Letter: Innocence, justice, compassion and judicial killing

Sir: Kenneth Clarke suggested that on rational and objective grounds he could not reverse the then Home Secretary's decision concerning the Bentley case. The same view was expressed by Michael Portillo the same evening on the BBC television programme Question Time.

What these two persons fail to realise is that compassion is not necessarily an objective and rational judgement. It is an intuitive insight that transcends rationality. Love, concern or compassion are moral and spontaneous insights, the kinds of insights that make one genuinely human.

Yours,

DAVID MAIR

London, SE22