Letters: GCSE coursework

GCSE coursework doesn't work any more - let's just drop it

Sir: Why not go the whole hog and simply abolish coursework at GCSE? ("Exams watchdog reveals GCSE coursework cheating", 22 November.) This from a former head of English who enthusiastically introduced the first 100 per cent coursework English GCSE at his school nearly 20 years ago.

The arguments against coursework as a reliable method of assessment and as a means of motivating students and allowing them to pursue their interests independently - the arguments which made me such an advocate of coursework in the first place - are now overwhelming.

It can no longer be reliably authenticated as the student's own work.

It puts an unbearable strain on schools, spending hours of unproductive time chasing students for uncompleted coursework from December to Easter, leading to the laughable paradox of schools running "examination coursework" sessions before deadlines.

The strain on students is also immense, with conscientious girls being the worst served as they spend hours "padding" their work and ensuring the presentation is immaculate, leading to the maxim that teachers don't mark coursework, they simply weigh it! Boys, in the main, are the ones being chased for uncompleted work. How unfair it must seem when a bright boy hands in a hastily but intelligently written concise piece of coursework which scores the same mark as the ton of paper produced by his conscientious and equally bright female peers.

Parents too are under their own pressure to, at one extreme, "simply" get their children to produce the coursework, and at the other extreme, ensure that their children's coursework is the highest standard possible - and we all know what that can lead to.

As for coursework stimulating individual research and rewarding initiative, the pressure on teachers to "come up with the results" has lead to blandly uniform coursework tasks like the ones I too eventually found myself using in English GCSE, my little list of "can't fall off" assignments complete with "idiot notes".

Let's scrap it and spend rather more time teaching the kids.

ROBERT NEWTON

SUTTON COLDFIELD, WEST MIDLANDS

Cluster bombs and engineers' duty

Sir: The design, manufacture and use of weapons such as cluster bombs (report, 21 November) raises serious questions for the engineering profession in the UK.

Engineering has a great influence on the world we live in, often in very positive ways. Practising engineers, as corporate members of recognised professional bodies, undertake to uphold the dignity and reputation of their profession and to safeguard the public interest. The engineering institutions have the duty to regulate the conduct of their members and to apply appropriate disciplinary procedures in the case of breaches of good practice.

The design and manufacture of such weapons would be impossible without the use of advanced engineering techniques, both theoretical and practical, across the range of the engineering disciplines. This clearly raises the question as to whether the engineering institutions regard this as an appropriate use of the skills of their corporate members, and if not, as to what action they intend to take.

As a final point, it might be noted that a failure rate of 5-30 per cent would be very unusual in modern engineering design. It should not be considered unlikely that the "bomblets" which fail to explode on impact, and which subsequently can cause exceptional injury to civilians, may have been designed to act in this way.

PROFESSOR RICHARD BOWEN

SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UNIVERSITY OF WALES, SWANSEA

Sir: Would it not be reasonable to expect the manufacturers to bear the cost of retrieving unexploded (and, therefore clearly faulty) munitions from the battlefield?

A S WIGAND

LONDON SE13

Reform of public sector pensions

Sir: Your leader on pensions (18 November) confused three issues - the age that people actually retire, the Normal Pension Age (NPA) in occupational schemes and the age at which the state pension is paid. This leads you to criticise the recent public pensions settlement on false grounds.

Many public sector workers covered by the deal are already working beyond their current pension age of 60, to retire at an average age of around 62. The picture in the private sector is broadly similar, with retirement on average at around 63.

Through a range of policies - from tax reforms to new incentives to take the state pension late through to the outlawing of age discrimination - we are ensuring that in future more people in both private and public sectors will stay in work for even longer.

You suggest that the public sector deal will make broader pension reform more difficult. How can this be so?

Public sector pension reform will now get under way, with all new staff having an NPA of 65. This is the key to ensuring financial sustainability. Turnover is high - 90 per cent of today's 20-year-old public sector workers will have left before they reach 60. That's why 85 per cent of savings were always going to come from new staff.

Leaving aside transitional arrangements for existing staff, we have established for the future that all public sector workers will have a normal pension age of 65. In equivalent private sector schemes, 40 per cent of active members have an NPA of 60. Indeed, I am not aware of any occupational, scheme that has a higher NPA than the one we're now establishing right across the public sector.

The age at which the state pension is paid is, of course, an entirely separate issue again. The state pension is received by public and private sector workers alike, and there is no reason why arrangements that their employers (whether private companies or the Government) make in respect of their occupational pensions should constrain debate about this.

ALAN JOHNSON MP

SECRETARY OF STATE, DEPARTMENT OF TRADE AND INDUSTRY LONDON SW1

Sir: Jeremy Warner compares pensions to a many-headed monster which cannot easily be slain ("The cost of public sector pensions is twice the national debt", 15 November). Help in vanquishing the pension monster is at hand thanks to the success of the Chancellor's Pension Credit, which has delivered more money to the poorest pensioners than any previous government.

However in order to cement this success the Government must deliver a long-term pensions reform which coincides with the winding down of the Pension Credit. Without a long-term reform the bill of this benefit is set to reach £39bn by 2050 - equivalent to an additional 13p on the standard rate of income tax.

The reform currently being proposed by the Pensions Reform Group is for a new basic pension based on the contributory principle delivering a guarantee of between 25 and 30 per cent of average earnings throughout retirement. This guarantee would be achieved by adding a funded component to the existing pay-as-you-go National Insurance scheme, with the funds being managed independently by a body with a similar remit to the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee.

