Letters: Do we really need to cut the national thirst for alcoholic drinks?

The horror at the inclusion of representatives of the drinks industry on the Government's working group on alcohol (leading article, 1 August), illustrates two assumptions, one undesirable and the other questionable.

You point out that if a government committee on reducing the danger to health caused by smoking included members of the tobacco industry there would be an outcry. That would not make the outcry right. A perfectly legal industry among Britain's leading exporters has as much right to be heard as tax funded anti-smoking organisations. The idea that the drinks industry should be shut out of the debate smacks of an anti-capitalist desire to paint legal enterprises as "bad".

The proposition that we need to curb the amount of alcohol consumed overall is also open to challenge. The official limits for safe drinking are probably on the conservative side and have got more so over the decades. Statistically, heavy drinkers live longer than non-drinkers. (Readers who do not believe this can Google that statement).

The official limits suggest couples having a bottle of wine every evening with their dinner are on their way to an early grave. Even if this is not good for their health is it the job of the Government to stop them?

The problems of crime and disorder in our town centres on Friday and Saturday nights would be solved if the laws against selling alcohol to those already intoxicated were enforced. These are pertinent points for the industry to make. Let us be glad that in this instance the Government is not instinctively reaching for regulatory overdrive.

Rupert Fast

Esher, Surrey

Your leading article failed to understand the role drinks companies can and do play in tackling alcohol misuse. Contrary to your assertion that drinks companies will never see an interest in discouraging people from buying their products, our members wish to discourage irresponsible consumption of alcohol because it undermines their brands and discredits their businesses. The drinks industry has both a duty to help tackle alcohol misuse and a commercial interest in doing so. We invest millions of pounds annually in programmes and campaigns to address the problem.

Drinks companies do not make government policy. We are consulted because policymakers recognise businesses can help implement policy faster and more effectively than might be achieved through regulation or legislation. This is certainly the case in relation to health messages on product labels – an issue the industry is committed to addressing voluntarily by agreement far faster than might be achieved via a European legislative route.

While there is clearly an issue to address, it is important to remember that overall alcohol consumption has fallen by 11 per cent since 2004 and only last week the latest NHS figures confirmed the trend of declining underage consumption.

Industries that do not engage are often accused of failing in their responsibilities. Having accepted an invitation to be involved we are attacked by some health group stakeholders, who have sadly declined the opportunity to participate in some of these discussions. Their choice should not disqualify us from taking part.

Jeremy Beadles

Chief Executive, The Wine and Spirit Trade Association, London SE1

Brigid Simmonds

Chief Executive, British Beer and Pub Association, London SW8

Campbell Evans

Director of Government & Consumer affairs, scotch Whisky Association, Edinburgh

Laws of cricket disregarded

In all the discussion following the reinstatement of Ian Bell after his run-out by India on the last ball before tea on the third day of the Trent Bridge Test match it appears to have been assumed that the Indian Captain, M S Dhoni, was entitled to withdraw their appeal and thus rescind the umpire's decision.

This is not the case. Law 27.8, "Withdrawal of an appeal", is clear: "The captain of the fielding side may withdraw an appeal only if he obtains the consent of the umpire within whose jurisdiction the appeal falls. He must do so before the outgoing batsman has left the field of play. If such consent is given, the umpire concerned shall, if applicable, revoke his decision and recall the batsman."

Thus, by the time the decision to reinstate Bell was taken, just before play resumed after tea, it was too late to withdraw the appeal or involve the umpire. In effect, the law was overridden. To that extent, James Lawton (1 August) is right.

But he is wrong to say that what happened was "a burst of sentimental cricket illiteracy". The "Spirit of Cricket" is not sentiment, but a vital part of the game. Not for nothing is the phrase "It's not cricket" used to describe unfair or unsporting behaviour.

As Dhoni said when interviewed: "The law probably says [Bell] was out, but it wasn't right in the spirit of the game." For the umpire's decision to be left to stand would have been wrong. As the Apostle Paul, might have put it (2 Corinthians 3, verse 6): "The letter [of the law] killeth, but the spirit giveth life."

David Lamming

Boxford, Suffolk

With all the triumphalism concerning the rout of the Indian cricket team, there seems to be little regard for the spectators, who paid good money to see a competitive cricket match. I consider myself fortunate that I only saw the first two days, prior to the lamentably one-sided encounter that followed.

