Letters: The Government’s road out of lockdown is littered with unmanageable bureaucracy

SIR – The Government is at risk of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Having won almost universal praise for securing and administering millions of vaccinations, rather than just finishing the task, it appears to be hell-bent on introducing a complex mixture of rules, tests and apps, which will lose it the support it has rightly gained.

Graham Blashill
Bristol

SIR – As Covid-19 dies out in this country due to both vaccination and natural immunity – particularly among the unvaccinated young – it is incredible that the Government wants to carry out 100 million lateral flow tests a week at enormous expense.

Public Health England estimates the false positive rate for these tests to be about 0.3 per cent, which would result in around 300,000 false positives every week. Consequently, this would disrupt the lives of around a million people (affected household members) as they wait for confirmatory (negative) PCR tests. Moreover, these tests are not infallible, and would result in, say, 100 double false positives, thereby justifying the exercise and causing it to be repeated ad infinitum.

Malcolm Hammond
Bacton, Norfolk

SIR – The plan to offer everyone two lateral flow tests a week strikes me as an insane waste of taxpayers’ money.

These tests are known to be inaccurate but, more to the point, what makes the Prime Minister think that people, particularly the asymptomatic, will report a positive result?

Against a background of low case and death rates they will keep schtum. Even if they don’t, the Test and Trace system is so ineffective that reporting a positive result will be pointless.

Peter Munro
Wincanton, Somerset

SIR – Are we going to have a robust strategy for disposing of all this extra testing kit? What risks are posed by used nose and throat swabs finding their way to our litter bins – or, as is likely to happen in many areas, on to our streets, to accompany the ever visible disposable face masks?

The litter problems in our country have been widely reported. Here is another looming wave of Covid trash.

C J Elliott
Birmingham

SIR – Your Leading Article argues that, if the Government insists on pursuing vaccine passports, there should be a “hard and fast cut-off period of no more than six months”.

Given the Government’s record of policy U-turns and broken pledges, how could anyone have confidence that such a date would be honoured? Nor could we rely on Parliament to protect us. Labour has hardly covered itself with glory in its scrutiny of policy and constructive opposition. And, without its help, the pitifully small group of Conservative MPs who still believe in liberty would have no chance of preventing this overweening Government from extending the life of these “passports” indefinitely.

John Waine
Nuneaton, Warwickshire

SIR – The Government has to get a reality check and stop telling us what we can and cannot do. It should forget about vaccine passports for domestic use, but maybe allow people to use them for international travel.

Graham Mitchell
Haslemere, Surrey

SIR – Covid “passports” obviously don’t go far enough. It’s time the Government got on and microchipped everyone with their full personal and health details. A simple hand-held scanner could then establish whether we are allowed to enter any particular premises – or indeed leave our homes.

As a bonus, they could satellite-track everyone at all times, and nip unacceptable straying in the bud.

Cynthia Harrod-Eagles
Northwood, Middlesex

A terrified nation

SIR – Congratulations to The Telegraph and Gordon Rayner for revealing that the campaign of mass fear that reduced a once brave nation to trembling terror was deliberately organised to secure obedience to the policy of lockdown.

I have only once before seen anything like it. This was when I was posted to East Germany in 1962. Such a brainwashing tactic was employed to frighten East Berliners into believing that the Berlin Wall was a defensive measure to protect them from tiny West Berlin, and that the Stasi was their guardian. The wall was of course an instrument of enslavement.

I never thought that the government of a country whose uniform I once wore with such pride would sink so low. Those responsible should be identified without delay and ousted from all office over us.

Frederick Forsyth
Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire

Heat pump pitfalls

SIR – We should be worried if the Government is too reliant on heat pumps to replace gas boilers. These pumps can be effective for highly insulated homes, but for many residents the costs of installing and running them would simply be too high. Yes, we need alternatives to fossil fuels, but a stampede into retro-fitting heat pumps could be disastrous.

James Harden
Salisbury, Wiltshire

SIR – My new tariff for gas is 2.8p per kWh; allowing for a low 80 per cent efficiency, that is net about 3.5p per kWh. Electricity, required for heat pumps, costs 15.7p per kWh, which at a coefficient of performance of 3.2 gives a net cost of 4.9p per kWh. In my book that is at least a 50 per cent rise in costs.

