Letters: International interference in the EU debate reeks of hypocrisy

The EU referendum is a matter for the British people; the reality of the gender pay gap; Super-Weston-Mare; and risking restoration to revive St John

President Barack Obama will use the report as evidence for action as he tries to move ahead with policies on climate change before leaving office in 2017
Barack Obama, President of the United States Credit: Photo: BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP

SIR – Barack Obama, the American President, and Wayne Swan, the former deputy prime minister of Australia, have both made comments in support of Britain remaining in the EU. Their views are mostly centred on economics, while proposing that, strategically, Britain is either essential to the EU or vice versa.

These politicians have been democratically elected in sovereign nations, with laws that only their own parliaments and people can affect. It is inconceivable that the United States would consider entering into anything other than pure trade alliances with its neighbours, or that Australia would enter an EU-type organisation with countries in the South Pacific.

The forthcoming referendum is a matter for none but the British people.

Ray Cox
Martock, Somerset

SIR – How dare foreign politicians presume to tell us to remain in the EU for their own benefit? The referendum is about national sovereignty for British citizens. We are not pawns in an international chess game.

Their input only adds to my determination to get out.

Carmichael A Thomas
Wellingborough, Northamptonshire

SIR – Before Britain joined what was then the European Economic Community (EEC) I worked for a large British diesel engine manufacturer that sent me to Australia to sell its engines. Before leaving, I wandered down the test bed of one of our factories and noted that practically every engine on test was bound for Australia.

After four years in Australia (during which time we had joined the EEC), I returned to Britain and visited the same factory. The test bed was half empty and not one engine on test was Australia-bound.

Britain lost the Australian market principally because of its EEC membership and the subsequent end of beneficial Commonwealth tariffs, which let in Japanese manufacturers. Now British engine factories have been taken over by German companies.

Roger Biddle
Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

SIR – You report on a letter written by a relatively small number of Conservative councillors urging the Prime Minister to support Brexit. The lead signatory was Ben Harris-Quinney, who was suspended from the party after he urged Tory voters to back Ukip at the last general election. The article also quotes Arron Banks, one of Ukip’s biggest donors.

As patron of Conservatives for Reform in Europe, I support David Cameron’s stance that Britain would be better off in a reformed EU. I hope that many fellow Conservatives will also take this stance, while respecting those who do not. But whatever our views on the EU, I hope we can agree that Conservatives could do without the advice of those who assist our political opponents at elections.

Sir Eric Pickles MP (Con)
London SW1

Antibiotics in farming

The routine use of antibiotics in factory farms is contributing to the worldwide crisis - Imagine life without antibiotics
There are concerns over the amount of antibiotics used in farming

SIR – The dangerous overuse of antibiotics in human medicine and the rise of antibiotic resistance are now firmly on the global agenda, but we need greater political action against the overuse of antibiotics in farming.

Farm animals account for almost two thirds of all antibiotics used in 26 European countries. About 90 per cent of farm antibiotic use within Europe is for group treatments, often where the animals are entirely healthy.

Bacteria resistant to colistin, a last-resort antibiotic, have been found in farm animals and people in several European, Asian and African countries. This is the latest sign that current veterinary prescribing practices can’t continue.

The revision of the EU Veterinary Medicinal Products legislation provides an opportunity for progress towards more responsible use. The farmers’ unions of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden recently called on their governments to propose an EU ban on routine, purely preventative treatment of groups of animals where no disease has been diagnosed in any of the animals. We urge EU governments, the European Parliament and the European Commission to support and implement such a ban.

Baroness Hollins
Chairman, British Medical Association Board of Science

Professor Tim Walsh
Cardiff University

Dr Jeremy Farrar
Director, Wellcome Trust

Shirley Cramer
CEO, Royal Society of Public Health

Babulal Sethia
President, Royal Society of Medicine

Dr Clifford Mann
President, Royal College of Emergency Medicine

Professor Peter Piot
Director, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

Professor Jane Dacre
President, Royal College of Physicians

Professor Michael Dixon
Chairman, College of Medicine

Professor Barry Cookson
University College London

Dr Alex O’Neill
University of Leeds

Dr Asha Kasliwal
Vice President, Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare

