Rosemary remained in Africa for 12 years, collecting and recording fish, and working for various organisations and institutions, including the Natural History Museum. In addition to Nyasa she studied the fish at Lakes Albert, Turkana and Tanganyika, as well as in the Pagani river in Tanzania. She investigated the life cycles and feeding habits of fish, their life strategies, parenting methods and how the various species rubbed along with one another. She was briefly the acting director of EAFRO.

^{Fishermen on Lake Victoria (ALAMY)}

In 1953 she married the geologist Richard McConnell, requiring her to leave EAFRO, which had a “marriage bar” under which married women were not allowed to hold permanent posts. She joined her husband in Botswana (where she collected fish in the rivers and ponds of the Okavango Delta) before the couple moved to British Guiana in South America, where her husband became director of the British Guiana Geological Survey. There she recorded the interaction between electric fish from America and Africa and carried out research in the Rupununi savannah – the first survey of the Guiana shelf between the West Indies and Brazil.

In 1962 she returned to Britain, settling into a research post at the British Museum, to which she had sent samples during her travels. The museum, she wrote, was “an ideal base for meeting people and a catalyst for ideas and information”.

But her work in the field did not end there. She visited the vast reservoirs of West Africa (including Lake Kariba and Lake Volta) in the late Sixties, and in 1968 was the ichthyologist on the Xavantina-Cachimbo Expedition to north-eastern Mato Grosso in Brazil, run by the Royal Geographical Society. In Brazil she filed reports on catfish and gymnotoids and marvelled at the region’s birds, plants and insects. A decade later she travelled to Gatun Lake in Panama where the species Cichla ocellaris had been introduced to the waters.

She arranged various symposia on fish studies and played an important part in establishing tilapia aquaculture. She believed that the species was a valuable food source in Third World countries and promoted its production with the fisheries administration of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation and the International Centre for Living Aquatic Resources Management (now known as the World Fish Centre).

^{Red tilapia: the species is successfully farmed, and is known as ‘aquatic chicken’ (ALAMY)}

In 1995, by then a freelance consultant, she helped to raise awareness of the ecological damage being inflicted on the fish stocks of Lake Victoria in East Africa. What was once a “treasure trove” of approximately 300 species of cichlid, many unique to its habitat, had in recent years suffered from disappearing stocks. At first the finger of blame was pointed at the carnivorous Nile Perch, introduced to the lake’s waters in the mid-Fifties. This, maintained Rosemary Lowe-McConnell, was only half the story; siltation was also a contributory factor. An estimated 200 species, she maintained, once present in the lake were now extinct.

Regarding the ecological future of Lake Victoria, she supported a unified policy between Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda, all of which border the lake, on the assessment of fish stocks (including the possibility of introducing species). “This is one of the largest experiments, albeit unwitting, that’s ever happened,” she said. “Now we must discover as much as possible about what is going on.”

She was a fellow of the Linnean Society of London (and its vice-president in 1967), the first editor of the Biological Journal of the Linnean Society and a member of the Association for Tropical Biology .

She wrote more than 60 academic papers and published several books, including Fish Communities in Tropical Fresh Waters (1975) and her memoirs, The Tilapia Trail: The Life Story of a Fish Biologist (2006), in which she noted the peculiarity of African traffic signs (such as those warning of wandering elephants).

In later life, at her home in Sussex, she enjoyed assisting young ichthyologists and fisheries scientists . In 1997 she received the Linnean Medal of Zoology – “Not bad for someone who hasn’t had a job since 1953,” she observed.

Her husband predeceased her.

Rosemary Lowe-McConnell, born June 24 1921, died December 22 2014

SIR – I admire immensely the stance that France has been taking, in the wake of the atrocities carried out there, on freedom of speech.

Will David Cameron, the Prime Minister, follow suit and allow freedom of speech to return to Britain, or will we still have to look over our shoulder before offering an opinion on race, religion, sexuality or any group to which our politicians pander for votes?

Lieutenant Colonel Ian Beck (retd)
Dearham, Cumbria

SIR – The attack on Charlie Hebdo was an attack on freedom of expression, as well as a horribly murderous attack on individuals. However, we must not allow the French Republic to bask in its own self-image as a bastion of freedom of expression. It is nothing of the kind.

The legal restrictions on freedom of expression are more encompassing in France than in any other country in Europe. A careless choice of word, in an off-the-cuff discussion (or even an attempt to avoid a discussion) can result in a peculiar hybrid criminal prosecution and civil action brought by private organisations.

Such actions might lead to criminal penalties and damages payable to campaigning organisations. Indeed, Charlie Hebdo was the target of such an action as the result of the re-publication of the Danish cartoons. While that action failed in 2007, its menace would have cowed many weaker editorial teams.

France’s repressive restrictions on freedom of expression in the areas of race, religion and ethnicity create a culture of expectation that dissent from the political class’s line will be stamped out. When legal actions fail, illegal action will be pursued.

Andrew Brons
Leeds, West Yorkshire

SIR – Je ne suis pas Charlie. I am appalled at the horrific terrorist attack in France. While I am a committed advocate of free speech and am deeply against the puritanical doctrinal path that some strands of Islam are taking, I am in no way a fan of Charlie Hebdo, in particular its unnecessary decision to reprint the 2005 Jyllands-Posten Mohammed cartoons.

I believe in mutual tolerance, respect and love. This sort of divisive hate-spreading incitement causes damage by radicalising and dehumanising both sides.

Am I alone in seeing parallels between these cartoons and those depicting Jews in Thirties Germany?

Max Jalil
Birmingham

SIR – The Oxford Dictionary defines phobia as “an extreme or often irrational fear of or aversion to something”: Islamophobia is defined differently, as “dislike of or prejudice against Islam or Muslims, especially as a political force”.

In the traditional sense of phobia, I am unfortunately, but undeniably, Islamophobic. Yes, I do fear Islam: I fear for my future, and my children’s, because of the danger that fundamentalist Islamic fanatics cause. I fear that until the Islamic hierarchy, political or religious, stands up to eradicate the fanatics among them, then my fears are indeed justified.

Gidon Stemmer
Salford

SIR – I follow no faith, but mainly observe Christian moral values. Many comments about the slaughter in Paris, by people who assume they are Christian, civilised, Western and cultured, condemn the actions of a fanatical cadre.

However, they do not seem uncomfortable about the uncivilised, insensitive, childish, intellectually presumptuous cartoons in Charlie Hebdo.

Anyone with any decency, even if agnostic, should observe sensitivity and respect for other cultures’ beliefs.

David Culm
Littleover, Derbyshire

SIR – The Paris shooting was ghastly, but why is so much attention given to it yet so little to repeated killings of this nature in Nigeria, where more people are murdered?

In Paris there had been provocation by some of those killed. In Nigeria there is none other than that of not being Muslim.

David Pitts
East Molesey, Surrey

Unprosecuted crimes

SIR – How disingenuous of Chris Grayling, the Justice Secretary, to say he wants to end the “cautions culture”. He is the architect of the latest and arguably the most savage cuts to both prosecution and defence funding, which have produced this unhappy state of affairs.

The drive to save costs has resulted in a culture of routinely charging people with less serious offences than would previously have been the charge, in order to encourage guilty pleas in low-profile, high-volume cases. If, despite this, the case seems to be heading for a trial, ludicrously lenient plea packages are increasingly agreed by the Crown, save in the most egregious cases, rather than suffer the time and expense of litigating the matter.

The sentencing judge is bound to sentence only on what an offender has pleaded guilty to. The net result is that many really quite serious offences go unprosecuted or underprosecuted.

Yvonne Coen QC
Stamford, Lincolnshire

A duty to the electorate

^{(Rex Features)}

SIR – David Cameron, the Prime Minister, says he will not take part in the general election TV leadership debates unless the Green Party is included.

I believe that any candidate for political office has a moral duty to present himself or herself for public scrutiny. This is particularly important for those seeking leadership positions. Perhaps the time has now come when participation should be a legal requirement for those seeking office.

Doug Clark
Currie, Midlothian

Scrapheap of history

SIR – When I spent the year 1963-64 as Reuters’ (and the West’s) sole correspondent in East Berlin, I had a Wartburg (Letters, January 6). It was a disgusting pink colour but it was compulsory. This horror had one advantage: you could sneer at Trabants as you went past them.

On October 1 1990, reunification day, I watched the new masters from the west sweep past in their Mercedes and run the Wartburgs and Trabants off the road. I almost felt sorry for them.

Frederick Forsyth
Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire

Telephone directories

SIR – High Wycombe is not the only place that BT has moved into another county (Letters, January 8).

In Cardiff, the eastern section with the postcode CF3 is deemed by BT to be situated in Newport and given a Newport telephone directory.

If we want a local directory, we have to buy one for £10.

I have challenged this over many years and am always told by the marketing department in Scotland that this part of Cardiff is deemed to be in Newport “for marketing purposes”.

It seems to have escaped BT that its directories are passé and have a diminishing marketing value.

Barrie W Cooper
Cardiff

Law unto Broadchurch

^{Olivia Colman in ‘Broadchurch’ (Patrick Redmond/ITV)}

SIR – As often happens when screenwriters do not take authoritative legal advice when venturing into legal waters, Broadchurch, an otherwise excellent show (Letters, January 9), seems now to be talking nonsense.

I was a barrister in private practice in London from 1963 to 2006. The suggestion that the family of the victim would hunt out a QC to “represent them” or “take the prosecution on their behalf” is ridiculous.

It is not their case; it is the State’s case. Presumably the famous lady QC is expected to put pressure on the Crown Prosecution Service and the Director of Public Prosecutions, perhaps calling in a past favour or two, so that she is nominated by them as counsel for the prosecution.

I do not necessarily think nobly of those gentlemen, but I certainly do not see them being pushed into making such a choice; more likely involvement of the QC with the family would make it certain that she would not be selected.

