Only pubs can save the British high street now

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Pubs are breathing a sigh of relief that Dry January has come to an end (“Expert warns of major mistake people make at end of Dry January”, Sunday 2 February).

Now we must protect our pubs. That means recognising them for the true public goods that they are, especially in the age of online commerce, automation and globalisation.

While sales were down on the high street compared to last year, pubs saw a 2.7 per cent increase, proving their worth in the revival of our towns and cities. That’s despite the well known but contested shift towards living and spending online, which is hollowing out the social fabric of our towns, cities and the public realm at large.

Pubs have faced years of neglect under previous governments, which failed to properly protect vital community assets.

We must have bold, new thinking about what kind of society we want to build. Is it one that prioritises efficiency and profit – or one that values creativity, knowledge and community?

Noah Law

St Austell, Cornwall

After tariffs, Trump will see the light on free trade

What on earth does Donald Trump hope to gain with this stunt around tariffs? (“Trump’s tariffs may be isolating and weakening America more than he realises”, Monday 3 February).

When Britain introduced the concept of free trade in the mid-19th century, it represented a paradigm shift away from the “beggar my neighbour” approach that nations had previously adopted.

Obviously, there have been hiccups – but the liberalisation of world trade has continued to be a principal aim of all state persons of goodwill ever since.

Can we hope that the US president can be persuaded to think again?

Andrew McLuskey

Ashford, Middlesex

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Trump’s threats to impose tariffs are just an opening gambit in his favourite bargaining activity. As we know, he likes nothing more than doing a deal.

Perhaps the rest of the world should play the same game and decline to do any business with the US until its president either sees sense and behaves like a more normal politician, or is replaced.

Susan Alexander

Frampton Cotterell, Gloucestershire

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The international response required to Trump’s trade tariffs is axiomatic.

By imposing trade tariffs on the US at 25 per cent immediately, All nations trading with the US will strain the American economy far more rapidly than any retrospective reaction to trade tariffs imposed on them by Trump.

Proactivity will win out. Striking the first blow is key.

Keith Jago

Brighton

EU the hell does Starmer think he is?

If Keir Starmer can manage to “ride two horses” during the trade wars, I would go along with that (“Starmer walks Trump tightrope between Europe and US as tariff war sparks market turmoil”, Monday 3 February).

However, his red lines on closer ties with the EU don’t fill me with confidence.

I was hoping that at least there could be some movement on youth mobility – but my hopes were dashed when Yvette Cooper ruled this out, on the grounds that it would increase net migration. So, yet another example of Labour pandering to right-wing Brexiteers.

In addition, I am appalled by the ditching of green policies with the go-ahead given to Heathrow expansion and the likelihood of approval for more North Sea oil extraction.

I’m sure that I’m not the only long-term Labour member having misgivings about the direction of travel.

David Felton

Crewe, Cheshire

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Starmer has been vocal about the nimbys (correct spelling is actually “nimbies”) who do not want renewable energy projects, giant pylons, overhead lines or substations in their local area (“PM vows to curb ‘nimby’ court battles over major projects”, Thursday 23 January).

Yet, it would appear Starmer is the greatest nimby of them all.

Dumping such junk in our countryside, in the name of net zero, comes at a price – and that price is the offshoring of our industrial carbon emissions.

The turbines, the pylons and the lithium batteries don’t come from countries where industry is magically carbon-free. The UK does not source the materials required for renewable energy from within these shores.

Instead, these resources come from countries where unethical and exploitative practices often take place. China, mainly – which has the greatest consumption emissions in the world.

If you add a country’s offshoring of emissions (otherwise known as “territory emissions”) to its consumption emissions (the ones it produces within its borders), the UK remains pretty productive in CO2.

Starmer’s idea of net zero is a fantasy – and he is an old-fashioned, self-righteous and hypocritical colonial.

Denise Davis

Kiltarlity, Inverness-shire

Far rights and wrongs

In her recent letter (Letters: “Helping the far right push their agenda”, Friday 3 January), Sasha Simic emphasises that a Home Office report in 2020 concluded “the majority of child sexual abuse gangs in the UK [that year] were made up of white men under the age of 30”. Hardly surprising, given the following year’s census reported the white population as being 81 per cent of the total, and the Asian population at 9.3 per cent.

We seem, rightly, exercised by the identity of rioters at Southport being mostly far-right white British. Why can we not also accept the reality of the overwhelming demographic of the grooming gangs?

Edward Thomas

Eastbourne, East Sussex

Hand clap for Corbyn

It was startling to read Sean O’Grady swallowing his gall and credit Jeremy Corbyn with prescience over the sale of our NHS to overseas private companies (“If Britain is to avoid Trump’s tariffs, the NHS may have to pay the price”, Monday 3 February).

At the time, Corbyn’s Brexit policy was sneered at by all and sundry, including Starmer. He wanted us to have a vote on whether to remain in the EU – a “final say” referendum – and if not, the option of staying in the customs union and single market.

Now where have I heard discussed recently? Oh yes – right here and now, in the UK.

As we face the disaster of being out of the EU while Trump rages manically around the globe in search of even more enemies, how far-sighted Corbyn was.

Dr Jennifer Poole

Romsey, Hampshire

Could you pre-loved?

Talia Roderick raves about Vinted as an online shop “for secondhand items, mainly clothing and accessories but also homewares” (“Declutter, make money… but beware of ghosting”, Sunday 2 February).

In her piece, she namechecks a few other sites, including eBay – but fails to make any mention of charities, which are delighted to receive your unwanted items to raise money to support the most disadvantaged and vulnerable members of our society through their online shops.

The Oxfam Online shop, as an example, not only lists huge quantities of clothing, accessories and homewares – but also sells vast numbers of books, toys, records, cameras and memorabilia.

Richard Roberts

Lincoln

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