Letters: It’s too late for the Tories to atone for their failure on immigration

SIR – The Supreme Court’s decision to strike down the Government’s Rwanda policy, taken together with Rishi Sunak’s ditching of Boris Johnson’s promises to the Red Wall, demonstrates that the liberal Westminster-Whitehall “blob” is firmly back in the saddle. 

Come the general election, millions of natural Conservatives will probably not bother to vote, and the party will be annihilated. I suspect Sir Keir Starmer will then be pushed by the blob to take the first steps towards reversing Brexit.

Terry Smith
London NW11 

SIR – The anonymous civil servant who wrote, “Why my Civil Service colleagues are celebrating the Rwanda ruling” (telegraph.co.uk, November 15), explains why recent Home Secretaries have achieved precisely nothing trying to limit legal and illegal immigration into the United Kingdom.

Most of us will be angry to have confirmation that our democratic votes are being ignored by a once-revered institution. 

A government put into position by a democratic society should be able to assume that its decisions and laws will be enacted.

Nicholas Copestick
Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire

SIR – Mr Sunak will lose the next general election. Within another 12 months Suella Braverman will be elected as leader of the Conservatives with a mandate to restore the party’s core values.
James Thacker
Tanworth in Arden, Warwickshire

SIR – The judgment of the Supreme Court is completely unexceptionable under existing law. And no treaty change will alter the position.

The Government’s only remedy is to reframe our international law obligations by withdrawing from the ECHR and the 1951 Refugee Convention, together with all ancillary obligations. Only then will Britain be free to legislate as it thinks fit to “stop the boats”.

The Government has also failed to reform the Home Office and other hostile Civil Service departments by dismissing or otherwise disciplining obstructive staff. Consequently, it can blame only itself for this debacle. 

Nicholas Dobson
Doncaster, South Yorkshire

SIR – The political case for leaving the ECHR is strong.

The initial flight to Rwanda in 2022 was halted by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, but other signatories to the ECHR are not so fastidious in observing its rulings. As Groucho Marx might have said, who wants to be in a club that has serial human-rights abusers Albania, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Moldova as members?

Dr John Doherty
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire

Prayer for peace

SIR – Yesterday, the Telegraph’s Text for the Day (Announcements) was from the Book of Isaiah and read: “I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people; no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress.”

The verse continues: “No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days…”

How relevant this eighth-century BC prophet of Judah’s writing is to what is happening in the Middle East (“We were exhausted, hungry and scared’ – escape from a Gaza hospital”, telegraph.co.uk, November 15) and how the world is reacting (“Starmer to sack Labour rebels who vote for Gaza ceasefire”, report, November 15).

Robin Thomas
Thorverton, Devon

SIR – The hatred expressed by tens of thousands of extremist protesters during the recent pro-Palestinian marches means that British Jews are now hiding their identity and arranging to meet in secret.

This is how 17th-century Catholics had to live in England. Can we rely on our Government to deal with this problem?

David Conway
Theydon Bois, Essex

Vaccine scepticism

SIR – I applaud Amanda Pritchard, the chief executive of NHS England, in her ambition to eliminate cervical cancer by 2040 (report, November 15) and truly hope that this target will achieved. However, even a superficial dive into social media reveals a large and growing scepticism of all vaccines, including those that have prevented infection from diseases over decades.

This has undoubtedly risen as a result of mistrust of Covid vaccines and presents a huge challenge to those who endeavour to improve the nation’s health. Unless this sentiment can be countered effectively, I fear a return to the dark ages.

Dr David Shoesmith
Acklington, Northumberland

Popcorn intermissions

SIR – James Hare (Letters, November 15) highlights a problem with overlong films. Of course, long films are not a new phenomenon; many cinema classics, from Gone with the Wind and Lawrence of Arabia to Spartacus and Gandhi, are also epics, but what older movies did that modern epics don’t is include an intermission for popcorn replenishment and other necessities.

I can understand the reluctance of cinemas to include intermissions: long films risk poor revenue as they leave less time for multiple showings, and adding a break increase that risk. However, in the long-term I still feel that intermissions would be better for cinemas. People would be more inclined to buy a ticket  – accompanied by expensive snacks and drinks – instead of waiting for the home version if they knew that they wouldn’t be squirming in their seat the whole way through, begging for a boring scene so that they could dash to the lavatory.

