I enjoyed The Sun editorial, July 26. As a fifth generation European New Zealander, whose blood is both English (like about 80 per cent of NZers) and Scottish (like about 50 per cent of NZers), I'm proud to be a descendant and beneficiary of two rich and overlapping cultures.
The English and the Scots, like all nationalities, were involved in warfare, sometimes against each other. But the English part of me has to gently reproach the Scottish part. Which, like the editor, seems only to remember the times in history when an English army crossed the Scottish border but not the times when a Scottish army crossed the English border. Nor should we forget the Medieval clashes between England and Scotland had more to do with aspirations of Norman-descended English and Norman-descended Scots than aspirations of the Anglo-Saxons (England and south east Scotland) and the ‘Celts' (west and north Scotland). From the 17th Century we should refer to British colonisation rather than English colonisation, as the Scots and Irish played an important role in the Empire, especially in the Imperial army.

R.Rimmer, Welcome Bay.