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Major’s record
Sir: The rehabilitation of John Major (‘Time for a Major re-think’, 30 January) is long overdue. Although not all of his policies were unqualified successes — his health and education reforms saw the creation of the bureaucracies we so detest — his management of the economy and his dealings with Europe were sound, unspectacular and effective.
Unfortunately, he was brought down by a fledgling alliance of some politicians and the media, which maintained a campaign of systematic vilification of his abilities as a party leader. Many of these critics were on his own side, notably the patrician element, and many of us will not forget that. I also think that the media-political complex formed in that time has now taken on a life of its own, and is now so far removed from the values of ordinary voters that many, like me, have nowhere to place their vote. John Major was certainly the last decent man to be Prime Minister, and he may also be the last to have any meaningful connection with the electorate.
Chris Nancollas
Gloucestershire
Modernising Malaysia
Sir: Rod Liddle’s kind remarks about Malaysia are most welcome (Liddle Britain, 30 January). But may I, as someone married to a Malaysian, set him straight over his less positive — and incorrect — comments? No one refers to non-ethnic Malays as ‘sub-standard’ citizens. They may be denied the extra privileges granted to Malays and other indigenous peoples, but Chinese and Indian parties have been part of the governing co-alition, and represented in the Cabinet, since independence in 1957.
Sadly, Rod’s mention of Islam Hadhari (usually translated as ‘Civilisational Islam’, not ‘Islam Today’) will find little echo in Malaysia now, as the theory, although admirable, was wholly associated with the last, and disastrously ineffectual prime minister Abdullah Badawi. Even then, many were sceptical of its merits. When I asked one former Cabinet minister how this theory of government diverged from previous Muslim thinking, he replied: ‘What’s the difference between a lift and an elevator?’
Sholto Byrnes
London NW1
Those were the days
Sir: Paul Johnson’s piece in The Spectator about Magdalen College of 50 years ago (‘When dons were still happy to be egregious’, 16 January) is a reminder of what a remarkable collection of dons were then there.
‘Tom Brown’ — actually C.E. Stevens — was on my staircase. He sported his oak for his tutorials and when the door was open wafts of port or madeira would float out. He was said on one occasion to have started his lecture on Roman history by asking all the young ladies in his audience to cross their legs and, once they had done that, began, ‘Now that the gates of Hell are closed, I can commence.’
I was lucky enough to have A.J.P. Taylor as a tutor. ‘Why do you hold your lectures in the hall at 9 a.m. in the morning?’ ‘Because if I were to start at 11 a.m., there is no hall large enough in Oxford to hold the audience.’
A.J.P.’s life was full of jealousies: at that time it was Hugh Trevor Roper who had just been appointed the Regius Professor of Modern History at Oxford — ‘a waspish old maid’. Then, of course, there was the great medievalist Bruce MacFarlane, stroking a Siamese cat on his lap as he drew your attention to another manorial roll.
Those were the days.
Lord Baker
London SW1
Tattoo taboos
Sir: Mary Killen missed a trick on the issue of the ‘tramp stamp’ (Dear Mary, 23 January). The term specifically means a tattoo low on a young woman’s back, so positioned as to be visible when she is wearing midriff-baring garb, or to flash in and out of view as she bends down when clad in a regular shirt and low-rider jeans. It is the young woman’s much sexier equivalent of builder’s bum.
Mary’s general remarks about tattoos are, of course, canonical.
Michael Rolfe
Cape Town, South Africa
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