Paul Plummer claims rail passengers have rated the UK’s railway the best major network in the EU (Letters, 3 August). To be able to make this judgment with any conviction a person would need to have extensive experience of, say, six to eight European rail networks. How many people have this?
Michael Cunningham
Wolverhampton
• I have been enjoying Maskerade’s bank holiday crossword over the last few days (Letters, 29 August). I may have to declare it a draw when it’s time to put the recycling out, though.
Jem Whiteley
Oxford
• Four friends (in our 80s) are tut-tutting by email to each other across the country nowadays about obscure or suspect quick crossword clues. One among us (not I!) says she finds the cryptic easier to finish.
Betty Clarke
Malvern, Worcestershire
• Regarding Thomas Hobbes’ view of human life (Letters, 1 September), a Ugandan colleague at Makerere University in the 1960s told me that, in their political science lectures, they had always understood the quotation to be “nasty, British and short”.
Ron Clarke
Malvern, Worcestershire
• The Electoral Reform Society makes nine recommendations on how to run a referendum (Report, 1 September). Only one is needed. To paraphrase Mr Punch: “To prime ministers about to hold a referendum. Don’t.”
Michael Hudson
Lincoln
• “Whitehall divisions emerge as civil servants draw up Brexit scenarios” (Report, 31 August). Surely meeting at Chequers it will be black and white.
Harold Mozley
York
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