It seems apt that Catherine Bennett should use the phrase "homeopathic-style schools dedicated to pig ignorance" ("Since when was giving people a choice a good idea?", Comment), thereby demonstrating her own pig ignorance of a centuries-old, tried, tested system of medicine.

She joins the ranks of the bigoted, unqualified commentators who have recently mounted a concerted attack on a therapy they know nothing about and which the public is choosing because it works. The fact that the current government has seen fit sensibly to allow patient choice of a treatment they wish to use has spiked the guns of the ignorant and allowed the dedicated staff of the NHS homeopathic service to continue helping patients with an effective, low-cost treatment from which all would benefit.

Just to put the record straight, there are no homeopathic training courses of less than three years which are recognised by responsible professional registering bodies and the courses which are operating often recruit students who already possess a first degree in a scientific discipline.

Ian Hamilton

Editor, the Homeopath

Dunkeld

Perthshire

Unfair about Italy

John Hooper's thinly disguised attack on Silvio Berlusconi needs addressing ("Alcohol-fuelled parties threaten to end peace of Italian beach resorts", News). As a hotel and cafe owner of many years standing in San Remo, I can say that all Italian establishments are allowed to serve alcohol during the day and night to our customers, who, in general, are responsible drinkers, like most people from the Med. Hooper's bizarre claim that all hell will break loose at Italian coastal resorts and mayhem will follow on the roads seems an extreme conclusion to draw. On the busiest Sunday of the Italian holiday season, 15 million Italians drove with no fatalities to beach destinations. The "new liberalisation" of laws is merely a tinkering with what was already in place and it is disappointing that this scaremongering article might put off UK customers from holidaying in the hospitable, captivating country that Italy is.

Peter Riley

San Remo

Italy

Prison hastens death for poor

There is no doubt that close confinement in prisons with little exercise, fresh air or fresh food and high levels of violence and stress shortens lives, and contributes to self-injury and suicide ("Poor food and stress 'lead to rising deaths in jails'", News). But we are using prison as the dumping ground for the mentally ill, poor and dispossessed. People arrive in prison having a history of poor mental and physical health. Rather than treating their problems sensibly, we are using prison to sweep them away from public view, thus shortening their already troubled lives. Prison is an expensive way of hastening the death of poor people.

Frances Crook

Director, the Howard League for Penal Reform, London N1

Staggering overstatement

While the fact that 264,000 households are made up of people who have never had a job, this does not justify employment minister Chris Grayling's description of "staggering" (Briefing). It represents less than 1% of all households, and almost 200,000 of them consist of just one person.

Harvey Cole

Winchester

Oxbridge was right for me

I've got blue hair and a nose ring, my surname isn't triple-barrelled, Daddy didn't buy me a polo team for my last birthday and I've just finished my first year at Cambridge. It therefore saddens me that the deterrent stereotypes about who can and cannot get into the top two universities in Britain are proving tenacious ("Is Oxbridge right for the likes of me?" Comment).

Having gone to a vocationally focused comprehensive I could easily have regarded Oxbridge as a dream worth forgetting. At times, I've struggled with feelings of inadequacy, but categorically never because of my fiscal or social status.

If an equal and unbiased education system is desired, then a radical reform is in order and not the proposed laissez-faire approach with "Free Schools" which will undoubtedly lead to the undoing of any progress made and a further distancing of higher education from those that would benefit from it most.

My college, Emmanuel, topped the Tompkins table again this year with one in three students getting a first; nearly two out of three students there are from state schools. I rest my case.

Alice Martin

Cambridge

Curtains for my film dream

According to the producer who optioned my novel Antwerp, the UK Film Council was interested in funding its adaptation ("Hunt hits back at protests by film actors", News). Now that won't happen. Of course, it may never have reached the screen, but I could dream. Now I can't even dream. Thanks, Jeremy Hunt.

Nicholas Royle

Manchester