Letter: Better late . . .

Sir: The Prime Minister's back to basics appeal is having some instant effect. I have today had a book returned to me by a former student who borrowed it 25 years ago. Is this a record, as well as a trend?

The book happens to be W. G. Runciman's Relative Deprivation and Social Justice. I am half inclined to pass it on to the Prime Minister, if I thought he had time to peruse it, or whatever Trollopeans do with other books.

Indeed, the country might benefit if he could read it more quickly than my student, Geoff Green of Broomhall Place, Sheffield, who deserves honour under some charter or other.

Yours faithfully,

BERNARD CRICK

Edinburgh

9 December