FOLLOWING a letter from yet another member of the huge 'name and address supplied' group, my wife and I felt we had to reply to some of the issues they raise. In the first paragraph they say that the fact that the SNP put forward a persistent argument for independence means many people do actually think the party is a cult. By that argument then every party that puts forward an argument for remaining in the union must also be cults. Even we don’t think that! Also at least with the SNP we are quite clear that our ultimate goal is independence, the Tories and Labour seem to change their goals depending on which way the wind is blowing so no one – even we suspect the parties themselves – knows what their ultimate goals are!

The letter writer then goes on about criticising a Labour council tax increase but not criticising an SNP proposal for even bigger increases. In what they say, with one word, they cut the very feet from their own case. That word is consultation. The SNP did indeed put forward a consultation proposal for council tax increases. However, when the vast majority of responses – including our own – opposed the proposal, they immediately listened to the people of Scotland and dropped the proposal. This is called democracy. With regard to the Inverclyde Labour group's proposals, we are sure that the more than 10,000 leaflets that were delivered to houses in Inverclyde by those opposed to the proposed increases might have at least partly influenced Councillor McCabe into doing a U-turn on the council tax increases. Also Councillor McCabe didn’t 'push to raise much needed funds for local services'. As Councillor Quinn and others pointed out, if Inverclyde Council had simply waited for a few days then the extra funds would have been available anyway when the Barnett consequentials were confirmed. He was simply carrying out a political stunt.

The writer next raises the issue of the ferries at Fergusons. They quite rightly point out that they are costing £400 million, approximately £300 million over the original price quoted to the Scottish Government. What the writer fails to point out is that if the Scottish Government hadn’t stepped in to save the yard then more than 300 highly skilled jobs would have been lost and shipbuilding would have died on the lower Clyde. We believe that the original price quoted for the two ferries was unrealistic given the complex nature of the work. This is the same as the original price quoted for the complex Scottish Parliament building but we don’t hear anyone criticising the then Labour government in Holyrood about this. That is because the Scottish Parliament building is amazing and a huge asset for Scotland. When the two ferries are in service they will also be a huge asset for Scotland. To put the price of the ferries into context, in 2020 Audit Scotland reported that by 2047/48 Scottish taxpayers will have forked out £40 billion for PFI projects in hospitals and schools for assets worth £9 billion. The £31 billion difference is more than 100 times the extra being paid for the ferries.

How many teachers, doctors, police, social care jobs would the PFI money have funded? Let us not forget that PFI was foisted on us by a Labour government at Holyrood that told us it was 'the only game in town'!

Carol Ann and I are then accused of wearing rose tinted glasses when it comes to SNP policies. Let us compare some policies for the SNP and Labour:

· SNP – early in life – the Baby Box and the Scottish Child Payment of £27.60 per child per week. The latter has been estimated by campaigners to have lifted approximately 100,000 children out of poverty.

· Labour – early in life – they refuse to repeal the two child benefit cap and totally obnoxious rape clause. How Keir Starmer can say he will make the rape clause 'work better' makes me sick to the pit of my stomach.

· SNP – later in life – committed to protect the triple lock on pensions, committed to introduce a wellbeing pension for all, estimated to be at least £241.50, and to oppose any increase in the pension age.

· Labour – later in life – will only commit to protecting the triple lock if 'resources allow it', no commitment to not raising the pension age and no commitment to introducing a wellbeing pension for all.

By all means criticise Carol Ann and I for the points that we make but please don’t do it while wearing Tory blue – sorry Labour pale pink glasses!

Carol Ann and Tom Tracey