IAN Roberts’s letter of December 1 (“Electoral route must be available as an alternative to indyref2”) rightly suggests we need to have an option to gain independence via an election if a referendum is stymied by the UK Government.

Whilst a referendum should be the desired route to independence under the mandate given by the electorate to Holyrood, we certainly need to make clear to Boris Johnson that in the event of any attempt to delay or prevent that from happening, the vote on independence will be exercised at the next Westminster election. That election, with the correct manifesto, could be run as a plebiscite, and with a majority of pro-independence MPs and vote share returned it would declare overwhelming support for Scotland to become an independent country.

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There has been much support of this option,with many voices across the independence movement echoing the same thought that an electoral plebiscite is not only credible but essential as a Plan B. The Scottish Government should take serious consideration of this, as without a Plan B we could be held prisoner by the government at Westminster.

First and most importantly though we need the mandate gained in May to be set in motion. That means the Scottish Parliament with its pro-Independence majority needs to act on that mandate by the early part of 2022 and in my opinion by the end of February at the very latest. With the wheels in motion and placing the ball squarely in the UK governments court it will quickly become clear whether we will have the referendum the country voted for or if we need to formalise a plan B so the mandate is upheld.

Dominic Milligan
Motherwell

IS it never going to end? As if all the allegations of corruption and duplicity by Boris Johnson’s Tory cabal in Westminster were not bad enough, we now hear that – in flagrant disregard of the rules in force at the time – drinks parties were being held in Downing Street last Christmas.

The country was in lockdown, but apparently rules designed to keep the public safe did not, by whatever magic, apply in that special place!

And yet, as we see from the Old Bexley and Sidcup by-election result, people are still, contrary to all common sense, prepared to vote Tory. Can anyone still really believe that we are better together with this lot?

David Howdle
Dumfries

WHY can’t any of them just say that there was no party? Saying that no regulations were broken doesn’t relate to the question.

John Jamieson
Edinburgh

I READ with interest the latest musings of this generation’s very own Bobbin’ John, aka Henry McLeish (‘Let’s not allow Scotland to fall into Westminster’s trap’, Dec 5). It is incredible to believe that Mr McLeish can actually believe the words he speaks.

Asking Scottish politicians to unite around a subject, immigration in the cited example, is laudable but Mr McLeish then suggests we take that united front to Westminster. And do what Henry? Simply say: “Please, sir, can we have some more?”

Scotland is already a a nation, and every election shows us to be divergent from the other nations on these islands but most glaringly from that based around Westminster.

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That divergence is never respected but rather the facts are that a stealth “land snatch” of Scottish competencies in under way. No nation should be going with the begging bowl just to have its own views “allowed”.

That is why no amount of tinkering with devolution or reasonableness on our part changes the position that independence, and only independence, is the answer for Scotland.

Kevin Cordell
Dundee

I WRITE to comment on the letter from Jim Taylor in The National of December 4 regarding the exploitation of the Cambo oil field.

He tells of the speaker at a St Andrew’s Day dinner saying that the oil represents an infinitesimal degree of carbon release on the grand scale, and that our atmosphere could easily deal with it. I and my colleagues in Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, and every other group working for the future of the planet have been fighting to overturn this opinion for at least 40 years. Our young friends in Extinction Rebellion carry placards saying “Leave the oil in the ground”! It’s the younger generation we have to listen to, not the same old, same old, blah blah blah of so-called influencers.

The only way we are going to do this is through independence, as the Westminster government won’t give up control of the oil.

Margaret Forbes
Kilmacolm

MAYBE Alyn Smith’s SNP has “waited 87 years for independence” and they can wait a little longer “without being restricted by Covid” (Action on Covid doesn’t mean inaction on indy, Dec 1). Can we?

I understood that it was an undemocratic parliament, with a majority of self-interested and cash-hungry individuals, which voted us into this Union against the wishes of the majority Scottish people. That makes it 314 years we have waited, and NOT 87 years! As far as I am concerned a democratic vote by a majority of the Scottish electorate AT ANYTIME can take us out of it. In 1707 they didn’t delay for hunger, famine or disease, only for the gold to be paid, so why should we delay now? The sooner the better.

Paul Gillon
Leven

THANKS for your front page on Thursday – 55% SUPPORT FOR INDEPENDENCE. It made an excellent window poster. I’m always looking out for a constant flow of positive posters – not so keen on the attacks on the opposition (well deserved though they are!). Please keep the good ones coming.

Jean Hall
Pensioners for Indy