Saturday, 21 November 2009

Any reduction in funding should be greeted with dismay. The Dance School of Scotland is indeed a unique centre of excellence and its achievements should not be understated.

Over many years, its students have gone on to join major ballet and dance companies and others to perform leading roles in shows in the West End in London. This is no small achievement in a highly competitive field. These alumni are wonderful ambassadors for Scotland and, in particular, Glasgow.

Furthermore, The Dance School of Scotland has strong ties with Scottish Ballet, a world class ballet company, which has recently moved to its new base, with greatly improved facilities.

The Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama has just launched a BA Modern Ballet, a course taught in part by former staff of The Dance School of Scotland. These are exciting developments. It is therefore small-minded for Glasgow City Council to contemplate cuts in funding of any nature.

Finally, The Dance School of Scotland at Knightswood Secondary School fulfills an important social mission. Its excellence should be applauded and rewarded. It does Glasgow proud.

Steven Walters, Glasgow.

I suppose that most of us will remember that famous New Labour pledge about education, education, education. Unfortunately, as Ian FM Saint-Yves

perhaps suggests, the rot set in a long time ago (Letters, November 20).

I remember being in high school in the 1970s when something called traditional and alternative versions of curriculum subjects were offered to pupils. As far as I can see, the alternative route led us into an educational mess.

Some few years ago, I received an e-mail message from my nephew of school-leaving age which included the sentence “I’m gr8”. I assumed that his computer had malfunctioned and wrote back to him to clarify.

Similarly, another girl I know went for a job interview at a call centre and was given a basic arithmetic test that amounted to being asked to multiply 1,234 by 20. She failed.

When her mother -- who was more than a little surprised -- asked what had gone wrong, her daughter retorted: “They didn’t even give us a calculator.”

More weight should be put on the teaching of grammar and spelling and encouraging reading in schools, but some children are mentally lazy and should use their own gumption more.

Barry Lees, Greenock.

Your report on the pupils at Dyce Academy, who had their tuck shop closed down, illustrates in a nutshell everything that is wrong with the nanny-state policies of both the present SNP administration and its Labour Liberal Democrat predecessors (“MSPs sweet-talked about chocolate ban”, The Herald, November 18). The only difference between the two is that the SNP appears to have appointed itself as some kind of Supernanny.

Does the Scottish Government seriously believe it will stop childhood obesity by banning chocolate, cereal bars and even fruit juice when pupils can go across to the local shop and buy anything they want?

Furthermore, is this the reward for the worthy efforts to secure Fairtrade status for the school? Is it really the reward for those who have taken on a meaningful role in the life of the school? Finally, if any profit is to be made from the sale of said snacks, is this really the way to reward enterprise and initiative in our teenagers?

Scotland, with its endless bans and guidelines (read diktats) risks ending up like Soviet Russia. I long for an independent Scotland but if we carry on in this high-handed way, will it be worth it?

Alastair Naughton, Aberdeen.

Political carve-up over Brussels top job deals a blow to Europe’s credibility

The appointment of Belgian prime minister, Herman Van Rompuy, as the first president of the European Union and Lady Ashton as the EU’s new foreign minister is deeply disappointing (“Brown drops Blair but Ashton wins key EU role”, The Herald, November 20).

At a time when the European Union needs political heavyweights to punch its weight in the world, European leaders have, through a political carve-up, gone for low-profile candidates.

There is nothing inherently wrong about a Benelux prime minister in Brussels. But, to most of the world, the president of the European Union will stand for the EU as a whole. If Europeans want the EU to be credible, such a person must seem able to match the traffic-stopping power of a US or Chinese president.

Although he is, I am sure, an excellent man in his own way, Mr Van Rompuy could not do that. EU leaders should have found somebody who could -- Sweden’s Carl Bildt, say, or perhaps Spain’s José María Aznar.

The new foreign-policy supremo also needed to be a person of weight, which points to the need for both long experience and a background of taking the diplomatic world seriously. Once again, Mr Bildt would have been a good candidate, as would Germany’s Joschka Fischer. However, a deal has seen the position going to someone with little experience of European affairs, Lady Ashton.

Carving up jobs according to political affiliation or nationality is unlikely to be a way of finding the best candidate; nor is choosing from among those who are the least well-known or controversial. Sadly, this is exactly what has happened.

Alex Orr, Edinburgh.

Police chief’s bonus is a disgrace when front-line jobs are being threatened

You report that Steve House, Chief Constable of Strathclyde Police, is to make cuts to the police budget that could mean job losses (“Sweeping budget cuts to hit police service”, The Herald, November 19). I am a retired police officer and I would suggest to the Chief Constable that he leads by example. He should give back the £25,000 performance related bonus he received this year. I think it is a disgrace to be cutting the budgets of front-line services while giving bonuses to high-ranking public officials. In this time of financial constraint, it should be enough of a bonus for anyone in the public sector to be in employment.

Alistair Watson, Glasgow.

No doubt for reasons of space, my article on the extension to Easterhouse Baptist Church omitted the dates of its opening (In My Experience, The Herald Society, November 20). They are: Sunday November 22, a service at llam with Dr David Smith of International Christian College: Friday 27, open to community representatives 2-3pm: Saturday 28, open day for local residents 10-30-2.30pm.

Bob Holman, Glasgow.

