Letter of the week: Farage has forced Britain into a post-truth world

I live in Notts, and our recently elected Reform councillors openly admit that they don’t know how to run the council. We’re in a post-truth world.
Tim Smart

Nigel Farage is good at getting himself free publicity, good at fraudulently posing as a man of the people, good at convincing people that unworkable policies will solve our problems, and good at denying reality.

Are any of these talents suitable for actually governing the country?

Farage played a large part in bringing about the policy that cost us billions to make us poorer. The billions spent on Brexit could have been used to support our crumbling public services. Brexit has resulted in a reduced tax take, making Labour’s task of restoring those services even harder.

Farage and his partners in crime should be ostracised as unfit to have any say in how the country is run. Instead, Labour seems to be modelling much of its policy on Farage’s utterances. 
Catherine Wilson Eiles, Llangadog, Carmarthenshire

The pound will tank the moment Reform win. Ditto the bond and stock markets. I’m sure none of the party’s wealthy backers will have primed their stockbrokers to bet on this and make a killing.
Keith Hobbs

Reform are masters of the art of galvanising the protest vote, media attention and every Facebook complainer about “them politicians”. Farage is actively reusing his strategy from the referendum – directly targeting voters with what they want to hear. 

Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves need to take a back seat and give those in their government who are good at making an argument for progressive politics more space. Also, in this age when so many people get their news from social media, the government’s efforts there are puny.
Simon P Croft

Alastair Campbell (Diary, TNW #441) tells us that according to “another major poll”, three-quarters of people think climate crisis is real and want “bold action”. I think not. 

As referenced later in the same issue by James Ball (“Death in denial”), while the majority do believe climate change is a factor, an increasing number want less bold action. Especially when it costs us dear and the major polluters in the world do nothing. 

Most people actually think Net Zero is nonsense and that Ed Miliband should be sacked. How do I know this? I read it in another major poll.
Ian McIntyre

Re: Everyday Philosophy on climate change (TNW #441). In addition to the very sensible suggestions made by Nigel Warburton, we should radically reduce the speed limit on all roads and make 20mph the limit in ALL built-up areas.

Many SUV drivers like the feeling of power and speed, and if that were made more difficult, might opt for a more climate-friendly mode of transport.
Tim Devas

Re: “Kneecap have their day in court” (TNW #441). The advanced publicity gained when both Kemi Badenoch then Keir Starmer called on the BBC not to stream their performance live, was a gift to the band. And a gift to Bob Vylan, who preceded them on to the Glastonbury stage and seized the moment to give their own controversial take.

Now the police have been called in and no doubt will find breaches of the law. Whether the DPP decide to prosecute is another matter. 

Thinking back to my youth, bands caused plenty of offence then. The establishment gasped in horror when John Lennon described the Beatles as “more popular than Jesus”. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were jailed for minor drug offences. 

This storm, like those, will pass. Yet people in the Middle East will go on losing their lives for years to come. That is the real scandal.
David Rolfe

Unlike Paul Mason (“A conflict beyond the law”, TNW #441), I do not think that the most likely form of regime change in Iran would be a coup by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which is not a regular army but more akin to the Gestapo. It is closely tied to the present regime and would not be able to survive it.

It is far more likely, as well as far more desirable, that the opposition group the National Council of Resistance of Iran would take over.
Carolyn Beckingham,
Lewes, East Sussex

A great line from Tanit Koch in Germansplaining (TNW #441): “It’s as if someone watched Yes, Minister, nodded thoughtfully and decided to make it constitutional.” It seems there are terrible problems with bureaucracy and management in Germany. 

To that end, I recommend the Germans take the advice of Sir Humphrey Appleby: “Set up an interdepartmental committee with fairly broad terms of reference so that at the end of the day you’ll be in the position to think through the various implications and arrive at a decision based on long-term considerations rather than rush prematurely into precipitate and possibly ill-conceived action which might well have unforeseen repercussions.”
Graham Allen

“Royals sell off the family silver (TNW #441) was a sad piece from Silvia Marchetti on the fate of Italian historic buildings falling into disrepair. It made me wonder if a similar venture such as Historic England, that has preserved much of our heritage, is the answer.
Simon Lawrence,
Balham, London 

James Ball’s review “March of the symbolic capitalists” of Musa al-Gharbi’s new book We Have Never Been Woke (TNW #440) was superb. Al-Gharbi’s thesis – that the various waves of concern for social justice come and go, creating less change than proponents hope, while being based on self-interest – is perhaps a little reductive, but contains a kernel of truth. 

The late great Gil Scott-Heron put it best in his song South Carolina: “Whatever happened to the people who gave a damn? Or did that just apply to not dying in the jungle of Vietnam?”
Dr Marc Hudson,
Stone, Staffordshire 

BELOW THE LINE

Good luck to Marie Le Conte on giving up vaping (Dilettante, TNW #441). Addiction is a seductive mistress always whispering in your ear. There are plenty who can verse sanctimonious assertions about never having dallied and yet may well be addicted to that other devil drug, sugar.
KEITH BRISLEY

Marie Le Conte’s column is always the first thing I look at and this one struck a chord. Marie has just given up vaping, and I gave up smoking in 1972. I am now 84 and feeling fine. Long may she live and prosper!
RUBY FORD

I started smoking at the age of 12 and continued on and off for 20 years. Stopped when in my 30s and have never taken a puff since; I am now 72. Vaping is, of course, the tobacco companies’ master stroke in finding a new market as cigarette purchases decline even further. I think it is vile, and the sickly/sweet steam train of vapour that emanates from these tubes I find disgusting!
ADAM PRIMHAK

Re: “Claret, clearly not French” by Peter Trudgill (TNW #441) was a fantastic article. I love etymology and Bordeaux wines, so could have read pages more of this stuff.
MARTIN MORGAN

“The metamorphosis of Africa” (TNW #441) was an excellent article, just what we need in The New World. Welcome Emma Sky!
SIMON P CROFT