Labour’s authoritarian agenda is contributing to rise of the far-right

Tory economic policies led to economic decline. The Tories then manipulated the financial data to obscure the consequences.

Figures such as Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson are adept at distilling the nationalist and militaristic rhetoric of mainstream capitalist parties into their own aggressive expressions.

Farage, Robinson, Reform’s Richard Tice, GB “News” and other far-right figures have incited poorly educated individuals and fostered a culture of violence.

This troubling and virulent strain of Anglo-Saxon nationalism underscores the necessity for Scotland to seek independence.

The threat of fascism is escalating in England, and the situation is likely to deteriorate further.

In the 1930s, Hitler persuaded the German populace that Jews were the root cause of the nation’s issues. Similarly, Farage and his associates are trying to scapegoat immigrants in the UK.

While it is widely acknowledged that Hitler’s assertions were erroneous, it raises the question of why Farage’s claims are not being similarly scrutinised.

Alan Hinnrichs

Dundee

AFTER Rachel “Freeze” Reeves scrapped the Winter Fuel Payment for 1.5 million pensioners who are too poor to retire, it emerged that last year she claimed £1200 for energy bills for her London MP home.

In 2015, the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) suspended her parliamentary credit card– yes, MPs get one – after she ran up a £4000 bill.

It’s doubtful Reeves can empathise with poor pensioners who will now be cold this winter and even die as a result of her cruel cuts. On top of her £91,346 MP salary, she receives a £67,505 ministerial salary and lives rent-free at 11 Downing Street.

The English Labour government’s first steps have shown their utter contempt for the working poor. As usual, Scots will suffer the most. Our nation is colder. We pay the most for energy of all UK nations and we face rising prices this winter as the price cap is raised.

And our energy resources are being stolen with the GB Energy con, a shell company that won’t generate any energy, won’t lower prices and won’t stiffen Ofgem to rein in price-gouging monopoly private suppliers.

Reeves doesn’t understand government finance nor has she learned that austerity never leads to growth but to immiseration. One thing is clear – Scotland can’t afford to remain in this failing Union.

Leah Gunn Barrett

Edinburgh

I WAS born in January 1959. I foolishly thought I had some kind of pension “deal” with the UK Government. I wrongly thought that if I worked for the right number of years and paid the right amount of National Insurance I would get a very basic UK state pension at 65 years of age – if I was lucky enough to survive that long.

The male pension age was then moved upwards to 66 years. So this year I am currently being robbed, deprived and cheated out of around £12,000. For Waspi women it is a lot worse, with their retirement age moving from 60 to 66. Now it seems that any hope of some assistance with the UK’s obscene fuel bills, when I finally become a pensioner in January 2025, may now have gone.

The next part of this attack on pensioners is still to come. Those who during their working lives were able to save a little or pay into an employer’s pension scheme can, I suspect, soon look forward to the prospect of refunding more of it to the UK Government by way of paying more in income tax.

The average life expectancy for men in the city of Glasgow is currently less than 73 years and is falling. It is clearly the intention of both Labour and Tory UK governments, in the longer term, to increase the pension qualifying age still further in the hope that fewer of today’s workers will survive long enough to even claim their meagre pension.

The final step may be means testing the state pension itself. I do not remember any mention, in the several election leaflets and letters I received from Mr Sarwar and the local Labour candidate of cutting the funding which assists pensioners pay their winter fuel bills.

I do remember very vague promises to cut fuel bills via an unspecified entity called GB Energy. Perhaps those vague promises assisted in Labour’s election victory.

Sadly, the SNP dumped any and all commitments to a real national energy company some time ago. This needs to be reconsidered.

Brian Lawson

Paisley

COLIN Fox of the Scottish Socialist Party was right to decry the new Labour government’s predicted use of PFIs in the public sector (Jul 31). The use of such funding transfers wealth upwards, and can’t truly be described as public investment.

Executives draw eye-watering salaries and bonuses and any democratic control evaporates. The public experiences declining service quality.

The Scottish Socialist Party is right to call for an end to using public money in this way, as it does nothing to protect services or employment conditions but merely adds to the ever-widening wealth gap.

Belinda Cunnison

Edinburgh

WE have just had an exchange of prisoners between Russia and the West. And much controversy about Israeli hostages taken by Hamas last October.

No news, however, about release of the thousands of Palestinian hostages held in Israeli jails for years.

I would say it is time for a level playing field.

Margaret Forbes

Blanefield