JACKSON Carlaw wants “heads to roll” due to the poor quality of build of our new hospitals ("Heads should roll: Sturgeon feels heat over hospital crisis", The Herald, September 13). Some hope. Could Mr Carlaw provide a list of previous “rolled heads” due to poor delivery on public procurement? I cannot think of any serious publicly-funded investment delivered on time and budget during my three score years and 10, not least military procurement. Present examples (out of dozens) could be Crossrail in London, or HS2 in the southern half of England, late and vastly over budget. Who got sacked? Just wait till the bill for refurbishing Westminster comes in. It will make Boris Johnson’s “moon bridge” appear a bargain.

On procurement itself, the public purse is being stiffed with a huge debt overburden due to PFI scams introduced from the time of John Major’s Government (and vastly expanded by Labour) to “privatise” public investment. Profits are enormous, with little apparent risk to the lenders involved, and resultant build quality is poor (Scottish schools – did council building inspectors heads roll?). The building contractors should obviously pay the penalty, but too often the contracts are poorly drafted, no bonds are posted and companies regularly go bust expunging liability. I recall some years ago it was revealed that construction companies were found to be acting in concert, with “fixed” bids when contracts were being apportioned. Capitalism not being so much “red in tooth and claw”, as cronyism and secret handshakes.

GR Weir, Ochiltree.

JEANE Freeman has now announced that there was a mistake in the tender documents, in particular with the ventilation of critical areas and that the mistake lies with NHS Lothian ("Heads should roll: Sturgeon feels heat over hospital crisis", The Herald, September 13). Has this same scenario, or similar, been the cause of all of the problems at the Queen Elizabeth in Glasgow? Surely some of the blame must also lie with the Scottish Government, as high-cost, publicly-funded projects would surely have had their documentation checked by it too? This error goes beyond carelessness.

George Dale, Beith.

THIS week, the interim leader of the Tories in the Scottish Parliament got manna from Heaven in the shape of problems at new hospitals in Scotland, and used these to avoid any mention of the interim leader of the British Tories who had been publicly castigated by three of Scotland’s most senior judges. At First Minister’s Questions, Mr Jackson hectored on about faults in the new hospital but he would have been justly incandescent if the Health Secretary, Jeane Freeman had not stopped the opening of the new hospital.

Incidentally the word “egregious” has been only vaguely known by me over the years, but its use by Lord Brodie in the prorogation case of the Westminster Parliament led me to check my dictionary; the definition was “outstandingly bad, flagrant”.

It was no wonder Mr Jackson was anxious to avoid any mention of Boris Johnson.

Jim Lynch, Edinburgh EH12.

THE SNP never likes to be seen to fail. Disguising this all-too-resent aspect of its term in office, now approaching 13 years, has been achieved by kicking everything into the long grass by setting up committees or saying "lessons will be learned". The grass is now a wilderness.

No excuses are adequate to describe the mistakes and delays in this flagship hospital over several years. These years have seen very ill children therefore being treated in less than satisfactory conditions simply due to the age of the building, not staff application. This is not on and now yet more taxpayers' money is being used to fix what should have been excellent. There really can be no excuses now. Nicola Sturgeon has a favourite word to describe the opposition, it is "shambles". This shambles has simply joined the queue behind the economy, transport and education in her back court now.

Dr Gerald Edwards, Glasgow G77.

BARONESS Kennedy, Labour member of the House of Lords, made a statement on the BBC (Politics Live, September 13) which has major implications for Scotland if it represents a widely-held position. Baroness Kennedy, in the context of a Brexit discussion, asserted that since referendums were advisory, Parliament did not require to implement their outcomes. Also, she was completely opposed to having any referendums.

Assuming she had given this some thought, this would mean that if the Scottish people voted for independence in a referendum, there would be no obligation to act on it. Also if referendums are to be ruled out, what would constitute a legitimate route to achieve independence if this has majority support? Is she suggesting that it should be a majority of Scottish MPs that would trigger independence negotiations? Or have we to wait until a majority of the enlightened opinion at Westminster decide for us? One thing the Brexit issue has done is to flush out a lot of confused thinking on both sides.

Isobel Lindsay, Biggar.

I HAVE just been watching Question Time on BBC 1 (September 12). Once again I have heard the same fundamental error repeated by both pro- and anti- groups: that we must respect the democratic decision of the people in the 2016 referendum. One speaker even said that Parliament is not sovereign, the people are sovereign. This is nonsense. We elect a Parliament which is sovereign and has not only the sole right but also the duty to govern.

A referendum can only be consultative, a test of public opinion, not a policy-deciding process which the government has to obey. This lies at the heart of the dangerous situation which our country now faces. Where are the constitutional lawyers who must know that this the issue? Parliament decides on policy after debates, readings, consultation in both Houses by people who have a reasonable chance of understanding the issues and only Parliament can finally decide government policy.

Kenneth Roberts, Lenzie.

Read more: Sturgeon under pressure at FMQs over hospitals' crisis