Readers' Letters: 'New Labour' to blame for Scottish party's decline

I note that, in the recent election for the leader of the Scottish Labour Party, the total number of votes cast was 6,751.That equates to an average of 92 votes per Scottish Parliament constituency, and that figure includes affiliate supporters who are not required to be party members.

When I was first elected as MP for West Stirlingshire in 1974, there were more than 100 Labour Party members in the village of Bannockburn alone. Since Blair’s miscreation of “New Labour”, the party has experienced a massive haemorrhage of members and has consequently lost its connection with local communities.

If we were to exclude all the Labour MPs, MSPs, members of the House of Lords, Knights, Dames, councillors, researchers, advisers and other salaried hangers-on, the number of grassroots party members in Scotland would be approaching zero.

Michael Marra shakes hands with a party member after being announced as winner of the Scottish Labour leadership contest (Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

What used to be called the People’s Party seems to be in a state of terminal decline. I wish Michael Marra well but, if Labour in Scotland is to rediscover its long-lost soul, it must reconnect with the working class and embrace the cause of Scottish independence, or at least let the people of Scotland decide our future.

Dennis Canavan, Bannockburn, Stirling

Dream team

Here's hoping Scottish Labour’s new leadership partnership will restore their party and Scotland’s fortunes and emulate Liverpool FC’s all-conquering management duo, with Michael Marra as Bob Paisley and Joe Fagan as Joe Fagan.

Allan Sutherland, Stonehaven, Aberdeenshire

PISA in perspective

Since PISA was last conducted in 2022, the Scottish mean score has declined by 5 points in reading and 4 points in maths. However, pupils have shown an improvement in science, up 8 points compared to 2022. The changes are marginal, however, and so are not seen to be statistically significant. For example, comparing with England, mathematics shows the largest gap between subjects of -25 (492 vs 467). At -5.1 per cent this is only slightly in excess of the statistical margin for error (4.5 per cent).

It seems as if those in the media who make a habit of talking Scotland down with a lack of supporting evidence would be well advised to exhibit caution when comparing PISA data from the broad-based Scottish Highers system with the much narrower and more specialised A-level system in England. Time enough to specialise at university. What is not so well documented is that England, unlike Scotland, only allows top-performing schools to take part in PISA. On this evidence, the mystery is why Scotland performs so well.

DW Lowden, Mannofield, Aberdeen

Noble intentions

Following the death of Princess Diana, her brother made the noble statement that he would never seek to profit from her death.

In light of that worthy expression of respect, I look forward to hearing about the charities, institutions and good causes to which Earl Spencer will donate all the profits made from his book, the newspaper serialisation and related TV and other interviews.

The noble Earl should be congratulated for this generosity of spirit in memory of his late sister… when it happens.

Paul Lewis, Edinburgh

Pension plan

It’s all very well Brian Barbour reminding us that Westminster doesn’t maintain a “pension pot” from National Insurance payments (Letters, 18 September), but has to use incoming NI to fund existing pensions – but that’s a world away from saying that Scotland becoming independent absolves Westminster of any responsibility for state pensions for those of us who contributed our own NI payments on the understanding that we’d receive the a state pension based on those contributions.

He did acknowledge that folk who have retired to countries in the European Economic Area still receive their UK pension, and annual uplifts. And we do know that different arrangements apply to folk who retire to other countries.

And we’re not daft enough to assume that Westminster would want to have to explain to their own continuing NI contributors that they were still paying “Scottish” pensions and so, for that reason, Westminster will join in with discussions that will include, within the final agreed overall fiscal settlement, how the handover of responsibility for ongoing state pensions to the new Scottish government will be dealt with.

To pretend that Westminster could, or would even want to, wipe its hands of any responsibility for future state pensions for those of us who’ve paid into the system, is disingenuous in the extreme.

Ian Waugh, Dumfries

The best is history

It is a matter for regret that the impecunious University of Edinburgh appears to share a former Labour Education Secretary’s dismissal of medieval history as “ornamental”.

Denys Hay, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Edinburgh, from 1954 to 1980 would certainly not have appreciated Charles Clarke’s flippancy. What might be the subject of the Annual Denys Hay Lecture in 2027? Through knowledge of the past, history anchors or roots a person in the present, establishing reference points; without it, one is simply bobbing helplessly along on the surface of ever-changing currents of “novelty”, of “fashions”, of “trends”.

Duncan McAra, Bishopbriggs

Very charitable

Perhaps the hapless Collette Stevenson has a point. The extension of ‘free’ bus travel, or heavily discounted fares, to an ever-widening range of Scots does suggest that transport is being treated as a charity.

Jill Stephenson, Edinburgh

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