YOUR article on scams (‘Half of Scots’ have been scam targets, June 10), makes me wonder if I am living in the same country as everyone else! Maybe it’s my magnetic personality – only joking – but I cannot imagine being in the situation to which your article refers.

I had three scam calls on Saturday forenoon alone. Very few days have gone by in the last couple of years when I have not received such a call. Judging by the voices on the other end of the line – when I have actually picked up, I only have a landline – they are coming from various parts of the UK plus a fair proportion from the Indian sub-continent.

The subjects referred to tend to centre around media and financial elements of life: “your e-mail or internet has been compromised and you must act NOW to prevent untold inconvenience and disaster”; “Press 1 NOW to get it sorted”. Whatever you do you should definitely not press any requested key as it will surely make a seriously illegal contact with your computer, phone or whichever device you use.

The latest variation on these has been the very recent addition of the quite posh (and they hope believable!) English voice wishing to talk to me regarding a discrepancy in the file regarding a traffic accident in which I was apparently involved in the recent past. I expect it would have gone on to suggest I was due a refund and could I just give them my bank details so that I could get the recompense I was due!

These calls come at all hours of the day from early morning till late at night and are almost always shown as coming from a correct UK phone number. If you try to call these numbers back – I only ever try that after a lapse of perhaps days, in case they still have a hidden connection going on – my phone tells me that “the number you have dialed does not exist”.

Beware – be seriously aware that “they” are out to get you and your hard-earned cash.

George M Mitchell
Dunblane

I AM intrigued by Mary McCabe’s letter of June 7 regarding Radio Free Scotland. This operated in the years I was in the SNP, but I never heard it; I joined in 1966 in Peterhead but we were largely unaware of it, and I do not think the coverage spread up to there.

We moved to Edinburgh in 1969 and I joined Corstorphine branch of the SNP; in 1972 the SNP conference was in Rothesay and I was a delegate. One evening we heard there was to be a RFS broadcast from Rothesay, so myself and Tom Howe from Moray, who later became a prominent SNP councillor, found our way to the location. As was fairly obligatory at SNP conferences, strong drink had been taken!

When we got to the Rothesay tenement we were met at the close entrance by a plug ugly who said “What do youse want?” or some other congenial phrase; he was the security, but after showing our ID we were directed to the top floor. To my recollection the equipment was on a bed and there were a few nationalists there, I think perhaps Gordon Murray was one of them. Tom said a few words to the mike and I think I added my name and a comment, but as I said, strong drink had been taken, so it was all pretty vague.

I knew some of these involved in the operation, principally David Rollo, who had been a paratrooper during the war; he was the engineer responsible for the equipment. I cannot remember what he worked at but he used to tell me that he never knew bloody accountant was two words until he was 36; I was an accountant. David had been the SNP national treasurer and was involved with the Scots Independent newspaper. Gordon Wilson was the director of programmes; he was the party’s national secretary, then the MP for Dundee East, and became the party chairman in 1979. His book about Radio Free Scotland, Pirates of the Air, was published by the Scots Independent newspaper.

Jim Lynch
Edinburgh

IN response to Michael Fry’s article in yesterday’s National, I too am wary of the concept of “Inclusive Growth”, as growth in this sense usually means taking things out of the soil, refunctioning them in some way and often putting them back in the soil wrapped in a black plastic bag (Four years on, Scottish minister have yet to learn this crucial lesson, June 11). Those who benefit are the ones who own the machines, fundamentally the few and not the many. The fact that many of the very wealthy cluster in and around London means there is not much chance of the “trickle-down” effect benefiting the Scots. Never-ending “growth” will destroy the planet and the rich will be the last to suffer.

However, comparing Scotland with Somalia is disingenuous and to characterise heart attacks as a penalty of affluence is both incorrect and simplistic. Micheal Marmot has completed well-known health inequalities research into this, using Whitehall staff for his extensive data set. The message from his work is that a lack of autonomy in your life is harmful to your health, especially your heart health.

One day, soon I hope, when the Scots go to the ballot boxes and get the shade of political structure that they actually vote for, their hearts will be a lot healthier I’m sure.

Kairin van Sweeden
Co-convener, Yes Edinburgh North and Leith