Ringing the changes

WATCHING Labour MP Stephen Pound shedding a tear on TV after the final chimes of Big Ben for four years almost made me weep, too.

Big Ben is a bell in a clock tower, not a terror victim, a family surviving on handouts or a child exploited by a grooming gang. Their outrage over Big Ben shows our MP are out- oftouch with the rest of us.

A. JONES, Oldham, Lancs. WHY all the fuss over Big Ben when Londoners are the only people who hear it regularly? For the rest of us, it is just the bongs before the news. Believe it or not, there is a little bit of the UK attached to the capital.

ANN RUDD, Northwich, Cheshire. SPEAKER John Bercow’s influence over the silencing of Big Ben may have earned him the only award he is likely to win — the no-bell prize.

HOWARD RICHARDS, London NW1.