Letter of the week: Do we really need another referendum?

The trick, I suggest, is to enter Schengen and then the single market first, simply by normal governmental processes. This clearly does not require a referendum. 

Then put the further option of full membership to the electorate, after free movement has already been established, and shown to “stop the boats”. Which it would, of course. 
Roger Barnes

Re: “Game Over: How the world overtook Grand Theft Auto” by Peter Hoskin, TNW #504

Thanks to Trump, Farage and co, it’s not just a question of overtaking GTA. We have left even its violent and cruel worldthousands of miles behind.
Adam Primhak

Re: “It’s time for Burnham to kill off old Labour” by Peter Kellner, TNW #504

I read Peter’s essay with great interest. He clearly explains the inadequacies of the current socialist/capitalist dichotomy in the context of today’s British economic system.

However, the future he proposes is almost what’s happening in China. A strong state hand in guiding and permitting economic development while at the same time allowing private companies and investors a free hand to innovate and grow? Let’s aspire to raising standards for al,l but please don’t believe this could be the answer to our problems.
Steve Brinkley

I find Peter Kellner’s argument that we need both capitalism and “social-ism” (as he defines it) entirely convincing. But I doubt if his expression “socialist capitalism” will ever catch on.

“Socialist” has far too strong a connection with the left, and particularly the hard left, for any term that includes it to be acceptable to those who are neither, whether in the centre or right of centre. “Social capitalism” is surely a better term?

“Social” has few if any of the hang-ups of “socialism”: we talk of social security, social cohesion, social behaviour etc. without triggering left wing connotations. Let’s press for social capitalism for all.
Richard H Burnett-Hall

It is clear the author neither shares nor understands where Andy Burnham is coming from, nor where he is heading. Massive alienation of youth across the world is speaking to the failure of everything that has come before. The whole lot has to go.
Penelope Lane

Re: “Nostalgia politics won’t work in the modern world” by Patience Wheatcroft, TNW #504

“The electorate there once was” got trashed successively by austerity, Brexit, Boris Johnson, Covid, an iceberg lettuce and a presidential pumpkin. It’s hard to detect much harm in Burnham’s baby steps away from that concatenation of disastrous policy-making.
Paul Davidson

I think the biggest gift Burnham can give the British people, especially the younger generation, is the strong possibility of a return to the EU.
Kenneth Stephens

As Patience Wheatcroft says, perhaps the £100 bung in January may feel like a retro step. But I think it has landed pretty well with the public, who are dealing with the never-ending cost-of-living crisis. “Every little helps” as the leading supermarket says.
Judith A Daniels

Re: “The frontline of our war with Putin: the phone in your pocket” by Paul Mason, TNW #504

The worst thing is that I don’t believe that Putin has really started his attack yet. I think he is “testing the fences”. And I do not think we can simply focus on our domestic response. 

This has to be a Europe-wide pushback, because my instinct is that when he does launch his full-frontal assault, it will be Europe-wide. 
Janey Bayford

Re: “The great crypto con is finally falling apart” by James Ball, TNW #504

Why would anyone invest in something that can be made up out of thin air with no intrinsic value?

People who understand that it is a gamble and rely on the greater fool principle would be better off betting on dog racing.
David Morris

Re: “Offering humanity a deal it doesn’t want” by Jay Elwes, TNW #504

The issue is: how are governments going to protect the rest of us from AI? Firms are shredding labour to maximise profits. Unless the economic impact is managed I envisage increased social instability and unrest which, history suggests, governments will respond to with repression.
Brian Ronson 

Suggested Reading

How the iPod helped ruin everything

Phil Tinline

Re: “The iPod turns 25… and its greatest hit is social isolation” by Phil Tinline, TNW #504

This was a fascinating reminder how fast tech moves and how intrusive it can be. But I don’t think a pod mindset is a bad thing. A good podcast keeps our brains sharp and helps us leave our personal pod, build empathy and make sense of the world. The risk of isolation grows when we stop listening.
Simon Tomes

Re: “Why Cézanne is the artists’ artist” by Emma-Kate Symons, TNW #504

My wife and I went to a talk on Paul Nash. The speaker suggested that in the context of British art, he could be regarded as the bridge between romanticism and modernism. Britain’s equivalent of Cézanne?
Tim Fell

Re: “Blue Lights and the power of copaganda,” by Jamie Klingler, TNW #504

My experience of the police over the years is, like Jamie’s, negative – of jaded, uninterested blokes with no capacity to understand the crisis you are in. They acted like labourers rocking up to a building site.
Ste Thomas

BELOW THE LINE

Re: “Sixteen ways to make Bonfire Night great again,” by Jonn Elledge, TNW #504:

Jonn Elledge writes: “Its roots in the ancient Gaelic festival of Samhain mean it’s long been celebrated in parts of Scotland”. There are also indigenous Brittonic traditions still celebrated on Nos Galan Gaeaf or Noson Galan Gaeaf, in Wales. It’s Kalan Gwav in Cornish (don’t know if it’s kept up) and was exported to Brittany to become Kalan Goañv when Britons emigrated there.
Lynne Edwards

Re: “Having your cake and eating it around the world” by Adam Sharp, TNW #504:

I would like to share an English expression with the same meaning which I only ever heard one person use. When I worked in Bolton in the early 1980s I had a supervisor who used to say, “You can’t have the pudding and the penny.” I suspect this is a regional variant, but my father, also Lancastrian, didn’t know it. 
John Cubbon

Re: “The problem with Wild Horse Nine” by John Bleasdale, TNW #504:

This was thrilling writing. Bravo.
Christopher James

Re: Rats in a Sack on the Telegraph’s cuts, TNW #504.

I see Nigel Farage’s regular column for the paper is to end! It’s odd to get some good news from the sad, mad, bad Telegraph.
Paul Shields