Dr John E Lloyd
Darlington, Co Durham

Sound of surveillance

SIR – The Police and Criminal Justice Bill allows the police to stop demonstrations which are causing anxiety by noise, among other things.

In fact, the most stressful aspect for the public of demonstrations in London is the continuous noise from police helicopters – all day every weekend, and often during the week.

These cost thousands of pounds to keep aloft. Surely it is possible for police commanders on the ground to call on them only when necessary.

David Rodgers
London SW1

Remote GPs

SIR – As a retired NHS consultant, I could not agree more with Dr John Statham (Letters, April 2).

I have a neighbour who received two diagnoses for which he was prescribed treatment without ever seeing his GP. Within five days, on a Sunday, his wife called me urgently because she was concerned. He was clearly moribund and we arranged an emergency admission to hospital via NHS 111. A lung abscess was found and successfully treated.

In August last year, I diagnosed atrial fibrillation, a cardiac arrhythmia, in my wife. It took several months to confirm the diagnosis and for her to receive anticoagulant treatment without ever seeing our GP or another doctor.

Professor Robin Jacoby
Bicester, Oxfordshire

SIR – I sympathise with Philip Barry (Letters, April 5), who has struggled to see his GP during lockdown, but my experience has been completely different.

After briefly describing symptoms using the myGP system, I was invited to a face-to-face consultation on the same day, and potential bladder cancer was diagnosed. This was confirmed in a specialist unit at my local hospital one week later, with rapid follow-up after that.

There may be much to criticise in the NHS, but my personal experience has been of an exemplary service provided by dedicated and caring professionals. I am very grateful.

Bob Vass
Bollington, Cheshire

Cat-proof bird feeders

SIR – I am sorry that Joan Sedgwick (Letters, April 3) no longer has birds at her feeder. However, if a feeder is strategically placed, birds will come to it, cats or not.

Locating it well above a clear piece of ground, so that cats have no hiding place from which to pounce, but close to cover (a tree, bush or building) from which birds can come and go will enable them to do so unharmed.

In our relatively small garden, in which our two cats are free to roam, we have six feeders in constant use, and I cannot remember the last time either cat caught a bird.

While some people may not be able to provide such facilities, even a feeder attached to a window – as long as birds have cover from which to gain access – will be well and safely patronised.

Simon Tonking
Abbots Bromley, Staffordshire

Has Brexit helped puffin numbers take off?

SIR – Your report (March 29) on the increase in breeding puffins brings welcome news in this dismal spring.

The rise may be an unintended consequence of Brexit, which has reduced the fishing of sand eels, the primary food of these delightful birds. The eels (which are really fish) had been hoovered up by Danish vessels to be turned into fertiliser, an appalling way to use natural resources.

Chris Rome
Thruxton, Hampshire

Boat Race blighted by babbling commentary

SIR – The Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race (Letters, April 5) was completely ruined by the commentators, all vying to say more words than the others. It’s as bad as Wimbledon.

Their attitude appears to be: viewers are obviously ignorant, so we’re going to show our superior knowledge.

As with Wimbledon, we turned off the sound – but then lost the atmosphere.

Nina Keay
West Molesey, Surrey

SIR – I thought the BBC coverage of the Boat Race was disgraceful.

We wanted to watch the races. We did not tune in to hear about, for example, allegations of sexual offences in Oxford. In addition, why did there need to be hours of coverage?

It was a mess. No wonder people are questioning the licence fee.

Alan D Collins
Kotu, Gambia

SIR – As I watched the men’s and women’s races on Sunday, I fondly remembered the days when there was just the occasional dignified comment by John Snagge. The coverage improved significantly after I turned the sound off.

Charles Steward
Chippenham, Wiltshire

SIR – It was fantastic to have the Boat Race back this year, giving us a sense that normality is returning. A hearty well done to all crews, winners and losers, for the excellent viewing.

Philip Hadley
Leamington Spa, Warwickshire

SIR – Is it not time to alternate the order of the men’s and women’s races from year to year?

Dr Andy Ashworth
Bo’ness, West Lothian

SIR – From now on the venue of the race should alternate between Ely (Cambridgeshire) and Henley (Oxfordshire).

Charles Sykes
Wickham Market, Suffolk

SIR – Cambridge rowing teams are always known as the “light blues”. So why do their shirts appear to be green?

John Bryant
Toddington, Bedfordshire

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