Boris Johnson has proven himself to be utterly useless. Can’t we just swap him for Jacinda Ardern instead?

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Do you think that if we offered Jacinda Ardern the option to reside in Britain, she would come and sort out our mixed messages, woeful promises and general dissatisfaction and breeze in like the breath of fresh unspun​ air she undoubtedly is?

She is just so upfront with the people of New Zealand, and I am sure would admit unreservedly when things went wrong. But she would also give us a real sense of hope that we can do this if we just keep the faith.

Instead, we are force-fed daily briefings with a distinct sense that much has gone wrong with government policies. Woe betide any minister placing his “surplus to requirements” head above the Downing Street parapet and actually stating as much.

Judith A Daniels
Great Yarmouth

Hiding behind the science

Simon Clarke claims that “science is a process, not a finished body of knowledge” when discussing the challenge for scientists to come up with new knowledge to tackle the coronavirus. But what is evident to me is that scientists need a paradigm shift to beat this virus. It may finally come from an unorthodox method, but only if science embraces plurality. Are the politicians willing to embrace this, when they are stuck on calling science wrong when it suits them?

Kartar Uppal
Sutton Coldfield

Mixed messages

James Brokenshire has warned us of the delayed introduction of the NHS smartphone app, suggesting anyway it is “just one part of the test and trace system”. We have been led to believe it would vitally complement it. Could he claim the trapeze artist charged to catch the poor lady is “just one part” of the act. But then, she has a safety net, we do not.

David Wardrop
London SW6 ​

When will the likes of Boris Johnson realise that we no longer have an empire and we are not in fact any better than those in other developed countries? We don’t need a world-beating app to help in the current pandemic, just one that works. Other countries who, compared to the UK, have been spectacularly successful in keeping their death rate to a fraction of ours, seem to manage with one of the currently available apps.

G Forward
Stirling

Brexit isn’t all bad

It may be true that the British fishing fleet is today no longer big enough to exploit the full opportunities provided by the UK gaining full control of its fishing waters (Editorial, 20 May: “Especially now, the UK needs the EU more than the other way around”). It may be true that today some of the species fished will not be eaten by the British public.

But time will allow the British fleet to expand and the public to acquire the taste for other species. It will also result in the seas not being overfished, allowing for fish stocks to grow.

It is not all bad news.

Philip Pound
London SE26

Brexit will destroy the UK

The UK’s ability to extend the period for negotiating a comprehensive future relationship with the EU27 runs out in six weeks.

Barring a breakthrough, this will mean the UK leaving the EU without any trading deal with the world’s biggest economic bloc. The EU supplies 80 per cent of our food imports and no deal further damages an already crippled economy.

If forced back on a US deal on damaging terms, Scotland’s agriculture industry could disappear overnight, our seafood industry could perish, our universities may go to the wall and the NHS will begin to be sliced up into neat pieces for US companies to digest.

This will hit the UK at exactly the same time as we are struggling to recover from Covid-19, which is forecast to potentially lead to a 35 per cent decline in UK economic output.

There is no need for this damaging double whammy. Polling points to the fact that 77 per cent of British people (83 per cent of those in Scotland) want a breathing space. They want the UK to ask for an extension to the transition period, but the UK government continues to rush towards the cliff edge.

At the very least we deserve this folly to be debated in parliament. A public debate is vital, ensuring that the opposition can challenge this situation, exposing it for what it is and the damage it will inevitably lead to.

Mark Lazarowicz​ (chair, The European Movement in Scotland)
Edinburgh