Last year, we replaced our old petrol car with an electric one (Lemon juice, legumes and local activism: what green habits have you adopted in 2020?, 11 October). We decided to stop flying, use the car locally and take trains for holidays. Then Covid – no more train journeys. So we find ourselves doing much longer trips by car, which is proving difficult with the lack of charging points, especially on motorways. There have been long stretches of the M5 and M40 where none of the chargers have been working. The infrastructure for charging needs urgent attention.
Amanda Wearing
Birmingham
• Robert Bracegirdle (Letters, 11 October) may like to reflect on the 40s and 50s and recall whether friends were allowed to embrace when meeting. Missing physical contact is not being soft, nor is it about values. It’s a basic human need that too many of us have been deprived of for months. “You don’t know you’re born” misses this point.
Diane Veale
Nottingham
• My granddaughter celebrated her ninth birthday recently at school and when I asked her if her class sang Happy Birthday, she said that they didn’t because of the fear of spitting. They hummed it instead, she said.
Kathrine Pattrick
Woodford Green, London
• Wednesday’s paper suffered from a proliferation of mildly funny puns about tiers/tears – John Crace, Letters, Marina Hyde (twice!). May I suggest that if you have plans for any more, you shed them now?
Lewis Rudd
Twyford, Hampshire
• Tiers for Fears?
Michael Heaton
Warminster, Wiltshire
