IT can take decades for the consequences of government inaction to be realised (“Sticking plaster will not solve NHS shortages”, Herald editorial, May 21).

The European Working Time Directive of 1993 limited working time to 48 hours in any seven-day period. The directive came into full force in 2009 with the major impact on the health services. Junior doctors in particular had been working 70 or 80 hours per week.

It should have been apparent in 1993 that if doctors were working fewer hours either you would need more doctors or there would have to be a massive improvement in productivity. There were plans to increase the enrolment in Scottish medical schools but these plans were never implemented. The political horizon stops at the next election in less than five years. Long-term strategy is not in the political equation.

The political inaction of 1993 and later years now finds us in a staffing crisis in NHS Scotland. Taxpayer money is being spent outsourcing radiology services to India and Australia.

There is a government global advertising campaign to attract more doctors from third world countries. This is waste of taxpayer money since these foreign doctors will not be allowed entry to the UK by the Home Office. In Scotland, newly qualified doctors are moving abroad since NHS Scotland has an inflexible employment policy. You will work where we say, not where you want. Potential junior doctors are voting with their feet and moving abroad.

John Black,

The Scottish Jacobite Party, 6 Woodhollow House, Helensburgh.

I RECEIVED some emergency hospital treatment in Perth at the beginning of February this year.

I then received a letter dated February 27 from Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board notifying me that I was on their waiting list for an operation.

The letter gave my Treatment Time Guarantee (TTG) date. I had been seen by the surgeon and told I was an urgent case. The TTG date is May 22, that is 12 weeks after seeing the consultant. After inquiries today I hear that I won't be seen in May or June but possibly July, possibly not. The letter mentions the Patient's Rights (Scotland) Act 2011.

I know that the staff in the NHS would not send me a letter with the word "guarantee" in it unless they were sure it would be delivered or unless they were forced to do so.

So I would like to know whether or not the staff are strong-armed into sending out misleading letters, or if the guarantee is supposed to mean what it says. Why I have not been offered treatment elsewhere in the UK, if Glasgow does not have the resources to honour the stated commitment?

In anything other than the NHS in Scotland, there would be some sort of redress for a promise made but not kept.

David Sillito,

17 St Bride's Road, Glasgow.