I HESITATE to write in support of a Tory, but there’s a first time for everything. Your front page headline today contrasts Margaret Thatcher’s pernicious right-to-buy policy on council housing of 1980 with Ruth Davidson’s call for “thousands of new council houses across Scotland” (“Tory leader is accused of hypocrisy as she calls for new push to build 25,000 homes”, The Herald, September 1). Ms Davidson was probably still in nappies in 1980, so it’s rather unfair to lumber her with the sins of the past and accuse her of hypocrisy.

Someone who does deserve criticism is Pauline McNeill, Labour’s housing spokeswoman. She claims that Ms Davidson “forgets to mention it was a radical Labour government that fixed” the post-war housing crisis. That is one of the most egregious examples of rewriting history I’ve ever encountered. It was the Conservatives under Winston Churchill, with Harold Macmillan as Housing Minister, who built 300,000 houses a year in the 1950s, including the many council housing estates like the one I was born and brought up in in Aberdeen.

Labour was in power in Westminster for 13 years, from 1997 to 2010, and at Holyrood from 1999 to 2007. Throughout that time, I and others within the Labour Party argued that a lot more money should be spent on public housing. After the global financial crisis struck with full force in 2008, I argued on these pages that there was a crying need for Keynesian spending on housing. Building houses is labour-intensive. If you pay people to build houses, you collect tax from them; they spend their wages, paying more tax on the goods they buy and keeping others in employment. Government spending circulates and returns to the Treasury.

And what did Labour do when it had the power and opportunity to tackle the housing crisis? Zilch, nada, nothing.

The example of China shows how construction can be a powerful motor for the economy. Over the whole country, they are building houses, roads, railways and airports, and the economy is surging. The difficulty they’re going to have is reducing their reliance on construction as a driver for the economy, as there’s a limit to how many new apartments you can actually fill. However, as a short or medium=term measure to bolster a weak economy, building houses has got to be about the best thing any government can do.

Doug Maughan,

52 Mentieth View, Dunblane.

IT defies the credibility of even the most naive among us that Colonel Ruth Davidson should have the impertinence to call upon the Scottish Government to secure the building of more council housing in Scotland. This is the political leader who has just restored two self-proclaimed bigots (Messrs Majury and Davies) to office on Stirling Council, where doubtless they will enthusiastically support her newly found concerns for the homeless and be voluble in their criticism of the council's administration for its lack of care for the under-privileged.

It is reassuring to us all to know that Scotland's leadership contains such humanitarian gallants forwarding the cause of the many thousands of our people impoverished and suffering as a direct result of the Tory Governments in Westminster.

KM Campbell,

Bank House, Doune.

I AM sure that in the next few weeks members of Scottish Labour will be on the receiving end of a great deal of comment and advice from your correspondents, although curiously much of this will come from those who have already made it clear that they do not have the party’s best interests at heart. (Or, to use a phrase much loved of the First Minster, we will be “expected to take lectures” from them.) As someone whose Labour membership will reach 40 years duration in a matter of weeks, maybe your readers might like a view from the inside.

First: Kezia Dugdale. Ms Dugdale knowingly took on a very difficult job and did it with no little success. She showed courage, energy and intelligence in all that she did. Above all, she “spoke human” – sometimes to her own disadvantage. No-one will deny that she had her faults like all politicians, but many of these would have been eliminated over the longer term, and she started from a much higher level than, for example, Nicola Sturgeon, in the qualities required. It is also crucially the case that under her leadership Scottish Labour positioned itself as a more radical redistributive party than the Tory-lite do-nothing-and-moan SNP. So we can thank her, and should now look to see how we can build further on what she leaves.

I really hope that the leadership election is as expected between Anas Sarwar and Richard Leonard.

On the one hand we would have the child of an immigrant family that has succeeded in creating a prosperous life for themselves from nothing and in the face of discrimination and prejudice. Mr Sarwar is also an experienced parliamentarian who has been knocking spots off the hopeless Scottish Government in the health brief at Holyrood. It is easy to see him as the Scottish Sadiq Khan.

On the other hand, Richard Leonard brings with him decades of experience in the world of industrial relations and trade unions, as well as being a trained economist: both of these place him head and shoulders above anyone on the SNP benches. His union background might place him as Scotland’s Alan Johnson.

Above all, as a Scottish Labour member, I am heartened by the reception of both of these possible candidates by different parts of the party. One of the most left-wing members I know has welcomed the prospect of Mr Sarwar as leader , and another friend (who is even more right-wing Labour than I am) has described Mr Leonard as an “all round good egg.” I am sure that whoever wins will deserve and receive a breadth of support from the party unseen for many years. When we add this unity to the platform created by Ms Dugdale, things are looking up for Scottish Labour’s revival.

And who will I vote for? That’s between me and my ballot paper.

Peter A Russell,

87 Munro Road, Jordanhill, Glasgow.

DURING Kezia Dugdale’s watch, Labour suffered a number of electoral defeats. She could have resigned at any point but kept her hand on the tiller and has finally guided the party back on to a winning course. She can leave with her head held high.

W Findlay,

Flat 64 Bishop’s Gate, 20 Kenmure Drive, Bishopbriggs.