There are many mysteries surrounding the CIA’s burglar-in-chief, James McCord, as his obituary suggests (6 May). In a press release put out by McCord, he wrote that “in the late 1960s he cooperated overseas with British intelligence officials on a highly secret operation involving the security of the British government”. Does anyone know what that might be?
Dr Stephen Dorril
Netherthong, West Yorkshire
• No – many miles of Cornish hedges have not already “vanished” or been “lost” (Call to protect Cornwall’s distinctive hedges from developers, 6 May). They’ve been destroyed. It’s high time we started using plain English to state facts.
Maggie Moss
Bristol
• Can you please stop putting spice into almost every vegan recipe? In Feast (4 May), all the vegan recipes contain chilli. Spicy food is not to everyone’s taste. You appear to be pandering to the misguided notion that vegan food has to contain spices to be interesting.
Joanna Griffiths
Wallington, Surrey
• Welcome though the your report on parental resistance to the takeover of schools by academies was (6 May), it’s disappointing that it referred to schools being taken “out of local authority control”. It’s a long time since councils controlled schools.
Jeremy Beecham
Labour, House of Lords
• At a relative’s cremation service, one of the musical offerings was a medley of piano pieces (Letters, 8 May). I can’t have been the only person to notice that one of the items was Smoke Gets in Your Eyes. I had difficulty keeping a straight face.
Christine Shuttleworth
London
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