Sir: Polly Toynbee's "if you can't beat them, join them" approach is profoundly depressing to those who seek real reforms in the UK. By swallowing the Tory agenda in mouthfuls, Tony Blair is positioning himself almost ideally to betray the hopes of t...

Sir: Polly Toynbee's column "We lost, but Son of SDP will win" (21 June) with its claim that Tony Blair is our creation, there only by grace of our efforts, the sweat of our brow. reminded me that history is always interesting after a rewrite. As som...

The spin doctors are having an understandably hard time. Those from Tony Blair's office are attempting to reassure grant-maintained (GM) status supporters, especially in the 28 key marginal constituencies that have GM schools. While things cannot sta...

Dear Tony, We've got a bit of a slippery problem with the party's policy on fishing, so I thought I should cast a fly over in your direction. As you know, we did our bit yesterday to hook the fishermen by announcing our "Anglers' Charter": "a rod on ...

Shell is certainly a giant. It is a multi-billion, multinational company with vast resources and an excellent reputation. It must be made clear, however, that Greenpeace is no small-time organisation. It has a budget approaching pounds 100m, bases in...

After the initial shock most Conservatives will feel intense relief. And perhaps not only them. The remorseless campaign against Major - death by a thousand smears - has become a bit of a national embarrassment. Having a party rule-book for an annual...

Sir: The central flaw in Access to Justice, Lord Woolf's strategy to improve civil justice (" `Failing' civil courts face radical shake-up", 17 June) is that it aims to achieve much with little or no extra resources. The report makes a very wide rang...

Sir: Your new format has caused domestic chaos. Every morning my sports- mad husband used to disappear into the bathroom with a cup of tea and the second section of the paper, leaving me in peace to enjoy the first section - a perfect arrangement now...

Sir: Your report (21 June) that Sainsbury's and other retail chains are planning to build superstores in Northern Ireland makes one wonder if we are capable of learning from our mistakes. It is now generally acknowledged that the growth of superstore...

Nor would it have made for good government. Gouverner c'est choisir, but a party obsessed with its own internal problems is not strongly placed to make rational choices. It is also shrewd in terms of John Major's own interests. Labour Party accusatio...

Yours faithfully, ANNA LOVE Seaton, Devon 21 June

We argued that Labour would need to pay serious attention to environmental issues if it were to be elected. Mr Smith, however, was insistent that people's only concern was the pound in their pocket. The Brent Spar affair has shown just how wrong he w...

The next symptom of real talent is where they put their pieces. High- level chess demands an instinctive feel of where pieces belong and how they co-operate with one another. Over-trained pseudo-prodigies win games either through intimidatory over-ag...

Old Wives, one of whose tales has been offered some vindication by a paper in Archives of Ophthalmology that links certain cases of blurred vision with intense sexual activity. "Maybe this gives us a physical explanation as to why there were some old...

The huge increase in the population has given rise to very large numbers of non-English speaking children who have to be taught in large classes. An ever-increasing number of children are leaving school at a time when the fight for jobs is difficult ...

Councillors looked after their pals; they looked after themselves. Those living in council flats got their repairs done quickest; the Coatbridgers (Catholic) got the lion's share of the caretaking jobs, leaving the Airdrionians (Protestant) out in th...

A number of factors contributed to this retrogressive development. The "invasion" of the Golden Temple in Amritsar and the explosion of the Salman Rushdie affair in Britain alienated Asians not only from the indigenous population, but also from each ...

Living in the West, I've developed a powerful spirit of contradiction: the moment I see a forbidding sign, or a placard calling for this or that, I feel an irresistible urge to disobey. An innocuous "No Smoking" plate causes a strong craving for a ci...

There are 97 million smokers in the EU (15 million in the UK). UK smokers pay over pounds 10bn in cigarette taxes each year, respect the laws and rules on when and where they can smoke, and are regularly bombarded with information on risks associated...

Yesterday, the Department of Health took stock. In a paper that has the tone of an experienced grandparent, it recognises the impossibility of raising children perfectly. Too much time, the paper cautions, is spent investigating suspected child abuse...

I speak as someone who remembers Safeway's experiment with horror, and I can only hope that Sainsbury's trolleys suffer the same fate ["they got nicked"]. Yours with bruised and lacerated ankles! NORMA TREGONING Bideford, Devon 16 June

If you are short, fat, big-nosed, notoriously poor at sport, or just plain ugly, you will have almost no chance at all of being selected as head pupil anywhere, regardless of your potential leadership qualities. Yours sincerely, STEPHEN R. GOULD Lond...

Jim White Independent TV reviewer "This film should shock because the truth hurts" runs the coverline of the video Executions. Which is true. Not many truths shock more than the one on show here, as the producers seek to disguise their cynical attemp...