Alan Broadhurst

Nottingham

Historic emails lost for ever

The deletion of large numbers of emails relating to News International (report, 2 August) is a matter of concern in respect of current investigations into the activities of that company. It is also an issue for historians who in future may wish to research what is without question one of the significant political and social areas of our period.

Prior to email, perhaps some of the lost discussions would simply have been verbal and never recorded. Many however would have been noted on paper and filed away. Even allowing for shredding and documents being lost, a record would have remained.

It is more than time that there was a legal requirement for, at the very least, public companies and public bodies to deposit a representative sample of their email exchanges for posterity and the attention of researchers in decades to come.

Dr Keith Flett

London Socialist Historians Group, London N17

When the boss is on holiday

Susie Rushton's Notebook (2 August) really struck a chord with me, who previously worked for nearly 30 years in the London headquarters of ICI. It was very obvious how much more smoothly departments, and entire businesses, ran when managers were away and people were left to get on with their jobs without unwanted and unneeded interference.

The same applies to the running of the country. It sticks out like a wart on a nose just how much smoother the country runs itself in August when the self-important busybody MPs are all away. I would even go so far as to suggest that they should work in August when the rest of us are on holiday, then take the rest of the year off, leaving the running of the country to the people who do it best, and do it anyway – the Civil Service.

I think I have just cured the UK's stagnation problem. Next?

Paul Harper

London E15

Targeted for not liking the state

We object to the blanket assumption that anyone who promotes a stateless society is a potential terrorist.

The Metropolitan Police's Project Griffin terrorism briefing states: "Anarchism is a political philosophy which considers the state undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, and instead promotes a stateless society, or anarchy. Any information relating to anarchists should be reported to your local police."

As academics, graduate students and concerned members of the public, we object to this attempt by the Metropolitan Police to place political beliefs under suspicion. This leaflet automatically casts doubt over the integrity of those who study, teach and research in this area and also threatens the principles of freedom of speech that underpin our society.

Where do we draw the line? Anarchists are not the only ones who hold these views. Some of the most famous capitalists think the same. For example, any number of US Tea Party supporters subscribe to a variation on this position. Isn't the "Big Society" all about "rolling back the state"? Most Marxists believe a stateless society to be a future ideal, as do a huge proportion of environmentalists, Christians, Buddhists and Muslims. Are they all under suspicion? How do we discriminate?

Alex Prichard

London School of Economics

Benjamin Franks

University of Glasgow

Lara Montesinos Coleman

University of Durham

And 15 others

Our friends the gulls

Pete Dorey (letter, 1 August) complains of the "squawking" of gulls. We live in a seaside town where they are thick in the air. Their "squawking", that is, varied vocabulary of calls, is close around all our windows and, being natural, never keeps us awake.

We put no food into the trash bags we put out, which therefore are never ripped open as are others next to them.

We often take picnics at seaside spots where the gulls, whose beautiful antics in the air we are watching, might be expected to snatch, but only begging pigeons come close. We get endless interest from observing the family life of the gulls who nest on our roof.

All anecdotal evidence, of course. But at least it is first-hand, unlike, I suspect, many of the anti-gull horror rumours that we hear so drearily often.

Guy Ottewell

Lyme Regis, Dorset

The gulls that now nest among us are mainly herring gulls (a declining species). They only nest in our towns because of lack of other nesting places and access to large amounts of human food waste. This takes the form of discarded fast food, general rubbish and municipal dumps. Problems, as ever in nature, are usually caused by Homo sapiens rather than Larus argentatus.

Andy Lane

Cotgrave, Nottinghamshire

Once it was a great pleasure listening to the dawn chorus of blackbirds and thrushes singing in the morning. What we have now is landgulls, which used to be called seagulls, and pigeons making a continuing miserable cooing noise. Is it not time the councils did something about removing them before it is too late and they will be deemed listed?

John Connor

Dunfermline Fife

BBC in the Tories' sights

Colin Burke's letter (1 August) identifies the risk to the BBC. The Conservatives have got it clearly in their sights and the PR campaign is under way, with references to "the left-leaning BBC" and the need for plurality.

