Will Scots Labour MPs be Starmer's lapdogs over Palestine?

The Herald Scotland

8 hours ago

Labour MP Richard Burgon said this was 'truly sickening, especially given the genocide being carried out' in Gaza. It's also a flagrant violation of international law. The International Court of Justice has been totally clear that all states must stop any co-operation that aids Israel's illegal occupation of Palestine'.
So not only are we supplying Israel with weapons: we are also, quite disgracefully, training their soldiers on UK soil. It is surely now imperative that we have a full, independent public inquiry into the UK's role in the slaughter in Gaza as quickly as possible.
This new development must, inevitably, only add to the suffering already being endured by the Palestinian people.
It will be interesting to see if any Scottish Labour MPs will protest about it or whether they will continue to act as if they were the Prime Minister's lapdogs and remain silent.
Alan Woodcock, Dundee.
A simple question for the taxman
The reason that all pensioners should receive the winter fuel payment is the same reason that all children should be eligible for primary education, free school meals, free nursery places and for child benefit, and why the state pension should not be means-tested.
We should never have a system where someone earning one extra pound is worse off than those without it when they were below a threshold.
There should be no cliff edges.
If we decide that someone should only keep 45p of that extra pound (the Universal Credit taper for someone below the tax threshold), 32p (the taper combined with basic rate income tax and national insurance), 50p (the top rate of income tax and national insurance above £125,140, and also between £43,663 and £50,000), 79p (the intermediate tax rate for a pensioner), or 91.25p (basic rate dividend tax), or all of it, then that should be a simple question for the tax system.
The tax system will also collect more of whatever you do keep if you spend it on cigarettes instead of on food or children's clothes, or other zero-VAT items.
If we decide that pensioners need some extra cash to heat their homes during the winter, as we don't expect them to be at school or at work during the day, we should give them all the extra cash, and expect them all to contribute towards it with the same rates of taxation that everyone else pays.
While Brian Wilson ('A universal truth: not all pensioners deserve the winter fuel allowance. But U-turn is welcome', June 12) might complain that a pensioner in Scotland receives £100 more in their winter fuel payment, those with incomes above the £35,000 threshold are paying most of it back in extra tax compared to England, and those above £40,000 will be paying all of it back.
Will Mr Wilson stick to his newly revealed principles and argue in a future column that parents above a certain income threshold should pay for primary school education?
Or will he return to the old-fashioned Labour principle of universalism?
Alan Ritchie, Glasgow.
Turning a defeat into near-victory
I see that SNP MP Pete Wishart is bigging himself up on social media, telling us how long he's served as an MP and informing us that he's one
of the separatist politicians who 'almost won an independence referendum'.
So, in SNP la la land, must we assume clearly that losing means almost winning?
Martin Redfern, Melrose, Roxburghshire.
Russia's military incompetence
Britain was spending about 7% of GDP on defence in the 1950s. This has now shrunk to little more than 2%, less if we remove service pensions from the calculation.
This makes us as one of the top spenders in Western Europe. The USA spends 3.19%. Russia is spending 6.3%. I suggest it is a little fanciful for George Morton (letters, June 8) to claim that Nato was gearing up for any sort of conflict with a nuclear-armed Russia. When the Ukraine war began, Germany offered Zelenskyy 7,000 helmets. That's how war-like they were.
Russia has a long history of extreme military incompetence. They keep attacking smaller neighbours and either get beaten (Japan 1904) or do badly initially, but grind on and eventually extract some territorial concessions as they did with Finland in the Winter War (1939-40) or Poland (c 1920-21).
Ukraine seems to be an example of the latter situation.
Russia's position would be much worse if Nato had made a serious attempt to supply arms before and after the invasion. If Russia is being attacked every day, as Mr Morton suggests, it is only because, in the words of Donald Trump, they are 'bombing the hell out of Ukraine'. Russia bombs hospitals, schools and apartment blocks. Ukraine shoots up some warplanes. Putin denounces this as terrorism and bombs some more civilians.
Nato did take action over Kosovo to prevent the Serbs massacring the Kosovars as they had the Bosniaks. The UN should have done it but Russia would have vetoed any such move. Mr Morton's view on EU democracy seems to come directly from the Putin/Trump/Farage book of propaganda. The EU Commission is accountable to the directly elected European Parliament.
Each EU member sends a commissioner, chosen by their elected government. The commission, like the US presidency, is therefore an example of indirect democracy, which is a whole lot more democracy than Putin is willing to tolerate.
We live in dark times but the darkest hour is just before the dawn.
Ronald Cameron, Banavie.
Why we need a Scottish Trump
Every day under the SNP administration we hear of more Scottish companies closing down in Scotland. The latest news this week concerns yet another two companies – bus maker Alexander Dennis and the Scotbeef abattoir. This leaves me to believe that we need a Scottish Donald Trump to save our Scottish industries.
The SNP's banning of fracking led to the closure of Grangemouth refinery and they are intent in closing down the entire North Sea operation to keep the Green party happy. Perhaps it is time to give Nigel Farage and Reform a chance to show how they can save Scottish industries instead of running them down.
Dennis Forbes Grattan, Bucksburn, Aberdeen.
Medicine demands world leadership
Robert Kennedy Jr, as US health secretary, has appointed eight replacement vaccine advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention panel since he fired all of the previous scientific experts. Is this a misnomer, as many of them could be considered anti-vaccine and their scientific expertise could be questioned?
For the US, the recent measles outbreaks provide evidence for the need for more vaccines. Measles is not just annoying spots: it can kill. For the rest of the world the danger is in both the possible spread of diseases and more in the lack of support for the development of further vaccines by American scientists. The world needs leadership in medicine and medical research.
Dennis Fitzgerald, Melbourne, Australia.
Joined-up thinking must be a priority
We welcome the Chancellor's announcement of £2.6 billion to decarbonise the UK's transport system. The commitment to electric vehicles, particularly vans and HGVs, is a vital step towards a lower-emission future.
It's especially encouraging to see £400 million ringfenced for the rollout of charging infrastructure. This investment must be focused on delivering a public charging network that is reliable, accessible, and fit for commercial vehicle use. The commercial vehicle sector is responsible for 10% of UK emissions but decarbonising it at scale means creating confidence in infrastructure, not just vehicles.
Infrastructure developers are already making progress, but a joined-up approach between government, developers and fleet operators will be key to accelerating the transition.
Michael Shaw, CEO, Aegis Energy, Wakefield.