Readers' letters: Scrapping Covid rules is bad for the vulnerable

I am at a loss to understand the logic of those overseeing the control of the pandemic in the UK.

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson wears a face mask due to the Covid-19 pandemic, as he leaves 10 Downing Street in central London in September 2020

If the number of deaths and those tested positive with Covid is still fairly high, why are we now being told that the rules of yesterday will no longer apply?

People lost their businesses, others were not allowed to be with dying relatives, some were arrested and the list goes on.

What has changed that the rules can now be scrapped? I don't suppose the economy has anything to do with it, has it?

So, how do Westminster and Holyrood propose to protect those who have been shielding?

I've been mostly shielding on my own for two years, is it any safer for me if I go out now, or less safe?

I was informed there are badges etc that one can wear, but who on earth will notice them unless they get too close?

It has already been a nightmare, when many taxi drivers taking me to hospital appointments refuse to wear masks and there are no proper windows in some of the cabs, and the drivers come face to face to assist me with my wheelchair.

Also many deliverymen who come to my door expect me to pose for a photo, wearing no mask and breathing into my face, yelling for me to pose.

How much worse is it going to be now that most of the rules have gone?

Elaine Pomeransky, Edinburgh.

Council is making bus travel harder

Edinburgh City Council wants us to use public rather than private transport. It, therefore, takes steps to make bus travel less rather than more user friendly.

Yesterday I found out the hard way that my planned journey to Jeffrey Street from the southern suburbs had been scuppered.

The idea had been to alight at the bus stop half way down the Mound and walk down Market Street. But there is now no stop half way down the Mound, not even one at the foot of the Mound.

There is no stop for the 23 and 27 buses between George IV Bridge and half way up Hanover Street.

I can only assume that this derives from the bollarded cycle track farce, some of which has had to be abandoned.

In the end - after the slowest of crawls down the Mound - I alighted in Hanover Street and with the time of my engagement imminent, took a taxi to Jeffrey Street.

Users of the 23 and 27 buses are already disadvantaged by the removal of the bus stop (going out of town) at the top of Chambers Street. This means that there is no stop between the National Library and the old Royal Infirmary.

If one thing is clear, it is that Edinburgh City Council has no care for Edinburgh’s elderly and infirm inhabitants who require a usable bus service that brings them as close as possible to their intended destination.

Their response to my complaint would doubtless be ‘on yer bike’.

Jill Stephenson, Edinburgh.

Renewable energy is simply unreliable

You report ('Scottish renewable sources could provide the answer to oil and gas', 8 March) that Michael Matheson claims that 'alternative sources of energy' (he means renewables) can provide 'a more consistent and stable form of energy supply'.What nonsense.

Renewable energy is inherently unreliable and, in any case, can't provide oil or gas.

Ignoring fossil fuels, only nuclear power can provide reliable electricity.

Renewables are an expensive and ugly distraction.

Steuart Campbell, Edinburgh.

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