TEARING my hair as I read about yet another new party intending to divide the independence vote in more ways than a cake at a kid’s birthday party.

How many more of these “has-beens” with their inflated egos are going to ruin our chances of winning? For they are indeed “has-beens” – folk who “have been” in some level of public position/power in the past and so believe their particular views and wishes are more important than those of the vast diversity of troops working together for a common cause. They would still be “today’s men” if their views were shared by a sufficiently large number of the public.

These new parties, which seem to be multiplying like rabbits, do not seem to think of how this proliferation will actually result in fewer votes for each independence-supporting party. There will be an upper limit of the turn-out who intend to vote for an independence-supporting party and the more these votes are distributed over an ever greater number of such parties, the less chance of any one of them winning any seat at all, but Unionist parties will pick up more. And remember that the Unionists have only ever said “if the SNP win a majority of VOTES…” – note, not seats.

READ MORE: Ex-SNP MSP Chic Brodie launches new independence party Scotia Future

At the moment we have at least four or five of these smaller and new parties – I’m losing count! Some votes will still go to the SNP and Greens, and so we could see the vote total shared among seven or eight parties. So will any one win enough to gain a seat? All these new parties are a gift to the Unionists, part of their tactics, to divide the support into ever smaller fragments. The core fact that Unionists recognise is that, whether we agree with them or not in anything else, the SNP is our only viable political vehicle for final success.

This nth new party, in any case, seems to have lost the place. They promote staying out of the EU, when 63% of Scots voted Remain and that pro-EU figure has been rising recently, even ahead of independence. So their platform will oppose a large majority of voters – great idea!

All their other policies have no bearing on independence but will be decided AFTER independence.

We all have our differing, strongly held personal views, but if we are to reach our goal, these must be subordinated to the single objective of fighting for independence TOGETHER. Otherwise we engineer our own defeat.

L McGregor
Falkirk

I BECAME almost apoplectic when I read of the formation of something calling itself “Scotia Future” (Former SNP pair announce new pro-indy party, October 23).With friends like these and the other silly little fringe nationalist parties, Scotland needs no enemies.

One might wonder if some were in fact fifth columnists.

Do these ultra-pure nationalists never read our country’s history? Do they not understand that ever since 1066, the English Government has played the divide and rule game with considerable success. United we stand, divided we fall.

I have to say my strictures apply to those in the SNP sniping away at the government. The Scottish Government cannot walk on water, yet does a pretty good job. The time for argie bargie is after independence, not now.

R Mill Irving
Gifford, East Lothian

HERE we go again! Yet another bunch of ego-trippers setting up a pro-independence party. Voters next year will be presented with a ballot paper resembling a toilet roll cascading over the bathroom floor. My advice to those voters would be: keep it simple; ignore the wannabe middle-men and women; look for the weel kent “clootie dumpling” symbol; and make both votes SNP!

Brian McGarry
Fife

IN your article about the formation of yet another so-called pro-independence party, you quote Andy Doig as saying it was about “the Yes movement fragmenting and growing”. I can just hear the Unionists saying “Now why didn’t we think of that?”

David McCann
Alloa