Charles Lewis
London N2

Tough as old boots

SIR – Our tortoise lives in the garden and is more than 80 years old. The only medical intervention he has had followed a fox bite on his undershell, which drew blood. A little well-placed epoxy resin glue and he was good as new. That was 10 years ago.

Mary Whittle
Rochester, Kent

The scientific truth behind an old wives’ tale

^{Salad days: a 19th-century still life by the Belgian painter David Emile Joseph de Noter (www.bridgemanart.com)}

SIR – It is in fact true that carrots “allow you to see in the dark”.

The carotene pigment that gives them their orange colour is both an antioxidant and pre-vitamin A. Converted to vitamin A in the body it combines with the opsin protein found in the rods at the back of the retina to form the compound visual purple. It is this compound that is responsible for the detection of light. Thus, the earliest clinical symptom of vitamin A deficiency is night blindness; the inability of the eye to adjust to dim light.

Dr Ruth Ash
School of Human Sciences
London Metropolitan University

A chance for young musicians to excel on stage

SIR – Ivan Hewett makes many appreciative comments in his review of the National Youth Orchestra’s concert at the Barbican, for which we thank him. We appreciate serious criticism because our high standards demand it.

Mr Hewett also questions the wisdom of fielding a double-sized orchestra. We do this primarily because NYO exists to give breakthrough experiences of orchestral music to teenage musicians and audiences, and we want as many talented, committed young musicians as possible to have the chance to play with NYO. For many it is a life-changing experience, and we have to turn away far more than we would like.

Our size has an added benefit. It helps keep the NYO culture of youthful brilliance in orchestral performance alive from year to year. Our standards rely not just on our teaching team and conductors such as John Wilson, but also on peer inspiration. New members learn a tremendous amount about how to excel as orchestral musicians by following the lead of our returning members.

There are limits to what you can achieve with an orchestra of 163 teenage musicians, more than half of whom are playing in a world-class orchestra for the first time. But those limits are set far higher than you might expect if you have never heard NYO perform. Readers who wish to decide for themselves can hear our Barbican concert that was broadcast by BBC Radio 3 yesterday, at any time in the next 30 days via BBC iPlayer.

Sarah Alexander
Chief Executive & Artistic Director, National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain
London WC2

Out walking one day, a talent scout spotted her and persuaded her to enter the Miss Universe contest. Winning as Miss Sweden, she gained a trip to Hollywood. A screen test did not bring much work and she returned home disheartened. However, she was determined to make good as an actress and began saving for a return trip.

Her break came when Bob Hope chose her to accompany him on a Christmas tour of American air force bases in Greenland in 1954. Studio moguls soon heard about the roars of approval for Anita and offered her a contract. She had small uncredited roles in films such as The Mississippi Gambler, Abbott and Costello go to Mars and The Golden Blade, before winning supporting parts in Artists and Models (1955) and Blood Alley (1955; playing a Chinese girl). Her first lead came in Back from Eternity (1956). By this time she was being touted as “Paramount’s Marilyn Monroe”.

^{Anita Ekberg and Marcello Mastroianni in La Dolce Vita (Kobal Collection)}

She moved to London in the mid-Fifties but was lonely and hardly left her hotel. Having refused dozens of invitations to premieres, something impelled her to finally accept one offer. Her escort turned out to be Anthony Steen, a matinee idol alumnus of the “Rank School”. They were married in 1956.

In her first British film, Zarak (1956), she met her match in Victor Mature. Playing a native dancer, with a few spangles and bangles judiciously placed, who falls in love with Mature’s hulking Zarak Khan. The film left audiences wondering who had the bigger chest. She teamed up again with Mature the following year for the thriller Interpol.

At this time her marriage to Steel was rarely out of the headlines, with reports of drunken driving, rows and violent recriminations. Eventually the union completely soured and they divorced after three years.

^{Anita Ekberg with her first husband Anthony Steel (REX)}

She did not have time to mourn the marriage. Her performance in Fellini’s La Dolce Vita the following year made her a star. Shot in Rome at a time when the Italian obsession with celebrity was at its height, she played the starlet Sylvia opposite Marcello Mastroianni’s philandering paparazzo journalist. The part fixed her in audience’s minds as the European blonde “sex bomb” – stylish, sensual, shallow and ephemeral.

In the film’s most famous scene, she splashes with abandon in the Trevi Fountain, her black low-necked dress trailing in the frothy waters, cooing: “Marcello, come here.” In fact the scene had been shot in February and Mastroianni was doped up on vodka. “I was freezing,” she recalled. “They had to lift me out of the water because I couldn’t feel my legs any more.”

Following the success of Fellini’s masterpiece, Anita Ekberg appeared opposite Bob Hope in Call Me Bwana and Frank Sinatra in 4 for Texas (both 1963). She was also considered for the part of Honey Ryder in Dr No but lost out to Ursula Andress. When she did appear in a Bond film, it was both unwitting and unflattering: in From Russia with Love (1963) Sean Connery shoots a spy escaping through a gigantic Call Me Bwana poster featuring Anita Ekberg’s face. “She should have kept her mouth shut,” says Bond.

^{Anita Ekberg in the Trevi Fountain (Alamy)}

Anita Ekberg’s on-screen persona – a freewheeling man-eater from overseas – soon spilt over into her private life. Sinatra was one of the many leading men she was rumoured to have taken as a lover, along with Errol Flynn, Yul Brynner, Tyrone Power and Gary Cooper.

She often played characters possessed of an untethered and wild spirit. As a “war lady” in The Mongols (1961) she indulged in torture and sado-masochism, striding in thigh-high boots among the slave girls cracking a bullwhip. For “The Temptation of Dr Antonio”, Fellini’s episode in the portmanteau feature Boccaccio ’70 (1962), she was once again the sex object, this time as the model featured on a “Drink More Milk” billboard poster who is brought to life to trap a puritanical doctor. Thus Fellini followed Tashlin in using her abilities for erotic satire.

In 1963 Ekberg married Rik Van Nutter (who later played Felix Leiter in Thunderball). They lived in Spain and Switzerland and in 1969 became entrepreneurs. “Rick and I have gone into the shipping business. We found a cargo ship and we’re in business with the captain,” she said (the couple also bought a Chinese junk). “Ours is a good marriage. There are so many good times in marriage, that the bad times are really unimportant. Anyway, I learnt from my parents that difficulties are there to be overcome.”

As with all sex symbols, age diminished her currency. By the end of the Sixties she was complaining about the lack of available roles. “I should be able to get work myself on the strength of my acting. I shouldn’t have to sleep with producers to get parts. It’s depressing to see parts going to actresses who can’t act their way out of a wet paper bag but who are friendly with producers,” she observed. “My life has changed quite a bit, of course. The Ferrari’s gone – now I have a Mini Moke.”

The downward spiral continued throughout the Seventies. She made films but they were more often than not B-movies with salacious titles such as The French Sex Murders (1972) and The Killer Nun (1979). Her scenes for Valley of the Dancing Widows (1975) were left on the cutting room floor. At home things also began to disintegrate: she accused Van Nutter of cheating her over a car-hire business they owned. The couple divorced in 1975.

^{Anita Ekberg in 2010 (AFP)}

Two years later, her house was robbed, with the thieves stealing fur coats, jewels and silver, the fruits of her once-famous career. “My last 10 years have brought nothing but bad luck,” she stated.

After a second robbery in 2011, she appealed to the Fellini Foundation for financial help. It was a sad sign of decline from the Amazonian actress who had five decades earlier threatened paparazzi with a bow and arrow.

Her final years were spent living in semi-reclusion in a run-down Italian villa outside Rome, where her only companions were two great Danes.

Anita Ekberg, born September 29 1931, January 11 2015

In 1966 a working party was established to examine the concept of the museum, whose entrance feature was to be Tiny Tim (a huge 1883 steam-powered hammer which had been used to forge ships’ rudder posts). Beamish Hall, on a 300-acre site eight miles south-west of Newcastle upon Tyne, was soon identified as a suitable location.

The Friends of Beamish was set up in 1967, and in 1970 Atkinson left the Bowes Museum to become director of the new museum — the first to be financed and administered by a consortium of county councils (Cleveland, Durham, Northumberland and Tyne & Wear).

A preliminary exhibition called Museum in the Making, which opened in 1971, set an instant record by attracting a two-hour queue on its opening day, and 50,000 people came to visit over 21 weekends. The museum began with just two members of staff, and until 1972 displays were confined to the hall; but as open-air aspects of the museum became accessible, Atkinson developed new techniques of interactive, entertaining and participatory display which have been influential on older museums.

Displays included a whole town constructed from the buildings that had been dismantled and re-erected, with terraced housing, shops, a pub, a park, a school, a newspaper office, a bank and a row of houses where professional people would have lived. There was also a drift mine, a farm with animals, a steam railway and trams to take visitors round the attractions.

^{A tram stops on an Edwardian street at the unique Beamish Open Air Museum (NNP)}

However, while the exhibits were fascinating in themselves, it was the first-person interpreters (many of them local people who had experienced the life they described) who brought history to life. “Visitors to the museum can follow a coal miner into the eerie blackness of a 1913 drift mine; wait in a prim Victorian parlour to be called upstairs to a scary cast-iron dental chair flanked by a foot-pedal-powered drill; sample freshly baked bread in the kitchen of a miner’s cottage; watch cheese being made at the Home Farm; or shop for tea, treacle or fancy bloomers at the cooperative store,” remarked an American visitor who recommended a day at the Beamish as an antidote to “castle burnout”.

But, as Atkinson explained: “Beamish was established mainly to give confidence to the people of north-east England themselves. They tended to have a chip on their shoulder about their past, proud of it and yet feeling that it was undervalued. The museum was for them. Tourism didn’t exist up there when we first planned it.”

