THE suggestion of doing away with prison sentences of less than one year is unsound ("Bid to ban jail terms of under one year", The Herald, October 26). Any sheriff will have had experience of community-based disposals, which, in the case of Community Service Orders did not result in much of a re-education in re-offending.

Kenny Macaskill changed the name to Community Payback Orders which do not seem to be much better, despite his claim. The reason lay, and lies, in part with an insufficient number of social workers, and, in part, with restrictions imposed by local authorities on the type of work which they would permit offenders to do: that is, something which an employee of the local authority would not be able to do, like working in a charity shop. Painting school railings, for example, would not be permitted, because that is a matter for the local authority, even if that work is not high on the list of priorities.

In my experience as a sheriff, community-based disposals of all kinds would be tried with the same offender and there would often be a long list of those before the first custodial sentence was imposed. Mr Macaskill claimed, as others will also, that their particular type of community-based disposal will work. Until such a disposal is discovered, short prison sentences ought to remain, if only to give the public a rest.

Douglas J Cusine, Stonehaven.

ORVILLE, RIGHT?

FIDELMA Cook (" I fantasise about slapping his gerbil cheeks until they wibble wobble", Herald Magazine, October 24) likens Michael Gove to a gerbil; my wife says he is similar to a chipmunk, but I think he is most like Orville (except he is a true blue, not green like the famous dummy ).

For those who cannot recall him, or never saw Orville, he was a green duck-like puppet on the knee of a great ventriloquist, namely the late Keith Harris (died 2015).

The question is really about who is working Michael. Is it Dominic Cummings or Boris Johnson?

One thing we all agree about is that his performances are excruciatingly poor – unless you like doubletalk. Orville had a better scriptwriter.

JB Drummond, Kilmarnock.

THANK you, Fidelma Cook, for a description that has become a visual equivalent of an ear worm (a song that once heard remains running around in your head). Her likening of Mr Gove to a gerbil-cheeked fellow and “a pouty, superior, know-it-all, condescending smile on his newly scrubbed-up, moisturised, boys' own face” painted a picture that cheered up an otherwise dull and rainy Saturday.

I visualised him in a wee wheel on Dominic’s desk being encouraged to run endlessly to be PM. And I like gerbils.

Ron Oliver, Elie.

TURN OVER A NEW LEAF

I NOTE your Tech review of a Hyundai leaf blower (Herald Magazine, October 24). I thought these devices were contributing to "insect Armaggedon"? The article also mentions petrol leaf blowers as being useful for larger gardens. Maybe some joined-up thinking required if you are a newspaper campaigning about climate change.

Anna Grady, Glasgow G43.

MY WORD

I RECENTLY completed an online survey about the effects of coronavirus on my current situation. One of the questions asked if anything in my life had improved as a result of the virus. The only things that came to mind were my speed at solving your Sudoku and Kakuro and, as a result of the Codebreaker, my vocabulary. Recent words in the latter include innervate, nosology, zeugma, retrocede, dibbuk and hecatomb. They might be familiar to the erudite readership of The Herald, but they were new to me. Truly, you live and learn.

Brian Logan, Glasgow, G42.