As an Aberdonian by domicile, living in what Richard Waithew calls the real Scotland, I don’t accept his claim that Westminster governments and the media have forced us to accept England’s history, language, culture and politics (Letters, 28 July). Our town records go back to the 15th century, long before the Treaty of Union. They are in English. Doric is still our indigenous dialect. It faces no threats from Westminster. As someone who went to school in Lancaster (burnt by a Scots army in 1322 and visited again in 1715 and 1745), my approval of the Union rests on historical facts that I know something about, particularly regarding science and health. Mr Walthew would be correct if he said that the NHS was forced on us by a Welshman in Westminster, an organisation that provides, and still does, the funding for the Medical Research Council, my first employer as a virologist in Glasgow, and a brilliantly successful UK body which funded Alexander Fleming, and June Almeida (from Dennistoun) at the time of her discovery of human coronaviruses. Hugh Pennigton, Aberdeen.