By 1986 the Beamish had been named British Museum of the Year. In 1987, the year Atkinson retired, it became European Museum of the Year. Today it attracts more than 350,000 visitors annually.

The son of a plumber and an infant schoolteacher, Frank Atkinson was born near Barnsley on April 13 1924 and began building up his own small museum of odds and ends as a boy. Aged 10 he took up fossil collecting and became the youngest member of the Museum of Barnsley Naturalist and Scientific Society.

^{A 1940s farm at the museum (NNP)}

He was educated at Barnsley Grammar School, where he decided on a museum career, but after taking a Science degree at Sheffield University he initially worked at a coking plant, spending his weekends volunteering at the Wakefield Museum and Art Gallery. He eventually got a job there and became, aged 25, the country’s youngest museum director. Atkinson went on to direct the Halifax Museums before his appointment as curator of the Bowes Museum in 1958.

After retiring from the Beamish Museum, he worked with the Thomas Bewick Birthplace Trust and as a member of the (now disbanded) national Museums and Galleries Commission.

Atkinson published an autobiography, The Man Who Made Beamish, in 1999 and wrote several books about the history and traditions of the North East, including Victorian Britain: The North East (1989) and Life and Tradition in Northumberland and Durham (2001), in which gave delightful accounts of such traditional pastimes as pigeon fancying and leek growing.

He was appointed CBE in 1995.

In 1953 Frank Atkinson married Joan Pierson, who survives him with their three sons.

Frank Atkinson, born April 13 1924, died December 30 2014

SIR – Max Jalil (Letters, January 10) draws a parallel between the cartoons in Jyllands-Posten and those depicting Jews in Thirties Germany. The former ridicule beliefs, the latter demonise people.

David Culm (Letters, January 10) states that we “should observe sensitivity and respect for other cultures’ beliefs”.

This is wrong. We should show respect for other people, not their beliefs. These should be fully open to criticism, ridicule and opposition; especially those that justify murder as a response to mockery.

Mike Mahoney
Tetbury, Gloucestershire

SIR – Watching the unity march of one million people in Paris yesterday reminded me of the Iraq anti-war march of one million people in London, and 10 million people in cities around the world, on February 15 2003. Would the march in Paris have been necessary if those 10 million people had been heeded?

Chris Holden
London W4

SIR – We did not see so many of the world’s leaders in London after the July 7 bombings, when many more people than those poor victims in Paris were murdered by Islamist extremists.

Were those deaths less tragic or are the French more patriotic?

Marion Armstrong
Peacehaven, East Sussex

Protecting the pasty

SIR – It is not only Cornish pasties that are threatened by the prospect of the free trade deal being promoted by the European Union and America (“US could take slice of Cornish pasty market”, report, January 6). The proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership would have huge consequences for national sovereignty across the board.

It would introduce sweeping new powers for American corporations to sue member states for introducing legislation that is detrimental to their profits. Instead of such disputes being dealt with in British courts, investor protection provisions under the partnership would mean such cases would be heard secretly outside our national legal system.

It is ironic that many in the business community who so bitterly resent the intrusion of Brussels in legislative matters seem so keen to lock us into a far-reaching trade deal that would so dramatically undermine Britain’s ability to regulate its own health, labour and environmental standards, let alone its baked goods.

Nick Dearden
Director, World Development Movement
London SW9

Same-sex marriage

SIR – Our Prime Minister states he is proudest of a piece of legislation (same-sex marriage) that, regardless of whether you support it or not, has lost his party huge support and could precipitate the disestablishment of the Church. This connection between Church and state is demonstrably important, set against the background of events in Paris.

It is difficult to decide whether the content of the remark or the fact he chose to make it is more damaging to him.

Is it really too late to install a new leader for the Conservative Party before the May election?

Mary Baxter
Ledbury, Herefordshire

TV hearing aids

SIR – My wife and I have a three-pronged answer to the challenge of following the mumbling on Broadchurch and Silent Witness (Letters, January 9): we wear Bluetooth earphones, turn on the subtitles, and we can both lip-read a little.

We always need a whisky before bedtime.

Michael A Mills
Chesham Bois, Buckinghamshire

SIR – And for which values will we British march?

Avril Newey
Earlsdon, Warwickshire

SIR – In all the comment about last week’s atrocities in Paris, there has been much said about the rights and wrongs of insulting Muslim beliefs, freedom of speech, why many feel we must stand with Charlie Hebdo, why others have some sympathy with the killers because of the provocation.

Extraordinarily, I have not heard or seen a single comment that questions the motive of a killer who enters a Jewish supermarket and kills random shoppers. It seems there is no need to explain. They were killed not because they said or did things that were blasphemous or provocative, but because they were probably Jews.

Is the world so inured to this that the question “Why?” is not even deemed necessary?

Frances Canning
Stanmore, Middlesex

SIR – During my teenage years, the law declared that I was entitled to read Lady Chatterley’s Lover. While I appreciated being given the choice, I have never chosen to exercise this particular right. Equally, there are times when I exercise my right to use the off button when certain comedians appear on television.

How much longer will I have any choice? When can I expect a visit from a politically correct jobsworth to inspect my bookshelves?

Polly Haselton
Horley, Surrey

Cancer Drugs Fund

SIR – We will soon learn the fate of more than 40 medicines available to English patients through the Cancer Drugs Fund. This special fund was intended to be a quick fix, required because the appraisal methods used by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, which reviews all NHS medicines, continue to prevent cancer patients from getting the medicines they need.

We know the fund is not a sustainable long-term answer. But while Nice remains broken, the fund and its medicines must exist so that cancer patients can access new, innovative treatments.

Medicines are vital in the fight against cancer. Fifty years ago, just one in five people with cancer had any hope of surviving for 10 years or more. Today, more than half will live for a decade.

The pharmaceutical industry, in partnership with British universities, charities, clinicians and the NHS, has developed and delivered these medical advances. But there is still more to do, and as cancer rates rise, doctors need to be able to prescribe the right medicines at the right time for the right patients.

We need fundamental reform of Nice. Its role must be to identify promising medicines that help patients lead longer and healthier lives, not to be the gatekeeper of the public purse. Nice must be granted the power to make the NHS a world leader in the use of the most innovative new medicines.

We know the NHS is under huge financial pressure. That is why, as an industry, we have committed to underwrite the spend on all medicines so that it cannot exceed a set amount. So far, we havne’t seen this deal result in greater uptake. We have already offered substantial NHS savings, and will continue to do so.

The NHS spends less than £1 in every £10 on medicine. Further cuts would be short-sighted and compromise patient care. Innovation in medicines is moving faster than the health system can deliver to patients. The NHS needs to catch up.

Jonathan Emms
President, Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry
London SW1

If you think Switzerland is disorganised…

Avant-ski: flattening the snow before the men’s super combined slalom at Sochi last year

SIR – You report (telegraph.co.uk, January 7) that Suzi LeVine, the American ambassador to Switzerland, complained on social media that chaos reigns at Swiss ski lifts. She commented on Facebook: “We enjoyed a great day at Adelboden but I was so puzzled by the scrum heading to the lift (and the inefficiency in terms of how many people were on each lift).”

Has she ever been to Italy?

Dr John Doherty
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire

Helping the high street

SIR – You report that Tesco is to close 43 of its stores. We are keen to revive our high streets and independent retailers; surely, every little helps.

Dr Bertie Dockerill
Shildon, Co Durham

Superslow broadband in many rural areas
SIR – The Government’s claim that “We are now a superfast [broadband] nation” (advertisement, January 7) is a joke.

Here in rural Wiltshire, our maximum download speed is rarely above 2Mbps. In the evenings it often drops below 500Kbps, making our village website maintenance nigh impossible at that time.

We have been promised a high-speed connection, but not until late this year.

Andrew Blake
Shalbourne, Wiltshire

SIR – I live within a mile of our telephone exchange, in a large village 22 miles from Charing Cross; it’s not exactly the middle of nowhere. I am told that there is no prospect in the foreseeable future of replacing my very unreliable broadband connection with fibre-optic cable.

Why is the Government boasting about superfast broadband which I and so many others cannot have?

Norman Gerald
Radlett, Hertfordshire

SIR – I can assure those smug government ministers and civil servants in their ivory towers that our village internet connection is glacially slow, when it works at all, and there are no plans to upgrade the five miles of copper cable to the nearest exchange. It appears we live in two nations.

J B Grotrian
West Knoyle, Wiltshire

SIR – Here in the drab, dank, slow north, I have to share files by email with colleagues who live inside the M25 in a piecemeal fashion, and I am constantly obliged to remind them that we don’t all have the same super-duper broadband service.

Bill Thompson
Frankby, Wirral

Cut up the loyalty card

SIR – Brian Herbert (Letters, January 7) should be aware that detailed information about individuals and families is like gold-dust to marketing companies.

If he possesses a loyalty card he should cut it up, as they will know every intimate detail of his family’s life. That’s what loyalty cards are for: we are all just data.

Roy Hodgson
Northampton

Wolves’ persistent lack of success often led him to suspect that his money was being misspent, and in 1999 he even sued his son Jonathan, a former chairman of the club, for alleged financial irregularities. “They think Golden Tit — me — will go on forever,” Hayward said on television. “It’s blackmail. Money has been wasted.” In 2003 his prayers were finally answered when Wolves won promotion to the Premier League via the play-offs final, only to be relegated the next season. He eventually sold control of the club, in 2007, to Steve Morgan.

Jack Arnold Hayward was born on June 14 1923 at Dunstall, Wolverhampton, less than half a mile from Molineux, the Wolves ground. His father, Sir Charles Hayward, had been a circus performer known as “The Living Head” before making his first fortune manufacturing motorcycle sidecars. He lost it all in 1929, but then amassed a second, much larger pile with his engineering group, Firth Cleveland.

