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Letters

Wednesday, 12th March 2008

Spectator readers respond to recent articles.

One can but admire the open-mindedness of the Church of England these days toward traditions of other faiths. Is it then too much to hope that in one of London’s two main Anglican places of worship, Church members themselves might enjoy a similar deference to their preferences? Or is the beautiful Authorised Version, a few years short of its 400th anniversary, now officially banished from the city of its birth?

Sir John Weston

Richmond, Surrey

Wrong about Bea

Sir: I deeply regret having written in a column a fortnight ago (‘Boris’s most brilliant wheeze’, 1 March) that Bea Campbell, one of the signatories to the letter endorsing Ken Livingstone as Mayor of London, was a ‘crop-headed, lesbian feminist member of the National Association of Irrationally Furious Women Against Everything who works in Newcastle.’ It is clear from Ms Campbell’s letter last week that an apology is in order: I of course accept that she does not work in Newcastle.

Newcastle’s loss, in my opinion.

Rod Liddle

Marlborough, Wiltshire

History lesson

Sir: Lord Adonis says (Letters, 8 March) that ‘it doesn’t need the Conservatives to “bring the Swedish education revolution to Britain”’ because Labour reformers have already done so in the shape of the academies programme.

The academies programme is a typical piece of Labour rebranding — this time of the Conservative city technology college programme introduced in 1986 by the then prime minister Margaret Thatcher and secretary of state for education Kenneth Baker.

In the teeth of Labour opposition it was Conservative, not Labour, reformers who, in Lord Adonis’s words, ‘sought to introduce independent state-funded schools into England’ — concentrated in precisely the areas of low standards highlighted by Mr Nelson.

Andrew Mitchell MP

House of Commons, London, SW1

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Letters

Spectator readers respond to recent articles

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In his speech announcing his Pre-Budget Report, Alistair Darling said that he was going to put up the top rate of income tax to 45 per cent from 2011, because he wanted the burden to be borne by ‘those who have done best out of the growth of the past decade’.

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The Spectator's Notes

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Charles Moore's reflections on the week

Politics

Fraser Nelson

Fraser Nelson reviews the week in politics

Letters

Spectator readers respond to recent articles

Your chance to vote in the Spectator awards

James Forsyth

After a gripping week of political theatre in Manchester, James Forsyth invites readers to submit nominations for a new category in our Parliamentarian of the Year Awards: the prize for the Readers’ Representative