YOUR correspondent Scott Macintosh (Letters, April 27) asks whether customers are ditching Scottish banks because of poor service or as a reaction to the threat of independence (“Thousands switch accounts away from Scottish banks”, The Herald, April 26.

Whilst I cannot give him a categorical answer, I can say that when I was in Carlisle just this week opening new bank accounts to transfer my company’s business accounts from a Scottish-registered bank to an English-registered bank it appears that I am very far from being alone.

The business manager I met said that prior to the 2014 referendum there had been a great many Scottish businesses coming to her bank in Carlisle – and hers was but one of about eight different banks in the same street in one small town – and that very recently the number of similar inquiries has risen again.

Immediately on a Yes vote in a second independence referendum it is not unreasonable to expect the Scottish Government would seek to introduce capital controls to prevent flight of capital, the risk of which even our less-than-inspiring Finance Secretary would be aware of.

On Independence Day itself sterling balances compulsorily frozen in Scottish-domiciled accounts would be converted at parity to whatever currency the SNP is forced to create. But as soon as markets opened any new and wholly untested Scottish currency would take an immediate vertical nose-dive, wiping out whatever value a business operator’s or saver’s very hard work over many years had built up.

And what prudent business operator or indeed anyone else with money in the bank could possibly be sure that an incompetent and cash-strapped Scottish Government, propped up by the Greens whose passion for increasing taxes on “the rich” knows no bounds, would be able to resist the temptation to replicate the Cypriot government’s 2013 confiscation raid on savings accounts?

Are you absolutely sure that couldn’t happen in a newly independent Scotland with a £15 billion deficit fuelled by an ever increasing give-away welfare state and no oil taxes to fund it?

After all, it would generally only be the minority with sizeable bank savings – many of whom probably don’t vote SNP – and the business community – which doesn’t have a vote at all – who will pay for it.

Nicola Sturgeon declared that independence transcends everything. So it can hardly come as a surprise that un-enfranchised businesses and those whose voices are ignored anyway by the SNP will simply vote with their feet ... or their wallets.

Alasdair Sampson,

The Pines, 7A Loudon Street, Stewarton, East Ayrshire.

SNP MP Tommy Sheppard urges Green candidates not to split the nationalist vote by standing in seats where the Tories have a chance of winning (“Greens ‘should not stand if threat to SNP vote’”, The Herald, April 27).

I suppose why not from the SNP's perspective; all's fair in love and war. After all, the SNP owes its Westminster success to a divided Unionist vote.

But, with Scottish Greens co-covener Maggie Chapman already expressing enthusiasm for such an approach, what does this say about the Greens?

Let's remember the SNP wanted to build the economy of an independent Scotland upon fossil fuels. It has an environmentally damaging strategy of reducing Air Passenger Duty to increase massively the number of flights into Scotland.

So are the Scottish Greens now largely fixated upon shoring up the SNP? And are their once unquestioned environmental credentials subjugated to supporting the SNP's principal raison d'etre – the break-up of the UK?

Martin Redfern,

Merchiston Gardens, Edinburgh.

WHEN Theresa May referred to the Tory Party's image as the nasty party a decade ago, it was taken as a critique, not an agenda. We are now increasingly seeing the May future, and it is a dangerous, mean and nasty prospect.

Her Foreign Secretary has made it clear that the UK will line up loyally behind Donald Trump on whatever bombing raids he chooses and that there will be no need to get Parliamentary approval for this. Her Defence Secretary has said that they will not support a no-first-use policy for nuclear weapons. This support for pre-emptive nuclear strikes creates a frightening breeding ground for mistrust and miscalculation.

Her Trade Secretary is seeking any country, no matter how reactionary, who may post-Brexit do a trade deal with the UK and under no circumstances must Saudi Arabia be offended. Her treatment of many disabled, low-income families and unemployed has been heartless. She has shown a total lack of compassion for child refugees.

An increased majority will only reinforce the authoritarian and inegalitarian DNA of the Tories. The British future looks nasty. Scotland needs out.

Isobel Lindsay,

9 Knocklea Place, Biggar.

I COULDN'T agree more with Iain Macwhirter that Ruth Davidson should find it a difficult sell for essentially Ukip policies in Scotland (“Ukip’s collapse could create big problems for Scots Tories”, The Herald April 27).

Those tempted to fall for the ultra-Unionist Ms Davidson should remember that with "no referendum here" comes hard-line "do as your told Unionism" in which whatever Queen Theresa says will go, with no questions asked by Ms Davidson. The rape clause fiasco is ample current evidence of this.

Ms Davidson may fancy herself as a terrier "slaying Nats every day" as she puts it, but when facing Westminster I fancy her characteristics will be the same as all Scottish Unionist politicians in my lifetime – an ultra-tame poodle.

James Nelson,

17 Watermill Avenue, Lenzie.

DAMNED if she does and damned if she doesn't seems to sum up the position of the First Minister who, with the council elections and General Election coming back to back, has sensibly decided to wait until after the poll on June 8 before putting forward proposals to overcome Theresa May's objections to an independence referendum in around two years’ time. Ruth Davidson and Kezia Dugdale, who have spent months criticising Nicola Sturgeon for wanting to give voters the opportunity to choose Scotland's future, are now coming down on her like a ton of bricks because she is putting her referendum plans on hold during this election period. Ms Davidson in particular has made independence the be-all and end-all of the Tory's council campaign, no doubt to try to divert attention away from awkward questions on Brexit, the rape clause, and investigations of alleged electoral fraud.

Ms Davidson should reflect that if her boss in London hadn't called a snap General Election, Ms Sturgeon wouldn't have had to delay announcing her plans, while Ms Dugdale, with the opinion polls forecasting disaster for her party, might be better employed trying to resuscitate Labour in Scotland, and helping her boss in London brace himself for electoral annihilation.

Ruth Marr,

99 Grampian Road,

Stirling.