Jack was educated at Stowe and in 1941 volunteered for the RAF. He trained as a pilot at Clewiston, Florida, then flew Transport Command Dakotas on the hazardous supply route to the Fourteenth Army in Burma. While in India he crashed his Tiger Moth when trying out a “my next trick is impossible!” manoeuvre. All that survived were Hayward and the propeller, which took pride of place in his office in Freeport .

Demobbed in the rank of flight-lieutenant in 1946, he joined Rotary Hoes, part of his father’s Firth Cleveland Group, and set about selling agricultural equipment from the back of a truck in southern Africa. In 1951 he founded the American arm of Firth Cleveland in New York. He lived there for five years until restrictions on foreign investment took him to Nassau.

Hayward was quick to see the potential to make money in the Bahamas, and persuaded his father to put £1 million into Groves’s scheme to develop Freeport. Groves had leased 50,000 acres of swamp and bushland from the Bahamas government to set up a tax-free industrial complex centred around a deep-water harbour — the government was to receive a cut of the revenues. Hayward became administrative vice-president of the new Grand Bahama Port Authority, overseeing the development. He became chairman in 1976, after buying Groves out.

Hayward threw himself into the life of island pioneer, working hard to transform the bush around Freeport into a city. He banked in a tiny hut called Barclays at the harbour; he did not see a telephone until 1960; and he needed to put down a sheet fastened by rocks to signal to passing aircraft that he wanted a lift to Nassau.

His investment instincts, meanwhile, were spot on: Freetown became the fastest growing industrial centre in the Caribbean, as international companies rushed in, excited by the tax advantages, tourist potential and proximity to America. The shares rocketed on the New York Stock Exchange and Hayward became very rich.

He resented any suggestion that he was a playboy or a tax exile, feeling that although he had inherited money, he had multiplied it through shrewdness and graft. He was also both publicly and privately generous. Indeed, of all his pursuits, he seemed to derive most satisfaction from giving his money away.

A vivid — and subsequently unfortunate — example of his beneficence was his gift of £150,000 to buy Lundy Island, a wildlife sanctuary off the north Devon coast, for the National Trust in 1969.

The campaign to save the island had been launched by three West Country MPs, including Jeremy Thorpe, the leader of the Liberal Party. Hayward read about it in The Daily Telegraph while sitting at home in the Bahamas. As he later recalled: “I had a bit of spare cash, so I telephoned Jeremy Thorpe and offered it to him.” When news of his generosity broke, Hayward remarked that he was “fed up with pieces of Britain going to foreigners”.

^{Sir Jack Hayward and his wife in 1982 (REX)}

Three months later Hayward found himself sitting in a small church on Lundy, surrounded by grateful islanders celebrating its reprieve. In the pew behind sat Thorpe, whose smooth organisation of the day’s events made a big impression on Hayward. During the service of thanksgiving, Hayward leaned back and whispered: “God, Jeremy, you’ve done a super job, this is fantastic. You really should be prime minister if you can do a job like this.” “It’s on the cards, my dear fellow,” Thorpe murmured in reply. “But I might need some help.”

Over the course of the next day, Thorpe explained that the Liberal Party had an overdraft of £100,000. The next year, after meeting the Liberal MP Peter Bessell back in the Bahamas, Hayward was persuaded to part with another £150,000; the cheque was made out personally to Thorpe.

Feeling that Hayward was an easy touch, Thorpe made sure to cultivate their friendship. In the spring of 1973, shortly after Thorpe’s marriage to Marion, Countess of Harewood, the couple stayed with Hayward in the Bahamas.

Hearing that Hayward and his partners were thinking of selling Freeport, Thorpe offered to find them a buyer, in return for a commission. Thorpe asked Bessell to help . But before they could get a firm offer, Bessell became desperate for funds to cover up various frauds he had committed. He persuaded Thorpe that they should ask Hayward for an advance of $500,000 “to pay middlemen”. Hayward suspected something was up (albeit he thought Thorpe was being conned by Bessell) and told them they would first have to convince Wallace Groves, which they failed to do.

Undaunted, Thorpe again approached Hayward for money in April 1974. Thorpe now wanted untraceable money to enact his “final solution” to the problem of Norman Scott, his former lover. In his letter to Hayward, he apologised for the way “that bastard Bessell” had tried to con him the previous year, and asked Hayward for £50,000: £40,000 to go to the Liberal Party general election fund, and £10,000 to settle “election expenses” and to be paid to a man called Nadir Dinshaw.

Dinshaw was godfather to Thorpe’s son Rupert and, as Thorpe wrote, “conveniently resident in Jersey”. Thorpe explained to Hayward in the letter that he might carelessly have broken the rules governing a candidate’s general election expenses and that Dinshaw could safely pay the “ambiguous” bills which he had run up.

Hayward complied with both requests, so that when the election was called for October 10, Thorpe was able to splash out on a hovercraft which took him dramatically along the coast, until it was damaged when it sped up a beach in Devon. Their finances in rude health, the Liberals fielded a record number of candidates, although they ended up with just 13 MPs.

The next year, at Thorpe’s request, Hayward sent a further £10,000 to Dinshaw, in addition to £9,000 to the Liberal Party Direct Aid Committee. Neither Hayward nor Dinshaw knew it, but the money was to buy letters from Scott and to pay Andrew Newton, an airline pilot and now would-be hitman, for a “professional frightening job”.

^{Sir Jack Hayward celebrating Wolverhampton Wanderers win at the 2003 Nationwide Division One final (Getty)}

The ensuing events, including the shooting of Norman Scott’s Great Dane Rinka by Newton on Dartmoor and the eventual arrest of Jeremy Thorpe and his co-conspirators, culminated in what is often described as “the trial of the century”.

During the investigation, Hayward was contacted by the police and asked about the £20,000 he had paid to Dinshaw in Jersey. With relief he remembered that he had kept the letters from Thorpe in a drawer by his bed at his house in Sussex. “They saved my bacon,” he told Thorpe’s biographer Simon Freeman. “If I hadn’t kept them, the police might have thought I knew where the money was going.”

The letters were the last piece in the jigsaw of the prosecution case, and at the trial at the Old Bailey in 1979, Hayward gave evidence for the crown. Judge Cantley called him “a nice, respectable witness” . But it was scant consolation for being dragged into the squalid affair. “I’m too trusting,” Hayward later admitted. “I like everyone. And Jeremy was very charming and amusing. But everyone was taken in by him, weren’t they?”

In the meantime, Hayward had continued to find patriotic causes on which to shower his money. In 1976 he gave £150,000 to pay for the salvage of Brunel’s SS Great Britain in the Falklands and return her to her original dock in Bristol; he later invited Paul Getty Jnr to match his £500,000 to complete the vessel’s restoration.

He funded three international racing yachts Great Britain I, II and III, spent £100,000 on saving the sloop Gannet (the Royal Navy’s only survivor of the transition from sail to steam) and contributed another £100,000 to help raise the Mary Rose.

After the Falklands conflict, he gave £1 million towards the replacement of the fire-damaged hospital in Port Stanley, and a further £1 million to the widows and orphans of those who had died during the fighting.

With his crumpled clothes and pockets stuffed with bits of paper, it was observed of Hayward that he looked “more like an absent-minded retired geography teacher than one of the richest men in the world”. He relaxed by watching cricket (he was a life member of Surrey CC) and taking part in amateur dramatics — he built an excellent modern theatre at Freeport for the local Players’ Guild, of which he was a leading actor. In addition to his home in Freeport, he owned a farm in Sussex and was Laird of Dunmaglass, a 14,000-acre estate near Inverness.

He was appointed OBE in 1968 and knighted in 1986.

He married, in 1948, Jean Forder, with whom he had two sons and a daughter. His relationships with his children were often fraught, and in recent years they had been involved in legal action.

Sir Jack Hayward, born June 14 1923, died January 13 2015

SIR – So far, so idealistic – and indeed impressive. But the millions out on French streets on Sunday were not the ones with the Kalashnikovs and rocket-launchers.

Edward Thomas
Eastbourne, East Sussex

SIR – Britain is not equipped, culturally, to arm the police. In all countries where police are armed as a matter of course, people join them knowing they have to carry a firearm, and to use it, having been exposed to police sidearms in public from the earliest age. In Britain, applicants must apply to be a firearms officer, which calls into question their mindset.

When someone makes an application to carry the means to kill people, he or she is automatically suspect.

Stuart Cherry
Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

SIR – In the same week that the tragic death of 17 French people brought 40 of the world’s leaders on to the streets in a sign of unity against terrorism, more than 2,000 people were slaughtered by terrorists in Nigeria. And the world’s response?

Paul Francis
London W8

SIR – Mike Mahoney is wrong. You do not show respect for other people if you ridicule their beliefs. Sensible discussion is another matter, but it may make no difference to their beliefs, and mockery will probably strengthen them.

Ronald Phillipson
Brentwood, Essex

SIR – I have Muslim neighbours with whom I live in peace. I wouldn’t think of ridiculing their faith, as they wouldn’t mine, so what is Charlie Hebdo about?

There’s a difference between free speech and malicious speech.

Doreen Whittaker
Ilford, Essex

SIR – We will not defeat extremism without the wholehearted backing of the peace-loving Muslim majority in Britain. How can we realistically expect this support while we continue to ridicule their beliefs?

Anthony Haslam
Farnham, Surrey

SIR – Perhaps this is the time for the French to look in the mirror and reflect upon the way they treat the Jewish population in their country.

For different religions to live side by side there has to be tolerance and respect. Free speech is all very well, but mockery just lights the blue touch-paper and then everyone gets burnt.

Frances Henton
Salisbury, Wiltshire

SIR – It’s a bit rich of David Cameron to say of the Paris atrocities: “We must never allow the values that we hold dear – of democracy, of freedom of speech – to be damaged by these terrorists”.

