Letters: The NHS is not beyond reform – but it needs to be taken out of politics

SIR – Week after week, decade after decade, I read that the NHS needs “radical rethinking".

Yes, it does – but for far too long politicians have simply thrown more money at the problem in the hope that it will get better, and in order to avoid upsetting the electorate.

The answer is a Royal Commission, but with strict, non-political terms of reference. It must be time-limited, rather than open-ended, and contain recommendations that all parties are committed to accepting.

The naysayers will scream that it can’t be done, but with the right approach, and a willingness to learn the lessons of previous failed Royal Commissions, reform is achievable.

Alan Ferguson
Hadleigh, Suffolk

SIR – Management in the NHS has more than doubled in the past two years, while nursing numbers have risen by only 7 per cent.

When, in 1967, I started my first house job as a junior doctor at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Bournemouth, it was run by a medical superintendent, a (proper) matron and a small number of clerical staff working from three rooms.

In my two years there, I witnessed few problems, good morale and great teamwork – even if I was on call on alternate days during my six-month obstetric job.

Dr Malcolm Freeth
Bournemouth, Dorset

SIR – I was an NHS clinical director for several years, in orthopaedics. I also ran a private-practice organisation.

My wife is a GP. She works impossibly hard. There does seem to be a chasm between the frontline and the management of the NHS.

However, this vast organisation cannot succeed. No business could, with limitless demand and staff shortages. Doctors are being asked to do the impossible. Perhaps, in the end, individual users will have to pay for at least some of the services we all want.

Peter J F Wade FRCS
Coventry, Warwickshire

Exams still online

SIR – It beggars belief that leading universities are “using Covid as an excuse” to keep exams online. Are those in charge living in a different world from the rest of us?

For the majority of people (including at schools) life has practically returned to normal. Letting students complete their examinations online – and, in the case of Durham University, giving them 24 hours to do so – is ridiculous. What kind of test is it when students have access to the internet, notes and perhaps even help from others?

Mary Marshall
Ilkley, West Yorkshire

Persecution in Qatar

SIR – The Baha’i community in Qatar – a religious minority that has, since independence, been at home in the country – has in recent years experienced increasing discrimination at the hands of the government.

Many Baha’i families have been forced to leave as a result of false criminal allegations, blacklisting, and the baseless denial of “certificates of good conduct” needed to work in several professions.

We represent Remi Rouhani, a Baha’i and a Qatari citizen, and former director of the Qatar Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Mr Rouhani is due to appear before Qatar’s highest court later this month to appeal an unjust conviction. Our concern is that charges were brought against Mr Rouhani with the aim of pressuring him and his family, and to further unsettle the Baha’i community. We will closely monitor the proceedings and consider raising his case before international human rights bodies if justice is not served.

Mr Rouhani’s case – and the decision of the court – may serve as a bellwether for Qatar’s intentions regarding the people of the Baha’i faith and other religious minorities as the country attracts global attention ahead of the World Cup later this year.

It is important that Qatar respects the rights of all religious minorities. Religious freedom means that Qatar’s government cannot discriminate against Mr Rouhani or any other member of the Baha’i community. Qatar risks eliminating yet another religious minority from a Middle Eastern country if this pattern is not reversed.

Baroness Kennedy of the Shaws QC
Steven Powles QC
Doughty Street Chambers
London WC1

The force of poetry

SIR – As someone who believes that literary texts always have cultural and historical contexts, I find it difficult to quarrel with the idea that sonnets are “products of white Western culture”. And literature courses do need revision from time to time.

Nevertheless, it is worth remembering that, in spite of Audre Lorde’s claim that “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house”, there have been many writers who have used “pre-established literary forms which tend to be the products of white Western culture” to challenge that culture.

The Jamaican Francis Williams (1690-1762) used Latin elegiac couplets to offer a spirited defence of his right to be a black poet, while the Barbadian Hilton Vaughan (1901-1985) used English verse in traditional forms, including sonnets, to show the beauty and dignity which could be found in black working-class life, and to criticise the political orthodoxies of the colonial society of the 1930s and 1940s.

More recently, in her collection, The Kids (2021), Hannah Lowe has reimagined the sonnet to offer vivid portraits of multicultural Britain.

Dr John T Gilmore
University of Warwick

Failed traffic scheme

SIR – The low-traffic neighbourhood measures in Dulwich are a disgrace. They have failed to reduce pollution or provide safer routes to school.

Traffic has been displaced to surrounding areas, where there are also schools and health centres.

