Letters: Commons self-assertion

How the Commons could assert itself again

Bruce Anderson ("What does Parliament mean when prime ministers ignore it?", 12 January) gives an interesting, if ponderous and very selective, account of parliamentary history. However, his analysis of Westminster's modern difficulties is as layered with factual flaws as it is with irrelevant class war.

Labour MPs in recent parliaments have in fact been really quite rebellious; it's just there have been so many of them scarcely any difference is ever made. So disproportionate is their number – 55 per cent of the seats for 35 per cent of the votes – that it takes an avalanche of independent minds to have even the slightest effect against the bulwark of ministerial patronage.

The extent of executive power owes much more to the Divine Right of Kings than it does to a modern democracy. Anderson's article entirely misses the point that Gordon Brown promised in July 2007 to limit or surrender the powers he holds under the Royal Prerogative. In truth, it has come to nought, yet hardly anyone has noticed or taken the Prime Minister to task.

My colleagues Andrew Tyrie MP, Lord (Kenneth) Morgan, Sir George Young MP and I all recently contributed to a Democratic Audit booklet, Beating the Retreat, which outlines the real problems our Parliament suffers, some prescriptions to solve them, and a whole list of Brown's broken promises in this area. We have grown used to large majorities in the House of Commons: if the forecasts are fulfilled, the parliamentary arithmetic after the next general election may enable MPs to be more effective and assertive still, holding an over-mighty executive in check.

Lord Tyler

Liberal Democrat Constitutional Affairs Spokesman, House of Lords

Bruce Anderson complains of "intellectually defective" protesters who argue "if they don't like a law, they have the right to break it". Of course, he exaggerates; no significant social agitators, of any sort, call for a completely voluntary attitude towards all legislation. He clearly has in mind those who sometimes practice a limited and principled form of civil disobedience; the likes, in other words, of Henry Thoreau, Mohandas Gandhi, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King.

Such people, Anderson claims, should read Thomas Hobbes – who will teach them that slavery, oppression and injustice are perfectly acceptable prices to pay for the rule of law, whereas civil disobedience, of any kind, licenses everyone to commit murder, theft and rape as they please.

Andrew Clifton

Edgware, Middlesex

Heathrow at the centre of a muddle

Your leader of 16 January doubting the economic benefits of the Heathrow proposals makes me despair of this country ever tackling major infrastructure proposals with any sanity.

First, no one seems to see airport expansion, high-speed trains and other projects as a means of reducing the pressure on the South-east and increasing the economic viability of the North. Moving airport capacity northwards and providing a high-speed rail link could stimulate the economy and help solve many economic and environmental problems.

Nor do people even seem to know that the high-speed rail link to the Channel Tunnel was 13 years late. A high-speed rail link to Scotland by 2027 will be 31 years late. It will mean a domestic high-speed line 63 years after the opening of the world's first such line in Japan. It's pathetic.

And how will a high-speed line from Heathrow help the design of such a line from Paris, Madrid, Berlin, Istanbul etc to Scotland, via London?

Finally, the new St Pancras has added to London's large stock of termini, when what has been blindingly obvious for many years is that London needs through stations.

Can anyone reassure me that this is not all delay, mess and lost opportunity?

Philip Morgan

Winchester

There are moments in history that define a leader's response to great events. By caving in to the aviation lobby and sticking the finger to science, Gordon Brown has come out of the closet as a climate sceptic.

He and Peter Mandelson clearly mistake the economic challenges of 2009 for those of 1989. The salvation of our global economy comes not from cleaving to that past, but embracing and liberating a low-carbon future with enormous courage, ingenuity and optimism. If, as science and economics suggest, 2009 is not unlike 1939 in its need for great leadership, Gordon Brown has shown himself a Neville Chamberlain appeaser and not a Churchillian galvaniser. Thank heavens for Obama.

Steve Crawford

Lincoln

Not racist, but out of touch

The people who have accused Harry and then Charles of racism, over their distasteful nicknames for people of different races are missing the point entirely. I'm quite confident that Harry referring to his classmate as "our Paki friend" and Charles calling his dark-skinned polo playing friend "Sooty" do in fact believe that they are being harmless. I don't believe that the comments reflect hatred or disdain. What they do reflect is something more disturbing: being alarmingly out of touch, because of an isolated, sheltered social position of unbelievable and undeserved privilege.

I note that a friend of Charles publicly defended his choice of words by saying that it felt satisfying to "stick two fingers up to the PC brigade". It seems to me that the only people who want to "stick two fingers up to the PC brigade" are those who have never been called a faggot, cripple or nigger.

Diana Trimble

London SW10

Now is the time to invest in people

Philip Hensher ("Let boomers' babies fend for themselves," 12 January) believes government must let jobless people sink or swim rather than supporting the private sector in creating and sustaining jobs. This demonstrates an astounding lack of understanding of the needs of decent societies, modern economies and forward-looking businesses.

