Your leading article (20 June) urging the establishment of more formal arrangements for the papers and documents of public figures fails to mention the most glaring anomaly of all – the Royal Archives. Sustained by public money, they act as a hermetic private body, imposing stringent controls on access and frustrating legitimate historical research. They constitute a royal pocket borough at the heart of our supposed democracy, and they should be incorporated into the National Archives at once.
Dr Piers Brendon
Cambridge
• Your taste test (G2, 18 June) praises Sainsbury’s beefburgers for being flavoured with rosemary extract. Would that be the same rosemary extract that is described in your food industry report (Strange fruit, Weekend, 21 February) as being a “clean-label” substitute for antioxidants such as butylhydroxyanisole (BHA) and butylhydroxytoluene (BHT)?
David Gibson
Leeds
• As Peter Bottomley wishes trade unionists to nominate the party they wish to contribute their political levy to (Letters, 22 June), does he accept that this should also apply to shareholders of companies making political donations? If not, why not?
Stuart Watts
Baildon, West Yorkshire
• Speaking of Waterloo, Ian Jack (20 June) says news of Napoleon’s defeat took three days to reach London because, at the time, “news travelled no faster than the quickest horse or the swiftest boat”. On the contrary, legend has it that Baron Rothschild received the result a full day ahead by carrier pigeon.
Abraham Langdon
Kilbride, County Wicklow, Ireland
• If Jeremy Corbyn cycled competitively he’d have been a “veteran” for a quarter of a century by now (Letters, 18 June).
Bill Hawkes
Canterbury
• Your history of blacking up (When black is white, G2, 22 June) missed the “World’s Greatest Entertainer”, Al Jolson.
Nick Ling
Malvern, Worcestershire
