Iain Macwhirter is correct that China is a problem but he is wrong that they are the main problem.

Yes, they are the biggest emitters of CO2 but per capita they are at half the level of others like Canada, the US and Australia.

The world has to limit climate change gas emission and it has to do so in an equitable way, measured per head of population. That would allow less developed countries to catch up and will force the rich to curb their consumption.

In the Unites States, Joe Biden is already facing the demise of his “clean electricity program”, due to the opposition of coal and gas vested interests in the Senate. It may lead to a carbon pricing tax, but America is always reticent over hiking taxes seen as a burden on the middle classes.

My advice? Sell your low lying property, move north and build on higher ground. The world’s elite (led by Boris Johnson in this instance) will not lead a revolution against themselves, even as we face a catastrophe. They are mostly old and rich and will be gone before the proverbial hits the fan.

The clock is ticking toward the tipping point at which the climate juggernaut will be self-perpetuating and human intervention futile, and even bleating Royals in their many palaces, or billionaire space cowboys won’t be safe.

GR Weir

Ochiltree

Beware of Chinese threat

I must admit to sharing your columnist Iain Macwhirter's lack of optimism for a successful outcome to the COP26 Climate Conference if China's President Xi Jinping doesn't endorse a radical emissions-cutting programme.

This supposed last-ditch attempt to save the planet will come to nothing if China continues to pollute the atmosphere and focus on economic growth rather than taking the necessary steps to reduce the use of fossil fuels.

Of course, Western countries must take a lot of the blame for voraciously buying cheaper Chinese goods at the expense of our home industries which have now been lost and probably will never return.

China has become more powerful, both economically and militarily, on the back of this trade and it's obvious that the world's largest polluters will not commit to anything likely to damage their dominant positions.

Very little will happen until the West reduces its economic dependence on China but whether the Western leaders are brave enough to take the critical decisions to make this happen is a moot point.

If not, the world will be faced with a more powerful China bringing the threat of armed conflict even closer. COP26 could be a watershed but at the same time this 'Conference of the Parties' has the potential to turn into a huge junket achieving nothing but sore heads for the participants. The world's future inhabitants, both human and animal, deserve better than this.

Bob MacDougall

Kippen, Stirlingshire

We must halt Cambo

Iain Macwhirter refers to the argument by Oil and Gas UK to defend commercial exploitation of the Cambo oil and gas field – so that no imports are necessary.

However, Cambo is for exporting. It is also of little benefit financially to the UK with low Petroleum Revenue Tax, environmental harm and profits to be siphoned off to a tax haven. The main developer, Siccar Point Energy is ultimately owned in Luxembourg and the UK will likely be deprived of millions of pounds revenue.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC ) warns of ‘code red for humanity’ and says rapid and drastic cuts in CO2 emissions are needed to prevent climate breakdown with heating accelerating damaging effects – fires, deforestation, flooding and more, as well as devastating economic damage.

The International Energy Agency has said there should be no new investments in oil, gas and coal to meet climate targets. The UK government should listen to the world’s scientists and protect the planet and UK economy. They have the powers to stop Cambo.

The majority of Scots believe the Union is holding back tackling climate change. Scotland needs to say no to Cambo and obtain independence to tackle climate change .Climate transition can be funded by tax changes, savings and green quantitative easing not new taxes.

It can bring in fairer policies and benefits such as housing insulation/heat exchange, our own grid infrastructure and export cable with a reliable energy supply and stable base of renewable energy so we are not dependent on foreign gas.

Pol Yates

Edinburgh

Net zero crippling European economies

The net zero agenda being urged upon the world fatally damages the pragmatic and fragile consensus achieved at Paris, setting the West against the developing world.

Dogmatic green policies are creating a divided and acrimonious international environment that will permit China to greatly enhance its global economic presence and political influence as the Western democracies become weaker.

The astronomical cost of net zero is crippling European economies. If we want to protect our future we need to put our industries and way of life first.