The BBC is respected and envied throughout the world and the damage to trade and to our influence would be incalculable without the World Service. The Government's decision to cut funding contradicts its claim to be doing everything possible for the economy. We should all strenuously defend our BBC for democracy.

R E Hooper

Stratford upon Avon

Am I alone in thinking that the BBC News has been so much more relaxed and simple during the journalists' strike? I fear that the strike may backfire on them, when viewers wonder if we really need so many "correspondents" and specialist reporters standing outside odd locations. There seem to be more and more new faces on our screens, all commanding high salaries.

Beverley Atiyah

Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire

F1 races towards ratings disaster

The cobbled-together deal whereby the BBC only gets to screen live coverage of 10 of next year's 20 Grands Prix is the worst possible news for UK Formula 1 fans.

If we want to see all 20 races live we have to sign up for Sky Sports, which costs about £40 a month. That's £480 for the year to watch the 10 races we will not be able to watch on the BBC. This works out at £48 per race, which I for one cannot justify.

Audiences will shrink, sponsors will leave the sport and Mr Ecclestone will have killed his golden goose.

Malcolm Harding

Ipswich

Negative reaction

I could not agree more with J W Wright (letter, 1 August) about our dreadful national anthem, but I fear that he might be misguided in his choice of "Jerusalem" as the alternative. As my eminent legal best friend never tires of reminding me, this hymn begins with four questions, the answers to which are almost certainly "no", "no", "no" and "no".

Dave Amatt

Stroud, Gloucestershire

Dinosaur and rock chicks

I agree wholeheartedly with Tim Matthews's letter (30 July) on the hysteria that followed Diana's death, and his point that true mourning should be reserved for one's relations and friends. But why does he have to spoil it by being so pompous about "Keith Richards' crass sexism (perhaps only to be expected from a rock dinosaur) in saying, 'I never knew the chick' "? There are gals alive today, readers of The Independent some of them I warrant, who would still swoon to be called a chick by Keef. He's no dinosaur.

Ian Craine

London N15

Perspectives on the conflict in Libya

A hundred years of bombing from the air

It is almost 100 years since the first bombs were dropped from an aeroplane on operations – in Libya. On 1 November 1911 Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti of the Italian army dropped three 2.2kg grenades on the Taguira Oasis. In the light of our current involvement, are there any Nato plans to mark the centenary in an appropriate fashion?

Adrian Lee

Yelverton, Devon

Would you have rather seen Gaddafi win?

I usually ask people who take the line on Libya which you have lapsed into if they will repeat after me, in as many words: "I would have preferred to see the rebellion crushed forthwith and the east-Libyans take the consequences." They never answer.

Your editorial of 2 August is worse still. You are saying, are you, that if we hadn't intervened in Libya then that would have made intervention in Syria more feasible? And you would have supported it? This is a bizarre non-sequitur, leading to obviously false conclusions, and starting from a transparent evasion.

Roger Schafir

London N21

Nato assault has no backing from the UN

The bombing of state television may represent a new phase of the Nato assault on Libyan civilians ("Rebel feud puts Libya policy in jeopardy", 30 July).

The known highlights to date of "bombing Gaddafi" have included the murder of his four-month-old granddaughter Mastoura and his two-year-old grandsons Seif and Carthage three months ago, and the butchering of the extended family of General Khoweildi al-Hamidi (Nato referred to his grandson's fourth birthday party as a "legitimate target") in June.

UN resolution 1973 calls for a ceasefire: Nato has rejected every single offer of a ceasefire. UN resolution 1973 calls for the interception of military supplies: Nato arms small paramilitary groups then supports their indiscriminate shelling of pro-Gaddafi towns. It seems to be these armed men, who are guilty of egregious human rights abuses, that Nato regards as "civilians".

We are the paymasters for this grotesquely Orwellian assault on Libya: it is time that we checked it.

Peter McKenna

Liverpool

Now the dictator is the rebel

Now that the British government has recognised the National Transitional Council as the sole "legitimate governing authority" in Libya, in concert with most major powers the world over, will the media adopt a long overdue change of language? Gaddafi's fighters should be labelled the rebels. Gaddafi's ministers should be described as the former ministers of Libya and Gaddafi the former leader.

Chris Doyle

Director, Council for Arab-British Understanding, London EC4