British science Sir: Dr Fink is right that the UK bats well above its weight through curiosity-driven research (‘Back to basics’, 14 March). This forms the bedrock of scientific progress, but it is misleading to imply that ‘blue skies’ thinking and practical application are mutually incompatible. Should we not nurture both? In this way the
Coronavirus predictions Sir: While precautionary advice regarding the coronavirus should be followed, Ross Clark is right (‘Feverish imaginations’, 29 February) to urge an open mind on the doomsday predictions which are edging us towards panic. In 1996 the then government’s chief scientific adviser, Professor Kenneth Calman, predicted that 500,000 people could die within a few
We need career detectives Sir: Your lead article (Trial and error, 29 February) rightly condemns Tom Watson for pressurising police into investigating the spurious allegations of Carl Beech. What should urgently be abandoned is the fast-tracking of police officers into senior positions, and the promotion of uniformed inspectors into detective ranks without them having the
Devolved or decentralised? Sir: Paul Collier (‘Northern lights’, 22 February) conflates what devolution has come to mean, in UK terms, with decentralisation of authority. Thus it is adrift to imply that Edinburgh has benefited from a conscious decentralising of powers from central government. It was simply that Scotland as a whole got devolution and Edinburgh
No defence Sir: Jon Stone (Letters, 15 February) recalls the horrors and miseries of being subjected to bombing from the air. How right he is to do so. The deliberate burning and crushing of civilians in their homes is a revolting and indefensible form of warfare. It is no surprise that Hitler used it. What
A green and poor land? Sir: Your editorial (8 February) is a timely warning about what the government’s headlong drive to carbon zero really means. We seem to be intent on wrecking our economy in order to further reduce our 1 per cent portion of the world’s greenhouse gases. But while we are scrapping our
The chance to fail Sir: Matt Ridley’s article ‘Risky business’ (1 February) offers a variety of reasons why innovation has been stifled in Britain for too long. As an educator, I would like to add two factors that I encounter on a regular basis: the tremendously suffocating grip of insurance companies, which turns the safest
Enemies on the left Sir: James Forsyth’s article ‘Labour must change to win’ (25 January) describes how little appetite the party’s prospective leaders seem to have for arranging this change. Nonetheless, Labour remains a threat to national prosperity. The party was captured by the Trotskyists of Momentum in 2015. Trots never give up. Indeed, they
Royal travails Sir: The travails of the royal family outlined by Penny Junor (‘In check’, 18 January) may be public theatre but that does not make the suggestion to ‘slim down’ the monarchy any less dangerous. It might be farce now but it could turn to tragedy. Remember King Lear, where Goneril and Regan use
On child care Sir: Your recent editorial deplores, among other things, the cost of child care, to which you attribute the loss of female skills to the workplace (11 January). I would agree that pursuing a career is easier if one has no children. I also agree that the cost of child care is a
Wonder and gratitude Sir: Roger Scruton, in a very personal and moving portrait of his year (‘My Strange Year’, 21 December), reminds us that crisis is opportunity; and concludes that the meaning of life is gratitude — something we may only realise when, as Virgil put it, ‘mentem mortalia tangunt’. I think that language may
My father’s imprisonment Sir: Harald Maass’s piece on the plight of Uyghurs in China (‘A cultural genocide’, December 14) captures the grim reality of what has been happening. Articles like this draw vital attention to the crisis. I am an ethnic Uyghur and live in Belgium with my wife and children. My father, a 58-year-old
Given up on Chesterfield? Sir: Matthew Parris makes some interesting and accurate points about growing Tory support in the north and Midlands (‘The Tory push north will end in failure’, 7 December). He did not mention Chesterfield in his article, but it is a good example of what he talks about. It seems to me that
Look closer to home Sir: In your interview with Boris Johnson (‘Austerity was not the way forward’, 30 November) he attributes the EU referendum result to ‘regional inequality… parts of the UK were simply being ignored… leaving people behind’. Yet he says his remedy for this is ‘infrastructure and education and technology’. In other words,
Down to zero Sir: Paul Collier’s siren call to take advantage of near-zero interest rates to go on a massive government infrastructure splurge is one Jeremy Corbyn might welcome but Conservatives should resist (‘Back to Plan A+’, 16 November). Japan tried what he is proposing when its bubble burst in 1990. The result: $6.3 trillion debt and
Nowhere to turn Sir: Like Tanya Gold and Matthew Parris (9 November), I too am feeling politically homeless. Over the decades my vote has wandered along the mainstream party spectrum but today that seems wider than ever and its constituents increasingly unappealing. A vote for the Conservatives would be to endorse utter incompetence in government
A bad idea Sir: Your editorial in favour of an amnesty for illegal immigrants (‘The case for amnesty’, 9 November) flies in the face of extensive evidence. Italy, Spain and France have, between them, granted any number of amnesties; almost without exception, each one prompted further waves of illegal immigration. In 2005 the French Interior
No special protection Sir: Rod Liddle’s joke that the election might be held on a date when Muslims cannot vote, thereby reducing support for Labour, has apparently led to outrage. There has been no similar outrage over your front cover (‘A vote is born’), which satirises the Christian nativity by portraying Johnson, Corbyn and Swinson
Another referendum? Sir: Matthew Parris’s article ‘What question should a second referendum ask?’ (26 October) occasioned a wry smile from me this morning. His first question — whether Britain should remain in or leave the European Union — has already been asked and answered, at great expense and trouble, in 2016. The only logical reason why
Cameron’s fatal error Sir: Jo Johnson’s otherwise informative review of David Cameron’s For the Record (Books, 12 October) suggests Cameron’s ‘mistake’ was to not call the referendum earlier, and his ‘fatal error’ was his failure to nail down the Leave campaign on how they ‘would actually deliver Brexit’. Not so. Cameron’s mistake was to assume