WITH September just around the corner, this seems an apposite time to reflect on the summer of 2015. There has been a lot less heat than in the corresponding period of 2014; we have had the odd squall, too, some lows, some highs, but nothing like last year’s storms.
I am referring of course to the state of play regarding readers’ letters, though curiously, the weather has followed a similar pattern.
In August, 2014, we were at the height of the independence referendum debate. We were receiving around 200 letters a day, and in the week leading up to the big day we more than doubled the amount of space devoted to readers’ views.
Such an occurrence may (or may not) turn out to have been a once-in-a-lifetime experience. This summer has been much less frenetic, and with it have come debates that have been gratifyingly less rancorous and necessarily less polarised. And we are still providing an unrivalled platform for debate in Scotland, publishing more than 14,000 of your words every week.
Politics, though, has remained centre stage, helped by not one but two Labour leadership contests: in Scotland, and in the UK. Surprisingly, perhaps, it has been the battle to replace Ed Miliband which has taken up more column inches. Indeed, the inexorable rise of Jeremy Corbyn has engendered an old-school debate between left and right, with the impact of austerity measures thrown in for good measure.
Since I last occupied this space three weeks ago, both Scottish Labour’s new leader, Kezia Dugdale, and her new deputy, Alex Rowley, have put the subject of Trident up for discussion. I had expected sackloads of letters on the subject, but this has not materialised to any great extent. Possibly the debate we had around the 70th anniversary of Hiroshima earlier this month drew that metaphorical fire.
I have written here before of the folly of trying to predict what will most engage our correspondents. I am frequently surprised. I had not expected the proper use of language and the state of Scots grammar to gain the attention they did; perhaps I should have kent better?
Milk, whether, pasteurised, homogenised or whole, has been another talking point that has attracted a bigger postbag than anticipated, along with the question of what we should pay for it. Supermarket milk, it would appear, is not everyone’s cup of tea.
As always, there has been a vast array of topics discussed in the last three weeks. We have been talking about matters as diverse as the governance of charities, unsung explorers, the monarchy, railway services and rolling stock, grouse shooting, electronic cigarettes, genetically modified crops, this year’s Higher maths exam, the Longannet power station, the state pension, the architecture of Edinburgh, the BBC, Police Scotland, the bin lorry crash inquiry and much more.
Incidentally, last time out, I was bemoaning the poor ratio of female correspondents. I have to report that in the last 17 issues the number has remained almost static (in fact, there have been two fewer). Curiously, though, I have noticed that of the handwritten letters received, women outnumber the men by two to men. Is there an issue with the hogging of the household computer?
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