More Rod Stewarts, please!

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Prior to turning down a lucrative deal with Saudi Arabia, Rod Stewart had declined $1m to perform in Qatar because of the country’s human rights record (PA)

The contrast around four stories in the headlines concerning well-known figures struck me hard indeed. Firstly, Rod Stewart deserves copious praise for turning down a huge fee by not performing in Saudi Arabia. There are surely few people unaware of their dreadful human rights record.

Then we have three other people who have, to a greater or lesser extent, disgraced themselves.

Goodness only knows where former Barclays CEO, Jes Staley’s personal judgement went in pursuing a personal relationship with convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, and then the attempted obfuscations and untruths!

Next, I read that ex-Formula One boss, Bernie Ecclestone, pleaded guilty to a fraud so big that the sum total he must pay is £650m plus a suspended prison sentence.

Last and on this occasion only, the least, we have Hannah Ingram-Moore, who admitted keeping £800,000 from her late father’s (Captain Tom) book sales.

Did none of these people possess any common sense between them? All of it frankly appals me – total moral degradation.

To sum up: we need more Rod Stewarts and an awful lot less of the other three in the world.

Robert Boston

Kent

A modest proposal

Who remembers the Dutch famine of 1944–1945? Look at Gaza in 2023 and remember. No food, no power back then, and today the difference is there’s no water, no medicines, and the heavens are full of death.

Innocent men, women and children are being killed indiscriminately in pursuit of terrorists who melt away like the morning dew.

Who remembers anything anymore? There is only anger and despair. Meditate on Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels: “We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another.”

Sincerely

Rachel McKenzie

Seaford

Portrait of the endangered artist

It is great to see Labour pushing for “real world maths” and addressing gaps in our education system, as covered in Eleanor Busby’s article “Labour unveils plans to teach ‘real world’ maths in primary schools”. But what about art and creativity?

Arts education in schools has been cut to shreds. No paint, no materials, no status, no nothing. A situation made worse by the government’s 50 per cent funding cut to university arts subsidies in 2021.

Last summer, Labour committed to make creative education compulsory to the age of 16. Now we need some detail to back that up.

Let’s recognise the potential of all the arts to nurture self-esteem and creative expression in young people, and help them find their voice in the world. High-quality arts education is indispensable. It’s part of the reason why our creative industries are sensationally good. And it shapes our society for the better.

In two weeks’ time, the winner of this year’s Young London Print Prize will be revealed. This is a competition where young Londoners express their personal response to the climate crisis through the medium of printmaking.

Seeing their art shone onto the lights at Piccadilly Circus shows us a future full of colour and hope. That’s what you get by investing in art.

Matt Bell

Chair of Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair and co-founder of the Young London Print Prize

Protect the innocent – everywhere

You don’t need to have any particular connection with the people of Israel to be horrified by the latest Hamas attack.

But the harm done by the Israeli government to the trapped occupants of Gaza is now comparable, and you also don’t need to have any particular connection with the people of Palestine to be horrified by that either.

Forgive the cliche, but two wrongs really do not make a right. There are grievous wrongs being perpetrated by both sides. The government of Israel, supported prominently by the US, is committing war crimes. And the victims are innocent civilians, Israeli and Palestinian.

It’s incumbent on the rest of the world to use any legal and humane means possible to prevent further bloodshed.

Susan Alexander

South Gloucestershire

When blue sees red

If Labour have proved anything this week it is that they are now clearly a government in waiting.

Speaker after speaker (from Angela Rayner on Sunday to Ed Miliband on Monday and Sir Keir Starmer on Tuesday) have boldly presented what amounts to a clinical “timetable for action”. Action on waste. Action on fraud. Action on dodgy contracts. An Energy Independence Act. Cutting NHS waiting lists. Building 1.5 million new homes. Breaking down barriers to opportunity. And instead of looking after the richest one per cent, looking after everybody in all walks of life.

No wonder former Tories like me are turning to Labour in their droves.

Downing Street under the Tories is a war zone. Downing Street under Labour will be an action zone.

Geoffrey Brooking

Hampshire