If “we” Scots were ever to have a decent run in the World Cup, I very much doubt that we would view such an event through the lens of the last war as Jonathan Freedland suggests (Britain was led by Churchill then – it’s led by a Churchill tribute act now, 9 May). I imagine that to be the same for many people in Wales and Northern Ireland too. While most people in those countries remember the second world war with a mixture of sorrow and pride, as evidenced by events held last Friday all across the UK, it is no longer the constant reference point for how we see ourselves even in good times, as he suggests; rather as Barney Ronay points out (Were England really robbed by Argentina at Mexico 86?, 26 April) it is “England as a nation that is hardwired to see nostalgia and lost sovereignty on every available stage”.
I do not want to see the breakup of the UK but this constant revisiting of the past belies a lack of confidence in the present, hampers a progressive route to the future and plays into the hands of those who do.
Margaret Follon
Edinburgh
