FOR the SNP, for the last three years-plus, Brexit has been the gift that keeps on giving. From the moment it included in its 2016 manifesto that Scotland being taken out of the EU against its will would constitute a reason for Indyref2 and then not bothering to fight the EU referendum, limiting its spending to only £90,000, it has been on a winner.

The Leavers not ever having had a plan, Theresa May calling an election to kick Labour and losing her majority instead, Mrs May stubbornly refusing to compromise and sticking to her unworkable demands, and Boris Johnson threatening not to obey the law and die in a ditch, and endangering the Union with his crazy plan of a border in the Irish Sea; all this has all been manna from heaven.

But at some time, reality has to intervene. The SNP needs to win an election with majority support from Scots electors to prove that there is appetite for Indyref2. And that election has to be before the trial involving Alex Salmond.

So now thanks to the SNP we are faced with a pre-Christmas election that was forced on Jeremy Corbyn. But if Labour gains a majority, or can survive as a minority with support from other parties, and can then negotiate with the EU and hold a referendum within six months, with Remain on the ballot, the house of cards which has been built by the SNP will come tumbling down.

Phil Tate, Edinburgh EH14.

MOYNA Gardner (Letters, November 8) asks of Jeremy Corbyn, "what has he done to deserve this?" How's this for starters?

Mr Corbyn has described Karl Marx as a great economist, wants to repeal legislation banning secondary strikes, abolish private schools, introduce a four-day working week, increase taxes, confiscate (ie steal) 10 per cent of shareholdings in companies, thereby making the government the largest shareholder in 70 of the FTSE100 companies, and would prefer Britain to become a republic; not to mention his support of the IRA.

For whom does Ms Gardner speak when she asserts that "our" urgent concern is to get the Conservatives out of Westminster?

David Miller, Milngavie.

NICOLA Sturgeon must be seriously concerned over Boris Johnson's attempt to woo Scottish voters. To bring up the ludicrous " fake news" that the NHS is going to be "sold off" ("SNP to lay down bill to protect NHS from US firms", The Herald, November 8) is simply an election scare story designed to outmanoeuvre the Tory attacks on indyref2.

The mere fact that this chestnut has appeared speaks volumes. What Nicola Sturgeon has done, inadvertently, is focus attention on the SNP's own running of the Scottish NHS. It is not a pretty picture. Apart from the obvious everyday problems with GP and hospital appointments, A&E waiting times, operation waiting times and general staff shortages and low morale, we also have the recent Audit Scotland's dreadful report on the future of the Scottish NHS after 12 years of SNP control.

Ms Sturgeon has slipped on a banana skin of her own making and has brought the future of the Scottish NHS to the fore in the midst of an election. She has simply tried to attack Boris Johnson without considering that the public perceive the NHS is not safe in her hands. The evidence backs this up.

Dr Gerald Edwards, Glasgow G77.

NICOLA Sturgeon has urged the Prime Minister to apologise for the "chaos he and his party have subjected us to for years" ("Johnson fires warning as he heads to Scotland", The Herald, November 7).

Unsurprisingly, this plays into the separatist narrative of Scotland, again, being portrayed as a victim.

Perhaps the First Minister is correct in some regards. Of course some of the chaos in Scotland could be caused by globalisation, a lack of personal responsibility, an increasingly atomised society and social media; however to blame another political party is for easier and politically prudent for the nationalists.

However, would the First Minister like to apologise for Scotland having the highest death from drug abuse in the western world? Would she also like to apologise for the ruination our once-excellent education system? What about an apology for her divisive brand of politics that has utterly dominated the political and cultural narrative of Scotland in the 21st century to the point I expect she would rather see Scotland irretrievably split asunder than see it continue as part of the UK, despite the Union dividend?

What about a personal apology to employees in the charitable and third sectors who have lost their jobs due to budget cuts in the local authority (myself included; two redundancies in three years).

If the First Minister has the gall to ask for an apology, surely the people of Scotland could ask for one as well?

David Bone, Girvan.

IT comes as no surprise that the monotonous theme of your unionist correspondents is the SNP's purported obsession with independence and alleged failings at the "day job". In so far as there are failings Holyrood works successfully to expose them, and while there have been failures, some of them substantial, the Scottish Government and ministers have generally tried to achieve the best for our nation.

That is in stark contrast to the self-serving conduct of the current UK Government with its offshore holdings and it says little for the abject failure of HM Opposition to hold it to account. The simple fact is that in Scotland we have our differences but they are our differences. They are not those of Nigel Farage and his ilk, and the prospective pharmaceutical profiteers. They are the differences of a nation which should be addressing the challenges of our new century, of our succeeding generations, and the needs of our planet and our place in it.

The day job for electors in Scotland is to secure that we take control of our own affairs. Do you seriously think the bunch down there are making a better fist of it?

KM Campbell, Doune.

Read more: Even traditional Tories should shy away from this compassionless party