Investing in people in difficult times may draw flak from some of those cushioned from economic hardship by well-paid and comparatively secure employment, but it's the right thing to do. If Britain is to cope with "this ugly mess" without descending into social chaos – and if we are to capitalise on the inevitable recovery – it is essential we keep as many people economically active as possible and let them develop transferable skills for the emergent industries of the next decade.

Andrew Hedgecock

Farnsfield, Nottinghamshire

It is looking as if the Tory-dominated banking sector will hold off getting back to normal levels of lending until the next election is over, despite being bailed out with billions of pounds. The Tory party, if it wins, will then start slashing public spending and blame Labour .

The banks will miraculously start lending again after the Tories come up with some half-baked scheme their banker friends can say was the key to the freeing-up of credit. As usual the establishment is orchestrating the Tories' coming to power; thus re-establishing what they regard as the natural order.

Chris Gale

CHIPPENHAM, WILTSHIRE

Politicised police miscount crowds

Is it any surprise that the police routinely play down the significance of anti-government demonstrations by providing inaccurate attendance figures (Letters, 13, 14, 15 January)? Anyone who genuinely believes the police to be apolitical must have been living under a rock.

Ever since Margaret Thatcher dispatched the police to deal with striking miners, police forces have become increasingly politicised. For evidence, we can look to the Menezes affair, the treatment of environmental protesters at Climate Camp last year.

With ministers falling over themselves to provide police forces with new powers and equipment (Tasers, for example), is it any wonder that the police are aligning themselves with the Government?

Tom Cunliffe

Oxford

Responsibility for deaths in Gaza

Amos Fabian rightly points out that the areas surrounding Gaza are far less populated than Gaza itself (letter, 13 January). He claims that this lower population density is the reason why Hamas rockets cause so few casualties.

Has he considered why Gaza is so densely populated? The majority of Palestinians in Gaza are 1948 refugees or their descendants. United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 states that these refugees should have the choice to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours. Israel has always denied the right of return to Palestinians and this is why Gaza is so densely populated.

Janet Green

London NW5

You quote the Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, as saying that Israel has proved it "is a country that when you fire on its citizens it responds by going wild". Well, what a surprise. After Lebanon 2006 I thought everyone knew that Israel was a model of restraint and would never do anything to endanger innocents while going after its attackers.

Hamas knew exactly what it was doing by continuing to fire its missiles into Israel and how Israel would react. This does not exonerate Israel for over-reacting again. It just tars Hamas with the same callous brush.

Mike Cherry

Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire

Home Office resists ban on far right

Your lead article exposing links between the BNP and private contractors working for the Home Office (14 January) raises an important issue. As the major trade union representing workers in the Home Office, PCS has been pressing management to ban membership of far-right organisations for a number of years. Sadly, Home Office management, including the Permanent Secretary, has consistently refused to do so.

Our members in the UK Border Agency do a difficult job which is not made easier by the often poisonous nature of the political debate on immigration. It is important that our members have the full support of management when they are trying to fulfil their obligations as public servants under the equality duty. That support should include rooting out any members of the far right within the service who undermine our members' professionalism in this respect. We call on the Home Office to implement a ban and we stand ready to agree a policy with them.

Paul O'Connor

Home Office Group Secretary

Public and Commercial services union, London SW11

Victorian scavengers

My great-grandfather was, like David Beckham's, a "scavenger". He worked in Arundel, Sussex, at the end of the nineteenth century. I believe that "scavenger" was the official name for the "rag and bone men" who went from house to house collecting. The rags were used to make the high explosive gun-cotton, the bones to make glue.

Ken Scutt

Bognor Regis, West sussex

Bush's legacy

One of the main things that George W Bush will be remembered for is his failure to act on climate change. When he became President, the level of CO2 in the atmosphere was about 370 parts per million. As he leaves office, it has risen to about 386 ppm. Roughly one quarter of this rise was caused by the USA.

David Love

TORQUAY, Devon

Friendly squirrels

I doubt that many readers, upon reading Stephen Usher's letter about the ravages caused to his garden by grey squirrels (16 January), will find much resonance with their own experience. I spent most of my adolescent years not far from his town, in Surrey, and never heard any complaint from my green-fingered parents about these delightful creatures. Relentless warfare was waged on slugs, but there was no conflict with the squirrels, despite their abundance, apart from the annoying one that tapped on the garden window and wouldn't go away until given a biscuit.

John Hade

Totnes, Devon

'Supporting' role

Kate Winslet has received a Golden Globe as best supporting actress for The Reader. The film concerns the relationship between two people, Hannah Schmidt and Michael Berg. Hannah is played by Ms Winslet, while the role of Michael is shared between two actors. In posters the name of Kate Winslet appears first. I wonder if one of your erudite film experts could explain what in this context is meant by the term "supporting".

Gordon Elliot

Burford, Oxfordshire

Terrorist geese

Along with the rest of the world, I applaud the pilot of the US Airways Airbus A-320 for landing it on the Hudson river with no loss of life. Should investigators find that the cause of the near-calamity was Canada geese, can we hope that, as a last hurrah, George Bush doesn't start bombing Ottawa?

John Schluter

Guildford, Surrey