The people using Remembrance Day as an excuse to criticise Jeremy Corbyn are a disgrace

Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

Jeremy Corbyn has come under criticism from some deluded souls who are arguing that the poppy he wore at the Remembrance Day ceremony was “too small”.

What is in fact “too small” are the tiny, withered brains of the petty fools attacking him.

These grubby “patriotic” poppy-worshippers would have attacked Corbyn if he had worn a poppy the size of a dustbin lid on his lapel.

I suspect that the same people who are outraged over the size of Corbyn’s poppy are also against him because he is resolutely anti-war and, as prime minister, wouldn’t add fresh war graves over which the great and the good can cry crocodile tears and signal their “patriotism” by wearing really big poppies.

Sasha Simic
London N16

So much for Theresa May’s “deep and special” relationship with Europe. Why could she not join Macron, Merkel and others at today’s ceremony in Paris? Because she, in her heart of hearts, now knows that the UK is a snivelling, child-like backwater?

Rachel Greenwood
Worcestershire

If anything sums up the utter absurdity Remembrance Sunday has come to, and a metaphor for contemporary Britain, it’s the irony of requiring a Peace Pledge Union’s white poppy just to be able to wear the armed services charities’ red one.

Furthermore, the old built-in pin was scrapped due to a preposterous health and safety diktat, the replacement feeble green plastic stem and optional pin combo results in thousands who buy the wretched things annually losing them within minutes.

The only way I have found of keeping one in place throughout poppy week is entwining the white poppy’s tougher metal stem around or threaded through the red one. It also has the advantage of ensuring I am never bothered by virtue signalling poppy puritans from either side.

Mark Boyle
Renfrewshire

Will we ever learn from the past?

How lovely it was to see the obvious warmth and affection between Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel displayed during their meeting this remembrance weekend. What a contrast to the appalling behaviour of Donald Trump, who couldn’t bring himself to get wet visiting an American war cemetery and appeared the embodiment of ill-will throughout his visit to France.

“Arrogance and hatred are the wares
Peddled in the thoroughfares.”

WB Yeats wrote those words in 1919. This weekend marked also the 80th anniversary of Kristallnacht, or Night of the Broken Glass, during which thousands upon thousands of Jews were subject to terror and violence by the Nazis. We need to remember where arrogance, hatred of “the other” and a warped sense of nationalism led in 1939.

Sue Breadner
Isle of Man

Brexit will be a disaster for the AI sector

With Brexit we can expect that Britain will be excluded from European funding for Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the defence sector.

The UK will see a fall in prestige in its AI sector due to the curtailment of funding from Europe, either directly or through commercial spin-offs. These spin-offs tend to be the bread and butter that make up the commercial applications for fourth industrial revolution infrastructure, including AI developments for transport. It is not sufficient only to have educated people in the country, AI development takes lots of money and collaboration.

Right now the UK has an excellent position in this field which could rapidly erode due to restricted integration with European research partners in this field post-Brexit. The impact on AI by Brexit must not be underestimated.

Amali De Silva-Mitchell
Berkshire

Let’s be realistic about the risks of leaving the EU

Although I laud The Independent for elucidating the challenges that could ensue from exiting the European Union, I found the furore about the possibility of medicine shortages a bit exaggerated.

The UK and the EU pride themselves on championing health and making access to healthcare services and medications not only a fundamental human right but a central plank of their Millennium Development Goals. I am afraid citizens are still being used by politicians as a bargaining chip in these seemingly endless Brexit negotiations.

Munjed Farid Al Qutob
London NW2

Can the Lib Dems give us a Final Say?

It is quite clear Corbyn will not allow a people’s vote. There is no time to form a new pro-Final Say party so it seems the only way forward is for the supporting MPs from both sides of the house to join the Liberal Democrats. This would give them an “off the shelf” organisation if an election becomes a reality and a framework for organised action to secure a people’s vote, and a party those who did not choose Brexit can vote for.

The question is whether those MPs and the Liberal Democrats can temporarily put aside their other differences in the interests of the country. That would immediately remove the power of the DUP and the ERG and Jeremy Corbyn, who are the arch enemies of a people’s vote. If not, then I am afraid the revolution will fade away like before as the rebels toe the line, putting self and party above the country.

Philip Wheeler
Address supplied