Scottish muddle

Sir: The Scottish Sentencing Council guidelines, introduced last year, affirm research as showing that young people, defined in the guidelines as those up to 25 years of age, ‘are not fully developed and may not have attained full maturity’ (‘Gender wars’, 21 January). As a result they are seen as less able to exercise good judgment; are more vulnerable to external influences; may be less able to assess the implications of their decisions; and may take more risks. However, Scottish people nine years younger than that, faced with the complex experience of perceiving their bodily habitus to be at odds with their sense of their gender, are judged fully ready to make permanent, legally binding, life-altering decisions independent of any external advice or assessment. It seems that maturity in Scotland is less a matter of objective reality and more one of political expediency.

Dr M. Jamieson

Glasgow

Build more grammars

Sir: David Kynaston, reviewing the book A Revolution Betrayed, seems unenthusiastic about grammar schools (Books, 21 January). This attitude is far too prevalent among those fortunate enough to have been educated privately. That includes Kynaston himself, and the leading members of the Conservative party. There were some specific problems with the old system; in particular, borderline cases were not handled well. But the vast majority of pupils were correctly assigned. If the Conservative party wants to build a blue wall, it will have to open new grammar schools there.

Michael Gorman

Guildford, Surrey

Remote learning

Sir: David Kynaston says I am ‘indifferent’ to doing something about the privilege of fee-charging schools. Far from it. But I would oppose a totalitarian state, the only form of government which could or would abolish them. Hence my desire (clearly stated in my book) to see them put gradually out of business – or transformed – in a free society by academically selective grammar schools. In the absence of that, private education will continue as just something against which left-wing people can complain, so as to impress each other with their moral purity. My carefully indexed book does in fact deal with his hackneyed quibbles over the 11-plus exam. And I do not, as he suggests, disapprove of schools mixing children from different backgrounds. I just do not think this can or should be achieved through mixed-ability teaching. I also know very well that the war against academic selection was well under way in local government before 1965, and why. But what is really odd about Professor Kynaston’s review is his belief that an elite based on talent rather than wealth would result in a governing class ‘all head, no heart and contemptuously remote’. He seems to have swallowed Michael Young’s Rise of the Meritocracy whole and never got it out of his system. What we have now, thanks to people such as him, is an elite with neither head nor heart: unimaginably remote and useless as well.

Peter Hitchens

London W8

No monolith

Sir: Melinda Hughes (‘Classic mistake’, 21 January) gave an impression of Radio 3’s output that many would not recognise. On any given day, you can hear whole pieces of classical music delivered – often live – by some of the greatest musicians in the world. Alongside that is discussion and analysis of arts and ideas and other music forms, such as jazz, which have been part of our mix since 1946. We play 17,000 pieces of music in their entirety every year.

Essential Classics is a programme that has been running since September 2011, and which has always presented an intelligent and broad mix of music. It now has less presenter speech than it used to, in response to listener feedback. Like Breakfast, it features shorter pieces which reflects the needs of audiences in the mornings, but these are in no way ‘dumbed down’.

Just yesterday we featured composers such as Wolf, Byrd, Gibbons, Gipps, Mahler and Franck among others. Later in the day we broadcast a complete performance of Schubert’s ‘Trout’ Quintet from Bath, a live performance of Sibelius’s Violin Concerto, a deep-dive into Shostakovich as part of Composer of the Week and Choral Evensong live from Selwyn College, Cambridge. Like every radio network, we offer different ways to listen at various points of the day.

A quick look through a day’s schedule will give you a sense of the quality and breadth of classical music that only Radio 3 offers. No station is a monolith. We continue to listen to our audience and look at ways of engaging new listeners, but dumbing down is simply not what Radio 3 is about.

Alan Davey, Controller of BBC Radio 3

London W1

Ringing the changes

Sir: Westway wasn’t the only section of ‘Ringway 1’ (GLC’s 1960s plan for an orbital motorway within inner London) to be built (Books, 14 January). The northern part of the ‘West Cross Route’ from Westway down to Shepherds Bush was opened at the same time, and the entire ‘East Cross Route’ was constructed as planned from Hackney Wick to Kidbrooke.

Charles Clark

Chislehurst, Kent

Hyperbolic missiles

Sir: While I greatly enjoyed Scarlett Maguire’s essay celebrating darts on TV (Notes On, 21 January), I was sorry that when discussing the commentary of pundits, she omitted to mention one of the most memorable observations of the legendary Sid Waddell: ‘When Alexander the Great was 33, he cried salt tears as there were no more worlds left to conquer… Eric Bristow is only 27!’

Christopher Goulding

Newcastle upon Tyne