John Humphrys’ righteous anger on the carelessness of nationwide establishments and the horrors that adopted in consequence – at Aberfan, Hillsborough, Grenfell and through Covid – is matched solely by his disgust on the lack of accountability afterwards (At Aberfan, I noticed fathers digging for his or her lacking kids. And the teachings society ought to have discovered, it hasn’t, 24 October). Sadly, it’s too usually true that these in management roles stroll away with not more than a slapped wrist.
In France, residents could be manning the barricades. Right here? “Dreadful, isn’t it?” Adopted by a shrug. Like Humphrys, we must be raging on the demise, grief and lasting trauma that had been delivered by our “leaders”. However we don’t. As a result of we don’t imagine that it’ll make any distinction. We’re apathetic, possibly as a result of we have now so little self-agency.
French kids are taught citizenship and what it means from an early age. They’ve a way of possession of their nation’s politics and establishments that we don’t appear to, actually in England. Might that be as a result of we aren’t residents? We’ve no assured rights, solely permissions, and they are often eliminated by “them”.
Class distinctions could have blurred, however we nonetheless dwell in a hierarchical society, personified by the notion of the “crown in parliament”. Till parliament’s monarchical powers are changed by a written structure wherein we, the folks, are sovereign, we’re prone to proceed to imagine “they” set the principles and “we” obey them.
Lyn Dade
Twickenham, London
I used to be moved by John Humphrys’s recollection of the Aberfan catastrophe. Maybe I ought to say that each John and I’ve one factor in widespread – that’s after spending an hour within the depths of a mine, we each needed to return again to the floor. I had organized to go down a pit within the Llynfi valley in my late teenagers to see the atmosphere wherein my father had spent a few of what ought to have been one of the best years of his life. He was given a decide and shovel on his 14th birthday and got here again up for the final time when he was 27, ruined for the remainder of his life.
I’m not, due to this fact, making an attempt to defend the Nationwide Coal Board by saying that it was not simply they who brought on this heartbreaking tragedy. The accountability for it was a lot wider. The varsity was in a really harmful location. “Everybody”, it appears, knew that. Can we all know if there are any surviving minutes of conferences of native councillors who would have mentioned this subject? Native councillors are elected to take care of one of the best pursuits of their constituents. What had been the conclusions of any conferences at which the hazard to the varsity and its kids had been mentioned? Have been there any proposals or plans for the relocation of the varsity to a secure website?
Lyn Collins
Rosewell, Midlothian
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