Readers' Letters: Sarwar's attack on Starmer has backfired massively
Correspondents are in agreement that Anas Sarwar made a big mistake this week
It is amazing to what extent Anas Sarwar’s call for the Prime Minister to quit has backfired (“Sarwar’s gamble”, 10 February).
He led his troops over the top, only to find a handful of footsoldiers behind him, with the vast majority of MSPs and MPs preferring to stay in the trenches.
With a phalanx of MPs and MSPs, including the whole Cabinet, now backing Keir Starmer, all the Scottish Labour leader has served to do through his botched coup attempt is galvanise Sir Keir and highlight how weak the Labour leader in a highly divided Scottish branch office is.
In creating such widespread chaos, it also makes it almost impossible for him to be able to work with the likes of Scottish Secretary Douglas Alexander, co-chair of Labour’s Scottish election campaign, who, unlike Mr Sarwar, supports the Prime Minister.
Anas Sarwar attacked an individual in the shape of Prime Minister Starmer, who is by far in the weakest position in UK politics, but still lost.
Alex Orr, Edinburgh
Out in the cold
Anas Sarwar has been left high and dry. His roll of the dice failed but Labour has come out of this utterly broken.
How many people in the UK think the entire Labour Cabinet really believes Keir Starmer is the ideal person for the job? How could Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting really send genuine messages of support when the plotting behind the scenes has been so completely exposed?
Labour is now a sham government. It is no longer a case of should Starmer stay or go, it is the case that all Labour MPs really need to have their credentials reverified, or otherwise, by the general public after yet another less than transparent show of support for Starmer. A new general election must be called.
Trust in Labour has utterly vaporised. It is not just Sarwar who is out in the cold.
Gerald Edwards, Glasgow
Vote loser
It was bitterly disappointing to see Anas Sarwar jump on the bandwagon and condemn the Prime Minister as he did. Not that I have any particular regard for Keir Starmer; I thought him a weak and vacillating PM, lacking conviction and certainly not a good leader.
There is, however, something basically wrong in being opportunistic to the point of kicking a man, a colleague, when he is down and that is how the vast majority will see it, despite Mr Sarwar's explanation.
I have voted Labour first and second at every election since Devolution. In truth, I did this mainly to keep the SNP out; I consider the nationalists a great danger to Scotland and this opinion has been amply demonstrated by events to be the right one. Now I'll have to rethink where I cast my vote, with the same end in mind.
Alexander McKay, Edinburgh
Own goal
Has the leader of the Labour Party in Scotland committed political suicide, or is he just trying to get more votes to ensure a win over the SNP? One way or another, he has scored an own goal.
His speech immediately sparked off a concerted rush by government ministers to back the Prime Minister, which saved him and his job for the time being. Tomorrow is another day. Many ministers who backed Keir Starmer in public were saying in private that he should resign.
Politicians should remember the law of unintended consequences, and think before they act.
James Macintyre, Linlithgow, West Lothian
English power
Surely Anas Sarwar can now see how little Scotland matters to the British government? Despite terrible polling data for the upcoming Holyrood elections, his appeal to Keir Starmer to resign, to give him a chance of becoming first minister, fell on deaf ears and he was left out in the cold like a naughty schoolboy. Cabinet minister after cabinet minister announced their continued support for the beleaguered Prime Minister.
In 2022 the Supreme Court reminded the then first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, that the constitution is a reserved matter, by refusing to allow a second referendum. Indeed, before and since the Supreme Court decision, prime minister after prime minister, and more recently Rachel Reeves, has echoed the sentiments of Boris Johnson, stating that Scotland had its chance in 2014 and that’s that.
What Sarwar must now see is that it is England that chooses the British government. Starmer is secure in the knowledge that even another nationalist majority in Scotland will not move the dial, as it is the British government that hold all the cards. Sarwar’s little election is of no consequence to the English voter.
Stuart Smith, Aberdeen
Silver bullet
Judas got 30 pieces of silver – Anas Sarwar discovered the hard way no one gave tuppence for his betrayal.
Mark Boyle, Johnstone, Renfrewshire
Go nuclear
While England and others begin to use unobtrusive mini-nuclear reactors for clean and reliable power, Scotland persists with winds light to variable, harnessed by foreign windmill owners who ruin our fine land and seascapes with their rotary bird-mashing monstrosities.
If our First Minister ever left the cosy confines of his upturned boat building in Holyrood, and ventured into the wild wood outside, he would surely have his eyes opened to reality.
Malcolm Parkin, Kinnesswood, Perth and Kinross
Value teachers
Only a third of secondary school teachers are male, while male primary schoolteachers reach 11 per cent (your report, 10 February). I wonder if these figures include head teachers.
Teaching, as a profession, is undervalued and underpaid. Nurturing the futures of children, from the age of five to 18, is arguably the most vital of professions, and it's beyond time that this should be recognised.
Teachers are certainly not in it for the money, which is derisory given the importance of their jobs, or indeed, vocations. Perhaps the time has come when they're no longer employed by the cash-strapped councils, but become the responsibility of the Scottish Parliament.
I'm quite sure far more men would see teaching as an attractive option were they to be paid according to their unquestionable worth. Many an excellent teacher can leave his or her indelible mark on their pupils for life.
We can always find the cash to destroy life, at the cost of enhancing it. Let's never forget the debt we all owe to teachers, male and female. Our children deserve no less.
Ian Petrie, Edinburgh
Jersey boys
Rona McCall writes in relation to hockey team Fife Flyers’ decision to have players wear Pride jerseys during the warm-up only, and not during the match itself, at Pride Night fixtures (Letters, 7 February). The club has explained that this was done to respect “the diversity of personal beliefs amongst the players”. The Hive, a hard-working local LGBTQ+ charity, has responded by declining donations collected for it by the club.
Ms McCall states that “the trans community ask society to accept their personal beliefs, that they are a different gender to their sex”. In expressing her concern, I wonder whether Ms McCall overlooks the deeper irony that the LGBTQ+ movement can be viewed as promoting gender identity claims directly antithetical to the interests of same-sex-attracted people.
Pride originated as a movement for lesbians and gay men — people whose sexual orientation is rooted, like that of the majority heterosexual population, in biological sex. Gender identity claims can reframe same-sex attraction as something to be overcome, insisting same-sex-attracted people should be open to dating members of the opposite sex who identify as the same sex. By the same logic, straight people should be open to dating people of the same sex who identify as the opposite sex.
If Fife Flyers wish to support local LGB and TQ+ people, I do hope they ensure the organisations and projects they support do not require assent to the contested ideological beliefs Ms McCall refers to. In saying this, I acknowledge the tremendous work The Hive have and will surely continue to do for LGB and trans-identifying people.
Brian Forsyth, Edinburgh
Weathering storm
The Met Office, the UK weather forecaster funded by the government at a cost of £346 million a year, has made a “major upgrade to the forecasting system” making it “more accurate” and improving “representation of model uncertainty”.
Their Cloud-based supercomputer has had a boost to its model-making ability “helping reach net zero emissions by 2050”.
Despite this, forecasting beyond a week or so in advance do in fact include “uncertainty”. As I write the long-range forecast to the end of February includes the words “may be”; “perhaps”; “somewhat”; “possible”, and “chance”. Nevertheless, they are confident in predicting the climate 50 or 75 years hence.
Next year the BBC weather forecasting contract switches from Meteo Group back to the Met Office. Let's hope less time is used telling us what the weather has been and more telling us what the weather will be, not may be.
William Loneskie, Oxton, Lauder, Berwickshire
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