Robert Frazer
Salford, Lancashire

Cheeky coppers

SIR – One advantage of self-service tills (Letters, November 15) is that one can get rid of unwanted copper coins without risking dirty looks from a human cashier. However, Sainsbury’s machines are getting wise to this ruse, and often give me the same number of coppers in change.

Michael Hughes
Birmingham

Unable to downsize

SIR – Your report, “Over-65s are stopping young families getting on property ladder, says Zoopla” (November 15), implies the property website found that older people are refusing to move out of large houses. If they were to survey that demographic, however, they would discover that we oldies can’t move because we can’t find suitable accommodation. 

Bungalows are in short supply and the few that are available are mostly old stock, and do not suit the needs of elderly and disabled people – walk-in showers and space to manoeuvre wheelchairs or walkers need to be factored in. When you are old and have restricted mobility, you do not want to buy a property that requires extensive and expensive alterations. 

When will builders and planners wake up to the real problem of the elderly house-blocking? We would move, but can’t.

Jan Peterson
Telford, Shropshire

International alphabet

SIR – When the cordial gentleman who answered my recent call to HSBC took me through security, he asked for my postcode. As it ends “BP” I said: “BP, as in BP oil.” This was met with total silence, so I tried again. “BP, as in Buckingham Palace.” 

“What’s that?” he asked, baffled.

Remaining sanguine, I ventured: “BP, as in Baden-Powell.” Sadly, he did not know where that was. 

On learning that he was located in Egypt, I said: “BP, as in Bravo Papa.”

Finally, I passed security. 

Gavin Littaur
London NW4

Pipe diversion

SIR – When newly qualified, I was employed by a solicitor who smoked a pipe (Letters, November 15). If he was asked a difficult question, or for advice that his client would not like, he would get out his pipe, tap it until empty, refill it, press the tobacco in, then put the pipe down. By this time, the client had been so distracted by the ritual that they had forgotten the query, and so the interview continued.

Pat Lush
Stratford-sub-Castle, Wiltshire

Crafty chocoholics

SIR – I do not think Basil, the dog who raided a sealed box of Quality Street (Letters, November 15), was working alone.

Gareth Light
Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex

Reading as a reward during school holidays

SIR – Jemima Lewis confesses that, as a child, she would only pick up a book once “the boredom had soaked right through me” (“Children just aren’t bored enough to love reading books”, Comment, November 9).

Ironically, my late mother-in-law, growing up in the 1920s and 1930s, was permitted to read a book during the holidays only after she had spent the day cycling, or playing tennis and golf.

Colin Henderson
Cranleigh, Surrey

SIR – Read a child a story and they will enjoy the experience for the length of the tale. Teach them to read, however, and they will enjoy reading for the rest of their lives. 

My mother, who was an avid reader her whole life, excused herself from the task of having to read endless childish stories by teaching me to do it myself when I was three years old. Reading has been a total joy for the past 80 years.

Audrey Lindsay
Over Peover, Cheshire

Benefits reform risks punishing the mentally ill 

SIR – I was deeply concerned by your report “Treasury to save £4 billion with disability benefits overhaul, November 13), which suggested that the Chancellor may announce reductions in benefits in next week’s Autumn Statement. Planned proposals to force people with mental illness to engage in work preparedness or face benefits sanctions were particularly alarming. 

People with mental illness should be supported to stay in work, or, where possible, to join the workforce with appropriate measures in place. However, a political narrative that punishes people with mental illness for needing benefits will only add to systemic harms. Sanctions cause a rapid deterioration in the health of people with mental illness, creating even more demand for NHS mental-health services. 

The Government’s ambition to “save £4 billion” could quickly be overshadowed by the cost of funding public services to support people facing further financial hardship, debt and crisis. 

The NHS has successfully trialled alternative models that support people with mental illness back to work or meaningful activity, which now have a broad evidence base. We urge the Government to consider how these could be adopted more widely. 

Dr Lade Smith
President, Royal College of Psychiatrists
London E1

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