Readers' letters: Kate Forbes will lead the SNP sooner or later

Of course, if Yousaf loses in either of the no confidence votes, Forbes may not need to wait to play her hand. Yet say a weakened Yousaf survives to limp on for a few months only to lose significant numbers of Westminster seats (which, even before recent chaos, opinion polls predicted), Forbes will be poised to pounce.

Even then though, Yousaf might hobble on until the 2026 Holyrood election to submit his party and himself to further humiliation – before finally deciding to step aside for his only likely replacement.

Whenever it is, as Yousaf lurches from one politically suicidal decision to the next, it must be beyond doubt that Forbes one day will wear the crown. Let’s leave a discussion of Forbes' ultra-conservative views on the LGBTQ+ community and abortion to another time, save to say that they render her unsuitable as a 21st-century Western political leader.

Martin Redfern, Melrose, Scottish Borders

Kingmaker Regan

I despair at the two-faced hypocrisy of some of our politicians.

Ash Regan is currently thrusting herself back into the limelight by setting herself up as some sort of “kingmaker” in respect of Yousaf's future as First Minister, suggesting she will support him “at a political price”.

Just last year she put herself forward as a candidate for the post of First Minister. She is a second-rate politician and everyone, herself included, knew she had no chance of winning the election. All she accomplished was to split the anti- Humza vote. Without her participation it is very likely we would have had a politically competent First Minister in Kate Forbes and the last 12 months could have turned out very differently.

Humza Yousaf has been a bigger failure as First Minister than he was in the three ministerial positions he held under Nicola Sturgeon. Ash Regan should scoot back under the bland umbrella of the Alba Party and leave politics to the few competent politicians we have left.

D Mason, Penicuik, Midlothian

Go to the polls

Wily Alex Salmond and his henchwoman Ash Regan may save Humza Yousaf’s bacon by keeping him in power and allowing him to win a confidence vote by the slimmest of margins. But that won’t satisfy the Scottish electorate because the power-sharing arrangement with the Greens was backed by most SNP MSPs and party members, with honourable exceptions of pricipled figures like Fergus Ewing. As Mr Ewing asks (Scotsman, 26 April): “How on earth could a party of government associate with these extreme and absurb Green policies?”

But they did associate. SNP MSPs championed green policies of scrapping gas and oil boilers, creating targets from thin air to reduce Scotland’s miniscule CO2 emissions even further, turned their backs on the treasure of Scotland’s North Sea oil, legislated that men could become women, and presided over educational decline. They’re aw in it thegither.

What is required is not just a confidence vote in the First Minister. We need an immediate Holyrood election so that the Scottish people can have their own confidence vote on the SNP government.

William Loneskie, Lauder, Scottish Borders

Guilty parties

Humza Yousaf is not the only Scottish party leader to have shown poor judgment and made bad choices. Anas Sarwar, Scottish Labour leader, has induced his MSPs to support the two worst pieces of SNP legislation, the Hate Crime Act (twice) and the Gender Recognition Reform Bill (GRR).

On Friday’s PM programme on Radio 4, Sarwar was asked by Evan Davies if, knowing what he knows now, he would still vote for the GRR?. Sarwar’s answer was “No”. Sarwar could, I suppose, argue that recently the Cass Report has shown the folly of the GRR. But there had, in 2022, been open debate about its flaws and dangers. Indeed, Labour had itself introduced ameliorating amendments to the bill, none of which were accepted by the SNP/Green regime. Regardless, Sarwar whipped his MSPs to vote for it. The Lib Dems, too, supported it, Alex Cole-Hamilton enthusiastically.

How have we reached such a pass in Scotland where these party leaders prefer to follow minority fads and fashions rather than attend to the issues that actually exercise their constituents? Is it just that it is easier to grandstand and virtue signal than to do the hard work of repairing our threadbare public services, especially health and education?

Jill Stephenson, Edinburgh

EU dilemma

At first sight it might seem a smart move for Keir Starmer to announce, Humza Yousaf-like, that Labour intends long-term to re-join the EU. He is a remainer, after all.It would be pinching a policy from the SNP, and Sunak would be even more confused than ever about how to respond. Moderate Tories and Liberal Democrats would be impressed.

One could edge away from slavish following of the US, which prefers economically to deal with Europe as a whole anyway. There would be less of a Northern Ireland problem since the whole of the British isles would be part of Europe.

There's only one big snag. Though it’s under-reported here, the Irish are demonstrating more violently than we are about asylum seekers. Its that awkward “freedom of movement” thing.

Crawford Mackie, Edinburgh

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