Bring back Major
From Mr Stanley Best Sir: Returning home yesterday just on 5 p.m. to a village in north Devon. I found in the letterbox a letter from the local authority which had been delivered, as I know, after 12 noon that day, warning me (as other residents, no doubt) that a funeral pyre for burning animal carcasses would be lit at 4 p.m. near the centre of the village. Villagers, particularly those who suffer from respiratory difficulty, were told that they should find somewhere else to live for the next four or five days because of the 'high level of irritants' which the burning would produce. Having had pneumonia three times and pleurisy twice, presumably I am one such.
My sympathy throughout the foot-andmouth epidemic has been and remains with the farmers, their families and employees, who have had, and are still having, a dreadful time. In that, I am no different from all others here and elsewhere in Devon, but now my sympathy must also be extended to the poor, the old and the infirm. Where are they to find the money to pay for nearly a week in a hotel? And how are they to remove themselves from the village at four hours' notice, or, in my case — having left home to go to Exeter at 12 noon yesterday — no notice at all?
I have no political-party allegiance but I believe that Bruce Anderson (Politics, 28 April) is partly right. What the country needs is a national government led by John Major. This would help to bring together town and country, which New Labour has cynically sought to divide. Those who can influence Mr Major to stand should do so. His qualities are needed by the country.
Stanley Best
Chairman, British Legal Association, Swansea, Wales
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