By Scotsman Letters
Copyright scotsman
Your report on a surge in passengers at Scottish Airports highlights new international routes recently introduced at Edinburgh (Scotsman, 24 September). But my recent experience would suggest that Edinburgh Airport should halt any new international routes until it can deal adequately with the passengers arriving on international flights. I arrived back in Edinburgh last Friday, 19 September, after a few days in Germany. It took an hour and a half to progress through the airport from exiting the plane to leaving the terminal building. Most of that time was spent standing in a queue for Passport Control. The queue started on one of the raised walkways that bring passengers from the various arrival gates. About 50 yards further on, a second queue of passengers on another walkway had to merge with the queue I was in. Then after another 50 yards, we reached the stairs down to the Border Control hall but there was yet another stream of passengers joining the queue at that point. Eventually we reached the “zig-zags” before finally reaching the e-gates. What a welcome to our country! I was acutely ashamed of the way we greet visitors from abroad. It is not just a black mark on Edinburgh Airport, it is a national disgrace. I spoke to a member of Border Force who said “Sir, I couldn’t agree with you more. We would like to make improvements but Edinburgh Airport are preventing us.” But earlier in the year I had heard Edinburgh Airport saying the problem lay with Border Force. I don’t know which to believe. But I do know visitors are being greeted in the most appalling manner and something needs to be done with the utmost urgency. Andrew Watt, Dalkeith, Midlothian Train trap In our world of constantly increasing bills is it really any surprise when we meet yet another chancer business ripping us off? We allowed privatised-with-privileges Edinburgh Airport to behave like Dick Turpin and introduce a “modest” charge to drop their customers off at their business, and of course as expected that has become a cash cow and ramped up exponentially since. Now Edinburgh Waverley has got in on the act. Having driven taxis out of the station, the 40-minute free period for dropping off passengers has been reduced to 15 minutes. Having used this recently, we took an elderly relative who required travel assistance to catch her train. With no signage explaining the change, I was now presented at the pay station for an unexpected bill for £5. That’s £5 for the privilege of taking their passenger to their train, to the assistance point not at the perimeter of the station, but embedded deep in the concourse. It’s impossible to do that in 15 minutes so the station is effectively discriminating against the elderly and physically challenged with this draconian charge. Is it any wonder our compassionless rail system is failing? And deserves to. Jim Taylor, Edinburgh Silence costs lives From Skye, I write as someone who has lived in Egypt and Israel and know the fear headlines can’t convey. Gaza is not an abstraction: it is hunger, danger, and disrupted lives. Silence is no longer an option. According to the UN’s Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, some 470,000 people in Gaza now face catastrophic hunger. UNICEF reports that 13.5 per cent of children screened – around 12,800 – are acutely malnourished. The Gaza Health Ministry says more than 65,200 Palestinians have been killed since October 2023. Famine has been confirmed in Gaza City, and at least 440 people (including 147 children) have since died from malnutrition or starvation. Independent press access has been severely restricted. Foreign journalists are largely barred unless embedded with military escorts. The Gaza Government Media Office records at least 251 journalists and media workers killed – some reporting live, others alongside their families at home. When access is blocked, verification suffers, and the public cannot see clearly. Scotland has close ties with Palestine through civic solidarity, culture, and humanitarian work. We value a rules-based order and an honest lens on events. Our tradition, as Robert Burns reminds us, is to recognise the human cost and speak plainly when lives are at stake. Silence is complicit. And it costs lives. Judith Campbell, Skye, Highland What a mess With the fledgling state of Palestine very much in the news, we should remember that back in 1948 it was the Mandated Palestinian State overseen by Glubb Pasha, KCB, DSO, OBE,MC, legendary British Lieutenant-General who created the Arab Legion. He fought in the First World War, the Second World War and the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Glubb Pasha will be spinning in his grave (at Mayfield in Sussex) at the mess Hamas, Hezbollah and and a vengeful Israel are making of Gaza, causing the deaths of thousands of innocents and destruction of their homes. Doug Morrison, Tenterden, Kent Swinney sympathy Poor old John Swinney. Those are not words I use lightly, but what a shambles he is in, presiding over ministerial resignation following resignation and general apathy about what he, the SNP, Holyrood and even the Scottish economy is about. He presides over a party which wants to shut down one of Scotland’s leading industries employing approaching 100,000 people, just like the way they presided over Grangemouth ending refining. Wasn’t that a clever thing? Closing down the North Sea is also, by any measure, pure genius – in a negative way – and can only be matched by wanting to push for another independence referendum. Goodness, me! Of course. He wants that too. No half measures for John, then. Since being soundly thrashed in the 2014independence referendum, Mr Swinney’s party, which split not long thereafter, is now producing its 14th “white paper” on independence. Not many, you may think, until you subtract the number of years since 2014, then it seems rather numerous. In fact, I believe that there has been one a year since Freedom Day. However, he need not worry. Any sane analyst would tell him the obvious fact: people vote in the SNP (not me, I hasten to add) to get “free” benefits. Benefits paid for by those of us who work, of course, so not really “free”. The Scots do not want independence because, daft though they may be to vote SNP, they know full well that all the “free” goodies would end on day one of independence. That is why, when he exhorts Scots to vote for the SNP in 2026 as the means by which to obtain independence, there is an echoing silence, because everyone and his dog knows that is untrue. Andrew HN Gray, Edinburgh Out of puff It’s fascinating that “Most Scots think SNP does poorly on public services” (your report, 25 September) In this case “think” is probably the wrong word; it should be “know”. It goes deeper than this. Scots are constantly being told that opinion polls still show the SNP at the top of the tree when it comes to voting intentions for Holyrood in 2026. This cannot square with these results. After 18 years in power the SNP has obviously run out of “puff”. Surely there will be a change of government in some shape here next May. All UK political eyes are concentrating on the future of Keir Starmer but surely John Swinney will be gone too. as surely the SNP will not want England to get “one over” on Scotland? Gerald Edwards, Glasgow No deterrent We learn from The Scotsman (24 September) that there are fears that prisons in Scotland are beginning to get over full. All prisons in the UK are the same. Soft justice leads to no fear of retribution and people are willing to risk a few months in prison for what they want or need to do. British justice is one of the worst in the world, with the added problem of an overpopulated country and far too few prisons to cope with demand. So now we have “early release” and half or two -thirds sentences instead of handing down totally adequate and deterrent sentences, and British prisons have been classed as home from home. Daily now we see killers receiving so-called life sentences for murder which are nothng like a life sentence. This alone, handing down 12 to 23 years for someone’s life, is the reason there are roughly two murders every day in Britain, and seemingly absolutely nothing done to deter or even punish. When the UK starts to have more compassion for the victims of crime rather than the offenders in crime, then we will see a drop in demand for prison spaces. Derek Stocker, Bexhill-on-Sea, East Sussex Delayed discharge The lengthy waiting times in A&E continue to be a major problem (your report, 23 September). As usual the response from the Scottish Government is to throw money (£200 million) at the problem without thinking it through. The problem is the “constipation” of delayed discharges. Rather than improving waiting times and setting up frailty teams it would be far more effective if the money was used to speed up the assessment process for discharge and increase the support in the community which would allow frail patients to be discharged more quickly and clear the blockage. This would free up beds to allow patients in A&E to move through the system. Does the Scottish Government never learn? Dr Roger Smith, Edinburgh Write to The Scotsman We welcome your thoughts – NO letters submitted elsewhere, please. Write to lettersts@scotsman.com including name, address and phone number – we won’t print full details. 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