Letter: Scottish Labour figures don't add up

I was intrigued by the comments by Labour's John Park in the article about the honesty of Labour's membership claims (28 September).

Notwithstanding his contradictory quotes, it also says he said that there are 7,000 Labour students who are not part of Labour's electoral college and this accounts for Labour's Scottish membership discrepancies.

As a former national organiser of the Young Scots for Independence, I can categorically state that the membership of the SNP students and the Young Scots for Independence have never been used to artificially inflate the overall membership of the SNP.

However, a more pertinent point I would like to make raises a more serious matter about Mr Park's credibility. That is that the affiliates section of Labour's electoral college actually does show that Labour students do have a vote and that there are only 4,225 members - across the UK.

Can Mr Park then explain his claims as we see another example of how Labour's membership numbers don't add up?

Euan Fergusson

Cadder Grove

Glasgow

One of the more interesting revelations from the Labour Party leadership count was that the Labourites now have just 13,000 members in Scotland, some 3,000 fewer than the SNP, whose current membership stands at just under 16,000.

Scottish Labour has always been regarded as Scotland's largest political party but this claim is now untenable. That the SNP has overtaken its biggest rival in terms of membership to become Scotland's major political organisation shows how far the party has come in the past three years.

Gavin Fleming

Grassmarket

Edinburgh

Your correspondents (28 September) who criticise Labour leader Iain Gray's poor grasp of economics should realise that he is only indulging in the opposition privilege of promising anything from the safety of being in no position to enact the proposals.

Automatic opposition probably also explains his being out of step with the mere 18 per cent of Scots favouring nuclear energy, which he claims to support, but which the SNP favour.

Where I would seriously question his judgment, and by implication his suitability to lead the country, is in his rejecting the case for having an alternative vote referendum on the same date as the next Scottish elections.

In justification, he cited the shambles of holding both local and national elections simultaneously in 2007. He is too intelligent not to know the difference between a multi-choice election and a simple yes/no referendum, so at best he was being careless.

Robert Dow

Ormiston Road

Tranent

John Curtice believes the Labour Party in Scotland "never embraced some of the New Labour signature tunes" (your report, 27 September).

What an astonishing assessment from one of Scotland's most respected analysts.Has he forgotten that Labour MSPs voted to endorse the war in Iraq? Or that they spearheaded the introduction of private finance into the provision of public services?

Iain Gray himself was an advisor to New Labour doyen Alistair Darling at the Scottish Office, and he is currently pursuing a policy on knife crime that would make the editors of the Daily Mail blush. Finally, a majority of Scottish Labour MPs supported David Miliband's leadership candidacy.

Labour in Scotland not only embraced some of the New Labour signature tunes - they wrote and danced to them.

Jamie Maxwell

Findhorn Place

Edinburgh

Ed Miliband's success in the Labour leadership contest will be a disappointment to the MPs from Scotland who backed his brother David in the hope of career advancement.

Obsession among Labour MPs from Scotland with achieving high office in London has left its party ranks in the Scottish Parliament full of second-rate performers.

Scotland would benefit if its most talented Labour politicians could get over the trappings of Westminster. Preferring to aim for shadow Scottish Secretary rather than First Minister of an independent Scotland is the kind of narrow unionist attitude that has held this country back for too long.

Patrick Grady

Dunchattan Street

Glasgow