If Charlie Hebdo had existed in Britain, it would have been shut down years ago and its editor charged with hate crimes.

Virginia Price Evans
Whitland, Carmarthenshire

SIR – Who can I offend and when? It was obviously not OK for Brenda Leyland to send offensive messages to the McCanns. It was not OK for Jessica Laney to be taunted to death by internet trolls.

Is it OK for me to offend black people, Jews, or immigrants, or is that racist? What about non-immigrant, non-religious white people – can I offend them?

Caroline Shaw
Painswick, Gloucestershire

SIR – Mr Cameron says: “Nothing we want to achieve will be possible unless we eliminate our deficit and deal with our debts.”

The events in Paris this last week should have reminded him he needs to assess the values of this nation’s foundational beliefs. They are more important than sound public finances.

Jonathan Longstaff
Woodford Green, Essex

SIR – The Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre says that the current terror threat is amber, that is, severe with an attack likely. Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, says an attack is possible but unlikely (two levels below the JTAC advice). I want to live near to him.

W K Wood
Bolton, Lancashire

Miliband’s NHS campaign focus may backfire

SIR – If it is Ed Miliband’s intention to “weaponise” the NHS and gain political advantage during the next few months, he may have to be careful that the fire is not turned on him – particularly given the abysmal record of the ruling Labour Party in Wales in running the NHS there.

Paul Pritz
Wolverhampton, Staffordshire

SIR – Andy Burham, the shadow health secretary, doesn’t believe in top-down reorganisation of the NHS. But isn’t he advocating exactly that when he talks about combining the social-care and NHS budgets?

Jonathan Midgley
Edinburgh

SIR – The Labour Party needs to be reminded of its previous attempts to interfere with the NHS.

While I was a GP manager the party ended fundholding – a scheme that had brought untold benefits to patients of my practice. Then Labour changed the GP contract to remove the onus on doctors to offer out-of-hours cover. This has led to a failed NHS out-of-hours service, a failed NHS Direct and increased problems for A&E. Will Mr Miliband and his party not listen and learn?

Nick Hawksley
Ashill, Somerset

SIR – It is surprising that Labour should want to make the NHS a major issue in the general election campaign.

It was the decision of the last Labour government to prioritise non-medical targets in hospitals that led to the premature deaths of more than 1,000 patients in Mid-Staffordshire.

John Gordon
Kingsbridge, Devon

Milking water profits

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SIR – You report that milk is cheaper than bottled water. It is perhaps more interesting that bottled water is more expensive than milk.

Water prices regularly exceed £1.50 a litre. It costs more than petrol, which is transported halfway round the world, refined, and then taxed to the hilt.

Cliff Billington
Nottingham

Bumf harvest

SIR – I have just received, from the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the sixth variant of the farmer’s guide to the new agricultural policy schemes. This version states that “the European Commission hasn’t finished all the guidance”, so presumably there is another document to come.

The weight of my paperwork so far is 1lb 14oz. With about 300,000 agricultural holdings in Britain, 250 tons of documents must have been distributed, outlining a scheme that has still not been finalised.

John Butler
Rowde, Wiltshire

Smart but inaudible

SIR – My ability to enjoy quality television sound using Bluetooth headphones and subtitles is under threat with the rise of the smart television.

Neither Sky nor Amazon provides subtitles and Netflix’s subtitles are poor.

Dr A E Hanwell
York

Same-sex weddings

SIR – My partner and I have converted our nine-year civil partnership into a marriage. We did not hold another celebration as we are awaiting the opportunity for a marriage ceremony in England’s established Church.

I understand the right of many religious organisations to claim exemption from carrying out same-sex marriage ceremonies, but it is a disgrace that the Church of England is allowed to do so.

Kevin Liles
Southampton

Queuing USA

SIR – As an American, Suzi LeVine is well placed to comment on queuing for ski lifts. More than 20 years ago, my wife and I learnt to ski in eastern Europe, enduring scrums for the lift every time. We even had to bribe the lift operator.

We then spent a week at the ski resort at Burke Mountain, Vermont. In America, everybody had to “get in line” – and it worked perfectly. Why Europeans find it so hard to organise a fair system of queuing is a mystery.

Robert Parker
Nottingham

On the rack

SIR – It’s not just the cost of commuting. I, a 54-year-old woman, count myself lucky to sit in the luggage rack occasionally rather than stand in the morning rush on the London train.

Jacqueline Heywood
Oxted, Surrey

The dangers to children of playing rugby

SIR – As Allyson Pollock notes, rugby is associated with rare but potentially catastrophic injuries, notably to the head and spinal cord.

No data exist to quantify the risk to schoolchildren playing rugby in Britain. Professor Pollock’s study of 470 school-age children in five Scottish schools found that there were 11 “time-loss” injuries – requiring an absence from the sport – per 1,000 hours of rugby played. She estimated that a “typical schoolboy” plays approximately 15 hours of rugby each year.

Many schoolchildren will feel disinclined to play rugby, and this should be respected. But others will relish the challenge that rugby offers and this, too, deserves respect.

Rugby authorities ought to commit themselves to a systematic reporting system for all injuries to children. This would set out the true risks and identify ways in which they can be mitigated, allowing parents and young people to make informed decisions about the sport.

Dr Adam Irwin
London SW1

Three years later, when the two divas met in New York, Vishnevskaya is reported to have screamed “Judas, Judas!” at her. Maintaining her grandeur, Elena Obraztsova departed with the words: “Très vulgaire, n’est-ce pas?”

Her conservatism was also evident in her work. She once prepared for a new production of Glinka’s Ruslan and Lyudmilla with the Bolshoi company, only to be confronted by the director’s unusual staging. “People came with kids to see a Pushkin fairytale, but instead they saw some naked girls running around and some beds with couples rolling around in them,” she recalled in disgust.

Elena Vasiliyevna Obraztsova was born in Leningrad on July 7 1937 (although she would later say 1939), spending her earliest years living under the German siege. Her father, an engineer who played the violin, left for the front, while in 1943 the womenfolk were evacuated to a small town in the Vologda area.

Her talent was spotted early and she was soon receiving singing lessons. She also recalled listening to opera performances on the wireless. After a post-war business trip to Italy her father returned with recordings by artists such as Beniamino Gigli and Enrico Caruso. By 1948 Elena was singing with the children’s chorus of the Leningrad Palace of Pioneers, and 10 years later she entered the Leningrad Conservatory, although her parents tried unsuccessfully to enrol her at a technical college.

^{Elena Obraztsova in ‘Boris Godunov’ at the Bolshoi Theatre in 1965 (ALAMY)}

If there was any doubt about where her future lay, Elena Obraztsova dispelled it in 1962 by winning gold medals at competitions in Helsinki and Moscow. In December 1963 she made her debut as Marina in Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov in Leningrad, and the following year was seen at La Scala.

She was part of the Bolshoi delegation to the Expo in Montreal in 1967, again singing Marina, and in 1970 she won the Tchaikovsky competition. By 1975 she was appearing as Azucena in Verdi’s Il Travatore in Los Angeles with Luciano Pavarotti, Joan Sutherland and Ingvar Wixell; and three years later she sang Carmen opposite Plácido Domingo in Franco Zeffirelli’s film of Bizet’s opera, as well as appearing in Don Carlos with Domingo and Margaret Price under Claudio Abbado.

Thanks to recordings, her reputation in Britain preceded her debut at Covent Garden in 1981, where she reprised Azucena in the Visconti production with Joan Sutherland and John Tomlinson, conducted by Richard Bonynge. After the success of the Three Tenors in 1990 she joined Renata Scotto and Ileana Cotrubas as the Three Sopranos, appearing at the Roman amphitheatre in Syracuse, in Italy.

By the turn of the millennium she was still going strong: Prokofiev’s War and Peace for the Met, which was also Anna Netrebko’s debut; Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades in Los Angeles; and Donizetti’s La Fille du Régiment in Tokyo in 2006 with Juan Diego Flórez.

Having been a renowned teacher for many years, Elena Obraztsova was appointed artistic director of the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St Petersburg in 2007; latterly she organised her own vocal competition. When the Bolshoi Theatre reopened in 2011 she was seated next to President Medvedev.

Meanwhile, the feuding continued. In her autobiography, Vishnevskya identified Elena Obraztsova as one of those who had caused her the most difficulty with the authorities.

Elena Obraztsova made no secret of her cosmetic surgery and was showered with Russian honours. Her first husband was Vyacheslav Makarov, a physicist. Her second marriage was to Algis Zhuraitis, a conductor at the Bolshoi, who predeceased her in 1998. She is survived by a daughter of her first marriage.

Elena Obraztsova, born July 7 1937, died January 12 2015

Charles Holden
Lymington, Hampshire

SIR – Lampooning the pompous (like yesterday’s Adams cartoon) creates healthy scepticism and intelligent debate.

I’m a Christian who is sometimes upset by criticism but well aware that a lampooning cartoon will not offend God but rather the self-serving, puffed-up people who claim to serve him.

Less respect, more lampooning, please.

Diane Barlow
Cury, Cornwall

SIR – The Government should urgently consider changing the Public Order Act 1986 to allow uninhibited discussion with regard to religious ideology.

The present law clearly states that a person is guilty of an offence if he intends his words, writing, sign or other visible representation to be “threatening, abusive or insulting”.

John Barker
Prestbury, Cheshire

SIR – We should have the freedom to insult anyone, but the good manners not to.

Duncan Ruddick
Lytham St Annes, Lancashire

SIR – We suffer from a lack of respect for the “other”. We mask it with terms like “satire” and when it is challenged, we cry “freedom of speech”.

There are names deemed offensive to black people and Jews that we do not use. It is time we applied these standards to Islam.

