I AM writing this in my empty pub, no clink of glasses, no buzz of conversation, no banter between staff and regulars, no laughter and worst of all no life, the beer fonts no longer lit up, the fridges dark and silent. The quiet and deserted pub seems a lifetime away from the place which has been my life for more than 25 years.

For all my brave words to my staff and customers, sitting here alone I now wonder is this it? Can my business survive another period of closure with no income and only the bare minimum of support from the Scottish Government? The £40 million figure bandied about sounds a lot, but the grant I am receiving equates to £125 a day. Are our ministers and MSPs so insulated from the real world that they have no regard or respect for our industry and the contribution it makes to Scottish life, both in monetary terms and the service we provide to locals and visitors every day?

All the hard work and long hours, the hard times and good times, the laughter (and tears), the money spent and taxes paid will count for nothing if our industry is left without any further financial support. Perhaps now is the time for Holyrood to be honest with us and detail exactly how much it has received from the Chancellor since this pandemic began and show much has been paid and much has been stashed away.

Billy Gold, Hielan Jessie bar, Glasgow G4.

I’M assuming that Rosemary Goring, like many of us, lives in a warm and comfortable house with garden, and with company.

In these very strange times for us all, we have of course many inconveniences, plans cancelled, hopes dashed and more, but really relatively little to complain about other than the very real heartbreak of not being with and hugging family and friends.

In stark contrast, in our increasingly divided society, many are on their own or with dependants in need of constant care, single parents in high-rise flats, exhausted NHS workers,young and old terrified of not being able to feed themselves and their families, terrified of their future, the list could go on and on.

Ms Goring finds the current regime "wearisome", partly because decisions are taken out of our hands ("Is it realistic to expect everyone to stay in the civilian version of an open prison?", The Herald, October 21).

I feel a great relief that we have the relatively simple task of trying to follow the rules, as opposed to continually having to weigh them up against all the other factors in order to make decisions about how best to get the virus under control. I bet at times Nicola Sturgeon and Jason Leitch et al crave a bit of "wearisome" in their lives.

Does Ms Goring recommend we should all make our own decisions or only the privileged few?

Has she ever actually been in prison, by the way?

Molly Harvey, Glasgow G41.

RE Jim Coley's letter (20th October), regarding the flu inoculation. Two weeks ago I received a telephone call from the local community nurse to say they would be coming to the house that day to give both my wife and I our flu jab.

On Monday this week we both received a letter from NHS Lanarkshire advising of our appointment times at the local town hall to receive our flu jab with a telephone number to call if there was an issue with the appointment. Over the past two days I have made more than 300 attempts (according to my telephone's counter) to call the number and cancel the appointments. To date the number has been continuously engaged. As a result of this we will now both be classed as "no shows", thus stopping someone else from using the appointment.

Yet another fiasco our Health Secretary can be proud of, although am sure she will feel it is someone else's fault as it is never hers.

Mr Coley should try the Lottery this week with his luck.

Henry McColl, Cumbernauld.