I Spy

Sir: Overt political allegiance and class snobbery may indeed have thwarted Toby Young’s undergraduate ambition to be ‘tapped on the shoulder’ by the security services (No sacred cows, 13 June), but I wonder if he underestimates the importance of persistence.

We were almost exact Oxford contemporaries and ‘out’ right-wingers to boot. During my first term I recall vividly a long conversation into the early hours with a fellow St Edmund Hall freshman, who confided that he had set his heart on joining MI6. He also insisted that one of the fabled dons responsible for recruiting spies was none other than the senior English fellow at our college, who after distinguished service in the second world war was now close to retirement. This was the near legendary Reggie Alton (whose son, I believe, enjoyed a distinguished journalistic career before falling into obscurity as a sports hack).

When a couple of years later, as JCR president, I happened to be sitting next to Reggie on High Table, I plucked up the courage to ask him about his rumoured extra-curricular activity. While neither confirming nor denying his involvement, he gently opined that the security services preferred to take on lower profile undergraduates. If Young is right about the importance attached to social class in recruitment in those days, I suspect my grammar school background might have been the final nail in my coffin.

I rather lost touch with my freshman friend, but over the years occasionally wondered what had become of him. Curiously, even as the age of the internet dawned, there seemed to be no trace of his whereabouts. The mystery was solved on a Foreign Office ministerial trip. Visiting one of our south-east Asian embassies, I was ushered through to receive a highly classified intelligence briefing. Here I was introduced to the Head of Station, who offered me his hand and, with cool James Bond-like understatement, said: ‘Good morning, Minister; I think we may have met before.’

The Rt Hon Mark Field
London SW1

Preach

Sir: Hallelujah for Mary Wakefield’s scornful mockery of bishops and priests who rely on AI for their sermons (‘Save us from the Gospel according to Grok’, 13 June).

Michael Mayne, a great 20th-century Dean of Westminster, used to advise guest preachers at the Abbey: ‘Show a little of your own vulnerability.’ AI would not be much good at that, nor at including humanity, humour or the Holy Spirit in its robotic sermonisings.

I have been preaching in the chapel of HMP Pentonville for the past nine years. I work hard at my sermons, which often share common ground, compassion and even comedy with my congregation of prisoners because I have been where they now are. Sometimes I get heckled but more often I get hugged. I doubt whether an AI sermon would produce any such reactions.

The Revd Jonathan Aitken
Prison Chaplain at HMP Pentonville
London SW5

Happy hour

Sir: Your article by Christopher Howse (‘Raising the bar’, 13 June) reminded me of my time working at the Coach and Horses in 1979. Norman Balon wasn’t the easiest man to work for and one evening, just before he was about to leave at his usual time, he sacked the other barman who was working with me. I told the chap not to go anywhere as Norman would soon realise that would leave me on my own behind the bar. Norman promptly reinstated him.

On another occasion, on cup final Saturday of that year, Norman patrolled the outside of the pub alone, forbidding entry to any football fans who had made their way from Wembley to his pub. I thought this was quite heroic given the level of football hooliganism at the time, and it made me see Norman in a new and more respectful light.

John Bonny
Warwick, Warwickshire

Larkin about

Sir: Pleased as I am at the prospect of a fellow English Literature graduate finally becoming PM (‘A solid 2:1’, 13 June) I must query the idea that Philip Larkin really had an influence on Andy Burnham’s politics. Larkin, to the right of your esteemed editor, was surely (even in the 1990s) not a name to conjure with for those seeking to get ahead in the Labour party.

Ryan Dunne
(MA Hons 2011) Glasgow

Rules out

Sir: Matthew Parris (‘When two-tiering works’, 13 June) doesn’t go far enough. In his last paragraph he rather timidly suggests we don’t write down our procedures. Wise advice, but let’s not be coy about it. This country (like most countries) has too many written procedures, regulations and laws. Too many for anyone to master, too many to understand and often at odds with one another. Let’s have a bonfire, repeal what we don’t really need and keep only the essentials. As a guideline, how about ‘if in doubt, throw it out’, and bring in Marie Kondo as a consultant: Commit, Imagine, Discard, Categorise. Then (in her words): ‘Keep only those items that “spark joy’’.’

Perhaps coincidental was the admirable aim of Hans-Georg Maassen in the very next article; the painful decisions have to be made first. His Abolition Law is precisely what we need in every western democracy.

J. John Dyer
Poole, Dorset

Take a seat

Sir: Rachel Johnson should have accepted with thanks the seat offered to her on the Underground (Best Life, 13 June). I am older than her, quite capable of standing, but always accept a seat if offered to encourage others to follow a well-mannered person’s example.

Mary Moore
Croydon

Frame of mind

Sir: Rod Liddle laments the declining historical knowledge of modern politicians (‘Kemi has given me hope’, 6 June). One can trace the decline through their spectacles.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home and my second cousin Horace Maybray King, Speaker of the House of Commons, both wore the traditional half-moon reading glasses. These were not fashion accessories but practical tools, perched low on the nose to peer over at colleagues who had said something particularly foolish.

Today’s politicians present a different optical landscape. The Prime Minister’s spectacles became briefly newsworthy because someone else apparently bought them for him. Andy Burnham’s increasingly distinctive gig lamps have become as recognisable as any policy he may hold.

Perhaps this is the real story of modern politics. Once, politicians wore spectacles because they spent their lives reading history. Now they wear them because image consultants think that they look prime ministerial.

Ronald Lansdell
St Helier, Jersey