30 MAY 1981, Page 20

Pay before prestige

Sir: I truly do not want journalists to be fawned on by politicians (vide Paul Johnson's column last week) in the American manner. The thought that Mrs Thatcher might call on me for dinner as President Kennedy did on Joe Alsop, or Presidentelect Reagan on George Will, does not appeal. Nor do I particularly want her to invite me to Downing Street, which may be just as well, since there appears to be no prospect of such an invitation. (I bet Paul gets them all the time, as do most journalists who support her cause.) But I would not mind earning the kind of salaries enjoyed by American columnists. It is not their social prestige that I envy so much as their bank balances.

Peregrine Worsthorne

Sunday Telegraph, 135 Fleet Street, London EC4