Readers' Letters: Hearts v Celtic – grace in defeat and disgrace in victory

What a contrast to Celtic’s “fans”, who proceeded to do their best to turn Glasgow’s Trongate into looking like it had been visited by the Luftwaffe circa 1940, in between stoning emergency services going about their business – magine how those neanderthals would have behaved had they lost!

The real difference between the fan-owned Heart of Midlothian and the cosplaying class warriors of Celtic is that of grace versus disgrace.

Mark Boyle, Johnstone, Renfrewshire

Real winners

Once again as a country we have been shamed by pictures of mindless idiots invading a pitch and putting players at risk.

If a football club can be deducted points for failing to control their player eligibility selection or for mismanaging their finances, surely the time has come to deduct Celtic five points for failing to control their fans. This would result in a fair result for the 2025/26 league winners: Hearts.

James Watson, Dunbar, East Lothian

Affirmation bias

Jill Stephenson (Letters, 15 May) alludes to the nature of the referendum question. A ‘Yes/No’ question is now known to involve affirmation bias.

We can quantify this bias. Over the last ten years there have been polls asking, ‘Should Scotland remain in the UK or leave the UK’. We can compare these results with the average of the nearest ‘Yes/No’ polls before and after the date of the ‘Remain/Leave’ poll. We find a very consistent difference between these questions. There have been 15 ‘Remain/Leave’ polls since 2016. The average difference between the polls is 11.6 per cent. That is to say, almost 12 per cent fewer people support leaving the UK than say ‘Yes’ if asked ‘should Scotland be independent’. The average lead for ‘Remain’ is 15.6 per cent and no poll has shown ‘Leave’ to be ahead. This data shows why the separatists will fight tooth and nail to keep this biased question. I assume they would not be allowed, by the Electoral Commission, but the rules are a bit murky about re-using already used questions.

When this topic was broached in the past, the SNP said they could not have the ‘Leave/Remain’ question as people would confuse it with an EU referendum. The idea, ten years after this referendum, that Scots would not know what they were voting for is not very complimentary. My view is that the sensible separatists do not want a referendum, nor do they think they could win one. They just have to keep pretending to keep their core supporters voting for them.

Dr Paul Beswick, Edinburgh

Burnham love-in

The Andy Burnham media love-in has begun with the “King of the North” declaring that he will take his fight all the way. While Wes Streeting has also thrown in his hat we have still to hear from Keir Starmer. It’s unlikely that he would run as that would almost certainly result in defeat, even if Burnham lost the Makerfield by-election, which is a real possibility, or at least a “stiff challenge” (your report, 16 May). Failure would mean an Angela Rayner-Wes Streeting contest would be the most likely outcome. The Tories found that burning through five leaders in eight years is a huge distraction and led to their worst election result in 200 years.

There is a precedent for a sitting PM to win a leadership contest when John Major unexpectedly resigned as party leader, telling his detractors to “put up or shut up”. In the event, only the ambitious John Redwood challenged Major and he was soundly beaten.

For Starmer to perform a similar act would be a miracle, given he lacks Major’s vision and gravitas. Instead, Labour is set to lurch to the left, leaving the Tories the chance to occupy the centre ground. However, Kemi Badenoch is no moderate and is more likely to end up aiding a Farage-led government. As for the Great British public, to paraphrase Labour’s famous 1997 victory song, they just want things to get better, whoever leads the party.

Neil Anderson, Edinburgh

Selfish ambition

It seems English voters are about to experience the same contempt voters in Aberdeen experienced when Stephen Flynn ousted a sitting member to follow his ambition to be First Minister.

The voters of the Wigan area are being ‘told’ to vote for Andy Burnham so he can become Prime Minister. What happened to people standing for parliament to serve their voters? No wonder the countries of the United Kingdom are in a mess when personal ambition is so obviously displaced over the needs of the countries.

Elizabeth Hands, Armadale, West Lothian

Tough measures

A security firm has fitted panic buttons in 150 Scottish schools amid rising concerns of classroom violence (your report, 15 May).

Why are politicians so reluctant to step in and help councils solve this problem? How? Parents receive a UK Child Allowance of £26.05 per week for first child and £17.25 for each additional child until they are 16 or under 20 if they are in approved education or training. There must be some way of freezing this payment if a child is causing chaos in the classroom or on school grounds.

If the parents are in receipt of the Scottish Child Payment, then this £28.20 a week for each child could be suspended by Social Security Scotland until the child behaves. Who knows, it might even lead to better education results and a better future for all, especially the wayward child.

Clark Cross, Linlithgow, West Lothian

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