David Ross
Huntsham, Tiverton

SIR – The Deputy Prime Minister believes we should have the “freedom to cause offence”. What about the rights of those who are hurt by these offensive statements?

Ernest and Sylvia Adle
Didcot, Oxfordshire

SIR – Public focus should be on long–term planning towards a fairer society.

The right to swing my fist ends where the other man’s nose begins.

Hasan Beg
Kirkcaldy, Fife

Funding cancer drugs

SIR – Following the decision to withdraw the funding of life-extending drugs from 8,000 cancer patients, perhaps David Cameron, Nick Clegg and other members of the Government who so passionately support spending £11 billion of taxpayers’ money on foreign aid should explain to the patients concerned why their treatment must be cut while the aid budget is ring-fenced.

Ian Rolfe
Oxted, Surrey

SIR – The message that developing cancer is down to bad luck needs to be put into context.

First, breast and prostate cancer were not covered in the study by Johns Hopkins University, despite accounting for nearly 90,000 cases in Britain annually.

Secondly, the study concludes that “only” a third of cancers are preventable through factors such as lifestyle. According to our research, this means that 81,000 cancer diagnoses a year in Britain could be prevented, which is no small number.

Some cancers are not preventable, but the idea that we can do nothing to limit cancer risk must be challenged.

Amanda McLean
Director, World Cancer Research Fund UK
London WC1

Bubbling tankards

_(Alamy)

SIR – Defending his opposition to prosecco on tap, Luca Giavi, director of the consortium of winemakers in the Valdobbiadene-Conegliano area, claims that “the producers of champagne… would do the same”. He is on shaky ground.

I recall the bar in London’s Connaught Rooms where champagne was dispensed by the pint and half-pint, with the personal tankards of regular customers hanging, ready for use, above the counter.

John Carter
Bromley, Kent

Lost at sea

SIR – Every time there is the tragic loss of an aircraft over the sea – as with the AirAsia jet – there follows the hunt for the black box.

Since the technology is available to transmit such information from an aircraft to a ground location, it is time for an international agreement that all new – and, where possible, existing – commercial aircraft must be fitted with this facility.

Ron Mason
East Grinstead, West Sussex

The Government must act to reduce the deficit

SIR – David Cameron is right to draw the electorate’s attention to the consequences of Labour’s “borrow more – pay later” attitude for our children and grandchildren. Interest costs accumulated by an ever-increasing national debt will pile a huge burden on to future generations.

Labour’s policy is one of greed – robbing the future to pay for the present. However, with a large proportion of the population dependent on state handouts, the chances that this message will be listened to is remote indeed.

J B Box
Hertford

SIR – The Tory policy of a fixed-term approach to deficit reduction has strangled the recovery. With £75 billion of cuts and tax rises still to come, the inescapable conclusion is that austerity has failed.

Further attacks on the welfare budget would be morally reprehensible. For the Tories and the Labour Party to continue with this strategy is utterly nonsensical.

Alex Orr
Edinburgh

SIR – Ed Miliband has said that he wants to lead millions of conversations across Britain to explain his vision.

I welcome him to Surrey to explain why taxing wealth creators and family homes, increasing government borrowing, avoiding benefit reform, bashing private schools and refusing a referendum on the EU are policies we should support.

Stefan Reynolds
Godalming, Surrey

SIR – Given that the Coalition is worried about the level of alcohol consumption in this country, perhaps they could reduce the campaign period to three or four weeks.

Alan Stanley
Southgate, Middlesex

Business skills for life

SIR – Communication, teamwork and time management – often referred to as “soft skills” – are qualities every employer looks for in employees.

Figures released today reveal that these skills are worth £88 billion to the British economy. However, for too long employers, government and educators have failed to recognise or promote soft skills sufficiently, resulting in lost employment and development opportunities, as well as lower productivity.

We are calling for a wholescale re-evaluation of the importance of these proficiencies. Through open consultation, we hope to understand how businesses and government can work with educators to connect young people with employers and help them to gain the soft skills that are needed in the workplace.

If we succeed, the British economy could benefit to the tune of £109 billion by 2020. This will make a real difference to the careers and lives of millions of people.

James Caan
Jez Langhorn
McDonald’s UK & Northern Europe
Neil Carberry
Confederation of British Industry
Kirstie Mackey
Barclays Lifeskills
Fiona Blacke
National Youth Agency
Katerina Rudiger
Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development
Richard Atkins
Association of Colleges
Mike Johnson
Gelder Groups
Lizzie Crowley
Lancaster University’s Work Foundation
David Hughes
National Institute of Adult Continuing Education
Liz Watts
EdComs
Dereth Wood
learndirect
Simon Tarr
People 1st
Chris Jones
City & Guilds
John Allan
Federation of Small Business

To boldly swim where no man has swum before

_(Alamy)

SIR – I applaud your article encouraging more of us to embrace the pleasures of wild and cold water swimming (“Come on in – the water’s freezing”, Features, January 6).

However, without wishing to take anything away from the charitable fundraising efforts of David Walliams, I am concerned by the implication that he is the first and only swimmer to have swum the Thames. The only person to complete the full swim to Southend is the extreme swimmer Lewis Pugh, whose team I lead. He accomplished the feat in 2006, five years before Walliams. Moreover, unlike Walliams, who stopped at Westminster, he did not wear a wetsuit.

Lewis also holds the records for the furthest north (North Pole) and south (Antarctica) swims of one kilometre, again without a wetsuit.

Tim Toyne Sewell
Nether Wallop, Hampshire

Same-sex marriage Act

SIR – Mary Baxter’s letter on same-sex marriage raises important issues for all political parties.

The Prime Minister claims that the passing of this Act was one of his proudest moments. But one must consider the way it reached the statute books: it was hurried through Parliament at an unprecedented rate led by what appeared to be a personal campaign supported by an inner circle. The majority of the Government’s supporters failed to back it and a petition from the electorate with more than 500,000 signatories was virtually ignored.

If politicians wish to be respected, they need to reassure the public that the full democratic process has been restored.

Malcolm Blunn
Shorwell, Isle of Wight

Taxing questions

SIR – I run a small VAT-registered business and recently made an innocent mistake when submitting a return.

HMRC’s online system would not allow me simply to cancel the incorrect return and resubmit. I phoned an HMRC adviser and, after a 20-minute wait, was told to post a letter to the VAT Error Corrections office in Liverpool. I did this immediately but, some four weeks later, I received a “default” letter, containing a threatened surcharge. I contacted the HMRC Helpdesk via email; they were unable to help.

This totally avoidable waste of my time and theirs – on what should have been a very simple matter – is quite astonishing.

Wesley Hallam
Ubley, Somerset

Lay off the sauce

_(PA)

SIR – As a young boy I was addicted to HP sauce and my father had a battle to stop me dolloping it on every meal.

I always discovered the condiment, no matter where he’d hidden it. Finally, he referred me to the French on the back of the bottle, solemnly informing me that it said that HP was very dangerous for boys under the age of 17.

Foolishly, I believed him and it wasn’t until I began to study French a couple of years later that I became aware of the deception. I insisted on a raise in pocket money to compensate for the hurt caused and, God bless him, he agreed.

Michael Wilson
Dummer, Hampshire

The background to Mason’s appointment to the Met Office was the announcement in 1961 by President Kennedy of an ambitious “Global Atmospheric Research Programme” to improve long-range weather forecasting through the use of advanced computational and satellite technology. At the time the British Met Office was largely employed in making routine observations, plotting and analysing them by hand and making short-range forecasts. Mason, with his distinguished record in scientific research and an outstanding reputation as a physicist, was seen as the right man to lead the office into the computer age.

He embarked on a major programme of modernising and equipping the Met Office with the most powerful computers available – a programme that involved major building works and a significant expansion of basic and applied research. By 1983 he had replaced the traditional empirical forecasting methods with objective numerical techniques and extended the reach of the Met Office’s weather monitoring and prediction operations across the globe.

His achievement was recognised in 1977 at a major exhibition at the Royal Society to mark the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, at which the advances made by the Met Office in numerical weather prediction featured as one of the 12 most important British contributions to science during her reign. The success of the programme was a major factor in the decision by the International Civil Aviation Organisation, in 1983, to nominate the Bracknell office as one of two world area forecasting centres (the other being in Washington) whose global forecasts it approved for use by civil airline operators.

^{A lightning storm over the Dorset coast (ALAMY)}

After his retirement from the Met Office in 1983, Mason became director of an Acid Rain Research Project, involving some 300 scientists from institutes affiliated to the Royal Society or the National Academies of Norway and Sweden. Their report, published in 1990, confirmed that acid rain was caused mainly by emissions from coal-fired power stations and found that damage to hundreds of Scottish and Scandinavian lakes has exceeded earlier fears. The results, discussed at a week-long conference at the Royal Society attended by the three Prime Ministers, led the British government to implement measures which have seen levels of sulphur in the atmosphere drop 90 per cent compared with their peak level in the 1950s.

Mason was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1965, served as its treasurer and vice president from 1976 to 1986 and was awarded the Society’s Royal Medal in 1991. A Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society from 1948, he served as president of the society from 1968 to 1970, winning its Symons Gold Medal in 1975 and endowing its its Mason Gold Medal for outstanding contributions to the understanding of meteorological processes in 2006. He served as president of the Institute of Physics from 1976 to 1978, winning its Charles Chree Medal in 1965 and Glazebrook Medal in 1972. He was pro-chancellor of the University of Surrey from 1980 to 1985 and president (1986–94) and then chancellor of the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology from 1994 to 1996.

John Mason was appointed CB in 1973 and knighted in 1979.

In 1948 he married Doreen Jones, with whom he had two sons.

