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Reader suggests there is ‘unease’ over UK’s stance on China
Your headline quoting Tory MP Tom Tugendhat, ‘Whose side are you on, Sir Keir?’ highlights the unease over the UK’s stance on China.
Labour’s apparent willingness to appease Xi Jinping’s totalitarian regime in hopes of economic gain is deeply troubling – especially as MI5 director general Sir Ken McCallum has warned that China poses a threat to British security ‘every day’.
Earlier this month MI5 had to step in once again to counter a Beijing-linked threat and McCallum expressed frustration over the collapse of a major Chinese espionage case.
Spying charges were dropped against two men – who maintain their innocence – because the CPS says the government failed to give the necessary evidence that China was ‘an ongoing threat’ to national security.
Just as Britain once abandoned its position on Tibet, we risk repeating history – this time with the proposed construction of a vast Chinese embassy on the highly sensitive Royal Mint Court site in London.
Approving such a project would send a dangerous signal of weakness to Beijing and haunt Sir Keir’s leadership for years. Tsering, London
Reader points out Putin is ‘a tyrant responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths’
Nigel Farage calls Vladimir Putin ‘a very bad dude’. He’s far worse than that – he’s a tyrant responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths.
The Reform leader has praised Putin – saying he ‘admired him as a political operator’ – and has blamed Nato and the EU for ‘poking the Russian bear’ and provoking war in Ukraine. He appeared on Kremlin outlet Russia Today earning – in his words – ‘well under £5,000’ for two appearances. He helped deliver Putin-backed Brexit, which damaged Britain and continues to stir division, for political gain.
If Putin is ‘a very bad dude’, what does that make Farage? A useful idiot, I guess. Peter Brown, Cleckheaton
Reader calls Miliband’s energy policies ‘net zero fantasies’
It’s likely an increasing majority of people in the UK have net zero interest in becoming impoverished by energy secretary Ed Miliband’s net zero fantasies. I am sure most would prefer a return to pollution if it meant lower energy bills and a bit more money in their pockets. Stefan Badham, Portsmouth
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‘How many more graves will it take before the government takes the mental health crisis seriously?’, questions reader
Many say boxing champ Ricky Hatton ‘took his own life’. But that isn’t really true. His life was taken from him by poor mental health which went untreated. It was taken by a dire shortage of mental healthcare, with waiting times for treatment measured in months or years, and valiant staff who are so overworked and unsupported that they are regularly forced to abandon their jobs due to sheer burnout.
There are thousands of people in this country like Ricky Hatton who are killed by mental illness every year. How many more early graves will it take before the government takes the mental health crisis seriously? Sharon, Manchester
Is saying ‘excuse me’ rude?
Andi’s comment (MetroTalk, Fri) about being rudely interrupted while on the phone reminded me of a time I was on an escalator at Gatwick. A teenager was stood on the left while I was walking up, so I said ‘excuse me’. While he was moving to the right, his mum chastised me with, ‘Excuse me, please.’
I always thought that ‘excuse me’ was already a sufficiently polite phrase but have added the ‘please’ ever since, just in case. Was I in the right or wrong? David, Sutton
Reader defends teenagers who ‘cannot work a dial telephone’
Alan Yearsley (MetroTalk, Mon) decries the fact that teenagers cannot work a dial telephone and thinks ‘they would appear to be thinking too much in terms of modern-day technology’.
So presumably Mr Yearsley has a good knowledge of how to drive a horse and cart, repair a thatched roof and change the accumulator in his radio (showing my age a bit here). Martin, London
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