Mark Carne should not have been awarded a CBE after the railway mess

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Does the honours committee live in a parallel universe that doesn’t have railways so they didn’t know what 'appalling service' means? (PA)

The Department for Transport has said the timing of the announcement of Mark Carne’s CBE is “unfortunate”. I’m sorry, I think it’s a complete joke. It’s not like the railways were a picture of perfection five or more weeks ago when the decision was made. I mean, what were they thinking? Does the honours committee live in a parallel universe that doesn’t have railways, so they didn’t know what “appalling service” means?

Seriously, though, I think this award just shows there’s one rule for most of us but different or no rules for a select few. I know that if I had made as much of a mess of my job as I think Carne has I would have been out on my ear in seconds. What an awful way to incentivise young people to work hard and succeed when you have such a glaring and very public example that for some it just doesn’t matter.

Steve Mumby
Bournemouth

Microplastics in mussels? Let’s eat them anyway

I am not surprised to read that all mussels around Britain contain microplastics – they are bottom-feeders, filtering out the detritus at the bottom of our seas. So this story merely adds to the tsunami of stories about plastic pollution in recent months, from which major facts are now emerging: less than 10 per cent of plastic produced in the last 50 years has been recycled, the rest sits in landfill, blowing in the wind and sinking or floating in our rivers and oceans. We have been told that even highly purified tap water around the whole world contains minute traces of these materials.

But all of these stories simply show it is too late now to do anything about this, so let’s drop the hysteria. Yes, we need to do what we can to stop plastic pollution getting worse, but the millions of tonnes already out there will not go away, and all we can do is console ourselves with the thought that, despite the ubiquitous nature of this pollution, there are few known direct health effects on humans. And I have not seen any data showing what percentage of the deaths of animals, turtles and the rest is caused by choking on large pieces of plastic. Is it one per cent, 10 per cent, 20 per cent or what, does anyone know?

David Reed
London NW3

Acknowledging an increase in violent crime is hardly just a ‘negative outlook’

Hamish McRae is talking utter nonsense in claiming that violent crime is decreasing and that many of us have a negative bias towards facts. He seems to be living in a different world. Theresa May has embarked on a plethora of austerity measures without taking account the political, religious, social, economic and commercial contexts, as we live in a diverse and multicultural society. Such measures have exacerbated existing problems, from knife stabbings and acid attacks to paedophilia, domestic violence, mental health problems, high suicide rates, racial segregation, Islamophobia and antisemitism, to name only a few. The May government must understand that social disintegration and moral decline are more lethal than any external security threat.

Munjed Farid Al Qutob
London NW2

We need proper water infrastructure in the UK

The proposal by the GMB to use water from Mid Wales to ease shortages in London, which has triggered a predictable response from Welsh commentators, would be nothing more than the sort of “sticking plaster” solution we in Britain have unfortunately become all too familiar with.

A far better idea would be for the government to legislate to compel the privatised water companies to complete the national water distribution network scheme, for which much of the necessary infrastructure was laid down by the public sector water authorities when under the control of the National Water Council (NWC).

Unfortunately, this was not completed because when Margaret Thatcher privatised water the first thing the companies did when freed of NWC control was to throw the scheme into the shredder to maximise their profits without any thought of obligation to provide a service. The beauty of this scheme is that it would have allowed water to be transferred from anywhere in Britain to anywhere in Britain, using pipelines and rivers, thus solving everyone’s periodic drought problems permanently, as it is highly unlikely that this country will be short of water in all areas simultaneously.

As much of the work has already been done, for instance through Kielder Water, Rutland Water and the Wye Valley pump transfer scheme, it would simply mean installing the necessary pipelines and refurbishing mothballed equipment. The other problem, of course, would be the necessary financial measures to compensate areas properly for the supply of their water to other areas.

How much longer do the British public have to wait for the government to instal proper water infrastructure, instead of short-term panic measures whenever drought looms? The private water companies’ shareholders will squeal at the thought of reduced profits, but it is time they were reminded that they are a service industry, something which the old water boards were fully aware of.

Ian McNicholas
Ebbw Vale

Boris Johnson needs to go

The only thing strange about Boris Johnson’s latest attempt to undermine his own government and continue to debase Britain is that Sarah Wollaston is the only public voice who seems to have come to the obvious conclusion that it was Johnson who leaked the tape of himself criticising May.

It is important to remember, not only did he take part in the dishonest and toxic campaign to leave the EU during the referendum but he was an active poison pen against Europe for decades.

Now that the loons have got what they wanted and it is possibly the biggest socioeconomic disaster the UK has faced since the Second World War – the idea that Johnson would not be manipulating behind the scenes to try to place the blame elsewhere is preposterously naive.

As for why May won’t sack him – cowardice, stupidity, poor judgement, inertia, intimidation from the Eton elite – is anyone’s guess. Meanwhile, the UK suffers.

Amanda Baker
Edinburgh

Boris Johnson implies that the Brexit Irish border problem is illusory by comparing it to the millennium bug, but he is completely wrong in this comparison.

The millennium bug problem was a real and substantial problem for the IT industry. Programmers had used just two digits to describe the year so that 1901 was ‘01’, 1999 was ‘99’ with the ‘19’ part assumed. Thus on 1 January 2000 those programs would treat the New Year as 1900.

This was a significant problem which could have resulted in a vast number of IT systems across the world failing because they could not correctly calculate the year or the difference between two years. However, the problem was averted by the dedicated work of innumerable IT professionals working to expand date fields in their programs and do extensive process testing.

The Irish border problem also needs extensive work to define an agreed fix and cannot be wished away however much certain politicians wish it could.

Nick Haward
Havant, Hampshire