The bare bones for such a reform could easily be put into place when the new Secretary of State for Work and Pensions announces the Government's response to the Turner report. The PRG reform will help to cement the long-term success of the Pension Credit and will help to guarantee that people now of working age will not spend their retirement on means-tested help.

FRANK FIELD MP

CHAIR OF THE PENSIONS REFORM GROUP, HOUSE OF COMMONS

School PTA comes up against drink law

Sir: I draw your attention the injustice of the Government's change in the law regarding the licensing of events. Our children's Parent Teacher Association was set up to raise funds to enable the school to purchase extra books, computers etc. Some of the events warranted a bar; they could apply for a licence to the local magistrate at a cost of £10.

Now the Government has decided that this has to be granted by the local authority, which will require a member of the PTA to go on a course to become a licensed person. The venue will have to be licensed and the licensed person will have to be on site for the duration of every event. To do this the PTA will have to pay £600.

The PTA is being penalised for trying to make up for the shortfall in school funding which the Government has failed to provide.

K J ASLETT

HASTINGS, EAST SUSSEX

Persecution in China and nearer home

Sir: China is widely criticised for its repression of religious freedom (letters, 18 November). History is repeating itself. After years of internal bloodletting the English, too, were deeply suspicious of those with loyalties to foreign religious authorities.

In China it used to be said: "One more Christian, one less Chinese." Chinese Christians were persecuted during the Cultural Revolution, but earned for Christianity recognition as an indigenous faith. In England the Test Act barred Roman Catholics from office for 156 years. The service of thanksgiving for deliverance from the Gunpowder Plot remained in the Prayer Book for 254 years. Mao died just 29 years ago.

CANON CHRISTOPHER HALL

BANBURY, OXFORDSHIRE

Every sexual assault is a brutal crime

Sir: Thank you to Joan Smith for her piece on the prosecution of rape cases ("Stop treating men as moral imbeciles", 22 November)

Twenty years ago, I suffered a serious sexual attack by a stranger, which lasted for several hours and ended with an attempt on my life. I never reported the incident or sought help because I couldn't risk the horror of reliving the event and being met with disbelief, or being viewed as a co-conspirator.

Two decades on, it seems that many potential jurors will still believe that this event was in some way my fault because (a) I was in a "dodgy" part of London late at night and (b) I was totally naked. I should also point out that I was alone in bed in my own home.

Every case of violent sexual assault is different. But every person who is forced into sexual acts through fear or violence is the traumatised victim of a brutal crime, and no exceptions.

ZOE JARVIS

ST LEONARDS ON SEA, EAST SUSSEX

Insidious ideology of 'Little Britain'

Sir: Johann Hari is right to point to the insidious ideology that underpins the post-post-modern "comedy" of Little Britain, and its relentless mockery of just about every marginalised group in society ("Why I hate 'Little Britain' ", 22 November).

Particularly alarming is the way the great British public have taken to the portrayal of a devious, manipulative, demanding "disabled" character playing on the naivety of a liberal do-gooder - just at a time when the Government are intent on softening up public opinion for benefit cuts by encouraging the perception that most so-called disabled people are fraudulently soaping off "hard working families".

CHARLES HOPKINS

NORWICH

Sir: How strange that in his critique of Little Britain Johann Hari should steal a line from Bernard Manning. His statement that the programme is as entertaining as a burning orphanage is identical to a joke made by Mr Manning on the Mrs Merton show in 1998, when discussing the work of Jimmy Tarbuck. I do not take issue with the thrust of Mr Hari's argument but I think he should give credit where it's due.

NEIL BROCKLEHURST

WEST EWELL SURREY

Sir: Is there such a thing as compassionate comedy? If there were I don't think it would be very funny.

ROBERT HILL

DURHAM

True public servants

Sir: I am hoping to receive a copy of Sir Christopher Meyer's book DC Confidential for Christmas. I shall place it next to Peter Wright's Spycatcher. Thank God for those public servants who from time to time have the courage to reveal the truth about the way we are governed.

M A TIMMS

IVER, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE

Aziz the Christian

Sir: You describe Tariq Aziz as "nominally Christian" ("Friars of Assisi lose their independence", 22 November). How do you decide who is nominally Christian, and who is genuinely so? Is Tony Blair Christian? Is George Bush? And if conservative Catholics are bitter at the Iraqi minister's visit to Assisi in 2003, how do they feel about his audiences with the Pope in Rome in that year and in 1998?

THOMAS DEAS

BEIJING

Views of Venice

Sir: I don't know what painting Jonathan Brown was looking at when he wrote his piece "Turner masterpiece shown for first time in 30 years" (22 November) but in the picture neither St Mark's nor the Grand Canal is visible. What can be seen are the Giudecca, Santa Maria della Salute and San Giorgio - which, funnily enough, is the title of the painting.

PAUL DICKENS

LYTHAM ST ANNE'S, LANCASHIRE

Battle against slavery

Sir: Ken Livingstone's attempts to abolish slavery in London are not, as you claim, two centuries too late (Pandora, 21 November). According to International Labour Organisation estimates, there are about 27 million slaves in the world today and 360,000 in the industrialised west, including London, where they are mostly used in garment assembly, domestic work and prostitution. Any attempts to deal with this problem should be welcomed, not sneered at.

SEAN TUCKER

LIVERPOOL

Cry from the wilderness

Sir: I thought it was only in the valleys of Somerset that licence payers were being defrauded by the BBC. But the letter from the Rev Mike Bossingham (18 November) informs me that even on the plains of Norfolk viewers are charged the full rate for a TV licence only to receive half of the service. Perhaps other readers would join us in a campaign for justice for those who live in the digital wilderness?

THE REV DAN RICHARDS

BRUTON, SOMERSET