Professor Neena Modi
President, Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health

Vilma Gilis
President, Guild of Healthcare Pharmacists

Dr David McCoy
Queen Mary University

Dr Ron Daniels
Chief Executive, UK Sepsis Trust

Dr William Gaze
University of Exeter Medical School

Professor Derek Bell
President, Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh

Professor James P O’Gara
Head of Microbiology, National University of Ireland

Professor Murat Akova
President, European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases

Tim Reed
Executive Director, Health Action International

Carolyn Whitten
Executive Director, Universities Allied for Essential Medicines Europe

Nina Renshaw
Secretary General, European Public Health Alliance

Dr Anna Zorzet
Coordinator, ReAct Europe

Dr Ton Nicolai
Coordinator and Spokesman, EUROCAM

Thomas Breitkreuz
President, International Federation of Anthroposophic Medical Associations

Professor Jan Kluytmans
Amphia Hospital, Breda, The Netherlands

Professor Dick Heederik
Division Head, Institute for Risk Assessment Sciences, Division Environmental Epidemiology, The Netherlands

Dr Dik J Mevius
Head, Netherlands National Reference Laboratory for Antimicrobial Resistance in Animals, Central Veterinary Institute

Professor Jaap A Wagenaar
Utrecht University, The Netherlands

Dr Torkel Ekman
Deputy Dean, Vice Chairman of the Faculty Board, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences

Thomas Svensson
Acting Divisional Director for District Veterinarians, Swedish Board of Agriculture

Dr Jenny Lundstrom
Guest researcher, ReAct Sweden

Professor Jorgen Schlundt
Nanyang Technological University

Professor Frank Møller Aarestrup
Head of Research Group, National Food Institute, Technical University of Denmark

Professor Anders Folkesson
Technical University of Denmark

Associate Professor DI Hans-Petr Hutter
Associate Head, Institute of Environmental Health, Medical University Vienna

Lance B Price
Director, Antibiotic Resistance Action Center, Milken Institute School of Public Health, George Washington University, United States

Meredith Basey
Director, Universities Allied for Essential Medicines North America, United States

Shefali Sharma
Director of Agricultural Commodities and Globalization Initiatives, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, United States

David Wallinga
Senior Health Officer, Natural Resources Defence Council, United States

Dr Stuart B Levy
Director, Center for Adaptation Genetics and Drug Resistance, United States

Greg Filice
Chief, Infectious Disease Section, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, United States

Professor James R Johnson
University of Minnesota, United States

Dr Gudrun Illmanova
Senior researcher, Ethology, Institute of Animal Science, Prague, Czech Republic

Dr Robert Zajíček
Head, Prague Burn Centre, Teaching Hospital Kralovske Vinohrady, Prague, Czech Republic

Associate Professor Marek Špinka
Head of Ethology, Institute of Animal Science, Prague, Czech Republic

Dr Ivana Grossová
Prague Burn Centre, Teaching Hospital Kralovske Vinohrady, Prague, Czech Republic

Dr Miloš Kravciv
Medical House, Czech Republic

Professor Peter Collignon
Australian National University

Gender pay gap reality

SIR – I have considerable experience in the analysis of the staffing costs of a number of public and private-sector organisations. Gender pay differences, defined by differential pay upon recruitment for males and females, do not generally exist.

Two factors cause the perceived gender pay gap. First, women (on average) have less continuous and total service than men in the same role. If an employer rewards improved or more effective performance as a result of experience on the job, men will generally earn more.

Secondly, women are more likely than men to prefer part-time or casual employment. Such work is generally less demanding than full-time work, and consequently less well-paid.

I have only ever discovered two consistent causes of gender pay inequality. In manual occupations involving organised teams of manual workers, trade-union muscle has traditionally enabled male workers to earn more than female workers who have similar responsibilities and working conditions but who are scattered as individuals in different locations. Secondly, males in part-time employment will often earn less than women doing comparable work.

If gender pay equality is to be achieved it will require changes in social attitudes generally, not merely legislation.