Mr Swinney should try to think positive when it comes to financing the Glasgow Airport Rail Link

Achieving a Glasgow Airport Rail Link (Garl) is supported by an unparalleled consensus representing majority political opinion at Holyrood, west of Scotland local authorities, Strathclyde Partnership for Transport, Glasgow and Scottish Chambers of Commerce, the Scottish Council Development and Industry, CBI Scotland and BAA Glasgow .

John Swinney, the finance secretary, has been urged to engage in talks with the project’s stakeholders and other concerned parties, each of whom is anxious to explore opportunities for overcoming the funding difficulty, confirmed at £63m over the current spending period. Initiatives to break the Garl impasse include potential avoidance of Glasgow Airport’s fuel farm, redesign of the M8 single span bridge, applying for Network Rail assistance (through regulated asset borrowing powers) and asking Westminster for accelerated capital spending authority.

It is to be hoped Mr Swinney will adopt a ‘think positive’ attitude towards Garl by demonstrating political courage and personal humility, taking account of the Glasgow North East by-election result and the views of some in his own party.

K A Sutherland, Bearsden, Glasgow.

I am a keen supporter of a rail link to Glasgow Airport and was particularly disappointed to note the decision to cancel the Garl project. It has been interesting to follow the story in the aftermath of the decision to axe the scheme.

At first supporters were being asked by Government members to identify what other budgets would be slashed to allow Garl to proceed. Fortunately that confrontational position now appears to have been retracted and Stewart Stevenson, the Transport Minister, has confirmed that Garl has been sacrificed to ensure that other transport projects proceed. That position appears now to be an echo of John Swinney, the Finance Secretary, who confirmed to Parliament on November 4 that he did not examine the use of borrowing from the Network Rail asset base to fund Garl as he was concerned it would mean a re-opening of the agreement already in place for other railway investment.

I can tell Mr Swinney that, in a Freedom of Information response from the Office of Rail Regulation, it has been confirmed that his fears are unfounded. It states: “Transport Scotland could, at any time, request new enhancement projects that it wanted Network Rail to deliver and this would be addressed through our investment framework.”

There is your get-out clause, Mr Swinney. Make the approach to Network Rail and, if it turns you down, the scheme will be dead. On the other hand, it could approve the project.

William Forbes, Cambuslang.

Your exclusive report again highlights the need for sustainable alternatives for access between Inverness and the north (“Second A9 bridge in need of repairs” The Herald, November 20). It would seem that there will now be added congestion during 2012 whilst the Cromarty Bridge is repaired to add to the six months of repairs to the Kessock Bridge throughout the summer of 2011. The railway north to Dingwall and Tain has been doing its bit to help and traffic on the line is booming.

A year ago there was only one commuter train in to Inverness before 9am but now there are three. Plans have also been made to re-open Conon Bridge station. First ScotRail will be asked to put on longer trains during the road works, but putting on even more trains at certain times of the day would at present be difficult due to the long single track section from Inverness to Muir of Ord.

The rail users’ group, Friends of the Far North Line (FoFNL), has recently made the case for reinstating double track over a two mile stretch between Lentran and Kirkhill to divide up this 20-minute long bottleneck and allow trains to pass each other. This long loop would permit a commuter train to run in the other direction between Inverness and Dingwall, for which there is some demand, and also allow more services north from Inverness during the afternoons.

Richard Ardern, Inverness

PM’s lost it over deficit

The horrific state of Britain’s public finances is revealed in the new report from the Organisation for economic Co-operation and Development (“OECD forecast predicts slow expansion for UK economy”, the herald, November 20).

We have the rich world’s biggest annual deficit from now (this year projected at £220 billions and 14% of GDP) until 2017.

This is worse than the two other basket cases, Ireland and Iceland.

Public borrowing in October (in normal times a surplus month as a result of corporation tax receipts) was three times what it was in the same month last year.

The National Debt will rise to 120% of GDP by 2017, excluding off-balance sheet items like public sector pension liabilities, public private partnership commitments and bailing out the banks.

Only Japan, at 223%, will be higher. Interest payments on our rapidly growing debt will rise to at least 12% of tax revenues.

In the words of the OECD, we are at risk of a public debt spiral and a devastating blow to our international credit rating unless the Government takes drastic action.

But little will be done before the General Election because Gordon Brown is incapable of acknowledging the mess that he has created.

In 1997, he changed the rules of money supply control by excluding asset and commodity prices from his Consumer Price Index, the ‘inflation’ measure which he required the Bank of England to target.

Mr Brown took control of the banking system away from the Bank and deposited it with the inept Financial Services Authority.

He took no account of the impact of the United States and China on world trade and credit flows (though he is happy now to blame the global crisis instead of accepting some responsibility himself).

The result of these actions was what he intended -- a boom, funded by easy credit, which, by 2005-2007, generated the highest tax revenues recorded.

But these were not enough to feed Mr Brown’s public spending habit.

Against all the precepts of Keynesian macroeconomic management, which require a budget surplus during a boom, he borrowed a further £100bn during the same period to spend, spend, spend. Public expenditure now accounts for more than 50% of an increasingly emaciated economy and is indirectly supported by quantitative easing: printing money.

Instead of starting the cuts now, and thereby sending a reassuring signal to the international money markets that will be funding our deficit, the Prime Minister proposes a fatuous and unnecessary Bill to halve the deficit in four years.

He has lost the plot and should call a general election to restore some credibility to our political institutions.

Richard Mowbray, Glasgow.