about what is right for Syria based on their own dirigiste political views. I avoided any such prescription, only reiterating the principle of self-determination that I feel sure is well understood by all those who truly believe in Scottish independence, and thereby wish it no less for others. If the United Nations can help in societal repair in Syria without being shackled by any of the major powers, as has regrettably so often happened in the past, so much the better.

I must however take particular exception to the characterisation of myself by Andy Hurley as a “Better Together apologist” and “a typical Tory”. He is perhaps blissfully unaware of any contributions I have made elsewhere to the public debate over Scottish independence, which I wholeheartedly support, but there is nothing in what I have written here that justifies such wanton insults, and I ask him to withdraw them.

It merely sullies his case to attempt to chivvy someone about independence on the grounds that they do not chime with every iota of his own worldview. I actually find it hard to understand how someone could creditably claim to be a supporter of self-determination for the people of Scotland yet apparently wish the exact opposite upon the people of Syria.

The success of whatever stable government eventually takes control of Syria will not be measured by any politically motivated assertions from afar, but by those who have fled being willing to return. Their decision matters, no-one else’s.

Robert J Sutherland
Glasgow