Readers' letters: Travelling Safely in heavy disguise

Despite Edinburgh Council receiving overwhelming criticism from disability groups, businesses and residents, it is pressing ahead with its Spaces for People scheme disguised under the new name of ‘Travelling Safely’.

Spaces for People is being rebranded as Travelling Safely in Edinburgh

Perhaps learning from opposition to Spaces for People, which was promoted with signs on the streets and through social media, Travelling Safely is going through a little-known ‘experimental traffic regulation order’ process by which changes can be made with less consultation and less flexibility.

As a result, residents and businesses have been left in the dark about their impact and the documents on the council’s webpage are sparse, not even details about when measures could be implemented.

Nearly 18,000 responses were received from the council’s Spaces for People survey, and 81 per cent of surveyed businesses felt they were negatively impacted by the measures. This time, providing feedback is unacceptably laborious.

Now more than ever we need Edinburgh to thrive, for businesses to get back on their feet and for people to want to come into the city.

There are opportunities to make traveling easier for all, but we are at risk of being in a situation where people feel their views have been ignored.

Edinburgh Council must do more to engage with the people they represent and not make rash changes to our city that might benefit some, but at a cost to many, many more.

Cllr Sue Webber, Scottish Conservative MSP for Lothian.

Time for Scotland to end energy poverty

A report by Citizens Advice Scotland this week found that one in three Scots now fear rising energy bills.

According to Energy Action Scotland, a quarter of all families here already find themselves living in fuel poverty. That’s 613,000 households and the proportion is even higher in disadvantaged communities not connected to the national gas grid.

The Scottish Government promised to eradicate fuel poverty in Scotland in 2011. Ten years later, we are still waiting.

The late John Hills, professor of public policy at the London School of Economics, estimated that 27,000 people in Britain die each year from ‘cold related diseases’ after prolonged exposure to insufficient heating in their homes.

Scottish Socialist Party members have been out campaigning on the streets of Scotland in recent weeks to press for the abolition of fuel poverty. We have noticed how people’s anxieties have given way to anger over the failure of governments at both Holyrood and London to combat the scourge of fuel poverty.

While we support the cold weather payments made to those in difficulty, we want the government to recognise that these one-off measures are insufficient to deal with the underlying problem.

What is needed is statutory protection for every citizen against fuel poverty and to return our energy industries to public ownership, accelerate the drive towards renewable energy and to introduce insulation programmes.

Colin Fox, National co-spokesperson, Scottish Socialist Party

Proving a negative

After extensive online searches, I have established the procedure for producing proof of a negative Covid test to gain entry to certain events. It seems to be:

1. Obtain Lateral Flow Test Kit from pharmacy.

2. Do not use Lateral Flow Test Kit.

3. Report a negative Lateral Flow Test result online to the NHS.

4. Download or print said negative test result.

Dave Mackay, Edinburgh.