REPORTS that population increase has stalled in Scotland might be of interest to readers (New population figures underline need for Scots migration boost, August 15), but more significant is that we have known for a longer time that the life expectancy gap has got even bigger.

Not long ago residents in Springburn could expect to die ten years earlier than those in nearby Bearsden. Now they can expect to live 13 years less. Two near neighbouring communities with even more different expectations of real life in Scotland.

An independent Scotland could and should be dramatically different and that will cost a lot of money, which can be collected easiest by taxing the richest most and so incidentally making us a less unequal society.

Norman Lockhart
Innerleithen