Buses are delayed by being held up in traffic jams (one route’s service has been reduced).

Businesses have suffered from lower footfall. There are no concessions for the residents or the disabled. The installation of planters in one street has resulted in the traffic blocking the only access road.

Southwark Council sent out information letters, followed by a survey showing that most residents wanted the LTN measures abolished. This has made little difference. There have been slight concessions but the lack of democracy is worrying. Pollution has to be reduced, but LTNs are not the way to do it.

Linda Bird
London SE21

The librettist’s lot

SIR – You report (May 15) that Oscar Hammerstein was “furious” that the composer Richard Rodgers received more credit for their work together.

In opera, it is universally accepted that the composer gets the praise, not the librettist. Musicals are not so different. The tunes from Oklahoma, Carousel, South Pacific and others are enjoyable if played by an orchestra without anyone singing the words – but few people, if any, would be interested in hearing just the words spoken, without the tune.

Melvyn Owen
St Ives, Huntingdonshire

Brighter prospects for retired police dogs

SIR – I was disappointed to read of the fears that former police dogs “will become to expensive to adopt” (report, May 15).

This is not the case everywhere. In 2005, as a member of the Lancashire Constabulary Animal Welfare Scheme, I set up (with many willing helpers) the Retired Lancashire Police Dogs Benevolent Fund. I was motivated to do so after learning of two distressed handlers who were worried that they would not be able to keep their retired dogs due to the likely vet bills.

Once we had established and publicised ourselves, we were inundated with requests for advice from other constabularies looking to set up similar schemes. The first was from Essex, which is now the leader in assistance and guidance.

The Association of Retired Police Dog Charities lists 20 constabulary areas, all of which are busy raising money with local support, as we are in Lancashire. Our recent payments have amounted to over £4,000. We turn no police dog in need down, and in the past have helped prison dogs as well as police dogs from outside the county.

Sheila Maw
Whalley, Lancashire

Wines of Wales

SIR – There are indeed some real gems to be found among English wines (Letters, May 15). And with some 30 vineyards in Wales, there are outstanding (and award-winning) wines to be found there, too. White Castle, Ancre Hill and Gwinllan Conwy are just a few examples.

With Welsh Wine Week and English Wine Week in June, there will be a perfect opportunity to discover the delights that our home-produced wines have to offer, and support our domestic wine growers and local wine retailers at the same time.

Iechyd da! Cheers!

Martin Nuttall
Cambridge

Don’t lose the shoes

SIR – I wholeheartedly agree with Sophia Money-Coutts (Sunday, May 8) and J M Moss (Letters, May 15) that expecting people to remove their shoes when they enter one’s home is bad manners.

Several times I have visited people who have insisted I remove my shoes at the front door, then immediately offered to take me on a tour of their garden. I have hastily retrieved my shoes, while my hosts have remained barefoot. Then they have returned to the house without wiping their feet. I have taken my shoes off again.

In future I am going to rebel and refuse to do so, unless I have just walked through a muddy field. The doormat has a purpose that should not be ignored, but people no longer seem to know what it is for.

Rosemary Wells
Weymouth, Dorset

SIR – If J M Moss had been raised on a farm, as I was, she would know that removing one’s outdoor footwear is a matter of courtesy as well as hygiene.

John Newbury
Warminster, Wiltshire

SIR – For our family, removing shoes is a matter of respect. Also, when my children were younger, I was able to work out who was in the house on my return from work.

Jane Baddon
Louth, Lincolnshire

SIR – My wife and I usually take our slippers with us when visiting friends and family.

Robert Boad
Shenfield, Essex

SIR – J M Moss’s letter reminded me of an occasion when we were living in Borneo and expecting guests. We had a new puppy, and thought it best to leave him in the garden.

As is the custom, the guests all left their shoes at the door. Later we spent ages in the dark trying to find 30 pairs of shoes scattered all over the garden.

Jennie Bedford
Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

Hedgehog helper

SIR – Philip Corp (Letters, May 15) is right to blame badgers for slaying hedgehogs. When we moved to our house near Cholmondeley in 2000, we put in a cattle grid. There was a small ramp in it and I asked the contractor what it was for. “For hedgehogs,” he replied, “so they can climb out if they fall through the grid. Lord Cholmondeley insists on every cattle grid having one.”

There were many hedgehogs then and there are still plenty of badgers – but I have not seen a hedgehog for 18 years.

John Bromley-Davenport
Malpas, Cheshire