WITH regard to the Windrush controversy (“May says sorry for treatment of Windrush generation”, The Herald, April 18), it may be instructive to consider updating the following passage by changing the square bracketed words in the following passage:
First they came for the [socialists], and I did not speak out – because I was not a [socialist].
Then they came for the [trade unionists], and I did not speak out – because I was not a [trade unionist].
Then they came for the [Jews], and I did not speak out – because I was not a [Jew].
Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me.
Pastor Martin Niemöller, who had first-hand experience of blatant and brutal state-sponsored, politically-motivated, Nazi discrimination when he penned the above.
P Fabien,
41 Kingsborough Gardens, Glasgow.
WHATEVER one may think about Jacob Rees-Mogg and his politics, it took tremendous courage to state publicly this week of all weeks that his father's condemnation of Enoch Powell's Rivers Of Blood speech has stood the test of time – alienating at a stroke the so-called "patriotic right" who saw in him a new champion ("May’s startling ineptitude has the nation up in arms", The Herald, April 17).
Like his father before him, whose landmark "butterfly on a wheel" editorial sparked outrage yet spared Mick Jagger from a jail sentence orchestrated by a sinister alliance of unscrupulous police officers and a gutter tabloid, he has chosen principle over popularity – ironically Powell himself would doubtlessly have nodded in approval on such grounds in the same manner he did both Tony Benn and Michael Foot.
That Mr Rees-Mogg encored with a blistering attack on the evil manner in which the Windrush immigrants have been treated (a matter Powell himself also addressed when alive by encouraging them into training as NHS medical staff when most were paid less than their white counterparts in other occupations) in stating "all British citizens must be treated equally and the Home Office needs to think of the individuals concerned, not its own administrative convenience" is heady stuff. Even when Jeremy Corbyn fumbles, thank providence Mr Rees-Mogg can be relied on to land the timely blows to our nation's internal foes.
Mark Boyle,
15 Linn Park Gardens, Johnstone.
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