Dream industry
Grant Frazer (Letters, 11 May), painting a bright future for an independent Scotland, stresses the profitable production of “renewables” hardware and the development of “clean” hydrogen as an energy source.
Travelling to St Andrews in the 1950s, I found Kircaldy justifying the ditty “You can tell very well from the terrible smell [of linseed] that you’re no’ very far from Kircaldy”. That aroma came from lino manufacture. No longer, as is typical of many defunct industries in Scotland.
Most of our heavy industries – coal, steel ships and locomotives – have gone. Bold attempts to develop replacements, as seen in the largely empty newish office buildings and factories on the approach to Dundee, illustrate failure in many present policies.
Grant Frazer, anticipating successful enterprises from renewables-related businesses, discounts their foreign manufacture. It is these foreign factories that are “world leading”. Their products, such as wind turbines, become subsidy dependent here.
Could he please suggest whence adequate money could come in a Scotland independent of our present Southern compatriots?
Charles Wardrop, Perth
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