All present and correct
The accusation that the Liberal Democrats were somehow absent from Westminster for the opening of this session of Parliament is daft and wrong (Politics, 15 October). Of course we were there — in force. Don Foster was leading the battle on the licensing Bill and Lib Dem frontbenchers handled the Iraq, South Asia earthquake and business statements as usual.
The facts are that the Liberal Democrat shadow cabinet was using the weekend before Parliament resumed to have a strategy meeting about how to provide the real opposition to the government while the Conservatives are mired in their leadership debate. We returned to Westminster for the start of business on Monday at 2.30 p.m. The Tories put out a misleading press release suggesting something else.
It was a cheap shot and underlines how worried our political opponents are about the Lib Dem threat in this parliament.
Charles Kennedy MP
House of Commons SW1
Slackers’ charter
May I congratulate Charlotte Leslie on an excellent article (‘University is a waste of time’, 8 October). She’s quite right; it’s absurd to encourage all young people to attend university; but what she may not realise, being an Oxbridge graduate, is quite how absurdly slack the courses at other universities have become.
My son is in the final year of a history degree at what is considered to be one of the country’s best universities (though not Oxford or Cambridge) and he has the princely total of six hours’ tuition per week. In addition to this he is given three reading weeks each year during which there is no tutor contact and no recommended books to read. My son finished his second year on 30 May and recommenced on 30 September, but there was no work set for him to do during these four months. His reading list for his final year was produced by the university for the students in mid-August!
As the ‘paying parent’ I am appalled by this dumbing-down of standards. My son will leave university having learnt very little, with serious debts and a qualification meaning nothing to most employers. Had I known before my son started his course what I know now, I would have encouraged him to skip university altogether and go straight to work experience, followed by a job.
Pru ColsonLondon SW1
Why Ken Lost
The content of your article ‘Europe is costing us a bomb’ (15 October) is very relevant to the outcome of the Conservative party leadership election. In the most recent election in which the rank and file were consulted Iain Duncan Smith won his overwhelming majority largely if not entirely because it was widely believed that Kenneth Clarke had ‘under Chatham House rules’ revealed that he looked forward to the day when ‘the Mother of Parliaments would have become merely another local government authority’.
Antony Flew
Reading, Berkshire
Kind to be cruel
I enjoyed Rachel Johnson’s jolly article on the wonders of insurance-based animal health care (‘Why the NHS isn’t fit for a dog’, 8 October). But the situation is not quite as rosy as it looks. Insurers will not usually take on new animal clients after the age of eight. Some pet insurance only covers a pet up to the age of eight (roughly middle age) and then the pet is too old to be insured by another insurer. Sometimes the small print excludes chronic conditions or repeat problems. And, alas, MRSA is moving into the veterinary world. Also, I wonder if current trends really are so great for pets: parrots kept alone in cages instead of in their flocks in the wild, budgies spending a lifetime with never the chance to fly. Is it really good for cats to be kept indoors in small flats with no chance to mouse? Do dogs given just 20 minutes round the local park have such a great life? Or what about dogs kept alone with a human carer and no chance to meet and play with their own species? A luxurious life in human terms may not necessarily be the same for other species.
Celia Haddon
London SW1
Greetings from Mrs T
Following the many and varied tributes to the Great Lady on her 80th birthday last Thursday, readers may be intrigued to hear of another aspect of Lady Thatcher’s character.
When the Conservatives won the general election in 1979, my mother discovered in a press report that Margaret Thatcher and she shared the same birthday, 13 October. So, out of a sense of fun, she sent a birthday card to Margaret c/o The House of Commons with an enclosed message wishing her well and signed, ‘From the other Mrs Thatcher’. By return, a hand-addressed birthday card arrived at Ley Farm, Teffont, addressed correctly to Mrs J. B. Thatcher. The handwritten message inside said simply, ‘Wishing you a very happy birthday too, from the Other Mrs Thatcher’.
I reckon that was pretty damn good.
Tom Thatcher
Sutton Mandeville, Wiltshire
On-line diagnoses
Jonathan Bamford (Letters, 15 October) says it is all right for priests to pray for the sick without falling foul of the Data Protection Act since ‘it is very unlikely that this sort of information about members of the local congregation would be held on computer’. Unless the sick person is relying solely on divine intervention to regain health, I imagine that he will already have paid a visit to his doctor, in which case all his details will be on the surgery computer, and so protected under the Act. That makes the priest culpable and all of us who decide to discuss details of the illness down at the King’s Head.
Mark Tinney
Laxfield, Suffolk
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