The forthcoming Domestic Abuse Bill must prioritise children who are at risk

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Over two million youngsters are in need of assistance, according to a major report (iStock/Getty)

The shocking findings by the children’s commissioner for England (reported by May Bulman for The Independent), highlight the huge numbers of children across the country who are the hidden, and often forgotten, victims of domestic abuse. This trauma has a devastating and long-lasting effect and a recent survey by charity Hestia found more than half of children who have experienced domestic violence would be in an abusive relationship as an adult.

We must break this cycle. UK Says No More’s charter on prevention calls for children who have witnessed domestic abuse in their homes to be given priority access to support, especially mental health services. We need this to become reality in the new Domestic Abuse Bill.

Domestic abuse will affect all of us in our lifetime, either directly or through our friends and family. It’s time it stopped being nobody’s business and became everyone’s business.

Lyndsey Dearlove, head of UK Says No More at Hestia
London, SE1

We won’t forget the SNP’s decision to make MPs miss England’s World Cup game

The SNP’s forced series of House of Commons votes on motions linked to public spending for the petty spite of ensuring English MPs missed their football match against Columbia was unedifying in the extreme.

Peter Grant MP boasted on Twitter: “Thanks to impeccable timing of votes and points of order by @theSNP, the adjournment bells all over parliament rang at the very moment England scored. Tory whips, you have no idea how much influence we really have.”

Well, good job! Next time Scotland needs friends over important matters, we’ll see how willing any MP from down south are going to be to help after this.

The one crumb of comfort is English MPs will empathise with their thousands of constituents whose work commitments equally meant not watching the game with a cold beer. In that respect a parliamentary cold dash of reality as to how “the other half live” is just the tonic.

Mark Boyle
Johnstone

Replacing legal hunting with scientifically-based culling will eradicate the sport’s social gratification

It’s not hypocritical, as Chas Newkey-Burden suggests, for meat eaters to condemn wealthy people for paying large sums of money to kill iconic big game species such as lions and giraffes. The arguments against mass livestock farming are very different. Big game kills may be just as legal and in some senses justifiable.

For example, the animal could be old, there may be too many of them in a particular area and the meat could be valuable – but there is more to it than that. There is a distinctly blurred line between “legitimate” big game hunting and illegal hunting. Encourage one and the other thrives.

Replace the legal “sport” with official, scientifically-based culling, rendering all other paying or poaching activity more easily identifiable and the supposed kudos attached to the trophy photo will become even more socially unacceptable than, thank goodness, it has already become.

If these sad people need that ego boost so badly, they’d be better off paying to have their names associated with more worthy environmental causes and earning genuine respect in the process.

Patrick Cosgrove
Bucknell

All air conditioning systems and swimming pools should be solar powered

To blunt the impact of climate change on power consumption (Air conditioning to tackle summer heatwaves causes surge in deadly pollution), it should be a requirement that all air conditioning and swimming pools be exclusively solar powered.

A simple but effective change.

Steve Ford
Haydon Bridge

We need to reconsider what we tax as we could be aiding the environment

“Sin tax” is a tad pejorative.

Sumptuary or pigovian taxes are alternatives worth employing too. They are positively virtuous as they raise revenue while improving efficiency, the environment and overall health.

However, as we are all free market zealots this week, we should be talking about fully pricing in all negative externalities. If carried out with proper zeal the positive transformation of our society would be spectacular to behold.

Steve Ford
Haydon Bridge

Leaders must set better examples

Sorry President Donald Trump, spelling is important and so is correct grammar. There is a big difference between Trump and tramp.

Many educators complain about the declining standards of their students in relation to spelling, grammar and even handwriting and although few of us are perfect we should check what we say and write. As a leader there is a greater responsibility to set a better example.

Dennis Fitzgerald
Australia