East Asia and China have made it abundantly clear where their priorities lie. Unsurprisingly, keeping the lights on and an economic miracle going is deemed far more important than sticking to woolly net zero targets demanded by a virtue-waving US and Europe.

Dr John Cameron,

St Andrews

Johnson's Irish deal disgrace

Boris Johnson's 'oven ready deal' would have been better received if the turkey it represented had been thoroughly defrosted instead of the ham-fisted approach that has since been taken.

There can be no doubt that the signatories on the British side have made a pig's ear of the whole agreement and have cast doubt on their good faith for the future in any subsequent treaty negotiations.

If the story circulating about what our illustrious PM told Ian Paisley junior about ripping up the NI protocol, once he had got Brexit over the line, is to be taken as gospel, it reveals that he was double dealing during negotiations with his EU counterparts.

That was hardly in the spirit of sincere negotiation, since it casts doubts over any promises or agreements entered into by this man.

Credit must be given to the EU side for the compromises it has made within the protocol to mitigate the bulk of the form filling difficulties the NI protocol provoked in its less refined genesis.

What the UK side is after is to remove the protocol lock, stock and barrel to allow it to have its own way, in much the same way teenagers expect to have everything their own way without consideration for the position of others.

There comes to mind the old saying that, when you make your own bed, you just have to lie in it whereas the UK signatories have been doing no more than lying about it.

Is this specious tantrum intended to trump the truth?

Denis Bruce

Bishopbriggs

Let politicians pay for Afghans

So far, only 18 out of 32 Scottish councils have offered housing support to the 15,000 Afghans who were forced to flee from Afghanistan. Why should council tax payers fund this when MSPs receive between £64,470 and £157,861?

Our MSPs should lead by example and either contribute to their upkeep or better still take an Afghan family into their own homes.

After all, six years ago Nicola Sturgeon promised she would take a Syrian refugee family into her home. Strange that there have been no regular updates as to their progress.

Clark Cross

Linlithgow

Dangerous UK foreign policy

The Commons debate on the fall of Kabul laid bare the unravelling "special relationship" with Tom Tugendhat and other MPs speaking of their shame at the US betrayal. A raft of opinion polls since confirm the public's support for the US has fallen off a cliff.

Why then, given there was no mention of Taiwan in the Defence Review, has Boris Johnson signed up to AUKUS? Surely it has to be based on something more than a desire to stitch up President Macron?

Our Carrier Strike Group is currently in the Pacific but any suggestion that a British fleet could be permanently stationed there is patently absurd. In 1941, when we were a global power, the sinking of HMS Prince Of Wales and Repulse and the fall of Singapore showed how overstretched we were and unable to commit resources there.

The inadequacies of the Strike group are well documented: the dependence on US F35Bs with their eye-wateringly expensive technical faults; the Type 45 destroyers, which spend most of their time in port and break down in warm weather; and Type 23 Frigates, which are Falklands-era with the Type 26 still four years away.

The Brexiteers guaranteed a free trade deal with the US (even if that entailed chlorinated chicken and hormone injected beef), but Nancy Pelosi has put the kibosh on that. That situation won't get better anytime soon with Johnson preparing for battle with the EU over Northern Ireland. If Global Britain is no longer trade, is it our navy?

Why does President Biden even want the UK to add a fig leaf to their unilateral foreign policy? Sleepy Joe, who inauspiciously did not recognise his ally, Australian PM Scott Morrison, has said the US has treaty obligations to Taiwan. Actually, it doesn't.

Furthermore, there is a Pacific NATO ie the "Quad" (US, Australia, Japan, India, with Canada likely to join), capable of thwarting Chinese ambitions to restore the country as it was from 1644 under the Qing dynasty.

As recently as 2015, President Xi was feted at Buckingham Place and China planned to develop the Huawei 5G network and advise on HS2. Then we saw our role, appropriately, as being the defence of Europe and enhancing European strategic autonomy.

The French are right; we are reverting to being the lapdog of the US as we were in the illegal war with Iraq. Johnson's foreign policy is lurching in a very dangerous direction.

John V Lloyd

Inverkeithing