Readers' letters - September 2

I have just inadvertently caught a snippet of X- Factor at the moment some young man with a daft haircut has announced he is going to sing Cecilia “a song by The 
Vamps”.

This song is not a Vamps song.

It is a Simon & Garfunkel song, just like Hallelujah is a Leonard Cohen sing and not an Alexandra Burke song, as I have heard one ‘contestant’ state.

Why can’t or don’t these people check a song’s credentials before singing it ?

Why, also, do the judges not challenge such misconceptions?

I watched clips from this show because I’ve seen reports that it has improved.

Not so.

We get the same old stories from contestants – I was bullied at school; I’ve got self-esteem issues; I’ve got confidence issues; I want to live the dream and not stack shelves.

What is this attitude to hard working people?

R Kimble

Address supplied

POLITICS

I agree with Jeremy C

I agree with Jeremy Corbyn on two issues.

Firstly, the need to burst the Westminster bubble.

Westminster is often described as the mother of Parliaments and of the democratic system, yet Jeremy Corbyn was voted leader by a majority of the Labour Party in accordance with its rules, but most of his MPs have refused to work with him.

The Liberal Democrats have said they will ignore the results of the EU referendum, while Owen Smith, the other contender for the Labour leadership and many other MPs of all parties, are calling for a second referendum. Can we therefore assume it is only democratic if the population agree with everything that MPs say and do?

Secondly, to not only re-nationalise the railways but all the other utilities. When these industries were denationalised, we were promised that prices for the commodities would be reduced and service improved, yet we seem to have exchanged a government monopoly for a private industry cartel whose profits rise year on year with none of the benefits promised.

The groups looking after the public interest are toothless and unable to do anything about it.

Roger Whitaker

via email

politics

Farage and Trump duo

Last week I got up, switched on BBC World News to the spectacle of Nigel Farage speaking on a platform 
he shared with Donald Trump.

In this speech he described himself, and Trump, as “anti-Establishment”.

What?

He represents everything about “the Establishment” that we should loathe.

He had an ‘independent’ education (of course) and worked in the corrupt financial system.

He led a political party that had members whose views were clearly racist.

These views still mirror a party that looks to our imperialist, nationalistic past as some heyday.

A time when we exploited other cultures, for example India, for our own financial profit.

They make good bedfellows, Farage and Trump.

Which is very frightening.

Make no mistake.

They encapsulate all the very worst of “the Establishment”.

Terry Maunders

via email