Sir John Mason, born August 18 1923, died January 6 2015

But unlike employees, who are given clear protection from employers, many university students have no recourse other than the police when sexually assaulted by other students. Some universities refuse to investigate claims or discipline attackers, leaving students to study and live alongside their attackers. Many have poor counselling services, unclear policies on how the university will respond to sexual assault complaints, and no obvious member of staff who handles concerns about sexual assaults.

We are asking Universities UK to develop guidelines on how universities should respond to complaints of sexual assault. We’re calling on the Government to work with professionals in the sector to produce guidance on how universities should handle sexual assault. This would send a clear message to universities that sexual assault cannot be ignored, and must be addressed sensitively and thoroughly.

Toni Pearce, president of the National Union of Students

Katie Russell, spokeswoman for Rape Crisis

Sarah Green, director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition

Laura Bates, founder of the Everyday Sexism Project

Dimitrina Petrova, chief executive of Equal Rights Trust

Mark Castle, chief executive of Victim Support

Claire Burke, founder of Respect Yourself

Professor Nicole Westmarland, Co-Director, Durham University Centre for Research into Violence and Abuse

Jeremy Todd, chief executive of Family Lives

Miranda Seymour-Smith, chief executive of The Fawcett Society

Michele Burman, professor of Criminology at University of Glasgow

Chloe Smith, MP for Norwich North (Con)

Roberta Blackman-Woods, MP for the City of Durham (Lab)

Seema Malhotra, MP for Feltham and Heston (Lab)

Julian Huppert, MP for Cambridge (Lib Dem)

Greg Mulholland, MP for Leeds North West (Lib Dem)

John Leech, MP for Manchester Withington (Lib Dem)

Stella Creasy, MP for Walthamstow (Lab)

Yvette Cooper, shadow Home Secretary, MP for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Lab)

Funding for cancer drugs; respecting religion; duty to the law over party politics; the new Creme Egg recipe, and the Dutch forger who fooled Hermann Goering

Cancer patients currently receiving the treatments through the Cancer Drugs Fund will still be allowed to continue using them Photo: ALAMY

SIR – On Monday, Archbishops Welby and Sentamu expressed concern at the decline in Sunday church attendance – down to 800,000. Is it any wonder?

Ruth Alltree
Walden, Essex

SIR – The Church of England has assets worth £6 billion and its total investment income has risen during a recession in which many businesses have closed, and hundreds of thousands of people have been made redundant or been stripped of their welfare benefits.

An investment report in the middle of the recession boasted that the Church’s Hyde Park Connaught Village development was to focus on “boutique fashion, specialist retailers, galleries and high quality restaurants” and it announced “a number of exciting new retailers” to be added. The Church also invests in shopping centres and warehousing.

This may well raise an eyebrow from those lectured now by archbishops on the evils of consumerism and individualism.

When the Government announced it would end the zero-rated VAT concession on church repairs, the resulting outcry from the churches led the Chancellor to set aside £30 million per annum to continue to subsidise the practice, on top of the £12 million already provided to the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme, which provides funding for auto-winding turret clocks, pipe organs and bells and bell ropes. In December, a further £15 million was set aside for cathedral repairs.

Shouldn’t churches pay their taxes, too, in the effort to alleviate poverty – not least when these same archbishops have denounced Starbucks, Amazon and Google for tax avoidance?

Alistair McBay
London WC1

SIR – It would be more honest of the two archbishops if, in future, they were to sit on the Labour benches in the House of Lords.

Edward Giles
Wootton Bridge, Isle of Wight

SIR – The archbishops’ remarks will serve only to alienate the people who keep the ailing Church of England in business.

Susan Gow
Overcombe, Dorset

Television debates are not about entertainment

_(AP)

SIR – It seems illogical to leave the choice of candidates for TV debate solely to the broadcasters. The debates should be about parties presenting themselves to us, the electorate, not about entertainment.

Surely we should refer this matter to the electoral commission, or a similar independent body, to adjudicate.

Bob Woodward
Pewsey, Wiltshire

SIR – If the debates are to go ahead, all national parties, including the Greens, should be included. The SNP, Plaid Cymru and other regional parties should not take part in national debates.

Michael Edwards
Haslemere, Surrey

SIR – The proposed television debates between our political leaders would be a waste of time. The debates are in danger of becoming a clash of celebrities rather than an exchange of ideas.

Far better, in my opinion, would be an individual grilling of each party leader in turn by members of the public, chaired by a respected broadcaster such as Jeremy Paxman.

In this way, regional leaders of the SNP and other parties could be included in broadcasts in their own areas without the whole exercise becoming unwieldy.

John de Waal
Eastbourne, East Sussex

SIR – We were no less a democracy in the last century, despite not having any presidential-style hustings.

Andrew Wauchope
London SE11

SIR – I wonder if Ed Miliband will now refuse to take part in a televised debate unless the Archbishop of Canterbury is invited to participate?

Frank Tomlin
Billericay, Essex

British Jews

SIR – This week Manuel Valls, the French prime minister, denounced the rise of anti-Semitism in France. He said: “The awakening of anti-Semitism is the first sign of a crisis for democracy.”

You report that almost half of Britons hold an anti-Semitic view. This would seem to indicate a worrying trend in this country. Many British Jews also appear to feel threatened.

I wonder how many people in Britain would recognise that we may be seeing the first signs of a crisis for our democracy, too.

Neil Miron
Borehamwood, Hertfordshire

SIR – It was with increasing unease that I read online Emma Barnett’s article about growing anti-Semitism in Britain and the actions of those who conflate Israeli policies with the beliefs of all Jews. I know that some of my fellow Muslims do so routinely and that radical Muslims see Jews as targets for their hate and bigotry.

Muslims with a more modern or secular outlook who aspire to greater integration in Britain have a responsibility to stand up to those who hold such bigoted views. Doing so consistently will enhance our right to demand action and condemnation of the many who vilify all Muslims for the actions of a violent minority and seek collective accountability.

Muslims wishing to live in Britain have not only to stand up to the violent minority but also expose and condemn all forms of racism. Making a common cause with Jewish citizens is a good way to start.

Osman Sarioglu
Bromley, Middlesex

SIR – Might we have less race and creed and more ethics?

Penelope Govett
London SW3

SIR – Imam Ibrahim Mogra, representing the Muslim Council of Britain, suggested yesterday on the BBC’s Breakfast that instead of an image of Mohammed, the Charlie Hedbo publishers should have published a blank page. He seems to be confusing free speech with saying nothing.

Paul Harrison
Terling, Essex

SIR – I, for one, salute Charlie Hebdo for its magnanimity, thoughtfulness and courage in responding so eloquently to this tragedy.

Dr Neil McLellan
Birmingham

Container ships are small fry to Seawise Giant

_{The Seawise Giant supertanker was the longest and heaviest ship ever built (Alamy)}

SIR – Media reports on the construction of large container ships keep referring to them as the “biggest ships ever built” or the “world’s largest ships”. They are not.

The largest ship by deadweight tonnage was the Seawise Giant, broken up in 2009, which weighed 564,650 tons and had an overall length of 1,504.1ft – some 200ft longer that the CSCL Globe container ship that docked in Felixstowe recently.

The four TI ultra large crude carriers are considered to be the largest ships in the world today by displacement, deadweight tonnage and gross tonnage.

Modern container ships may have a larger displacement when the above-deck storage is included, but they are nowhere near the deadweight of these behemoths that used to, or still do, ply the oceans.

Jeremy Wescombe
Buckingham

Green Deal failure

SIR – The Green Deal continues to be a waste of public money. After a take-up of 8,000 and a cost of £42.5 million, most participants say they have lost money and are disillusioned with the scheme.

The building industry, especially at the level of small firms doing small projects, is harshly competitive and hard-working. The training and accreditation procedures for the Green Deal appear cumbersome and expensive. Reliable local builders are not short of work, so the likelihood is that only less successful operators will apply.

As an architect specialising in home extensions, I have always been depressed by the incentives of 5 per cent VAT on energy consumption against 20 per cent VAT on improvements, including better insulation. The most cost-effective way to boost woeful standards of home insulation would be to introduce a VAT concession on insulation materials. This would help reputable workmen give better value with minimal red tape, leaving the consumer to pick an installer they know and trust.

Stephanie Webster
Woking, Surrey

Inactive children

SIR – The Government has overseen a dramatic decline in the physical fitness of the young.

A relation of mine manages a leisure centre – owned and operated by the local authority – which is undergoing a £2 million refit. The proportion of this money being spent on providing sports facilities to schools, or indeed young people generally, is minimal. The bulk of it is being spent on a gym and fitness suite, because this is what produces the income. The council is interested in profit rather than being a cog in the wheel of “inspiring a generation”.

Peter D Harvey
Walton Highway, Norfolk

Fondant memories

SIR – The airline I work for used to offer Cadbury’s Creme Eggs to passengers at Easter. Cutbacks have since curtailed this largesse but, back in the day, a correctly positioned, unwrapped egg would grow an inch-high chocolate-tipped white stalagmite as the pressure change during ascent forced the fondant centre up and out through the bunghole.

I believe changes in manufacturing technique have halted this phenomenon – but then I haven’t tried it for a while.

Keith Macpherson
Houston, Renfrewshire

Signs of expense

SIR – I am glad that Welsh villages have rejected alterations to their village names; we already spend too much on Welsh signs. At Caerphilly railway station, a Tacsi sign has been added next to Taxi. All Welsh road signs are bilingual to please a tiny percentage of the population. Yet we lack money for cancer drugs.

Robert McCarthy
Caerphilly, Glamorgan

SIR – Why stop at hyphens to aid pronunciation for only Welsh place names? Ewell in Surrey would certainly benefit from becoming Ewe-ll.

Gillian Fogg
Surbiton, Surrey

A mountain to ski

SIR – It’s the time of year again for complaints about Alpine ski resorts. Why more people do not sample the delights of the Tatra mountains in Poland is beyond me; wonderful scenery, hassle-free resorts, lovely people, and the beer’s £1 a pint.

