Apropos recent letters about meetings and their effectiveness (Letters, 18 September), I compiled the following ornithology during a particularly tedious occasion. It suggests various species, frequently observable. They are: the red-necked table-thumper; the incorrigible rambler; the inveterate conclusion-jumper; the dismal doubter; the backward harker; the procedural plodder; the uncontrollable joker; the time-insensitive blatherer. I wonder what further species readers would suggest?
Roy Evans
Harpenden, Hertfordshire
• I was pleased to see Jess Phillips (G2, 13 September) calling for a statue of Mary Wollstonecraft. Local people have been campaigning to have a statue erected at Newington Green where she lived, ran her pioneering school for girls and worshipped at the Unitarian chapel. See www.maryonthegreen.org.
Richard Kirkwood
London
• I worked in the 1970s as a young architect on the Alexandra Road housing scheme that Deborah Orr refers to (A time when social housing was beloved, 16 September). Maybe I’m wearing rose-tinted glasses, but it was such a positive time. Then architects from all over the world came to work for British local authorities like Camden because we were building some of the best and most progressive housing. Today British housing, both social and private is, in general, some of the worst in the world. What has gone wrong since 1979?
Andy Pickering
Swainby, North Yorkshire
• Standardised tests for seven-year-olds could be a useful tool for teachers to assess pupils and plan for their progress, as reading-age tests were. Unfortunately, they have been used to assess the performance of schools regardless of the background of their intake. Good riddance.
Lindy Hardcastle
Groby, Leicestershire
• I rather agree with your correspondents (Letters passim) about modern, pop-song style hymns, but what church repertoire would be complete without Bobby Bare’s Dropkick me Jesus (through the goalposts of life)?
David Ridge
London
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• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters
• The final letter above was amended on 19 September 2017 to correct the spelling of Bobby Bare’s last name.
