WHEN is the opportune time for Scotland’s indyref2 is a question exercising minds both within government and in less official parts (Yes demo planned for SNP conference to urge indyref2 action, The National online, August 16).

Considering it is 90 years since the first organised group of seven male individuals got together and announced the establishment of the National Party of Scotland, the pace towards the restoration of Scotland’s self-governing nationhood is surely a slow one.

Also considering the various dodgy goings-on in the 2014 referendum, when early postal vote opening was unintentionally disclosed on live television and in the opinion of many should have there and then invalidated the whole voting process, Scotland going again to the polls should be a sooner rather than later prospect.

Not that the country cannot wait a few years, having retained its national consciousness over 300 years of being subjugated from what was meant to be a parliamentary partnership role to one of provincial status, outnumbered, ignored, and no more than the poor cousin the UK household of nations.

Whatever the arguments of urgency or patience though, as the opinions in The National show, at least there is no doubting the doughty words of Alex Salmond in 2014 that “the dream lives on”. Not to mention the sense of an increasing awareness among non-Scots UK nationals, outwith the portals of Westminster, that there is a correction outstanding, a large wrong to be righted.
Ian Johnstone
Peterhead

IAN Stewart is quite right when he surmised that some, like me, may have voted to remain in the UK Union as the best prospect of also remaining part of the EU in the short and medium term; leaving for any period creating uncertainty and an unwelcome disruption to Scotland’s prosperity (Letters, The National, August 16).

For me, living in an economic world of globalisation, bringing ever greater power over us to corporate business, it seems a logical imperative for nations to band together to regulate and control corporate excess.

This is why I am so disappointed at the position of the Corbyn-led Labour Party. At a time when the Conservatives and conservatism has never been more prone to defeat and replacement by an egalitarian agenda, isn’t Corbyn acting against the interests of workers, those on low incomes like those on benefits, pensioners etc, and the poor by co-operating with those very forces of conservatism which should be anathema to the Labour Party?

There can surely be no better platform to campaign for a global socialist agenda than through the EU, precisely why the Tory right wing is so desperate to detach Britain from; their reward a nation where they can promulgate their own vested interest agenda, at the expense of the very groups Labour has traditionally been charged to represent and protect.

So I, and hopefully many others, got it wrong in 2014 and why it is essential we get the opportunity to redress our error of judgement as soon as practical.

Isn’t it also not too late for Labour in Scotland to rethink its view of Europe, recognise its importance to our future and that the only certain way to membership is through the self-determination of an independent Scotland’s parliament?
Jim Taylor
Edinburgh

IT is gratifying to see another letter from your contributor, Linda Horsburgh, in The National in which she challenges again the authenticity of legal documentation surrounding Scotland’s sovereignty (Letters, The National, August 14).

As an ardent supporter for independence I value the raw passion it engenders, the usefulness of statistical analyses and overall stamina it takes to keep moving forward; but without the basis of our legal rights we are whistling in the wind. Let’s hear more from this standpoint, please.
Janet Cunningham
Stirling

AS the disaster of Brexit unfolds, along with the growing divergence of Scotland and England and as the clamour for indyref2 increases we should look again at the great achievements of the late Canon Kenyon Wright. A religious and political giant, who as a lifelong supporter of CND was never a member of any political party, yet is acknowledged as the Godfather of Devolution.

This quiet and gentle man was able to unite political parties, trade unions, business bodies and faith organisations in calling for a Scottish Parliament. Under his inspirational leadership, as chairman of the Scottish Constitutional Convention, the devolution blueprint was published on St Andrews Day 1995 – opposed only by the Tory party.

It had been a long road from the narrow Yes victory in the 1979 referendum, which Westminster did not accept, to the overwhelming Yes majority in the second 1997 referendum which established the historic return of a Scottish parliament in 1999.

In the recent 2014 referendum Kenyon Wright became a positive and vocal supporter of independence, writing at the time: “Devolution is power by the gift of others. Power in Scotland is ours by right.”

Against the anger and fury of British nationalism it is good to reflect on the quiet achievements of Kenyon Wright.

The peaceful passion, persuasiveness and persistence of this man, who devoted his life to helping others and to creating a better society, should inspire an independent Scotland, open to the world yet in concert with all the peoples of the British Isles and in confederation with the independent nations of Europe.
Grant Frazer
Newtonmore