A year after being elected to SBC, isn't he aware that SBC already consults with Northumberland County, Dumfries and Galloway, East Lothian and Midlothian councils on many issues such as transport links – and not to the detriment of the area either?
Back in 1946 the local fire brigades all joined together to form the South Eastern Fire Brigade along with Edinburgh, now Lothian and Borders Fire and Rescue Service, and in the 1970s Roxburghshire, Selkirkshire and Berwickshire Police joined with Edinburgh and Peeblesshire to form Lothian and Borders Police. These were two major strategic moves at the time and from which the Borders has greatly benefited over the years and will continue to do so.

The way I see it, no area of Scotland is an island, so to speak, when issues such as strategic planning have to be addressed.

The Nicholas Watsons of this world want the Borders to be a backwater languishing in an abyss and nothing else.

Nick Wirsten

Leslie Place

Selkirk

Your correspondent from Ancrum (letters, May 1) was quite right to be concerned about the Borders becoming, without any meaningful consultation, part of the Edinburgh city region via the intended Strategic Development Planning Authority (SDPA).

In reality, the decision was taken long ago at SBC headquarters, well in advance of the formal vote and the token, abysmally-resourced national consultation last autumn. The efforts by Save Scott's Countryside, The Borders Party and others to alert people at the eleventh hour were apparently unsuccessful.

However, the figures from the consultation make interesting reading. Although Edinburgh is only one of four proposed city regions and the Borders only has two per cent of the national population, the Borders accounted for more than half the responses received.

This is a remarkable proportion, though it seems unlikely to change the government's intentions.

For our local councillors, however, there may be a lesson to be learnt.

Those who sit proudly at the table of the SDPA may find themselves in danger of being shot when they arrive back as messengers bearing bad news. Metaphorically speaking, of course.

CHarles Humphries

Gattonside