AS usual, Iain Macwhirter gets right to the heart of the issue ("Time to look at the motives behind immigration claims", The Herald, December 19).

In England xenophobia has indeed "come in from the cold". Sadly, Westminster politicians are encouraging fear of "the other" as a means of distracting people from the real issues, which are of their own making.

In Scotland our future economic and social needs will be better served by encouraging immigration. Our historic experience of inward migration has been largely positive. Migrants and their descendants have not just enriched Scotland, they are Scotland. Walk round any long established graveyard in any city, or seaside town, and look at the names on the tombstones. Italian, Irish, Ukrainian, Polish and Asian names abound. Look at any record of members of the professions - medicine, education , law or the media - "foreign" names are much in evidence. Their ancestors came to Scotland, often many generations ago, seeking a better way of life.

Nor was it a one-way street. Professor Tom Devine's magisterial book, To the Ends of the Earth, shows how the Scottish diaspora sought opportunities in other lands and left their mark wherever they went. If the Union was such a boom and a blessing to Scotland how come its sons and daughters were driven out, or chose to leave, in such large numbers?

Recent migrants to Scotland are aspiring. They seek to make a better life, just as those of the Scots diaspora did over the years. In modern times the free movement of labour policies of the EU has enabled young Scots to work across Europe enriching their experience. So here we have a win/win situation and yet the UK Parliament is united in its opposition to the policy.

The Better Together campaign is being urged to tell us what Scotland would look like if we vote No in the referendum. Here's my prediction: we would be impoverished. Our universities would be unable to admit international students, with no growth from incoming migrants our population would continue to decline and, if the rest of the UK votes to withdraw from the EU, young Scots would lose the right to work in Europe. I call that a lose/lose situation.

Patricia Dishon,

62 Inchview Terrace,

Edinburgh.

MAGNUS Gardham ("The energy debate will become a hot potato", The Herald, December 21) makes the common mistake of using the word "energy" when he means "electricity". Scotland's electricity consumption is about one-quarter of its total energy consumption. So renewable electricity in 2012 was only around 10% of total energy.

Too many people have been misled into thinking that trashing Scotland's mountains and moorlands for the highly-subsidised wind generation of electricity lets us off the CO2 emissions hook.

While wind has some, probably exaggerated, value in CO2 reduction, electricity generation is a very small part of our total ecological footprint. The major parts are greenhouse gases embedded in imported goods and services from abroad and from the rest of the UK. Scottish produc­tion for Scottish consumption accounts for less than one-fifth of Scotland's consumption-based greenhouse gas emissions.

Scotland has too many people, consuming too much stuff. There is no sign the Scottish Government or the major opposition parties are in the least concerned about this - quite the opposite. They seek to promote consumption at almost every turn and against all demographic logic seem to think that by constantly importing younger people we can postpone forever the difficulties of transitioning to a stable, older population structure.

Unless Scotland's people and politicians get serious about the immense changes in our economy and society that are needed to equitably address the totality of Scotland's environmental impact, we will continue on a course that can only increase the likelihood of an unstable and unpleasant future. But at least we will have the variably flickering electricity from wind turbines to light our way there.

Dave Gordon,

60 Bonhard Road,

Scone, Perthshire.

MAGNUS Gardham mentions Ofgem's Project TransmiT, which aims to cut transmission charges for electricity generated in areas that could be described as "remote" . That is Scotland, Wales and northern England.

Nothing illustrates the arrogance of our London-centred system of government than these higher transmission charges. Charges for transfer of goods are well understood by most of the population, particularly those who reside in remote areas. Indeed, despite living only 19 miles from Glasgow, I was contacted by the company supplying a new fridge to tell me that, as I lived in a "remote area" there would be a surcharge on top of the standard UK delivery charge. Apparently all PA postcodes came into the category of remote. And that story illustrates the insult of the higher transmission charges. They should be paid, as for other goods and services, not by the generators, but by the recipients of the electricity.

In terms of delivery of electricity from renewables it is not Scotland that is remote, but London.

Kenneth W Johnson,

Alves,

West Gates Avenue,

Lochwinnoch.