Martin Ternouth
Bridport, Dorset

Worth every penny

SIR – The expenses claimed by John Bercow, the Speaker of the House of Commons, over the past few years (“Bercow’s expenses top half a million pounds”) were used when entertaining visiting speakers and dignitaries from around the world, as well as British MPs at appropriate times in their careers.

This expenditure is quite proper – the Speaker was carrying out his duties for the nation. Visitors to the Parliament of the oldest democracy in the world must be treated in accordance with their status.

Mr Bercow has been elected as MP of my Buckinghamshire constituency five times, and he is held in very high esteem by many of his constituents. He is recognised as an excellent MP and a very talented Speaker.

Charles Strickland
Wing, Bedfordshire

Longer Sunday hours spread spending thinner

SIR – Before the late Eighties, pubs in England opened at lunch time on Sundays, from noon until 2pm. Customers would line up outside the pubs, awaiting the noon opening time, and they would spend whatever they had earmarked for that outing. At 2pm they all went home for a hearty Sunday lunch with the family.

When closing time was moved to 3pm, customers stopped lining up outside before opening time. They came later and still spent whatever they had earmarked for the occasion.

When people go to shops or pubs, they set aside a certain amount that they are willing to spend. So, from a retailer’s point of view, opening for longer does not reap more profit. In fact, it costs the business more.

It would be better to reduce opening hours for most retailers on Sundays so that people can get back to enjoying some sort of family life – for example, over a Sunday lunch.

George Hobart
Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire

It’s worth a risky restoration to revive St John

Brushing up: restoration of Leonardo da Vinci’s 'The Last Supper’ in Milan in 1998

SIR – You report on the current restoration by the Louvre of Leonardo da Vinci’s St John the Baptist. Professor Carlo Pedretti states that he is “against the restoration in principle” and says that “it wouldn’t take much to destroy St John”.

Restoration is not necessarily harmful. It is how it is approached and carried out that is critical to the success of the treatment. In the case of this painting, centuries of dirt, yellowed varnish and retouching have obscured the legibility of the painting. While it is not possible to restore a painting to its original 16th-century appearance, restoration can bring us closer to the painter’s intention.

In Britain, restoration is underpinned by professional standards, judgment, ethics and a code of conduct. Accredited conservator-restorers understand that the restoration of complex objects must be preceded by thorough technical examination and assessment of all of the risks. This is normally a collaborative effort between conservators, scientists and curators.

No one would claim that restoration is without risk. Leonardo is notorious for having used his own recipes for media and pigments, which have in many cases deteriorated so severely over the centuries that in spite of, and sometimes because of, frequent restoration the images have become unintelligible – most notably in the case of The Last Supper.

However, without intervention of some kind, these images may be lost altogether to future generations.

Alison Richmond
Chief Executive, Institute of Conservation
London SE1

On guard

SIR – Len Denton asks when the Army relaxed its stance regarding live ammunition and suggests that such ammunition was not provided at British Army camps during the IRA emergency.

I did my national service in the Royal Signals in the Fifties. While posted to the Royal Armoured Corps Bovington camp in Dorset, as attached personnel we were required to do regular guard duty, carrying armed rifles with live ammunition. This was signed in and out at the start and end of the guard duty shift.

Jack Knights
Northampton

SIR – In 1956, I was from time to time guard commander at the depot of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment.

On attack by the IRA, the guard commander was to send a runner to the officers’ mess to rouse the duty officer from sleep. He would then make haste to the guard room with the key to the wall cabinet, which contained a Sten gun, an unloaded magazine and a box of ammunition. Someone would load the magazine and we would then be ready to repel the IRA.

Julian H Bates
Burnham Market, Norfolk

Super Weston

SIR – I wish to express my annoyance at the continual appraisal of Weston-super-Mare, where I have lived for the past 18 years, as downmarket.

In his review of Il Michelangelo Keith Miller says the restaurant “huddles on Weston’s windblown promenade”. In fact it has a prominent corner position overlooking Knightstone Island and Weston Bay, with views across to the Quantocks and Exmoor. The sunsets are magnificent – sitting on the terrace with a glass of wine on a summer’s evening, you could indeed imagine yourself looking across to the isles of Greece.

I am glad Mr Miller liked the food, though.

Maureen Bezzant
Weston-super-Mare, Somerset