2 MAY 1998, Page 27

Bon mot

Sir: I don't take The Spectator regularly, but faced with a long train journey the other day I bought your edition of 18 April. Is it obligatory for your contributors to use the phrase bien pensant in their articles? Three of them did so, one, Anthony Daniels (`The Third World in Britain'), three times in one article. It seems to have a very specialised use in Spectator-speak: left-wing, disagrees with me'. It's becoming a cliché; jump on it, editor.

Terence Denman

3 Worcester Gardens, London SW11