IT is interesting to consider the current position of the Conservative Party in British politics. Following the decision to hold a referendum on British membership of the European Union in 2016, the toxicity of Brexit has eroded the veneer of Tory unity and, if the prediction of the forthcoming results of the European elections are accurate, has also marginalised their influence and standing. The irony that David Cameron held the original referendum to maintain party cohesion will not be lost on observers and opponents alike.

Theresa May’s tenure as Prime Minister has been disastrous. It has witnessed the UK becoming an international laughing stock, a Brexit-fuelled resurgence in individuals and groups on the far right and an increase in social inequality.

However, rather than putting their faith in a prospective leader of gravitas and sound principles who will command national respect, the Conservatives appear to be resigned to the fact that Boris Johnson will be the new Prime Minister (“Zero to hero: Tories have fallen in love with Boris”, The Herald, May 24) An astonishing and shameless volte-face has been witnessed by Messrs Gove and Mundell as well as by Ruth Davidson, in the last few days, ample evidence that they are politicians of few scruples or genuine principles. Mr Johnson has been lambasted, correctly, for his buffoonery, casual racism and total contempt for Scotland and its people. Nevertheless, these three Scottish politicians, blinded by personal professional survival and ambition, have abandoned their previous implacable opposition to him as the political wind changes course.

It seems that they will bow to the common populism within their own party and therefore to Mr Johnson and his acolytes, to allow themselves to endure.

I suspect that this treachery in enabling this sawdust Trump to climb to the pinnacle of power in Britain is only the first scene in the Conservatives’ own re-enactment of the Night of the Long Knives. Mrs May’s administration has been a slow burner but now, with her con man pretender waiting in the wings, the lunatics are poised to take over the asylum.

Owen Kelly, Stirling.

Read more: Theresa May resigns as Prime Minister

THE Westminster Parliament has finally done for Theresa May and the race is on to find a successor. It might be Boris Johnson, but if precedent is anything to go by the front runner seldom gets the crown in that particular nest of vipers.

If truth be told, they would be just as well to appoint Nigel Farage as he has led the Conservative and Unionist party by the nose for a number of years.

Regardless of which placeman they pick the time has come for Scotland to go its own way.

DS Blackwood, Helensburgh.

I HAVE no tears for the resignation of Theresa May. She was a reactionary Home Secretary and an incompetent Prime Minister. However, she is likely to be replaced by an even worse person: Boris Johnson, who is a charlatan. If the people of Scotland don’t choose independence now then they never will.

Hugh Kerr,

Edinburgh EH3.

THERESA May was hit by irreconcilable tectonic plates south of the Border and has finally succumbed.

Yet she could have earlier reached out across all parties and governments, in particular in Scotland and Wales, (there was no government at Stormont) to create an agreed broad approach to Brexit. But she did not. She tried bungs to the DUP, she dismissed the inputs from Edinburgh and Cardiff, barely entered into discussion with Nicola Sturgeon and became more haughty and stubborn as time went on issuing her red lines as political writ.

The British manifest destiny myth as interpreted by all and sundry down south finally did it. Confused by notions of entitlement and power, the society in her English heartland, filtered through the duopoly and exaggerated by the ERG in particular and the Tory grandees in general, the Brexit juggernaut finally flattened her premiership as it will subsequently inflict politically and constitutionally a denouement on the UK.

As a person Mrs May might be glad to go, but as a former and failed PM she will have a great deal to reflect on. She has experienced what the country, and Scotland in particular, has experienced from her very party, a ruthless vindictive organisation. It rebounded on her very self. She was ironically a product and a victim of that very party.

John Edgar, Kilmaurs.

THE world has just witnessed the biggest exercise in democracy with the General Election in India, where more than 600 million people took part.

Almost two years ago, more than 12.3 million citizens, in one of the world’s oldest democracies, elected Theresa May to be their Prime Minister and the leader of their country. But it only took a small number of predominantly politicians from the ERG and the 1922 Committee to throw a collective temper tantrum, thereby choosing to ignore the will of the people by bullying Mrs. May out of office, simply because they could not get their own way in Parliament. This, coincidentally, is the same “will of the people” that this same group of politicians say must not be ignored over Brexit.

If we are truly a democratic nation, why are there no failsafe protocols to prevent this from happening? How can Parliament hold its head high and take the moral high ground on any issues when it so brazenly cheats its citizens, by ignoring the basic fundamentals of democracy? We chastise and punish children for much less serious behaviour.

Unlike the UK, the PM of India (short of massive criminal wrongdoing) will remain in that position for five years.

Francis Deigman, Erskine.

THE likely coronation of Boris as the new Tory Party leader is a wonderful example of the extraordinary poor quality of many MPs in the 21st century. Whatever happened to intelligence, maturity, responsibility, caring and the like?

Brian McKenna, Dumbarton.

ALMOST exactly five years ago I told the assembled gathering at our Sunday lunch that if Scotland didn’t take advantage of the opportunity presented by the independence referendum, Little England would drag us out of Europe and we’d end up with Boris Johnson as Prime Minister.

I take it back.

It was only a joke.

Honest.

Steve Brennan, Coatbridge.