Joanna Hackett
London SE1

She focused her activities on New York City, and in the decades after her victory her image was ubiquitous: on television, as a regular panellist on the popular quiz show I’ve Got a Secret, and in subway advertisements.

Shortly after her victory, in 1946, she married Allan Wayne, a naval captain who had seen action in the Pacific. The couple had a daughter, Barbara. But Wayne suffered from what would today be called post-traumatic stress disorder; he became a violent alcoholic and the couple divorced in 1957. Bess married the entertainment lawyer Arnold Grant five years later.

_{Bess Myerson waves from a float during a parade before the Miss America pageant at Atlantic City in 1945}

In 1969 she entered public service when the mayor of New York, John Lindsay, appointed her consumer affairs commissioner. She took what could have been nothing more than a public relations role and made it into a serious job, suing companies on behalf of consumers and winning millions of dollars for people who had been defrauded by false advertising claims.

During this period she divorced Grant and became more involved in public service, as New York entered an era of crime-ridden decline. She also became the public companion of Ed Koch and was constantly at his side during his bitterly contested 1977 mayoral campaign against Mario Cuomo.

Koch, a bachelor, was a notoriously prickly politician. He was also rumoured to be gay, and Bess Myerson’s presence by his side smoothed out his rough edges with voters and partially neutralised the homosexual innuendo. She was given much credit for Koch’s ultimate victory.

^{Bess Myerson after being crowned Miss America in 1945 (AP)}

Her own foray into politics ended in failure when she was defeated in a primary race for the US Senate in 1980.

Then her life spun out of control. While serving as Koch’s cultural affairs commissioner, she became romantically involved with a married man 20 years her junior – Carl Capasso, a sewer contractor who did business with the city. When Capasso’s wife found out, she sued for divorce.

^{Bess Myerson in 1985 with New York Mayor Ed Koch (AP)}

Bess Myerson was later accused of inducing a judge to reduce Capasso’s maintenance payments by giving the judge’s daughter a job. The “Bess Mess” was sensational tabloid fodder. When Bess was subsequently arrested for shoplifting after visiting Capasso in a Pennsylvania prison, where he was serving a sentence for tax evasion, her fall from grace was complete and she drifted into obscurity.

In later life Bess Myerson had time to regret living her life in the spotlight. In a 1990 unauthorised biography written after all the “Bess Mess” trials were over, she is reported to have once told a Jewish businessman: “I should have married someone like you at 24 and moved to Scarsdale.”

She is survived by her daughter, Barra Grant, a film and television director.

Bess Myerson, born July 16 1924, died December 14 2014

Harry Leeming
Morecambe, Lancashire

SIR – I suspect that if the words Pakistanis or Scots were substituted for Jews in most of the questions in “the British public’s attitude towards British Jews”, the percentages agreeing would have been equally high, if not higher.

David Burton
Wellington, Shropshire

SIR – While it is undeniably the case that Charlie Hebdo causes offence (Letters, January 14), your correspondents must surely understand that protecting the right to free speech only when it does not offend is meaningless.

Who should decide what is offensive? Many people were upset by satirical programmes such as Monty Python, Not the Nine O’Clock News and Spitting Image. Not for one moment, however, did the broadcasters consider cancellation. The difference between these shows and the events in Paris is that now protests are accompanied by extreme violence.

Still, appeasement in the face of violence is counterproductive. If we want to defend our way of life, we must all have the courage to support each other’s liberties and continue as before.

Gregory Shenkman
London W8

SIR – There has been talk of countering terrorism through education and religion, showing more respect and curtailing the “freedom to insult”, but I have seen little mention of a more pragmatic approach, such as setting up a fourth branch of the Armed Forces specifically to deal with terrorism in Britain.

Of what practical value is a Trident submarine when the local supermarket is under siege?

Don Minterne
Dorchester

The love of money

SIR – The Most Rev Dr John Sentamu, the Archbishop of York, expresses concern about consumerism.

We went to York Minster on the Sunday before Christmas, but were unable to enter while a service was being held. The gift shop, however, was open for business.

Elizabeth Pearce
Runcorn, Cheshire

SIR – For all its faults, the Coalition has created a situation where more people are in employment than ever before.

In Peterborough, our cathedral continues to benefit from the culture of enterprise and wealth creation. Thanks to the dynamism of the Dean and Chapter, well over 60 corporate sponsors have signed up to the current fundraising campaign. One might well wonder where the cathedral would be without these businesses, or the Church without wealthy donors.

Neil McKittrick
Peterborough, Northamptonshire

SIR – As a regular churchgoer I fully understand the views expressed by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York.

Looking at the photograph of them both in Thursday’s paper, however, I would have preferred to see them in traditional black and white vestments rather than the gaudy and surely expensive robes of today.

James McBroom
Pangbourne, Berkshire

The TV executives out to censor political debate

SIR – We all cherish free speech, particularly in the wake of the horrific events in Paris. At least in this country we were able to watch the argument between David Cameron and Ed Miliband, at Prime Minister’s Questions, about the Prime Minister’s refusal to participate in a television debate without the Green Party, and thus form our own opinions (Letters, January 16). Sadly, the broadcasting executives who have the ultimate power in this matter remain invisible and unaccountable to the electorate.

These debates are supposed to help us make a decision about the next government, but this won’t be the case when the broadcasters censor what we are allowed to see.

Ian MacGregor
London N7

Enlightened market

SIR – Jeremy Warner’s article on the need for economic growth is excellent.

But I must challenge his assertion that without the free market system there would be no wind or solar power, and much of the world’s population would remain stuck in carbon-guzzling poverty. Wind turbines and solar power are not examples of free-market innovation. They require generous government-imposed subsidies, and even then only 0.6 per cent of today’s global energy requirements come from renewable energy systems. The rest comes predominantly from coal, oil and gas, along with a growing but minor contribution from nuclear power.

James Allan
Hartlepool, County Durham

Osborne, that’s rich

^{(Getty Images)}

SIR – George Osborne’s claim that Britain will be richer than the United States by 2030 is surely wishful, politically motivated nonsense.

America is self-sufficient in food supplies (and is also an exporter) and energy (particularly now with the exploration of shale oil, and vast quantities of minerals), and has a very large workforce – all ingredients needed to ensure economic success.

We, however, need to import large quantities of all of these at considerable cost to our economy.

R J Burn
Finstall, Worcestershire

Foreign aid disaster

SIR – It’s good to know that an extra £1 billion has magically been found to send overseas.

According to the Department for International Development, “UK aid only goes where it is most needed and where it will provide the very best results for taxpayers’ money”.

That’s a relief. Just think: it might have been wasted on recruiting a few thousand doctors and nurses to work in A&E.

Allan Mowatt
Smarden, Kent

SIR – You report that the inefficient spending of foreign aid was caused by government officials wresting with financial years ending on different dates.

Would they be the same officials who insist on ending the income tax year on the ridiculous April 5, when all other tax years run to March 31?

There is considerable evidence that business people, taxpayers and even tax officials would find their lives made much easier if income tax were accounted for in whole calendar months, instead of the present ludicrous system.

Perhaps the Chancellor could sort out this absurd anomaly in his next Budget speech.

Hugh Williams
Crapstone, Devon

Children need healthier lifestyles, not PE classes

^{Best foot forward: few children in modern Britain brave the elements on the way to school (Getty Images)}

SIR – In my school days, we didn’t get more than a couple of hours a week for PE and it did us no harm. For causes of obesity, we need to look elsewhere: children being ferried everywhere by car; spending too much leisure time on sedentary hobbies – using computers rather than playing outside with friends; eating too much fast food rather than enjoying more nourishing family meals together.

It’s all too easy to blame the Government and conveniently ignore the harmful effects of changes in social patterns and lifestyle.

Mike Neild
Blackburn, Lancashire

SIR – It is hardly surprising that the number of hours of PE undertaken each week is falling. We have seen a weakening in the regulations protecting school playing fields and no legal requirement for free schools to have any grounds at all.

At a time when the main response to the increase in demand for pupil places is to build temporary classrooms on playgrounds and playing fields, we have less outdoor space than ever for physical activity.

We need a radical approach to education in order to ensure continued access to the outdoors for children at school.

Juno Hollyhock
Winchester, Hampshire

SIR – The decline in school sport began in the Eighties, when the unions decided that members should not give their time to after-school activities. Consequently, teachers withdrew their time helping PE staff run teams and clubs.

Then the powers that be decided that activities should not be competitive. Competition is character-building, and a good teacher is always able to temper the effects of winning and losing.

Glynis Culley
Amersham, Buckinghamshire

Dutch exchange

SIR – Tony Pay (Letters, January 15) refers to “Hermann Goering, a well-known collector”.

A more apt description would be “a well-known thief”. According to Frank Wynne in his book I was Vermeer, Goering “paid” Han van Meegeren for the fake Vermeer by returning around 200 paintings stolen from public and private collections across the Netherlands.

Michael Zaidner
Bushey Heath, Hertfordshire

What’s in a name?

SIR – I was fascinated by the surname of one of your correspondents in Thursday’s paper – Fewster.

Apparently, it has origins as far back as the 12th century and means a woodworker. Even better, her first name is Trees.

Can anyone beat this for originality?

Gillian Lambert
Amersham, Buckinghamshire

Walked to death

SIR – You report that researchers at the University of Cambridge have discovered that taking a brisk 20‑minute walk every day will help a person avoid the risk of early death. I first heard this theory 40 years ago, when I was living in Chicago, and I began an appropriate programme with my golden retriever at my side. Ten minutes into the third day, the dog died.

I have not walked briskly since, and if I abstain for two more months, I hope to reach my 84th birthday.

Derek Gregory
Castle Cary, Somerset