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Letters to the Editor

Wednesday, 26th September 2007

Thank you for Peter Oborne’s ruthlessly accurate exposé of the Political Class (‘The Establishment is dead’, 15 September).

Sir: Sarah Vine’s ‘Don’t upset “the Sisters”’ (22 September) omitted some key points. Concerning the pay gap, research has shown that women simply do not ask for the same pay their male counterparts request at interview time, or throughout their career. No managers in their right minds would pay someone more than they demanded.
Vine says nothing about the details of maternity leave that the majority of women will have taken. Childless women can be particularly vociferous in their criticism of their mothering colleagues often looking for time off and not seeing that someone has to do the work they leave undone. Pay scales consider risk factors in all employees, and it is state legislation — often demanding that the mother will have the very same job awaiting her nine months after she takes maternity leave — that is detrimental to the survival of the company.
Finally, Vine is absolutely right to point out the gender-related unfairness in the state pension system. However, this is a problem of socialised pensions systems, and nothing to do with one’s present private-sector manager.

John Lalor
Dublin, Ireland

Badge of honour

Sir: Colonel Hancock (Letters, 22 September) notes General Jackson’s lack of knowledge of the Infantry of the Line ‘which he deconstructed’. Some small measure of redemption, however, would be the reinstatement of the traditional names of the regiments, e.g. the Green Howards, within the recently adopted three-battalion big regiment structure, e.g. the Yorkshire Regiment. Any costs would be minimal. A similar proposal was made by Nicholas Soames before the last election.
Other than for minor administrative convenience, it is not entirely clear why such rebadging was considered necessary in the first place. Historic names and traditions, and a significant degree of public understanding and community ownership, have been lost and now must painstakingly be rebuilt — if, indeed, such a thing is possible. Within the past few days General Dannatt, the immediate successor to General Jackson, has been highlighting the regrettable divorce between public and military.

Alistair Tucker
London NW3

On their watch

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A child of our time

From the economic and psychological bedlam of the global downturn has emerged a particularly dangerous false dichotomy: namely, that there is somehow a choice for ministers over the next few years between economic reconstruction and the repair of Britain’s broken society, and that the government (whether Labour or Conservative) must prioritise the former at the expense of the latter.

Diary

Anne Robinson

The daughter and I spent the last few days before the American election in Arizona.

Politics

Fraser Nelson

Fraser Nelson reviews the week in politics

The Spectator's Notes

Charles Moore

‘A money-financed tax cut is essentially equivalent to Milton Friedman’s famous “helicopter drop” of money.’ So said Ben Bernanke, now the chairman of the Fed, in a speech about how to ward off the ‘extremely small’ chance of deflation, which he delivered in 2002.