Readers' letters: Signs that apprenticeships are finally getting recognition

Not surprisingly, I was delighted that Dr Janet Brown’s views were given front page prominence in Monday’s edition. I still recall an encounter with one of my neighbours, an art teacher, back in the early 70s. I was painting my garden wall and mentioned a group of painting and decorating students with whom I was involved, as their general studies lecturer. He expressed astonishment that anyone was taught to carry out this work. Needless to say, I gave him a brief account of the four year apprenticeship, with day or block release to college preparing for City and Guild examinations, that aspiring tradesmen had to go through before servicing his car, repairing a burst pipe in his kitchen or re-wiring his house.

My only divergence from Dr Brown is when she appears to regret that the person repairing your boiler or fitting a heat pump should be given greater recognition for his or her skills. I doubt whether they are worried about status, more likely laughing all the way to the bank. They are the ones who can afford to buy their own homes. Perhaps they cast a sympathetic eye on the graduate stacking shelves in the local supermarket or the qualified primary teacher who is abandoned, after their guaranteed first year of probationary employment.

The decline of the FE sector seems to have begun with the appointment of one of the Scottish government’s education ministers who unashamedly favoured his own university sector and concentrated resources there. We are reaping the harvest of that now when a Scottish company had to import welders from the far east because no suitably qualified people were available locally. Thankfully, there are signs that Dr Brown’s views are now being heard.

Bill Greenock, Netherlee, East Renfrewshire

Big Mac and fries

Dr Janet Brown, a former Chief Executive of the Scottish Qualification Authority (SQA) and now Vice President Education of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) is a woman who needs to be listened to. She says we should value apprenticeships as much as degrees. She is correct. The phrase “education, education, education” was said in 1996 by Tony Blair and that led to everyone wanting a university education.

The result was every Tom, Dick and Harry and Judith and Elizabeth going to university. However many of the courses were of little use in the real world. International studies, journalism, fashion, library science, culinary arts, art history, travel and hospitality, ethnic studies and theatrical arts are just a few of the “degrees" which had little job prospects but the colleges and universities reaped the fees for three or four years. Plumbers, joiners, brickies and other tradesmen were and are far more beneficial to the UK economy. Reminds me of the joke. "What do you say to a person with a university degree? Big Mac and fries please".

Clark Cross, Linlithgow, West Lothian

Referendum maths

The fact that the SNP are making an IndyRef2 referendum by 2028 the keystone of their May election manifesto shows that there is a lack of basic arithmetic around the SNP Cabinet table. The Scottish Government Public Service Reform Strategy paper, published in June 2025, is based on fixing the looming £4.7 billion black hole in the Holyrood budget by cutting 20,000 jobs from the Public Sector work force.

However, assuming that the average annual wage of those facing redundancy is £35,000 a year that only cuts the deficit by £0.7bn. That still leaves the Finance Secretary with a short-fall of £4bn! The two options are to increase the cuts in headcount by a further 100,000 or increase income tax on the one hundred thousand highest wage earners by £40,000 a year.

This widens the tax gap with England for NHS consultants, Head Teachers, the 1st team playing staff of Celtic and Rangers plus the leaders of Scottish Quango units.

Note that, if the defence budget increases to meet Nato Committments, then the Holyrood budget could be cut by an additional £7.5bn leading to more reductions in public sector staffing levels.

That raises the question as to whether an IndyRef2 campaign about 2028, in the middle of massive headcount reductions in the Public Sector, is the best time for the SNP!

Ian Moir, Castle Douglas, Dumfries & Galloway

Unfair comparison

In strongly implying a comparison with Sir Keir Starmer by saying “We don’t want another Neville Chamberlain” (who hoped to appease Hitler by agreeing with France to the transfer of Sudetenland, where there were many German speakers, from Czechoslovakia to Germany) does President Trump not realise that he has done almost exactly the same in his dealings with Putin - and not just to pre-empt the latter’s warmongering but even years after his actual invasion of Ukraine?

Also, is Trump aware that the United States broadly agreed with our 1938 appeasement? Presumably he does know that even after Hitler’s full-scale aggressions in 1939-40, the US still did not formally join us until December 1941, but even then only after Japan’s Pearl Harbour invasion and Germany’s declaration of war on the US.

Eastern Ukraine has many Russian speakers, but in its 1991 referendum each of the four regions now demanded by Putin voted for independence from Russia by at least 83 per cent of the voters (and 64 per cent of the electorate). Is Trump even aware of that?

Finally, is he aware that Chamberlain, as chancellor and then as PM, at least prepared our military budgets for war, enabling Britain with the Commonwealth to win the Battle of Britain in 1940, without which the whole of Second World War and the US’s role, if any, would have been very different.

John Birkett, St. Andrews, Fife

Bring on midterms

Despite all President Trump’s increasingly shrill and erratic bluster, the war in Iran, now into its sixth week, is already appearing to be unwinnable. What was promised by Benjamin Netanyahu to be a short and easy war may well drag on as a dreaded forever contest.

While Netanyahu has a lethal plan for this war, in the shape of a Greater Israel, Trump seems to be floundering, piling up threats, which are never fulfilled. To say that he very much underestimated the Iranian resistance, would be a gross understatement.

As has been stated, Donald Trump just doesn't understand either Iran and its proud people, sadly in the grip of a deplorable government. The fact that Russia is supplying them with drones and other weapons, simply lets us see, just what a perilous world we live in.

This is an unpopular war, instigated illegally by an unpopular president. Trump’s demanding from Congress, a further $1.5 billion for continuing it, hopefully, may well be the final straw, for the restless, and increasingly angry, American people. Roll on the mid term elections, and we'll see what they really think.

Ian Petrie, Edinburgh

Redefining an ‘ace’

The concept of a “fighter ace” emerged in 1915 when naval and military pilots were engaged, typically, in dogfights. Five “kills” of enemy aircraft earned a pilot the accolade.

The Royal Air Force has announced that four Gunners from the RAF Regiment are to be known as “aces”.

These Gunners each shot down five or more Iranian drones during recent operations in the Middle East - keep up the good work!

However, fighter aces had to contend with flying their aircraft, usually under enemy fire and while taking evasive action. As seen in the movies, one such action is remarkable, five or more certainly heroic.

To use the term “ace” for shooting down five or more drones smacks of hyperbole. Better were another term used for such good shooting so as to avoid diminishing the accolade awarded to brave pilots and aircrew.

A new accolade would also, rightly, set these Gunners apart. Perhaps “fighter ace” and “drone ace” would be sufficient distinction but distinction there should be - good shooting in the air is rather different to good shooting of drones from land or sea.

Lester May (Lieutenant Commander, Royal Navy- retired), Camden Town, London

Parking solutions

The new regulations concerning pavement parking are causing, as expected, utter chaos. When new regulations are introduced,without obvious due diligence, nothing less would be expected. Are our politicians really helping people?

The argument is over how much room pedestrians have when streets cannot handle parking. Here is a sensible suggestion that seems to have eluded the authorities. Many roads in Scotland are simply too narrow to accommodate every option so why not paint a line, parallel to the road, along the pavement which allows vehicles to park up to that edge? This will show drivers where to park and guarantee pedestrians access too.

There has to be some give and take here otherwise we are heading for a huge increase in cars damaged by others scraping past or worse. Car owners have rights too.

Gerald Edwards, Glasgow

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