Letters: The real value of independent schools

Strength of service

Sir: Matthew Lynn and Steven Bailey (Letters, 1 February) are quite wrong to deplore the decline of Britain as a manufacturing nation. Manufacturing – especially of the heavy sort – is best suited to a country with plenty of space, little regulation, cheap energy and cheap non-unionised labour.

That was once the case for Britain but it is no longer; nor is it so for the majority of European countries. Germany epitomises the folly of mindlessly adhering to manufacturing, as is well explained in Wolfgang Munchau’s excellent book Kaput. Britain, on the other hand, has successfully diversified into services and is now the world’s second-largest exporter of this income earner. It is easy to be seduced by a nice shiny new Mercedes while wondering what a put option looks like and arguing that only making things constitutes ‘real work’, but it is also wrong. It is the same mentality that imagines that investing in property is a sure winner, whereas shares are risky things and best avoided.

A country is best off looking to the future and playing to its strengths, not indulging in nostalgia for old times.

John Murray

Guildford

Independent advantages

Sir: I read Katharine Birbalsingh’s article (‘Second class’, 8 February) with interest, agreeing with many of her points. However, the comparison she makes between her school and Eton College reflects so much about what is wrong in our modern education system: namely, concentrating on exam attainment rather than championing pupil achievement across all disciplines, which is the very core of independent education. Yes, she can be enormously proud of her school’s GCSE results, but she seems unwilling to acknowledge the incalculable extra benefits that schools in the independent sector offer their pupils. It is there that the real value lies. Parents pay the huge fees because they know their chosen school will provide so much more than just good grades, important though these are. The public debate with the Education Secretary which she requests would, I am sure, be enlightening.

David Edwards

Norton-sub-Hamdon, Somerset

Bad savings

Sir: As Douglas Murray predicted (‘America has seen sense on aid. When will we?’, 8 February), I have reached for my letterhead to praise his thoughtful critique, parts of which I fully accept. David Cameron and I made clear on day one in 2010 that no more money should go to China or Bolivia. It was a surprise to discover when I returned as a minister to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office in 2022 that these instructions had been ignored. He is also right to question spending like the ‘prosperity fund’ sanctioned by the Foreign Office. Its links to poverty alleviation are tenuous at best.

Every penny of Britain’s international development budget should be spent in the national interest. But I hope Mr Murray might agree that the national interest is entwined with the world beyond our borders. Fragile countries, which are the poorest countries, export migrants and dangerous ideologies to our doors. International development is the recognition that tackling conflict and building prosperity abroad make us safer and more prosperous at home.

Mr Murray suggests the UK should take a leaf out of Trump’s destruction of USAID. But Boris Johnson got there first – back in 2020 – when he vaporised DfID. That has turned out to be a disaster. Expertise lost and with it, Britain’s reputation and goodwill, leaving our credibility in tatters. Life-saving programmes (which Britons tend strongly to support) stopped in their tracks, making no financial sense. It is the epitome of ‘bad value for money’ and the opposite of the national interest. DfID transformed Britain’s place in the world and made Britain better for it. One day we might realise what we have lost.

The Rt Hon. Andrew Mitchell

House of Commons, London SW1

Folk export

Sir: Douglas Murray reminds us of the futility of American ‘educators’ being paid to introduce Afghan women to conceptual art, including the Marcel Duchamp urinal. Back in 1972 I had lunch with my now late godfather, the distinguished judge Sir Dermot Sheridan, in the Mombasa Club. His new wife Marion, an English repertory actress, confessed that after spending a couple of quiet summers treading the boards, she had accepted a posting to Kenya advertised by the Colonial Office with the brief: ‘To teach the natives Morris dancing.’ 

Nick Crean

Marlborough, Wilts

Far-left Nazism

Sir: Lisa Haseldine finds it ‘bizarre’ that Alice Weidel should claim Hitler was the opposite of right-wing (‘Sour Krauts’, 8 February). Nazism was rooted in the French Revolution; it was a centralised, anti-ecclesiastical and anti-monarchical system, with egalitarian, conformist and uniform tendencies. It vilified unpopular minorities, emphasised mass mobilisation and sought to eradicate the old forms of society. There is merit in the assertion that Nazism was a far-left identitarian totalitarian movement.

Barrie Mitelman

Westcliff, Essex

Don’t update

Sir: Lionel Shriver reports on her frustration at the robotic ‘improvements’ on her computer (‘I’ve been assaulted by AI’, 8 February). One way of avoiding these is to refuse updates. I’ve been using Word for ever and I still have just the bog standard version. Over the years I’ve tried to update my laptop, but the task required clickery beyond my comprehension. Ironically, this has left me with a system I can still use.

Dick Durham

Leigh-on-Sea, Essex