Is there nothing the public won’t forgive the government for? Apparently not

Letters to the editor: our readers share their views. Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

Wednesday 27 October 2021 16:26 BST

Boris Johnson leaving No 10 to take part in PMQs on Wednesday (AFP/Getty)

I’m afraid Daisy Cooper, the health spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats, is wrong when she says: “The public will not forgive this government if this delay in meaningful action results in harsher action down the line.”

The UK has suffered close to 140,000 Covid-related deaths since the start of the pandemic. There are currently more new Covid infections being registered every day in the UK than in France, Germany, Italy and Spain combined. This government has just been shown to have wasted £37bn on a pathetically ineffective test and trace programme.

We have the most catastrophically incompetent UK government in living memory. Yet it remains ahead in the polls.

It would appear that there is absolutely nothing the public won’t forgive this government for.

David Maughan Brown

York

Why bother?

I’m sitting in my lounge listening to the Labour shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves delivering her response to the Budget. Sitting behind her are two MPs flicking through their mobile phones, ignoring her.

Why should we bother taking her response seriously when her colleagues are not bothering to listen?

Michael Pate

Ingol, Preston

Start acting like a leader

World leaders visiting Scotland for Cop26 will no doubt be surprised at the lax attitude we have to the dangers of Covid-19. This despite a fairly good rate of adherence to the measures we do have in place. Compare this to comments from England, where people are more surprised Scotland has any measures in place at all, as the feeling down south seemed to be that the pandemic was over.

Come on Boris Johnson, give us a break and start acting like the leader you admire so much. Thank goodness we had Churchill in 1939 and not this clown.

Geoff Forward

Stirling

Young people matter

I read the column from MP Nadia Whittome and activist Scarlett Westbrook with interest and agreement that climate education should be a legal requirement for schools.

Children of primary school age and upwards are often far more engaged than the older generation (myself included) with this thorny question.

They are completely right that the climate crisis, like the pandemic, affects everyone, rich or poor, with its devastating floods, droughts and wildfires. Make it an integral part of the curriculum and very young children will soak it up like sponges. This will have so many beneficial ongoing effects, such as specialisms involving the myriad intricacies of climate change.

Young people are rightly engaged now as they watch governments and leaders fiddle while Rome burns, and it is their future we’re threatening by doing too little.