LETTER: Chablis socialists who are forced to choose between head and heart

From Ms Isobel Shepherdson

Sir: It seems that Harriet Harman's decision about the school her son is to attend might well damage the new Labour Party's election prospects and who knows what else beside?

The saddest thing of all is that it may well be a bad decision for her son. There is plenty of evidence that bright pupils do as well in comprehensive schools as they do in selective schools. They gain so much, in addition, in social competences, that selective schools begin to look somewhat deprived and limited environments for bright, independent-minded boys, or girls, to spend formative years.

Yours faithfully,

Isobel Shepherdson

York

22 January