IT is a difficult means of trying to understand why people, at least those in Scotland, would ever vote for a Tory politician. Unless of course they are of the same DNA calibre of the Conservative lifestyle voter, where it is the bank account that matters most.
To vote for a party which tolerates the likes of Suella Braverman as worthy of retaining a ministerial position is well beyond my own comprehension.
To exclaim that thousands of people on a perfectly legitimate protest march are only there to express hatred, and that everyone shouts in unison hate expressions, only displays her sheer ignorance of why we march and that it is always the few who might shout the wrong message.
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It appears now, however, that Braverman has given up on her earlier notion of stopping the “small boats” from arriving on English shores. She has now chosen to attack the consequence of that failed Home Office policy she so confidently felt sure would succeed.
Every homeless person, immigrant or otherwise, who has made it their “chosen lifestyle” to camp out on the streets of our towns and cities has become a stain on the way more “civilised people” would like their places of living and shopping to be.
Local authorities should have the powers to remove these rough sleepers by removing their canvas (or cardboard) places of accommodation, she believes. To where you might ask? Mebby in parks, or beneath canal bridges, or some back alleyway. Who knows?
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Suella Braverman has not taken one iota of responsibility for the mess she has created, not just for herself and her department, but for others she expects to pick up the pieces. Her preferred choice is, obviously, all local authorities, as if they they have the financial resource tucked away somewhere to help Braverman out of her own Home Office disasters.
The Scottish Government has its own inclusive policies to deal more humanely with immigrants who manage to reach our country. Let us hope Scotland can keep anyone who is homeless off the streets, while we march, without fear or favour, in support of those suffering and fleeing their home countries in times of strife, as we have explicitly seen in Ukraine and now more recently in Gaza.
Alan Magnus-Bennett
Fife
IN 1971, the Education Secretary in Edward Heath’s Tory government, a certain Margaret Thatcher, prompted the playground taunt “Thatcher, Thatcher, milk snatcher”, as she stopped the provision of milk for junior school pupils.
Suella Braverman’s reported call that homeless people should have their tents removed does not quite have the same ring but demonstrates a similar lack of empathy for many of those forced into such dire straits by the actions of her government. In addition, she is reported to be looking to fine charities found to have given tents to rough sleepers.
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To rub salt further into the wounds and demonstrate to what extent both her and her government have totally lost the plot, according to Ms Braverman many of those taking up residence in tents are doing so apparently as a “lifestyle choice”. So, as we approach winter, people are apparently deciding that this is the life they want to lead.
People don’t choose to be homeless, in the same way people don’t choose to be poor. And in a cost-of-living crisis, to look to take away the tents of people, many of whom have been left in such conditions due to Tory policies, demonstrates how vile this government truly is.
Alex Orr
Edinburgh
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