Letters: Johnson is key to the fight against Putin. He must have our support

The current situation in Ukraine and its evil culprits in Russia seem a lot more threatening to people like me who grew up during the Cold War than even the Cuban Missile Crisis.

The first duty of a government is to preserve the safety and security of its people. It therefore seems incredible that there are still calls for him to resign over Partygate.

A few weeks ago I thought he should resign if the Partygate inquiry found him guilty. But in the grand scheme of things the Russian invasion, its brutality and future threat require prioritisation. Mr Johnson is the PM and doing a good job so he should be supported, and properly challenged, in this. The world would be astounded if he lost his job due to Partygate. If found guilty he should be fined for breaking his own law. He, us and the world have bigger fish to fry for the foreseeable future.

Allan Sutherland, Stonehaven.

* I NOTE that Conservative MSP Graham Simpson thinks that if the PM was forced to resign it would be a boost for Vladimir Putin ("PM resigning over Partygate would send wrong message to Putin, says MSP", The Herald, April 4).

We are dealing with a dictator whose actions are beyond belief and who does not care about the Russian people (sanctions will not cause him to have to give up his wealth), so Boris Johnson being forced to resign would probably be a wee bit of a joke to him if he even cared.

There is no chance that Mr Johnson will resign despite any outcome from Partygate inquiries. He will lie and squirm his way out of it as usual. He will not go until the 1922 Committee decide that he has to go. So we are stuck with him for a while unless the local election results in England prove to be a major tipping point.

He will very likely be gone long before the results of the inquiry into the Government's handling of the Covid pandemic are published. As with previous major government inquiries, by the time the findings are published, the names of the ministers and officials involved will be long forgotten by most of the electorate unless the media keep them informed.

Meantime I don't think that Putin will be shaking in his shoes at the mention of Mr Johnson or any other leader of the western world. He does not care.

Malcolm Rankin, Seamill.

WE MUST ENSURE UKRAINE WINS

ROBIN Dow (Letters, April 5) is correct that Vladimir Putin won’t be extracted for a war crimes trial, but is slightly mistaken about why. It’s no longer up to Putin what happens to him. It’s up to the next phase of war.

Ukraine and the world need to regain all of Ukraine's coasts and to secure calm in the giant agricultural space of Ukraine, because the wheat of Ukraine feeds some half of the developing world.

The free world will therefore have to bite the bullet and make sure Ukraine wins. Russia will look and feel like a nuclear-armed banana republic. Her nuclear arsenal can gain nothing worth keeping

Putin’s sidekicks will deal with him in their own way. They are all dictatorial nationalists, but they may not all be mad. It does not really matter what happens to Putin, but he is more likely to be locked up and sedated than delivered to a process that shames Russia.

Tim Cox, Bern, Switzerland.

WE MUST RAGE AGAINST THE WAR

IN a recent article Brian Taylor (“Sunak's plan is an ideological challenge. Sturgeon counters with ideology of her own”, The Herald, March 26) memorably suggested that “we must rage, rage against the attempted extinction of the light in Ukraine”.

The following day Iain Macwhirter equally memorably insisted that “we cannot allow the conflict in Ukraine to be normalised – it's not just another war ... this is our war, a European war, and it has changed our world in ways we have yet to comprehend”.

My examination of the Letters Pages from Monday March 28 to Monday April 4 (including Herald on Sunday, April 3) containing 92 letters revealed that there were only seven relevant mentions of Ukraine. I was therefore gratified to read the letters of April 5 from James Watson and Robin Dow under the heading "No matter the cost, we must hit Putin and his ally states".

I agree with Brian Taylor saying “it is entirely right and appropriate that, in the midst of tragedy in Ukraine, democratic discourse should persist in those countries where it is still permitted”. However, while I accepted that there are a number of literally life and death domestic issues requiring debate, for instance the scandal of domestic poverty, I believed that there was much more balance required in the Letters Pages, now adjusted to a small extent by the aforementioned two contributions.

We cannot, if we are to retain our humanity, turn our backs on what President Zelenskyy refers to as “manifestations of evil”. We must “rage, rage” and must not “allow the conflict in Ukraine to be normalised”.

Neil Mackay sums the situation up in his article today ("We are at the heart of a war for the future of democracy", The Herald, April 5) which effectively answers, in his usual forthright fashion, the letter of the same date from Iris Clyde headed "Time to press for negotiated peace’.

John Milne, Uddingston.

ARE WE RESIGNED TO MEDIOCRITY?

A POLLING organisation predicts that the SNP will win an "astonishing" victory in the forthcoming council elections. Can we assume that it excluded from the people whose opinion it asked all those who have waited for hours for an ambulance or at A&E? All those who use our cities’ disfigured and potholed roads? Those who depend on ferry services to and from our islands? Those suffering from the closure of police stations, especially in rural areas? Those whose children are in substandard (in terms of both fabric and education) schools?

Or are Scots now so resigned to declining services that they will obediently vote for the party that promises them nirvana in the future while failing their needs in the present?

Jill Stephenson, Edinburgh.

* FRANCES McKie (Letters, April 5) points out that in spite of "relentless newspaper headlines and media attacks on the SNP Government" by unionists, we still have a huge majority of SNP MSPs in our Scottish Parliament. Going by the latest opinion poll, it looks as if we are also on course for a large majority of SNP councillors to be elected at next month's local government elections. Of course, the only poll which really matters is the one which takes place on May 5, but it does suggest that voters have confidence in the SNP, approve of its policies, appreciate the difficulties that have had to be faced by councils and the Scottish Government, especially over the past two years, and commend the First Minister for her commitment and her cautious approach to dealing with the pandemic and the lifting of restrictions.

Unionist parties which monopolise their leaflets with "SNP bad" are increasingly being viewed as a turn-off by voters who don't want the SNP beaten, because among other things, they appreciate not having to pay £9.35 per item for their prescriptions (as they do in England) or up to £27,750 for university tuition fees (as they do in England) while in England they pay hundreds of pounds more on council tax than we do in Scotland. But of course, in England they don't have the SNP, something that I know is a matter of profound regret to many people south of Hadrian's Wall.

Ruth Marr, Stirling.

BROADCAST WAS A FIRST FOR THE SNP

YET another first for the SNP. Congratulations to this lost party for giving us such a laugh at the start of the week. Last night's pre-election broadcast (April 4) showed, at a stroke, that the governing party in Scotland concurs that it is totally devoid of any ideas to present to its people whom it professes to govern.

Yes, it restated – as the First Minister does every week in Holyrood–- that the Tories are rubbish at the moment and should not be allowed to win or gain any seats in a few weeks' time. But when was a political broadcast ever shown that never once mentioned the party for whom it is trying to win votes?

Walter Paul, Glasgow.

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