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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World

Beware the Great British delusions

Flags are waved during the closing moments of the Last Night of the Proms at the Royal Albert Hall in London.
Flags are waved during the Last Night of the Proms at the Royal Albert Hall in London. Photograph: PA

Singing Rule, Brittania! and brandishing flags at the Proms may be a tasteless bit of musical comedy (‘Rewrite Rule, Britannia!’ What would you do with the Last Night of the Proms?, 10 September) but it is nothing like as dangerously delusional as ministers labelling everything from foodstuffs to railways as Great British. Presumably, this silly designation would be off-limits if Scotland unfortunately went independent?
Geoff Reid
Bradford, West Yorkshire

• If Zoe Williams’s pétanque match left her with a Zen-like calm, she wasn’t playing pétanque (Fit in my 40s: a game of petty and enjoyable malice? Step forward, pétanque, 11 September). For that you need the principles of Boris Johnson and the killer instinct of Captain Ahab.
John Lyon
Cholsey, Oxfordshire

• After Emma Raducanu’s wonderful success at the US Open, we will presumably soon be treated to photos of the bandwagon-hopping Boris Johnson sporting a tennis outfit and racket?
Mike Dunton
Wellington, Somerset

• Frances Ryan’s brilliant description of what really needs to be done to provide decent and comprehensive social care (Boris Johnson has created a ‘social care plan’ without any plan for social care, 7 September) should be essential reading for politicians of all parties. Listen to those who have lived experience.
Elizabeth Jones
Ulverston, Cumbria

• If Jeff Bezos plans to live for ever, or at least decades longer than the rest of us (Jeff Bezos is on a quest for eternal life – back on Earth, we’re searching for Amazon’s taxes, 10 September), perhaps he would be well advised to spend some of his vast wealth on ensuring that he still has somewhere to live when he reaches his advanced years, and I don’t mean a planet in a galaxy far, far away.
Phil Coughlin
Houghton-le-Spring, Tyne and Wear

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